Pluto, the Power of Intention and the US Elections
“America cannot be truly prosperous unless Americans are fully able to make their own decisions about their own lives especially on matters of heart and home.” - Kamala Harris at the DNC, August 2024
Kamala’s speech at the DNC was very Pluto-coded. This seems timely and appropriate considering the US is wrapping up its Pluto return and we are about to experience a shift from one era to the next as Pluto will be doing one final sweep through Capricorn until November 19th. These final 80 days of Pluto in Capricorn are writing the epilogue of the story that started in 2008. Something shifted then in a big way for all of us - individually and collectively. Collectively in the US we got the first black president, we had a major adjustment of the financial markets that leveled off a very inflated housing market and with these themes, we all started settling into the next chapter of our personal stories. Some of us started new jobs, some of us started new families and some of us started searching for the next thing in our lives. Regardless what the story was, it’s about to shift into a new theme for all of us. The Pluto thread present in our lives was activating themes of the house it resides in our natal charts. This is the house that Capricorn occupies for us personally. Whatever those themes were, there was a part of us that was searching for more autonomy, more agency and more personal power, either for ourselves or for someone else.
To start understanding Pluto and the plutonian archetypes, we have to take a really deep perspective. Pluto is associated with the Greek god Hades, the god of the underworld. Jean Shinoda Bolen in Gods in Everyman proposes that patriarchy and patriarchal religions gave way for the worshipping of the so-called sky gods like Zeus (Jupiter) and his entourage. These deities were given bigger importance as we tried to keep one dimensional view of a single male omnipotent god which replaced the pre-Christian religions where the underworld was not just known realm but also associated with the mother. This realm was visited voluntarily as a way to restore wholeness. In the pre-Christian civilizations such as the Sumerians, the underworld was shaped like a womb, a place that can give new life and where one could go to die and be reborn. Maybe this is what patriarchy tried to do - prevent us from going to the most potent place where we can claim wholeness and power for ourselves.
Even in the more recent non-monotheistic spiritual paths proliferated in the west, like Kundalini yoga, Reiki, etc the practices are based on connecting with the cosmic energy in effort to transmute the dark. But you can’t transmute that which you refuse to look at. Even Helios, the sun god himself, spends half of his time in the underworld. Humans are designed to rest, restore and do most of the physical and psychological processes of restoration while they are in deep rest. Autumn gives way to winter every year and the land goes barren until it’s time for a new cycle to begin. When the sun goes into the underworld, so do we and in that process we become restored and rejuvenated.
The unique challenge of the modern world is that we have lived our lives for so long under the patriarchal templates that we lack the confidence and know-how to access this realm and work with it. The closest we come to doing this is through psychotherapy, which by design is a process of navigating the underworld. Even then, we have so much stigma. Those of us who do brave to journey this realm can find true peace and wholeness by finding the lost pieces of ourselves.
So what are we talking about when we talk about things like the the archetype of the underworld? How does Pluto bestow riches? How does one “successfully” navigate the underworld? I can offer my view based on my lived experience supported by the myths and stories that describe the archetypes of our true nature.
First and foremost, you have to have a very strong intention that is rooted in the desire to create connection, love, unity and community. The only deities and mortals in the myths that have successfully navigated the underworld, did so with a very solid intention that was in some way related to a process of unifying and reconnecting, either with a lover, a parent, one’s own home or ancestors. Psyche, the goddess of the soul in ancient Greek and Roman mythology, was tasked with going to the underworld so she can be reunited with her lover Eros. Odysseus, the most famed Greek hero, had to go in the underworld to seek guidance from a seer so he can find his way home. Aeneas, the mythical hero of Troy and Rome, went into the underworld to honor his father, who had died a year before, who showed him the future of his descendants and thus the history of Rome.
In all instances there was a desire to connect, relate and bridge a lost part that was missing on the journey to wholeness. The desire to restore something to beauty, wholeness and peace. Much like we restore in our sleep, the restoring that happens in the underworld has to be done in service of the restoration of the whole.
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Going back to the current big transition of Pluto. we saw that August was a major plot-twist month for the US. In the very little news tracking I do, I was able to sense a new wave of energy that was infused as if out of nowhere. The astro community is busy analyzing and forecasting but to get to the core of it with the Plutonian theme I looked at Trump’s and Kamala’s Pluto story to try and take a glimpse into the future.
Trump has Pluto in the 1st house of his natal chart, an incredibly powerful position that bestows power to the native. While not every person that has this placement will become as influential as him, they will certainly always have a strong influence around their persona. But the wheel of life turns and what was once up will eventually come down and when that happens you have to get to reckon with the other side of the personal truth. In Trump’s case, as Pluto entered Aquarius, it activated 7th house of open enemies, where Pluto shifted the power to his open enemies, among other things. What you don’t hold yourself accountable for, there will be a time where the accountability will be demanded by what is outside of ourselves. Trump has certainly been busy using his power to build his empire in the last eighty years of his life and has been prolific in cultivating enemies. Since Pluto started showing up in the Aquarius part of his chart starting in March of 2023, we have seen him stand before a judges in the court of law, a very 7th house reality. Call it wishful thinking, if you will, but I see no reason for this trend to go away for him once Pluto sets firmly into Aquarius after November 19th.
Kamala has Pluto in her 4th house, the house of hearth and home. When she talks about power, unlike Trump who talks about it from the position of the power of the self, Kamala talks about it from the deepest and most intimate parts of her world. The part that holds her roots, her ancestry and her very own private place of home. She also has a very close Venus/Pluto conjunction and this placement gives not only potency to her Venus in the form of tremendous charisma but since it’s in the sign of Virgo, it is deeply inclined to be in service of others. You can really hear it in her delivery of the speech at the DNC.
