Mars Hitting Zero Aries! — One of the Sneakiest & Most Potent Transits of the Year

Hey everyone. This is Adam Elenbaas from Nightlight Astrology [https://nightlightastrology.com/].

Today we're going to take a look at Mars moving on to the zero Aries degree marker that is the first degree of the Zodiac, and the recent degree at which Saturn and Neptune conjoined in Aries and what is arguably the transit of 2026.

What this means is that Mars is reactivating and restimulating the epicenter of that recent event, which makes this one of the sneakiest and most potent transits of the year, because Mars is in its rulership in Aries, and there's sort of nothing more Aryan than Mars at zero Aries.

We're gonna, I think we're gonna see that this is one of the biggest transits of the year. This often happens and people don't know it with eclipses, for example, where an eclipse takes place, and then soon after, a powerful planet conjoins the degree of that eclipse, and you will see that it has almost as much potency as the eclipse, or in this case, the Saturn Neptune conjunction itself.

The reason for this we're going to explore today, and I'm going to tell you what to watch for. Then tomorrow, we'll be doing horoscopes for this sequence of events that's about to take place in Aries, sort of re-stimulating everything there, but that's just taking place between Saturn and Neptune. So we'll have archetypal coverage today, horoscopic coverage tomorrow. That's our agenda for today.

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But let's bring out the Epic Pen, and let's look at what we're dealing with. So this is right now. Today is Wednesday, April 8, but we're looking at this right here. My Epic Pen wasn't working. I had to pause and reboot the Epic Pen. See, this is the thing. The Epic Pen is staying around for you guys. You're like, no, don't you have a new program, but don't lose the Epic Pen. But the Epic Pen is so temperamental.

Anyway, you can see Mars here at zero Aries. Today's Wednesday, April 8. It's moving into Aries tomorrow afternoon, my time, central time, about middle of the day, it moves into that zero Aries marker. Now Mars at zero Aries is an especially potent placement. We're going to talk about why, but first, let's just sort of map out how this transit will unfold.

So if we go forward another day and a half, Friday into late Friday evening, by the time I get to Saturday, it's already at one and a half degrees. So this is really Thursday and Friday that you're going to see Mars at zero Aries. Now it's not like there's any major aspects taking place with Mars at zero Aries. So someone might say, you know, hey, what's the deal? Why are we spending so much time with this? But the reason for this is, if we go back, we're going to go back some weeks now, and we want to go back into February.

In February, we saw the meeting of Saturn and Neptune on February 20 at zero Aries. Kind of like an eclipse. When a powerful planet passes over the degree of an eclipse, it tends to reactivate the energy or expression, the symbolic expression, or karmic meaning of that eclipse. And the same is true for major outer planetary configurations. Going all the way back to 2020 when Saturn and Pluto conjoined, anytime planets went back over that space in Capricorn, you would see almost this major reiteration of the meaning of their conjunction symbolically, maybe with a little bit of a twist symbolically from the planet that activated it, in this case, Mars.

But the point is that this Mars ingress is a much bigger deal than a lot of astrologers... I mean, not a lot of professional astrologers are mostly aware of this, I think. But a lot of hobby students of astrology may not know, because it's sneaky, right? It's not something that is so intuitive. You might think, well, Mars is conjoining Neptune, and that's the story. It's applying to conjoin Neptune, and that's certainly true, but the fact that it is going across that zero degree marker is something that's very sneaky and under the radar and very, very powerful.

Now Mars, one of the reasons that it is so powerful, and I'm going to turn off my screen sharing now. One of the reasons that it's so powerful is that Mars is a god of action. It is in its own sign, in Aries, meaning it's in its own domicile. It is the host of this temple. And it loves inceptions. It loves starting things. It loves birth and action and intention and ambition and confrontation. It loves to take action on behalf of things that it wants to do out of raw impulse, instinct, the kind of libidinal thrust that is representative of Mars.

So Mars entering this zero degree marker in Aries is sort of always a big deal for this reason. It's a hot, heated, very ambitious, active degree for Mars itself to be in. It's sort of like Mars's degree of degrees, archetypally speaking. Not like it has an exaltation degree in Capricorn and all that, but I'm talking about a place where Mars is super, super Marsy. And on top of that, Saturn and Neptune met here.

