Mars rising in Cancer (0-1 degree) I’ve been taking the early hit…. projecting shadow, burned, digging deep, lather, rinse, repeat. The Mars-Pluto thing is really hard because I can see it most clearly in my protracted divorce battle, but as far as the psyche-digging goes, I’m really happy with my progress. I’ve been feeling this for about the last year.

Oh, and in December Mars conjoins Pluto on the exact degree of my Mars… might need a reading on this…

God, this perfectly sums up my Pluto in Sagitarius years.. squared my sun. It was high-flying and stone-sinking. I’m a stronger, more compassionate woman for it, that’s for hell sure.

“So how does one go about digging into the psyche, barring professional therapy? ?

When you think “they” are horrible, just make sure you’re not EXACTLY like them… and when you find out you are – then integrate.

Jessica – Yes, I have pluto trine my moon/mercury conjunction. (pluto in scorp in the 4th, moon/merc in cancer in the 12th) I like to think that aspect makes me more comfortable than most ppl with plutonic energy, but I’m not sure how to access it consciously. Any ideas?

oh, my aries/libra oppositions are really looking forward to it, too… ;P

You’ve got to be kidding me!! I thought I was going to get to breath for half a second having almost survived Pluto to my sun, now I have Pluto messing with my Cancer rising. On the upside, I have spent the last 9 years digging and am getting more adept at recognizing when it’s me and when its them (really them, not my shadow).

Seriously, that’s it in a nutshell, isn’t it Del? Elsa, do you take Blue Cross/Blue Shield?

Korellyn, wow, I have Moon (widely) trine my Pluto/Mercury conjunction, ha ha. I am by no means a master at this, but I have been working hard lately. I do not have a formal means of spiritual practice, but it’s been working for me to just spend time thinking really deeply about myself with respect to others. And to almost meditate – I practice detaching as soon as I feel fear or disgust or jealousy about someone else, like stopping the bad feeling in its tracks. I think it works because that gut negative reaction is what makes me want to push the quality away from me and project it onto someone else. If you can get really detached from it then it seems to lose its shadow power. I don’t know if this makes sense – it’s not something I’ve perfected yet, but to me it’s almost like a mental trick, like the trick of watching the spinning dancer reverse directions or seeing the image in the dot picture. Another thing that works for me is to imagine that the other person *is* me – so, not separating out a negative quality that I’ve projected onto them, but integrating everything about them and imagining that we are the same person.

This is like homebrew stuff, so apologies for the rough edges.