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Welcome to the Info Sphere, a space where all my writings, musings, and insights come together. Here, you’ll find everything from details about Samantha Jo's Balm Yard products to episodes of Healing in the Balm Yard podcast. This is also where I share glimpses into my own mind and life. It’s a space for exploration, connection, and growth—so please, be kind and enjoy. I’m excited to share this journey with you. Take care.

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  • Writer: Samantha Jo
    Samantha Jo
  • 4 days ago
  • 9 min read


What lives in your 1st house = what you cannot hide, even if you try.

Some placements in our chart are things we think about, but 1st house placements are things we live through our body, and for me, my truth is not just something I know, it’s something I physically experience in real time. So many things have been happening in this stage of life, and there was a certain feeling in my body that I kept returning to, one that felt familiar. I just hadn't had the proper words to describe it. So I went digging.


Looking at my chart, I noticed something that I’ve been staring at for years now, but never quite understood what this aspect & placement were here to expose. Have you ever had a favorite go-to spot, but never really studied the building it's in? Maybe light fixtures on the outside? Or notice how their side door is the color blue? But you know what your favorite snack or drink is inside of it without needing a menu. That's how natal charts are for me. I can study, and memorize, and still uncover new things about it as I grow. Social media is a weird place, we can all agree; however, more often than not, I find myself hidden in between threads that expose parts of myself I was unaware of, to a degree. I’ve always known I was a catalyst. If you've been here for a while, I've written about this before. After my most recent relationship, it hit me like a stack of bricks how often I find myself being the mirror to others. Never to stay permanently. For so long, I thought it was because of another placement in my chart, and half of that is true - but that placement was pressing up against something more hidden and mysterious: Lilith. I mention this because it's in a very important place, my first house in Sagittarius. My Lilth is in opposition with a couple of personal planets, where I thought this catalytic energy was coming from.


This is a beautiful place to start if you are new to astrology. The 1st house is quite personal, and we don't talk about it enough, especially if you have the 1st house in planets and prominent asteroids. The 1st house is the most immediate and visible of all. What lives in your 1st house will shape your lived experience in real time.


“This is how people meet me before they understand me"

Some parts of our chart are lived internally. Some parts are projected onto us by others. And some parts are felt immediately through the body (1st house).


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WHERE IS YOUR 1st HOUSE?

Sun in 1st House: You possess a strong sense of self and radiate confidence, often behaving as a natural leader.


Moon in 1st House: You are emotionally sensitive and wear your feelings on your sleeve, making you nurturing or reactive.


Mercury in 1st House: You are curious, communicative, and independent thinkers who may have a "no filter" approach to speaking.


Venus in 1st House: You are often charming, attractive, and artistic, projecting a harmonious and graceful presence.


Mars in 1st House: You are assertive, energetic, and courageous, taking initiative but potentially being confrontational.


Jupiter in 1st House: You exude optimism, confidence, and a love for growth, often appearing fortunate or wise.


Saturn in 1st House: You are serious, disciplined, and responsible, often projecting an image of maturity or reserve.


Uranus in 1st House: You are unconventional and individualistic, often acting as a "rebel" with a unique approach to life.


Neptune in 1st House: You appear dreamy, intuitive, and compassionate, but may have unclear personal boundaries.


Pluto in 1st House: You have an intense, transformative presence, often undergoing profound personal reinventions.


North Node in 1st House: Your life path involves developing your independence and focusing on your own path, rather than hiding behind relationships.


South Node in 1st House: You may come in with strong, well-developed, and automatic self-focus, needing to balance self-interest with serving others.


Chiron in 1st House: You may carry deep, early wounds regarding your identity, allowing you to become a "wounded healer" for others.

