Grabbed Episode 21: A Plutonian Cosmic Valentine

Hey everyone, this is Adam Elenbaas from Nightlight Astrology. Happy Friday, everybody. Today, we're going to take some time out for a #grabbed episode. If you are new to the channel, you may notice that once in a while, we shout out the #grabbed, and we tell everyone to share their stories using the #grabbed in the comment section or to email us your stories at our email address grabbed@nightlightastrology.com

One of the ancient names of the planets was grahas, which means to grab. It can also mean to grasp as in to understand, but there was a dual meaning that Indian astrologers had in that word Graha, which meant that the planet sometimes, as administrators of karma and fate, grabs us or seizes our lives, and especially in relation to the unconscious dimensions of our psyches and we also if we study astrology, we have an opportunity through reflecting upon the sudden appearances of the planets in the way that they grab us to grasp or to understand something that they may be teaching us. So this series is dedicated to highlighting your stories of the transits that you have experienced and the ways in which they served, as you know, education and soul education.

So, and also just to celebrate the fact that we live in a universe that can be observed through the archetypal patterns of the planets. It's just an amazing thing that by recognizing that, we can put ourselves back into an enchanted cosmos.

So this series has been devoted, for a long time, to highlighting your stories and celebrating the daily appearances of the planets in our lives, the way they show up and grab us sometimes in the way that we also grasp and understand through their appearances.

So, another storytelling episode today is our agenda. I've got a bunch of stories to share and some reflections at the end, as I always do. Thank you so much for sharing your stories. If you've ever if you would ever like to share them again, just use the hashtag grabbed or email us your story grabbed@nightlightastrology.com.

In the meantime, before we get into it, don't forget to like and subscribe. You can pirouette your way onto the like button. You guys are getting a little bit spicy. Someone said I'm going to sit on the face of the like button. I was like, we're gonna go there. Okay, some of you guys are having more fun than you ought to have with that.

Anyway, however, you do it. Actually, my favorite one was when someone said, Oh, I'm going to meditate on the like button to the point that I become the like button, and then I'm going to press myself. That was my favorite. Keep it clean, guys keep it clean. You can find a transcript of today's talk on the website nightlightastrology.com.

I also want to point you guys to a few things that we're promoting this week. One is the start of Ashley's new herbal apprenticeship programs. It's not new; she's just teaching it again for the first time in a couple of years since taking a maternity leave. If you want to learn more about Ashley's work and hear her teach, you can check out her YouTube channel, Skyhouseherbs. Instagram is skyhouseherbs, and then the website is skyhouseherbs.com.

When you go over there, you will see that Herbal Foundation's Apprenticeship course is starting in late April and is on sale now. So, if you want to sign up for the sale price, you can when you go over to the website, click on courses, go to Herbal Foundations Apprenticeship, and at the end of today's program and all of our programs for a couple of weeks.

At the very end, if you stick around after the content for the day, there was an interview that we have tagged on to the end where I sit down with Ashley and talk about her work as an herbalist, someone who works with the doctrine of signatures plant spirit medicine, and she will tell you more about her program if you are interested in studying herbs and pairing it alongside your interest in astrology.

The two go together nicely and very intuitively. So, the course is starting soon, and at the end of today's program, you can learn more about it with Ashley. So, on that note, I will also point you over to the Nightlight website and two things that you can check out there.

One is we have a new shop, and this is our digital archives. We have all of our MasterClass series from 2023 that are available, or you can bundle them. You can also pick up a copy of my book as it comes out chapter by chapter, which will be, you know, easily a year out before it is in published paperback form. So, an easy way to read the book as it's being written, and then you can check out the live talks coming up this month of March Neptune in Love on March 14. That's happening as the sun is coming into conjunction with Neptune.

So, another timely talk on Neptune significations in love and relationships in April. We're doing Uranus in Love, so you can check those out, and then the Pluto in Love recording from February is also available for purchase, so check those things out. Come sign up for the next webinar. We're doing Neptune in Love. Hope to see you there. All right. Now, on that note, onto your stories.

