Mars Conjunct Pluto: Where the God of War Likes to Hide

Transcript:

Hi, everyone this is Acyuta-bhava from Nightlight Astrology and today we are going to take a look at Mars's conjunction with Pluto, which is coming up shortly. This week today into the next say two days we'll really be feeling it. Before I do that, I want to remind everybody that two of my teachers, Loka and Vidarbha, are holding a class on the Bhagavad Gita. It's coming up soon. If you go to Bhakti wise.com, and you scroll down you can learn more about it's called unlocking the mysteries of the Bhagavad Gita. It's a 12 week week immersion, it is by donation, click on the study with us tab, you can scroll down to learn more about it starts March 15 runs through May 31. On Tuesday nights from eight to 9:30pm. Eastern everything is recorded if you can't make it live. There's also optional daily mantra meditation lessons available for you to drop in on. Those are free. So it's a great class to have my favourite people and teachers, I hope you guys will check it out.

That being said, let's put up the real time clock and take a look at what Mars is doing which is going to be our focus for the day. It is a new moon today in Pisces. And I will just briefly say that if you watched my March overview, I mentioned this new moon and gave you a little bit about my thoughts about the New Moon for the moon cycle ahead. So be sure to check that out. If you haven't yet you want something on the new moon. Basically, the gist of it is that we've got a new moon conjoined with Jupiter as the sun is conjoining Jupiter, the New Moon is configured in a sextile with Uranus, there's a feeling of breakthrough in the air, this great kind of redeeming promise of Jupiter Neptune forming. But we have some difficult astrology between now and later in April when all of that promise sort of manifests. In the meantime, Venus and Mars are going to go through Pluto, they're going to conjoin in Aquarius and then Venus will be in a malefic enclosure for most of the month of March. And on the 19th of March, you'll see Venus hitting a square to Uranus. And I think we might see some shift in the momentum for Venus around that time. But it's a very difficult spot for Venus. So we're looking at that.

The other thing that's happening is today, as I'm making this mercury is in a conjunction with Saturn. So another transit to kind of keep our eye on but I to me, I felt like today, we really need to place our attention on Mars's conjunction with Pluto, because that is just such a dynamic transit. It's it's very powerful. So we look if I advanced this one day to Thursday, March 3, you're going to see Mars going through the conjunction with Pluto today into tomorrow. Then Venus tomorrow goes through on Thursday, March 3, so it's back to back today, I'm going to do Mars Pluto. Tomorrow, I'm going to do Venus Pluto. So that's our order for this week. Now, given that Mars is conjoining Pluto, I decided it would be good to talk a little bit more about the archetype of Mars, especially given the fact that the topic of war is very much on a lot of people's minds right now. And astrologically it's a good time to meditate on this archetype.

Now, I will say, for people who are listening to this, who don't want to think and talk about such a heavy topic from an archetypal perspective, right, which means we're taking some we're deliberately distancing ourselves on a certain level from what's happening in the world. And the horror and outrage of the of warfare itself in the world right now. So we can feel those things. And we can also take a step back to meditate on the archetype of Mars. But if you're not feeling in the mood for that, or if that feels like you know, that's too much of a task for me right now, you know, just make sure you don't, don't listen to this as I certainly don't want to amplify people's feelings of anxiety, fear or frustration. But so we're going to talk about Mars today and Mars, Pluto, and that's not always easy.

But that being said, one thing that I really want to focus on for us today is in order to here's the thesis for the day in order to know the archetype of Mars, the god of war, who represents more than just war, but war is one of Mars's biggest archetypal swaths of land. Okay, so, you know, Mars, Mars has the real estate market, sort of, he's got it cornered a little bit when it comes to like conflict and war and aggression and hostility that's sort of Mars is territory. It's not certainly not the only planet that can give signs for war or conflict, but Mars sort of, you know, that sort of Mars is territory, just like being This is going to be love or beauty. So when any planet hits Pluto, especially in a conjunction, there's going to be this titanic release of force relative to the archetype, oftentimes coming up from what feels like a pent up place, or a place that is less seen or understood. So that that subterranean volcanic expression of Mars is potentially front and centre for us right now in our personal lives clearly on the world stage.

