Greetings friends,
This second half of June is when things start changing. The year has felt like a mixture of chaos and stagnancy thus far, has it not? I’ve been excitedly awaiting the shifts that late June will bring for several months, the reasons for which I will expound upon further below. I was going to give you a bit of a personal update, but to be frank with you, I’ve had the worst brain fog for the past few weeks, and I don’t even know what to tell you about myself. I’m excitedly awaiting some plans for the summer, most of which involve music festivals and lying in the sun. I’ve been drinking a whole lot of cortados lately. I’ve been getting better about standing up for myself and setting boundaries, which is a big deal to me and Pisces sun. Purpose is a big thing I’ve been contemplating lately, and I still don’t know what to make sense of it. I’m trying to workshop new ideas for community engagement, but I’m not sure what that looks like…more on that at some point in the future, I suppose.
Those are just some snippets of what’s been in my life and on my mind. I’m doing an experiment on myself currently, which I may share with you later if it proves to be useful; but we shall see how that pans out. Anyway, the reason I’m writing to you is because today, June 19th, we see Chiron moving into Taurus for a brief three-month visit before it regresses back into Aries. Chiron has been in Aries for the past 8 years or so, so this is pretty monumental. Let’s get into it.
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The nodes are changing, and the social climate is with them. It’s time to stop conforming for the sake of acceptance.
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what are you hungry for? acceptance? security? approval?
A Bit of Context: Chiron in Aries - Chiron has been in Aries since 2018, and over the course of its stay here, it’s been addressing the pain we experience associated with autonomy, identity, and choice. We’ve been urged to examine the pain we inflict upon ourselves by trying to convince others that we are not hurt and the inflammation we add to existing wounds by not giving ourselves the proper amount of time to heal. We’ve had to accept that, although we may try to outmuscle it, healing cannot be rushed. Aries is the warrior, and through this transit, many of us have likely gotten some wounds on the battle field of life. Perhaps we’ve grappled with the vulnerability that has accompanied our wounds, and in confronting that we’ve tried to neglect the wounds entirely for the sake of maintaining an appearance of strength or admirability. But over the course of this transit, we’ve likely realized that trying to ignore our pain only causes it to fester more, which has (ideally!) resulted in many of us finally accepting it and taking the necessary actions to heal it.
We’ve spent a great deal of this transit trying to make our wounds invisible, perhaps to make ourselves look more attractive, less vulnerable, or more in control of ourselves and our lives than we truly are. But neglected wounds are more likely to leave scars—evidence of our pain. What do we do when we can’t hide that evidence? We make it mean something. We find a way for the pain to be worth it. We morally justify it so the pain wasn’t felt in vain. This is what Chiron in Taurus will be examining.
June 19th - September 17th: A Glimpse into Chiron in Taurus - Chiron’s entry into Taurus will be a brief glimpse into what the entire transit will be highlighting over the full eight-ish years it will stay there. Its long-term stay starts in April 2027. This short window will be between June 19th and September 17th of this year.
Considering Chiron pertains to both pain and healing, I think we may find that wounds relating to physical beauty, morality, money, security, attachment, and deservingness will be brought into view for us to have a more in-depth examination of them and how our identifying with the unresolved pain around them may be preventing us from healing them. Chiron tends to point out this paradox, regardless of which sign it’s activating. Here’s a brief glimpse at how I think this is going to be showing up in some of the major topics of Taurus.
Beauty + Attractiveness: I think Chiron in Taurus will have us collectively returning to a more organic concept of beauty, as we may start to see more information come out about the impacts of plastic surgery, Botox, lip fillers, and other such bodily alterations we have culturally sought out for the sake of the evolving beauty standard. Chiron in Aries has literally had us putting a knife to ourselves (Aries being ruled by Mars, which governs injury, knives, and other weapons and harm) to resolve insecurities around appearance (one of the many wounds Chiron in Aries has intended to reveal). Obviously that’s not the motive for all getting injections or undergoing plastic surgeries, but we can see through Chiron’s transit through Aries how our expectations for our appearances have climbed higher and higher as the online space has expanded and the average person’s visibility has increased beyond what we could ever imagine it to be in the natural world. I think this transit is going to remind us that there is nothing more beautiful than feeling good in the body, as it naturally exists. I also think this will have us also examining how intensely we associate beauty with value. Aging and the cultural tendency to discard aging women specifically are bound to be but one example of this.