Most of the stories that I gathered for today's storytelling episode came through contacts with Pluto or the Venus-Pluto contact that came through around Valentine's Day; I just found that the quality of stories for that conjunction between Venus and Pluto was pretty profound. There are some Mercury-Pluto dynamics as well in the mix. But I focused a lot on transits to Pluto that have taken place recently as Pluto is moved into Aquarius.

So anyway, it is always an honor to read your stories. So many people submitted stories to our email address, and through the comments section, we aggregate those I look through them. I couldn't possibly feature everyone. So, anyway, let's get into it. A lot of these are Venus-Pluto dynamics that came in again around Valentine's Day. So, Venus-Pluto.

I have been waiting for an appointment with my psychologist for about two months, which my husband must attend as I've just closed some things, which I didn't realize I was letting slide as someone who has a lot of childhood trauma, so the appointment will take place as Venus conjoins Pluto, she's saying that she's saying stuff that I have put up with for 24 years is finally going to erupt in the session, and, I think, most likely end in our divorce. I can't wait for this release even though all I can see in my mind's eye is the goddess Pele in a volcano erupting, scared but relieved knowing this is coming.

Well, I hope it went well, and thank you so much for sharing. That is a very Venus-Pluto-like event to be taking place as the two planets get together. So I hope it went well for you. That has to be difficult, and I can feel that relief too. That's a great way of describing Venus. Pluto is that kind of relief that comes through it.

Now, this one, Venus-Pluto, this is as the two planets came together. It's talking with her husband, and the husband begins with the whole that so gay, derogatory remark. I usually just ignore it when he says something like this and move on. But this time, I paused, and I said, you know, it's okay to be gay. He said, No, it's not, and then I said why not? He went on to say you can control it, and it's genetic but also environmental. So if I control the environment, then if one controls the environment, then it goes away.

Then she went on to say that right before her husband's mother passed. She told me that the reason that she and her partners or her spouse's father got divorced was because she found out that his dad was having an affair with a mutual guy friend.

She said that her husband would never admit it, but that he's gay, and this is her husband is his son, and so she's reflecting, and she goes on, but I'll just summarize it that her husband's homophobia is related intimately to things that happened with his dad, which he is not even maybe aware of.

I thought that was, I mean, first of all, I just there's, you know, it's, uh, you know, it's appalling to me when people are homophobic and so good for you for saying something and for you know, trying to face something or I think it's good to speak up, you know, maybe there's growth that's possible for your husband, but what a Venus-Pluto thing to have happen.

It's interesting that you carry this secret about his dad that he doesn't know and that you haven't wanted to confront him with. Just the whole thing was so Venus, Pluto, and I can only imagine the difficulty of knowing what to say. I guess this comes from a person who has a strong Christian background as well, which is one of the things that you'll hear often in fundamentalist religious communities is that, oh, that's controllable. You can just change that about yourself. So anyway, it's a very dark and I imagined charged conversation to have as Venus was conjoined Pluto. Thank you for sharing it with us.

This next Venus-Pluto example is interesting. I got picked up by my dinner date on Valentine's. He seemed a little off, but eventually, it came out that he had been somewhere that day getting me a present when there was a shooting he was in, and he was leaving as police were literally rushing into the area. When we went back to my house later, there was this scary person lurking around outside. Who has been stealing from cars in the area recently still too loaded guns from a work truck.

Police have been called numerous times and never got him. Obviously, it wasn't exactly a relaxing vibe to come home to while you're trying to eat strawberry cupcakes, and then during the evening, as we were hanging out, I got a message from the relative of a friend of mine who had taken their own life last year. I felt very obligated to get back to them to support them in this hard time. But I was overwhelmed because I was trying to have a nice evening with my date in the midst of all of this. It was just a lot of crazy Venus-Pluto, and Mars-Pluto, too, was coming through. Yeah, I mean, first of all, all of that sounds very, yeah, like just an aura of Plutonian energy around Valentine's, and a lot of people saw that a lot. There were so many stories like that around Valentine's Day, which is why I chose to focus on this transit. It's interesting, you know, it's, it creates a mood and a feeling, and when you know the transit is behind it. I mean, at the very least, it's helpful that you know what's going on.