And yet, one of the things that happens with Pluto as well is that we are overtaken by the powers of the unconscious. Which means that even though an archetype is expressing itself in the light of day, sort of really overt in in your face, there's a way in which we can become possessed by it, this is why I use the hashtag grabbed the gras Hawes the grabbers, these are the administrators of the energetic flow and unfolding of our reality. And so as such, you know, one of the reasons that we're doing astrology is to be able to identify and participate in their unfolding as opposed to just being swept along, like, you know, debris, and, you know, sticks and stuff just being carried along a river with with fast currents, you know, we want to have some amount of agency some amount of participation, and I'm not suggesting we become, you know, controllers of everything or something like that, but we are conscious entities and it helps to know which direction the wind is blowing in. And, and to be aware of that, well, when any planet touches Pluto, one of the things okay, it can be released with this kind of Titanic, primal force, we can also become possessed by it. And so one of the archetypes you'll also hear associated with Pluto are transits to Pluto from other planets will be that which we come to understand, because it's been hidden in the unconscious, or there's some way in which we get taken over by something only to have to separate and get some distance or some understanding of. Pluto will reveal to us things that are hidden, in other words, things that are hidden, in this case, within the within the presence of Mars.

So today, I wrote this hypothesis that in order to know war, Mars, we have to know where it hides Pluto. And I mean, again, Pluto can obviously be more than just hidden stuff, but one of Pluto's meanings is that which is invisible. And so in order to know war very deeply, develop intimacy with its presence as an archetype separated now from all events, right, we're talking about understanding its presence in the psyche. And as such, we have to know where it hides. So here are 10 ways in which war hides that I've been meditating on as I wrote this talk starting, I started writing the talk yesterday, before I read it. And before I want to read you two quotes that come from James Hillman his book on really a book on Mars, which is called a terrible love of war. And these are two quotes that I was reminded of by one of my students named Brian really nice guy who sent me these quotes as he was reflecting on what's happening in the world right now. The Mars Pluto conjunction and reading this book, which you've heard me mentioned in talks previously, so this is from Hillman:

"To declare war normal does not eliminate the pathologies of behaviour, the enormities of devastation, the unbearable pain suffered in bodies and souls, nor does the idea that war is normal justify it. brutalities, such as slavery, cruel punishment, abuse of young children, corporeal mutilation remain reprehensible, yet find acceptance in the body politic and may even be incorporated into its laws. Though, quote, war is normal shocks our morality and wounds our idealism, it stands solidly as a statement of fact, this normal round of warfare has been going on as far back as memory stretches. During the 5600 years of written history. 14,600 wars have been recorded."

And he goes on and on but I just wanted to use those quotes because if there is any place that war hides, just generally, I'm going to go through 10 ways in which war hides as a meditation for today. But if I were to say, one place, generally, that war hides, it is in normalcy. We tend to think of war as something extraordinary. And it is, there's a certain way in which war is extraordinary. It is somehow an exceptional state that is different from other states and puts us on high alert, you know, and understandably, it's horrific. At the same time, one of the ways that war hides most, maybe the biggest way it hides is its normalcy, which means it's reality as an everyday experience. It's easy enough to feel like it's exceptional when we're seeing actual big wars unfolding. But its everyday reality is sometimes forgotten or not even noticed. And I don't mean that every day there are wars going on. Of course, there's conflict and violence every day all over the world. But I'm talking about something even more mundane. So here's 10 ways that war hides. And a lot of this has to do with an exploration of language and of the subtleties of our everyday psychological states. If we want to unpack Mars are recognise it right now in our lives. I think it's easy to spot it in the big things, it's harder to spot it in the underlying everyday mundane. So here they are, in my own life, I'm only speaking for myself, if you care to join me in this, you may, if not, then I hope it's at least, you know, a good meditation to consider today.

So it hides in my repulsion. Every day, I am repulsed by things, it could be very little, could be the colour of something, an advertisement, whatever it could be anything could be something my daughter says it whatever. But every day, there are moments that I have of repulsion. It's an experience in my mind in my body, and the etymology of the word repulsion means to drive back. So to have the experience of being driven back by something in sort of like disgust or dislike, that's an everyday part of my experience. And that's a Mars experience. If I can picture the etymological roots of the word to be driven back by something. And oftentimes what I'll do when I'm repulsed is drive back at the thing that suddenly drove me back. So in our everyday experience of repulsion, there's the God of War, driving into us as we drive back at whatever repulses us. Sometimes we don't drive back, but even having the experience of being driven into somehow and feeling repulsed by it. That's Mars, there's the hidden everyday presence of Mars.

