Aspect Map wheel for Solar Fire

[Jim Eshelman]

I just created a new custom wheel for Solar Fire to display a map of a chart's aspects in a way that I used to do for every natal I looked at (and now mostly do in my head). This Aspect Map will help disclose the "wiring diagram" of a natal chart. You can download the file, unzip it, put the one file in the same folder as your other Solar Fire wheel templates, and pull it up for your chart and others. (Though I normally recommend and prefer setting Solar Fire to Display Options to "proportionate houses off," this diagram looks better if you have proportionate houses on.)

Here is the download link: https://1drv.ms/u/s!Ansnmu2xbktam4xeIRy ... w?e=JbTo5X

Here are three examples of the output. The first is my chart. Notice how you can quickly see the three "clumps." Specifically, my Sun stands alone, as a singleton, not connected to the others; my Mercury-Saturn conjunction stands apart from the rest; then the remaining planets are all ultimately interconnected, the the large T-square and a couple of trine-sextile structures forming the main patterns.



The second example (below) is quite different. Everything is ultimately connected to everything else in this chart. Two multi-planet oppositions and two multi-planet squares provide much of the backbone but are hardly the whole picture. I think you can get a better feel of how the various pieces of this person's psyche do or don't fit together, what pathways consciousness follows to move from one set of needs to the other, etc., than looking at a more complex (all the details) chart.



Finally, this is Donald Trump's aspect map. You see the Venus-Saturn alone, acting more or less autonomously from the rest of the chart. The same is nearly true of Mercury-Neptune, which has no connection to the rest of the chart except a wide (thin line) sextile to Pluto. The other parts are all connected, but not smoothly. For example, Mars is barely tied into the rest of the chart - almost works like a lone-wolf with only a wide (thin line) sextile to Sun tying it into the rest. The primary opposition structures (touched by Jupiter) are most of what's left. We could summarize the illustration below (and thus the chart's aspect structure as a whole) with a series of discrete components:

Venus-Neptune
Mercury-Neptune... Pluto
Moon-Sun-Uranus-Jupiter... barely includes Mars

Over the decades, I've found this kind of thinking about a chart enormously valuable.

[SteveS]

Jim wrote:

Over the decades, I've found this kind of thinking about a chart enormously valuable.

Interesting! Tell me specifically how you interpret 'stand alone aspects' with this type view of a natal chart?

[Jim Eshelman]

A couple of ways...

Single planets or single pairs of planets I interpret as in the "Unaspected Planets" thread. (Two planets in isolation like, say, my Mercury-Saturn conjunction tend to have the characteristics of unaspected planets as discussed in that thread.)

However, the main way is that I think of them as different distinct characters inside of a person, each group of planets acting somewhat autonomous compared to the rest. It's not the kind of interpretation you could put i a book and reproduce the paragraph, and the words used to describe it would differ in each situation. It's more like the use of parentheses in a math equation to structure sequence and grouping of individual operations.

For example, Trump's Venus-Saturn conjunction is a stand-alone. In many ways, it's one of his defining aspects: you can tell he's always struggled with issues of love (or its lack) and sufficiency, is compulsive and over-compensating, finds it easier to work than play and most easily slaves his affection and cordiality as a business tool, etc. His Mercury-Neptune square is "a different tool in his toolbox," the manipulator of words etc. His Mars is almost isolated, rising and so terribly powerful in the whole chart but running lose and wild without constraints on it; but this, at least, ties directly (though weakly) to the real core of who he is, the Sun-Moon opposition strongly connected to Uranus.

So... to unwind it the other direction... who he fundamentally is, the real core of his motives and actions is in Moon opposite Sun and Uranus, which expresses as drive, demands for success, narcissism, a kind of genius, needs freedom and to be unchained, has his best effect from startling and shaking things up, needs to go his own way and follow his own path and instincts despite any attempt to control him, being persuaded how special and unique he is. This is most directly served by and naturally uses the rising Mars, which has enough link to his Sun to be ego-supporting but mostly acts like a runaway locomotive. This person we have been describing has two other "modules" that he can use with relative detachment from them, no particular personal identification: his Mercury-Neptune tendency to navigate complexity, keep him something as an enigma, and use whatever words or meaning serve him at the moment; and his Venus-Saturn component that long ago sold out on any actual love in his life and will use the same human-connection behaviors for his practical ends.

