Know Thyself through Astrology and the Enneagram with Beth Kuper

In this Episode

• [02:44]Beth Kuper defines astrology and differentiates it from horoscopes.
• [05:23]Beth shares how astrology has helped her understand her life journey and see symbolic meanings in her experiences.
• [09:13]Stephan and Beth explain how astrology is rooted in spirituality.
• [12:49]Beth relates the Enneagram to astrology and the importance of natal charts and transits, highlighting how they reveal an individual’s talents, abilities, and potential challenges.
• [15:59]Beth identifies four major transits affecting Stephan’s natal chart.
• [20:24]Stephan recalls his spiritual journey, including a transformative event and how he has been preparing for it through energy healing.
• [36:36]Beth discusses the impact of transiting Uranus on natal Saturn, leading to radical change and disruption of old habits and foundations.
• [43:00]Stephan asks Beth to describe the meanings of various astrological aspects.
• [47:41]Beth recommends getting a reading once a year to track progress and gain a deeper understanding of the transits’ impact on one’s Enneagram type.
• [50:18]Beth and Stephan talk about how Mercury retrograde can be a positive window in time for revitalization, renewal, and recharging.
• [56:00]Beth offers Enneagram and astrology readings and encourages us to take advantage of her services.

Jump to Links and Resources

Beth, it’s so great to have you on the show.

Wonderful. I’m very happy to be here. 

Beth, thanks for coming back to the show. I’d love to get your take on astrology—what it is and what a horoscope is versus astrology. Assuming our listener or viewer isn’t familiar with it, give them the 101 version.

Astrology is an ancient art and science. The ancients used the movement of the planets in the sky like a giant computer since they didn’t have computers, and they believed that the planets were gods. 

The orbit of the planet was its destiny, and they matched up what happened on Earth with where the planets were in the sky. But in the astrology that I learned—which is pretty common amongst astrologists today—the planets don’t really beam down rays on you and make you do things. It is not predictive in that way. They simply reflect an archetypal pattern that is everywhere present in the universe.

The archetypal pattern of the movement of the planets is very aligned with the archetypal patterns in your life. There’s that very ancient expression, “As above, so below, as within, so without, as in you, so in me.” 

We have, of course, computers today, so we can do up charts really fast. The fact that so many people all over the world are sharing their knowledge means that our understanding of astrology is growing much greater than it was previously. It’s something that can be shared with everyone, and it can be used in a very useful way. Not so much in a predictive way, but it’s more like a weather report. If it’s raining, you can decide, “Do I want to go on a picnic or stay home by the fire?” Or if it’s snowing, perhaps we could go skiing rather than taking a walk. 

You always have choices. It was much more predictive in the past because people did not have choices in their lives. You were born in a certain place. You may have been a serf and did what your father did. That’s what your life was, and it was all laid out for you. But now, we have tremendous choice and variety in what we choose. There’s a great deal of choice in astrology.

What is a horoscope in relation to astrology?

If you want an in-depth reading, you need to have an astrologer look at everything that’s going on, not just the sun.

You may have seen they have these dreadful horoscopes in newspapers, which are just such nonsense. I wouldn’t spend time reading them. That’s where they describe what is going on in the sky and how it relates to one planet in your chart and the sun sign. That’s the horoscope. It is dependent, of course, upon your astrological chart. If you want an in-depth reading, you need to have an astrologer look at everything that’s going on, not just the sun.

How did you start delving into this? There must have been something that happened where you’re like, “I needed this,” or some sort of synchronicity or something that made you want to dig into this at some point, I imagine.

Absolutely. I was involved with a school of metaphysics called The Prosperos in Santa Monica, California. It was for adults, and everybody took all the classes that we were given. I’m just absolutely fascinated with these metaphysical classes and learning symbology.

One of the classes was astrology. There were a lot of astrology classes. Of course, I took them. At that time, I thought, “Oh, it’s maybe too late for me. I’m 23 years old. Is it too late for me to learn astrology? But I’ve stuck with it all of my life.”

How is it showing up for you in ways that have been surprising or transformational? I know you’ve made a lot of impact on your clients in doing these readings and tapping into their natal charts and all that, but what about you specifically? What’s it done for you?

It’s helped me see what is going on in a symbolic way in my life. I could look it all up in the books. “What does this mean?” It doesn’t mean that I really understand it. Sometimes, I have to look back and see what was going on, “Oh, so that’s why that is. Oh, I have Saturn on the ascendant. Okay, now I can see why I have kind of a rather serious outlook on life.” 

I was very serious as a child. I’ve loosened up quite a bit because I’ve focused on some other things and expanded my understanding of what that means, but it’s very helpful for me to see—in terms of weather reports—what’s coming up and what I need to prepare for. “Are some really good things happening? Let me get ready for it so that I can take advantage of that. Are there some very challenging things happening? Let me remind myself.” I may be looking at the downside of things during that particular transit, and that’s not necessarily telling me the truth about who I am.