Here's another Venus-Pluto: my teenage son said something mean about another guy's girlfriend. The other guy knocked his drink out of his hand and said he would come over and beat his ass. My son said, If you do, I will shoot you.

Now, both boys are suspended while the school investigates the threats. I'm hoping he doesn't get kicked out of school. These boys are so stupid and dramatic. Yeah, there's Venus-Pluto, you said something mean about my girlfriend first of all, I mean, it's a shitty thing to do. But then, let's kill each other over it. Just like how Venus-Pluto does it get how Mars-Pluto does it get.

Mars conjoining Pluto, my mom is a teacher. I called her before she went to work over the last two school years; the bad behaviors of more and more students have escalated to the point where the teachers and other students don't always feel safe. Principal superintendent higher-ups have set protocols that leave teachers somewhat powerless despite voicing concerns. So, sometimes, she goes on to talk about how things are thrown and threats are made. There's physical violence in the school at times, and Mom told me this morning that she's come across paperwork that she came across paperwork stuffed in a desk written by a student with lyrics that he altered from a song and added lyrics about a gun in my backpack and not being a snitch. This stuff is becoming normalized.

Students are sent to the office just to return with a snack and juice, and she goes on to talk about how she's frustrated that someone like her mom comes across things like this and not a lot happens, and that all transpired as Mars was conjoining Pluto.

That is just That's hard. That's really hard, and I, you know, I'm not an expert on any of these topics. But it does seem to me that, you know, when I think about when I was in high school, Columbine happened, and that's the first memory I have of a really serious school act of violence like that, and it just seems like yeah, it's normalized now and to be reminded of that, in this very powerful way with your mom teach the teacher finding that note as Mars is conjoining Pluto is rattling I'm sure and it might leave you feeling very typical Mars Pluto theme of feeling a little powerless, powerless over forces that are like ominous or that we're somehow in denial of yeah.

Here's a Mercury-Pluto conjunction. I ended up watching a podcast that aired a couple of years ago that came on automatically after a regular YouTube video. It was all about thought and how our thoughts are naturally wired at times to go to the darkest ideas to imagine them in order to keep us safe.

There was a lot on how to reprogram thoughts. It was really interesting at the end; it switched to the dangers of AI, and we need to parent the AI to ensure it's ethical and acts in favor of the best of humanity and at worst, fascinating was also spot on for Mercury conjoining Pluto I agree and that's the thing is that if you can spot a Mercury-Pluto conjunction in relation to a podcast that just happens to pop up in your feed that you listen to. That's the astrological life, and it does. There's a lot of benefit in that outside of whatever you're listening to, to be able to reflect upon what you are listening to as an archetype is so valuable.

Mercury-Pluto, my grandmother, who passed away 15 years ago, received a letter from the bank regarding the status of her account and the remaining balance, and I have to deal with it. Communication from the underworld about riches, yeah, there it is, Mercury-Pluto.

I have not heard of TV, and for 14 years, another subscriber says I live in a rural community where TV services are pricey. I'm on a fixed income, which is no big deal because I've reasonable rural Wi-Fi and binge-watch YouTube. However, within three days of Mercury conjoining Pluto, out of the blue, nonrelated friends gifted me their former TVs after they upgraded so from zero TVs for 14 years to two just like that.

One is a smart TV that is in perfect working order so I can watch it on the Internet. Yeah, a Mercury and Pluto. Yes. Deal with the devil, maybe? No, I'm just kidding. Yeah, there's a Mercury-Pluto as a small event. That becomes a cosmic event when you know astrology.

