Category: Goddess Asteroids

The asteroid Chiron was “discovered” in 1977. Of course Chiron had always been there, but like a Terma in Tibetan Buddist tradition, it appeared in our consciousness at just the right moment. The time was ripe for healing and that is the meaning of Chiron.  In Mythology Chiron was a teacher and skilled with medicine. He was a healer, astrologer and respected oracle. Chiron was a centaur, half human and half horse and was rejected by his parents. Though Chiron was a healer, ironically he could not heal himself. He died from a poisoned arrow lodged in his foot.

In Astrology, Chiron is the wounded healer and it’s placement in our birth charts represents the areas where we have experienced wounding, usually in childhood. Finding it’s placement in our chart helps to understand the wound. As the wound sometimes acts like a Terma in our unconsciousness, lying waiting for discovery at the right time, the pain is often repeated over and over in our lives calling for us to pay attention. It’s that pattern that in the midst you realize, I can’t believe this is happening again. Chiron is the essence of “what we resist persists”. Yet every time it happens you are given the opportunity to go deeper into the wound and are presented with profound opportunities for spiritual growth.

Chiron also presents itself like a riddle. In Mythology, he was a healer, but could not heal himself.  Chiron’s wound is essentially where we feel rejected and disconnected from others. Even when we become aware of the wound, it can seem impossible to heal. In Mythology Chiron’s original wound was rejection and one can only wonder if connection, vulnerability and the ability to look imperfect could have saved him. It’s the classic case of the Doctor having a heart attack, or therapist having a breakdown. Watch  Brene Brown’s talk on vulnerability for a great example of this.

Chiron is not a Goddess Asteroid, but I believe it is the masculine persistent teacher, teaching us how to be receptive to the feminine antidote, vulnerability and receptivity in order for healing to occur.

What is your wound? What false belief about yourself does it create? In my own chart Chiron is in Aries in the first house of “who am I” and opposed to Venus in Libra in the seventh house of “who are we”.  The wound is around being myself and experiencing a wound in love and relationships every time I express the Aries “who I am”. Chiron created an essential false belief that I can’t be myself and be loved. Oh what relief to discover this and to heal it! Okay Okay… it’s in the process of being healed!

When Rosalind Wiseman wrote the book Queen Bees and Wannabes: Helping Your Daughter Survive Cliques, Gossip, Boyfriends, and the New Realities of Girl World , she missed a whole world of ‘mean girl population. Mean girls exist in schools, workplaces, and in the PTA. Mean girls are everywhere and all ages.

What is a mean girl? The Urban dictionary describes them as “Girls who are bullies and use ‘girl aggression’ (nasty comments, trickery, deceit, excluding people from events, spreading rumors, stealing boyfriends,etc.) to manipulate other girls”

A mean girl is Pallas Athena gone wrong.

Pallas in astrology is the asteroid representing feminine wisdom and justice. She represents creative intelligence and is good at seeing patterns. As the goddess of war and the protectress of the state, Pallas types will fight for and defend political causes. There is no doubt about it, a Pallas woman is powerful.

In Greek mythology there are many stories that tell of her nature, but here are just a few that highlight her potential for being a ‘mean girl’.

Pallas Athene
First of all, Athene is also called Pallas Athene. The two are recognized as the same. This is because in a “friendly” (or was it?) fight between the two goddesses Pallas was killed by Athena, and out of sadness and in rememberance of Pallas, Athene took Pallas’ name.

Competition for men’s attention. 

The Goddess Medusa was very beautiful goddess and pursued by many men. One day she was in Pallas Athena’s temple and overtaken by one man in particular, Medusa was violated becoming pregnant and gaving birth to twins. The mean girl came out in Athene! Jealous and blaming, Athene turned Medusa’s hair into snakes causing her looks to turn men into stone if they glanced at her.

Trickery

Athena was known for her skills with weaving and the loom. A woman from a village named Arachne was also good at the loom. She became very well known for her skill and claimed that it was a gift she was born with and not learned.  When Athena heard this fist she disguised herself as an old woman to get the ‘real dirt’ out of Arachne regarding where she learned the loom. When she got nothing, Athena then challenged her to a public contest to let all see who was best. When Arachne showed Athena up in the competition Athena turned Arachne into a spider.

