BORIS JOHNSON'S VENUS

The Prime Minister has Sun conjunct Venus. With Libra Rising, Venus is also his chart ruler. How appropriate that the No 10 lockdown parties are headlines again, as Venus retrogrades, a time for addressing Venus issues. I expect part of it was that he couldn't bear the opprobrium of not giving his employees what they wanted. That is the weakness of Venus. The need to be liked. 

 

 

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This PM will go down with a whimper, not a bang: it will be low-level stuff, because he couldn't help himself. It's a pity, because his 9th House emphasis gives a lot of ability to lead and to convey optimism. It's his Grand Trine, and his Saturn in Pisces too, that show how he undermines himself. It's a moral failing, and it is unnecessary. The 9th House is ethics. Maybe he will learn something. Or maybe not. You can never tell. That bit isn't in astrology charts.

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Here is what published astrologer Joanna Watters said about it: "The astrologer's first job is to demystify. The second is to fascinate. Through his insistence on pure craft winning, at every turn, over personal feelings or bias, Barry Goddard achieves just that. An astrological page-turner."

BORIS JOHNSON’S SATURN

Boris was the man who got Brexit done. It was a fudge over Northern Ireland, it was always going to have to be, and I think both sides tacitly understood that. The need to enact the outcome of the referendum ended up paralysing Parliament, it was a crisis, and maybe no-one but Johnson could have pulled it off.

I’ve been wondering for a while whether the major transits coming to Johnson in the next couple of years – Neptune square Sun, Pluto square Moon, second Saturn Return – will mean the end of his premiership, or its rebirth for a long innings. I think it is one of those two things, and I am now leaning quite strongly towards the former.

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I think Johnson’s Saturn in Pisces describes both his strengths and his weaknesses. It is opposite Uranus, and as Richard Tarnas has pointed out, this is a configuration that lends itself to crisis management. Churchill and Joe Biden both had/have hard aspects between these 2 planets. You can see why: Uranus disrupts the status quo (Saturn), and that is the crisis. But then Saturn reshapes and contains it.

Saturn, the planet of form and structure, find it difficult being in formless Pisces. Where it can come into its own here is on a collective level. The signs with outer planet rulers all have a collective dimension: Scorpio, Aquarius and Pisces.

Johnson seemed very sure-footed around Brexit. He stormed into Parliament, attempted to prorogue it, won a convincing election and steered the whole thing through. His Saturn was operating on behalf of a collective demand, and it was very effective. It was the same with Covid: he was able to manage that crisis, I am not saying no-one else could have done, and of course it was bumbling, but governments usually are.

Where Johnson’s Saturn in Pisces comes undone is on a personal level. Metaphorically, he cannot keep his flies done up. He lives and works in a chaotic way. He does not know how to give form and probity to his life. Johnson is an object lesson in the difficulty that Saturn has in this sign.

Sun conjunct Venus and Libra Rising gives him his great popular appeal. It also leads to the chumocracy.

His Mars is square to Saturn, suggesting he can find it difficult to motivate himself – unless, as we have seen, there is a crisis. As Ken Livingstone said of Johnson when he was London Mayor: “Boris is a lazy tosser who just wants to be there.”

The Sun-Moon-Saturn Grand trine can also suggest the ‘lazy tosser’ quality, someone who is talented and therefore to whom things have always come easily. I think it also gives him his optimism which is genuine and infectious. The optimism also comes from the 9th House Sun-Venus.

The only personal Earth in the chart is Jupiter in Taurus, which is hardly an earthy planet, and opposite Neptune. Nor is he impelled to find Earth by House – all he has is Neptune in the second. This is also why he can be optimistic – he is not overly weighed down by practical considerations. But it also means he doesn’t think ordinary practical things matter, like who pays for his decoration, or whether there is a party at No 10 during lockdown. It does, however, mean he can be creative and open in a way that is difficult for a more grounded person, which is how he got Brexit done.

