The Saturn-Jupiter Dance: Growing Sustainably

Over the last few years, Saturn’s notoriety has disseminated like a weed across widening astrological and popular discourses, social media platforms, and various literatures. If just about five years ago, the casual astrology consumer rolled their eyes in annoyance at the upcoming Mercury retrograde, the increasingly educated astrology aficionado now waits in uncomfortable anticipation for their Saturn return, or for any dreaded news on “daddy Saturn’s” latest escapades, and the updated version of hell that he intends to plunge us in.

While Saturn revels in its role as “malefic” — the strict father (even, at an extreme, the cannibalistic consumer of his children), the time-lord, the bearer of denials, boundaries, and punishment — Jupiter smiles at us with crinkles in his eyes, and generously blesses us where Saturn has maimed us. This “greater benefic” planet even literally shields us from asteroids and other dangerous cosmic activities, and its gigantic gravitational pull helps launch rockets into space: quite literally, Jupiter slingshots us to expand and ascend, carrying us on its shoulders to glimpse the bigger picture, all while ensuring our happiness and safety. 

But is this binary really productive? Might there not be a more holistic narrative we can play with that can help us reclaim the way we work with Saturn and Jupiter — perhaps together? That is what this article will focus on. First, I will discuss some of the ethos and associations of the two planets, and following, I will explain how to rethink their relationship. Finally, I will give you a short guide to discern the Jupiter-Saturn synergy in your natal chart, and I include a personal narrative that analyses my own natal Jupiter-Saturn relationship. For best results, I suggest you have your full chart on hand, so that you may use your natal Saturn and Jupiter placements as clear reference points. 

So, what do the planets Saturn and Jupiter symbolize in your chart? 

Saturn, in short, gives you the promised blueprint for how you experience and embody authority in this lifetime. This includes parental figures, bosses and institutions, teachers and masters, or even partners and friends — in short, anyone or anything with whom you experience an active dynamic of power. At a more conceptual level, Saturn dictates the rules and limits that continue to shadow and temper you throughout your life, whether to your disdain or compliance. Depending on your natal placement, you might violently rebel against rules, or you might defer politely to your superiors; you might find yourself cheered on by your educators and guides, or you mind find empowerment in communities outside of normative institutions. You might experience neutral or generally harmonious connections with those in higher positions of power, or you might often struggle with oppression or tension. Your experience, of course, could fall anywhere on these various spectra. Chances are, though, that Saturn — unless extremely well aspected in your chart — brings you some degree of friction in areas related to rules and authority. It is, after all, also the planet that rules over wisdom and old age, so it literally determines how you mature and grow through lessons, karmic experiences, and trial and error. 

We can also think of Jupiter as a teacher — although of a vastly different kind. If Saturn is the ruler-wielding disciplinarian — the professor you want to avoid for your college math course, the principal who quietly marks you truant as you walk into school one minute late — Jupiter is the cool dude who shows to class late and sits cross-legged on the desk, darting jokes left and right, and playing that prankster one day, or effervescent sage the next. With Jupiter, you don’t even realize how much you're learning for all the excitement, energy, and entertainment; with Saturn, you know exactly when you’re in the classroom, and when it’s time to sit down and shut up. Jupiter is the hippie art teacher, the disheveled philosopher, the joyful mystic or hermit, the stranger on the street you had a unexpected conversation with, the fascinating person you met on a different continent on your study abroad trip, the fun, wild date you’ll never see again but think of fondly. Jupiter is the great expander, the experimentalist, the alchemist, and the generous guide. It imprecisely points you to a large horizon to explore, then gives you complete freedom to experience it as your intuition leads you. It gets you excited about what you can experience “over there,” then rewards you when you show courage, initiative, and spontaneity. In short, Jupiter expands and affirms; Saturn limits and corrects. 

So, Jupiter Good, Saturn Bad? Not Quite. 

But that isn’t the full story. Jupiter can lead you to excess that is undesirable. Great, so you’ve found your passion and purpose, and even look forward to working hard! Now, you assume work is not work, and you stay up until 6 am following your inspiration, and drinking in the high of the flow state. What you’re left with is a weakened body, and a mandatory need to recover — to reset, to correct, to limit — for a period equal to your “transgression” in time and energy. Saturn, in this instance, comes in as the remedy. Next time you’ll know to set a timer even for your most passionate work, as the material world requires you to acknowledge you have a fixed body. Jupiter beckons you to go to that artist retreat or reading group where you had so many mind-altering philosophical discussions before, but you come back with a hoarse voice and a hangover. Saturn castigates you that it is not sustainable to yell and drink, and that you’re too old for that crap; it offers you orange juice and a probiotic and gifts you with an understanding of moderation — which you then internalize as an automatic impulse, because you know the threshold, now, of how much freedom will cause more harm than good. Jupiter tells you to embrace your longing to travel four times in a year, but you have no money left to pay December’s rent; now you’re in debt. And Saturn… well, does its Saturn thing. 

