Astro Notes for Pisces Season 2023 (February 18-March 20)
We’ve entered Pisces season, the final season of the astrological year. It’s a time of wrapping things up, bringing things to completion, and letting go into the mystery before a new cycle begins again with the Spring Equinox in March. This year, in addition to the Equinox, March brings several of the most powerful and dramatic transits of the year. In March, everything changes. There is therefore in the air a sense of needing to tie up loose ends and complete lessons so we can be ready for the big changes just around the bend.
Pisces is the final turn of the astrological Wheel of the Year. It represents the last stage of life, or any creative process, when there is a release of attachment to form and a surrender to the mystery. It is less about doing than being. From the perspective of the world of accomplishment, Pisces can seem like a realm of loss. But from the perspective of being, it is where we gain everything.
Pisces is the ocean that dissolves all boundaries that keep us in the illusion of separation. It is the awareness of the consciousness that underlies everyone and everything. As such, Pisces carries the energy of universal compassion. Pisces heals through the recognition that we are all ultimately part of the one reality, the one mystery. We are never alone, never truly separate.
Pisces season this year brings a very special and poignant opportunity to heal our deepest wounds. On March 12, Jupiter is conjunct Chiron in Aries. Chiron is the archetype of the Wounded Healer. The position of Chiron in our chart represents the location of our core wound. We all have one somewhere, it’s part of the cosmic design. Jupiter expands whatever it touches. When Jupiter meets Chiron, our very deepest core wounding will come to the surface – you can count on it.
Yet the magic of Chiron lies in the fact that our core wound is — very precisely — also the location of our deepest healing gift. And while Jupiter may magnify our wound and even blow it up out of all proportion, it is considered the Great Benefic in astrology for a reason. Jupiter’s encounter with Chiron brings with it a tremendous opportunity for healing our core wound and uncovering our deepest healing gift.
Although the Jupiter-Chiron conjunction is exact on March 12, the transit is operative for several weeks on either side of that date. So if you’ve been feeling a lot of emotional vulnerability lately — even to the point of desperation — know that you’re not alone. We’re all being initiated into a deeper level of service than we’ve known before. And the way through is to embrace the place of our deepest shame and inadequacy with as much compassion as we can muster.
But the Jupiter-Chiron conjunction is not the only big event taking place this Pisces season. On March 7, Saturn enters Pisces after being in Aquarius for the last two and a half years. Saturn is the sober taskmaster who assigns us lessons in maturity. Over the last two and a half years, we’ve all been asked to grow up in a particular area of our lives and put things in order there. (The particular area is shown by which house Aquarius falls in in our charts.). These lessons are now drawing to a close. However you did on your ‘exam’, when Saturn moves into Pisces on March 7, you will feel the focus shifting to a different area of life and new life lessons. The next two weeks thus represents a final chance to complete your current lessons and submit to the universe your Saturn in Aquarius ‘assignment’.
On the collective level, Saturn entering Pisces will be felt as a notable shift in the zeitgeist, a fundamentally new phase. Saturn began its journey through Aquarius in March 2020, coinciding with the beginning of lockdowns and the global pandemic. When Saturn moves into Pisces, it will also mark the beginning of a new era. With Saturn in Pisces we will likely be challenged to fully deal with our emotional reality and outgrow our escapist tendencies. There will no doubt be a lot of reckoning with the emotional trauma of the last few years. On the positive side, that process may lead to a collective spiritual maturing that will enable us to move forward more in alignment with reality.
Toward the end of March, Pluto enters Aquarius. Now this is BIG. Pluto has been in Capricorn since 2008. So this represents the beginning of another MAJOR cycle, one that we will be in for the next 20 years (more or less). I’ll have much more to say about this next month. For now I’ll just note that we are all likely sensing this transit subliminally like an approaching earthquake.
Big change is on the way. Big challenges. Big opportunities. Use this next month to deal with any unfinished business from the old cycle and to find support to help heal your core wounds and uncover your deepest gifts. That way the new energies rising in you will meet the new energies rising in our world, and you’ll be able to catch the huge wave of opportunity rolling in.