Book your reading for 2024 at: www.jilljardineastrology.com
Book a Vedic astrological reading with Dr. Alexi Martel at: aleximartel@gmail.com
Embark on a Vedic astrological adventure as Jill Jardine, joins forces with the renowned Vedic Astrologer and psychology professor, Dr. Alexi Martel. Together, we're setting sail into the cosmic seas of 2024, navigating through Saturn's recent intense influence on society and Mercury's challenging Gandanta transit. Expect to emerge with a renewed sense of hope as Dr. Martel charts a course toward a lighter, more optimistic energy, guiding us away from the turbulent waters of the recent past.
Ready yourself for an enlightening exploration of the planetary powerhouses, Jupiter and Saturn, and their profound impact on both our personal lives and the collective tide. We'll dissect the dichotomy between Jupiter's blessings and Saturn's discipline, examining the potential for growth within their celestial dance. As Saturn marches through Aquarius and Jupiter leaps into Aries, get set to understand the seismic shifts that could redefine our inner landscapes and societal foundations.
As the cosmic clock ticks towards 2024, Dr. Martel provides a telescopic view of the early months, forecasting an energetic surge and the chance to recalibrate our aspirations. The April skies promise a spectacle, with a solar eclipse and Mars-Saturn conjunction heralding potential global tremors. Fear not, as we extend our navigational prowess, offering sage advice to steer your personal vessel through these celestial storms with finesse and fortitude. Join us for this celestial symposium, and arm yourself with the starry wisdom to flourish in the year ahead.
Book your reading for 2024 at: www.jilljardineastrology.com
Book a Vedic astrological reading with Dr. Alexi Martel at: aleximartel@gmail.com
Embark on a Vedic astrological adventure as Jill Jardine, joins forces with the renowned Vedic Astrologer and psychology professor, Dr. Alexi Martel. Together, we're setting sail into the cosmic seas of 2024, navigating through Saturn's recent intense influence on society and Mercury's challenging Gandanta transit. Expect to emerge with a renewed sense of hope as Dr. Martel charts a course toward a lighter, more optimistic energy, guiding us away from the turbulent waters of the recent past.
Ready yourself for an enlightening exploration of the planetary powerhouses, Jupiter and Saturn, and their profound impact on both our personal lives and the collective tide. We'll dissect the dichotomy between Jupiter's blessings and Saturn's discipline, examining the potential for growth within their celestial dance. As Saturn marches through Aquarius and Jupiter leaps into Aries, get set to understand the seismic shifts that could redefine our inner landscapes and societal foundations.
As the cosmic clock ticks towards 2024, Dr. Martel provides a telescopic view of the early months, forecasting an energetic surge and the chance to recalibrate our aspirations. The April skies promise a spectacle, with a solar eclipse and Mars-Saturn conjunction heralding potential global tremors. Fear not, as we extend our navigational prowess, offering sage advice to steer your personal vessel through these celestial storms with finesse and fortitude. Join us for this celestial symposium, and arm yourself with the starry wisdom to flourish in the year ahead.
Welcome to Cosmic Scene with Jill Jardine. I'm your host, Jill Jardine, Master's in Counseling, Psychology, Professional Astrologer, Psychic Healer and Yogi. In this episode, my guest is Dr Alexi Martel, a second generation astrologer who specializes in Vedic Astrology and a professor of psychology. You're going to want to stay tuned to hear what Dr Alexi Martel has to say about the energetics of 2024. Welcome to the episode featuring my guest, Dr Alexi Martel. Dr Martel is a second generation astrologer who specializes in Vedic Astrology and is a certified instructor in Sanskrit Mantra. Dr Alexi Martel is a professor of psychology and a reverent in Sanskrit Mantra through the lineage of Thomas Ashley, Faran, Namadeva, Acharya. And so we are going to go on our astrological Vedic voyage to navigate what the energetics and the planets in Vedic Astrology have in store in 2024. Welcome, Alexi.
Speaker 2:Hey, happy to be here. It's good to be of the original generation. Seeing you here, mom.
Speaker 1:Yes, I'm glad I forgot to tell our listeners who didn't hear the first episode featuring Dr Alexi Martel. He is the son of Jill Jardine, astrologer. But you went a different path. I went Western and you went Vedic or Eastern astrology or, as it's called, jyotish science of light. So I know our listeners can't wait to hear what you have to say, alexi. What can you tell us about the energetics as we go into 2024, based on the Vedic planets?