Turns out, Jupiter needs Saturn, even in things that might seem to benefit from limitless expansion, like finances.

Receiving a windfall, inheritance, grant, higher-paying job, or the green light to be a business or property owner, surely means enjoying a surplus of resources, materials, benefits, and status. But — as many lottery winners also know (lottery and luck also exist in the realm of Jupiter) — sometimes winning — up-leveling — is a curse. Many of us who have dealt with scarcity, poverty, or who have been starved of some of that Jupiterian optimism I describe above, have probably felt some degree of indignation, even anger, hearing those with higher financial or circumstantial freedom talk about how “hard they work,” how careful they have to be, how expensive life is, etc. The thing is, inter-personal and inter-worldly Jupiterian energy is not of the human body, nor of the material realm; its blessings do not do well with limits, and they do not want to be contained. In order to become fixed, long-term, stable — a real thing, in the sublunar sphere — those Jupiterian sparks need Saturn to contain them. In other words, they need strain, pressure, anchoring. If you start a new business from your passion, you need to make room for it its mundane integration into your life. If you finally acquire cutting-edge equipment to support your specialized work, you need to get insurance to protect it. You finally found your million-dollar idea! — but now you need to find a vessel in which to contain it, and tools with which to capture its essence. You build something new, but that process requires you to play with some form of containment. Even on the stock market, perpetual growth is monstrous, in the grand scheme of things; even if you enjoy that tripled salary, you get to know the burden of that higher tax bracket; and even if you finally have a big house, well, watch out for your first rodent infestation — do you actually have any savings to deal with it? 

In that sense, Saturn is as much our beneficiary as Jupiter is a trickster who promises castles in the sky.

It is Saturn who gets us out of bed in the morning when we don’t want to do it; it is Saturn that reminds us true progress is in the incremental, quotidian, often boring, un-inspired single steps we take on our worst days, when a single step is all we can manage. Jupiter will always come in the dazzling performer and hero when we’ve finally hooked into that portal of divine inspiration, but it remains a fickle fairy godmother — you never know whether she’ll show up when you ask. Saturn, on the other hand, will meet with you every week, on the dot, to check on your progress, and it will give you feedback, whether you ask for it or not, and that feedback will be dispassionate most of the time, whether it hurts your feelings or not. Jupiter tells you what a child of divine genius and beauty you are, what a unique mind you have, what an exhilarating artistic sprit you contain! Saturn doesn’t care about that, but about the deadlines that you meet, and the concrete progress you can actually point to, because it knows you can have all the talent in the world to no avail: if you do nothing about it, or indulge too much in its seductive grasp, you’ll be its sole beneficiary — to your detriment.  

Conversely, Jupiter can be a reality check for a cruel or stuffy Saturn. That (traditionally) melancholic — black-bile-filled —  Saturn boasts that they’ve had the same exact schedule for 20 years, and that they religiously respected the “on time is late” mentality. "Okay, so….?! Is that in itself your achievement, Saturn?” Jupiter asks, exasperated. Because damn, that’s boring. Stuffy Saturn keeps every single receipt to every bill they ever paid; it loves to watch the accrued material trail of their existence. Ironically, Jupiter — the untethered Peter Pan — disdains and simultaneously pities such Saturnian childishness. Stuck Saturn yells, "This is wrong! This isn't how you're supposed to do this!" after evaluating a document, object, piece of art, product, whose creator moved on from Saturn's expected rules long ago. Jupiter shakes its head, whispering, "It's okay, they'll never understand." Sad Saturn struggled through life, so they think achievement is not real unless others struggle as they did. “Damn this lazy generation!” Saturn yells, as Jupiter is already halfway through building a resource for younger explorers and inquisitives, so they don’t have to experience the same struggles Jupiter did, that they overcame through sheer ingenuity and persistence. Work is mandatory; suffering and stubbornness are optional, Jupiter insists. 