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My Reflection


I always noticed that as I aged, I trigger people just by being myself. Not because I'm doing anything wrong , but because my existence asks people: “Are you living in truth… or are you performing?” The more I reflected on this information initiated by a Threads post, the more I’ve realized how I censor myself because this Lilith placement aspects with my Virgo Sun, in a square. So I’m always trying to refine the truth so it can land gently or “properly”. Sometimes tables must be flipped all ways up, with class, of course. There’s always a WAY to do it. Since I have this in the 10th house, there is often conflict between being raw vs being respected. A fear of being misunderstood publicly, but here’s the truth: my career is not built by shrinking Lilith. It’s built by integrating my Lilith energy into my work. Choosing truth even when it disrupts comfort. With this sitting in my midheaven of Libra energy (before y'all come for me - it's the ONLY libra I got!) I’m meant to package truth beautifully, so here I am, airing it all out, with all of you to judge; unfinished and RAW.


In my most recent podcast episode, I spoke about how all these planets have sat in the water sign of Pisces for over a decade. The water tides did something to me and revealed how a part of myself was drowning without me quite understanding it. And of course, my 1st house created an opposition with my Moon in Pisces in a Cancer house, also aspecting another placement in my Aries, sharing the same 4th house. It unlocked what I've known in my body for a long time. I found the catalyst seed right here. I share this part of me, hoping someone can relate and it helps someone else.


I meet myself through others. I don’t just “have relationships”, I initiate transformation in others through interaction. I always thought it was my Mars that my 7th house rests. I wasn't wrong. However, Lilith's aspect activates it in a BIG way. This is where my body reacts to truth before my mind can explain it. Are you following? I hope I didn't lose you. Stay with me.



I had a moment recently where something finally clicked for me, not in a soft or poetic way, but in a very real, almost confrontational way. I realized that my body reacts to truth before my mind can explain it (Lilith opposition Mars). When I really sat with that, I understood something even deeper: the self that knows cannot always protect the self that feels.


I’ve always been someone who can sense things quickly. I can read a room, feel when something is off, and pick up on what isn’t being said long before it arrives for others. But what I didn’t fully understand before is that just because you know something doesn’t mean your emotional body is ready to hold it. For me, that knowing doesn’t come through logic first, it comes through the body (Lilith square Moon). Tears, tension, exhaustion, confusion, that sudden feeling of needing to go home. Not because anything obvious happened, but because something underneath the surface didn’t feel right.


There have been so many moments in my life where my spirit said, “Something is wrong here,” and my emotional body responded, “I don’t want to hold this. It hurts.” That used to confuse me. I would question myself, stay longer than I needed to, try to understand others, empathize, and make space. But what I’ve come to understand is that I wasn’t leaving because I was restless, I was leaving because my body was already paying the cost of staying. I was sacrificing myself in the process. That is a completely different story.


Sometimes the wound isn’t loud or dramatic. It doesn’t always show up as chaos. Sometimes it looks like emotional absence, avoidance, someone saying one thing but embodying another, or a room that feels warm on the surface but cold underneath. If you are someone who feels deeply like I do, you don’t just hear what’s being said, you literally FEEL the gap between two worlds of words and truth. And that gap can be exhausting, honey.


I think a lot of people meet me in my ability to see, to name things, to sense what’s going on. But what they don’t always see is the part of me that has to recover from what I see. These social media apps leave out one important note: intuition doesn’t always arrive as peace. Sometimes it arrives as disturbance. Discomfort, heaviness, sudden tears, the urge to leave, and not being able to settle around someone. For a long time, I thought something was wrong with me. I thought intuition was supposed to feel calm, clear, even magical. But sometimes it’s simply your body saying, “This isn’t for you,” before your mind has the language for it.


If you’re someone who feels like this, I want to offer you a reframe. You are not too sensitive; you are perceptive. You are picking up on what is unspoken. Not everyone can do that. Some people need things explained to them, but some of us feel it before words ever arrive.


