SECONDARY

PROGRESSIONS
STEPPING INTO THE MYSTERY

by Anne Whitaker

Editor’s Note: This is a lightly edited version of the author’s fering a means of determining the timing, and understanding
original article with the same title, which first appeared in the the meaning, of significant developmental points in that indi-
May/June 2017 issue of the AA Journal. vidual’s unique unfolding journey.
In this article, I am not proposing to reinvent the
“I would love to live like a river flows, carried by the astro-wheel by offering detailed tuition on what SPs are, how
surprise of its own unfolding.” to calculate them, work with them, and relate them to what-
— John O’Donohue ever transits may be in operation at any given time. There is
plenty of information of that type available on the Web, as a

C
onsider this surprise. Astrology textbooks tell you that quick Google search will reveal.
the planets from Jupiter outwards move so slowly by Instead, my aim is to offer a personal reflection on
progression that their shifts are of no consequence. secondary progressions, continuing in the same spirit as the
On the very day in June 2016 that my 3rd-house Jupiter opening paragraph above. I’d like to share my clients’ experi-
moved by secondary progression from its hitherto lifelong ences of those mysterious symbolic tools, as well as my own.
occupancy of Scorpio into Sagittarius, I was offered a large My observations are also offered to experienced practitioners
library of astrology books from a university lecturer whose in such a way that they can take a moment to step back from
wife, a keen student of astrology, had recently died. In an- their astro-toolkit and be freshly awestruck by the essential
other case, “Phoebe,” a participant in the 1997–98 research Mystery which SPs evoke. Most of all, I’d like to intrigue and
I did on Jupiter–Uranus conjunctions, started piano lessons for inspire readers who are fairly new to astrology to begin their
the first time and became very interested in fashion/image in own journey into this misty, awesome territory.
1997 — the year her natal Neptune in Libra went direct by
secondary progression. No doubt readers could add their own
examples of progressed planetary effects, which supposedly
are of no consequence! Secondary Progressions offer a
Introduction means of determining the timing,
I am very well aware that there are several ways of pro- and understanding the meaning,
gressing a horoscope, which are no doubt valid. However,
traditional secondary progressions, or SPs as I shall now call of significant developmental points
them for short, are the only type which have consistently
spoken to me with great accuracy. These are calculated by
in an individual’s journey.
moving the planetary positions in the ephemeris for the day
of birth forward one day for every year of a person’s life, of-

