Where do Cycles Come From?

    CHICAGO, IL, June 27, 2016 /24-7PressRelease/ -- If you hope to fully understand the information age revolution exploding all around you it's best to take the long view.

UK astrologer Wendy Stacey says the origin for today's rapid advances in communications, modes of travel and electronic gadgetry date to the 1890s, when the slow-moving planets Neptune and Pluto were traveling companions in the astrological sign of Gemini.

Astrology is the only discipline that makes a serious stab at explaining where cycles come from and what, in a broader sense, they mean. Over centuries astrologers have focused on finding meaning in the cyclical patterns that unfold as planets in our solar system orbit the sun at varying speeds and distances.

Between transiting planets measurable geometric angles are continually forming and separating. Cycles end and begin again anew when two planets - or any combination of the sun, moon and a planet - come together in the same degree of an astrological sign.

Astrologers call this coming together event a conjunction.

The shortest planetary cycle astrologers ponder is the 29-day lunar cycle. The longest is formed by the two outermost planets in the solar system, Neptune and Pluto, which last came together in 1891 and 1892 at seven and eight degrees of Gemini.

In an article for the Astrological Journal Stacey says this conjunction marked the start of the current cycle and set the scene for the following 492 years. Currently, we're about 125 years into a cycle that will not end and begin again for another 367 years.

She points out that cycles do not operate in isolation. There's a need to look at the wider context and consider all of the other planetary cycles that are progressing in the heavens at the same time. But Neptune and Pluto and their cycle "provide the backdrop against which all other cycles will unfold," she says.

"With conjunctions of the outer planets we try to understand what happened or may happen by exploring the combination of these planets' characteristics coming together and what this could mean for the social, political and economic landscape. We analyze the point of conjunction as the 'seed' point, the end of something and the beginning of something else."

According to Stacey, planet Neptune brings an element of mysticism, an imaginative period. The planet is about alternative reality and fantasy, and has a tendency to romanticize and inflate. It rules things we cannot touch, and is elusive, subtle, manipulative and malleable.

"Neptune does not bring interest in what authority is or what tomorrow may bring but rather shows how we can see or experience things in a different way. It is Pluto that brings our attention to what is real, dangerous, sordid and what needs purging - destroying in order for renewal to spring forth," she said.

The 1890s have been referred to as the Naughty Nineties or the Gay Nineties, and marked the beginning of the end for the era author Mark Twain called the Gilded Age. Twain described the period as glittering on the surface but corrupt underneath. This, Stacey says, "is a very apt Neptune - Pluto description."

Neptune rules gases and liquids in all forms. Pluto is about digging, excavating and drilling under the ground or under the sea. Although drilling for oil had been going on for some time, the Neptune-Pluto conjunction is a marker for when the economic need for such resources stretched so far that oil became a major industry," she said.

An example of the Neptune-Pluto conjunction on steroids can be observed in the birth chart of Adolph Hitler. The German dictator was born with the conjunction of Neptune and Pluto in the area of the birth chart (eighth house) that astrologers identify with death and transformation.

Under Hitler's influence we saw the manipulation of the masses, the toxic (Neptune) penetration (Pluto) into the psyche of a collective that resulted in the rise of Nazism, she said.

"Hitler and Italian dictator Mussolini sought to create an idealistic totalitarian unified state. They attempted to achieve this by eradicating what they thought was societal decay - through mass murder.

Neptune-Pluto reminds us of this historically significant mass murder, which was predominately organized as death (Pluto) by gas (Neptune)," Stacey said.

The Neptune-Pluto characteristics give us the flavor of what will follow but the astrological sign in which the conjunction occurs is definitive. In a relatively short period of time - before planets in the conjunction have moved on to form their first major stressful alignment - there have been unprecedented historical developments in all things Gemini, she said.

"Industries ruled by Gemini provide one of the means through which Neptune-Pluto is lived out. Since the conjunction in 1891 and 1892 we have watched areas attributed to this sign flourish.

Gemini is about being mobile, and short distance travel is now a way of life. Advancements in roads and public transport have now transformed mobility and travel time to such an extent that flying around the world is often considered by many as a commute," Stacey said.

In the 120 years since the conjunction there has been substantial growth in other Gemini industries, such as export-import, communications and information. Interaction with each other through electronic means and social networking is growing exponentially. And virtual reality (Neptune-Pluto) sites are one of the fastest growing areas on the internet.

"We are living through an information age, all of which can be attributed to the greatest outer planetary cycle of Neptune and Pluto, which last conjoined in the sign of Gemini. One of the biggest concerns we face with such an information age is how we learn to filter the junk from the relevant, valid and valuable information, something that Gemini is not always equipped to do," she said.

The Astrology News Service is jointly sponsored by the American Federation of Astrologers (AFA),the Association for Astrological Networking (AFAN), the International Society for Astrological Research (ISAR),the National Council for Geocosmic Research (NCGR) and the Organization of Professional Astrologers (OPA).

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