Speaker 2:Yeah, sure. So 2024 is going to be a very interesting year. I think in many sense it will be an easier year than the previous few years. We've been moving through a lot of sort of heavy energy with. Saturn was in Capricorn, basically, came in and was the harbinger of COVID, and then COVID kind of mostly left the mainstream consciousness when Saturn left Aquarius, and now it's in the sign of changing societal structures, really kind of transforming outdated models of thinking and models of living, and I think it's institutional changes too. The concern, though, is what those changes are and how they manifest. So there's a lot of hope.
Speaker 2:There's also some fear and uncertainty around that, I would say, in the collective level. I also will say that we have seen lately some, I think, on a more personal level. People may have been feeling some sort of emotional grunge around the end of the year, sort of an emotional heaviness, stuckness, which I mean I would point to that because of Mercury. Basically Mercury, the planet of the conscious mind, the intellect kind of our consciously felt experience in many ways has been going through what's called the Gandanta. In the Vedic system we consider when a water sign meets a fire sign, it's a position of great psychological and physical churning and challenge, basically because you know, when fire meets water it's like an underwater volcano and that's a lot of force that's maybe not properly contained or managed.
Speaker 2:So essentially Mercury was leaving Scorpio and going into Sagittarius. But what was interesting about it recently is Mercury went retrograde, so it went into Sagittarius, moved forward past Scorpio, but then it turned around and decided I'm going to retrace my steps and walk right back into the grunge that is the Gandanta point and went moseyed on back into Scorpio and then it went direct and started moving forward again, once again back into Sagittarius. So basically, in the past month we've seen a dance where Mercury has danced back and forth across the Gandanta point, the fire and water meeting point, three times and now it is finally fully in Sagittarius and we'll be moving forward more quickly and I think that will bring a lightning of perspective.
Speaker 1:That's great news. So in December into early January, we had Mercury transiting back and forth through the volcano, basically, and then we had Mercury retrograde on top of that until late on January 1st. So now, as we forecast into mid-January, february, march, we're going to see a lightning. Thank you for that. And so Mercury is not going to be retrograde again until April, and we'll talk about that a little later. But as we come into 2024, what would be one word for you to describe? Well, let's describe 2023 in one word. I have my idea, but what would you say about 2023 if we look at what, astrologically and otherwise, for people?
Speaker 2:The word stage setting comes to mind. I don't know if that's a real word, but it kind of setting the stage. I would say transformational, but that seems a little too vague because it could mean anything, but it does feel like it in many ways. 23 was sort of moving on to a new paradigm, kind of setting the stage for it, whereas 2020 to 2023 were very much marked by the pandemic and sort of the conspiracy theory thinking and all the sort of turmoil domestically and internationally of foreign wars and such like that.
Speaker 2:And 2023 did see some new developments on that front, but it also seemed like people are starting to look for what's next, but there's also still some fear and attachment to what's come before and there's hope for the future, but it's mixed with fear of will the future be worse? And I think 2024 will start to see the manifestation of that future, which I, as an optimist and also just in general, I think is there's a lot of good things to look forward to that we don't necessarily see, you know, broadcasted by the media or a conventional conversation which kind of leads to focus on the negative, but I think there's a lot of bright, bright changes coming forward that will manifest more powerfully in this year into next year.
Speaker 1:So your word for 2024 sounds like optimism. I like that.
Speaker 2:I would say a manifestation of positive potential.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Right, and it's interesting because in the Vedic we've got Saturn moving on through Aquarius, the sign of the future, the sign of new paradigms and in the West, at the 20th of January, we have the planet Pluto, which is not used in Vedic astrology, but it is a planet of death, rebirth, transformation, purification, purging, release that is going into Aquarius in the West. So, anyway you slice it, whether it's through the Vedic system or the Western astrology system, we're coming into the Aquarian age and we're seeing some new paradigm potential. And so, as we do go into the first four months we're going to look at in this episode today, what do you think will be the positive months and what might be the most challenging month between January and April 2024?
Speaker 2:just actually a question for you. So, as you mentioned, I don't really work with the outer planets as a vatic astrologer, but Pluto is an assigned for roughly 30 years, right?
Speaker 1:well knows 14 years. It can be anywhere from about 14 to 20. So, okay, it just spent 14 years in the sign Capricorn in the West breaking down old structures, and we've seen that we've seen a lot of changes in everything that people took for granted with the medical system, the governmental systems have changed, educational systems have changed and Any other certainly financial, economic systems, educational systems I mentioned, but we've seen so many breakdowns of structures and so as we go into 2024 and beyond and actually Pluto's in Aquarius till 2044 we're going to see a Recreation or the new paradigm of all these structures start to blossom here in 2024, 2025, 2026 and start really getting underway for the end of the 2020s that makes sense.