As an obvious Jupiterian myself, I can, and love to, revel in the essence of a topic for pages, structure and succinctness be damned! — but I think you get the point. The real question is: how can we actually look at our charts and understand the discursive relationship between our Jupiter and Saturn? In other words, how can we build a fulfilling focus in life that also feels materially supported? How can we improve our life, expand, and intensify our joy in a practical way? In short, how can we turn dreams into goals into manifestations?

There are a few things you can do when you try to understand Saturn and Jupiter in your chart. 

1. The obvious thing is to see which signs your Jupiter and Saturn are in. This will tell you how those planets play their roles in your life. Each planet has a “home” sign or rulership, an exaltation (place of “honor”), a debilitation or fall (places discomfort or exile), and a few peregrine (neutral) placements. If your planet is in rulership, you know it has a certain degree of weight and authority in your chart; if it’s debilitated, you know it might have to jump through some extra hoops; and so on.

   
   

2. Next, you can look at the houses your Jupiter and Saturn fall in — and I recommend checking this in at least two systems, including Whole Sign (Placidus, Koch, and Porphyry could be some classic second options).

   
   

3. Then, observe whether your planets are retrograde or not, and notice their exact degree. You may use numerology to interpret the degree, or appeal to astrological decans (another topic for another day), or degree-based associations with planets.

   
   

4. Then, it gets a bit more complicated, but notice whether your planets form any specific aspects with others — whether they conjunct (0°), sextile (60°), square (90°), trine (120°),  quincunx (150°), or oppose (180°) it. You can also look at whether the aspect is an “approaching” (intensifying) or “separating” (weakening) one — whether it gets closer or farther from forming an exact aspect (e.g. if a planet is retrograde at the 5th degree and another planet is direct in an earlier house at the 3rd degree, it's "approaching").

   
   

   1. pay special attention to the aspect, if any, that the two planets form to one another

   2. also note how the house(s) they reside in relate

5. Finally, you should check what type of chart you have — day (sun above the horizon in houses 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, or 12) or night (sun below the horizon in houses 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6). If you have a day chart, Saturn plays a more empowering role than the “lesser malefic” Mars, and Jupiter has the greater power over the “smaller benefic" Venus. If you have a night chart, Saturn might cause you more trouble than Mars, and Jupiter might be slightly less supportive than your Venus.

   
   

6. There are many other things you can take a look at; these are some of the basics. The most important thing is how you synthesize the elements for yourself and what story you tell from what you intuit.

Now, I’ll put this all together via the example of my own chart — and my life experience. 

I for one have Saturn in Aquarius, which is in traditional rulership — a place of power. Because of this, Saturn is also one of my so-called “final dispositors“— a manager who rules “over” certain planets (in this case, my Uranus and Neptune). (My other "final dispositor" is Venus in rulership, which queens over all the other planets: a lovely little power struggle between my more powerful malefic and lesser benefic). Aquarius is a fixed air sign, which means that it deals with concepts and philosophies in a more structured way — yet Aquarius is also associated with the planet Uranus, which indicates unexpected change, revolution, and idiosyncrasy. In short, Saturn, for me, wants to systematically revolutionize structures and institutions, so it has a hard time with old dogma — yet it also dislikes chaos. Saturn is in the 7th house of relationships at the 29th degree (the anoretic degree — the last of a sign in astrology). Translation: the essence of revolutions, anarchic “disdain for rules,” and power struggles manifest in matters related to my romantic, business, and/or other institutional relationships with a particularly extreme intensity and karmic heaviness, yet with the potential for catharsis (anoretic degrees are about endings and culminations). In retrograde, Saturn makes me feel all of these energies in a more internalized way, meaning that while others often see me as successful or powerful in my connections, alliances, and institutional affiliations, I might be dealing with feelings of extreme disempowerment, even oppression, that are externally imperceivable. Saturn forms a grand cross with my asteroid of healing Chiron (and, only by sign, with my Ascendant in Leo), my Venus in Taurus, and Pluto in Scorpio. Grand crosses can be like literal “crosses to bear,” but they can also be aspects of immense power and success. The challenge here is balancing multiple interests and investments and not stagnating due to overwhelm and overstimulation. The blessing is powerfully manifested creativity and concrete success. I’ll come back to this in a second. 