As my mother would say, “Adversity builds character,” so that’s going to be a character-building time. But I know with astrology, it’s limited. It’s not going to be that way forever because the transits are simply where all the planets are in the sky in relation to where they were when you were born. The transits are always changing.

Archetypes are patterns that occur worldwide, regardless of your culture and language. They are what unites us as human beings.

I know you said that we don’t necessarily use this these days as a predictive indicator of where our lives are going to end up, but it seems like there’s a lot of potential to use it as a way to divine what’s going on and what’s going to happen. If somebody wants to look into their future, couldn’t they use astrology to do so?

Absolutely, you certainly can. You will see phases. Just like what I said before, it’s like a weather report. We know a storm is coming. Now, we can do some preparation. We know we’re going to have some wonderful sunny days. “Let’s make some plans for how we’re going to use that time while we’ve got it.” 

It’s more like that than a specific thing is going to happen, and this is how it’s going to be. It’s more generalized, but it’s specific enough because it’s going to show you the areas. 

When I talk about the transits in your chart, I’ll ask you how this is showing up in your life because I can give you a general definition, but I don’t know how it’s showing up. “What is really bothering you? What is not that difficult? What is really great going on?”

It’s important for our listener to understand, too, that this isn’t just some kind of hocus-pocus, new-age thing. It has spiritual roots. Astrology is taught in Kabbalah, for example, which is Jewish mysticism. It’s not anti-religious or heretical. It’s got a spiritual root to it, right?

Absolutely. For example, the Bible is loaded with astrology and numerology. You’ve got the 12 tribes of Israel, the 12 disciples, Jesus fasting for 40 days, and the rain coming down for 40 days and 40 nights when Noah was in his ark. These are all archetypal symbols. 

Archetypes are patterns that happen all over the world, no matter what your culture and language are. Certain archetypes will play out. That’s what unites us as human beings. We can get a greater understanding of those so that we can use our time here on Earth—which is limited—and our energy and put it in the most productive way.

My understanding of why this works and why it’s so good at predicting things about situations we’re going to be experiencing, challenges we’re going to face, etc., is because it’s like you’re dropped into this life at a particular point in time. It’s like an IP address where you’re given the coordinates of your place of birth, date of birth, and time of birth. 

This is where you get placed into a time-space continuum. It’s not random. You’re placed specifically there, and you can use that IP address or those coordinates to access information that’s in the upper worlds and the ethereal realm to give you some life tips. 

Some of that information can be accessed through numerology, some through astrology, and some through an Akashic Records reading—all of it is available to utilize as a tool. That’s my understanding of it from a spiritual perspective.

Challenges are good. You need challenges to get up, do something, learn, and grow.

Yeah. There’s a great verse in the Bible that God is saying, “I have given you the sun, moon, stars, and heavens as signs for you to understand.” Astrology is so old, we don’t even know how old it is, but the ancients all over the world used astrology. Only later was it demonized by the church and various other places that wanted to have control. It was a control issue, but we now find that it’s not angels and demons. 

They used to say, “Oh, this is a good transit. This is a bad one.” We don’t do that anymore. We say, “Hey, this is a beneficial one, and this particular transit is a challenging one.” But challenges are good. You need challenges in your life so that you actually get up, do something, learn, and grow because we don’t tend to grow when we get too comfortable.

Right. By the way, you’re an expert in this area of astrology and also on Enneagram. How many years have you been studying and working with astrology?

I’ve been working with astrology for over 50 years. I started young. I’ve been working with Enneagram for 30 years. It’s my 30th year.

You relate the Enneagram to astrology in what way?

Both the Enneagram and astrology are personality profiling systems. They help us understand who we are and what we’re here to do. The Enneagram is simply a system of nine personality types with the goal of moving beyond your type into wholeness. You’re not stuck in your type, but you learn the habit of perception of your type, the habitual way you look at the world, and all the things you don’t notice about the world. 

The Enneagram will help you understand that, widen your perspective, recognize the gifts of your type, and then move beyond your type so that you can access the gifts of the other types. The Enneagram is a movement of energy. You really do have access to all the types, but you have to start with your type. 

Once you know your type, you’ve got a composite. It’s like a super-duper bouillon cube, and you just unpack it. You just add water and unpack. You do that to find out what your paths of growth are, where your limitations are self-imposed, and how you can move out of them and have a more expansive point of view.

Now astrology, on the other hand, gives you a thousand details. You’ve got aspects, planets, houses, and all kinds of things in astrology. It’s huge. The difficulty with astrology is putting it all together into a composite hole that makes sense because many different things in astrology seem to be contradictory when someone reads your chart or looks at your transits.

You can’t really trust a system until you know its boundaries. You have to know what that system can do and what it cannot do, and then you can trust it. 

The boundaries of the Enneagram are that it tells you nothing about timing. I’ll run into this when I’m doing Enneagram sessions with people. They may be going through something really tense, and I say, “Wow, I’d like to look at your astrological chart and see what is going on here.”