Speaker 2:I mean with changes starting in late 2009 or 2010 through now it would make sense. I mean, systems have changed. Social media's emerged, political systems have emerged. But I think in both the Vedic and the Western we probably are in agreement that Capricorn is a challenging sign. An Aquarius Also ruled by Saturn is maybe a little more uplifting, a little bit more positive and hopeful. Capricorn can kind of get things done, knows the grindstone, but is it doing the right things? That's the question. So we've seen, you know, social media, new ways of interconnectedness Emerge, and I think maybe, hopefully, with this new paradigm, we'll step back and decide, as a society and as a world culture, are we doing the right things with these technologies? You know technology is pure potential, but are we, are we harnessing it for the betterment of mankind or are we using it to bring out, you know, the worst of ourselves? And so maybe this new planet, this new shift in Pluto, bring on more of that positive kind of Aquarian giving back to what matters.
Speaker 1:Because in the Vedic astrology, since Saturn has been an Aquarius, we have seen the rise of AI Artificial intelligence which is a big Aquarian technology and that's not necessarily a good thing. It basically you know.
Speaker 2:It's gonna be good could be bad, right depending on who, how the humans use it.
Speaker 1:It could be used for very good, but it could be used to basically Spy on everybody and who knows what other kind of malefic things. So again, that's the choice point of how we use these new technologies that are certainly gonna come forth in the coming years. So Saturn's going through Aquarius. What is the transit of Saturn as an outer planet in the Vedic, the outermost planet in the Vedic system? What? What does that look like going forward?
Speaker 2:Sure. So Saturn will go, start moving backwards relative to Earth, go retrograde on the 30th. Right now it's an Aquarius 30th of what month?
Speaker 2:the 30th of June. Okay, specific, yeah, so it's moving forward steadily through Aquarius. It had been retrograded recently, our until recently, till roughly November, and it was. It's been in Aquarius the whole time Since for some time now, but it's gonna really get into the middle of that sign, but then it'll start moving backwards in June through November. So Saturn, being the planet of structure is, actually will go direct to November 15th. So hopefully we'll see a shift towards good Saturnian shift in direction or positive direction.
Speaker 2:But, yeah, I think Saturn, I feel like perhaps sometimes we focus a lot on Saturn as astrologers because Saturn is kind of the scariest planet, the most Malefic planet, and I think in some sense that is important and necessary because it's been the big energy Really dominating our attention and awareness, particularly the last few years in Capricorn and now it in being in its own sound, aquarius.
Speaker 2:But I another thing I want to point to is the positivity that we're going to see with Jupiter now and and really pronounce more than we have, because Jupiter is in some sense you can think of Jupiter and Saturn as together. Jupiter is the cosmic Santa Claus is the giver of blessings, it's a jolly expansive energy full of good tidings and good cheer, where Saturn's kind of the cosmic crampus, if you will, which, if you're familiar with that, is the German folklore of you know, instead of giving kids coal, it's the dark side of Santa, like kind of an evil spirit that you know kidnaps children and beats them with the canes. It's kind of tough love if you are not even love necessarily, so anyhow.
Speaker 1:Saturn gets such a bad rap and all it's the grim reaper, the karmic taskmaster. But maybe you can also share some of the benefits of Saturn, or Shawnee Sanskrit.
Speaker 2:So, just as the, the folklore crampus, punishes children from his behavior, serves as a deterrent for misbehavior and encourages children to behave. If you think of Santa Claus as the carrot and compasses the stick, so too is of Jupiter and Saturn. Jupiter rewards us for our good actions or good behavior, basically anything we've done in in this life or in a previous life. If you believe in the, the Vedic system of reincarnation, basically anything you've done that's been helping others, intention to help other people you know, really for the greater good of those around you and the world, then you'll get that come back to you as blessings, and these blessings can be friends, family relationships, wealth, prosperity, peace of mind, money can be really blessed anything that you see as a blessing, whereas Saturn is more about a corrective. Saturn wants us to take responsibility, and so if we're doing what we need to do and you know taking care of ourselves and those that we need to take care of, fulfilling our responsibilities, you know work hard, pay your taxes kind of vibe, then Saturn's trends can actually be quite good and give you good things as well. But Saturn being the sort of the stick to the carrot stick equation, if you are not doing things, if you're leading a life of sort of selfish hedonism, saturn will kind of wrap you over the the knuckle with a here's, some stuff you have to deal with and here's, you know, you now have to deal with these things and kind of get back on track, and it can seem like Punishing until you realize the reason the punishments are happening. In some ways is because it's just a matter of a Course corrective, or sometimes it's just karma, that we don't know the source of it. But the lesson then is to take, put on, you know, a brave face and Focus on the positivity of Jupiter and make the best of whatever situation we find ourselves in.