52 — THE MOUNTAIN ASTROLOGER

 From the time I discovered SPs as a Faculty of Astrolog-
ical Studies student in the 1980s, they have fascinated me.
This fascination was amplified as I slowly became an experi-
enced astrology teacher, using my classes (as you do) for the In working with Secondary
brilliant qualitative research opportunities “on the hoof” that
they undoubtedly provide. When you first go around a class Progressions, you are stepping into
of a dozen students, tracking their Suns changing signs by the mysterious, intangible world of
secondary progression and discovering their corresponding
life changes as well as your own, it does rather cause you to the purely symbolic.
scratch your head — after you and your students have come
down from the sheer buzz of it all — and ask: “But why does
astrology work? And why does a purely symbolic technique trying to address this when he came for a consultation —
like SPs seem to work, too?” as his secondary progressed Sun triggered his natal Saturn
square Neptune.
Help Is at Hand: I think that an important part of the creative value of
Quantum Science being a practising astrologer lies in helping clients like James
These are good questions, which astrologers have been to understand, accept, and work constructively with the
asking for centuries, millennia probably, ever since those shapeshifting potential inherent in the particular energies
Chaldean priests from their chilly watchtowers scanned the with which they came into the world.
night skies for helpful advance warning signs that their kings From the above perspective very briefly outlined, it isn’t
and kingdoms were under threat. I do not propose in this too difficult to tie the planetary patterns in the sky — here
short article to add to the vast amount of erudite speculation and now — into the static picture of the natal horoscope.
which has arisen from such questions. You are working, at least in part, with what you can actu-
However, very briefly, my conclusion is this: Modern ally see. However, in working with SPs, you are stepping
quantum science has demonstrated that we live, move, and into the mysterious, intangible world of the purely symbolic.
have our being as part of a vast energy field which ripples I find that my (metaphorical, at least!) understanding of that
and changes in a sinuous, shapeshifting dance between order 4%–23%–73% ratio is very helpful in feeling comfortable
and chaos — order arising out of apparent disorder and in with such mysterious territory. That which cannot be seen,
invisible patterns, which would appear to contain 4% matter, perceived, or understood via our five senses within the 4%
23% dark matter, and 73% dark energy in a vast cosmic web. world of matter still has energetic validity in the landscape
I think that astrology works by tracking and mapping of the unseen 96% — that which modern science tells us
those energy patterns through planetary cycles against the is there, although we can only perceive it by inference and
backdrop of either the constellations via sidereal astrology, or don’t yet know what it is.
our more familiar tropical astrology, which is pegged to the
ecliptic. By a blend of astronomical calculation, mythic imagi- Secondary Progressions:
nation, intuition, and observation of correlations between life Family Inheritance
on Earth and planetary movements over millennia, humans The most striking example of the mysterious power of
arrived at a way of deriving meaning from the energies gen- SPs that I have ever had occurred a number of years ago,
erating the solar system, our tiny corner of that vast cosmic when I was playing around with the weave of interconnect-
web. It is no surprise that reductionist thinking cannot cope edness which you find as soon as you begin to spend time
with the possibility that something of great value to the hu- looking at family horoscopes. Having acquired the birth cer-
man project could have arisen from this eclectic weave. tificates of all four of my grandparents (three with accurately
There are several ways in which one can creatively recorded birth times) and having calculated their horoscopes,
reflect upon that ratio of 4%–23%–73%. I like to think of I took a notion to progress the birth charts of the two grand-
it in terms of the worlds of consciousness, personal uncon- parents who had been most significant for me, and whose
scious, and collective unconscious, respectively. Jung’s term characteristics I most clearly recognised blended in myself,
“psychoid” is very useful in enabling me to make sense of en- i.e., my maternal grandfather Calum and my paternal grand-
ergies which can and do manifest simultaneously — all the mother Isabella — both born in different years at different
way from being obvious and tangible to being invisible to the times. I progressed their charts, both with accurate birth
wider world though highly influential in a person’s life. times, to the day of my own birth.
For example, consider the client I saw some years ago, The results stunned me. Both grandparents’ progressed
with a dominant Saturn square Neptune aspect in his horo- Ascendants were at 9° Virgo, both progressed Midheavens
scope. “James’s” profession was highly tangible: He made were at 28° Taurus. And my angles? Yes, you’ve guessed it.
musical instruments. But a significant factor in the unfold- My natal Ascendant is at 9° Virgo, and my natal Midheaven
ing pattern of his life, also linked to that Saturn–Neptune is at 28° Taurus. My North Node is also at 28° Taurus,
square, was his having had to survive growing up with a and the degree of my prenatal solar eclipse is 28° Taurus,
severely alcoholic father. Being very aware of an inherited thereby emphasising the significance of the MC–IC axis in
tendency to indulge in addictive escapist behaviours, he was the transmission of family fate, karma, genetic inheritance, or