So what might that mean? A variety of different things in terms of what you can expect, what you can watch for. Now, the ultimate way of looking for this is going to be, as I was saying when we were looking at the Last Quarter Moon in Capricorn, and why that's such a big deal, which is coming through today, and we looked at that yesterday. So you could go back and take a look at that if you haven't yet; it will really help you understand the sequencing of all of this.

But the reason that this is so powerful: we have an upcoming New Moon in Aries. We're talking about a Saturn Neptune conjunction that's now just separating. Saturn is emerging from the beams of the Sun, and now Mars is going to pour through this degree and, in a sense, really launch us into some of the first consequences and ramifications of what Saturn and Neptune in Aries have been doing. And you'd be surprised at how powerful and clarifying and intense and even confrontational this could be for some of you.

And the reason for that is that Saturn and Neptune, when they come together, can be a bit of a fog. Their meeting is sort of hazy, and there's a lot of very deep, almost melancholic feelings that come with them, and a sense of things sort of dissolving, and new ambitions forming and consequences and the weight and gravitas of Saturn, but the dissolving, imaginative, sort of visionary space of Neptune. You put all that together, and it's not always immediately clear what those two planets are up to. And many astrologers have said this, right? If you've listened to astrologers in general talk about this conjunction, you'll see that many of us have been saying this, at least those of us who work with the archetypes from that archetypal perspective.

Now Mars entering this space is therefore really pushing forward the agenda of the Saturn Neptune conjunction.

There's also one other thing that I want to show you. Now that I'm thinking about it, I should show you guys this as well. So when we advance this chart by a couple of days, we're going to see that between Last Quarter Moon and the New Moon in late Aries, Mars is going to translate the light between Neptune and Saturn. So we can see Mars here conjoining Neptune. This is about Sunday, April 12. And then Monday starts getting into the engagement with Saturn. And we're going to see that the two planets are within that engagement range as the balsamic Moon in Aries is now coming through.

And then if we go all the way through the conjunction, the New Moon, that's Friday, April 17, we'll see that Mars is now within just a degree of Saturn. Get us to about one day out from the New Moon, Saturday, April 18 to the 19th, and we're seeing Mars and Saturn conjoin. The point is that the movement of Mars not only across that zero Aries degree mark, but across Neptune, across Saturn, effectively bringing them together bodily through one conjunction after another, is taking place just within the opening stages of the New Moon in Aries as well. All of which is also taking place as Saturn is emerging from the beams of the Sun, sort of just starting its early phase as a morning star and being reset and reborn. So you can feel what a powerful transition this is.

Now again, before I go into five things to watch for generally, I just want to emphasize, as I did yesterday with the Last Quarter Moon in Capricorn video, that this is so much focused on the whole sign house of Aries. Tomorrow, we'll do horoscopes as promised, and then you'll get a reminder about where to take note of all of these changes and transitions. But they really are big, and I think again, just because we're not always used to tracking planets across eclipse points, or in this case, planets across the Saturn Neptune conjunction point at zero Aries, it could sneak under the radar.

So what are the five things to watch for given all of this?

First of all, let's keep it really simple. Mars likes to act. So a lot of what life involves is thinking about things, contemplating, digesting and processing things. And then we get to a certain point where processing a lot of thoughts and experiences, patterns that we're in the midst of, and we have a relationship to, we contemplate them. I contemplate my work patterns. I contemplate my relationship patterns. I contemplate my parenting patterns, because I'm in them. And then there reaches this dramatic moment where the pattern shifts, because some kind of decisive action is required. A choice is made. You come to some kind of crossroads. You have an opportunity to follow a new intention or desire or ambition, or act upon something, or change something.

And Saturn Neptune together, even though they met at zero Aries, are a very contemplative pairing. By that I mean, it's a bit... they're so meditative. I mean, it's not a mistake that under this transit we started a meditation group. But they have this way of sort of... it's like a sea change. It's like gradually turning a large, big boat around takes a little bit, and this is a moment where that kind of shift of orientation that's been slow and big and sort of glacial in its size and pace, you could feel suddenly being acted upon more decisively. Suddenly, little micro agendas become clear.