Ugh, I don't even want to write this because it is so upsetting. I'm still feeling shaken. But earlier tonight, I heard someone knocking on my front door and then weirdly knocking on one of my windows. I didn't want to go out because it was so dark. So I just ignored whoever it was. But it scared me a little while later; there was some commotion outside. So go out there, and there's a guy and a girl who was passing a plastic bag to an animal control officer. Apparently, there was a cat hit by a car, and they had waited to hand the body off to the animal control person.

Immediately, my stomach was in knots because I feed a lot of cats that are like my family members. I looked and asked to see inside the bag. I was preparing for the worst when I looked. It was a cat I'd never seen before. But he did look almost identical to one of mine. It was just very bizarre.

Apparently, the guy knocking on my door was one of the finders who thought maybe the cat was mine. A few of the neighbors started talking about yes, so anyway, so it goes on. But the simple point was that this was Mercury Pluto again, where there was a messenger of death that came to the door with the body of a dead animal cat that they thought might have been hers. It turns out it wasn't, but wow.

I mean, that's just it's such a weird, simple event, and I mean, I feel like if you didn't know astrology, you might be startled by it, and you might get the shivers or the chills, so to speak. You might know it as a different kind of event. There's like a little ripple in the fabric of space and time, and things like that happen to people who know nothing about astrology, and I think people notice it. When you do of astrology, that ripple is it's I don't know. It's weird. It's like a cosmic paintbrush coming down and putting color all around what's happening.

On this day, Mercury conjunct Pluto, I told the person that I was in a relationship and that I would no longer be their mistress. Yes, I said it, mistress. It's not what you were expecting from me, either. So they go on to tell the story of how they started having an affair with a married man and being promised all sorts of things that they realized were never going to happen, and so they get to this point, Mercury conjoins Pluto after talking with their therapists where they say no more. Breaking the news to you that I will not be your mistress. Good for you. I'm sure that was not easy, but I'm sure it was necessary.

My niece called me Tuesday and made her stomach pains pain she's never felt before. I was looking at the aspects of Mars-Pluto conjoining, and I knew that it was probably a stomach virus. Anyway, so her pains were very sharp. Turned out to be E. Coli from Trader Joe's. Ooh, well, sorry. You know? No, I did not mean to scare everyone away from Trader Joe's by saying that, but yikes that sucks. I hope she got that straightened out; that sounds awful. But yeah, because you know, Pluto and Mars, you knew that there was something probably a little bit more serious going on, and we're able to advise her to go see the doctor that was part of this read. So that's good. I mean, that's how astrology helps us.

I've been in a relationship for three and a half years, doing my best to make it work, and I have to come to terms with the fact that we're not right for each other. The thing is, we live together and are high school sweethearts. There's a trauma bond after my engaged coworker, who we instantly clicked into sync with, and I think it may be the one because you can just tell sometimes nothing is hard with him. Everything fits naturally, and we get along really well.

So I have identified as asexual for 20 years, and this person has also awakened within them this coworker their sexual desires. Okay, wow and you're so you're okay, let's keep going. At the beginning of the month, this coworker admitted to having feelings for me. We've started to get attached to one another. Now we're talking every day. He got the ring back and is planning on having a breakup with his girlfriend, and I'm making moves in my current relationship. This is all happening as Venus is coming to conjoin Pluto this week. Drama.

I hope it works out well. I mean, regardless, I would you know, just my experience of Venus-Pluto, regardless of whether this coworker is the one or not, if something has been awakened and if there has been clarification about your existing relationship and moving on, that can't be a bad thing, I would say to go easy with respect to entering into the new relationship because if you attended my Pluto in Love webinar, quite frequently, trauma bonding or any kind of like codependent dynamic with Venus-Pluto can transfer into a new relationship that we see is the thing that will heal us or fix things. So you want to be a little, I mean, just my advice, unsolicited, take it or leave it, be a little careful.

