The gen­er­al out­look for 2011 would appear to be bet­ter than that of the last sev­er­al years. We have come through a series of align­ments that have shook and shocked our world, and there is more just ahead in this decade. And it has been whis­pered, just maybe, we will move into the dawn of a new world, the begin­ning of a new age, by the 2020’s. But, for now, 2011 might pro­vide some degree of need­ed respite to our chal­lenges and tribulations.

Where­as in 2006-07 we had Sat­urn oppos­ing Nep­tune, which her­ald­ed the bust­ing of many illu­sions in the world, not the least of which was the credit/debit bub­ble burst­ing. This was fol­lowed by 2008-10 where we faced Sat­urn and Uranus in oppo­si­tion, which was the dri­ving force of the con­flicts between out­worn exist­ing insti­tu­tions and sys­tems, ver­sus the some­times inco­her­ent erup­tion of ener­gies seek­ing to bring about fun­da­men­tal change in the sta­tus quo.

This jux­ta­po­si­tion of Sat­urn and Uranus was then joined in the lat­ter part of that peri­od, in late 2009 into 2010, by Sat­urn squar­ing Plu­to. This chal­lenge (Plu­to) to the sta­tus quo (Sat­urn) added a deep­er and more threat­en­ing tone to the forces of change sweep­ing our world. The forces attempt­ing to pre­serve order and those attempt­ing to cre­ate a new one are now locked in a great struggle.

A Time to Pause
But it would seem that this year there is to be a pause. That is mere appear­ance, of course, because time (the plan­ets) march on and there is always change, even if it is less intense for some of us. But it is a time to look for signs, a time to re-assess and re-group. For up ahead, the dance of the plan­ets con­tin­ues, and they will lead us into more pow­er­ful forces and align­ments, the very forces that can and will bring about a new world.

This entry is by way of begin­ning my expla­na­tion of what to look for in the year ahead and in the years to come, (and what we can learn from years past), as shown to us by what is known as Mun­dane or World­ly Astrol­o­gy. Just as in per­son­al or per­son-cen­tered astrol­o­gy, this can and must be viewed in two dis­tinct ways.

Two Kinds of Tran­sits
One type is as in the exam­ples above; that is of plan­ets mov­ing in a great dance with one anoth­er in our solar sys­tem. They con­tin­u­al­ly form up var­i­ous com­bi­na­tions of aspects with one anoth­er that cre­ate or pro­duce effects felt by one and all col­lec­tive­ly here on Earth. These com­bi­na­tions astrologers call Tran­sits to Tran­sits. With­in this great whirling of wheels with­in wheels, pat­terns form and re-form, pat­terns repeat but nev­er quite exact­ly as before. But since there is much that can be gained from look­ing at those pri­or align­ments, we look back to those sim­i­lar pat­terns in an attempt to dis­cern the con­di­tions for our present and future. So I will refer to oth­er times and places to illus­trate the nature of what we are faced with now.

The oth­er type of align­ment is what astrologers call Tran­sits to Natal. These are cre­at­ed by the plan­ets mov­ing through our solar sys­tem as they form rela­tion­ships with the plan­e­tary place­ments that are in a par­tic­u­lar birth chart. For Mun­dane Astrol­o­gy, we look at the charts of Nations, World Lead­ers and oth­er notable indi­vid­u­als, major Eco­nom­ic, Cul­tur­al, Spir­i­tu­al, or any oth­er “birthed” orga­ni­za­tions, to ascer­tain the forces at work in their past, present or future. I will be exam­in­ing a num­ber of such enti­ties in this 2011 fore­cast, and, as events unfold, will from time to time look at oth­er play­ers on the stage of history.

And with this sec­ond type of align­ment comes a caveat to my open­ing claim that 2011 will be a respite. Although the depth and pow­er of the “Tran­sits to Tran­sits” this year is more mut­ed, that may not mat­ter for some. For many indi­vid­u­als and orga­ni­za­tions, the tran­sits to their own charts that will be in force this year will be pro­found and chal­leng­ing. The forces that have been unleashed of late are still play­ing out in each of us and in our orga­ni­za­tions. That means for many of us, 2011 will seem as event­ful and chal­leng­ing as what we have wit­nessed before. The wheels are turn­ing; the dance of life goes on.

Des­tiny
But we must always remem­ber; this world is going to be trans­formed, not by plan­ets or stars, but by… us. We are the actors in this dra­ma; and forces play through and around us. But it is up to each and every one of us to make the world that is com­ing into being.

All we can do, and must do, is under­stand where and what we have come from, to watch for and under­stand the signs that have always been there to guide us, and, so guid­ed, ful­fill our des­tiny which is to cre­ate a heav­en here on Earth.

Part One

Time to sparkle; you need to act in a man­ner that tru­ly reflects your inde­pen­dence and social aware­ness now. Since Decem­ber 7th, Mars in Capri­corn direct­ed your actions in more prag­mat­ic and respon­si­ble path­ways. Why change what works?

