Fishy fishy fishy
happy cazimi to you all
There are plenty of week ahead resources out there (the CHANI podcast is a good one), so I thought it might be more fun to read a focused interpretation of one dynamic in the sky.
Happy Cazimi to you all: CAZIMI! One of the better technical astrology words. This refers to the moment when any of the traditional planets (Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn) sit in the heart of the Sun.
The exact moment of a Cazimi is when a planet shares the same degree as the Sun. Mercury does this about six times per year, and the rest of the planets experience it about once per year. It’s a rebirth, similar to a New Moon (which is when the Moon is in the same degree as the Sun). It’s sort of like a planting of a seed or recharging a battery. If you prefer social metaphors, you can think of it as a planet getting to sit in the king’s throne and survey everything the light touches. In short, for today, these planets are elevated in importance.
Today there’s a rare occurrence where more than one Cazimi is happening at the same time. Today, 2/28/24, Mercury and Saturn are both sharing space with the Sun in Pisces. A good day to tend to business, to speak clearly and directly, and to communicate your commitments.
Look at Pisces in your chart. Which house does it cover? Are there any truths in that part of life you need to acknowledge? Any difficult conversations that could benefit from a Saturnian steel backbone? Maybe some admin you’ve been avoiding. Mercury and Saturn would love to help you get your taxes in, and this could be a nice break in the Piscean haze to do so.
Do you have any Cazimis in your natal chart? Look for your Sun and see if any planets are exactly conjunct (in the same degree, not necessarily the same minute). Consider that planet’s themes and reflect on how they show up in your life. We would expect this planet to provide a certain tone to your life, depending on what’s activated at any given time.
Where are your fish swimming?
The Sun recently moved into Pisces, so I’m going to spend a bit of time looking at the mutable, water sign and its counterpart, Virgo.
Pisces is the sign of the two fish. The history of the myth behind it is somewhat debated, but the broad strokes are pretty consistent. The story goes that at some point Mother Earth decided that the Olympian gods needed to be brought down a peg. She sent her son, Typhon, the monster of all monsters, a combination of snakes and lions and bears and fire breathing dragon heads.
As Typhon stalked each of the gods, they all ran, trying to escape. Aphrodite and her son, Eros, tried to hide in the reeds along the Euphrates river, but it wasn’t long before they were spotted. In a last ditch effort, they leapt into the river and prayed to the local river gods for help. That help came in the form of transformation (an important Pisces theme). They were turned into fish that were able to swim quickly away to safety. These two fish are the fish that make up the constellation Pisces.
Let’s start with how Pisces and Virgo are similar: their mutability. I’ve talked about mutable signs before. They’re the ones that round out our seasons, giving way to what’s next. Pisces can be understood as the snow melt that makes it possible for springtime flowers to burst forth. Virgo, on the other side of the circle, is the simmering final days of summer, the season of harvest. These signs share the responsibility of handing off at an equinox. They conclude at a point when the light of day is even with the darkness of night—I like this for Pisces and Virgo. They each do a certain kind of cleanup for the sign that came before, Pisces giving a welcome release from the icy, Saturnian Aquarius season and Virgo providing a bit of shade, a cool spot in the soil beneath a tree after a long Leo season.
Pisces is a water sign, evoking the emotional, the spiritual, the creative. Water signs are fertile signs, maximizing what they influence. They’re wet and cool. Virgo, on the other hand, is an earth sign. Earth signs represent the material, the body, and structure. Earth signs are also cool, but they are dry, focused on sensation rather than emotion.
Possibly the most important difference between the two signs is which planet rules them. Pisces is ruled by Jupiter and Virgo is ruled by Mercury. Jupiter is expansive, over the top, and broad. Jupiter represents financial security, ease, relaxation. In Pisces, we see Jupiter’s artistic side come out, the spiritual, and the psychological. Mercury represents the opposite. Mercury is smaller, specific, and quick. We think of Mercury when we think about skill, work, crafts, and learning. Mercury is scrappy where Jupiter doesn’t have to be.
Pisces is a place where Jupiter will take care of you, a place where you might rely on being taken care of. Think about Aphrodite and Eros taking a leap of faith and being rewarded with protection. This is the Pisces ethos. On the other hand, you have Virgo, the woman working hard to pick apart the good wheat from the bad grains. Virgo is a place where one doesn’t ask for help. Neither is better or worse, they’re just different ways.
This Pisces season, you can as yourself: What are the lessons to be learned across this axis? Think about what houses they fall in for you.
Are you a Pisces rising? When does optimism or going with the flow turn into being unprepared? When does relying on a partner to provide structure turn into an imbalance? Is Pisces your 4th House? Maybe you apply that Virgoan ethic to your career but don’t feel you need to take as active of a role in your home life. How is that working for you?
These questions aren’t meant to lead to self-criticism, but self-understanding. The whole premise of the natal chart is that there are structural truths about a life that we all work within. The first step in working well within that structure is to know its shape.
Always a lot of credit goes to the people who have been my teachers, both directly and through their freely shared knowledge, and so many books.