But yeah, anyway, the story starts in 2017. This summer, after my first year in college, my younger sister and I hung out almost every day with a mutual group of friends that were several guys, one of whom I was attracted to. So we started talking, and he showed an interest in me. My sister told me one day that she liked him as well as two other guys, one of whom she was in a relationship with. I didn't think much of it because I thought it was normal to have crushes on multiple guys at that age. I also did not disclose my own feelings to her because I was still not sure of our connection at the time.

So they started seeing each other. One thing led to another, became physical, and we hooked up a few times before he confessed to me that he had hooked up with my sister once before we started talking. This shocked me to the point that I had a little mental breakdown. Never talked about my sister before then. So, it never even crossed my mind that this was a possibility. I felt awful and betrayed. We hung out a few more times, and we broke it off, and I never told my sister.

So anyway, she goes on for quite a ways to tell about how in 2023, they finally kind of have a conversation about everything coming out all hunky dory. We're all going to move past it, and as Venus and Pluto come together, they're invited to a house party, and they both get there and what do you know what? Wodi Dodi? There he is. So they said hi. They left the party; the sister stayed behind.

Anyway, they went out again the following weekend, and she saw him again. They had a hug and decided that they just wanted to be cool and be friends going forward. She sees her sister a little later in the evening, and they have a big fight about the whole thing. This goes on for paragraphs and paragraphs, guys, so I apologize.

By the way, here's just a piece of advice for everybody: try to make your story super concise. It's like it's easier for me to recount the stories, especially when they're good ones. This is a good one.

Anyway, so long story short, they have they had a major sisterly feud after reencountering this guy that they both had hooked up with, and she had to sort of stand her ground and find some confidence in the situation, which was very hard to do. Because there's a lot of tangled, complicated emotions on both sides. A feud with a sister, Venus, is love and sex and sisters. Did you know that Venus was one of the planets associated with sisters? So there's a major conflict over, you know, a guy that both sisters had hooked up with and see again, as Venus is conjoining Pluto can't make this stuff up.

It has always been part of the deal that when my husband and I were finished having biological children, I would have a mommy makeover to balance everything out. It entails different things for different people. But for me, for whatever reason, this area of fat around my upper abdomen has always bothered me. It's one of those areas that needs to be removed surgically because diet or exercise won't do it.

I underestimated the psychic mental effects this would have on releasing my mother's energies because this was something that her mother had as well. Yes, she says I likely underestimated the psychic, mental effects this would have on releasing my mother's energy, likely her traumas, because this type of fat storage is likely related to stress cortisol patterns then passed to me after the surgery was finished, and this happened has been as conjoined Pluto my mind felt so much clearer. Fat cells allegedly stopped growing after age 25ish. So, I don't know if any of this is true, by the way. I'm just reading what they wrote. I am so happy that everything is now and it's a more proper place, by proper, I mean, at rest and less stressful.

So Mommy Makeover leads to the releasing of fat in the body. But there's some connection with Mom that feels appropriate for Venus-Pluto, like a cosmetic surgery that has this kind of trauma history behind it. So, I can see how Venus-Pluto certainly related to that kind of procedure. But then also the sense of there being a big karmic relief that you feel is connected to mom because she had the same sort of fat deposit. Wow. You know, I mean, when is astrology helpful? Right, I mean that's ultimately what people are interested in, whether they're getting a reading or consuming YouTube content; we want to know when and how astrology is useful.

It is useful when it helps us to discover that fat is more than literal fat and the planets when they are combining at such moments are very clearly showing us that there is a karmic energetic level of reality as much as there is a physical one.

When a feud with a sister is taking place in the underworld, Venus and Pluto show you that the terrain in which something is happening is multi-dimensional and cosmic when you can just feel that he's the one, but you have to break up with the spouse when you're going from a sexual to feeling sexual, and Pluto is lurking with Venus. When you can tell the stomach virus is Hades.