Or something like that...

I just ran yours, Steve. You have tightly interwoven aspects that more or less connect everything to everything, so there isn't much "isolation of components" in your character. If we back off to Class 1 aspects only, four pieces stand out which, though a little artificial, at least helps sort out the strongest pieces (Sun-Uranus, Mercury-Pluto, Mars-Jupiter, Moon-Neptune); but the whole is tightly-woven, a single interconnected thread. Even then, we can see groupings that tend to pop to the eye and start to organize thoughts about the chart: the two triangles of Sun-Mars-Jupiter and Moon-Mercury-Neptune-Pluto, which then are interconnected by their interweavings; Uranus coming into Sun-Venus from the side in one bold stroke; the way the rising Jupiter is the main link between the two triangles by its square to Saturn, perhaps showing that it is your practical give-and-take business sensibilities that most ties together your bold, enterprising masculinity (Su-Ma-Ju) and your more introverted puzzle-solving, mystery-chasing idea, inquiring side (Mo-Pl with Me-Ne). Or something like that... The eye makes it more obvious to the brain how the ideas should be grouped and related, bringing the right hemisphere of the brain into play with different information than the factual interpretation pieces of the left hemisphere.

Steve Map.jpg

[Jim Eshelman]

I should add that I've long felt that this would be a remarkable tool to guide long-term insight-based psychotherapy. It allows an easy way to isolate "slices" of the psyche and explore them as discrete "pieces" - easier to grasp and explore because of their partial autonomy within the psyche - and then find their relationship back to each other. Hoping that forum members who have put their own self-dissection openly into discussion, here are four examples that pop out:

Lance first has Mars as a singleton - aspectually unbeholden to anything else in the chart and free to run maverick-like on its own impulses. He then has an interesting interconnected set of Mercury, Venus, Saturn, and Uranus, with Venus-Saturn the strong aspect that binds all of them together: This "unit" can be explored to one's satisfaction on its own. But nothing I've mentioned so far involves the luminaries, and when we peal the five mentioned planets away, we the underlying core: his Moon-Jupiter-Pluto T-square with the opposition trine-sextile into Neptune plus Sun connecting quietly - gaining its access point to the rest of the psyche - through a wide sextile to Jupiter. There is gold to dig through in this layering!

Svshalom Binyamin has Mercury and Venus unaspected as singletons. It's hard to see Mercury really "distant" from the rest of the psyche for a double Virgo, but OTOH that singleton Venus speaks loudly about some of the things Av has most often discussed about himself recently. Unaspected Venus is known to tie people into the arts and make the men remarkably attractive while still leaving Venus seeming disconnected and harder to understand (not always detrimentally), something that has to be wrangled with. - Strip those away and the rest of the chart is two distinct sextile slices (Neptune to Sun-Moon-Pluto and Mars-Uranus to Jupiter-Saturn) bound together by a moderate-orbed, otherwise not overly distinctive Jupiter-Neptune square. Several things spill out of this: the Sun-Moon-Pluto cluster is clearly the core of the identity, the center of who he is (so far as aspects express this), and its one link to the rest of the psyche (to "all the tools in the toolbox") is through sextile to the rising Neptune. And the only thing that binds this large block of his psyche to most of the rest is the Jupiter-Neptune square, a major "space" for his integration. (Notice that this approach doesn't give clear answers so much as engaging, important questions.)

Priorities in James Condor's chart were always easy to see, but perhaps not anywhere near as easy as with the Aspect Map. It has three parts, one of which absorbs the majority of the whole chart. His close Venus-Uranus conjunction stands alone, it's own "thing" in his psyche. He has a wide Sun-Saturn sextile that almost leaves both of them unaspected but gives what I would expect is a 'father complex' of some form to be resolved. Then the rest of the chart, the other six planets, boil down to that tight, background yet dominant Mercury-Jupiter-Neptune conjunction, square Moon exactly on one side and sextile Mars-Pluto on the other: over a dozen aspects in this one amazing aspect bundle. Again, the Aspect Map provides a map for layered self-exploration one slice at a time.