Not All Signals Are Treated Equal


The real lesson for me has been understanding that just because I can feel everything doesn’t mean I am meant to hold everything. That’s where boundaries come in. To be transparent, I'm still working on what that looks like. Because the pattern can look like sensing something is off, staying open, trying to understand, absorbing too much, becoming overwhelmed, retreating to recover, AND THEN later realizing you were right all along. I’ve lived that cycle enough times to finally say that I don’t need more evidence to begin protecting my peace. My circle of great listeners helped me along the way of this discovery. Re-routing me back into my body, because I've spent so much of my life intellectualizing everything. If I let another person tell it, I would have judged myself more harshly. One Spring, I received a dillogun reading from someone at a festival in New Orleans. He mentioned how my life seemed like a rotating door of people, and I took it so personally. I asked myself as I read his lips, "Am I not to evolve?" There is a shadow to this placement of my Lilith, cutting off too quickly. But because it involves intuitive places, I've rarely been wrong - even if people may not even understand themselves. So I've overstayed, time and time again. This isn't to say I have not made some mistakes along the way. This is a large part of why I know for a fact I'm a bridge to different practices; it's harmful how we leave one way of viewing someone's destiny out of the conversation. I do think readers also need to understand Astrology. It should definitely be a course taught at Hogwarts. It's just as important as a Science class. He did not know this about my chart, but I had an idea. And now fully aware of myself and why the revolving door exists.


If you’ve ever felt like you outgrow people quickly, leave spaces before you can fully explain why, or feel things in your body that don’t make sense until later, I want you to look at your 1st house. Not just your rising sign, but anything that lives there. The 1st house is what you experience through your body in real time. It is what people feel from you immediately, and what you feel from the world. For me, that realization changed everything. It helped me understand that my intuition isn’t separate from me; it is my body.


I’ve also come to understand that this kind of sensitivity is like being able to smell petrichor before anyone else sees the rain begin to fall. You are not wrong for noticing it early; you are just early. And maybe the work isn’t to keep proving what you felt, but to trust it sooner?


My intuition doesn’t always feel soft or dreamy. Lilith presses on my Imum Coeli; which is the lowest point in our natal charts. Mine is in firey Aries, which is VERY on brand for this year, so I'm actually surprised I'm really understanding this now. Sometimes my intuition is fast, sharp, and immediate. A sudden yes or no, a pull to move, a knowing that doesn’t wait for permission. And I’m learning to honor that too. Because sometimes the truth doesn’t arrive as a vision, sometimes it’s as simple as my body knew.


There is a rebirth happening for many of us mutable signs, myself included. All my top 3 and some personal planets are all mutable. But something else is taking place for me at least, my Jupiter return in Leo. My Lilith naturally aspects this placement, and it will be activated in a whole new way this year. And with us leaving so many Pisces placements behind and stepping into Aries everywhere, My Lilth is no longer swimming; she is dry enough to burn. Ready to be seen and expressed in healthy ways. So my beginning thought, and question was how does my Sagittarius burn and reignite my sense of self? My sense of self returns when I stop negotiating my truth. For so long, water covered me in emotion, projection, confusion, empathy overload, and mental dis-ease. Now the covers are coming off, and fire does that. My Sagittarius Lilith isn’t here to hold everything anymore; it’s here to tell the truth, clear the field, and make space for something real to grow.



  • Writer: Samantha Jo
    Samantha Jo
  • Apr 18, 2025
  • 15 min read

Updated: Apr 28, 2025




Recently, I watched Ryan Coogler’s film Sinners. The film stirred something deep within me. It reminded me that as Black Americans, we inherit far more than blood—we inherit sorrow, silence, gifts, and burdens. Our healing journey is layered, complicated, and urgent. Watching Sinners made me reflect even more on how many of us are living out unhealed stories written long before we were born. Stories we sometimes carry without understanding, stories we sometimes repeat without realizing why. It reminded me why astrology has been such an anchor for me—not for entertainment, but for survival. Astrology gave me a way to trace these stories back through time, to find not only the root of the wound but also the root of the medicine.