Astrology is masterful. It’s one of the best profiling systems ever created for telling time. It’s all about timing because, like I said, you have a natal chart that never changes. That’s your birthright. That’s your blueprint. That’s when you first took your breath, and it stays that way all your life. 

But then the planets keep right on moving. You got born, but they keep moving, so the relationship of the planets in the sky to your natal chart is what we look at with the transits.

Interesting. Let’s have a look at what you found. I gave you my information so you could look up my natal chart and do all your analysis. I’d love to hear, first of all, generally, what’s the explanation for why someone would want to do a natal chart with anyone—you or any astrologer—and then let’s get into some of the specifics about me.

Your natal chart is very important to see what your talents, abilities, and direction are in your life. It is potential. 

For example, when I do a chart for a baby, I’m going like, “Well, this is all that’s going on. This is what I think is going to be very strong in this child’s life, this is not so much, and so forth.” 

As an adult, you need to know how that chart has influenced you. “What was your blueprint? What was your divine inheritance? What are your talents? What are the things you were naturally going to be good at if you put in some energy? What are the areas that are going to be difficult for you that might trip you up? What are the challenges that you need to work on in your life?”

I’ll just show you an example right here. This is what a transit chart looks like. The inside right here is your natal chart. That does not change. But out here, we have the transits going on here. The planets are moving round and round and round here. They’re making relationships with the various planets in your natal chart.

I’ve circled around the four major transits you have going on. I put a circle around those. Those will be the ones that I’ll be talking about.

Let’s start on a high point here. Right now, you have transiting Jupiter. It’s making a trine to your natal sun.

We should specify that today’s date is March 22nd, so the stuff you’re sharing about astrology and where things are in alignment, planets, stars, and all that is now on March 22nd, 2023.

Great. This particular transit I’m talking about started on March 16th. It’s going to continue for another week or so, and then gradually, it will decline. 

Jupiter is the planet of hope, optimism, and good luck; the sun is your essential personality. You can feel good and optimistic that things are going your way, people like you, and you might do some travel, and finances are good. You just generally feel good. You feel happy, prosperous, and abundant. How has that been from mid-March to now for you?

It’s been a good run. I can say that’s true.

You have a very naturally optimistic personality, so you’re very open to that sort of thing from the years I’ve known you.

You have a natal chart that never changes. That’s your birthright.

The next transit is the most powerful in your chart at this time, and it will last for a long time. We have transited Pluto, making a trine to your natal Pluto. 

I’ll explain trine. A trine simply means they’re 120 degrees apart, which is very beneficial. It means things go well and smoothly, and if there are difficulties, you surmount them easily.

Pluto is the planet of power, transformation, and control. It is the most powerful planet of all the planets and the slowest moving, so whenever you have a Pluto transit, it lasts a long time. Everything I’m going to say will be very strong this entire year, all through 2023 and into 2024. It is nothing less than spiritual progress on the path to freedom.

I like that.

This transit is very concerned with your purpose and direction. You put a lot of drive and willpower into creating what you want to create in life and where you want to go. Pluto gives you that power, and you access the power within yourself. 

All the planets and signs are really within you. Self-improvement and moving along your path toward evolutionary development are very important because Pluto has much to do with transformation. You can much more easily let go of obsolete behavior and move towards more enlightened ways of doing things. 

How does that show up in your life?

In many ways—I have been on this quest to elevate my consciousness, climb Jacob’s ladder, and get closer and closer to God. That’s the thing I’m most passionate about. I’ve been studying quite a lot. I take online courses, read, watch videos, meditate, talk to God, and just connect with the upper world all the time.

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You’ve been doing this for a long time in your life, haven’t you?

Yeah. But it’s been a huge part of my life since early 2021.

So it’s even been more so.

It was the awakening event on January 22nd of that year in the middle of the night when I prayed to God for a job. He showed me the matrix, and then I could see the whole illusionary world, and I was given the job. I want to make a difference in this world and help people connect to the Creator and cleave to God.

When I hear something so specific—January 22nd, 2021—it makes me go, “Oh, I would love to see what transits were going on at that time for you because it happened all of a sudden.” It wasn’t a gradual thing. You’ve been maybe moving in that direction, but it was a very powerful incident.

Very much so. It was in Israel, and that was not a coincidence. I was a key part of this. I was preparing for that. 

I didn’t realize it, but I had been getting these entrainments every week for months. They’re in Israel with the practitioner who studied under Donny Epstein, who was a guest on the show, an energy healer and creator of a modality called NetworkSpinal Analysis. 

I didn’t know it at the time, but that was getting me deeper and deeper into connection so that I was poised and ready for that massive download that happened that night.

Poised and ready, boy, is that important. Did you have any health issues going on, or did it disrupt your system in any way?

No, I didn’t have any health issues. Disruptive in a positive way, and that changed my whole outlook on everything. I was already spiritual, but it was like, “Oh, most of the stuff I work on doesn’t really matter.”