And Jove... well, the Sagittarius dominance was always obvious, but the Aspect Map shows the "wiring diagram" of the psyche in a vivid way. After peeling of Sun and Jupiter (which are easily revealed as unaspected), the Map singles out his two large conjunction bundles as the core of all the action: Mercury-Venus-Uranus and Moon-Saturn-Neptune, each worthy of exploration at length on its own. Then Mars has a wide connection to Moon-Saturn-Neptune, while Pluto has sextiles to both conjunction clumps. (Mars and Pluto are on the outskirts in some ways; in other ways, Pluto is a pivot planet that allows Mercury-Venus-Uranus to communicate with or have some relationship with Moon-Saturn-Neptune. As above, it is an opening of an engaging set of questions more than a terminal list of answers.

[Avshalom Binyamin]

So, basically, I'm a love-obsessed, passionate, analytical loner who finds a sense of connection through fantasy, mysticism, and the arts.

[Jim Eshelman]

So, basically, I'm a love-obsessed, passionate, analytical loner who finds a sense of connection through fantasy, mysticism, and the arts.

You gotta problem with that? <g>

[Avshalom Binyamin]

Less and less with time.

[FlorencedeZ.]

Jim, I'd love to see how you would asses my natal chart if you don't mind,
regards, Flo

[Jim Eshelman]

Jim, I'd love to see how you would asses my natal chart if you don't mind,
regards, Flo

Flo, your chart is quite integrated. Ultimately, everything is connected to everything else by aspect. In no sense is your chart boring, but it's boring in terms of this particular way of looking at it: Everything ties together without the same kind of layering.

But there's a little. That is, your chart organizes into a series of triangles (if you draw out the Aspect Map). Taking your strong Mars-Saturn opposition as the base line, Neptune connects to both of them by trine-sextile. Neptune also sextiles Pluto off to the side, then Pluto trines Saturn (so Saturn-Neptune-Pluto is a second triangle), while squaring Venus. Meanwhile, Sun is sextile both Uranus and Jupiter, the Uranus trines Moon and Jupiter while squaring Mercury... it's all tied together.

Searching for some extra detail to give you from this... the two different triangles spinning off Neptune plus the multiple things converging on Uranus make this Uranus vs. Neptune theme much stronger than is otherwise obvious in your chart. How you juggle candid perception and openness vs. holding tight to your existing reality is a big deal for all of us, but it a particular controlling function on how all the energies move in your life and psyche. While everything is connected, your Neptune is most connected to the Mars-Saturn-Neptune triplet (so Neptune is especially stirred by conflict situations and life-struggle: survival reactivity), but Uranus is most active in the Sun-Moon-Jupiter-Uranus triangle, which includes both luminaries and very positive planet energy: it's more directly tied to who you are.

What conclusion do I take from this? (Well, it's all an on-going self-exploration but, still, some conclusion for now?) It's that the least effective side of you comes out when you find yourself in survival mode, trying to survive a situation or endure or evade a problem. The best and truest side of you comes out when you stare naked truth in the face and find success through ingenuity or surprise, i.e., in totally unexpected places.

[Avshalom Binyamin]

Interestingly, this ties into a realization I had after a breakup a couple years ago: I'm alone, so that I can be creative.

Still, I never saw Pluto per se as such a key to wholeness in my chart.

Pluto is the "out" that gives me time to dedicate to writing, practicing music, etc.--solitude is vital for my integration, and integration is the key to feeling a sense of belonging, whether alone or with people.

So, rather than worrying about whether I have to choose between connection and creativity, I should embrace Pluto, which will lead to more authentic connection--however that looks.

[Jim Eshelman]

Yes. What if that is the actual kernel, and the rest is its unfolding, eh?

[Avshalom Binyamin]

Well, then the very stone that the builders rejected would become the chief cornerstone.

[FlorencedeZ.]