APRIL/MAY 2019 — 53
Secondary Progressions my summing-up notes: “A most interesting reading with a re-
markable young woman, who despite a very difficult early
life and teenage years has managed to turn her life around.”
The two dominant SP features symbolically structuring
whatever you wish to term it. I have written about this before Pearl’s life’s unfolding are the progressed New Moons and
and described my feeling then of having been “brushed by her chart’s ruling planet, Mercury, noting its shifts of sign, as
the wing of a great Mystery.” well as its retrograde and direct motion.
Recently, whilst thinking about this article, I recalculated Her first progressed New Moon, at 5° Libra in the 6th
that set of progressions, just in case I had somehow made a house, came at age four. (See Chart 1, below.) At the same
mistake all those years ago. The result was the same. age, progressed Mercury moved from Libra to Scorpio, also
in the 6th house. She hit puberty at that unusually early age,
Progressed Planets and and stated that “I was overwhelmed by a power I had no idea
the Progressed New Moon how to handle.” She was treated with hormone injections.
When I am preparing for an in-depth astrology reading, Unsurprisingly, family, social, and school difficulties arose
I routinely do an “SP scan” through the ephemeris: Planets from this. Family life was turbulent, they moved around a lot,
going retrograde, then direct some years later, usually reveal and her parents separated whilst she was growing up.
significant phases in a person’s life. Take “Antonia,” for ex- Pearl’s progressed Mercury went retrograde in Scorpio
ample, aged 61 when we met two years ago. She has been when she was twelve (chart not shown), a point at which she
living in Scotland for many years. Her Venus went retro- became “a total nightmare” to herself and her family, getting
grade by progression at age 18, at which time she “escaped”
from a difficult family life in another part of the United King-
dom. At age 59, when Venus went direct, she began to feel
Inner Wheel greater
Progressed planets going Outer Wheel
the pull back to her home country, as well as feeling
Pearl
openness to people and to the possibility ofNatala significant
Chart rela- retrograde, then direct some years
Sec.Prog.
Pearl
SA in Long
tionship, after having been single for a numberSep 23of1981, Wed
years. Feb 16 1986, Sun
8:55 pm BST -1:00
I also note years where there was a progressed
Northampton,New
England
later, usually reveal significant
12:00 pm BST -1:00
Northampton, England
Moon (when the progressed Sun and Moon 52°N14' 000°W54'
conjoin). De-
Geocentric phases in a person’s life.52°N14'Geocentric
000°W54'

pending on the length of a client’s life to date, there may be

Tropical Tropical
Placidus Placidus
two or even three of those, if the first oneTrueoccurred
Node in the True Node
early years. “May’s” first progressed New Moon occurred
28° ‰ 18'
when she was six years old, at which point she moved with
39' 10°
her parents to the UK and a new life phase began. Her Š Ê ‰ 35'
second progressed New Moon, at age 36, coincided 21° 29°
with her return to the UK (she had by then been ‰
living abroad again for a number of years), her
‹ 32'
Œ

marriage, and the birth of her child. 44' Ê 23°

Ü 00° ˆ
“Pearl”: An Unfolding Life 00° Š 29'
By a timely piece of serendipity, last 00'
22° À
S ˆ
autumn 2016, as I was beginning to reflect 15'

on writing this article, I encountered a cli- Ý 10 9

22°
À ¿
11 8 ˆ 18' ‡27°
ent in her mid thirties who ticked several 12'
» 01°
43' ‡17°
of the above key SP boxes in one read- 01°
 22°Ý 22'Œ 12 7
ing. Pearl has very generously allowed  22°Ý 30'Œ ¿ 34'
06' ‡27° ‡00° º
‚ » 29'
38' ‡12°
49' † †23° Á
ˆ
me to use parts of her story to illustrate 15' 1 6 19' º 18'
26°
†23° 15'
just how much SPs on their own, before 21'
19' † Á 51'
16°
†17°
½
2 5 †11° ½ †11°
one even begins to add the overlay of cur-
¾ ‡
41'

00° ¾
3 4 † 39'
rent transits, can give a vivid picture of †05°
¸ 00'
†05° ¶
an unfolding life. Here is what I wrote in S
00' 48'
37'

23° „ „
„
13°
¸ 44'
00° 08°
‚ †
29' É ¶¼ 00°
19'
Chart 1: Bi-wheel. Œ
„
32'