The lies are very Gemini, and he has 4 personal planets in that sign. Politicians always lie when in a tight spot, it’s just that Boris has more tight spots than most due to his chaotic ways. They are always over stupid things like parties and affairs and personal money. His one big public lie was the bus, and he regretted that – it was an exaggeration from £250m to £350m with some dodgy accounting. The reason I’m saying this is that he also tells it as it is to the public, he likes to explain. Gemini has a strong relationship with truth as well as lies.

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Above is Johnson’s Solar Return for 2023, just 18 months away, or maybe a bit less, as SR charts can kick in a few months early. Sun on the IC square to Neptune Rising. The IC, the bottom of the chart, describes endings, because that is where something is no longer visible. I think that says it. It is a very strong chart. He will step down. Boris’s SR Chart for 2019, when he became premier, had Moon-Saturn-Pluto in Cap in the 10th, and Cap MC: a weighty responsibility. So his SR charts show form.

In 2023 he will have his first exact Saturn Return just before his solar return. Pluto will all but square his Moon, ruler of his MC, his standing in public. It looks like sometime in 2023 will probably be the end of his premiership.

I think that, as with any politicians, we have to be able to look at their strengths as well as their weaknesses. It is too easy to dismiss them as just this or just that. We get a kick out of doing so. It puts us above them, as if we could do any better. But I don’t think a chart analysis is possible unless you can give credit where credit is due. And that applies to Donald Trump too.

 

FAMILY CONSTELLATIONS

 

I have two younger brothers, who are a lot more like my father than I ever was. He died in 2015. Their relations with him were easy. They have lived as he did - straightforward, ambitious, materialistic guys, like a lot of people. Their charts don't interact particularly strongly with my father's, except in easy ways.

Mine, however, does. His Sun conjoins my Asc and squares my Moon-Saturn. His Saturn conjoins my Moon. His Moon opposes my Sun. His Mars hard aspects my Asc, Moon and Saturn. His Asc conjoins my North Node. My MC conjoins his North Node. Strong, visceral, challenging interactions that were 'meant' to be. 

 

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We never had much to do with each other once I left school. We were chalk and cheese. I fled for my own psychological survival, and to pursue my metaphysical quest. But he was never far away. Breaking free consumed me for decades. He is still there. A shadow lifted from me when he died.

For his part, he was proud, how was he to speak of me to his friends, this eldest son who was, from his point of view, an embarrassment and a failure? This man, with a Sun-Mars-Saturn t-square, to whom what other people thought mattered so much?

 

As I say, the astrology shows the connection to be strong and visceral, for both of us, but never spoken because challenging, and powerful in a way it could never be with the younger sons who were like him. How interesting. Such a strong interaction, yet we lived away from each other, precisely because it was so challenging. But that didn't mean there wasn't an intense relationship occurring. Considering our charts has alerted me to this.

 

And then it happened again with my ex, who I was with for 18 years. She has the same Sun and Moon as my mother. Her Sun squares my Mars, my Sun squares her Mars. Her Saturn squares my Sun, my Moon-Saturn squares her Moon. Very difficult. Yet we were pulled irresistibly together because her Sun and Moon are in my 7th House, my Sun conjoins her Asc, my Moon-Saturn conjoins her MC. We have been apart for over 4 years. It was always difficult, yet it changed me hugely. I can't speak for her. We have very little to do with each other now, and I suspect it will need to always remain that way. It is not the sort of synastry where you remain 'friends' afterwards. We could easily be enemies if I behaved like she does. 

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So like my Dad, there is this strong ongoing relationship in which we rarely meet, described by the antagonistic astrology. But that doesn't mean there isn't something transformational going on under the surface, that requires the distance in order to happen. It's a long and deep process, which will run for many years yet.

 

Pluto is coming up to conjoin my Aquarian Venus. How will I love, who will I love, then?

TEACHER PSYCHOLOGY

This is the point I am leading up to: if there are things in ourself we don't want to get close to, our relationships with pupils will tend to reinforce that.

