Chiron Pisces Scar Tissue
Chiron ingressed into Pisces May 2010, went into retrograde into Aquarius and then moved completely into Pisces in March 2011 and will be there until March 2019. This is a long station in Pisces. It was in Aquarius since 2005 and in Capricorn from 2002. Much has been focused on this new discovery since the mid 1970’s. Chiron’s journey has taken us to a place where we are meant to face our wounds and move forward toward a new horizon of wholeness. There are many ways to see our wounds in a chart but a pinnacle place to look to see a particular center or source of our patterns of working through and manifesting our pain and suffering would be the planetoid (some say asteroid) Chiron.
Chiron represents an area in our life where we may suffer a wound that is not curable-a tender spot that continues to bring some type of suffering whether that is a health issue, financial, relationship, family etc. One of my first studies of Chiron came with the book “Chiron and The Healing Journey” by Melanie Reinhart. Here she discusses and sees working with Chiron as an opportunity to use Chiron as a rainbow bridge of our personality to our soul and a way to transform the incurable wound by allowing a healing breakthrough. Often in this unraveling, we discover the deeper recesses and significance to our wounds as we fully experience their effect which has us become that much closer to our soul.
Chiron is also considered the “wound of the soul” where the attachment to suffering is difficult to release. The Chiron return at age 50 is a marker of a time where we may find resolution and acceptance and learn to make peace with our wound. Chiron Pisces will give that opportunity for compassion and surrender to our healing, honoring spiritual methods to bring a sense of cohesion and interconnectedness as Pisces symbolizes merging with the greater whole where we are all connected. Here we have an opportunity to dissolve and unravel the layers to the wounding although there could be the negative of escape and scapegoating, pasting our pain elsewhere and disappearing into a void, wishing to immerse ourselves in incubation.
We saw clearly the devastating wounding occurring with Chiron Pisces (Neptune water related issues with oceans, flooding, tsunamis, hurricanes) with the Gulf Oil spill just as Chiron first moved into Pisces in 2010 as well as the catastrophic Japan Tsunami as Chiron moved back into Pisces once again in March 2011, with the continuous tremendous torrential rains and flooding. Chiron Pisces will give the opportunity to shed many tears whether literally or metaphorically and the pouring out of pain with a time to release and surrender and let gush out the flow of anguish and be brought to your knees.
I read something about happiness that I found enlightening regarding being wounded “don’t nurse them, don’t curse them, don’t rehearse them. Don’t immerse them, reverse them”. This is considered the logical and rational and stoic way to handle pain however not a spiritually honorable and elevated one. I just read a book on unconditional acceptance which messages in general that we give notice to what ails us, yet society in many ways shuns such emotional indulgence. It’s easier said than done and ideal to turn the other cheek, numb or deny or cover up or push under the carpet and put on a smile over our pains however the process of uncovering and unraveling our hurts move us toward the healing process. Chiron is a gift to reach the core of our emotional pain as the hurt we feel is the underlying, often masked emotion that gets trapped in our tissues under all our anger, depression, irritation, obsession and denial.
There is so much to be understood and learned about our wounded selves. When Chiron is impacting our chart in a challenging transit or aspect, we experience our wounds more helplessly, feeling defeated and weakened. When Chiron is harmoniously accented in our chart, we have opportunity to heal others and ourselves. Chiron in Pisces may show wounding to areas Neptune Pisces related-immune system, feet, addictions, deceit, delusion, apathy, sacrifice, isolation and building our own prisons. I have seen many new salons open for treatment of foot pain (reflexology, pampering foot massage businesses seem to be thriving now).
Healing with water, hydro therapy, swimming, soaking, submerging and healing with faith, hope, charity, compassion and forgiveness-surrendering to a higher purpose and call, letting go and letting God. Those who have Chiron tenanted strong in their chart have powerful healing abilities. Chiron points to a healing crisis where we must enter a deep abyss and dark hole at times to reach that vulnerable hiding place and grapple with our demons. We all have our places of pain and we are all wounded in one way or another. No one escapes some form of suffering in his or her life. While some of us luckier to escape a heavy load, some endure through the most futile crises.
Chiron is associated with the mythical “incurable wound”. It is the open wound that doesn’t get closure. Its a perpetual reminder where we learn to embrace and just be with the wound and learn to accept which leaves us to a compassionate surrender to what is. The mythical story around Chiron, a centaur more noble and wise than the typical behavior of centaurs, was noted for his wisdom and healing powers but who was tormented with an incurable wound being pierced by an arrow. When Chiron transits a tender spot it often feels just like a piercing and a stabbing jolt of pain. Chiron to the Sun and a stab to the heart, Chiron to the Moon, a stabbing in our gut. Chiron was immortal and thus had to endure continuous pain with no escape through death. The lesson and moral of the story is of being human and the release through mortality which was finally granted to Chiron.
Chiron points us to the root cause of our pain. A wound we all have that will continue to haunt us yet the path to transcend and cure it is in embracing it. A wound has to expose itself. The open vulnerable exposure and bleeding of a wound is its cathartic moment, the festering is open toward healing. Bandage and cover ups can protect but the wound needs to breath. We can bury emotional wounds deep but purging will allow healing. Substance abuse or any addiction is common for trying to cope, numb, mask, dull and suppress pain and further bury the wounds. Pain is an acknowledgment. Pain is an instinctive warning sign that something is wrong and needs attention. Only with a naked and vulnerable surrender and facing our pain and truly feeling the rawness can we ultimately set ourselves free.