Thank you very much Jim.
May I ask you, which birthtime did you use?
Because imo I don’t have a Neptune sextile Saturn aspect and Sun doesn’t make an aspect with (sextile) Uranus.
I could be totally wrong of course.
Regards, Flo
oct 24 1960, 1.10 PM, The Hague, Netherlands.

[Jim Eshelman]

May I ask you, which birthtime did you use?

1:10 pm, just as you gave below, though the time won't affect the aspects.

Because imo I don’t have a Neptune sextile Saturn aspect and Sun doesn’t make an aspect with (sextile) Uranus.

Saturn at 18°50' is 4°17' from sextile Neptune at 14°23' Libra. Sun at 6°54' Libra is 5°56' from exact sextile to Uranus 0°58' Leo. - These are somewhat wide, but for an aspect map like this you want to make sure all aspects are included, not just the close ones - otherwise, it looks like things are unaspected that have aspects.

[FlorencedeZ.]

Ah, okay, got it. Yes indeed.
Tomorrow I will study what you just wrote carefully.
Thanks again.

[TheScales_BothWays]

How about mine, please? Only if you're free (I see that it's pretty late in California right now).

Thank you very much for the Wheel, Jim. I love how that this wheel just makes the planetary aspects stand out; it helps me to particularly focus on them.
My "wiring diagram" does look a little intricate, especially when you increase aspect orbs up to 7° or 8°, and most planets appear to be aspected by 3 or more other planets. With wider orbs, I see that I have some interesting aspects that I don't usually identify with, like:

Sun trine Moon, 6º00'
Sun sextile Mars, 6º02'
Moon conj. Uranus, 7º00' (Probably too wide)
Mercury square Uranus, 6º36' (Although I suppose this is the "astrologer aspect")
Venus trine Saturn, 5º11'

[Jim Eshelman]

Hey, Scale....

You're right, it's a very integrated chart. It does break into layers, though.

Sun opposite Jupiter squares Neptune, and then only adds Jupiter's trine to Mars. (Su-Ju-Ne + Ma). Let's call this your solar side, your ego expression. It's dramatic, vivid, entertaining, belief-uplifted, energetic.

Drop that out and we have what we might call the lunar side of you. However, an important consideration is that the two connected patterns pivot off Saturn. First, Moon squares your Mercury-Saturn opposition. Then Uranus squares Saturn, Venus squares Pluto, and the two squares trine-sextile other. I suppose you could count the 7°01' Moon-Uranus conjunction and have the whole thing even more integrated, but I find it interesting that there are two parts that Saturn ties together. (There are five important-looking hard aspects in this segment.)

My first impression - I'm not saying this is right, just that it's my first impression - is that this segment shows emotional difficulties you've had to live through (being who you are, where you are). You can break it down aspect by aspect for more info, but the gist is that we have a mind hat has learned to be careful, watch what it says, adapt to the environment carefully (Moon square Mercury-Saturn), the "I'm bright and flexible and you arne't going to easily pin me down by saying I'm a this or a that" Saturn-Uranus, the "gay kid on the block" Venus-Pluto square, and various aspects binding them together - with Saturn as the pivot or binding point, your survival instincts. This seems to encapsulate whatever defense mechanisms you've conjured in two decades.

Meanwhile, the Sun-Jupiter-Neptune + Mars seems to be where you're going, what you're up to, the ship you're going to use to sail out of that port into a future.

That's just off the cuff, of course, any impressions?

[TheScales_BothWays]

Hey, Scales....

Hey Jim...

Sun opposite Jupiter squares Neptune, and then only adds Jupiter's trine to Mars. (Su-Ju-Ne + Ma). Let's call this your solar side, your ego expression. It's dramatic, vivid, entertaining, belief-uplifted, energetic.

Meanwhile, the Sun-Jupiter-Neptune + Mars seems to be where you're going, what you're up to, the ship you're going to use to sail out of that port into a future.

These both are very true. I would like to add Venus from my Sun-Venus semisquare, but I do have plenty of Venus from my Libra Sun.

