I’ve spent so much time lately writing about this summer’s cardinal T-square that I’ve barely given much thought to Neptune and Chiron, both of which turned retrograde this past week.

Those of you who followed me over from The Pisces Chronicles may recall my posts about the Neptune-Chiron conjunction of the past few years and the opportunity for healing deep wounds, both collective and individual. In my observation, that window is a bit wider during times when one or both planets are changing directions.

In November 2008, I wrote:

Culturally, we are taught that giving up is a bad thing, that it shows we are weak. Don’t go down without a fight, we’re told. But sometimes, giving up and giving in is exactly what we need to do, and there’s nothing like extreme pain to force us to let go of everything we are, everything we believe, and to open ourselves up to something else.

Neptune dissolves the ego and allows us to open up to that “something else.” We’ve got some extra help from Mars, the surgeon. Mars is opposite Neptune and will oppose Chiron on Tuesday. Re-opening old wounds can hurt like hell, but sometimes it’s necessary before true healing can take place.

Most of us have some idea of our individual wounds, but we’re at the point at which we have to address our collective dis-ease. This wound is millennia old, and I believe its origins lie in the separation of male and female energies. Many of my old PiChron posts were devoted to the coming planetary shift and what it means for healing the imbalance between feminine and masculine energies — yin and yang, if you will.

Given the building intensity of the cardinal T-square, it may seem like Neptune is a minor influence at this point. And besides, now that Uranus is in Aries, they’re no longer are in mutual reception. But Neptune is still a player in this lineup, albeit in a more subtle, Neptunian way.

Within the cardinal T-square is polarization and extreme tension. Polarization is at the root of every conflict on the planet right now, and it all goes back to the separation of the fundamental masculine-feminine energies. We’re stuck, and the only way out of it is going to be a major breakthrough in consciousness — if we don’t kill each other first. Breakthroughs are not possible without first having a breakdown, and that happens when the ego gives up and stops fighting.

The ego is invested in hanging on tightly to old wounds. Experienced for long enough, our fears, insecurities and paranoia become so much a part of us that we may take them for granted and not even realize how much they’re affecting us. If we do manage to release them, we feel an odd emptiness, like something is missing.

I believe that an increase in consciousness will come simultaneously with the opening of our hearts, individually and collectively. We have to open our hearts and keep them open despite repeated hurt, and we have to work to clear out the energies that prevent love from taking root. Love makes us whole, but it can’t descend on us and bestow its light unless we clear a space for it in our hearts.

For those of you who are working on making the world safe for love, I want to encourage you to keep going. I am optimistic that we’re about to turn a corner, even though it seems like we’re in the darkest hour, and the in the outside world, it’s feeling a lot like war and the seven plagues.

I leave with you with a video called “Soldier of Love,” from the first album in 10 years by Sade. A Capricorn (ruler of the military), she’s back just in time for the cardinal T-square. And what about those Mayan ruins on the album cover? Just a coincidence?

Pat