The birth of a child, our first kiss, a new job promotion, and the day of the wedding: all real life matters that involve timing, whether of the variety that requires prior planning or of the unscheduled type whose effects we must measure later. Timing has remained a central preoccupation of astrology since its inception; it was, after all, born out of a desire to make better use of the natural cycles for agricultural purposes (in accordance with the regular rhythmic movements of the stars and planets throughout the solar year). Our calendrical system and clocks are based on the heavens. A year is the time it takes for the Earth to orbit once around the sun and a day the time it takes for the Earth to make one complete rotation on its axis. The month was originally based on the orbit of the moon about the Earth and a week of seven days was designated so that each day was named after the planet that presided over it (some of these names have been replaced by Germanic gods -- such as Venus’s day of Friday named in English after her Germanic counterpart, Freya -- and some remain close to their Roman roots such as Saturn’s namesake, Saturday). These systems were developed in companionship with astrology to better structure human society and actions in precise coordination with the movements and meanings of the stars. When considering the place of timing in relationships we are looking to uncover the factors capable of activating the potential evident between any two individuals’ charts. You might think of a forest fire here, preceded by conditions of, say, drought and its resultant dryness, abundance of fuel (timber) and oxygen, just awaiting the introduction of the final element, heat, in the form of a heat wave or careless match perhaps, to set the whole region ablaze. Of course, a sudden rainstorm that interrupts the drought and stops the fire before it even gets started is also a matter of timing. These simple metaphors only just
to touch on the complexity of human relationships where we typically find multiple timing factors pulling the nascent partnership in different directions at the same time.
We know from our experience that all matters of timing break down ultimately into one of two different types: subjective and objective. These terms are, albeit, a bit simplistic for describing the range of factors involved but they will, for our purposes here, suffice. Subjective timing refers to the personal developmental aspect, i.e., what we encounter in life merely because we are ready or primed to do so. Each individual enters this world with an innate timetable of personal growth hardwired into us. It may be encoded genetically or that may be only part of the story, our science is still too young to tell us for sure, but either way it reveals through the medium of time the intent our Soul has for expressing itself on this occasion of bodily existence. To explain what I mean I refer to the early novels of author, Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., and to one of his favorite creations, the alien race of the Tralfalmadorians. Appearing in several of Vonnegut’s works of fiction such as Slaughterhouse Five and The Sirens of Titan, the Tralfalmadorians are a race of beings that see and move about in four dimensions just as easily as humans see and move about in three. We are all familiar with the three spatial dimensions of length, width and breadth but physicist Albert Einstein posited that the fourth dimension might be time. It is common to think of space and time as being two entirely separate things but what the eminent scientist was suggesting is that time may be actually be an extension of space, another way that space "behave" besides the three ways we know so well. Using this concept, Vonnegut created an alien species that look at humans, for example, and see multi-legged creatures existing simultaneously from birth to death in all their many manifestations throughout a given lifetime. How they appear as a child, what they look and act like as a teen, the person they become when they get married or first parent a child, and on through the many phases of a lifetime until the moment that they leave this earth for points beyond -- all captured at a single glance. Tralfalmadorians see time, or, perhaps more accurately, they see in time. If Dr. Einstein is right, if time is just another extension of space, are we then fated from birth? Do we meet our death at the same second that we take our first breath? For Vonnegut’s aliens this is pretty much the way it is and they accordingly practice a philosophy of life detached from concern about events that, as far as they are concerned, have already happened, are going to happen, and are even now happening concurrently. The author’s point, however, is to contrast the very strangeness of the Tralfalmadorians’ experience to the way that humans must live, to underscore the impossibility of the same kind of detachment for a race who cannot see in time and must therefore make choices with unknown consequences. When I said earlier, therefore, that we are born with an innate timetable of personal growth hardwired into us.I did not mean to say that our paths are fated but rather that we come here with plans and purposes already laid out, and that if we could see as the Tralfalmadorians do we would see our entire lifetime of purpose at a single glance. It is this lifetime of purpose that astrologers analyze when we study somebody’s secondary progressions.