You know, when I'm reflecting, for example, on parenting, when you're in the midst of a parenting pattern of some kind, the bedtime routine, whatever it is, you're in it for a long time, and all of a sudden, a pressure or a momentum builds, and you can feel that your perspective is reaching a point of turning and you go, yeah, this needs to change. I've been doing this long enough, and I keep thinking it needs to change, and now it's time to actually change it.

This is the same thing that happens frequently when people make major lifestyle changes or spiritual changes, or they go to therapy, or they hit rock bottom and join a 12-step group. There is a momentum building karmically that is making something clear from a spiritual and evolutionary standpoint: this is what my soul needs to grow or evolve, and now it's time to do something about it, or it's time to take action somehow. But what I'm saying is you're either reacting to something or you're being proactive about something at this point. That's one way of looking at it, and it would be linked to what's been taking place in that whole sign house of Aries in your chart, the Saturn Neptune conjunction dating back to late February. Okay, so that's one way that you can look for this.

Number two would be confronting something in the whole sign house of Aries. By that, I mean that there could be something like a tension that's building. Mars likes to confront, compete and deal with conflict. So it could be that there's some kind of unavoidable confrontation or conflict. That doesn't mean it has to be World War Three, you know, which, although, like, I guess that's in the news, but more personally speaking, maybe for some people, the confrontation is massive. For a lot of us, it might be fairly simple. It's time to be direct about something. It's time to confront something within ourselves. It's time to directly address something that's a little scary to address.

But thinking about a confrontation that is somehow necessary from an evolutionary perspective. Confrontation is a little different than "it's time to react" or "it's time to be proactive. It's time to take action. It's time to move forward with an intention, ambition, a life direction." This is more like something that you have to face, something you have to confront. That's a very Mars in early Aries kind of theme.

Now, number three on my list would be the early consequences of Saturn Neptune. Mars was the planet that rejoiced in the sixth house in ancient astrology, which was the house of bad fortune. What is meant by bad fortune is not like a curse. It's just the basic reality that life in the material universe has duality, yin and yang, good fortune and bad fortune, pleasure and suffering. You know, it's got all of it. Mars was the god associated with stubbing your toe on the way to your car, or it was the god of getting a flat tire, just the shit sandwich that life serves us on a casual Tuesday. It can also be things like just getting sick and being out of work for a week, or can be chronic disease. The sixth house can be, and Mars was a god that rejoiced in this house, because Mars is both the feeling of frustration and impediment and things afflicting us that we feel as unpleasant or difficult. But Mars was also the specific god of perseverance, endurance, courage. You know, courage under fire, courage under the fire of bad fortune was all Marsy.

So the point is that Saturn and Neptune at that zero degree of Aries mark, one thing that they can bring are struggles. And this is because Saturn is a malefic planet that often brings things that are about limitation, death, hardship, kind of hard facts that you have to face up to. Saturn was the planet that rejoiced in the 12th house, a place where we lose control, where forces that are bigger than us, we have to surrender to, such as Saturn's primary rulership of death, right? We all have to surrender to the fact that we're mortal, that's a Saturnian reality.

Saturn and Neptune together can be about kind of hard realities that shatter our dreams or hopes or aspirations, but they can also be about a kind of healthy realism required for us to achieve a dream or a goal. Thus their recent conjunction here. When Mars hits this space, it can be a very consequential moment where something we have to endure or overcome, or the courage we need to face some kind of hardship or adversity, may be in order to achieve some vision or dream, right? Or maybe in order to overcome something that life has thrown our way, or maybe in order to meet a goal that we have got to be a lot more realistic about what's required of us.

Either way, the sort of early, consequential, cannot-avoid-it realities of what that Saturn Neptune conjunction has meant so far will be active when Mars hits this degree, and that might feel to us like something that we have to endure or overcome, that has a very consequential feeling behind it. Because if you've been working hard, you might feel empowered right now because you're starting to overcome something or gain traction, momentum. On the other hand, if you've been avoiding something or just kind of floating in this marshy soup of Saturn Neptune, and maybe it's been a little agitating (a fire sign after all), now you might be like, well, if I don't do this, this is what's going to happen, or because I was lazy, now I have to really work my ass off. Whatever the case might be, you'll notice that this degree is pretty consequential.

