News from Jules | 09.05.2022 | This is 40

Sep 06, 2022

Whether it’s true or imagined, I keep having deja vu experiences cycling back to five years ago. Not as if it’s already happened, simply that it’s happening again. As if I’m reliving versions of the same lessons, except at a different time in a different place with different people.

“Nothing ever goes away until it has taught us what we need to know,” said Pema Chödrön.

Considering the rise and fall of the sun and moon, the rotation of the stars and planets, the ebb and flow of the ocean, the turning of the leaves—why wouldn’t humans also live in cycles?

In 2017, I was living in a cottage nestled in the woods of inner city Portland, Ore. when a close friend read my astrological chart for the first time. Rationally, it sounded made up like reading my Virgo horoscope based on the 12 signs of the Zodiac in Cosmopolitan Magazine. And yet spiritually, so much of the chart reading matched private truths that felt rooted from deep within. How could she know?

Given that Western Astrology has held fairly constant since Roman times and nearly 2,000 years of human history, I can hold it with many grains of salt even if they’re more story than science. As verifiable as any of our human stories about ourselves have ever been.

Now in 2022, I am living in a cabin nestled in the woods of the Mid-Hudson Valley in New York where an Omega coworker, the only other person who also came from Portland, read my astrological chart for the second time.

A week before my 40th birthday, the chart reading felt like the first of countless gifts kicking off an abundant celebration of life. What has been and what is to come.

I listened as the astrologer affirmed details from my natal chart, or what the sky looked like at the moment that I was born, that resonated with the first reading and my life experiences. For instance, strength in communication from my Sun sign and a nonconforming nature from my Moon sign, as well as a move away from constraining partnerships and a move toward self-development in this lifetime.

Then, he rubbed his hands together and excitedly delved into the astrological chart for my upcoming 40th year.

“This is your year,” he said smiling.

Intrigued, I leaned in and started a new page of notes.

What did that even mean?

He explained that one of the many cycles we live in astrologically matches with the 12 constellations of the Zodiac, we move through one sign and a planet each year, every 12 years. So, in my 40th year, my planets are aligned with Mars in the sign of Scorpio—as I lived through when I was 28 or 16 or 4 years old. This combination represents fun, casual, creativity, pleasure, art, wonder, spontaneity, temporary, and relationships. Areas where I am naturally very strong and carry intense power when used for good.

Before going into details about how the year may transpire month-by-month, he offered some general advice:

“Follow your bliss. Go after what you want. You’ll get much farther this year than other years.”

This answered a question I’d been holding about this third cycle in my next Saturn Return, another astrological phenomenon.

Years ago, someone summarized the 28-year (ish) cycle in four turning points:

The first seven-year cycle (0-7 years old) is about feminine energy, often associated with a mother,
The second seven-year cycle (8-14 years old) is about masculine energy, often associated with a father,
The third seven-year cycle (15-21 years old) is about one’s own energy or sense of self,
The fourth seven-year cycle (22-28 years old) is about one’s contribution to community or the greater good.

One’s first Saturn Return is about leaving youth behind and entering adulthood whereas, with the second return one enters maturity throughout years 27-54 approximately, according to Wikipedia. Unlike most of my life, my Saturn Returns feels ahead of schedule cycling through closer to 26 years.

For a long time, I took the cycles as more of a framework than a guide.

Reflecting now on those years what I notice is more metaphorical—a gravitational pull toward nature and my true nature. I spent so much of 2008 to 2015 retreating to the rhythmic cycles at the ocean, just as I spent much of 2016-2022 pulled to the solid constancy of the mountains. This is how I learned and grew. And it feels like 2023 to 2030 are drawing me to the vast possibilities in the stars.

Not that my aspirations are now astronautical. I’m simply wondering how they might help me align my own energy and sense of self in this next cycle, especially this next year.

After all, my favorite time of day is when the stars sparkle the brightest against the endless night sky stretching over all of us.

And I would love to share that with as many humans as possible.

May you find meaning in your life this week.

Love,

Jules

P.S. The hugest THANK YOU to everyone who made this 40th birthday one of the best ever—including so many of you, my loyal “cheer readers.” I have never felt so loved. What a gift! One of the many gifts I was given last week was the following poem written by one of my best friends of 27 years: “with me in mind and heart.” Like all of my own writing, I am sharing in case it inspires your own everyday journey toward integrity.