Isn’t that something? It changed your trajectory. This Pluto transit, the Pluto trine, which is very beneficial and takes a long time, is something that is going to give you an increased perspective in terms of you’ve planted seeds for more than two years. You were preparing yourself up until January 22nd, 2021. Then, you had this profound experience. 

You have been working on that ever since. This is wonderful preparation for something as powerful as this happening because transits can happen at different times in someone’s life.

If you’re older, a bit more mature, or prepared the ground in advance, you can take much better advantage of them. You can use them to their fullest extent in the most beneficial way. This will increase and transform what you have done to an even greater degree because that’s the nature of Pluto. 

Pluto is the god of birth, death, and transformation. Things get born, the old has to die, and the new has to be transformed. I’m definitely going to take a look at the chart for that particular date. Where in Israel were you?

Ramat Gan specifically. That’s a suburb of Tel Aviv.

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That’s close enough. Was there any particular time that this happened?

It was in the middle of the night. It might have been the morning of the 23rd because it would have been probably 1 AM or something like that.

I know this is approximate, but that’s very close to having something profound happen to you in this way.

By the way, I had the angel number 5858 earlier today. I looked it up, and it says angel number 5858 indicates you’re 100% protected and supported for making a fresh start on a pending project.

Wonderful. I’m very interested in finding out what that project is and how it goes. 

I want to explain a little bit about passes. Here’s what happens. This happens with all the outer planets. If this represents your natal planet, here’s Pluto. Pluto comes along. This is the first pass where it’s conjunct.

For somebody who’s only listening and not seeing a video, they’re going to have a hard time visualizing what you’re talking about.

All right, but it’s going to pass over. It’s going to go back over it again retrograde—that’s the second pass—then it’s going to go forward as the third pass. 

You are just in the first pass of Pluto, making a beneficial trine to where it was when you were born. This is going to be to the exact degree—and it stays in the exact degree for quite a while—from mid-February of this year through the end of March, a powerful time. 

Then, Pluto moves on. It makes a second pass where it goes back over the same place from mid-June through the end of July this year. That’s going to be a really powerful time for you. 

The third pass is mid-December through mid-January of 2024. Basically, it isn’t just when Pluto is the exact degree that you’re feeling it. You’re going to feel it up, and you’re going to feel it as it recedes. You’re going to feel it all year long and into 2024, the things that we’ve talked about.

During those little windows where it’s passing, those little one-month or six-week windows that are going to happen a couple of times, what are the significance of those specifically?

The first pass is “woah.” Sometimes, it can hit you like a ton of bricks, sometimes not. The second pass is with difficult transit. With a challenging transit, sometimes it feels like you got run over by a truck, and then it backed up over you and then ran over you again. You got your three passes.

Sometimes, it will reinstate the same lesson the second time around, and the third time can sometimes be challenging because, “Okay, did you really get it?” The universe says, “Did you really get it? Because this is it, and I’m moving on. I’m not going to be doing this particular aspect anymore.”

It doesn’t have to be earth-shattering. It can be very powerful. Pluto is funny. Sometimes, you don’t really know what happened until after it’s over. You can look back, and you go, “Oh, that was then, this is now. Okay, now I get what some of these changes were in my life.”

For some people, it can feel like getting hit by a truck, but for others, it feels like. “I’m being helped along here on this transformation journey.”

Exactly. Because you definitely have invisible means of support. That’s good. You’re in touch with your angels. They are definitely helpful. Every religion there has had angels or something similar.

Here’s another transit. This is happening to the exact degree as well. This is a square, and your transiting Saturn is the square of your natal Neptune. 

The square means challenge. For some people, it can be terrible. For other people, they can go, “Okay, I’m going to buck up here, and I’m going to meet this challenge.”

Saturn represents structure, order, and discipline. It rules your bones. It is the god of timing.

Saturn represents structure, order, and discipline. It rules your bones. It is the god of timing. We have Kronos, the god of timing. That’s our structure. It’s making a challenging relationship with Neptune. 

Neptune is a planet of spirituality. Neptune dissolves boundaries so you can be one with all there is. Saturn creates boundaries so you can have a structured life in a physical body here on Earth. 

Saturn and Neptune are not friendly. Neptune is busy dissolving boundaries. It has much to do with your spiritual life, idealism, and faith. But on the low side, Neptune has to do with nebulousness. You don’t know where things are at. It’s a fog. 

The lowest side of Neptune is spirituality through drugs. I’ll take a shortcut through drugs and illusion and delusion.

When Saturn, one’s structure, is making a challenging relationship with Neptune that wants to dissolve structure, your idealism and faith are tested because the idealism is Neptune, and the testing is Saturn. 

Saturn will always test you. Saturn is where your fears and insecurities lie. As long as we’re in a physical body, we have fears and insecurities like, “What’s going to happen to me?” You can feel insecure and doubt yourself. “Things are going well, but I don’t know. I don’t feel good.”

You can lose your perspective. Your normal spiritual expansive perspective can seem to shrink down. Trying to figure out what is going on can be very nebulous. It can make you feel depressed and discouraged.