Speaker 2:So you know, there would be no growth without suffering. Right to see people, something that associates that are suffering and has that element. And you know, no one wants suffering. But we, you know, just like when you lift weights, you need resistance, strength Training, right, that resistance builds muscle. If you didn't have that resistance your muscles would stay soft and weak. So in Saturn, in some sense is that Strength trainer, but you want to balance it with the benevolence and joy of Jupiter, you know? A quick question so Saturn is this strength training planet?
Speaker 1:I wonder, like so going through Aquarius in the Vedic, I wonder what that lesson is for the collective. Could you Saturn and Aquarius?
Speaker 2:yeah, could you give us a little. Well, this would be a case. It's harder for me to speak to the collective.
Speaker 2:My focus is in terms of what, how the lessons will specifically manifest. My focus is much more looking at individual charts of clients In the sense that where Saturn falls in your once chart is really where, how it impacts you specifically, right. So if you're you know this if it depends on what your rising sign is, your first house of self. So in the standard conventional zodiac where Aries is seen as the first house of self, saturn and Aquarius would be in the 11th house of income and gains and could be, you know, gains through hard work. Saturn always relates to hard work and Aquarius always relates or typically relates to, you know, future, facing kind of futuristic directions, changing paradigms. So Saturn is working towards changing paradigms. But so for the collective it does show, it doesn't indicate a shift in how People interact with the structures and society around them, you.
Speaker 2:But as for the specifics, it really it's easier to look at an individual's chart and say, okay, this is in your 11th house of income, or for someone else it might be in your seventh house of relationships. So you're gonna have to work pretty hard on your romantic relationships. But Saturn always the theme is always if you do the work, you will get the reward, and it typically is a reward that has staying power, right. So it's something you've earned, that you've built your way up to, so yeah, so this how it will manifest really does depend on the individual. How it manifests as a society is, in my opinion, the aggregate of the individuals doing their own work in their own lives and aiming for the highest, you know, aiming for the best. If we all do that individually, then the collective result will be great. I think the pitfall, perhaps the mistake of Aquarius that people make, is they try to fix the world before they fix their own lives right.
Speaker 1:Yes, be the peace you want to be in the world.
Speaker 2:Exactly, we have to have that inner peace before we can radiate the outer peace.
Speaker 1:Well, thank you for letting everybody know about how Shawnee in Sanskrit, or Saturn, works in the chart and with the collective. So let's move on to the Cosmic, santa Claus, jupiter and a little bit about the Jupiter transits in the Vedic system this year.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so Jupiter, it's worth mentioning where it was in 2023. So it moved into Aries out of its own sign of Pisces, which was sort of a more action oriented sign. However, it was very close to the lunar node, the north node of the moon, Rahu, which is not a physical planet, but it's a point in space in which eclipses can happen. So it's an energy that, when it joins of another planet, essentially overshadows or eclipses it and sometimes brings out the darker side which would Jupiter could be sort of an over-extension of oneself, maybe overconfidence, or sort of a overestimating one's ability. Maybe, you know, investing on wisely things like that.
Speaker 1:Over-extending on resources.
Speaker 2:Exactly, yeah, overdoing, but sort of like a you know it can bring, like an overconfidence or maybe like a Pollyanna, like everything's great, a sort of like naivete of not seeing the practical realities when just everything will be excellent. So that would have been most manifest around May. And then it pulled apart. They moved apart from each other in Aries, and so the lunar node Rahu went into Pisces in October. So Jupiter is free of Rahu since October, but Jupiter itself was still moving backwards, retrograde, kind of retracing its energetic steps, so to speak, until really the end of last year. I think it was the 30th of December.
Speaker 1:Right, it went direct.
Speaker 2:It went direct. So now we're just we're just seeing Jupiter, now direct, moving forward, picking up the pace. When a planet shifts from retrograde to direct, there's a point where it's kind of slow. It's called stationing, and its energy is kind of not fully manifest. It's somewhat stuck doesn't necessarily have to be a bad thing, but it's not flowing as much as we'd like when a planet is in the middle of moving direct or even the middle of retrograde, retrograde sometimes gets a bad rap but if the planet is moving quickly, it's doing. It's moving right along, doing what needs to do.
