As you are probably aware, we are rounding out the calendar year of 2018 at the end of December. However, astrologically speaking, we actually see the new year as starting on the winter solstice which will be happening at the end of this week when the Sun ingresses into the sign of Capricorn. Before we get into the indications of what the Sun’s upcoming ingress into Capricorn can bring with it, I’d like to discuss some interesting facts about Vedic Astrology’s viewpoint on years and a deeper understanding of our own calendar and how it relates to astrology.
The Calendar in Vedic Astrology
In Vedic Astrology, there are four different measures of a year and it’s all about context of perspective and how it is measured. To basically summarize it, as it would take a deeper exploration to parse out the specificities, there are variations of perspective involving counting sunrises, lunar phases, or degrees of movement of the Sun through the zodiac to measure a year. However, they all are relative to the Earth’s orbit around the Sun, as we commonly know it. Where they differ is in the measurement of the incremental passages of time that occur along the way and how they map out the year.
Then there’s the concept of the start of a calendar year. This is actually the most recently formed type of year, believe it or not, and it is the one that we typically follow in modern society. This is based upon the calendar and is in a close approximation in relation to the winter solstice. The new year is said to begin whenever January 1st comes around, regardless of any other phenomena in a stellar sense, and is about ten days or so after the actual solstice occurs. Whereas this may seem inaccurate in an astrological sense, it is actually incredibly practical and pragmatic. After all, if we always adjusted the dates of the calendar then it would become very stressful to the working world and the scheduling of things in a large scale (like for all states and countries to agree on and implement). It also helps for the predictive sense of astrology as in wanting to easily be able to count the amount of days until something happens and for easily giving a perspective of range of dates.
The thing about our Gregorian calendar is that it is actually related to astrology! First off, there’s twelve months just as there are twelve signs in the zodiac. Then, more fascinating than that, is the fact that the seven days of the week are each related to a planet. It takes multiple languages’ translation to really see this fact. For example, whereas Sunday in English is easily recognized as related to the Sun, Tuesday is not simply relatable until we look at another language. In Spanish, Tuesday is known as Martes which shows us that Tuesday is related to the planet Mars.
Even more fascinating is the fact that the natural planetary order known in Vedic Astrology goes as follows: Sun, Moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, and Saturn. This is the same relationship that our days of the week are related to! This is actually extremely valuable in an astrological context because certain activities and such are said to be more auspicious if performed on the day of the week related to that planet. For example, the Sun is related to the top of the hierarchy and to purity and Sunday is the day that most people spend engaged with their religious group and give reverence to a higher power.
The Ingress of Sun into Capricorn
Now, coming back to the ingress of Sun into Capricorn happening on Friday December 21st…First off, the ingress of the Sun into Capricorn doesn’t necessarily bring about the indications similar to the New Year’s resolutions that are so commonly known. Actually, that is more related to when the Sun crosses over one’s first house in their natal chart or even more so when it returns to the same degree in the sky as in one’s natal chart. This is known as your astrological birthday and that typically is when each individual looks at his or her life, assesses which courses of action need to come next, and makes course corrections and plans.
Now, what is happening during this ingress is the conjunction of Sun with Saturn. This is not a pleasant conjunction by any stretch of the imagination. In Vedic Astrology, Sun and Saturn are known to be what is called mutual enemies. This means that the influence of one on the other creates more difficulties and hindrance towards the other in bringing about its natural characteristics and agenda.
With Sun getting influenced by Saturn, this can work out in a multitude of different ways. However, how it is mainly experienced is by a sense of lack getting in the way of one being able to fulfill their goals or just express their naturally bright self. In more common parlance, this can lead to one revisiting issues of self-esteem and being put into situations and circumstances where this is brought to a head. It can be a lot of self-doubt and general feelings of incapability—basically, a lot of ego challenges. An example of this could be where at work one is to become the leader of a research group. They then feel like their research ability is not as great as the others in the group and therefore they don’t deserve to be the leader. Whereas there could be truth in that fact about research capability, being the leader doesn’t necessarily require one to the best at research, but more so to be the one that organizes everyone and keeps everyone on track and helps to establish realistic goals.
Time to Check Your Ego
The key to working with this energy is akin to how I described it in the previous example. Even though one may be more prone at this time to feel the weight of a situation and want to cower away because of their inadequacy in the context of others, it is important not to lose sight of that which actually needs to be accomplished. This energy actually presents a wonderful opportunity to get some great work done as there will be more circumstances availed to check one’s ego at the door. At times, it’s important to be an inspiration to everyone else and to be recognized for one’s competency, but at other times, such as this, it’s important to let others’ abilities lead the way to greater progress. The key here to not letting the feelings of inadequacy take over is to zoom out and see the biggest picture possible and to accept that sometimes the only real obstacle that is in the way is a hurt ego. But, oh boy, can that be the biggest obstacle!