Chiron in Aries has brought us many “quick fixes” for insecurities or wounds relating to appearance, but Chiron in Taurus is bound to show us the cost we pay in our internal wellness when we cast aside the natural form for something that grants us instant access to what we think is the cure to our pain. This activation is also bound to illuminate how hollow these topical changes are, and we may find that there will be deeper examinations of our perception of inherent value as a result of this.
Money + Security: We will be addressing wounds around security, both materially and morally, which may mean that we will also have to confront wounds that have resulted from financial insecurity or social criticism. This may be a time in which we will be further unwinding scarcity mindsets and generational limiting beliefs (especially once Saturn and Chiron conjoin—and square Pluto—in 2028). I think a new financial system will be starting to form through this transit, but this also means the existing one will have to collapse—we can already see it’s on its way out. Perhaps we will also have to dismantle our moral narratives around money and will have to untangle our self-worth with the amount of money we possess. I also suspect this transit will usher in a new form of currency, perhaps one that will look like a bartering system or something totally different. Or at least, it will magnify the flaws in our current financial systems and currency to make their discrepancies unavoidable, with the hopes that the pain will inspire action toward healing and change. Considering astrological bodies at 0° of a sign tend to exaggeratedly manifest, Chiron at 0º Taurus may draw our collective attention toward the financial inequality that exists in our world more intentionally (Elon becoming a trillionaire…), perhaps increasing the pain we feel around it for the sake of inviting us to examine how we may start to recalibrate the system to be more equitable.
With this just being a brief window into this transit, though, I think we are just getting acquainted with the rudimentary themes of this transit, which will obviously reveal their intricacies more once Chiron moves deeper into Taurus. I think the best way we can all navigate this on an individual scale is by restructuring our personal relationships with money, security, and wealth.
Morality: Taurus and Scorpio are the axis of “good and bad” as we have been conditioned to define those words. Taurus is often what we associate with good or moral, because it is what has provided us with security and stability. Scorpio is often what we associate with bad or immoral, because it is what has often led to upheaval and destruction. With Chiron passing through Taurus, I think we will be examining how we have associated suffering with moral rightness; we may have to reckon with the ways in which we’ve found a sense of righteousness in choosing suffering for the sake of staying “good” in the definition of morality we’ve found security in. I think this will play into what we are already exploring with Pluto in Aquarius and build upon what we had to address with Uranus in Taurus. Can you believe in your goodness even if you are perceived as bad? Can you let go of your need to stabilize yourself in the nods of approval from others?
I also think that with Jupiter’s presence in Leo at the same time as this introductory period, we will be bringing more attention to the tendency for us to perform “goodness” for the sake of social acceptance, even if the actions that appear “good” are not derived from an organic, independently occurring place within. Chiron in Taurus, in my opinion, is going to dismantle the reward system for being “good” as many of us have been conditioned to operate through, whether we learned that through a religious institution, a familial dynamic, a community culture, or a societal structure. Astrology is an impartial and morally neutral system—the planets do not divinely bestow titles of “good” and “bad” on hand-selected individuals. The planets have no favorites. If anything, they clearly describe how being a “good” person will not automatically grant you access to a “good” life, and the inverse is true as well! There are plenty of corrupt people who get “good” things without moving from a place of integrity. But I think with this transit dismantling the cultural structure—influencing both material and social advancement—that weaponizes our fear of being “bad” against us by exploiting our empathy, generosity, and kindness, we will see a new structure come together that will depend much more on personal accountability. This may create a bit of an “every person for themself” type of cultural morality, but I think it will ultimately support people to liberate themselves from social hierarchies that allow individuals to reject their authority over their actions to an extent.
Instead of being “good” to avoid social exile, unwanted repercussions, and shame, we will likely see an increase in people choosing moral integrity as an expression of their character.
