by: Nancy R. Fenn It is hardly possible to emphasize too much the importance of the Saturn Return. The first Saturn Return happens when we are about 29. Let’s take a look.
The planet Saturn, the stern taskmaster, returns to the place it was when you were born twice during a normal lifespan, once at around 29 and once again at 59. It takes Saturn 30 years to make the complete circle of your chart.
When Saturn returns , he has a few questions to ask: Who are you? and Where are you going? These are simple questions but the truth is, at 29 you are beginning to wonder about the answers to these questions yourself. This is because your “real life” is just about the begin!
Yes, it’s true. Up until the age of 29 we are living out our “past lives”. By the way, if you don’t have an experience of having lived before (reincarnation or past lives), then please consider this a metaphor. It works just as well. Don’t let terminology get in the way of the point I’m making because it will help you so much to understand this.
Up until the time of our first Saturn Return, we are living on the fruits or harvests of past lifetimes, so to speak, good or bad … you know the answer to that one yourself. In other words, if your life up to 29 has been wretched, you can now look forward to choices and experiences which may be much more positive because they are of your own making. Karma is the name for this but don’t be afraid of “karma”. It’s like a mathematical equation. Whatever starts ends somewhere and things tend to even themselves out over lifetimes. If on the other hand, your life up to 29 has been easy, good, blessed, etc., then you will now have to begin “earning” these privileges in the current life time. You may have been working off credits that had accumulated in former lifetimes, so to speak.
You may think you know the answer to these questions that Saturn asks but perhaps you don’t. If Saturn asks, “Who are you?” some possible answers are:
1. My father’s son. 2. My family has always been very hard working and interested in business and education. 3. I think I’m pretty much like every other girl/guy my age here in Omaha. 4. Me and my brothers are going to take over my father’s business, so I guess you’d say I’m a rancher from way back. 5. All I saw was people grow old in my hometown and die, so I struck off in the Navy as soon as I could. I don’t really know what I’m doing here other than that.
If Saturn were rating answers on a scale of 1 to 10, answers 1 through 4 would get a “1” and answer #5 would get a “10”.
The first Saturn Return is a time of serious self examination. The Quakers would call it a time to “take stock”. The universe conspires to make this possible through the transit of Saturn. Sometimes outer events will precipitate greater self knowledge or sometimes it is an inner pressure. Either way, most people consider their first Saturn Return to be one of the most difficult times of their life -- and the most rewarding. If you rise to the task at hand during your Saturn Return the entire rest of your life will be easier because you will be on your path and the universe will support you. If you take a wrong turn here, the universe will keep trying to correct you but each time it does, it will be harder for you to respond because you will be more and more entrenched in your way of life and it will be that much more difficult to make a change.
In a way what we are saying is that you’d don’t really know yourself until after the first Saturn Return. For this reason, as an astrologer, I advise people to wait until after they are 30 to marry and have children. We don’t really know ourselves until after 30 but this seems to be a lesson that can only be learned in the fires of life and not by being passed on from mouth to mouth. People under 30 can’t understand and often don’t trust people over 30 precisely because of this threshold which is crossed. There is no way to explain it … only to live it. People over 30 are very different from people under 30. It’s quite true.
Better answers during the first Saturn Return would be:
• Everyone in my family is a hairdresser but I’m getting the urge to try something different. • I spent a few years traveling to get some perspective on things and I decided I belong right back here in Omaha, raising a family just like mom and dad.
In other words, now it’s time to chose your own life, based on some serious soul searching, rather than following in the footsteps or perhaps worse, the expectations of your parents, extended family, individual culture (church, neighborhood, graduating class, religion, etc.) or extended culture (“all the girls I know are …” “all the people in my generation …”)
Of course if you know the answer to the first question, “Who am I?” you already know the answer to the second, “Where am I going?”. You’re just not sure how you’re going to get there.
Sometimes the first Saturn Return requires some very difficult acts of courage. Some things must be left behind or sacrificed in order for you to become a more authentic person. If you think about it, this is the way of nature. When we prune, we are removing good growth in order to encourage better growth. Pruning is a very difficult art. There is wisdom in pruning and the Saturn Return is a pruning season for you.