It hides number two, in congratulations, to congratulate means to celebrate victory. And you can look at the word victory as well. But congratulations, celebration and victory all have the connotation of winning etymologically which means that anytime I feel like I'm congratulating myself or congratulating someone else, I'm acknowledging that somehow I've risen to the top. And or somehow I've won. Now maybe the thing that I've won hasn't been, you know, I haven't brutalised, anyone, you know. So we're talking again, about the subtle, everyday normalcy of Mars, because it's from this pervasive level of the archetype. That the you know, that we, we mistakenly think that an archetype is exceptional when it shows up in in some huge way. In other words, if you're not in touch with if you're not in touch with Mars on an everyday level, it's possible that you'll only be able to see Mars in these very gross ways. And then it can feel alien and separate from you. And ironically, you're more likely to then have a kind of relationship with Mars that is very polarising and confrontational. And ironically, what we want with the god of war or from the God of War, is in some ways to have some intimacy with that God, which does not mean that we condone or justify brutality, it means that we understand the reality of that God in our own lives, because that's what generates compassion. That's what generates empathy. If we don't understand Mars in ourselves, its presence in our own lives, then it's harder to generate compassion and empathy. And we end up being at war with war. And that's maybe the worst place that we want to be, in a sense, because it's, it's exactly in that space that we tend to get grabbed, that we that we tend to get seized. It hides in congratulations.

Number three, it hides in the excitement that we feel when conflict arises. As if conflict is an indication that something real is happening, breaking apart, the feeling that life is superficial or boring. Conflict literally means a contest. And the contest has the sense of game and play involved in it. And I'm not suggesting that we're all sickly celebrating brutalities in the world. But for me, I notice that there are times where when conflict arises, I get excited. I wouldn't call it joy. But I would call it a kind of excitement. And it's like a gravitational pull. The excitement is because where there is a contest, people tend to gather like they do in arenas, Gladiator arenas, sports arenas, people circling around the two kids in high school who are fighting. Fight, fight, fight, why do people do this? There's something about it that feels like the underlying tensions that are always there are now being expressed. And there's something about it that can feel relieving. Now, mostly, I'm talking about this in my own life in very basic and small ways. I'm not someone who loves seeing, you know, people hurt one another or anything like that.

But I'm talking about the fact that conflict generates a level of excitement and engagement that we often feel drawn to because there's something that feels there's there where there's conflict, there's contest, and where there's contest, there's an element of play. And there's an element of spectatorship and a sense of something being at stake. And oftentimes, we're drawn to that with a kind of enthusiasm. Not saying it's right, I'm just saying it's common. I remember still, when I was a young boy, and I was in college, I remember when 911 happened. I did not at all feel gladness or joy that that was happening. But I was excited. I was really excited. Remember being excited to tell people who did not know. And I don't mean by that, that I felt excited that people were dying or that brutal, horrible things were happening. I felt like wow, that something really real and important is happening. And I I need to share this with people. And like everyone else, I was glued to the TV set in both wonder and horror. And what I'm trying to point to is not any kind of glorification of those things. But the fact that we, on much smaller levels are drawn into that exact thing that we tend to call horrible, that somehow we still drive down the road. And when there's an accident, traffic slows down simply so everyone can look at it as they're driving by that's a gravitational pull. That's a Mars Pluto kind of thing where that hidden force, the excitement, the the feeling of there being something contested, urgent and real, that's happening that breaks up the the A chord of peace, the status quo, people are drawn to that. So, you know, people are drawn to drama. I am. I'm just admitting it. That's all. And I'm not saying I'm proud of it. I'm just saying it is a natural, psychic reality of our lives. It's something that happens in small ways every day. So that's where Mars hides.

Number four, it hides in urgency. Whenever we feel urgent about something. It hides in urgency. Whenever we feel really urgent about something morally, spiritually. In terms of our agenda for the day, our relationships wherever there is urgency, urgent means to press and to drive hard. Those are Mars words. So even in urgency Mars is the War is there. It hides in righteousness.