Now, you have to put all this in relationship with what’s going on with this Pluto trine because a Pluto trine is very powerful. You might not feel this all that much right now—this is only its first pass—but this is going to repeat from now until another 1 ½ weeks. That’s not very long. It will move on, but then it will back up and do the second pass square your natal Neptune.

That’s retrograde.

Then, it will do a third pass after that. The second pass will happen in late September through mid-October of this year, and the third pass will be late November through mid-December of this year.

Basically, you’re going to be feeling this all year long, but there are certain times in the year you’re going to feel it more. You just have to remember that this, too, shall pass.

I’m being tested.

Yeah, you’re being tested. Has it shown up for you? Have you noticed?

I’m being tested right now. I’ll share some specifics. I do something called Health Nucleus, which I had David Karow on the podcast to talk about. I get a full-body MRI scan, the whole genetic sequencing, the different battery of blood tests, and everything. It’s very comprehensive and not covered by insurance. It’s expensive, but it’s really good. Somebody who wants to live a long time would go and do this on a regular once-a-year basis.

I went and did it. One of the things they had me do to augment this was go and get checked for skin cancers because they can’t check that with an MRI. They referred me to a dermatologist in my local area. I saw him, and I got the results. They did a couple of biopsies, and one of them was precancerous. That’s not easy for me to take. 

I know I’m guided, cared for, protected, loved, and everything. I know that. As you said, I’m in a physical body. We’re all on physical bodies, so we have issues that show up as we age. I’m 52, so I have to go in and get them all removed. It’s a minor surgery, but it certainly does give me pause. 

I know that this was why I was guided to go to Health Nucleus because I wouldn’t have thought to go to a dermatologist and get all the moles checked if I hadn’t done the whole comprehensive exam. This is an adjunct to that.

That’s the challenge. That’s where I’m being tested on my faith and everything. I know that I’m being guided, protected, and loved. I caught this early. It’s not even cancerous. I was guided to go to Health Nucleus. I was guided to go pretty much right away, so I made that happen, and disaster was averted. But it’s still not easy to go in for minor surgery. That’s a challenge for me.

Of course, because the mind and the imagination immediately go, “Oh my God, pre-cancer. So it could be cancer.” This is where the imagination can run amok.

Neptune is all about imagination. It was wonderful that you had this habit of going in once a year and having everything checked, even though you don’t necessarily have negative symptoms going on. 

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One of the things about Neptune is it’s nebulous. Sometimes, weird things happen with people’s health, and they can’t quite put their finger on it and figure it out. Then, when the transit is over, it’s just done. It’s not a problem anymore. 

That nebulousness of the fact that you have been doing your Saturn work by going in, getting regular checkups, and doing way more than what insurance pays for is very beneficial. It’s a wake-up call. At age 52, you’re immortal. You are a mortal being.

The body is mortal. This is an important distinction.

Yes, of course, the body is mortal. 

I used to believe that I was my body. Most of us did or still do. I’m not my body, but I occupy a body. I’m renting this body from God. I have a duty of care to maintain this vessel, go to the gym, lift weights, and keep my muscle mass, bone mass, and all that stuff. I have a duty of care. Part of the duty of care is to get regular checkups, make necessary diet changes as advised, and so forth.

Our bodies allow us to connect with the earth to walk around and do things that we can only do when we’re in a body. Absolutely, we must take care of them. 

Since Saturn rules time, we have a limited amount of time. I know you want to make absolutely the best use of it, so I want to commend you for what you’re doing in the way you’re paying attention to it.

Thank you. Another thing, too, is I’ve realized that time is an illusion. The asset that I’m spending isn’t time. It’s my attention and intention. I can make time slow down or speed up based on my attention and intention. How I show up with 100% presence or just half here and half on my phone or whatever is also me spending that asset of attention in a good or bad way.

Our bodies allow us to connect with the earth to walk around and do things that we can only do when we’re in a body.

I love that expression, intention and attention. We may not think we have choices, and we may have the amount of money or whatever, but we have a choice on where we put our attention. 

Back to the Enneagram, simply, your Enneagram type shows you your habit of attention. Again, there’s Saturn. When you recognize your habit of attention, you realize you can change that habit. 

The next transit I’d like to talk about is a very positive one, but it could be very disruptive. In fact, it will be disruptive. This is another one that’s going on. 

Saturn is squaring the natal Neptune and challenging it. You’re going to feel this all year long. You’re not really going to be out of this woods until well into 2024, so just get used to it. This is how it is. You have the resources to deal with it.

Here’s what will help you break through some old patterns resistant to change. That is, transiting Uranus is conjunct with your natal Saturn. Where Saturn was when you were born, transiting Uranus is conjunct with it. It’s within half a degree today of being exact, so it’s very, very strong. You’re going to feel this through the month of April. This is its third pass, and it’s done this twice before. 

