OK, I am holidays at present, so here is last years Pluto retrograde post updated…

In my younger less married days I used to love doing the Cleo and Cosmo sex quizzes on the train to work. Learned some interesting things from them too… but obviously that is not for here… I would make sure that I counted the score in my head so no one reading over my shoulder could see my answers and therefore know what I really thought about doing _______, or whether I really would be likely to________ or indeed had done_______ where? Really? There?

Recently I have been having some fun with a series of Outer Planet point scoring quizzes that Donna Cunningham has been running on her Skywriter website. Just like the Cleo & Cosmo sex quizzes I have learned a lot, but this time the things I have learned have been about myself and are therefore possibly more useful in everyday life- or so I would hope.

Obviously I am so much more mature now too, so am going to publish my results for all to see- the results are possibly not as interesting (to some) as the sex quiz stuff, but some things are best left to the imagination.

First up was How Plutonian are you? Being so Piscean, I always knew that I was pretty influenced by Neptune, but the Pluto result blew me away. Using her system (check it out here), my Pluto score was a massive 74 points. Anything over 25pts is seen as being very Plutonian, with association with all the good and bad sides of Pluto and Scorpio  (see Donna’s article for more explanation- Donna is the expert on all things Pluto): power, control, trust, holding on to things & feelings, revenge, obsession, healing, transformation. Looking honestly at myself, I do have to say it is all true- the good & the bad. With most of my Piscean planets in opposition to Pluto & with Pluto sitting right on my Descendant, the struggle with trust & power & control- particularly in relationships has been constant battle.

Anyways, Pluto is now retrograde through until 19 September (or thereabouts). As with all retrograde planets, the retrograde motion makes Pluto act, well, more Plutonian and Plutonian people even more susceptible to Pluto.

As with all retrogrades, the energy is directed inward rather than externally. In Plutos’ case, it acts sort of like a planetary detox where the crap (for want of a better term) in our lives is eliminated (a very Pluto word). This can be emotions we have been holding onto, attitudes or values which should have changed or evolved, vendettas we should have let go of, revenge fantasies we are just waiting for the right moment to act upon (ooops, that’s me!), secrets that you have been keeping under wraps.

For those of you who are strongly influenced by Pluto (see below) or currently experiencing major Pluto transits (especially anyone with the Sun, Moon or ascendant at or around 12-8 Cancer, Capricorn, Libra or Aries), this will be a big thing. Now is the time to get rid of those photos (you know the ones at the back of your drawer of X with Y), or, alternatively do some internal Pluto work on yourself- a physical detox, heavy meditation- anything that is regenerative and gets you back in touch with the innermost core of you. Pluto retrogrades often bring sudden expansion or loss of power, manipulation, obsession and power struggles are the order of the day.

As with all retrograde cycles, the critical points are the station degrees- in this case 11 Capricorn 35’ where he is stationing retrograde and 8 Capricorn 59’ where he will station to turn direct. These are points of pretty huge transformation and metamorphosis if they happen to fall on a sensitive point in your natal chart. I’m not talking orbs here- when it comes to station points I’m talking direct hits. To the degree.

I have a friend who has the Midheaven at 11 Capricorn 25’. That’s close enough for the impact of a Pluto station…

Pluto’s a little like that- because he moves so slowly, the orbs of influence are very narrow. If he turns retrograde even a degree before exacting an aspect, you may get just a passing glance…this time. The thing with Pluto though, is there’ll always be a next time…and usually a next, and a next.

Now, this is the bit where I have to have a good hard talk to some of you guys- Pluto does not necessarily equal bad, so don’t look for negativity where there may be potential. Sure it may be like that- there is no denying. It will also be hard, challenging and all those words where it does hit your chart, but a Pluto transit can also be healing, manifesting and transforming ie ultimately powerfully cool. And that applies to the shittiest of shitty Pluto transits- although you mightn’t want to hear this until a few years down the track.

Whatever happens there is no escaping the effect…Pluto is like that…but trust me, hanging onto those photos, revenge fantasies and whatever will not help. Let em’ go…if you can…

Every so often our personal power feels a little (ahem) constipated. Stuck. In need of a little, shall we say, cosmic fibre to get it all moving again.

Perhaps you have been feeling like that lately? Like the projects, the real transformative projects, have lost their momentum. Perhaps you’re feeling a little out of control, like your hands are no longer on the steering wheel. I hit that point yesterday- as you may have gathered from my over-sharing post.

It ended up being a bit of an over-sharing day, with some straight truth talking from my BMF, and then many tears shed during a 90 minute phone call with my BFF on the other side of the country. It was frustration speaking, coloured with a little obsession, more than a little mis-directed self loathing, and a feeling of loss of power.