Drop that out and we have what we might call the lunar side of you. However, an important consideration is that the two connected patterns pivot off Saturn. First, Moon squares your Mercury-Saturn opposition. Then Uranus squares Saturn, Venus squares Pluto, and the two squares trine-sextile other. I suppose you could count the 7°01' Moon-Uranus conjunction and have the whole thing even more integrated, but I find it interesting that there are two parts that Saturn ties together. (There are five important-looking hard aspects in this segment.)

Interesting

the gist is that we have a mind hat has learned to be careful, watch what it says, adapt to the environment carefully

Yeah. I am hesitant to express my direct opinions to people in real life, especially on social issues and social justice. A lot of times, I refrain. I am also, of course, careful not to give too many clues of my sexuality (I do like to give some subtle hints if I'm feeling daring). Calling people out and confronting them is also very hard for me. I am also very nervous and scared when I get confronted.

"I'm bright and flexible and you arne't going to easily pin me down by saying I'm a this or a that"

More like "Yes, I am as such (let's say, gay, or progressive), but I don't want to tell you because I'm afraid, what if you'd persecute me" or "Yes, I am as such, now that you know, please do not persecute me."

I realised I like men when I was 15, which is somewhat late, while I have no issue with it, and I totally accept and embrace my sexuality, I am afraid of facing homophobia powerlessly, and I am pretty much scared off by the vile homophobia that exists online.

[SteveS]

Jim wrote:

The eye makes it more obvious to the brain how the ideas should be grouped and related,

Indeed! I like this different graphic chart representation. Thanks.

[FlorencedeZ.]

What conclusion do I take from this? (Well, it's all an on-going self-exploration but, still, some conclusion for now?) It's that the least effective side of you comes out when you find yourself in survival mode, trying to survive a situation or endure or evade a problem. The best and truest side of you comes out when you stare naked truth in the face and find success through ingenuity or surprise, i.e., in totally unexpected places.

Thank you so much Jim. You really hit the nail on the head with this. In a few sentences my life struggles are outlined and I am really moved by that. Neptune plays up when I am least effective and I am a mess inside.
Successes through ingenuity and/or surprises is what has been happening all along but it always comes at a heavy price so it seems, I have to go through so many difficult barriers, often after the successes.
At work for example my management lets me do all the 'difficult' projects (underpaid) and I deliver them to my own surprise quite well and they walk away with the ideas. Of course this happens a lot to many people but it seems my successes always have these patterns. And if I were to resign I lose the job I love. For years I am trying to solve these barriers and I have no clue how, it just seems the way it is and I live with it, this is in all other areas in my life too. After all my life is good despite the struggles.
Regards,
Flo

[SteveS]

Flo wrote:

I have to go through so many difficult barriers, often after the successes. 
At work for example my management lets me do all the 'difficult' projects (underpaid) and I deliver them to my own surprise quite well and they walk away with the ideas. Of course this happens a lot to many people but it seems my successes always have these patterns. And if I were to resign I lose the job I love. For years I am trying to solve these barriers and I have no clue how, it just seems the way it is and I live with it, this is in all other areas in my life too. After all my life is good despite the struggles.

Flo, I can certainly see your above descriptive words 'it just seems the way it is and I live with it, this is in all other areas in my life too' with your angular Mars- Saturn opposition in your Natal. Ebertin in his book 'Combination of Stellar Influences' says about this combo:

The more energy the more difficulties are overcome, or vice versa. Periods of (very difficult) progress or advancement in life. Will-- directed activity meets complete resistance ( as governed by circumstances)...

And then Ebertin's words for Mars-Saturn-Ascendant influences:

A person whose advancement in life takes place with great difficulty, obstacles or inhibitions caused by other people.

Flo, I commend your working positive attitude for living with this difficult combo with your words:

After all my life is good despite the struggles.

[FlorencedeZ.]

Thank you dear Steve, you are very kind.
Regards,
Flo

[SteveS]

Flo wrote:

Thank you dear Steve, you are very kind.

Thank you Flo for sharing your main life's obstacles which Jim so beautifully explained with his chart tool. It helps us all with understanding the language of planetary symbolism.