Uranus is the planet of change and revolution. You’ve got to break up the old in order to bring in the new. Uranus just wants to get rid of everything the way it was and open you up to greater creativity, but it can be very disruptive because Saturn wants to hang on to everything the way it was. Saturn loves the old. It loves habit and tradition. Saturn and Uranus are not friends. They have very different energy dynamics. 

The fact is that transiting Uranus, the one that’s moving, is hitting your natal Saturn. You are being forced to let go of old habits, old behaviors, old opinions, old ideas, and the very foundations of your life—which is what Saturn is, and it’s your foundations—are going to go through and are going through radical change. 

It can be very shocking, and it can disrupt your security. You may think you’re not hanging on to something very tight until Uranus knocks on your door or breaks it down, and you realize, “Oh, man, that’s not working anymore. It was working, but now it’s not. It’s being taken away from me.”

When you recognize your habit of attention, you realize you can change that habit.

At this point, you need patience and flexibility. Fortunately, you’re getting a lot of that with your trine Pluto. Pluto is not known for patience and flexibility, but when you’ve got that nice trine, you can flow with it more easily.

Uranus gives you freedom from restrictions in the past and freedom from restrictions of old habits. Maybe there’s some old habit you’ve been wanting to break. If you want to design a new future, now’s the time.

It also will give you faith in the future. The future will be way more important than the past because the future is Uranus, and the past is Saturn. 

Sometimes, though, if your sense of security is broken up in your external world, you must find a sense of security within yourself. That’s where your security really lies so that it’s not linked to your external structure. You’ll find out what’s important to you and what isn’t important to you. 

This is a time to know this, like the weather report. “What do you want to change in your life? How’s this showing up for you?”

A message I get a lot is to jettison on the trivial distractions.

I like that, especially when you’re in a lifeboat, you have to get rid of the stuff you do not need. 

That incident that happened today was sudden. You didn’t expect that. You didn’t know it was going to be happening. That could also be part of Uranus’ sudden change, uncoupling you and unlinking you from dependency on the security of your body.” I have good health, and I’m just fine,” and suddenly, you’re disrupted.

Like I said, this is the third pass. The first pass, the first time this happened, is this Uranus conjunct your natal Saturn. This happened from mid-June of last year through early July, and then it happened again mid-October through early November of last year. 

It’s always interesting to look back and say, “Okay, what was going on then? Was there anything that was very disruptive during those times?” Once Uranus moves on, it won’t be making this anymore. Somewhere around April, you’re not going to be feeling this all that much anymore.

You’ve got to break up the old in order to bring in the new.

What was the timeframe?

It’s mid-June through early July and then mid-October through early November.

I’m trying to think about what was happening from mid-October to early November. Nothing really strikes me.

After we’re done talking, it might be helpful to just glance at your calendar. I know you have to live by your calendar in many ways with all your appointments and everything. See if that will jog your memory because we often don’t remember things if we’re not paying attention to them. They happen, we forget about them, and then we move on.

It was in the fourth house. I’ll go a little bit further. Transiting Uranus is in your fourth house. 

I’ll show you this again. There are 12 segments in a chart, and you can see them. We call them houses. First, second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, and so on. 

The fourth segment, right down here, is the house of home. It’s your home and family environment. It’s what you were brought up in, the beliefs you drank with your mother’s milk, the past, and all the things that make you feel secure. 

Uranus has been passing through this house for the last about seven years. It may have been disruptive, and it was in this house when you had your revelation back in 2021. It can be very disruptive to how you think things are and what makes you feel stable, calm, and secure. Do some reflection on that and see what you come up with.

I will. If a listener or viewer is looking at a chart and sees these different squares, triangles, and all that, what’s the legend for that? What do those different geometric shapes mean?

A conjunction is when two planets are in the same place, so they’re the same degree. It doesn’t matter what that degree is. It can be anything from 0 to 29 because that’s how many degrees we have in each house. Of course, 360 degrees in a circle. It just means when two things are conjunct, they’re in the same place.

Is there a symbol for that?

Yes. I’ll draw it for you. Right here, that’s the conjunction.

Okay, it’s a circle with a line going up to the right.

It’s a conjunction. The next one we’ll talk about is the trine. The trine’s energy is free-flowing, and the two planets are 120 degrees apart. That could be in your natal chart or a transiting planet making 120 degrees with a natal. 

I’ll draw you a trine. It’s just going to be a triangle. It looks like this. There’s a triangle. If you look at a circle, you can make a nice equilateral triangle. There’s your circle with your equilateral triangle. If you had a planet, each of these points, you’d have a grand trine. Either one of these is going to be 120 degrees from each other.

For the listener, the triangle is inside of the circle.

If you look at the whole circle, yeah. That’s a triangle. 

Then, the square looks just what you would think it would look like. It looks like a square. There’s your square. That’s when two planets are 90 degrees. 

The way we figure this is if you had one planet—I’ll find you one. Saturn is squaring Neptune. We’ve got Saturn down here. This is transiting Saturn, and this is your natal Neptune—transiting Saturn here, natal Neptune here. If you draw a line to the center of the circle and up like this—so you’re going to connect those two—you’ll get a nice right angle. That’s what we call a square. That’s a challenge.