Many people consider this the most difficult time in their whole life but if you wrestle through to a more authentic self and get yourself on your right path for this lifetime, the universe will support you the entire rest of your life and your second Saturn Return at 59 will be a breeze AND a reward.
On the other hand, if you fail to do this, you will have to face the same situation at 59 when it is extremely difficult to answer any calls or make the necessary changes. Many people die around 60 and I am convinced that this is one of the reasons. Retirement comes at this time, but retirement can be a happy thing. What is depressing and possibly fatal is the realization that you have not really lived YOUR life at all. And now it seems too late to do anything about it. Don’t find yourself in this position at 58! Make rigorous choices at 29 that set your feet on a path that is meaningful to you. If you need help finding your path, that’s something a professional astrologer will be glad to help you with.
Here are some examples of the choices people have made at their first Saturn Return, two “wins” and one “loss”. I have fictionalized names, occupations and geography, but the examples are from real life.
WIN with PETER PEACHTREE Peter Peachtree, a huge strapping boy, was born into a family of well-to-do Pennsylvania Dutch dairy farmers in Minnesota. Peter was the first son and it was always understood that he would take over the family business some day. After all, he would be the fourth generation. Peter was rebellious during his school years and got sent away to a boarding school. After graduation, he married a girl from his hometown and had two kids. Peter’s wife called all the shots. Peter worked under his father’s strict and overbearing presence from sun up to sun down and never thought anything of it until one day, at around 29, Peter met Lisa. Lisa was a very independent career girl visiting from a nearby metropolis where she was a real estate salesperson. Lisa was a also free thinker and a truth teller. Peter was immediately attracted.
Lisa was not. She thought Peter was a player. After all, he was married. But Peter persisted in his admiration and friendship toward her. Lisa began to point things out to Peter, how unhappy he was, how controlled he was and how hypocritical his situation was. Since this happened to be the truth, Peter’s eyes opened. He realized his wife had married him for money and his parents had always taken advantage of his size and energy around the dairy farm all his life without respecting him as a person. At one point they even tied him to a tree in the afternoons when they couldn’t think of any other way to “control him”. Peter convinced Lisa to wait while he straightened out his life. This was a long, painful and difficult process but eventually Peter obtained a divorce and at least the acceptance if not support of his parents. He and Lisa have married. They have twin girls. Peter runs his own milk delivery service in the area and his parents are finally coming to terms with his new life, which is a more authentic one for him.
As difficult as this was for Peter, he is now living the spiritual, non-materialistic life that is more suited to his true nature. When his second Saturn Return comes around at 59, Peter will be richly rewarded for these difficult choices by knowing that he has chosen the life he was meant to live.
WIN with MARQUESA CLAVIER It seems like Marquesa spent the first 29 years of her life studying hard and being very responsible. An only child, Marquesa was very close to her single mother. Both worked hard (Marquesa had her first job at 14) and their life had a rather serious tone to it. In her mid 20s, Marquesa began a Master’s degree program at the local university and at the same time began living with a man who was halfway between her age and her mother’s. The couple moved into a small unit on her mother’s property, 16 acres in northern Washington state. The relationship between the three began to seem more like two parents and a child. Marquesa was getting the father she never had and Marquesa’s mother was getting the help on the property with maintenance and repairs that she had never had. All was well until Marquesa got close to her Saturn Return. About this time her boyfriend was demanding marriage and children. Marquesa realized this wouldn’t work for the rest of her life. Also the arrangement was stifling everyone and most of all herself. She had a lot of internal pressure and finally broke off her relationship.
