Jupiter Clears

Jupiter has been afflicted for months now, in Aries.

Beginning at the end of October, this affliction began to clear. On 11/16 this area will become even less tense, with Mars moving into Scorpio and removing his gaze from Jupiter. The Mars influence on Jupiter has been present since 8/18 (first through his 8th house aspect from Virgo, then his 7th house aspect from Libra), and although this may have acted like a ‘spark’ in the area of your life Aries influences, given the other negative factors involved it may have acted more like the final straw in an already tense situation than the mobilizing high-energy combination Jupiter and Mars create when they come together.

The result of this long, drawn out affliction to Jupiter—which really began about one and a half years ago with Rahu’s conjunction—is in an exhaustion of all that the planet stands for: positivity, spaciousness, morals, spiritual integrity and good decision-making. At the tail end of such a transit, Jupiter starts to wonder if spaciousness and morality and clean living are even worth preserving. He’s been taking hits from so many angles for so long that he hardly knows who he is. You may feel a bit like this in some area of your life right now, which will likely line up with the placement of Aries in your natal chart.

The (very) good news is that Jupiter will start to get some reprieve the second half of this month. He will still be influenced by the lineup of Saturn and Rahu preceding him in Aquarius and Pisces, respectively, which forms a ‘mala yoga’ wherein the sign right after a string of malefics gets hit with their combined influence, but this should be relatively minor compared to what’s been going on in recent months. Already Jupiter is experiencing relief simply from Rahu not being directly conjunct. Over time this will contribute to a general ‘head clearing’ effect for the collective, as the Rahu influence on the head of the zodiac lifts and Jupiter is there to support some clear seeing.

Jupiter will still be retrograde through November and most of December, which means that his focus is inward and he is moving slowly, likely contemplating all that he’s just been through and what it means. Parts of life and people related to Jupiter (teachers, teaching, spirituality, education, support, etc) may appear to be harder to get to or require more effort, as they may be involved in this process of internal re-hashing of recent events which may have turned them upside down. As stated earlier, this is a good time to engage in challenging spiritual practice or education, or undertake a difficult teaching task requiring lots of complicated pieces. The retrograde will support such a task, as it has endurance and a detail-orientation related to its planetary archetype.

It might be helpful to support Jupiter’s slow regeneration after all of the affliction by taking whatever opportunities may arise to make more space in your life—whether that means moving into a bigger room or house or taking an extended trip or building out a few hours per week for yourself—so that Jupiter (and you) can remember what it feels like to not be constricted and under constant stress. It is good to consciously engage and release the psychological, emotional or physical patterns that were created during a transit such as this so that they do not become permanent features of your psychology and nervous system.

Other ways to create space include working with sound (which is the medium through which space works), either in the context of a workshop (sound baths, etc) or on your own time by filling your space with sounds that soothe you.

Those with a weaker natal Jupiter will have felt the impacts of this transit more acutely and may need more recovery time to get back to a healthy sense of spaciousness in their lives.