Zeitgeist Trends: May 31, 2021
Songs to the self (that have gone flat), dilapidated neoliberalism, and dark matter behaving badly. It must be time for a solar eclipse!
IMAGINE A OUROBOROS choking on its own tail. An apt image to consider throughout the rest of the year as the ongoing Saturn Uranus square moves towards resolution.
Doubly so as the New Moon in Gemini (an annular solar eclipse on June 10th) is quickly revisited by a retrograde Mercury in Gemini—and the past reasserts its power to capture your attention like a pinned butterfly.
A quick reminder: Astrologers anthropomorphize astrology. In nature—whatever the essence of a Saturn Uranus alignment might connote—it is integral to the arising or disappearing (Uranus) of ‘things’ within the body of time (Saturn). Things being any sort of noun that you can imagine. But verbs apply too.
The bass note: departure.
Can we ditch the compulsion to replay our personal past? Other than orienting us to who or what we think we are as individuals, what does the constant retelling of our story serve? Gurdjieff called this tendency “the singing of our song”—the most tedious tune in the universe.
Of course, there’s no absolute answer to the above question. And no matter. The question is everything. See if you can sit on the inquiry like a hen on her egg. Watch for the clues, hints, or flashes that your dream body perceives in the field around you. The field of any dream is constantly winking at us. Dreams aren’t interested so much in linear narratives but serve as gateways towards alignment with flow, or the Tao, or whatever you want to call ‘seamless, boundless’ reality. Oy, all of these names! (More stories).
We demarcate nocturnal dreams from diurnal or ‘day dreams’—when actually there is simply dreaming—and we’re steeped in it 24/7. The computer monitor or mobile screen you are reading this on is dreaming you as much as you’re dreaming it. It’s our stories that shore up the subject/object division. And it’s the stories that recapitulate identity.
Dream bodies—unlike our clunkier sense of self (the ego), aren’t locked into the linear framework of time. The dream body is all over the place simultaneously. Check it out. You might catch a glimpse into how much psychic force you spend shoring up your ideas (Saturn) about who you think you are as an individual (Uranus).
Rogue dark matter
On the world stage, things appear more complex (i.e., seemingly out of our control). But the same hints and flashes are available within the collective’s dream field too. The same Saturn/Uranus theme is vibrating along the (seemingly) solid edge of reality.
Today I read where Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity is beginning to wobble. And might be ‘wrong’. This has something to do with how dark matter is behaving (you can read the report for yourself).
This is yet another perturbation within the consensus field of facts. I laughed at that spot in the article where the physicist being interviewed by the BBC explains that these new dark matter discoveries may lead to a completely “unknown domain”. The very idea disrupts his story and makes his “stomach cringe”.
Science is forever the great trickster that pretends that it’s our perspectival be-all, end-all. Actually, science is just another form of entertainment complete with neon-lit axioms. (With two surprise matinees every other weekend.)
Raggedy neoliberalism
Here’s an old crock that’s ready to crack—neoliberalism.
There are dozens of different ways to describe neoliberalism, but the version we live with today took root in the 80s when Jupiter and Saturn broke rank with their long cycle through the Earth signs and formed a conjunction in Libra. This coincided with promoting the idea that market-oriented policies (like deregulation and corporate privatization) would improve the world. Which it did, for the wealthiest individuals on the planet.
As author and theorist Mark Fisher argued in his book Capitalist Realism, the limiting horizons set by neoliberal society mean it is now easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism.
Fisher asserts that capitalism has such a grip on our imagination (it has replaced the religious or spiritual impulse) that “capitalist realism” has crippled our creative capacity. I mean, why imagine starting a new business when you know that Google or Facebook will either destroy or effortlessly duplicate (steal) your idea?
Fisher also argues that cultural time has stalled and we’ve become increasingly incapable of producing the ‘new’, the ‘now’ and postulating the ‘next’. We choke on our stories with the redux, the repeats, the sequels, the revising. “Oh, they’re remaking Gilligan’s Island? I can’t wait.”
This is a classic Saturn Uranus dichotomy. Especially when the two planets are aligned in a waning square, what astrologer Dane Rudyhar termed as the “crisis in consciousness” phase within any unfolding cycle. With this, too, is the topsy turvy scrambling of our personal experience of time. Meaning: the speed of culture has slowed down while the speed of everyday life has accelerated into the absurd.
Look at it this way: If the ongoing Pluto in Capricorn transit is the baseline narrative—the continuing Uranus Saturn square is the leitmotif. Mirroring these two transits, Fisher suggests that at the end of history, all that’s left is an endless return of dead forms and failed futures, haunting us from a grave we keep digging up. The ouroboros choking on its tail.
And other tales, too.
Conspiracy theories dominate the cultural dialogue now as trust in traditional authority (Saturn) continues to collapse (Uranus). People resort to conspiracies not to seek guidance (as one would in consulting knowledgeable sources) but to find somewhere to place their anxiety. As Karen Armstrong wrote: “We are meaning-seeking creatures.” When traditional narratives are untrustworthy, people will create their own. Somehow, someway, a story must be told.
Spirit in the sky
As an exciting distraction, a classic End of Days theme has reappeared in the collective narrative. Namely, the ongoing revelations of UFO sightings (Uranus) and the government conspiracies that deny (Saturn) their existence.
I’ve no idea if UFOs are genuine or not. The essential point is the image—what the dream symbol of a UFO connotes amidst our complex geopolitical predicaments. When the world’s coming to an end, humanity wonders: Who will arrive to shuttle us away to a new and improved place—a new story? This explains Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk’s obsession with flying off to Mars.
Game of throws
Oh, and the Duke of Sussex—(these fucking fairytale titles 😩)—Prince Harry is back on TV with Oprah, firing off more volleys at the decaying monarchy. Yet another institution that’s long past its ‘sell by’ date. More chunks of debris from Pluto’s long Capricorn transit.
What wormhole will you pass through as Mercury retrogrades back into the nimbus of June’s eclipse?
Suggestions (and new stories) arrive tomorrow in June’s Horoscopes for Moderns (for paid subscribers to WOODRUFF).
Don’t miss yours.
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Love,
Love the painting!