It's a trap!

If you have enough chart knowledge to be dangerous, here’s a hole I want to encourage you to stop falling in: “I act [this way] because of [this chart configuration.]”

• I can be rude all the time because I have Mercury in Aries.

• I’ll never find the perfect partner because I have Neptune in the 7th house.

• My Saturn-Uranus conjunction means I’ll always have problems with authority.

You can’t change history. If you have Neptune-flavored love life problems, you’ve probably dated some losers (sorry, losers!). But just because that happened in the past doesn’t mean it needs to keep happening in the future, especially if you stop condemning yourself to a future that looks very much like the past, which is accomplished by realizing that just because you have an energy in your chart, you do not have to keep doing the same thing over and over.

Let’s take an example that we can all agree sucks: Saturn opposing Venus. When you have an opposition in your chart, you have the option to play out one side or the other before you learn to keep the energy balanced (more on that in a sec). So either you’re acting like the Venus person, all nice and sweet and Venusian, and largely focused on your preferences and values (which makes Saturnian people tell you those preferences and values are dumb). Or you can be the Saturn person and be cranky and grouchy and attract all these sweet Venusian creatures toward you who you then nitpick to death. I’ve seen people with this aspect flip back and forth daily (or hourly). Cranky-sweet-cranky-sweet, then “no one loves me.” These sound like patterns that need to die, no? If you accept that you have Saturnian energy tied up with Venusian energy in your birth chart, it’s going to be a lot easier. Saturn’s about responsibility, commitment, and making healthy choices, so accepting that the phrase “whirlwind romance” will probably never be used to describe your love life is step 1.

Then I’d encourage you to take a long, hard look at your patterns and the stories you tell yourself about this problem area. It’s *your* energy, after all.

Saturn-Venus energy can be the following:

• Lonely

• Exacting in relationships

• Low self-esteem

• Being willing to work hard in relationships

• Refusing to commit to anyone who doesn’t meet a ridiculous set of criteria

• Someone who is artistic and works hard at it, or works in an artistic industry in some way (fashion, interior design, architecture, etc.)

• Someone concerned with justice

• Romantic late bloomer

• Someone who is socially reserved

• Someone who works hard to build their sense of self-esteem

• A person who dates people who tend to be older than they are

• Someone who winds up being the caretaker for their significant other

• Frugal or thrifty

• A person very aware of what relationships can and can’t do for them

• Someone who takes their relationships very seriously

• Enjoying of things that are old, antique, or historical

• Doubting of the affections of others

• A person who moves very slowly when dating/committing to someone

• Someone who commits and means it

• A person who stays in a bad relationship forever because they made a commitment

• The fun police

• The fun organizer

• Group leader

I’m sure there’s more that I left out. Not all of the things on that list are bad, right? Some of them definitely are, though. Values, relating, and romantic attraction energy is tied up with maturity, work, responsibility and goals, essentially. And the aspect I named is an opposition, which is an aspect of learning balance. Too much Saturn is stifling and too much Venus is selfish and navel-gazing. You can tell which one you’re leaning more heavily on by who you’re attracting into your midst. If you’re acting like Saturn, you’re shaking your fist at the ‘damn kids’ and if you’re acting like Venus, everyone’s being critical toward you. But if you decide to make yourself your own personal authority about what values system and relationships are right for you, it’s easier to let the haters do what they will.

You can’t control what happens outside of yourself. But you can decide to commit to a self-improvement plan, or explore commitment to a partner who maybe doesn’t check *all* the boxes but is pretty damn good, or who makes you happy when you really think about it. You grow up and don’t expect someone to take care of all your needs, and you don’t let yourself become the person solely responsible for all of theirs, either.

So regarding that list: I can do that for pretty much any aspect you can throw at me. You have a lot of options as to how you express your own energy, and a lot of people have 1 or 2 (or 10) bad habits that they default to and then mutter something about “that’s just the way I am.” Fine, if that’s how you actually want to be. But don’t false-logic yourself into a corner. There’s other ways of being that might make you happier.

XO,J