Speaker 2:So Jupiter is slowly picking up, picking up steam as we go into, you know, moving through January and February. So it's going to be able to better deliver the blessings and the blessings associated with Aries. So wherever Aries falls into a person's chart, they'll really see good luck and good guidance and you know all the blessings of life. But you really want to look to the individual's chart to tell them how that manifests. And when I say look to an individual's chart, we typically want to look at its Vedic astrologers at their rising sign, which indicates their physical body and their self, their moon signs, where their moon falls, which indicates how they experience things psychologically and emotionally, and then also perhaps the sign of a planet that rules their planetary phase, or Dasha. Or perhaps we could look at the sun sign. Although sun signs aren't given the same importance in the Vedic system as they are in the Western. We look at more of the rising sign and the moon sign as paramount to our experiences, certainly our day-to-day experiences.
Speaker 1:So Jupiter will be transiting out of Aries into Taurus at some point during 2024. When will that be?
Speaker 2:So Jupiter will actually be moving to Taurus on May 1st, which I think will be good for people. Aries is a fiery energy and, you know, sort of a get things done kind of thing and Jupiter, you know, can get things done. But Taurus is more of a sort of comfortable, you know, fixed energy. It appreciates like good food, good company, good drink, all the sort of pleasures of life. It's a planet, it's a Taurus, it's a sign ruled by Venus, so it knows how to enjoy the pleasures of life. And Jupiter can also expand pleasures and expand, you know, the happiness in terms of like day-to-day feel-good happiness, right, the one cautionary thing is sometimes Jupiter can be a little too, let's say, back an alien or hedonistic, like party-hardy, when it's in, you know, associated with Venus. So but having that energy, you know, manifest a bit in our lives is, I think, helpful. It has a light-heartedness to things and I think we'll see more of that light-heartedness when Jupiter moves to Taurus.
Speaker 1:That would be nice for a change, because the last basically four or five years have been a little stark I don't feel like there's been. People haven't really been able to let down their guard and enjoy life. So that's what I was seeing too in the Western astrology it's more of a year where not so much the past, except for moving into the future now, and but there's something where we've missed out on actually being in the moment and enjoying life, and I feel like Jupiter and Taurus and the Vedic may bring that.
Speaker 2:I think so too. There's this idea in the Vedic system that planets become more comfortable and their energy manifests more positively the closer they move to the point where they're exalted or at their highest point of strength in the zodiac, and the opposite is true when they're at their point of debilitation. So Capricorn was where Jupiter was debilitated, and it was in Capricorn, I believe in that we had COVID yeah.
Speaker 2:I believe, in around 2020, 2021, a few years ago and it's been slowly moving away from, let's say, its darkest point long to Aquarius and Pisces and Aries, and so now Taurus. I think is the start of the good times. Let the good times roll, then it'll go to Gemini. Ultimately, it will then go to Cancer, and Cancer is where Jupiter is exalted right. It's both comforted and strongest position. So I think we will be seeing a that's two years out, then in about 2026.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and then you know we won't get there overnight, but I think we'll be slowly seeing more of an optimistic side to at least our own lives, perhaps the collective. But once again this is something I want to emphasize that I really think that focusing on the positivity in our own life is the key to making the world better, because the collective and the narrative of the collective that we see, you know, in the media whether people tell us social media is just a narrative and it's a narrative that's usually not so positive. And I think we can choose our own narrative, at least for our own lives, and kind of manifest that and make aim for the highest of that, and so Jupiter will help bring out the natural good energy. If we do focus on our own you know and things we can actually impact ourselves, our own life, and if we do that individually, then the collective will improve by virtue of people becoming happier.
Speaker 1:Welcome to 2024. This is Jill Jardine, host of Cosmic Scene International, astrologer. Hey, go to my website, jilljardineastrologycom, to my shop page on Booker Reading, so that you can find out what the stars have in store in 2024 for you personally. I totally agree and I think that's important. That's if any message people take out of this episode, out of this podcast episode, is what you just said, alexi, which is you can make your reality.