Food + Wellness: This activation might make us aware of how dull our senses have become and how manufactured and overcomplicated we have made what it means to feel good in the body. This will also magnify the pain and sickness that have resulted from corrupt food systems and agricultural practices and the mega-corporations that are in control of these resources. I think we will be prioritizing more farm-to-table operations, and we may see an increase in people learning about where their food is coming from and how they can be more intentional with what they are consuming. We will definitely see more people gardening and will perhaps see an increase in people romanticizing homesteading, creating community food projects, and shared gardens. I think this will also have us dissolving morality around food; we may be focusing more on intuitive eating and movement and will perhaps find a simpler way of increasing wellness in our lives. With the beauty standard being examined with more criticism under this transit, I think we will also be addressing disordered eating, unrealistic lifestyle practices, and the removal of pleasure from wellness that has resulted from our desire to achieve the beauty standard.
Overall, we are bound to examine the intricacies of food as a source of pain or healing. And this also translates into choice; we may find that this transit also points our attention to other things we “consume” as a way of either providing ourselves with a temporary feeling of peace or as an act of love for the body.
Romance + Connection: The romantic sphere will be changing quite significantly under the guidance of Jupiter in Leo and the nodal activation of the Aquarius-Leo axis, but I think Chiron in Taurus will guide us through a longer examination of the pain that results from our attachment to security in connection and the inevitable collapse that results from our refusal to address the things that we fear will destabilize our relationships. I think this will also be urging us to be more aware of performative pleasure in sexual dynamics that are perhaps driven by both our desire to make our partners feel accomplished and our desire to feel safe in our pleasure (i.e., no more fake orgasms). I think we will further examine our attachment to security through relationships during this transit. Do we stay in relationships because they genuinely bring us peace and pleasure, or do we stay because they are predictable and, therefore, stabilizing? We may find that we’re going to be more intentionally observing how our attachment to stability may prevent us from discussing very worthwhile conversations in connection, perhaps those of a morally turbulent nature. We may also find that this transit facilitates a beautiful healing process and a new definition of what security looks like in relationships, perhaps as a result of the upheaval we went through with Uranus in Taurus.
I’m sure I will have more to say on this as we get further into this transit, but these are just a few initial thoughts that come to mind when I consider this activation. I think Chiron is often mischaracterized in popular conversation; we tend to focus more on the “pain” part of it. But I encourage you to remember that Chiron is equally healing. We experience the healing of Chiron when we accept that we cannot outrun, force, or control healing; we can only gently guide its organic process. Chiron, the healer, the centaur, only relieved his pain when he relinquished his immortality so he could finally pass on to the other side. This does not necessarily symbolize what it may literally look like—that suffering only ends when we die (like yes, I suppose, but…). I think this intends to remind us that in the essence of Chiron choosing to die, the way we ease our suffering is by releasing our desire to control the pain. When we surrender our control over what hurts, we may find that the sensation associated with it changes—it may not even register as pain anymore.
This reminds me of an experience I had a few months ago, when I got my back tattooed. It was a 19-hour project over the course of three days. It was a deeply spiritual and meditative experience. After all the pain I’ve endured that I didn’t have a say in—wounds that others have inflicted upon me—I felt a sense of power in getting to choose this pain. And while I sat with it, I found myself focusing more on the feeling rather than trying to escape it through distraction or dissociation. It made me realize that those 19 hours were the most ~in my body~ I had been in a very long time. I let the sensation lose its definition as I had been taught to perceive it—it wasn’t pain, it didn’t hurt, and it wasn’t bad. I was just there, and the feeling was with me. And now I have a beautiful reminder that I can be present in my body, and by removing learned definitions from the feelings and sensations I experience, I can turn any experience into one that brings me closer to myself.
I encourage you to keep this in mind as we experience this brief window of Chiron in Taurus. Maybe something only hurts because you’ve assigned a meaning to it that was meant to validate your pain, when in reality it’s only distanced you from that thing being integrated as something that is an asset to you. Maybe it keeps hurting because all you think when you feel it is “this feels bad.” Bad isn’t a feeling…so what else is there?
Talk soon. Hope you’re well.
xx, Aspen
this is my tattoo btw for those who are curious
Got too excited and wanted to say foremost your tattoo is breathtakingly stunning 🖤🩶