From now until Feb­ru­ary 22, you need to not mere­ly pre­serve and pro­tect what has been achieved; you need to act in a man­ner that reflects a greater social con­scious­ness. Move out­side your com­fort zone but do it with your friends.

This is not the time to fol­low the path that is well-known or tra­di­tion­al; now you need to show that you are ready to make a dif­fer­ence by being freer with your­self and oth­ers. Be the future you want to share with your com­pan­ions. You do this by help­ing to cre­ate a greater space of free­dom for all to enjoy.

Seri­ous thoughts ahead! For the next 3 weeks you’ll only impress to the extent you are prag­mat­ic as Mer­cury moves back into Capri­corn. If it does­n’t work, if it isn’t prac­ti­cal, it will not mat­ter how pret­ty you make it sound, your ideas are going nowhere with­out some major ground­ing now.

Mars Sex­tiles Jupiter means anoth­er day of mean­ing­ful progress towards your goals now. You faced a chal­lenge at the end of Novem­ber when they squared one anoth­er. Now with your actions (Mars) and prin­ci­ples (Jupiter) in sync, you can move can move for­ward and secure the prize… and be thanked for it too!

Right action is right when you assert your­self in non-self-cen­tered ways.

Get ready…you are real­ly mov­ing for­ward now. When Mars sex­tiles Uranus, we have a won­der­ful oppor­tu­ni­ty to act in a more cre­ative, free and self-affirm­ing man­ner. Enjoy the ease with which you can take a new approach; you can achieve your goals, and you do it with orig­i­nal­i­ty and style.

When last they met in ear­ly Decem­ber, Mars was Squar­ing Uranus and we had to exer­cise cau­tion so as not act impa­tient­ly. We need­ed to make a choice (square) to inte­grate our per­son­al dri­ves and desires with con­sid­er­a­tion for one another.

Now we reap the ben­e­fits of what we learned then. We find it easy to take a new approach. This new and bet­ter way of being comes from the blend­ing of respon­si­ble action (Mars in Capri­corn) guid­ed by com­pas­sion­ate under­stand­ing (Uranus in Pisces).

Enjoy! Be inven­tive; show your cre­ativ­i­ty and try some­thing new.…you are mak­ing progress now and it real­ly feels good.

This, too, is the third of three align­ments of Mer­cury with a plan­et, this time it is Jove, Jupiter, the greater benef­ic, throw­ing down the chal­lenge to our think­ing and com­mu­ni­cat­ing functions.

Though we call Jupiter the greater benef­ic, (because it rules growth and expan­sion, and who is not for more of many aspects of life, like friend­ship, love, peace…?), not all expan­sion, not all growth is good, (like in the human body when we go beyond a safe weight, or when we suf­fer from a dis­ease of unre­strict­ed growth like cancer).

With this in mind, you need to approach your think­ing and speech with care now, so that you don’t go too far, so you don’t go to excess, and cause harm to your cause or to one anoth­er. You are more like­ly to be over­ly enthu­si­as­tic about your posi­tion or belief, or encounter some­one else who is being dog­mat­ic now. So be care­ful, refrain from boast­ing, or push­ing an idea upon another.

Remem­ber a square is not real­ly there to push or pull you into some bad act or behav­ior, (though, unfor­tu­nate­ly this is a more com­mon result and aris­es from igno­rance, fear and a lack of spir­i­tu­al devel­op­ment). Real­ly the square is there to present you with a choice. You can either react, retreat and so stay at an old lev­el of self-unre­al­iza­tion. Or, you can choose to under­stand and rise to a high­er lev­el of self-actualization.

To make the bet­ter choice requires lis­ten­ing to your inner voice, which leads to a quick­en­ing of self-aware­ness. Through that greater self-aware­ness you move into right thought, right action and a high­er degree of self-fulfillment.

So at this square lis­ten to what Jupiter is say­ing to Mer­cury. It is say­ing (through Pisces), that your ideas, opin­ions, beliefs and atti­tudes (Mer­cury in Sagit­tar­ius), though seem­ing­ly right and true for you, and which are an impor­tant part of the whole song of cre­ation, are still lim­it­ed because they come from just one part of, one aspect of, the greater reality.

Jupiter in Pisces says you must grow into that greater under­stand­ing that flows from the truth that Real­i­ty is real­ly made up by a host of mul­ti­ple real­i­ties; that you real­ly exist in what should be seen as a mul­ti­verse. Our chal­lenge, real­ly, is how are we to under­stand and live in the one real­i­ty while we appear to exist in these sep­a­rate realities?

Jupiter in Pisces says you can do this because the greater Truth is that you orig­i­nate from, live through and will always be one in Spir­it. Thus, you can and will under­stand one anoth­er by liv­ing your life with and through compassion.

When we do, when we tru­ly see the oth­er as our self, then we can accept and cel­e­brate our dif­fer­ences, while hon­or­ing our com­mon ori­gin and des­tiny that is found in the stars.