I didn’t choose this path. It chose me. And the more I studied my chart, the more I realized that healing wasn’t a passion—it was a contract, signed long before I incarnated. One of the clearest examples in my own chart is my Saturn placement. I often use my chart not to project it onto others, but to show how these codes can reveal themselves if we’re willing to look. My Saturn sits at home in Capricorn in the 2nd house—a placement that speaks volumes about ancestral survival, land, ownership, money, dignity, and self-worth. As a Black person born in North America, I understand that my bloodline carries the memory of systemic theft—of land stripped away, of wealth denied, of bodily autonomy stolen. That survival coding runs deep. It often shows up as a fear of not having enough, or a subconscious urge to constantly prove that I deserve to exist, to belong, to have.


But Saturn doesn’t only bring hardship—it brings sacred responsibility. Saturn asks me to reclaim sovereignty over my body, my time, my talents, and my resources. Every time I choose myself—when I honor my gifts, when I refuse to let oppression or scarcity thinking define my value—I am liberating my bloodline. Saturn in Capricorn in the 2nd house is not just about material success; it is about becoming the root my ancestors prayed for. It is about remembering that survival was their wealth—but thriving can be ours. Healing this placement means breaking the generational curse that says our worth is tied to how much we can endure. It asks me to build lasting foundations rooted not just in wealth, but in dignity.


There’s a kind of alchemy that unfolds when life drops us into the deep end—a spiritual molting that feels like chaos but is really just truth rising to the surface. Over the past month, under the weight of eclipses, retrogrades, and collective energetic upgrades, I felt that chaos deeply. But instead of letting it break me, I accepted its invitation to become. This post is not written from a place of arrival, but from within the process itself. It’s a love note to anyone navigating heavy placements in their chart, ancestral karma in their lineage, or cycles of self-rejection that echo louder during seasons of growth.


Like many of you, this most recent wave of transits cracked me open—and not gently. When I finally loosened my grip on parts of myself that had long expired, I found clarity. During the Libra Full Moon, I metaphorically opened my hands and realized how bruised and bloodied they were from holding onto pain that wasn’t mine. And while environment and relationships played their part, I had to face the deeper truth: I was the one saying "yes" to spaces and versions of myself I had already outgrown. I'm not sharing this for pity or performance; I'm sharing it to reflect something real—the uncomfortable, invisible work that many spiritual spaces don’t always show. It’s not all love and light.


The rainstorms? They've been helping my roots grow deeper.

Over the last few years, I’ve turned to my natal chart more consistently—not for aesthetics, not for trends, but as a tool for navigating real-life spiritual storms. And what I’ve learned is that the hard aspects don’t just warn us—they prepare us. They are sacred mirrors, often showing us the very work we’ve been avoiding. They are portals to evolution, if we’re willing to stop looking away. Astrology, at its deepest, is not a prediction tool. It’s a mirror that says: you already know. You’ve always known. Now live like it.


This season forced me to realize that even with all my spiritual tools—meditation, rituals, cleansings—I was still bypassing. I was trying to sit still in the fire without realizing that I had the power to step out of it. When I finally did, I could clearly see how much I had been overextending myself. Some people only reached out to make sure they still had access to me—not because they cared how I was. And I had to be honest: I didn’t have much left to give. And that was okay.


My romantic relationship acted as a catalyst for this revelation. It exposed every leak—emotionally, spiritually, energetically. And when I went back to my chart, the alignments were undeniable. The transits weren’t just happening to me—they were activating me. Placements like my Pisces Moon in the 4th house, my North Node in Aquarius in the 3rd, and Pluto’s entrance into Aquarius were all pointing to the same truth: it was time to release, to elevate, to trust that what was crumbling was not meant to be rebuilt in its old form.


Reading these aspects is one thing. Living through them is another. Transits activate natal placements in ways that shake loose everything we’ve been gripping out of fear. Some collapse. Some awaken. I did a little of both. The truth hurt. But it also set the groundwork for radical self-love, for better boundaries, for a more authentic way of living and loving.