A crisis can bring to light a wound that any denial, guilt, acceptance won’t allow to fester any longer. We can go for years with pain and suffering for many reasons. Chiron aspects and transits give an opportunity to understand the dynamics of our wounds and the prison of pain. Wholeness or consciousness comes after integrating all parts and getting intimate with all our separate selves to create unity. Without this understanding or perception, we become lost in victim hood and apathy. Carl Jung stated “There is no coming to consciousness without pain”. Often the wisest are those who have had the most to suffer and endure and often have the most to share and teach. Those who really and truly understand compassion, know the perils of pain. The artist’s pain is his muse. Chiron was a healer and teacher-learning through trial and error and the growing pains which gives the polished stone of wisdom.
Most of us spend our lives seeking pleasure, happiness and peace and running from pain. Makes me laugh thinking about how my father used to gripe and grumble that “people are just pleasure seekers” When really one can’t have one without the other. There is a polarity here as with anything, you know the nagging feeling you get when everything is going well, too well-what goes up, must go down…too much of a good thing, another curve ball etc.
We each have our own cycles, waves of ups and downs. And we fine-tune these waves as we grow. We recognize our patterns, triggers and our own ball and chain. Some of us need to plunge to the depths of darkness into the abyss of our anguish. The paradox of pain/pleasure is akin to masochism and sadism. So much pleasure will usually need a balance with the same measure of pain. The worst scenario being a heroin addict who needs their pleasure injection. Isn’t hedonism pleasure masking pain, denial and escaping? Do we need to learn to just be with our pain? Ride its waves, experience its dimensions. Embrace it and all its hidden richness. In the place of surrender and acceptance, the honest expression and acknowledgment leaves us left with true peace and inner happiness. Happiness then isn’t something you seek, it’s something you are.
This is the secret of the opening of the heart chakra. It is an agreement with our pain because this odd intimacy will take us to our needed discovery. The pain that envelopes us and takes us from our pursuit of happiness may be a strong teacher and catalyst to the very place of joy we are searching for. Suffering and pain can often give us guidance to where our strengths are and how we can better serve our selves and others. Our weaknesses can also come to light more, giving us a deeper understanding of our limitations and where we can have freedom from our self sabotage, unrealistic expectations, weaknesses and sensitivities.
Can we live and find no pain, have only peace and hence live happily ever after? Sounds like a bland Utopia, a mirage of still waters and white noise. Yes, eventually we will find this pleasure and peace, but not without some bruising and scars, learning and growth. Like a symphony, the pursing, resonating, pulsating rhythm taking us to a climactic release, and then a gentle flowing of the tension leaving. This continual breaking the heart open and bleeding gives us greater endurance and exercise of this profound place of healing.
“Much of your pain is self-chosen.
It is the bitter potion by which the physician within you heals your sick self.
Therefore trust the physician, and drink his remedy in silence and tranquillity:
For his hand, though heavy and hard, is guided by the tender hand of the Unseen,
And the cup he brings, though it burn your lips, has been fashioned of the clay which the Potter has moistened with His own sacred tears.” Kahlil Gibran on Pain-The Prophet
Karma is often equated with our wounding. Where we may find our pain manifested through illness, career frustration, financial issues as well as the ongoing relationship challenges. The chart and placements of Saturn, Pluto, Moon as well as Chiron can give a good picture of some of the pain memories and trigger points. We are told we keep moving forward in our soul journey through the shedding of our Karmic debts. Some have come through many lifetimes already through many lessons.
We talk about balance and centering ourselves. We learn about boundaries and about give and take. Relationships are perhaps our biggest learning centers and where most suffer their deepest wounds. We quickly learn that misery loves company. Both happiness and misery are infectious. The dynamic interplay in our connections shows how we attract those to take us to those deep wounded places where we bring conscious those layers in our psyche. Somehow we find those who take us to our sensitive spots and we continue with those that keep puncturing those wounds with jabs to our heart so the pain takes us deeper, gets us very acquainted with our core wounds.
Difficult and challenging relationships are the catalyst to our growth. They are gifts in a way. If only we can see our Karmic connections we are compelled to enter, often driven initially by a powerful attraction and those we have less choice to encounter such as family, work etc. A pull somehow to take us to those places of experience, in hindsight a lesson to be learned for somehow we need to pass through these stages, phases in order to experience the levels of emotion or sensations; to stretch or test our boundaries in order that we may realize our pain threshold where we can get into topics about masochism and sadism in speaking of the boundaries of pain.
We compromise our principles and values for certain comforts and pleasures, we bargain between our hearts and minds in order to satisfy our immediate desires. Some live in a denial state, claim to be above their emotional needs, have a tough exterior and push down what they desire. They live in a numb state accepting the limiting circumstances. Some live in an emotional vacuum, can’t ever be satisfied, can’t ever get enough, the neediness propelling them to continuously take and expect more while not ever able to fill those empty spaces. These imbalances are often seen reflected in relationship cycles. The evolution of our soul will give us an indication of the trials we must go through with the uncovering of our unconscious bringing us closer to ourselves and our truth.
“Therein lies one of the greatest paradoxes about Chiron astrologically. In our wounding lies the key to our healing, and it all has to do with feelings (Moon). We are taught to suppress how we feel, from little on, and those stuck knots of unresolved pain often rule us from the subconscious where we are unaware of what causes our knee jerk reactions to certain incidents that repeat past patterns. So we stay stuck in ritualistic responses, to the detriment of our growth. To be in a body is to feel, and Chiron is associated with the pain of embodiment. We use the expression, “a free spirit.” It takes a lot of living to learn to be free within the confines of flesh and blood–to feel merged with the other beings, despite this fleshy armor with all its foibles. Just trying to move through the thickness of matter can be a chore. Some part of us remembers when there were no walls (bodies) between us. That is what we crave and take so long to learn: It is a state of mind. Separation is really an illusion. ” Author unknown.