I don't always recognise it when people are seeing me as someone they can learn from. It's not just English modesty - a much over-rated, and sometimes hypocritical, virtue - but also an unwillingness just to stand up straight and say to myself this is who you are, you've been round this block enough times: if you haven't got something to say, then who has?

It's not just to do with having been around the block. It's also something I came here with, that has always been natural to me, and yes I've had to stand back for years at certain points to round it out and clear some s%$t out the way, but it would be false of me not to own that. So my first point is if you've got it, own it, it is not a virtue to deny it. You will see it in people's responses to you.

Coming out of that is my second point. People will love you and they will give some of their own power to you. This is a natural thing: most of us are not fully living our own connection to Spirit - the East of the Medicine Wheel. They may raise you up beyond where you are yourself. Never mind. Projection is usually a necessary thing, to some extent. First we see it out there, or we imagine we do, and then we claim it for ourselves. The pedestal is something we have to learn to handle, and to honour it, for we are holding something precious for the other person till they are ready to embody it themselves. It's a delicate thing. Often people's way to their own power is the painful one of betrayal by the teacher. But it doesn't have to be like that, not if the teacher has been around the block enough times and learnt from that.

And what I'm referring to is the teacher's shadow work. The places we are needy, or concealed from ourselves. It has perhaps been the place I have learnt most from myself: giving others my East, then having that betrayed. It is a valid path, albeit rather protracted and painful. To some extent, it is inevitable, for no teacher is perfect, we are all human.

There is this gross level, where the teacher really should be back in his or her cave for a decade, sorting their stuff. The teacher who needs everyone to think like they do, and if they don't, tells the pupils they are 'confused'. The one who creates a love-fest centred around them at the end of the workshop, because they need to be loved. The one who has their issues with authority, and draws the pupils into their own conspiracy views of how the world works. You can often tell when there is something funny going on, because the people around the teacher will tend to reflect the imbalance or woundedness of the teacher.

Then there is the more subtle level, which is where I really wanted to get to. The people who come to your workshops aren't going to challenge you in an intimate kind of way. Challenge is the wrong word. It's softer than that. It's more like they won't relate to you like a good friend will. It's an energetic thing as much as anything. They won't move in on you personally, they will hold you at a respectful distance. By and large. You are the teacher. I'm not quite sure how to put this. I know. They are not going to come near the stuff in yourself you want to keep a distance from, whereas a friend may do, if you're lucky. Or a family member, that's what they're for :)

The astrologer Liz Greene talks in her Mythic Tarot book about the psychotherapist as someone who can protect their own woundedness by creating relationships in which they always have the power. I think this is really what I am getting at. When you have pupils, there is usually a relationship based around you carrying the East, and initiating them into it. That is a powerful thing, and it creates a powerful relationship. But it also hides you from the things in yourself that you aren't very comfortable with, or are unconscious of. There is an unspoken agreement not to go there. And this is what we need to watch out for, even if we have done a considerable amount of our own shadow work.

Put it this way: if there are things in ourself we don't want to get close to, our relationship with pupils will tend to reinforce that. So we also need people we don't have that kind of relationship with.

BE TRUE TO THE UNIVERSE

Most of the blogs I write at the moment are at my Shamanic Blog. They get emailed out (unlike this one) if you subscribe, and you can find me at http://shamanicfreestate.blogspot.com/. Here is one I wrote last night, having had the idea just before in the bath:

If there is any way that you are not being true to who you are in your life, do not overlook it for the sake of not causing trouble for yourself or others. It matters, and it will eventually bite you, hard (if you are fortunate.) It cannot be smoothed over or wished away. You may get seriously ill if you try to skirt around it. It is where the cutting edge of your soul lies. It can take courage, it can take those close to you thinking you have lost it. It can take a lot of trust in the bigger design of things, and that you are being taken care of.

 

 

It is not just ourselves we need to be true to, more accurately it is the whole universe we need to be true to, because that is what we really are - the whole universe. It is about being true to the Great Spirit that runs through everything. That is what we are here to do

HOW LONG WILL BORIS LAST?