ƒ 16° …
Inner wheel and house cusps: Pearl
10° 29°
¼ 39'
Outer wheel: Progressed to age 4 ƒ 35' É 21°
„
Compliments of:
Charts use Placidus houses and the True Astrologer
Node.Linda Kaye
916.730.6805
28° ƒ 18'
www.lindakayeastrology.com

54 — THE MOUNTAIN ASTROLOGER

into sex, drugs, and all kinds of self-destructive behaviour. She progressed New Moon occurring in early Scorpio. Pearl’s
fell in love and had her first serious love affair at 15. On the progressed Mercury at 18° Libra will be transiting over her
positive side, she was always drawing and painting and got natal Pluto–Mercury conjunction (23° and 26° Libra) in the
into music and the arts. Pearl did various jobs after leaving next few years. (See Chart 2, below left.)
school, then had her daughter at 19. This coincided with her Pearl feels that she is now in a new life phase but is not
progressed Full Moon and the start of her grounding herself. as yet clear about the way forward. She wants to develop her
Progressed Mercury retrograded back into Libra when business and her writing, so I made various suggestions about
Pearl was 21. In her early twenties, she had a crisis involv- how she could go about developing them both, pointing out
ing drugs in which “I nearly died.” From then on, she went that New Moons, progressed or otherwise, take place in the
from one extreme to the other, turning her life around. She dark. Just as the familiar Sun–Moon monthly cycle takes a
took up yoga, became a vegetarian, and aligned herself with, couple of days for the waxing crescent to appear, so in the
as she put it, “the guidance of the Divine.” She is a yoga 30-year progressed New Moon cycle, it takes a couple of
teacher, loves teaching, and being a natural performer, is years for the shape of a new life phase to become clear.
probably very good at it. Pearl found that knowing about the unfolding of her
She had also been with the same man since her progressed New Moon and progressed Mercury, as well as
early 20s, but as she has become more independent and the reinforcing information provided by transiting Jupiter’s
self-motivating, the relationship gradually withered and 11- to 12-year and Saturn’s 29- to 30-year cycles, turned out
died. They broke up at the end of 2015, timed with pro- to be extremely helpful and comforting. It gave her a sense
gressed Mercury going direct in Libra, and with her second of awe, a feeling of being held in something — a meaningful
pattern much, much bigger than herself.
I felt the same. Inevitably, over many years, you become
In the 30-year progressed New
Inner Wheel
accustomed to astrological symbolism “delivering” consis-
Outer
tently. Every soWheel
often, however, you are privileged to witness
Pearl
Moon cycle, it takes a couple of
Natal Chart theSec.Prog.
life of another
Pearl
SA in Longperson in which the symbolic tools we
Sep 23 1981, Wed work8:00Dec 1—
with 2015, Tue
in Pearl’s case, her secondary progressions —
8:55 pm years
BST -1:00 for the shape of a new life pm BST -1:00
Northampton, England speak with such
Northampton, eloquence that it takes your breath away.
England
52°N14' 000°W54'
Geocentric phase to become clear. 52°N14' 000°W54'
Geocentric
Tropical ConclusionTropical
Placidus Placidus
True Node I do hope True that
Node this guided stroll through some of the
highways and byways of secondary progressions and their
28° ‰ 18'
mysterious significance has some effect in stimulating read-
39' 10°
Š Ê ‰ 35' ers, especially those of you who have not yet explored
21° 26° that territory, to consider doing so. You could start by
‰ following the shifts of the progressed MC–IC axis;
‹ 14'
Πlike the progressed Sun, they are easy to plot
since they both move at roughly 1° per year.
44' Ê 23°
Ü 00° ˆ Consider this: My secondary progressed
00° Š 29' MC–IC shifted into Cancer–Capricorn,
00'
22° À and my Ascendant–Descendant into
S ˆ
21° » Libra–Aries, when I was 32. My second-
52'