Undermining

Finally there was a trial of Orestes. Orestes was accused of matricide. Athena, who was presiding over the matter, declared that he was not guilty because there was no sanctity of a blood relationship with a mother and child (it was a crime only to kill blood relations in those days). Athena reasoned that because she was not born of a mother (she sprang from the head of Zeus), that men not women were the rightful owner’s of the child. In so doing she undermined all women and declared male supremacy.

Remember Eat, Pray, Love? Remember how we all ran to the bookstore after seeing Elizabeth Gilbert on Oprah, bought and devoured her book? (okay some waited for the movie with Julia Roberts). The story was a woman’s search for herself after a horrible divorce. How she did it? She hopped on a plane, ate herself silly in Italy, went deep within in India and found love again in Bally! And then she wrote her next book Committed, A skeptic makes peace with marriage. Well we didn’t hear much about that one. Most, including myself, only made it half way through the book. Does she make peace by the end of the book? Honestly…. someone will have to let me know! The marriage picture historically and across cultures was so depressing that I had to put the book down!

Read the chapter on Juno in Demetra George’s, Asteroid Goddesses  and you have a similar experience. The asteroid Juno in one’s chart show’s how, where and with whom we are likely to show our commitment within relationship and our style of relatedness. However in Greek Mythology, Juno, who was the wife of Jupiter, though committed, never attained the relatedness she so desired. One account of their marriage tells of a rape and resultant guilt of Juno (or Hera) as the reason for the marriage, and another tells of a forced marriage. Curiously, in pre-Greek (Pre-Hellenic) times, the Goddess Juno (Hera) ruled alone and had no consort (or spouse). At that time she was called Three Moon Goddess. More on Three Moon Goddess in future posts… but for now we can note that somewhere between between Egyptian times and Greek times, a great female wound occurred in commitment and relatedness.

Though Astrology was developed in many cultures and across time, it was the Greeks who brought it to the form it is currently in. This is why all of the planets are named after Greek gods and goddesses. Before Greek times, the constellation of Libra, which describes relationships and marriage, didn’t exist. Libra was a part of Scorpio; the tail end of it. The Greeks created Libra, and the 7th house during the rise of patriarchy. This she is told in Libra, she cannot do unless she signs a contract. And in the marriage contract (the 7th house also rules business contracts and other partnerships) the contract is steeped in the patriarchal history of marriage.

I hope you are not depressed by all of this because thankfully, this is a wound that is healing.  It is my feeling that we are are in a time where relationships are finding a deeper connection and deeper purpose. There are whole sections of bookstores, programs, talk show and so on that are making sure of that. Astrologically, there are many who have Juno and the principles of relatedness well integrated in their birth charts and then there are those who struggle. And as women in this day and time we have been able to step into our power both economically and to a power within ourselves. As a result relationships have been forced to develop away from marriage as a contract in law, were women are regarded as property etc to marriage as soul contract, which has the potential to really transform the self and the world. I see this as Scorpio reclaiming and reattaching it’s Libra tail. As we are in the midst of this transition, finding out where Juno is in your chart and what aspects she makes will tell you lot’s about your own style of commitment and relating and quickly give you hints on how to heal.

Tools that will help Juno on her path: Check out the Goddess Report on my website www.threemoongoddess.com. There are many books and programs that are fantastic in helping to heal Juno, but some of my favorites are,  Marianne Williamson’s book Enchanted Love, Katherine Woodward Thomas’s book Calling in the One and 7 week program. Also helpful is the crystal, rose quartz.

When Juno is in her flow her gifts are: loyalty, steadfastness and the willingness to work it out (separate and return within relationship).

Note: Maybe you do not resonate with the Greek names of the Goddess Energy… One of my goals in explore the feminine in Astrology, is also to explore what names, goddesses, archetypes in other cultures and times describe the same energy… more on that in later posts!