The astrological technique of erecting and interpreting secondary progressed charts is an old one, reflecting an ancient realization that birth is only the beginning of the journey -- not its destination. The methodology for creating such a horoscope is fairly simple and is embodied in the phrase, "a year for a day". Take a look at an ephemeris for the period immediately following an individual’s entrance into this world and progress the planets forward exactly one day for every year of life. For example, if you are 22.5 years old you will note by sign and degree where the planets were located 22.5 days following the moment of your birth and that is where they will be located in your progressed chart. If you want to make a rough estimate of where the progressed sun should be at any given time without using an ephemeris you can approximate its movement to a degree a day. If you are 30 years old, therefore, you can add 30 degrees to your sun’s natal position to get a general idea of its progressed position. For accuracy it should be noted that the sun moves at different speeds at different times of the year so only an ephemeris, or an astrological software program, can help you to determine its actual location. What the secondary progressions reveal to us are the unfolding story of one’s birth, the internal storyline of our one’s entire stay on the planet for any given lifetime. We are highly impressionable during our first three to four months of life and absorb everything around us like sponges in a remarkably accelerated fashion never equaled again. During that period we formulate the basic ideas of reality that we spend the rest of our lives working out in actual experience. As we grow older that first year our sense of time and capacity to learn slow till we settle on a time schedule that associates the two primary solar cycles we’ve become familiar with, the day and the year. By then the fundamental template for the current lifetime has been formed at the deepest and most hidden levels of the individual’s mind. The brain has received the primary programming out of which all other life experience will derive. The secondary progressed chart, therefore, helps us to access this meta-program so that we might better understand our own role in creating the events we are currently experiencing. We do so not in isolation but, rather, in tandem with events impressed upon us by objective reality, which exists apart from our own designs or desires, an act of co-creation that emphasizes our choices and that has no predestined outcome.
Objective reality takes place outside of any individual’s complete personal control although people groups of various sizes and compositions (local communities, voluntary associations, movements, political parties, religious groups, companies, nations, societies, etc.) can have a very great influence upon that reality and certain individuals, by having impact on those groups, can do the same. Levels of influence vary greatly so that while a political leader may have powerful sway over the country they rule they may have little to no effect whatsoever over the evolution of the species. The observation and analysis in astrology of transits, the continuing movements of the planets in relation to each other and to any particular chart of choosing, tell us from a planetary perspective what is going on in objective reality and the impact it is likely to have. In the field of synastry, the transits can tell us when opportunities might arise to meet others, what kind of relationship issues we may need to address or the conditions under which certain types of relationships might be formed or perpetuated with greater or lesser success. The degree to which individuals simply react mindlessly to transits or, on the contrary, proactively use them to further their goals indicates the individual’s extent of self-direction. This is a good determination to make from the start for any form of astrological counseling since the whole purpose of what we do is to train our clients to become ever more self-directed. The precise manner in which we respond to these transits will in large part be shaped by whatever we are ready to experience as indicated by the secondary progressions. They act as a filter for the experiences that the transits impress upon us from the outside. When looking for astrological indicators of soul mate contact, therefore, we must take factors of timing into account.
Look now to the progressed chart and compare it to its natal corollary. What do you see? The faster moving planets, Sun, Moon, Mercury, Venus, and perhaps Mars, will all have noticeably progressed in location from their natal positions. The Moon, especially, makes one complete circuit of the chart approximately every 27.5 years or about 13 degrees a year. Depending on the age of the chart subject, the progressed Moon may have already completed a circuit or two and be on its second or third way around. The progressed lunar cycles are central in all matters of timing but especially so matters of human relations. They outline the emotional conditions and developing ego-state of an individual for the period of time in question, central determinants in assessing a person’s capacity for a given relationship. If, for example, the progressed Moon is in hard aspect to progressed or natal Saturn, the person may be feeling lonely and isolated, or even depressed. A person in such a state is more likely to miss new relationship opportunities due to the preoccupation with self that such a condition engenders, or simply because they want to be alone. Look again and see a person whose progressed Moon is in soft aspect to their natal or progressed Sun and you will see somebody who is in touch with their joy and may be looking for another to share it with. Examine the planetary aspects between progressed planets and between progressed and natal planets, and you will get a good overall picture of an individual’s state of readiness for relationship.
