How South Nodes & Planets in Capricorn are Reshaping the World

By Allie Kesler

Photograph | Robert Collins

This is a big moment, testing in whether we can allow our personal mastery to respond to requests with a cooperative attitude. To notice that the way we use our mastery could be tweaked to be more encompassing of the way others master things, better able to help them on their path, or to be utilized effectively in the world. It’s the moment we either harmonize, developing elegance through our ability to move with others—OR—find conflict in an inability to either find cooperative others, face others who ask us to compromise in uncomfortable ways, or contend with an inability to imagine the benefit of all by compromising in positive ways. The dance broadens. The world via relationship challenges you to find your correct give and take. But output is a must no matter your ability to move with Other.

This initial moment of exhale, or recognizing our mastery, of newly needing to find our rhythm in relation to Other, is upon us in multiple layers right now. The concept of self-mastery built upon a new vibration that triggers us to initiate something can be as short as a breath, a day, a year, or a longer pattern such as something that’s taken ten or twenty years. But, what we’re talking about right now also holds very long patterns. On one level, there are things coming to this point that have taken around nine years, some that have taken fifteen years, on another level there are things that we began in a previous lifetime or that we inherited through great grandparents. But also, on a whole other level, potentially things we started hundreds of lifetimes ago.

The South Node of a few planets/cosmic bodies is what’s being triggered right now. These points show where a planet’s orbit begins to descend below the ecliptic, holding the energy of an exhale, like autumn, pushing from self-development into offering your wholeness into the world.

It’s a mystical karmic point in relation to our soul’s journey and puts us at 180 degrees around a circle, directly facing something we began months, years, or lifetimes ago.

In the shortest patterns coming into being, but most obviously felt, the moon’s south node is crossing over both Saturn (authority – April 30) and Pluto (transformation – April 4). This indicates something around power and position that we’ve been working on in a personal, embodied way, for nine or so years, is being felt coming to a place of confidence and arrival. In the sign of Capricorn, all of this nodal shifting will take place around our reach and how we’re building our reputations and expertise with integrity.

In a much broader way, the south nodes of Pluto and Saturn (which have been in Capricorn our whole lives), are both being crossed by their own planets over the next year. Pluto did this in February, but will reverse back over his south node in July, and then cross again for good in December. Saturn will kick 2020 off with a bang on January 12^th as he does this with his own node at the same time as he conjuncts Pluto, WHILE the sun and Mercury also conjunct this momentous event.

The last time Pluto crossed his own south node was in the last days of 1770, leading up to the American Revolutionary War. It was a time of radically forming new notions around constitution of governance. The last time Saturn did this was in 1990. Around this time structures either crumbled or found more authority: The Berlin Wall came down reuniting Germany, the Soviet Union crumbled ending the Cold War, Nelson Mandela was freed from prison, Clinton started campaigning to be the US’ Chief Executive.

*Of course lots happened around these times, but I’m trying to keep it to themes that Pluto and Saturn would’ve triggered during their above nodal crossings. Feel free to add to the comments, historical events you feel are important to these times and themes. I welcome encompassing accounts.

On top of this, everything is leading up to Pluto making his 250 year return in 2022 to his position in the US’ birth chart. This has never happened for the US. At the same time the US is undergoing its 19-year nodal return with the signature of chaos, shedding baggage, and making room for new beginnings. AND, its rising sign is hosting its own ruler for a new 12-year reboot, with Jupiter in Sagittarius. It’s going to be some heavy but also fresh igniting years in this nation! Radical reinvention sounds about right.

This is major stuff. This is burn it all down and rebuild from our ashes stuff. Although I won’t go that far in literal terms—but figuratively it feels this way.

Let me break down the bigger, more Karmic patterns around Saturn and Pluto’s South Node crossings.

This year, Pluto crossing his own south node: What is full in each of us, and in our generational powers, that’s ready to face karma, cooperation/conflict, or potentially more elegance, balance, and exchange around our radical depths?

Find your ability to share resources in a way that’s empowering to all involved in the sharing, or to all who are affected by merging of power. Equalizing power/governance in authority and constructs is the goal. In the greatest pattern, I believe the earth is ready to reclaim and equalize how her resources are being abused through our constructs. She loves sharing and reciprocation, but it’s currently unbalanced.

Think about your own resources in this way. What deep inner wells of value in your expertise are you ready to put into the world that might be vulnerable to outside powers, or bring you more exchange? This is likely something in you that your soul has been working on for a long time, that you now need to face during this lifetime.

Just as the earth is mined for gold, silver, oil, and all sorts of other valuable resources, close your eyes and feel into your being. Imagine heat, compression, aging, chemistry, and alchemy that’s been at work on you since before you were in your current body. What do you see in your darkest, oldest recesses? Write down any imagery that arrives. What’s ready to be mined and exchanged on?