It was a mini emotional detox that should free my energy for the next phase of my project.

It was Pluto stationing direct sextile my Mercury. It all came spewing out. Luckily my friend was also in the same boat. Her Pisces Moon is conjunct my Mercury, so she was also feeling the Pluto pull. Her Gemini Sun was receiving the inconjunct from Pluto and her Cancer Venus the opposition. She has a few planets between 5-7 degrees…

Both of us were complaining about feeling like we were stuck in some sort of slow moving, toxic sludge. Hey, we have Pisces Moons- our emotional imagination is dramatic indeed. Like we’d started something Big and somehow had lost direction, momentum and control.

What we were describing is Pluto stationing direct. Pluto is about power, ambition, transformation, truth and elimination, so it’s natural that after 6 months of that energy being turned inward, something needs to give.

The stationing point is always a powerful one- especially if it triggers something else in your chart. If your transformational projects have been feeling stuck, they will very soon start to move. Between the energy of Mars moving through Scorpio and Pluto moving forward, now is the time to eliminate any of the crud that is holding you back from being who you need to be.

And crud, is very often what it is. This is real truth or dare time.

I’m relatively fortunate, in my case the aspect being made is a sextile. It’s an opportunity to grasp the power of my Mercury in all its dubious glory, and move forward. When Pluto is involved, it’s usually more of an offer that you can’t refuse. Having said that, acceptance of Pluto sextile and trine opportunities make the harder aspects somehow easier to deal with when they come. Somewhat. Part of the work has been done.

In any case, have a think about what this is activating for you. Is there any part of your life that is in need of a little cosmic help to get things moving again?

The highlight of today has been the Moon-Jupiter conjunction in Gemini.

My sister in law made this smash cake for my nephews’ first birthday party. The deal was pop the cake in the middle of a picnic rug, sing Happy Birthday quickly, and then get out of the way as all the kids hands make for the cake. Gemini does, of course, rule the hands and fingers. How very social, how very Moon in Gemini, how very Jupiter- and abundance of hands, icing and cake crumbs. How clever of my wonderful sister in law.

The Gemini Lunar energy will be with us for another day, so those of us in the Southern Hemisphere will start Monday under a surge of busyness. Use that multi-tasking energy to, well, multi-task!

The week ahead has a Pluto feel to it.

Soon after the Moon enters Cancer, the monthly opposition to Pluto will occur. That’s cool, we deal with this one every month and now know all the tricks- you know, the bits about rage, volcanoes, resentment and my favourite Moon-Pluto word “seething”.

This month, we get some added spice courtesy of sweet little Venus, who is just a tad less sweet and a tad more passive aggressive in Cancer- especially when in opposition to Pluto.

I’ll probably post more on this as we get closer to it, but here are a couple of tasters I prepared earlier:

Pleasure and Pain

Jealousy

In the best Pluto tradition, this one will start to be felt well before it is exact- in a brooding, intense sort of way.

If you have Venus natally aspecting Pluto, or venus in Scorpio, you’ll feel quite at home with this energy. If you don’t, well, it could be fun…

OK, I am holidays at present, so here is last years Pluto retrograde post updated…

In my younger less married days I used to love doing the Cleo and Cosmo sex quizzes on the train to work. Learned some interesting things from them too… but obviously that is not for here..I would make sure that I counted the score in my head so no one reading over my shoulder could see my answers and therefore know what I really thought about doing _______, or whether I really would be likely to________ or indeed had done_______ where? Really? There?

Recently I have been having some fun with a series of Outer Planet point scoring quizzes that Donna Cunningham has been running on her Skywriter website. Just like the Cleo & Cosmo sex quizzes I have learned a lot, but this time the things I have learned have been about myself and are therefore possibly more useful in everyday life- or so I would hope.

Obviously I am so much more mature now too, so am going to publish my results for all to see-  the results are possibly not as interesting (to some) as the sex quiz stuff, but some things are best left to the imagination.

First up was How Plutonian are you? Being so Piscean, I always knew that I was pretty influenced by Neptune, but the Pluto result blew me away. Using her system (check it out here), my Pluto score was a massive 74 points. Anything over 25pts is seen as being very Plutonian, with association with all the good and bad sides of Pluto and Scorpio  (see Donna’s article for more explanation- Donna is the expert on all things Pluto): power, control, trust, holding on to things & feelings, revenge, obsession, healing, transformation. Looking honestly at myself, I do have to say it is all true- the good & the bad. With most of my Piscean planets in opposition to Pluto & with Pluto sitting right on my Descendant, the struggle with trust & power & control- particularly in relationships has been constant battle.

Anyways, Pluto is now retrograde through until mid September. As with all retrograde planets, the retrograde motion makes Pluto act, well, more Plutonian and Plutonian people even more susceptible to Pluto.