All right. Number four, clarity and action. If Saturn and Neptune coming together have a way of dissolving structures and maybe replacing with new visions of what is possible, this is actually a space where Mars can be very clarifying. It can tell us: look, here is a very clear picture of what's going on. Here's a very clear picture of what's required. Here's a very clear picture of what your hidden motivations are, or what you've been unconscious about. Or here's a clear picture of exactly what is going on with people that you live with or are in relationship with.

Mars at zero Aries can be like a clear flame that illuminates your vision, and usually will bring with it a call for some kind of immediate, decisive action. But it's because of the clarity lent through... we don't think of Mars as sort of brutal, like it's just muscle and athletes jumping over hurdles on a race track or something. But Mars in this sign, remember, is in the sign in which the Sun is exalted. The Sun is also in this sign, culminating in this sign. We've got a New Moon in this sign. And I remember Liz Greene, one of my favorite astrologers, talking at length about how underrated this sign is in terms of its brilliant, intuitive level of intelligence. The reason for that is that it's the exaltation of the Sun, and the Sun rejoiced traditionally in the ninth house, which is the place of higher wisdom. The Sun is a planet that is associated with enlightenment, clarity, illumination, often the kind that's very raw and intuitive. Fire is associated with intuition. It's that quick, clear, decisive sense of something that is real or true, like instinct meets intelligence. It can be a little impulsive. You have to be careful with that. But the point is that Mars moving on to this degree can actually show up as this brilliant sense of mental clarity. And as that happens, usually it's going to be a call to do something about it, to say something, to confront something, you know, again, to act on something. All the things we've been saying.

Number five would be, and look, this is the one that's least comfortable. But Mars loves to fight, and you're going to find that Saturn Neptune conjunction traditionally has highlighted things like walls, barriers, divisions and the dissolution of those divisions, or the escalation of conflicts relative to those divisions. Think the Berlin Wall in the late 1980s or '89 or '90 or whatever that was. You have a wall that is divisive, and you have conflicts escalating around this divisiveness, and then the dissolution of that wall. That's a Saturn Neptune process.

Saturn Neptune together can bring up, in other words, very hard divisions between people, groups, ideologies, etc., and within ourselves, we can experience those things too, in certain relationships, where there might be competition, division, rivalry, and then we're going to see the dissolution of those divisions, boundaries, etc. In the process, many of us will see that dynamic unfolding. Well, Mars entering this degree can escalate the need to explore these divisions and conflicts as well as potentially dissolve them or allow them to be somehow mended or healed.

Even though Mars is a god of conflict, the fact that Mars is meeting with Neptune (that's a planetary transit; we're going to talk about Mars Neptune on Friday of this week as well) can paradoxically bring about... it's like the image of someone rather than fighting, laying down your sword. I always think of Obi-Wan Kenobi, kind of lifting his lightsaber up and closing his eyes, and then Darth Vader strikes him down. He's like, "Now I'm more powerful than you can imagine," and he's like a spirit Jedi. That's very Mars Neptune.

So the point is that while certain conflicts can escalate right now, it's also possible that the escalation of certain conflicts leads to one of the bravest things we can do, which is to surrender our stake in a conflict and sort of dissolve into some transcendental position. It's laying down our sword. It's a surrender as a... it's very Taoist, martial arts, Jiu Jitsu. It's kind of surrender as a mode of engagement, you know, retreat rather than advance. It could be something like that.

But either way, watch for the escalation of certain kinds of conflicts as Mars does enter Aries. Brief, hot, fast, often not super long lasting. It's kind of one thing that's nice: things will flare up very dramatically, and I suspect that that'll probably be the case as long as Mars is moving through Saturn, Neptune, and Saturn through about the next week. But once the Sun gets into Taurus, the New Moon cycle starts moving on with the Sun in Taurus, we get Mars past Saturn, Neptune, et cetera, things will probably calm down a little bit. But anyway, that's how I'm seeing it. I hope this is all very useful for you.

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I hope you're having a great day today, guys. I'm going to sign off now. After I sign off, there is an informational video about our Year One program, Ancient Astrology for the Modern Mystic. It is an absolutely fantastic program. Starts again in June. I'd love for you guys to come study with us. Get really deep into astrology and let it totally transform your life and your relationship with this beautiful subject.

All right, that's it for now. See you again later. Bye.