Solar Arc sextiles

[Jim Eshelman]

(March 5, 2012)

Solar Arc directions long ago proved themselves to me, using the 45° aspect series. Unlike Secondary Progressions, I'd never had a sense that Solar Arcs worked for soft aspects.

An example came up this week that I was planning to remark on in passing. Directed Mercury sextiled natal Saturn on Saturday. (When I say "on Saturday," understand that these directions are given up to a 1° orb, which is plus-minus one year, but tend to manifest most at the time they are exact. A 1' orb is traversed in not quite one week.)

I was planning to say, "Well, as expected, nothing came of that."

But I just got off the phone, having learned that a friend's car on which I sometimes rely (and for which I share expenses) died yesterday. Final diagnostics will be in tomorrow, but it's probably dead.

Mercury-Saturn indeed! (Though I'd have expected Saturn to Mercury for this, not Mercury to Saturn.)

[Mike V]

(March 5, 2012)
[...]
Mercury-Saturn indeed! (Though I'd have expected Saturn to Mercury for this, not Mercury to Saturn.)

Please forgive my necromancy with this post. This just strikes me as really interesting...

I have seen not one, not two, but three incidents of deaths of loved ones occur with directed Pluto aspecting natal Venus. (Two of those were multiple-death scenarios, and the third one is still in orb, approaching exact, and so remains to be seen...) If this were transiting Pluto, the symbolism would be obvious and there would be nothing much to remark about it (and I have seen the death of a friend's partner occur under that).

My understanding of directions is that they are treated the same way as progressions - the directed/progressed planet is interpreted as if it were natal, and the natal planet is interpreted as if it were transiting. So these Pluto-Venus directions would be interpreted similarly to Venus transiting natal Pluto.

Which is the opposite of what I would've expected - just like your case. Just interesting to note.

This is assuming I'm correct with this whole flip-the-planets concept.

[Jim Eshelman]

1. Either a Venus-Pluto or Pluto-Venus could have that effect, so this isn't really that decisive.

2. Directions seem clearly to work like transits, i.e., the directed planet impacts the natal planet. I suspect this is because all aspects have equal odds (all planets move at the same speed, which I think may be a factor in why progressions often look like they work the other way).

3. Even though it's easy to find examples where progressions work exactly as you describe (and I've written about that since the 1970s), it's not invariable. I had begun to doubt the model and then, in the last week or two, started to see a subtlety that draws it all together sensibly. It's too early to belabor it - I'll have an articulation of it by the time I write CSA Vol. II - but I thought I'd mention I was softening on that. (And sometimes it's unclear in the first place. When Mercury spent a year squaring natal Moon and I wrote about 1,000 pages of new material almost like a direct stream, was that like "Moon on Mercury" or "Mercury on Moon"?)

[Danica]

My perspective on this is that: the directed/progressed planet is the development-experience-stream of the given Rx planetary-ergie (faculty), while the natal planet is the ergie in a general, more "absolute" sense (it is not static! -- but the dynamism of it refers to the life-long time span/scope, and this in a wholesome-way).

.. So, in practice, it isn't exactly like transits -- it's rather about the dynamics of one's own ergies: the (peculiar harmony of the!) unfolding-in-time, related to these.
(And in experience, when this seems/feels like transits, it is the directed/progressed planet that has the "flavor" of the transiting-faculty, more than the other way around.)

Re what aspects: I've been looking at trines, sextiles and quintiles, in progressions/directions (together with the cnj, oct, sq, opp) --- none of these are to be neglected, on account of the 90* series (oct, squ, opp)!!! --- look at all of them, and take notes of the focalization-period(s), to develop the "feel" how it all practically works ( -- for, it *does* work).

... And: all of these are the more-simple & more easy-to-notice factors, closer-to-surface of perception; beneath this, there's the underlying layer of the dynamics shown by Midpoint configurations -- a directed/progressed planet coming to the exact MP of two natal factors.

[Mike V]

Thank you both for your experiences on this. I continue to watch!