I don't know if Boris Johnson will be gone or not in a couple of years. Certainly he will have Pluto square Moon, Neptune square Sun and his second Saturn Return to contend with, all at the same time. These are not continuations of other major transits, they are a big new phase for him, so as I wrote a few months back, it will probably be the end of him as PM. If not, I think he will be settling in, post-Covid and post-Brexit, to an innings of quite a different nature that will last the rest of the decade, at which point Neptune will square his MC and dissolve his premiership.

You can never quite tell. If he goes, it may well be because the way he operates is just too chaotic for his colleagues to stomach. Chaotic is one word for it, open and creative is another. That is why he could get Brexit done when diligent Theresa May couldn't. I think BJ works intuitively: he can see something can be done, and leaves the detail to others. Diligent, conscientious people are notoriously judging of open, creative people. Think accountants vs bohemians. That is why Gove and Cummings, two of his closest colleagues, have at different times declared Johnson unfit for office. In a sense they are right, but they are also missing something, and that is part of what makes him electable. He is not a robot.

Johnson has 7 planets in mutable signs: Sun, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Saturn, Uranus and Pluto. Mutable signs do not have their own motivation. They work best when there is pressure from outside, as we have seen with Johnson. His Saturn-Uranus opposition is good for crises (creating a container/Saturn for disruption/Uranus). His level of mutability, and particularly, maybe, Saturn in Pisces, describe the chaos that seems to envelop him. But also his openness to new solutions. Don't expect him to have thought-out policies. He works responsively, and there is a lot to be said for that.

Johnson has a Sun-Moon-Saturn Grand Trine. This is why he is an optimist who thinks everything will work out. This is something I appreciate about the guy, especially in a Capricornian country such as ours, where we think it is only right not to think well of ourselves. His Grand Trine is compromised by being in 2 elements - Air and Water - when the point of Grand Trines is that they are all in the same element. But I think it gives him the ability to articulate (Sun-Venus in Air) emotion (Moon and Saturn in Water), which is why he has hitherto been so electable - as MP, as Mayor of London, and as PM.

I think we can rely on him, as an optimist, not to create austerity as a response to our record debt levels. This is what the Tories did last time (2010) and they got panned for it, which I think is unfair, because it is a responsible approach to debt. Spending your way out of debt, which the Americans did, worked, but it is not the obvious thing to do. Taurean Rishi Sunak will, of course, argue for austerity, because that is what Chancellors do. So expect tension.

It may be that he gets bored of being PM. That would be one outcome for his second Saturn Return (in Pisces). It may turn to ashes for him, not providing the meaning (his 9th House emphasis) that he thought it would, his childhood dream to be 'king of the world'. His Pluto-Moon and Neptune-Sun transits will reveal this, and others will sense the loss of fire and political killer instinct. Johnson is a natural writer (Sun and Mercury in 9th Gemini) and this is what he may turn to.

Johnson's Moon in fixed Scorpio (ruling his MC) tells a different story to his Grand Trine and his unusual mutability. It describes the enduring drive for power behind the bonhomie, which you need to have if you are a politician. You need ambition if you are to do well in any walk of life, and I think we need to allow that to politicians, like we would with other professions. The problem is the degree to which it can take over. In Johnson's case, he may lose his fire, but will nevertheless want to hang on (Moon in Scorp) and may need to be ousted.

His Moon in Scorpio also describes his desire for personal and family privacy. But because it rules his MC, his personal matters do tend to become public. There is one mishap after another, mostly as a result of his chaotic nature, whether it is his personal finances or being indiscreet in his utterances (but really, there shouldn't be leaks, and people shouldn't leave government, like Cummings did, and then attack his erstwhile employers. It is dishonourable, something the Victorians would have understood.)

Personally, I don't mind the chaos that is around Johnson. It is not my problem. It is a problem for those who work with him. He is a good front man. He is libertarian, he is bold, he is a good communicator, and he is reasonably centrist. He polarises people, and maybe that is a Gemini thing. Think Blair, with Mars Rising in Gemini. I have seen well-known astrologers refer to the present administration as a bad lot, as though that is a fact rather than a value judgement. That reflects the degree of polarisation we have politically at the moment. Astrologers need to be beyond that.

