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FOR FEBRUARY THROUGH DECEMBER 2004

by Brian Habit

Saturn trines your Midheaven from roughly July 2004 till May 2005.

How do you want to make a name for yourself? By acting selfishly and ruthlessly, or by acting ambitiously and responsibly? Those are the sorts of questions that you would do well to ponder now.

Let’s review what your natal Midheaven symbolizes. Then we can look at how Saturn is triggering it.

The Midheaven is the doorway to your house of public pursuits (your 10th house). It’s the highest point in your chart, at the top of the circle when you look at the picture of your chart. It represents your reputation, position in society, and destiny. The Midheaven represents your most public and high-profile pursuits and the highest to which you might aspire in life. This part of your chart also relates to changes in your status in the eyes of the public, such as becoming married or divorced, or going from being a working person to being a retiree. Furthermore, the Midheaven indicates the way that you come across to those who know you impersonally, only by your reputation. We often speak in short phrases as a way of referring to something about others. “She’s a tree-hugging liberal,” “He’s a staunch Republic,” “She’s an urban hipster” or whatever the case may be. Oftentimes these labels are based on our profession. Sometimes they’re based on our membership in a political party or some other organization. Sometimes they’re even based on other things about us.  Whatever the case, they help us make sense of people that we know only from some social distance. The Midheaven, then, also symbolizes how we appear in this respect. This stands in contrast to the Ascendant, which indicates the first impression that you make on others, when you interact directly with them.

Saturn takes 29 years to go around your chart. During a 29-year cycle, Saturn triggers your Midheaven every few years, and each time he does, it marks a new stage in the cycle. As a whole, the cycle represents the process by which you develop your worldly ambition or identity (Saturn) through the roles that you play in your public life (your Midheaven).

For example, from 1999 till 2001, Saturn formed a tense 180-degree angle (an opposition aspect) to your Midheaven. That event marked a major turning point in the process, either a peak or a new beginning in a 29-year cycle. I can’t say with certainty which one occurred when, but I can say that, right now, you’re at a less stressful stage in developing your identity through your most public roles than during that time.  

A lot of what happens now depends on whether you have been pursuing a course that is well-suited for you.

If you’ve been pursuing a path in your career or other community activities that has been appropriate for you since the turn of the millennium, then now is a time when you could take another big step in advancing your goals. During this transit, you can make headway while investing less effort then you might have to do at other times (such as you might have had to do in 1999-2001). If you made a new start during that period, then whatever ambitious next step you take now could help position you well for 2006-2007. At that time, you can expect to go through a time of testing. If you’re on an appropriate course, then that will be a time to strengthen your resolve by withstanding pressure or trials from your environment. Whatever happens, it will take more effort to accomplish desired results then, so do what you can now, while you have a “tailwind” pushing you along.  

Take some time to think about the sorts of results that you’ve been getting since 1999 or so, in pursuing goals in your career or other activities that unfold in the public eye. Does the path that you’ve been on seem to reflect your innermost wants and needs? Or does it say more about what your parents, or society, or someone else would want you to do than what you really want or need?

With Saturn, it’s important to pursue realistically achievable goals, rather than (A) resigning to coping in life, not pursuing any dream at all, or (B) either drifting, saying “someday,” or putting a lot of effort into trying to accomplish something that is just not realistically within reach, no matter how hard we try. Now, while you’re not under a lot of pressure in this Saturn cycle, check in with yourself about the goals and strategies that you have been pursuing in recent years. Do they reflect your having made a realistic compromise between these two extremes (resignation and fantasy)? If so, then take what seems like a logical next step in the process, to continue building on what you’ve accomplished so far. If not, then make life easier for yourself, and take a step toward realistic, purposeful action now.

Missing the boat with this transit means that you act immaturely in pursuing your ambitions, and you account for your actions either now or later.

Maybe you act brutally toward someone. For example, you behave ruthlessly and selfishly toward a parent or someone else in a position of authority. And maybe you get caught. You become a spectacle or a news item, and you’re held accountable for your transgressions by the law or some other authority. Perhaps you default on some responsibilities (such as to a spouse or relative) by pursuing your ambition in another area (such as work). You take a risk to accomplish some ambition, but it doesn’t pan out. Or maybe you act viciously toward someone else and then lie to keep it a secret. You enter into an unethical if not illegal personal relationship with a higher-up at work, and you conspire to cover it up. You might keep it under wraps for a while, but even if you do, it might come to light and cause problems in the future. 

Getting this transit right means that you come by your success in the world honestly. You’re like the financial firm, Smith Barney, which advertised its services by saying, “We make money the old-fashioned way. We earn it.”

You take on meaty responsibilities, perhaps additional duties, in your personal life, your public life, or both. (The Midheaven relates to your public life, but at the same time that Saturn triggers it, he also activates your Nadir. Directly opposite from the Midheaven, the Nadir relates to your private life.) For example, you might seek a position of relatively great responsibility at work, such as heading up a project. Acting seriously and ambitiously, you commit yourself to some course of action in a very visible way. It might be a course that leads to a change in your social status, such as a change from being single to being married, or from being a private citizen to being a public figure. Whatever responsibility or role you take on, you act industriously and productively in it. It serves to define who you are. You work hard, and you’re more visible and popular than usual. Another possibility is that you close one happy chapter and move on to another, such as by completing an academic program successfully or ending a successful career.

In addition to acting responsibly toward others, you also act responsibly toward yourself. Saturn is moving through your 6th house of health while triggering your Midheaven, so maybe you get routine health checkups. If you find that you need to get treatment for some condition, you make the necessary time in your schedule to do it, in spite of any prior commitments that you have. This helps you accomplish what you want in the long run.