Ý 10 9 À 00' ˆ ary progressed 1st-house Sun was a

28° ¿
22°
11 8 ˆ
12' 49' ‡ mere 2° away from an exact square
26' ‡06° ¶ 01°
01°  21°Ý 10'Œ
 22°Ý 30'Œ 12 7
06' ‡27° ¿
to my natal 10th-house Uranus at the
‚ 38' ‡12°
» 40'
29' ‡04°
¸ ˆ same time. Did anything change? It
49' †
15' 1 6 19'
26°
†23° º †24°
Á 15' certainly did!
21'
19' †16°
Á 44' †23° I met both my future husband (he
2 5 41'
†11° ½ 17'
†
½ has the Sun and Venus in Uranus-ruled
00° ¾
18°
†15° º ‡
3 4 † 29'
Aquarius, how literal is that?!) and astrol-
¸ ¾
S
00' 48'
37' ogy that year. In the three years following,
23° „ 44' I obtained the Faculty of Astrological
„ „ 13°
00° 08°
‚ †
É ¶¼
01'
29' … 00° continued on p. 65
04°
Œ
14' ¼ …
ƒ
10° 26° 39' Chart 2: Bi-wheel.
ƒ 35' É 21°
„ Inner wheel and house cusps: Pearl
Compliments of:
Astrologer Linda Kaye
916.730.6805
28° ƒ 18' Outer wheel: Progressed to December 1, 2015
www.lindakayeastrology.com

APRIL/MAY 2019 — 55
 Secondary Progressions Conference Calendar
continued from p. 55 continued from p. 59

Studies Certificate, and we moved house so that I could work August 30 – September 3, 2019: NCGR Conference
from home. I also acquired a half share in two small children 2019, Baltimore, Maryland, USA. For info: URL: https://
(still with me, now grown up, both very Uranian) and a very www.geocosmic.org/ncgr-conference-2019
elderly cat.
Who needs transits? November 22–25, 2019: Annual Sedona Vedic Astrology
Conference, Poco Diablo Resort, Sedona, Arizona, USA.
Chart Data and Sources For info: tel. (928) 282-6595; URL: https://www.sedona
vedicastrology.com/
“Pearl” is not the client’s real name, and birth data are confidential. Source:
“Pearl’s” mother. Rating: A.
January 16–20, 2020: 23rd Federation of Australian
Note: “Pearl” read and approved her case study prior to my finalising this Astrologers Conference, “Astrological Crossroads and Con-
article. The other clients briefly quoted have also been given fictitious names,
having granted me permission to present brief “clips” of their life stories —
junctions,” Melbourne, Australia. For info: URL: https://
apart from “James” whose horoscope and notes were shredded before 2001, www.faainc.org.au/faa-conference-2020/
when I gave up my practice for several years. My grandparents’ names are
their own. September 6–15, 2020: Save the Date! ISAR 2020
Conference, Westminster Westin Hotel, Denver, Colorado,
© 2017, 2019 Anne Whitaker — all rights reserved USA.

© 2019 Gloria Star – all rights reserved

Anne Whitaker lives and works in Glasgow, Scotland. She has been an
astrologer, teacher, and writer since 1983. Her writing appears in the UK’s
Astrological Journal, Infinity Astrology Magazine, Dell Horoscope Magazine, Gloria Star is a professional astrologer, author, and
and Astrodienst. Anne blogs at http://www.astrologyquestionsandanswers. teacher. You can learn more about her and her services at
com, where details of her books can be found. http://www.GloriaStar.com

7th Annual Great Lakes

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June 27 - July 1, 2019
Holiday Inn, 3600 Plymouth Rd.,
Ann Arbor, Michigan
The Gift of Challenging Times

Gemini Brett, Anne Ortelee, Early Bird

Armand Diaz & many more Special
www.greatlakesastrology.com before 4/30/2019
734-434-0804 $285

APRIL/MAY 2019 — 65