Saturn Returns!

Am I the only one who didn’t know about Saturn returns?

Hmm, interesting… for the next three years, I will answer any question as to how I’m doing with some remark about my “Saturn return.”

“How are you?”

me: “Oh, you know, with this return of Saturn happening, I’m just a little overcome with crossing into the new threshold of maturity.”

IT’S GONNA BE AWESOME.

But seriously, I stumbled across a mention of this in an article this morning and was intrigued. Here’s what I’ve discovered, via my “extensive” five minutes of research.

Apparently this hasn’t really hit me full force yet, since I’m 27, but oh, it’s coming.

Via astrology.com (hey, it’s better than Wikipedia, right!?):

Each twenty-nine years naturally presents us with the challenge to rise to new levels of awareness, or face the consequences of having failed to gain the wisdom required so to do. When Saturn in the heavens returns to the zodiacal degree where he was placed in your birth chart, you are said to be experiencing what astrologers call your Saturn Return – one of the most important times of your life. It only happens once every 29 years, so at around age 28-30, 57-59 and (if you live long enough) 86-88 you have a Saturn Return. This signifies a time of transformation, an emotional transition from one life-phase to the next.

The first Saturn return (around age 28-30) marks the transition from the Phase of Youth to the Phase of Maturity; the second from the Phase of Maturity to the Phase of Wisdom. The last one, if reached, seems usually to mark the transition either to the next world or else back to a second childhood!

As the Saturn return approaches, often our lives seem to speed up, as if hurrying to clear out old baggage from the past, to lighten the load for the next stage. Important things that either finalize old issues, or prepare the ground for new developments tend to occur with increasing frequency. For those who are unprepared, this is often a time of severe suffering, as we struggle to understand the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune that seem to be aimed squarely at our hearts. Indeed, relationships and major life-decisions are all too often the focal points for this clearing out of karmic baggage.

It certainly makes sense, and might also explain the strange sort of hysteria that often surrounds a 30th birthday. They’re not worried about getting “old”! They’re simply transitioning from the Phase of Youth to the Phase of Maturity!

And yet none of this explains at all my love for No Doubt’s album, “Return of Saturn” at the age of 15. Other than No Doubt was the coolest.

I mean, am I the only one that remembers this?