My Chiron wounds, my parent wounds, my overgiving, my deep attachment to proving my worth—they all came up for review. Pluto wasn’t letting me hide behind spiritual language or good intentions anymore. I realized I wasn’t alone—so many of us were being confronted by the same archetypal forces, just through different stories. The wounded healer had come for all of us. And I understood that none of it was punishment. It was preparation.





For me, salvation came through my North Node—a placement that points to purpose. In Aquarius, sitting in my 3rd house, it asked me to speak, to teach, to show up in community with clarity and authenticity. It also asked me to reconnect to my Imum Coeli (IC)—the root of my chart—which holds the emotional origin story I was born to transmute. Together, these placements reminded me of my ability to alchemize pain into purpose. As a Virgo Mercury in a more evolved position, my words can be my medicine. My storytelling is my healing.


And so, I did what I know how to do. I researched, I studied, I reflected. We cannot change our natal charts. But we can evolve them. We can alchemize what we were given.


Sometimes, when you read your chart, it takes real courage to sit with what’s there. To look at your Saturn and see your great-grandfather’s shame. To see your Chiron and recognize your mother’s grief. It can feel like being exposed. But that’s where compassion blooms. Because the truth is, some of these wounds were never ours to begin with. We inherited them. But we were also chosen to heal them.


Someone once told me a story of her receiving a past life regression, where she discovered she was an enslaved person in her bloodline who had jumped into the sea to avoid the horrors ahead. Her soul never touched American soil. But generations later, she returned—still carrying the water trauma. She couldn’t swim. She feared deep water. No trauma in this lifetime explained it. Her body remembered what her mind could not.


We often think reincarnation happens immediately. But it can take decades, even centuries, depending on the soul’s readiness. Sometimes, the soul must sit in the school of ancestors until it’s prepared to return. Earth, as I often joke, is like signing a Bad Boy Records deal—you might get a couple smooth lifetimes, but you better read the fine print.


Healing doesn’t begin with perfection. It begins with remembrance.

Our charts aren’t just about traits and talents. They are sacred maps—guiding us through the soul contracts we made long before we ever arrived here. And when we truly start remembering who we are—and where we come from—we don’t just heal ourselves. We heal them. All of them. And we prepare the soil for the ones yet to come.







Ten Challenging Natal Chart Placements Leading to Transformation


  1. Moon-Saturn Hard Aspects (Conjunction, Square, Opposition) These aspects can lead to emotional suppression and feelings of isolation, often rooted in early life experiences. However, they also cultivate resilience and emotional maturity.

= Ex. Pisces Moon in the 4th house already carries weight — emotional hypersensitivity paired with a deep connection to home, ancestry, and emotional roots. This often echoes Moon-Saturn themes of emotional heaviness, ancestral grief, and a tendency to retreat or suppress emotions until it becomes too much to carry.

  1. Mercury-Uranus Hard Aspects (Conjunction, Square, Opposition) This combination may result in erratic thought patterns and communication difficulties, but it also fosters innovative thinking and unique perspectives.

  2. Neptune-Mercury Hard Aspects (Conjunction, Square, Opposition) Such aspects can blur the lines between reality and illusion, potentially leading to confusion or escapism. Yet, they also enhance imagination and spiritual insight.

  3. 12th House Stellium Multiple planets in the 12th house can indicate hidden strengths and subconscious challenges, often pointing to karmic lessons and the need for solitude and introspection.

  4. Chiron in Cancer, 4th or 12th House This placement often signifies deep-seated wounds related to family or past lives, offering opportunities for profound healing and empathy.

  5. Pluto in the 4th or 12th House Indicates transformative experiences within the family dynamic, often involving power struggles or deep emotional undercurrents.

= Ex. Pluto in Scorpio in the 12th House – A generational placement common for those born in the late '80s and '90s. As we now witness Pluto shifting into Aquarius for the first time in our lives, this placement is lit up. It’s a mark of spiritual power — one that often awakens through isolation, spiritual warfare, or buried trauma. It says: break the ancestral chains or be buried by them. If you have this, you likely inherited shadow work from both your bloodline and your past lives — and still, you are the one who can clear it. Pluto here is the healer’s initiation, but it demands sacrifice, solitude, and deep integrity. This energy is rising now, as Pluto prepares to square itself in transit — intensifying your rebirth.