There are many aspects, but these are the ones we use the most. 

If your sense of security is broken up in your external world, you must find a sense of security within yourself.

This is the sextile. I didn’t go into sextiles today because we only have so much time, but this star right here is the sextile. That’s half as good as a trine. That means you have some opportunity but must do a little work to make it happen. It’s not going to be just free.

I got it. What is the house?

This is your natal chart. It never changes. If you look around here, you’ll see that this circle is divided into 12 houses. These are the houses. It’s just like a pie divided into 12 pieces. 

Each house has a meaning. When a planet is in that house, it takes on that meaning.

I’ll give you an example. Let’s just take the first house. The first house is your physical body. It’s how you put yourself in the world and what people see. When you walk into the room, you see that. That’s your purpose. 

You would have a planet there. You’ve got your Mercury there, so that means you are going to be great with communication. You have a natural talent for it. You communicate with people, they understand you, and you know how to express yourself. It also gives you talent in writing and in anything to do with communication. 

Here, we are communicating. You do lots and lots of podcasts, all kinds of teaching, and so forth, so I expect that to be prominent in your life. It’s within about six degrees of your ascendant. 

This line right here, if this were a clock, it’d be the nine o’clock position, but that’s your ascendant. That’s what constellation was on the horizon when you were born. You were born with 29 degrees Sagittarius ascendant. 

That’s like a stained glass window. Everything will go through that window, through that Sagittarian expression of wanting freedom, wanting to gallop off in many different directions, wanting adventure in life, and being willing to explore everything, very open-minded. 

Nicely enough, it’s ruled by Jupiter, so there’s a lot of abundance and good fortune on your ascendant. Everything filters through that. That has a lot to do with your basic attitude in life.

Cool. How often would you recommend somebody get a reading like this? Is this a monthly thing, quarterly, once in a blue moon, or what?

It would be nice if it were once a year because these are the four major transits we talked about today. Not all of them, but most of them will be very strong throughout this year. 

A year from now, it will be excellent to have another reading. I’ll keep my notes from this reading and say, “Okay, so what happened when you went through this because you have some more passes of Saturn square Neptune and Pluto trine Pluto?” That’s going to be going on all year long. You’ll have more of a perspective. Then, we look forward to more of the future.

How would I apply this information to my Enneagram? How do those two go together for me specifically?

Astrology will illuminate how you express your Enneagram type, and your Enneagram type is going to inform how you experience these various astrological transits.

That is an area that I am seriously investigating. We didn’t have time today to talk about as many things as I’d like to, but I would like to talk about some of these things in relation to your Enneagram type. 

Of course, we discussed that last time. You’re type nine. How you would experience these transits would be a bit different than somebody who was a different type, and one will illuminate the other. 

Astrology will illuminate how you express your Enneagram type, and your Enneagram type is going to inform how you experience these various astrological transits. 

I’m playing with this because I focus on doing Enneagram insight sessions with people. We focus on the Enneagram, but on the side, I want to look at that person’s chart. 

It’s good to work the two together. I just want to gather more information on how they work together. Knowing your Enneagram type, I have a composite of your personality. Astrology has lots of details. I love to work more on how you put those together.

That’s fascinating stuff. When somebody hears their new-age friends say in passing, “Oh, Mercury’s in retrograde, you better watch out.” What does that mean on a practical level for everybody and anybody who’s completely unfamiliar with astrology and how all that works? They don’t have any interest in reading a horoscope, getting a reading, or anything. 

Again, coming from a place of willing suspension of disbelief, what would that mean for them? Mercury’s in retrograde now, so you better watch out.

I live in the Boulder, Colorado area. I’m about ten miles east of Boulder. Everybody here knows about Mercury retrograde. They may not know anything about astrology, but they certainly know that. The more you watch out for it, the more you’re going to see it happening.

What happens is mercury is going around the sun. It doesn’t really go backward. It just keeps going around the Sun. 

Planets don’t suddenly go backward, but in our point of view, if you look at where the Earth and Mercury are, it appears to go retrograde. Almost all the planets, not the sun, have some retrograde motion. 

You don’t have to know anything about astrology, but if you know a little about symbology, Mercury is the planet of communication. It also rules the hands because every planet rules some body part. Because it rules the hands—manufacturing—it rules machinery. 

When it goes retrograde, communication seems to break down, people get irritable, they can’t keep their appointments, their computer breaks down—please backup your system before Mercury retrograde—and all kinds of disruptions start happening in communications and machinery. 

If you know this is happening, you can make some preparations ahead of time. That means, like I said, you back up your system. You also have more patience with people. Don’t be so judgmental when they don’t show up and they promised they would. Give them some grace and go with the flow. 

Go ahead, you can plan a party if you want, but don’t expect it’s going to go the way you planned it. Be able to just ride with the tide. If you can be more fluid and flexible, you don’t have to suffer so much, but if you hang on tight and things should be a certain way they aren’t, then you can have a difficult, disruptive time.