Jupiter for me is in art-loving Libra — and therefore “managed” by my other rulership planet,  Venus in Taurus — at the 6th degree in the 3rd house of expression and communication. And, nothing could speak more clearly to who I am: an artist, musician, writer, philosopher, astrologer, and a lover of beauty and fashion. I constantly write, play, perform, think — or else, love to dress elegantly in luxurious, spectacular clothing I can't afford.... If possible, I want to do all this every day of my life (the 6th degree could also harken to the 6th house of daily routine, otherwise it’s a “flowy” number indicating harmony and collaboration), and I am happiest when my environment and relationships with acquaintances and collaborators are harmonious. My grand cross with Pluto in Scorpio in the dark 4th house of inner being, home, and my innermost soul, gives me a burdening intensity which is reflected and refracted by authority figures (Saturn) and often experienced with difficulty in partnerships, especially romantic (Venus); it is also in constant tension with my need to have some visibility in the world, despite how it triggers me (Leo rising in sign-by-sign conjunction to Chiron), so the very last thing I want is to have my external world further mirror my inner turmoil. I am happiest in bright, friendly, warm environments — thus, I rather stubbornly refuse to even consider leaving California again (I lived in upstate New York when I was in grad school — a most unfit experience). As Jupiter is in rulership in Sagittarius, it manages any other planet in the chart that is in this sign — in this case, my Moon (and the North Node doesn’t really count in this calculation, but I count it because it’s in sign-by-sign conjunction with the planet that symbolizes the heart — the most personal thing there is). The Moon concerns one’s emotional security, so I gain the greatest comfort, inspiration, and happiness from matters related to Venusian and Jupiterian things — the aforementioned art, philosophy, performance, experimentation, writing, etc. — and on top of that, I strive to directly experience as many of these things as possible (the North Node signifies your insatiability, to some degree, but could also represent what you’re “striving” for, as part of your purpose). 

From my chart, it is clear that my temperament leans to all possible things Jupiterian and Venusian, but that its greater strength and authority stems from my dignified Saturn. Jupiter, a more personal placement in my chart, says “give me art, give me a room-sized closet, give me comfort, friendliness, warmth, sun, a lax environment, an easy schedule, let me just exist as an artist-writer-thinker plucked straight out of the Romantic era,” but my Saturn, the planet of the “other” — the external authority figure, part of that grueling grand cross — says “you must work hard to feel worthy, you must feel constant pressure to be alive, you must have some kind of inner strife or intense story to tell that also helps humanity, or at least that creates community.” So, I struggle wondering whether the things I enjoy the most are meaningful, important, or relevant enough for the world for me to justify my full commitment to them; I struggle between wanting to fulfill the gods of limitless productivity and those of beauty and intuitive creativity (I literally sometimes rewrite what I inscribe by hand because the first time “looked ugly” — and I’m aware of what a ridiculous waste of time it is!).

In short, my Jupiter says: be beautiful and deal in beauty, and my Saturn says, be productive and experience intensity. Can you do both? Sure. But at what cost? 

So, what would the solution be, in this particular chart? One lovely thing is that Saturn and Jupiter do share a sign-by-sign trine. I say sign-by-sign because the trine is not perfect (the 29th degree of Saturn is extremely out of any normal orb with Jupiter’s 6th degree). But I will allow this stretch, just for the purposes of illustration here. Jupiter — as ruler of Sag — is a philosopher, and it likes to think about forests and panoramas, not trees. Aquarius, the sign of my Saturn, wants to be a humanitarian, and is a broad philosopher in a different, but compatible way. Saturn in Aquarius wants me to create relevant work that assists others, and Jupiter in Libra loves the idea of doing something for justice and the greater good. So both planets, in the element of air, can ultimately find some common ground in the way they intellectualize their energy and aims: “We are doing this in order to improve the world in however mundane or modest a way.” So, Jupiter can learn some things about moderation, mundanity, and the grating intensity of the everyday world as long as it reminds itself that it’s for a greater cause, and Saturn can let Jupiter be Venusian (pretty and art-oriented) as long as it serves the purpose of attracting audiences that will hear what it perceives to be its “serious” and “important” message. Executive Saturn tells the artist Venus, “do you want to do this fantastic, glorious thing that is breathtaking and sublime?” Venus says, “Absolutely — and before you even say anything, I what you’re going to say: it will take some self-sacrificing work and intensity. I’m willing to do it, as long as it’s for beauty.” And Saturn, secretly happy that I’ll be engaging in productive pressure, lets Jupiter do its thing for whatever aim it wants to. Saturn knows the true value is the work itself, the essence of the toil — and it wants to share that with the world. Oddly, these decidedly diverging energies find a way to be on the same page — and to express in the world. 

I love this Jupiter-Saturn discussion and would love to read your chart and find what relationship your greater benefic & malefic form with one another, and how you can understand the balance between fulfillment and achievement in your life!