As with all retrogrades, the energy is directed inward rather than externally. In Plutos’ case, it acts sort of like a planetary detox where the crap (for want of a better term) in our lives is eliminated (a very Pluto word). This can be emotions we have been holding onto, attitudes or values which should have changed or evolved, vendettas we should have let go of, revenge fantasies we are just waiting for the right moment to act upon (ooops, that’s me!), secrets that you have been keeping under wraps.

For those of you who are strongly influenced by Pluto (see below) or currently experiencing major Pluto transits (especially anyone with the Sun, Moon or ascendant at or around 4-8 Cancer, Capricorn, Libra or Aries), this will be a big thing. Now is the time to get rid of those photos (you know the ones at the back of your drawer of X with Y), or, alternatively do some internal Pluto work on yourself- a physical detox, heavy meditation- anything that is regenerative and gets you back in touch with the innermost core of you. Pluto retrogrades often bring sudden expansion or loss of power, manipulation, obsession and power struggles are the order of the day.

As with all retrograde cycles, the critical points are the station degrees- in this case 9 Capricorn 33’ where he is stationing retrograde and 6 Capricorn 57’ where he will station to turn direct. These are points of pretty huge transformation and metamorphosis if they happen to fall on a sensitive point in your natal chart. Personally speaking, my north node falls at 7 Taurus 44’,  & Mercury at 6 Pisces, so this is one retrograde period I will be taking notice of.

Now, this is the bit where I have to have a good hard talk to some of you guys- Pluto does not necessarily equal bad, so don’t look for negativity. Where there may be potential. Sure it may be like that- there is no denying. It will also be hard, challenging and all those words where it does hit your chart, but a Pluto transit can also be healing, manifesting and transforming ie ultimately powerfully cool.

Whatever happens there is no escaping the effect…Pluto is like that…but trust me, hanging onto those photos, revenge fantasies and whatever will not help. Let em’ go…if you can…

pic by me

The other day I had a couple of trees removed from my backyard. Aside from causing damage to the electrical works in our pool area and lifting pavers, neither tree was healthy. We had another tree pruned and dead-wooded in order to help it flourish, and it now looks like a new tree.

Since they have been removed, and the other camphor laurel pruned and shaped, the light and the view is incredible.

When I posted it on Facebook the other day (amongst some comments about eye candy and tree surgeons), a friend asked if I was having a Pluto transit- you know, all the removal of dead wood.

I’m not, at present, but have for the last 5-6 years had a cycle of Pluto transits that is now almost complete:

• Pluto square Moon (this one went on for ever)
• Pluto square Saturn (so did this)
• Pluto sextile Mars (8^th) and Mercury (12^th)
• Pluto sextile South Node and trine North node- this one is happening now

I mentioned in a post after Christmas how leaving work and holidaying in Bali felt like a closure of all the crap that had been going down over those last 5-6 years.

Removing the deadwood and opening up the view feels like a metaphorical closure of that and a beginning to something new.

For the last year or so I have resisted doing readings- with work, with my writing, with family, I really didn’t feel that I would be doing the best job by my clients or myself. Things are now different, and from February 1, I will be doing readings again, so if you are interested, please email me (jo@jotracey.com.au) for rates and times. Interestingly since making this decision I have received the first few enquiries for readings in a long time.

Also for the last couple of months I had closed off comments on the website- mainly to discourage the spammers that were having so much amusement at my expense. The silence is, however, deafening, so comments will be open again.

Anyways, to the big transit of the day- the annual hook-up between Mercury and the zodiacs’ enforcement specialist, Pluto.

Mercury= information, communication, messages, data

Pluto= secrecy, power, control, ambition, transformation, truth

Capricorn= serious, mature, timely, business, ambition

Put them together and you get…the next 24 or so hours. You also get a very timely reminder that words can be powerful, have the power to hurt, to heal and to transform.

I was reminded of this during an unrelated conversation earlier this morning. For the next couple of days, think carefully about both the words you use, how you react to those used by others and just what to do with any information you receive. Treat it maturely, treat it responsibly and treat it with respect.

The Moon in Virgo adds a critical and analytic energy to this vibe- can you handle the truth?

Adding to the earthy, practicality in the air at the moment is a trine between the Sun and Mars. This will peak within the next few hours, so if you have any serious planning, forecasting or analytical work that needs to be done, today is a real get it done day.

I am about to visit my local plant nursery to check out some options for landscaping the vacant area that is now around my pool. A blank canvas, in full sun = limitless potential…and a perfect use of all of this earth energy.

Todays photo is something I shot in Bali that reminds me of the beauty of nature. Speaking of beauty, I will pop back in later today to talk about Venus and Neptune…until then…