You might see glitches in Internet connections while trying to do podcast interviews and things like that.

Yeah, little things like that. Mercury is not retrograde yet, but it’s going to be. I’d have to take a look and see. I have a whole little thing here about when it’s going retrograde. It’s not going to go retrograde to the 21st of April, but you feel it a couple of weeks prior to that. 

If you just start noticing, oh, am I noticing some things or some of these things are happening, then you can more easily work as harmoniously as possible with what’s going on. 

People love Mercury retrograde. I’ll tell you why because it gives us something to blame. Everybody has something to blame. Yes, it’s Mercury retrograde. That’s why things are falling apart. But don’t worry, they’ll get put back together again. They may get put back together again in a better formation.

I know people who won’t sign contracts and make big purchases during Mercury retrograde. 

Mercury is the planet of communication.

Also, as you said, there’s a couple of weeks before that’s called the shadow, and then a couple of weeks after, and then you’re completely clear of the Mercury retrograde.

I agree with you on the contracts. Sometimes, you can’t avoid it, but get some good friends to look at the contract. You may even want to have an attorney look at the contract beforehand because you won’t always be seeing things accurately the way that they are. These are just little precautions. 

The shadow is just where you’re moving up to it. You’re getting closer to it, and then there’s repair work after that retrograde.

My understanding of Mercury in retrograde as a positive window in time for you is that it’s a great time to reflect, revitalize, renew, recharge, reassess, and all the other kinds of words.

Absolutely. I’m glad you brought that up because people think of it as bad. That’s just the general attitude about it. 

It is a time when we have special abilities in all those areas. We can recreate how we see ourselves and show up in the world. It can be useful if we have the wit to use it for what it can be used for.

Everything is a blessing. It’s just whether you look at it as a blessing or not. It changes your experience of it. If everything’s a blessing, which it is—in my understanding, everything’s a blessing even if you don’t recognize it at the time as such—and if you’re willing to consider that or take that on board as a universal truth, that will make it a lot more palatable to go through these different challenges.

I like that, and everything is a blessing. Sometimes, it’s a blessing in disguise. Sometimes, we have to go through it and look back at it to see that it’s a blessing. 

As Buckminster Fuller said, “The universe is a conspiracy in our favor.” God doesn’t make mistakes. It’s all in the divine right timing. We have to trust.

Speaking of divine right timing, it’s time to wrap up our episode.

This has been so much fun, Stephan. You know a lot about astrology. You’ve been studying on the side.

You can't trust a system until you know its boundaries. You have to know what that system can do and what it cannot do. Click To Tweet

I don’t know that much. I know more about numerology than astrology, but I’m fascinated by all this stuff.

If our listener or viewer wants to work with you, you offer these insight sessions, astrology readings, going over their natal chart, and all that, like we did today. How do they get in touch? 

I know you’re going to offer my listeners a complimentary consultation to discuss how using the Enneagram can enhance their personal growth and business and coaching practice.

Right. I’m happy to talk with anybody—a complimentary phone call or, even better, a Zoom call—and talk more about where they are, what they’re looking for, and so forth. 

I do Enneagram insight sessions. My favorite thing to do with astrology is the transit reading. You can see where things are, what things will be changing, and how that will affect your life. 

Anyone who has seen this podcast, just mention that you saw it. I’ll give you a 20% discount on either of my services. My very favorite thing to do is to do them both. Do the Enneagram, then do the astrology, and connect the two.

We did an Enneagram insight session, and I just got so much value out of it. You are gifted, knowledgeable, and wise on both of these topics—Enneagram and astrological readings. Thank you so much.

You’re very welcome, Stephan, and thank you so much for those very kind words about two of my favorite things in life. I sure appreciate being here.

Awesome. Listener, please take advantage of this opportunity to work with Beth and book a session with her. Again, where is the website address to find you?

My plain old email. It’s bethkuper@gmail.com. I look forward to hearing from you.

Awesome. Thank you, Beth. Thank you, listener. We’ll catch up with you in the next episode. I’m your host, Stephan Spencer, signing off.

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About Beth Kuper

Beth Kuper has been studying astrology for more than 50 years, and the Enneagram for 30 years. She will discuss the unique integration of these two personality systems. The Enneagram gives you a composite picture of your personality; and your astrological transits give you timing of the major cycles in your life. Each system enhances your understanding yourself as a whole person.

Disclaimer: The medical, fitness, psychological, mindset, lifestyle, and nutritional information provided on this website and through any materials, downloads, videos, webinars, podcasts, or emails is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical/fitness/nutritional advice, diagnoses, or treatment. Always seek the help of your physician, psychologist, psychiatrist, therapist, certified trainer, or dietitian with any questions regarding starting any new programs or treatments, or stopping any current programs or treatments. This website is for information purposes only, and the creators and editors, including Stephan Spencer, accept no liability for any injury or illness arising out of the use of the material contained herein, and make no warranty, express or implied, with respect to the contents of this website and affiliated materials.