Work (Saturn) to do in Nourishing Yourself (Venus)

There are so many places to buy tight jeans and so many places to buy sweat pants. How to choose? Expansion (Jupiter) and contraction (Saturn) in the chart indicate where to look for the rolls that keep rolling. When your ass passes the size of Texas (WTF?), it could be a transit of Jupiter blowing everything up and out and over.

No one knows what to eat, when to eat, or how to eat. Maybe you have a garden and you grow your own fruit. Ripe or not, how are you feeling? Is the cherry pie toxic? Are we eating it on the floor of the broom closet? Fear and pleasure; high and low blood sugar; Cancer and Capricorn, two sides of the same coin. Flip it, and the wrong amount can do us in.

What are we feeding ourselves? How is our nervous system doing? Who’s the boss of your body and brain? Are you even in your body, or did you leave? So many of us have unresolved trauma. We are wired for fight or flight constantly, assuming a tiger will shred us limb from limb. That tiger may have been our mother, or the weirdo that lived around the corner who normal mothers warned their kids to stay away from. Or maybe we went to Catholic school and verbal abuse was the norm. Can too much Holy Communion-receiving lead to a gluten intolerance? How about guilt and shame? Can that give you a chocolate chip cookie addiction?

What a pain the ever-expanding ass-eating can be. In Astrology, the second house is ruled by Taurus or Ferdinand the Bull. The bull wants things simple. In Japan, the gut is the heart. Your belly watches your third eye. In the beginning, you were the baby; nurtured in there, fed there, swimming around just a newbie egg. We all shot out traumatized, whether we were right side up or ass first. We all came out screaming for food. Are we still screaming for food? Do we trust the doctor (Saturn)? Do we trust our mothers (moon)? Do we trust ourselves (second house of Taurus)? Do we trust our earth suits (the first house of Aries)? How can we feel safe in our skin (Saturn)?

We all want a normal, healthy mother. What is breakfast, lunch, and dinner (or the lack thereof) but a way to tell ourselves we are okay, and there is no monster under my bed. The fourth house, Cancer ruled by the moon (hello mom) holds our cups empty, dirty, or full. It’s our job to find the right cocktail and fill our own cups up.

The second house is our physical form: our body and how we use our energy and resources. Wash it, feed it, work it, use it. Every day, our human body gives us a thumbs up (for good health) or giant YOU SUCK NOW YOU HAVE A HEADACHE sign. I study the moon, second house, fourth house, Saturn, and Jupiter. I see how the person is wired for feast and famine, where the appetite has been, and is currently. I find a key (and a wooden bat) somewhere in that chart where the person can slam down a door or six, and heal herself.

So much goes into every meal. There’s no ritual quite like it. If you’re cooking, the act of choosing ingredients, playing with fire, mixing, and separating is pure alchemy and intention. Did you put love in your food?

And what about going out to eat? I’m constantly amazed by dating. On first dates, everyone goes out to eat. You sit there with a person’s second house of Taurus, and exchange stories while chomping on shumai and edamame. Just two fish lovers swimming in the deep waters of Saturn and Venus. This is serious stuff. You are also sitting with this new stranger’s mom (in spirit).

There was a book I once saw at a library titled People Around You Are Making You Fat. I thought about what an awful title that was. It should be titled You’re Letting People Around You Make You Fat. It should be a book about boundaries and finding your middle finger—your Saturn finger. Setting limits (Saturn) can make the eat your feelings game stop. It sucks to use food to manage stress. Life is hard enough in the physical body without a massive eating disorder. The only thing we should be taught in school is Boundaries 101 and AP Boundaries 102: How to Use your Middle Finger / Applied Science of Saying No. Because being nice and making nice is making us all obese.

Saturn is hard. The Tin Man has to try to uncover his heart from the rust. We need the rain. Feeling good: this is why we are here. Gene Kelly had it right all soaking wet and singing in the rain.

Saturn is exalted in Libra (Venus) because Saturn (work/boundaries/limits/structure/social order/ expert/) doesn’t do things she doesn’t want. She doesn’t serve a useless master. She owns her own balls and swings them in the breeze, no matter how long it takes, or how shitty and cold the hill she rolled the rock up was.

Eaten Alive by Eating: The True Story of Food in the Chart