  1. Saturn in the 8th House Challenges related to intimacy, shared resources, and transformation, encouraging deep personal growth and mastery over fears.

  2. North Node in the 12th House Suggests a life path focused on spiritual growth, letting go of material attachments, and embracing the unknown. Now, this is a grey area as well because you can also find GREAT power and healing in this area. More on that later.

  3. South Node in the 4th House Indicates past life attachments to home and family, urging the individual to move beyond comfort zones toward public life or career ambitions.

  4. Venus-Pluto Hard Aspects (Conjunction, Square, Opposition) Can lead to intense and transformative relationships, teaching lessons about power, control, and deep emotional connections.


These placements, while challenging, often serve as catalysts for significant personal evolution and awakening.​


Natal Chart Placements Guiding Toward Awakening


Yes, we all carry “heavy” placements, but our charts also show us where the medicine is — the balms, the breakthroughs, the guidance. Here are the key placements and planets that often offer support, relief, or healing pathways for tough aspects in a natal chart:


1. Jupiter – The Great Benefic (Blessings, Expansion, Spiritual Protection)

  • Role in healing: Jupiter brings optimism, divine protection, spiritual insight, and wisdom. It often shows where and how you can expand out of difficulty — even if it's squaring something tough.

  • How to use it: Look to the house and sign Jupiter is in — this shows where life tends to offer grace. Even in a hard aspect, Jupiter can eventually turn tension into wisdom.

  • Jupiter in Water houses (4th, 8th, 12th) = deep emotional and ancestral healing.


Jupiter is BIG energy. It’s where magic lives — but it activates when you believe. You can’t block what’s yours, but you can delay it. This is where you THINK BIG, BITCH. No matter the tension — activate it.


2. Chiron – The Wounded Healer

  • Role in healing: It literally points to your deepest wound and the path to becoming a healer through that pain. Healing Chiron is never about removing the wound — it's about finding meaning and strength in it.

  • How to use it: The house and sign placement show where your pain is most personal. Look to aspects to Chiron too — especially trines and sextiles — to see where support may already be flowing in.


This is your shadow work. If you’re stuck in therapy or running circles around a trauma — go here. Chiron (especially with Lilith) is the transcript you should bring to your therapist. There’s info here you haven’t fully unpacked. And yes — sometimes we lie to ourselves, so how can we be fully honest with a therapist? If you’re ready to break chains — start here.


3. North Node – Soul Evolution, The Healing Edge

  • Role in healing: Following the North Node is like applying aloe to sunburn — it’s uncomfortable to start, but it’s where the soul is asking you to grow. It’s not comfortable, but it’s the future.

  • How to use it: Healing comes when we consciously walk toward our North Node and slowly release the patterns of the South Node. Support comes through its ruler too — so check the planet that rules your NN sign.


I’m OBSESSED with the North Node. It’s the “what’s next?” of the soul. Sometimes, the activation comes with divine timing — you might need certain transits first. Aquarius North Nodes especially — your time is now. Your healing work lies in collective rebuilding, community work, local movements. Same if your NN is in the 11th house. EMPOWER and REBUILD.


LISTEN IF YOU HAVE ARIES NORTH NODE: BABY. This is your season. It’s time to choose yourself — lovingly, fiercely. Stop stalling your blessings to fix what isn’t yours. Clean your own plate first.


4. The IC (Imum Coeli / 4th House Cusp) – Your Root System

  • Role in healing: The IC shows where we come from, what shaped us, and what kind of inner security we need to truly heal. This is the emotional core and where your inner child lives.

  • How to use it: Reflect on how safe, seen, or supported you felt growing up — this is a clue to the healing you need now. Planets near the IC can show trauma, but also tools for inner sanctuary.


If you’re a generational cycle-breaker — look here. Seeing trauma written in the chart hits different. The IC reveals the diagnosis and the medicine.