In another perspective, as we face off with things started lifetimes ago, we may feel certain debts, weights, and challenges lift off of our plates, or fight the balance being sought and compound some difficult Karma.

Next year, Saturn crossing his own south node: Closer to January I’ll share a practice to help visualize what is ready to come into exchange around our soul’s Saturn-esque qualities.  For now, recognize how you might be feeling some pressure to perfect some sort of authority you’ve been honing over the past 15 or so years, as well as in other ways, over many lives. Find personal rhythm in order to weave authority complete in yourself. You will feel, after April 30^th when the lunar south node crosses Saturn, a smaller experience of what Saturn’s builder rhythm is working to perfecting through you.

How all of these south node crossings plays out for each of us will be quite different. We each have karma we’re unaware of. We each have our own maturity around cooperation and compromise. Both beautiful and difficult things will be triggered. Do your best to put yourself in the shoes of others and you’ll find a better grasp of the balance that is needed to dance through this equalizing time.

How each sign (read for your sun and rising) may see the lunar south node crossing over Saturn and Pluto, unfold over the year:

Aries | 10^th House: Your authority and power are ready to rise. Be ready for more feedback, more responsibility, and more open-mindedness to keep fairness in balance.

Taurus | 9^th House: Your perspectives and ability to create authoritative growth in your life out of willingness to push into the unknown, is on the rise. Partners or partnerships may be important elements in play here, and the goal will be to share the broadening of authority and power in a balanced way.

Gemini | 8th House: Your authoritative connection to shared resources is rising, partially through the power of your work, but with this, you will need to be willing to compromise and cultivate equal exchange, fairness, in how resources are utilized or promised.

Cancer | 7^th House: Your partners and partnerships are gaining more clout, partially via creative ability and leadership. You’ll need to find dynamic balance to agreements and willingness to use your spotlight in cooperative ways.

Leo | 6^th House: Your work and lifestyle are finding more capacity and expertise. A master of processes, it’s now time to share this in the world and find compromise in order to attract the work that gives you due respect. A deeper connection to your roots and security could be partially at the heart of your new-found solid rhythms.

Virgo | 5^th House: Your presence and command are moving from cultivation and hard work into an elegant ability to share through your heart, your authoritative creativity. Your powerful detective mind could be partially to thank for the solidity of your star that’s rising, but that will need to cooperate in what’s being created or led.

Libra | 4^th House: Your sense of security is beginning to feel solid and more balanced, with roots that now have room to allow more Others to feed from your care, or contribute to it. Your self-worth finding more form is partially at the heart of why things are solidifying. Be sure to find more space for cooperation in your private life as more elements begin to appear.

Scorpio | 3^rd House: Your Mind and communities are firming up with a deeper command over your network of connection. Through your ideas or written word, you will have access to more authority in your life, but authority that will need to be fair, potentially shared, and cooperative. It’s partially through deep personal passions and a rising sense of Self that you are generating more diversity in your power.

Sagittarius | 2^nd House: The authority and expertise you demand from yourself to feel worthy of value, or in how you solidify values, is coming into its own. It’s time to relax into recognition that your authority is solid enough to ask that it be recognized and valued. It’s partially due to your connection to spiritual or inspired realms that you are better finding your material connection to the pleasures of life—maybe via a cosmically assigned title. Be sure to create a flow of give and take to keep your ‘boss of magic’ value balanced.

Capricorn | 1^st House: You have been under a lot of pressure, Cappy. Working very hard to cultivate who you are as a person with passion and authority over Self. It’s time to relax a little more, trusting yourself that you are solid and whole just as you are. Everyone is going to want a piece of you, and it’s partially due to your powerful insight into group, technological, or collaborative innovation. With more attention, you will need to find balance between how much of your passion you share and how much you keep to help you stay centered.

Aquarius | 12^th House: Your grasp of the mystical and artistic realms has been working very hard to find a sense of rhythm and wholeness. You are arriving in grand fashion right now. Rest in the knowing that you’ve crafted your authority in things intangible. At least as far as they are meant to go for the now. There is a readiness to show your work in more seen ways, to feel respect for your grasp of composition or trust in things beyond. It’s likely that your career and aspirations are partially at the root of what’s been pressuring you to work so hard at ‘flow states’ or finding clout in professions of magic and glamour. You may be asked to share your gifts in ways that you aren’t used to, but you’ve got the foundations to bend any way you choose.

Pisces | 11^th House: Groups, collectives, movements, technology, humanity. These are the things pushing powerfully up through rhythmed hard work. Your reputation in the world is rising but with this (and know you have what it takes now) you will need to find room for all kinds of sharing of skills and ideas. You will need to create spaces that are fair and elegant in how authority is used or experimented with. It’s partially due to pushing your powerful boundaries and visionary aim that you are solidifying your authority in electric spaces.

