Every 29 years Saturn returns to the same point in the sky that it was at the time when one was born. It’s an astrological transit from the harsh task maker that is the planet of Saturn, the planet of karma, restrictions and reality. In English, you’re basically meant to “go through it” and “transform” or whatever that means. As Saturn leaves Aquarius and moves into Pisces for the next 3 years, I will enter my first Saturn return in this life. With it, I will experience several shifts that will change my current perception of how I wish to live my life. 

This is both cool and terrifying. I’ve already been experiencing harsh life lessons in this current year of life. Thanks 27! I’ve had to get comfortable with career, relationship and home change, learning to feel and move through change to end up on the other side. Saturn returns have always been mysterious to me. Watching my older friends leave their Saturn returns, a cold and harsh period of time where I felt sorry for them, I’m scared for my own return. My friends who have experienced their Saturn returns are less urgent now. They are slower, more intentional, and have learned the patience I feel I don’t yet have. They are entering whole relationships where they are respected and cared for, a shift from the relationships they entered before their returns had started. I’m hopeful but scared for my own Saturn return experiences, as I’ve been told by experienced astrologers that my own return will be within myself. I’ll be breaking down my current idea of structured relationships. The romantic, familial, friendships, and the relationship I have with myself will likely crumble only to be built back up again in the way it was always meant to be. Surrendering to astrology or the philosophy that I do believe in the Universe or some higher power has never bothered me. Though, something about surrendering to a planet that will inevitably fuck up my life and bring more change sits weird with me. It’s like, you know you need to pay your rent every month but you’re not happy about it. On a larger scale, I feel like this. 

Pre-Saturn return, I’m struggling with rejection and betrayal. In this season of life, I am grappling with not being chosen in the ways I want to be, both romantically and with myself. Themes of rejection, for me, are associated with knowing, deep down, the outcome of a situation before entering into it and choosing to have the human experience anyway. I’m sad and upset that a person I wanted flowers or letters from is sending them to someone else and I’m struggling with being enough on my own. Rejection. I’m disappointed with myself for knowing a romantic situation would end in massive hurt for myself and I’m upset with how I acted, both to other people and to myself. Betrayal of my own intuition. I’m hurt and angry that I was gaslighted into thinking that my own acknowledgement as a romantic partner didn’t matter, and that this person knew the lies they were telling were wrong but engaged in hurtful acts anyways. Karma? Who knows. 

As Pisces enters Saturn next month, I can feel time closing in around me, urging me to close out important cycles in my life and release what isn’t working for me. Though I feel I’ve been slowly working towards this release, I still feel weird. These themes, feelings, and ways of living I am being asked to release have served as the building blocks for me and who I am as a human. Knocking them down, knowing that I have to rebuild them in some way, feels like I am going back to the drawing board of who I am as a human and being told to start over. In many ways, this is exactly what Saturn serves to do. Again, I’m scared and hopeful, but mainly scared. I can’t predict the future, so who’s to say this Saturn return will encompass completely different lessons than what I’ve been told? I remain open to new experiences and transformation, but even writing that sentence is hard. I plan to log the events, experiences and outcomes of my own Saturn return as a method of reflection and growth. Thank you, Universe. I guess I don’t have any other choice but to fully surrender.