Number five on my list. Righteousness means to be straight and to stand straight and not crooked. It's one of the etymological meanings. As in like a a sense of I am right and strong and proud and tall. And it gives the image of like a posture. And Mars is in that posture, the righteous posture, the strength that's there in righteousness, that we're attracted to being righteous, because it's somehow a posture of strength that we find attractive. That doesn't mean that righteousness is good. You know, often enough righteousness is really arrogant, but we're attracted to righteousness to it hides there, we often think of righteousness as right and good. You know, if I have a righteous cause, then it's right, you know. But what we don't pay attention to is the posture where the warrior is there standing tall and strong and proud and my righteousness makes elevates me. Right that that's there, the God of War of the night is standing there. It hides in caring. I know that sounds weird. But did you know that caring means charged with a view to something safety and protection, to care. So when we think about protecting something, keeping it safe, I care about this thing, Mars is there, Mars, the martyr, the same root word who would lay down its life in care, or protection of something. So there's Mars, these are the places Mars hides in our everyday lives, it's harder, to be completely outraged, shocked and thrown off our centre. When massive things happen in the world, they will happen, because we've spent every day getting to know the presence of that God. And we know that there are times when it possesses us. And we know there are times where it's going to bubble over in very big and explosive ways. We're familiar with this God.

Number seven, it hides in morality, morality has behind it the standard of right conduct. And where there is righteous conduct, there is a sense of nightly code, there's a sense of the code of the code of conduct is very closely related to the code of war, the way in which you act or behave so so as to preserve peace and protect against war or discord. So, even in morality, there is a sense of the warriors protection, right? So it's there every day. Mars hides in these things. We don't necessarily think of Mars, we tend to only think of Mars in terms of the terrible face of brutality and war and stuff like that, but Mars is in us every single day.

Number eight, it hides in our feeling offendedness. Offendedness: the action of attacking, or being or I'm talking about, like, let's say I'm offended by something, that means that I feel as though I have been attacked, but also, interestingly, etymologically to be offended, the word also means to be annoyed. And what I find so interesting about that is, of course, offended in a sense on the offence, to be attacked, or to attack someone or to feel that you've been attacked, but also to be annoyed, irritated or vexed. vexed means to have been jolted out of your centre. And so there's something every day where we're struggling, I'm offended, or I feel offended, and then we're like, Well, I'm not going to feel offended because I've been jolted out of my centre and no one's going to push me out of my centres. So you know, and I wish that everyone would just shut up about being so offended because I'm so offended by everyone being offended because I'm so sick of everyone being knocked off their centre all the time. Sit up straight on your horse, my good man, you know, sit up straight and be a knight. Don't be vexed so easily. Don't be irritated out of your centre, irritation, burning agitation, frustration, being vexed. Those are all Mars words traditionally in astrology. So, you know that battle within us? No, no. What are you telling me that I should always be strong that it's not possible for someone to injure or harm me. You're telling me that it's up to me to choose whether I'm offended or not. It's like to two things can be true simultaneously. Someone could be a jerk and have offended you, but you also don't have to be vexed by it. And both of those are interestingly caught up in the etymology of Mars. I find it interesting that if we're honest with ourselves, we get offended pretty regularly. I mean, people attack and offend us in little ways every day and in in big ways, too. And it can be true that that person really offended us. It's this weird false choice we create where we're like, you only you can allow yourself to be offended. And what they really mean is all you you only you can allow yourself to be vexed, which is different than being offended. being offended means you were attacked, you can be attacked and not be vexed, or you can be attacked and talk about it and feel that some justice should be done or something should be addressed without also being irritated or vexed out of your centre somehow.

Anyway, I'm not telling you what you should do, or shouldn't do, or think or feel, I just find it really interesting that the word offended, breaks down into not only attacking or being attacked, but also being annoyed or vexed, being irritated or jolted out of a centre. Isn't that just fascinating? If I think about it politically, or socially, or culturally or whatever, everyone talking about, you know, PC culture, or how easily people are offended or whatever. And I think less of it really boils down to this is just me thinking archetypal. I'm thinking like an archetypal as a symbolic thinker. And I'm just thinking, Gosh, it really boils down to differentiating Mars a little bit more like, and I read this, I was like, well, it makes total sense that there is the reality of one word offended means both to be jolted out of one's centre. And maybe there's some sense of a choice in that, but also to be attacked. In which case, there's no choice in that. And somehow, we want to act like it's this binary, well, you either choose to be offended, and, and otherwise, you know, you're impenetrable, and no one's really attacking you, you're just choosing to be offended. And it's like, well, it's not that simple, you know.