Speaker 1:The collective reality, which always has the next shoe about to drop, can be very grim and you can align with that. Especially in an election year. It's going to be very polarizing in the United States here. So you can either align with that and have that become your reality, or you work on yourself. You know, focus on things like self-realization, what you need to be manifesting in your life and what brings you joy other people, situations, circumstances and bring that energy into your life. And we're dealing with two different realities here the density of the collective political polarization which can be your reality, or the upliftment or the actualization of hopes and dreams or connection with your soul that maybe you've been working toward in previous years and there's been a lot of blocks or obstacles. So this is a year of choice point, I feel, which we didn't have in the previous years, and really it is going to perhaps a higher dimensional reality within your own life, while still being rooted in the collective planetary life, but not giving it energy.
Speaker 2:I think that's a key point where we give our, where we give our attention or focus our awareness is where we give our energy. So you want to ask yourself, like, if you're watching the news, right is it? Is it entertainment to you, Is it to get you informed? If you can watch it and it's just information for you, that's one thing. But if you find yourself feeling, you know, depressed or fearful or scared of what's going on in the world, I wouldn't necessarily say don't watch any of it if you really aren't as important to you to know what's going on. But I will say, psychologically there is a point of diminishing returns.
Speaker 2:I think it was a metric that after like half an hour of daily consumption of news, past that point, it starts to negatively impact your own personal life Because at the end of the day, you know what are you seeing on news but, like you said, political partisan division. You see wars, you see all these fearful things which as an individual we don't have much power to move. We can't just wave our hand and make the wars around the world and just stop, and then peacefully tomorrow, as much as we'd like to, and fixating on that, tweeting about it, reading about it, consuming that, making that are what we give our attention to, makes it our reality, and it is tragic that it is some people's reality out of their own power, the people who live in the war. But what I think we can do in our own world is try to focus on the things we can change, and focusing on that.
Speaker 2:The way to do that involves taking our energy back from these things that are essentially, I guess you could say, leaks in our own energetic ship. So the more we cast our attention and awareness towards the things in the world that are distressing, that we can't directly impact, the more we lose our final leak in our own personal power to affect the things we can directly impact. And so I think that you know by nature of just how our systems are designed, or maybe by nature of some intentional efforts to control people. Either way, I try not to dwell on that line of thinking, but the point is it's easy to fall into the trap of casting your attention in many different directions outside of yourself, many of which are fearful or negative or inducing anger, and realizing that there's a better way. You can choose where you give your attention, give your awareness, because ultimately, where you give your attention and awareness to repeatedly is who you are. It determines who you become.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much for that. Doctor of Psychology, alexi Martel. It's that old adage energy flows where attention goes. So we can we do have the power to pick where we want to put our attention in 2024. And so also what I hear you saying is that there can be great healing for us this year as we look at what it is that we don't want in our life and what we're trying to bring in and body, and that kind of speaks to the transit of the lunar nodes Rahu and Ketu. In the Vedic system. Rahu is in the sign Pisces and Ketu is in the sign Virgo, and as an astrologer I've always viewed that axis of Pisces and Virgo as a healing axis. And you may have something to say on that and give us the specifics about the timing and how you see that happening, because that goes on all year.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I agree I think the Vedic system is in agreement with you that there's a lot of healing potential around the Virgo Pisces axis. Virgo, in particular, is the natural sixth house of the zodiac, if we treat Aries as the natural first house, the first sign. So Virgo, being sixth house, relates to health, health improvement, self-improvement, obstacles and overcoming them. So, basically, with Virgo and its energies, and indeed with a sixth house and anyone's chart, it can either be something that sets us free or something that binds us and it's very concerned of our day-to-day behaviors. So, virgo being a sign of health, ruled by Mercury and relating to sixth house, of health and health improvement, I think it's important to identify the habits that are for our greater good, for our physical, mental well-being and health, and those that are not, and find a balance.
Speaker 2:I think that sometimes people like to think in black and white of like oh you know, I'll cut out all these foods and go on a certain diet where I only eat these things, or I'll cut out this substance, or people think I'm either thinking that way or I'm just not regulating anything, and I think neither is an effective, sustainable strategy to live. I think that the lesson of Virgo is find the things you do that make you feel good in your body and mind and maintain them right, and no that sometimes you, you know you maybe have like a personal vice. You want to have a food or drink. That's fine, like you can enjoy that, and but if you're going to enjoy it, I think where Pisces comes in, the sort of Virgo, is very much about physical life and physicality. Physical improvement Pisces is psychological. Sometimes there's a tendency to lose oneself and you know, immerse oneself in the, in anything really kind of lose oneself into it can be mystical things but can also be substances. So you want to find a balance.