5. Neptune – Spiritual Release + Higher Compassion

  • Role in healing: Neptune dissolves. It helps us surrender control and egoic attachments. While it can also fog things up, its highest function is divine love, music, art, prayer, and unity.

  • How to use it: Use Neptune for forgiveness practices, creative release, and spiritual connection. Its house placement shows how you naturally connect to the divine (or where you may need better energetic boundaries too).


Neptune has finally moved on from dreamy Pisces — a foggy era for all. Only Gen Alpha will truly live with Neptune in Pisces. If reality’s felt slippery, you’re not alone. Neptune is spiritual. What gifts are waiting in your chart?


6. Pluto – Death, Rebirth, and Raw Power

  • Role in healing: Pluto burns things down so they can be reborn. It's not gentle, but it is thorough. Healing through Pluto means facing shadow, trauma, control issues, but coming out the other side utterly transformed.

  • How to use it: Healing through Pluto is about facing, not avoiding. Look to Pluto transits or Pluto trines/sextiles in your chart — these can guide you through deep shadow work.


7. The 12th House – Ancestral + Subconscious Healing

  • Role in healing: Planets here are hidden but powerful. This is where we carry karmic baggage, unconscious habits, and ancestral imprints. But also where we can release and transmute.

  • How to use it: Look at your 12th house planets for clues about old wounds that want to be released through ritual, solitude, spiritual work, or therapy. This house is a key to soul-level healing.


8. Venus – Self-Worth + Softness

  • Role in healing: Venus reminds us we are worthy of love, pleasure, and ease. When dealing with tough placements, Venus is your reminder that you don’t have to suffer alone — there is sweetness to be claimed.

  • How to use it: Even Venus in hard aspect is an opportunity to reclaim softness. Look to the sign/house/aspects of your Venus to understand your love language and where healing is best accessed through beauty, art, or connection.


9. The Moon – Emotional Regulation + Inner Nurture

  • Role in healing: The Moon shows how you self-soothe, what you need emotionally, and what you did or didn’t get growing up.

  • How to use it: Tending to your Moon sign’s needs (like a ritual) every week — through food, home, touch, journaling — helps heal deeper wounds. Especially important if you have a Moon-Saturn or Moon-Pluto aspect.


10. Chart Ruler (Ruler of Your Rising Sign) – Personal Compass

  • Role in healing: Your chart ruler acts like your life’s lens or compass. It colors how you approach life and can offer healing when aligned properly.

  • How to use it: As an example, if you're Sagittarius rising, Jupiter is your chart ruler — making Jupiter's placement and transits extra important for healing, especially around purpose and faith. Your chart ruler is the planet that rules the sign on your rising sign.


Bonus: 🕊 Healing Trines + Sextiles


While the focus is often on “hard” aspects like squares and oppositions, don’t forget to look at the other aspects like the ones below:

  • Trines (120°) – gifts and natural flow

  • Sextiles (60°) – opportunities for growth through effort These aspects can act like soft landings and spiritual support — even when other areas feel chaotic.


These are the places I go when I feel lost, broken, or ready to give up. They don’t erase the pain, but they soften it. They show me that there’s a path through.



Why So Many Awakenings Lately?


We’re not imagining it. Something is shifting in the year of Mars. We are feeling the burn to release and rebuild whether in community or within ourselves. Rapid spiritual awakenings, deep ancestral purging, old friends falling away, new identities being born. So what’s going on?


1. Pluto in Aquarius (2023–2044)

Theme: Rebirth of the collective, radical transformation, ego restructuring

  • Pluto in Aquarius (and out of Capricorn) Pluto is the planet of death, rebirth, and shadow — and it moved into Aquarius (for real this time) in November 2024, after teasing us throughout 2023.  is shaking collective structures and pushing us toward authentic evolution.

  • Aquarius rules the collective, technology, innovation, and rebellion. Pluto in this sign is revolutionizing how we see ourselves in society, in community, and in systems of power.