So if we just had a little bit more imagination about words and language, and we took the time to carefully differentiate our experiences when it comes to being harmed and harming, when it comes to how we respond to being harmed, and so on and so forth. There's not just one right response. Sometimes I think it's less about issues and more about not not being thoughtful enough about what experiences are actually like, anyway, I'm going to war. So I will keep going.

Number nine, it hides in our war on drugs, our war on cancer. I think it was George Carlin who pointed out, gosh, for a society who wants to find peace and not war, we should think about not going to war on every single thing that we want to fix a war against violence toward women. It's like no, come on. That's just not the right metaphor. I don't know. I mean, so absurd. We go to war on all these things, where and so many of our so many of our daily metaphors are war based, as well. Take your shot, you know, have you taken your shot, you go for it. You know, there's so so much of the language of every day is like, evokes the image of the warrior and we don't even think about it, but then we're apparently we're completely baffled by the presence of war in the world. It's like, well, not saying again, it doesn't normalise or justify war or aggrandisement or anything but it's like well, should we be so shocked when Mars is present? Every day? You know we have like a you know, imagine if you had like a knight clad in like 200 pounds of armour like the mountain from Game of Thrones that seven foot tall you know warrior with a broad sword the side of your kitchen the size of your kitchen table lumbering around in your house, like you know you wouldn't mistake it but that's the truth of what we also have walking around in our psyches every day in a sense.

Finally, it hides in peace. Peace, the Latin word packs to fasten together so you you're taking things that have been apart and you're fastening them. So implied in the act of peace is a joining of what is separate. So anytime we're talking about peace, we're also acknowledging this the presence of division, strife, separateness, discord, and so forth. It's there in our drive for peace. Over the years, you know, one of the ways I recognise it is okay, I'm going to today I'm going to slap something on my I don't know my Thinking back in the day, when I was on Facebook, I haven't seen this on Instagram so much, but something would happen and you replace your profile picture, you know, with something that you're supporting. And I did this a bunch and I, and I don't regret it at all, I felt kind of felt like I was a part of something cool. And I'm not sure anymore if they still do that, because I'm not on Facebook. I seem to remember at some point, there was like three, like three lines. And it might have been in support of gay marriage or something like that. This was like, right, when some laws are being passed, maybe I can't remember. But, but anyway, you get the idea. You're supporting something. So you put it, you know, as your as your profile picture to show solidarity. And I'm a sucker for those things. Personally, when I was on Facebook. And I was thinking about this as I was writing today's talk, I was like, it's like war flags. You know, it's like, here's my banner, you know, and I'm on my horse and I'm riding into my job today. I'm making fun of myself to no one who does it I'm this is just me and my dark humour. But I'm riding into my day, you know, as a dad and an astrologer with my banner flying on my Facebook page of what I'm supporting, you know, and it's like, I think of myself as a peaceful person. And I guess my point is that I don't imagine myself like riding into battle. But it's the little little things like that, that Mars shows up. And if anything, that's how, if we're going to change or find healthy expressions for that archetype in our lives in our collective, we have to get to know it. It hides in normalcy. So I don't know that's just my thoughts for the day.

I'll read these quotes again to declare war normal does not eliminate the pathologies of behaviour, the enormities of devastation, the unbearable pain suffered in bodies and souls, nor does the idea that war is normal justify it. brutalities, such as slavery, cruel punishment, abuse of young children, corporal mutilation remain reprehensible, yet find acceptance in the body politic and may even be incorporated into its laws. The war is normal shocks or morality and wounds or idealism, it stands solidly as a statement of fact, this normal round of warfare has been going on as far back as memory stretches during the 5600 years of written history 14,600 wars have been recorded.

So I hope that you are able to grasp something uplifting from today's talk I certainly don't mean for this to be some kind of get over it. No, I want us to get to know it. That's all and that's what I'm doing right now. As there's war in the news and a lot of people are around me are talking and reacting to it as I'm you know, taking it. And there's more every day, of course, but some some are gonna be more in the headlines and in your face. And there's transits where collectively we're all drawn like a gravitational centre to contemplate this reality. So as I've been doing that for myself, this is what I've been thinking about. And I hope that you guys find it useful as well. If you have any stories you want to share about Mars Pluto this week, use the hashtag grabed, put your story in the comment section or email us grab the nightlight astrology .com. Hope you guys have a great day and we will see you again tomorrow. Bye