What made this attempt successful?
Chart 1. Event chart cast for July 31, 2022 at 10:07 am (PST) using Regiomantus house system.
A friend told me recently that she had almost given up on her art this past year. I was shocked. This woman has been a working artist for over thirty years. When I asked her what kept her going, she said that getting an acceptance recently made a huge difference. Deluged by waves of rejection, this acceptance felt like someone throwing her a float. It was like my life depended on it, she said. My artistic life.
Intrigued, I asked whether she had the time that she sent the submission as well as the moment of acceptance. She had both. With her permission, I am excited to explore these charts to learn more about the ineffable magic of timing.
The first thing I look for in a chart are its themes: what is happening at the axes, the cusps, and with the major arrangement of planets?
· In Chart 1, the axes are all mutable. It's a situation that may go back and forth.
· The rulers of the AC/DC and MC/IC are Mercury and Jupiter - communication is highlighted.
· Neptune is conjunct the Descendant - appropriate for an artistic opportunity involving photography
· Chiron is conjunct the 8th house cusp - owwww
· Mars is conjunct the 9th house cusp - effort toward publishing
· The upper hemisphere is favored - outward/social
Next, what stands out?
· Mars, Uranus, North Node stellium in Taurus in the 9th house
· Uranus and North Node in tight conjunction
· Sun and Jupiter in near-perfect fire trine
More to come on these threads. Next, I dig into the significators.
The ascendent is in Virgo, so ruled by Mercury. Mercury is in Leo in the 11th house. Mercury in Leo at 23.45 degrees is peregrine. It is wandering in the eleventh house, searching for connections, for benefactors.
Mercury is separating from an opposition to Saturn. Saturn in Aquarius is strong, though it is retrograde, which can channel a planet’s shadow side. This opposition may have been what my friend experienced as the crushing weight of severe rejection which led to diminishing her confidence.
A Saturn opposition brings up questions of one’s own worthiness. Fittingly, in this chart Saturn rules the 5th house of artistic and creative output. An opposition to Saturn in Aquarius can cut because it puts you in your place. This can be especially challenging when Mercury in Leo craves praise and recognition. It flowers where there is light. It withers where Saturn’s cool grip cinches its lifeblood.
She almost quit, but she didn’t. Mars in Taurus is stubborn and it is stubbornly pursuing its goal to be recognized by the ‘academy.’
By the time she sent the submission, the inner showdown with Saturn had peaked. Mercury is limping away, hurt in the Achilles heel of pride. Is it bad to want to be known? Not innately, but Saturn demands that you earn it. Fortunately, there’s a lovely sextile to Fortuna in Libra coming up soon for Mercury. If not for that saving grace, Mercury would wander through the end of Leo void and sad indeed.
Fortuna in Libra is ruled by Venus in Cancer, who is well-placed in the tenth house of public view. Venus is in an applying sextile to Mars, North Node, and Uranus in Taurus.
Since Venus is in Cancer, it is disposited by the Moon. In this chart, the Moon is in modest, devoted Virgo. The Moon applies by trine to Mars, North Node, and Uranus in Taurus. The Virgo moon is fertile in an earth sign. It is waxing, having just been a new moon in Leo. The Moon carries the light of all things.
Had this been a horary, I would have looked at a few relationships for judgment. This is not a horary chart, though. It is an event chart for when my friend sent her submission, the one which came back as a YES, the yes that she needed to hear. So let’s look at Chart 2 – the acceptance arrives!
Chart 2. The acceptance arrives. Event chart cast for November 18, 2022 at 8:30 am (PST) using Regiomantus house system.
For Chart 2, I have wrapped the arrival chart around the submission chart in a synastry overlay. The first thing I notice is that Saturn and Mercury from Chart 1 are conjunct the cusps of the 3rd and 9th houses of Chart 2. The 9th house rules publishing, the “academy,” and the formal acceptance that the querent needed so badly. The cusp of the 9th house meets her signifier in the arrival chart.
Also to note, Mercury, her signifier, is in an exact sextile to the MC in Chart 1. I had missed this my first time looking at the chart!
Now, that MC in Chart 1 has MARS conjunct it in the synastry overlay. That stubborn Taurus Mars on the 9th cusp pushed through and made it to the top of the chart. Persistent effort won the day.
The Moon in the arrival chart is also in Virgo, having just trined the Mars, North Node, and Uranus stellium in Chart 1.
In the arrival chart, Venus and Mercury conjoin in the early degrees of Sagittarius, a sign of hope and truth. The Sun and Jupiter carry over their lovely trine from Chart 1 into Chart 2, but the flavor is different. In Chart 1, the trine is between Sun in Leo and Jupiter in Aries – fiery, passionate, inflationary. In the arrival chart, the trine is between Sun in Scorpio and Jupiter in Pisces – healing, redemptive, spiritualized energies.
Looking at this, it does not surprise me that the acceptance on November 18th hit like a spiritual balm, a saving grace. The hyperbole of Jupiter is probably embedded in the idea that this acceptance “saved her artistic life.”
Chart 1 holds the promise of a new Moon in Virgo heading into trine with Mars, North Node, and Aquarius in Taurus. This is manifesting energies – spiritual purpose, practical effort, material art. Mars, juiced by Uranus, North Node, and the Moon, climbed to the top of the chart, making her work, the fruits of her labor, visible to the public view.
The acceptance, when it finally arrived, felt like a gift, but it was a gift she gave herself by putting her work out there over and over again. This chart tells me that it was work effort, humility, and perseverance that are her true gifts.