Speaker 2:I would say that the healthy balance of anything is whatever you do, enjoy it to the fullest. So like, for example, if you really really want a slice of cake, you really want it. Have the cake, enjoy it, have those slice, don't regret it. But if you're like, well, I could have a slice of cake but you know that you're going to feel guilty while eating it or after, then maybe don't have it right. If you can commit to fully enjoying the thing in the moment, do so. But if you know that it will cost you more you know mental turmoil then then don't do so and enjoy. Enjoy the feeling you get from not doing it right.
Speaker 1:Right and Pisces in astrology does rule the house of endings, the 12th house, and it is considered mystical, but it can also be very addictive again. So if somebody is like, yes, I'm going to have that piece of cake and then I'm going to have the next piece of cake and I feel no conflict with that, we could also see people overindulging or over immersing in personal habits or other things that kind of do disconnect them from their body.
Speaker 2:Right and I think well, virgo, pisces, and with Rahu and Pisces and Ketu and Virgo, these signs are about control and the law, giving up control and Virgo's strength but also potential weakness. It's about your ability to control oneself. But too much of that energy and you can be over controlling of yourself and others, you know, really hyper focused on your, everything you consume, everything you say, can be paralyzing, right, debilitating, whereas Pisces is about freedom and surrender, but there also can be this willingness or desire to lose control. And so, you know, virgo can be under indulgence or perhaps restrictiveness, and an extreme Pisces can be over indulgence or lack of restriction. And so I think that it's important to, with any sign, but certainly the signs that have the lunar nodes in them Rahu and Ketu, as you mentioned because these are planetary shadow energies where eclipses can happen that really deal in extremes. They're not as balanced as the other planetary energies, just by default. I think it's integrating this desire to surrender to something beyond oneself, to like lose oneself in a flow state that Rahu and Pisces experience, integrate that with this desire to control and improve oneself that Ketu and Virgo experience, and the trick is to find the right things to lose yourself in and immerse yourself in and the right things to be. Let's say the opposite control yourself or be mindful.
Speaker 2:So I was reading about the distinction recently between mindfulness and flow states.
Speaker 2:Often meditation people talk about mindfulness, you know, watching your thoughts, feelings, awareness and there is value in that, to recognize how and why you think and feel a certain way and choose how you react.
Speaker 2:But too much mindfulness can be, I think, a bad thing, because now you're overly analyzing everything you do and it's stressful and now that you know watching your thinking becomes itself a form of negativity. But Pisces, on the other hand, can really get into this flow state where you are immersed in whatever your passion is. It can be exercise, it can be art, it can be music, it can be your work, it can be sex, really anything that you just lose yourself into flow with is part of that flow state. So I think balancing the flow states of things that we enjoy and bring us just a sense of complete oneness with the moment where we lose track of time, where we can do this, for you know hours and not even and feel like minutes have gone by Balancing that with this sort of being mindful of where we are putting our flow states and where we're putting our energy and where we're trying to do things. I think is sort of the key to this Rahu Ketu pull between desire to lose oneself and the desire to completely control oneself.
Speaker 1:That's a great synopsis of the Rahu, ketu and I just think, for the collective, because it is the healing access, I think we might see the integration of maybe the allopathic medical, which I see as symbolized as Virgo, and then some of the energy systems of healing such as yoga, acupuncture, reiki and other sound healing, pisces, roll sounds. I think we're going to see integration of these systems with each other in the collective I mean, or the beginning of it. It's going to take some time for it to show up in the bigger picture, in the bigger collective, but I just think more people are awakening to alternate forms of healing and connecting into the physical body and the soul body and bringing it together. So it's exciting on that level of what the karmic access of Rahu and Pisces and Ketu and Virgo will have to offer this year and certainly all our listeners are on that kind of path, so they're going to enjoy this cycle.
Speaker 1:Welcome back. My guest is Dr Alexi Martel. We want to wrap up this episode with a little summary of what we can look forward to in Vedic astrology. If you were to give maybe even one word or a couple sentences to wrap up or summarize each month, let's do it. Let's start in January. What would you have to say about January 2024?
Speaker 2:Okay, we're focusing on the first four months of the year.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:Cool. So, yeah, so, starting with January, I think there's, I guess, a quickening of energies that have already started moving in motion.
