Creative Connections & Client Communications
Getting to the Skeletons in the Closet!

Saturn related to Pluto is perhaps astrology’s most demanding, draining, debilitating symbolic construct. I’ve long carried an image with me that I think captures Saturn-Pluto analytically: skeletons in one’s closet. I have seen many, many hundreds of times, perhaps thousands, that Saturn conjunct, square, opposed, or quindecile Pluto natally connotes a skeleton in the closet of early development.

So often, the astrologer can see the “snag,” the ice-cold focus of upset, but not get at it easily, until sophisticated conversational, probing tools are learned (see the Archives in this department, immediately following this essay, for many essays sharing those techniques with you).

But look what happens when the Aries Point (29 Mutable to 1 Cardinal; see “Analytical Techniques” Archives for Aries Point essays) is brought into assimilation with Saturn and Pluto!

We know that the Aries Point somehow magically brings forward whatever is configured with it. It stands to reason that AP=Saturn/Pluto would help to open up the Saturn-Pluto knot! —And IT DOES.

For some years now, every time I have seen AP=Saturn/Pluto in the natal horoscope [the Aries Point conjunct, square, opposed or quindecile the midpoint of Saturn-Pluto], I have learned to say, gently but with authority, “What’s this skeleton in the closet … in those early years?”

I say this in a relaxed manner, with a kind of knowing, non-threatening air about the question. “What’s this skeleton in the closet suggested in the early family life?”

It’s amazing: the client is READY to talk about it forthrightly, openly, sometimes with great relief!

Most recently, a lady in her 30s showed AP=Saturn/Pluto. I began the consultation, “Jane, I really appreciate your coming to see me, your faith in this process; we’re going to have a fine discussion together. The planetary patterns at the time of your birth fascinatingly reveal many of the patterns in your life development. And one of those patterns shown here suggests a … well, a skeleton in your closet, back in the family development time! What is that?”

Without blinking an eye, Jane leaned forward and very calmly said, “Well, my father and I had a sexual relationship for four or five years.”

“Did your mother know about it?”

“Yes, she did … but she never said a word, never did a thing about it.” [And of course, this is a MAJOR issue for the consultation to follow.]

And here, I usually get the client off the skeleton focal point by saying –and these are very carefully chosen words … learn them…”And what have you carried forward from that experience into adult life?”

Jane responded right away, emphatically: “I really, really understand children!”

And, having worked out her vocational profile before the consultation, focusing strongly on Moon-oriental, I replied smoothly, “And that’s why you are a teacher!”

“–How did you know that????”

Look what was accomplished so quickly with just a few well turned snippets of conversation, led by the confidence that the Aries Point would easily open the door to the Saturn-Pluto knot!

Another client, a man in his 30s, when I asked him similarly about the skeleton in his closet, replied immediately, “I guess you could say it was a really neurotic, problematic mother.” –What he carried forward from that experience was/is crucially important to his relational dynamics with women today.

Martha Stewart [August 3, 1941 at 1:33 PM EDT in Jersey City NJ] also has AP=Saturn/Pluto, and also AP=Mc/Asc (the demand for publicity).

Martha Stewart is an open book! She needs to put it all out there.

You can imagine her answers to the question about “What’s this skeleton … or, dare I say, skeletons in your closet that I see here? How have they affected your development? How are they still with you?”

–Note that the way the question is asked defines the question as assumptive, i.e., it presumes the skeleton is there (note: “this”); and the astrologer is assuming that the illumination of it will come forward. Those assumptions are abetted by the strange nature of the Aries Point, bringing things forward.

–Note that because Saturn and Pluto move very slowly, when their midpoint is established at an Aries Point, many, many people will be born wearing their skeletons on their sleeve, if you will. For the last four months of 1941, Saturn/Pluto was at the Cancer Aries Point. Another time period: the end of 1967-early 1968 … etc.

–Note that the astrologer should not just go flying into this investigation as if it were a game of “gotcha”. This is a very serious technique to inspire revelation, and the astrologer must be elegantly prepared to manage the information the client shares.