It became difficult to maintain this decision, so Marquesa began a 6 month research project in a foreign country in connection with her Master’s degree. There she met a man who was close to her own age and they became engaged. Marquesa realized how much she had grown to dislike the fast pace of America and how unfulfilling her Master’s program was. They married and the couple opted to remain abroad where they could live more cheaply. Marquesa reorganized her life around some other interests and eventually stayed home to raise a big family. Her ex boyfriend married shortly after she did and they remained friends via email. Marquesa’s mother, although shocked by the suddenness of her plans, was happy for her daughter. She sold her property, flew over to visit a couple of times a year, and moved out in new directions of her own. At Marquesa’s second Saturn Return, we will expect to see her looking back with peace of mind, knowing that her decision to be “herself” at 29, difficult as it was, also gave health and happiness to those she loved.
LOSE with LOUIS LAZINKSY Louis grew up in the Chicago area, the first son of a prominent, wealthy Roman Catholic doctor. His mother was an aggressive social climber. The family was Roman Catholic. Louis went to all the “right” schools, joined all the “right” clubs and succeeded in distinguishing himself at Yale University as an undergraduate. Between college and medical school, he took two years off and volunteered for a program in an underdeveloped country. While there, he fell passionately in love with a fellow volunteer from Lilian, Alabama named Loxie. They conceived a child and married shortly before it was born. Louis’ parents were extremely disappointed because Loxie was not of the same social or religious background but they dealt with the situation as best they could. To them the important thing was that the union was blessed by the church and their grandchild would have a father. The couple and their young son returned to the United States and Louis began his medical training at Johns Hopkins University. Louis’ father helped the couple to live very comfortably while Louis was in school. Louis’ mother adored her son and saw a great future for him. Louis graduated and began his practice in another state. By this time, Loxie was very unhappy. She didn’t like being a mother. She didn’t think she was “cut out for it”. And she didn’t like Louis’ friends. She thought they were “stuck up” and felt that their wives rejected her because of her lack of education. Loxie began to drink heavily and experimented with drugs. The couple neared 29 and Louis realized he had made a mistake. Both he and his son were suffering as Loxie grew more desperate and depressed. She refused to have more children. She refused help. And she graduated to cocaine. Louis confided in his father that he intended to get a divorce. Louis’ orthodox Roman Catholic father forbade it. If Louis divorced his wife, he would be disinherited. Louis began a life of quiet desperation. He turned more and more to his mother for emotional support as his wife’s condition deteriorated. Loxie died in her late 40s of alcoholism. When Louis was 59, his mother died and he followed her to his grave a year later.
Here are a few other examples of changes real people have made at their first Saturn Return where they won:
• Nora divorced her abusive, overbearing husband who never let her out of the house and went back to college to start a career. She realized that she had never been happy being married and did not marry again, but supported herself as a paralegal and is now working toward a law degree in the evenings.
• Nick was a concert promoter. He drove a big car, dressed flashy, chased women and threw his money around. The concert business dried up for him and at 29 he went into real estate. He married and had two boys. Since he had not saved any money from his promoter days, his lifestyle changed as well.
• Evan’s father ran off with another woman when he was 15, leaving him as the “head of the household” with his embittered and overwhelmed mother and 3 younger brothers. Evan’s father made no support payments. In order to provide for the family, Evan began work immediately at an auto parts store in Atlanta and continued there after graduation. When he turned 29, Evan put together enough money to attend a world famous Scuba diving school in San Diego. Evan later worked at the school and used his Scuba diving instructor’s income to take night classes in video production. Soon he opened his own business making movies of weddings and other events.
• Kurt was making trial graphic presentations for litigators in a company based out of Chicago. He operated as an independent consultant and made enough money in 6 months to travel for the other 6. At his Saturn Return, he moved to Hawaii and became a massage practitioner and holistic healer. 7. Rory was a super achiever CPA and tax attorney who married the first woman he ever slept with. At his Saturn Return, he began an affair which ended his marriage. The affair ended as well and after that he dated quite a few different women. He was able to make a wiser choice when he remarried 6 years later.
If you are approaching your first Saturn Return, please don’t let the pressure get to you. Do some soul searching and be willing to make some hard choices if you have to because if you do ... you will win for the rest of your life!
If you’re not sure when your Saturn Return is taking place, email me at parklanenancy@hotmail.com and I will give you this information free of charge to support you on your spiritual path.
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