To take it one step further, Pluto is about to spend 20 years in the part of her chart that is classified as in-between world, the place where you are neither fully immersed in the unknown nor you are fully anchored in the mastery domain and your strength and power comes from successfully navigating the acquisition of new knowledge. In some sense she will be experiencing lessons about higher knowledge. A 9th house in Aquarius as a keyword can have term democratization of knowledge, information and sharing. Giving knowledge to the people, since Aquarius signifies humanity vs the individual. Since we have already seen that the emergence of artificial intelligence has already been linked with Pluto in Aquarius. Kamala’s chart is truly configured in such a way that she can play powerful role in shaping the trajectory of artificial intelligence as we traverse the terrain of regulating it and finding ways to work with it in a sustainable and life-affirming way. Oprah Winfrey, who has Pluto in this part of the chart natally, has generated tremendous power for herself by doing exactly this - sharing knowledge with the masses through her talk show which is what made her famous and influential.
So, what does this all mean to you, dear reader? How can Pluto affect you personally and what can you anticipate the themes of Pluto to affect you? My safe bet is on you already having enough proof to show you the way, as we don’t live our lives in disconnected ways, even if our human selves sometimes think so. In many ways, the part of your chart that houses Pluto will is an area where deep riches can be found if we do the work to do so. The same goes for the transits of Pluto. There is great abundance that can be accessed in the realm of the underworld and how this will play out for each of is will be different.
I created the below quick guide to Pluto through the houses. If you are interested in exploring the archetype of Pluto and see how it manifests in your life, I offer Soul Blueprint Sessions where I take deep dive into the patterns and archetypes that influence you personally by analyzing your birth chart.
Pluto in the 1st/7th house axis: The power of the self.
The first house is the most personal house, the house that holds the sign that was rising in the eastern horizon at the moment of your birth which talks about who you came to be. The first house carries the torch of who you are and having Pluto in this part of the chart will give you tremendous power that is up to you on how you use it. Themes of self-respect, growth in the awareness and understanding of your own power and the subsequent use of it. People who have Pluto in this house natally have been given a very powerful torch and the journey then becomes one of learning the use (or abuse) of power. Donald Trump famously has Pluto in the first house of his chart, and he is about to have his Pluto opposition when Pluto enters Aquarius. I might argue that this in itself means he is about to start receiving lessons in humility through open enemies (and he has plenty of those).
Pluto in the 2nd/8th house axis: The power of giving and receiving.
The 2nd and 8th house are partially the house that teaches us how to receive and give. Generosity is not just the act of giving as learning how to receive is a way to empower another human by giving them the opportunity to understand and embody the power of giving. Do you know how to ask for help? Are you comfortable receiving and acknowledging the gifts we are given. None of us exists because we did everything ourselves, but because we were able to receive the food that was prepared very often by others and the other way around. The lessons of Pluto on this axis will range from learning how to learn and remember to say thank you to those who have given to us, knowingly or unknowingly. Understanding that none of us exist in a vacuum.
Pluto in the 3rd/9th house axis: The power of knowing and the power of not knowing.
Say what needs to be said. The 3rd and the 9th house are the houses of journeying from one place to another, both metaphorically and literally. They are also houses of communication both between humans and communicating with God or everything under the realm of the unknown. Knowing the truth and saying it holds the same power as not knowing the truth and also communicating it. What we don’t know is sometimes as important as what we do know. The ability to communicate this clears the space for true power to emerge. Clear communication as a path of holding and giving power.
Pluto in the 4th/10th house axis: The power to hold visibility for oneself and others.
Honoring the power of visibility and the power of all that came before you to help you stand on the podium of life. Our presence here, our visibility is not merely a result of our own deserving, but if not for the teachers who took the time to educate you, then the ancestors that came before you that learned how to survive made sure you are now alive and able to shine your ligth. Visibility, when done from a place of empowring ourselves and others to be visible and stand in their true power, is the power of this axis. When we stand on a podium, who do we represent? What do we stand for? The answers to these questions make all the difference in how Pluto will bestow riches.
Pluto in the 5th/11th house axis: The power of creating and co-creating.
A basic rule of our life here on earth is our ability to create and bring into life things and use our being and our free will do do so. Creation is where we experience ourselves as the one that has the power to create and in that process we find the arc of greater creation by learning to and experiencing the power of co-creation with others (11th house). This axis has an inherent position of power as we are the ones that create but the risk here is to lose sight of the fact we are the creator and do so in a default position and forget we are the creators. We experience What you create is your own, the gift of being alive, to be able to play and grow through play. The other side of the coin is that co-creation with others, in playful manner especially which is why the 11th house is known, among others, the house of friends, alliances and it is the house of joy and good fortune. because to be live and create and co-create is the biggest joy in the experience of being here on earth.
Pluto in the 6th/12th house axis: The power of service in action and in stillness.
There is power in sitting still and not acting and there is also power in actively working and being of service. Mother Teresa, a Virgo sun, in her published letters, you can see someone who fearlessly navigated this position of serving and being under the power of her church higher-ups - 6th house topic. She would pray, meditate and have conversations with what often times felt like an absent god, and asking for permission from those in power and waiting to receive it before doing it. She was relentless in working towards taking her ministry out on the streets of Calcutta - outside the confines of her monastery. Her expansion and power came from this place - the place of servitude to others and the place of the deep silence in her prayers - 6th and 12th house activities respectively.
Curious about where Pluto is in your natal chart and how that might relate to your experiences? I offer one on one sessions where I walk you through your natal chart and offer insights that just might be the perspective on your life and challenges that you need. You can find out more about my approach here.
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