When you break things off with someone and the words I am not your mistress, are Pluto's speaking, when there are cosmic deaths of animals right outside your door, coloring the way in which you experience someone knocking at your window.

When Pluto gifts you with a TV set, when Hades is moving through letters found on desks at school, and nobody is listening, you can sense that things may erupt if they are not taken more seriously. Gives you an ominous feeling of urgency. You know that these things are real because the planets are there in your understanding. When the podcast you randomly listened to speaks to worst-case thinking and changing your thinking, and Mercury and Pluto are conjoining.

When a squabble over a girl leads to death threats, my God. Mars-Pluto. When a Valentine's Day gift, an evening is covered in cosmic trauma that makes it hard to look at your strawberry. Your strawberry cupcake when homophobia is very clearly related to Venus, Pluto, and trauma in a person's life around sexuality. When you're having difficult conversations for breakfast, when you are preparing to speak to a husband in therapy, and you're like, I'm ready to eat a difficult conversation for breakfast this morning. It may not be easy, but I know I need to do it. You know Venus and Pluto are coming together in the sky.

See, our lives are enriched because of a lot of those things on the list today. I mean, they may as well go in the, you know, the shit heap bin of Pluto stories. A lot of them are kind of bummer or heavy or dark. But when we live an astrological life, they become that and so much more. I mean, aren't there times in life when you need to listen to something played in a minor key?

Aren't there times where, you know, lamentation or the blues are worth singing, and we have no problem imagining that life includes singing the blues? Through something like music, poetry, or film, we have a harder time grasping the idea that inherent in the experiences themselves are archetypal patterns.

So, for some reason, we think that the realm of the arts will be in that realm; it's okay to make our experiences artistic. But as soon as you start suggesting that the universe itself, in the way that experiences flow, is artistic, people inherently think you're crazy. But that's what we astrologers live with every day; there's nothing to hide, there's no shame in it, and it makes our lives more manageable.

Let's be honest: like any of those experiences, it can be a little heavier and stressful. You have the planets there, and you know that there is music playing presently in the experience. It doesn't mean that you have the answers to anything because you have that awareness. But it also, just like music, often takes you outside of the need for answers.

So does astrology. It just takes you into an aesthetic appreciating capacity for the intelligence, the beauty, the Divinity, the mysterious order of things, and we need that. We need that. I believe that it's a fundamental human need, and a lot of the time, because so many of us are dealing with Maslow's hierarchy or whatever that is, you know, we're dealing with such basic features of survival.

But astrology, I don't think that you have to have; you can have very little and be struggling with a lot of very basic things and still have some access to A paradigm in astrology that is truly for the people. It is for all human beings, and with that, all of our basic struggles in life can become so much richer; we can step back into our birthright, which is to live in a beautiful Cosmos whose meaning is really not so inaccessible to us. Ancient people knew this language; we've forgotten it, but we can remember it very easily, and your stories are a big part of how we do that on this channel. So, I want to thank you for sharing them.

If you ever have a story to share, use the #grabbed or email us your story grabbed@nightlightastrology.com. We'd love to feature you on a future storytelling app. So don't share anything that you don't mind reading, as I just did. You could put the #grabbed, name the transit, and then put your story in the comment section or do the same thing via email. The other thing is keeping it concise. As you can see, the longer they are, the more I have to sort of summarize, even if they are good stories.

So anyway, that's it for today. I hope you enjoyed this storytelling episode. Stick around because after I sign off, I'm going to be interviewing my wife Ashley, who is an herbalist, about her upcoming apprenticeship program, which she is teaching again for the first time in a few years after coming back from maternity leave. So, if you guys like the doctrine of signatures, plant medicines, plant spirit medicine, talking with plants, and working with plants, ancient astrologers and ancient herbalists were cut from the same cloth. So, I think if you guys enjoyed my work, you'll love Ashley's. So stick around afterward and check it out. Alright, that's it for today. Have a good one, everyone. Bye