And There’s More: Winter Progressions, A Triplicity Change & Synodic Resets

There is so much going down over the next couple of years in the sign of Capricorn, as if the above wasn’t’ enough. It’s truly a historic time.

In a broad sweeping way, several powerful planets in Capricorn show us some general but big progressions to be aware of.

Currently we’re experiencing Saturn, the farthest planet that we can see with the naked eye, thus indicating our reality, pushing through its own sign of Capricorn. Symbolically, Capricorn welcomes us into winter energy, indicating a need to batten down the hatches as reality needs us to focus, reach, and rely on the solid strengths we’ve developed with foresight over the past 22 years when he ignited in Aries’ spring energy through to Sagittarius’ end of autumn visionary aim. Whatever is excess may be too much of a burden to carry, depending on what you’ve built. Lean down so that your resources go far. In Capricorn we’re seeing what in our realities (and actual structures) are strong enough to hold up, and what is crumbling. In his tour through Aquarius during 2021/22/23 we’ll reinvent around what breaks.

Jupiter will enter Capricorn at the end of 2019, ruling over how we create civilization and shared philosophies. In Capricorn, our beliefs will be put under pressure tests. We’ll shed weight and see overly compromised social judgements crumble. In 2021 moving into Aquarius, reinvention will start to take place, but the winter feelings of needing discipline and lean living will be present due to these two planets that shape our tangible constructs. They’re needing us to let go of old, making room for imagination and experimentation that will lead to fresh cycles of shaping the world. Just before 2023 Jupiter will move into spring energy, and just after the start of 2026, Saturn will. We’ll all fare differently leading up to this time. We’ve all planned and prepared and built differently, but our sociopolitical integrity is going to be under tests of pressures for years to come.

We also have Pluto who’s been burning things down around the integrity of powers in the world, travelling through Capricorn. He’s not felt as personally as Jupiter and Saturn, but in larger pattern, so harder to see ways, he’s at work transforming and uprooting structures of the deepest and darkest things in our world. He entered Capricorn in 2008, to stay until 2024.

We have mounting winter energy playing out in big societal ways. This is a lot, but to add to the plate, each of these planets is going to make conjuncts to each other over the next two years, igniting new synodic cycles. There is sacred geometry to these rare occurrences.

First up, Saturn will conjoin Pluto on January 10, 2020, igniting a new 34-year cycle in how we find integrity in our power.

On July 21, 2020, Jupiter will conjoin Pluto in Capricorn, igniting a new 12.5-year cycle of how we expand in power.

With both of these happening in Capricorn, major long term cycles are indicating a need for integrity, strength, and foresight in our foundations and depths.

Last up, Jupiter and Saturn will conjoin on December 21, 2020. This is the occurrence that is most closely felt. There are some interesting patterns that these planets play out called the Triplicity Cycle. For 200 year chunks, these planets will conjoin every 20 years in one element. This is used by many astrologers as a way to measure our sociopolitical and historical climate. In earth for the past 200 years, we’ve been heavily focused on industrialization, mining the earth for resources, and valuing the tangible assets in life. There was a bridge occurrence in 1981 as this took place in the air sign of Libra, but in 2000, we went back to the earth triplicity with a Virgo conjunction.

We’ve been in a bit of a meld between the era of information and the era of capitalism. Come this new conjunction in the first degrees of Aquarius, we fully enter the era of air signs, every 20 years moving backwards to the preceeding air sign. I very much so agree with these articles

(http://www.sevenstarsastrology.com/entering-ages-air-ground-sky/  &  https://www.astro.com/astrology/aa_article160602_e.htm )

in that we are still in the age of Pisces, but that it’s in fact this Jupiter-Saturn bridge time of partial airiness that has made us feel like the age of Aquarius has begun.

The era (not age) of air/Aquarius will be upon us in more straight forward ways come December 21, 2020. It will be interesting to watch and see if more utopian views start to find real traction, to see where technology goes, and how much more information we can be bombarded with—or innovative ways to handle it.

This article is a little advanced for the novice, but I love its videos, giving imagery of how the planets are moving and the music of their spheres interacting during these epic years.

https://www.lunarplanner.com/~lunarpla/2020/index.html

A Note from Me:

I’ve developed my own patterns in how I see planetary nodes, in how planets progress, and how they each have their own phases, like the moon, that take you out of the flat chart, out of fully being geocentric in orientation, and gives more dimension and elegant wholeness to the sacred geometry of our universe.

If you want to learn more about my lens with astrology, sign up for the

It’s a piece of me. It’s born of a mind that digs and digs and digs for the roots of patterns and rhythms in a way that can be felt though sensation. I use biology, ecology, and other sciences to bridge depth of understanding. They’re all entangled. It takes one out of so much mental gymnastics into embodied recognition of cycles playing out. It’s a lifestyle tool to help you cultivate balance and rhythm in co-creation with nature and the stars.