Speaker 1:I love that A quickening.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it starts off slow and gets a little more. Things start moving more as the month goes along, energetically and socially. February I see more of as a good month to kind of make hay, with the sun shines, which ironically, february is one of the darkest months in most places, but still I think it'll be a good month to sort of really see where you're at at the end of January, see if the year is already moving, the direction you want to go in, maybe reevaluate if you set some New Year's resolutions where they realistic. Maybe you just want to do something, a smaller change that's more gradual but impactful, as opposed to some big change. But yeah, really kind of February I think is a month for moving forward.
Speaker 1:February also has Lunar New Year happening on February 10th, which is always a chance to redo your New Year's intentions at the Lunar New Moon on February 10th. So that's exactly in line with what you just shared, alexi, nice Good to hear it.
Speaker 2:And yeah. So then March. I think March is a good month of essentially making sure all your ducks are in the row, kind of preparing, batting down the hatches, because I will say, this year overall looks quite positive. But April seems to be one of the more challenging ones astrologically. With late March we find there will be an eclipse, I believe in March 25th, so towards the end of March, a lunar eclipse which will start a clip season. But April 8th will be a total solar eclipse which you'll be able to see from Central United States.
Speaker 2:And so eclipses are astrologically, you know, in addition to being astronomically really cool, astrologically are considered an energy of big transformation and change and intensity. And at the same month, april, where we have this massive solar eclipse, Mercury will be once again retrograding over a fire and a water sign, in this case moving backwards from Aries to Pisces. So it's that Gandanta, underwater volcano energy again. And at the same time we're also going to have Mars and Saturn closely together by transit. So the planet of war and the planet of, I guess, misery will become, is erating during this eclipse and during this fire, water, mercury.
Speaker 2:So April will be a month to, you know, basically persist through and I think you know we'll be fine be prepared for in March April's not a good month to get married or sell your house or make a big career change. You can make note of the desire to do these things. You might powerfully feel, hey, I need to make a change, and definitely note that. Keep track, write it out, journal it, think about it. Don't make moves on that to, at least I would say, mid-may.
Speaker 1:Well, yeah, I mean we've got one layer with Mercury retrograde, we got a second layer with the eclipse happening and we've got that third layer of the Saturn Mars conjunction. We also have a fourth layer, which you didn't mention, which is the Jupiter Uranus, and that's in the Western astrology, so that's why it doesn't show up in the Vedic, and that's at the end of the month. So it's interesting. We've got a lot of planetary action in April but, again, if we get it over with in the first trimester, then we'll be fine for the rest of the year and probably in the United States. It has a lot of stuff to do with political situations and volatility, as well as the war-like situations going on around the world. So it'll be interesting. But personally, batting down the hatches, as you said, and what would be a piece of advice that you could give listeners, alexei, just maybe more from your psychological professor hat than Vedic astrologer hat as far as well-being and happiness.
Speaker 2:Well, as far as I can make it, I think one thing really valuable that, at least politically, both sides each kind of fixate on one half of this equation but kind of leave out the other the American political parties and I think having a balance of both makes a person strong, and that is compassion and competence. If you can run your life with compassion for those in need, compassion for those you can help care about others, but also have a strong focus in fulfilling your responsibilities, taking care of your own life, things you can improve. Don't cast all your energy out to things that you can't change in the world, but be competent and fulfill your responsibilities. Do your best you can do your job well, do your responsibility as well and balance that with compassion Kering. If you can balance compassion and competence, you will have struck a through line that these political parties in their immature phase still haven't gotten to. But as a world we can find that balance.
Speaker 2:And I think if you manifest that yourself balance compassion, competence, focus your awareness on who you want to be and what you want to aim for and not the things you're afraid of that will really go a long way. And if you want specific advice and guidance on how to do this based on your own chart. I would highly recommend reaching out to a Vedic astrologer or a Western astrologer Myself, dr Alexi Martel. I can be reached at Alexi Martel at Gmail. That'll be in the show notes, have the exact spelling and, of course, my mom, jill Jardine.
Speaker 1:JillJardineastrologycom and Alexi, that whole idea of the compassion Pisces keynote North node and competence Virgo keynote.
Speaker 2:South node.
Speaker 1:So I think that is great advice to go out with be compassionate and competent within yourself and with the world and everybody. If everybody in the world did that, I think we would see the new paradigm come in very fast. Thank you, alexi.
Speaker 2:Thank you, mom.
Speaker 1:I hope you enjoyed this episode of Cosmic Scene featuring my guest, dr Alexi Martel. Remember to subscribe, download, share and give us a five star review. This is Cosmic Scene with Jill Jardine sending healing Vedic visions out into the quantum field Duh, thank you, thank you.