If you want to do political astrology - if you want to have intelligent things to say politically - we need to step out of the crass habit of assuming the worst of the politicians you don't vote for. It gives a comfortable liberal tribal identity, but there is no understanding in it. Personally, I am willing to live with people thinking I am naive for not assuming the worst, for assuming that there is something that politicians of all persuasions are trying to do, that isn't just about power. I think it means I can, to a degree, do political astrology. Whereas those still in the matrix cannot: they tend to misuse astrology to confirm their political prejudices.

AMBITION AND SATURN

If you have Saturn near the top of your chart, visible to the world, then there is a good chance that you will be ambitious, in the sense of there being some sort of mark you will need to make on the world, that helps define who you are. We are here to incarnate, to bring spirit into matter, and Saturn is the planet that forces us, sometimes painfully, to do just that. So it is not just an ego thing: by putting your mark on the world, you are giving birth to yourself. As I wrote the above, someone with Saturn in the 10th House asked me for a reading. So I'm probably onto something :)

But Saturn can also be limited. He can have his ears closed to the outer planets, indeed he may try to boss them around, and that is always messy. Saturn is also the Protestant Work Ethic, that tells us to define our worth by how much we work and how much we have visibly achieved. So if you have a prominent Saturn, and you have a drive to be self-aware, then I think there is often a process of disentangling to be done after you have made your initial mark. You may have a painful period where the old is no longer working so well, so how do you define yourself now? 

 

One way of looking at this is that our true nature is formless, while anything we put out into the world by definition has form, has Saturn, so it cannot fully express who we are. And who we are is, hopefully, going through a deepening process all the time. This is why poets pay such attention to the words they use. Giving exact expression to the inner world is difficult, and always an approximation. 

 

And then there is the good old ego. It comes out one way or the other, whatever our chart. In the case of a prominent Saturn, you can ask yourself how you feel in those interim periods where you have no projects, and the world is not noticing you? How brittle are you if someone critiques whatever it is you use to define yourself? How threatened are you by your rivals? We can learn a lot about ourselves from these places, precisely because they are uncomfortable.

 

Then there is Saturn in the bottom half of the chart. I am being schematic here, because it is never this simple. But simplicity can be illustrative. I have Saturn hidden away in the 4th. I'd say that it is not in my nature to keep myself very busy, to do lots as a way of defining myself. I do less, but what I do comes after a lot of cooking and tends to work well, and there is not too much of 'me' in the way of it. Saturn has, to a large extent, become the guardian of my inner life instead of, as he started out, the denier of its value. This has been the big Saturn battle for me. 

 

It is a difficult and elusive placement, because Saturn is naturally much happier with outer, visible things that can be measured. How do you measure inner change? Well, you don't. Only you know it, though you may also get good feedback from others sometimes about who you are, rather than about the great things you have done. When I was younger, I was always trying to prove something about myself through what I did, and it rarely worked very well. In fact, it often hardly worked at all. This is because my Saturn does not belong primarily out in the world.

 

The challenge with the extraverted Saturn is not to let your sense of who you are get too tied up with what you do. It will limit your awareness of your own fluid depths, and keep others at a distance. With the introverted Saturn, I think the challenge can be to learn to value yourself simply for who you are, and not indulge a feeling of worthlessness on the world's terms. This Saturn, once he is on side, can give you self-mastery, gravitas, depth.

 

Mythologically, Saturn devoured his children at birth, jealous that they would overthrow him. In the same way, Saturn can lead us to doubt whatever we have genuinely achieved, telling us it is not good enough. He is very strong in this form in the culture at large, because that is how large societies tend to control themselves. Original Sin was in this respect a great wheeze for controlling people. Saturn goes both ways: he helps us achieve, helps us incarnate. But then denies the value of that.