  • Many people are waking up to how they’ve been unconsciously complicit in their own suppression — especially within structures like capitalism, family, identity roles, and traditional relationships.

  • Pluto here demands the death of the old paradigm ego — the ego built on control, performance, perfectionism, or validation.

  • Those who resist this transformation? They’re hitting walls. Those who surrender to the shadow work? They’re being initiated.

2. Saturn in Pisces (2023–2026)

Theme: Spiritual tests, emotional maturity, illusion vs. reality

  • Saturn, the planet of karmic lessons and structure, is now in mystical, watery Pisces — a sign that rules dreams, illusions, the unconscious, and spirit.

  • This combo is calling people to embody their spirituality, not just talk about it.

  • It’s breaking down false light, bypassing, and escapist spirituality. Anything built on fantasy, delusion, or denial is dissolving.

  • If you’ve been suppressing your emotions, abandoning your inner child, or building your identity on illusion? Saturn in Pisces is calling you all the way out and not fucking playin with you!

  • It’s also returning many people to ritual, creativity, ancestral connection, and spiritual discipline.

  • Saturn in Pisces is dissolving boundaries and forcing us to sit in the emotional soup of everything we’ve avoided.

3. Chiron in Aries (2019–2027)

Theme: Healing the wounded self / reclaiming personal power

  • Chiron is the Wounded Healer, and in Aries, it’s spotlighting identity wounds — Who am I? Am I enough? Am I allowed to exist as I am?

  • It’s forcing people to confront rejection, abandonment, and shame related to self-expression and self-trust. Chiron in Aries is making self-identity and wounding impossible to ignore.

  • This is also why so many relationships are being challenged — when you start reclaiming your power, it changes the dynamics around you.

  • Many are realizing: “I’ve been silencing myself for others. I’ve been shape-shifting for love. I don’t want to live like this anymore.”


  1. North Node in Aries + South Node in Libra (2023–2025)

Theme: Individuation vs. people-pleasing / the courage to choose yourself

  • The Nodes of Fate shifted into Aries–Libra in July 2023, where they’ll stay until early 2025.

  • Aries North Node is about courage, boldness, and asserting the self — especially after years of shrinking or compromising in the name of peace.

  • Libra South Node is calling us to release co-dependency, superficial harmony, and approval-seeking.

  • This axis is literally pushing people into ego death if their ego was built on “being the good one,” the healer, the peacemaker, the supporter.

  • It’s also why we’re seeing such a dramatic rise in breakups, friendship shifts, and boundary setting — the soul wants freedom.

5. Uranus in Taurus (2018–2026)

Theme: Revolution in values, embodiment, money, and self-worth

  • Uranus is the awakener. It brings shocks, breakthroughs, and sudden liberation. In Taurus, it’s shaking the ground beneath anything we’ve clung to for comfort or stability.\n- For many, that’s looked like money breakdowns, body healing crises, or radical shifts in values.\n- Uranus is helping people break free from material attachments that keep them from evolving.

  • Uranus in Taurus is reshaping how we relate to resources, values, and embodiment.


6. Eclipse Cycles (Oct 2023–April 2025)

Theme: Massive karmic endings + new beginnings

  • The current eclipses in Aries-Libra are catalyzing deep identity resets — especially around relationships vs. self.

  • Every time an eclipse hits a personal planet or point, it accelerates the timeline — and many are being forced into rapid endings, job changes, relocations, spiritual revelations.\n- The Libra Full Moon Eclipse on March 25, 2024 and the Aries Solar Eclipse on April 8, 2024 were particularly intense for identity shifts, breakups, and revelations.\n- Eclipses = spiritual contractions that birth a new self.


These aren’t just trends — they’re activations. We’re being asked to do what our some ancestors couldn’t.

And the astrology confirms it.


Your Chart Is Not a Curse


If you take anything from this, let it be this: your birth chart — no matter how “heavy” it looks — is a map, not a life sentence. You can grow beyond the more difficult parts. Think of it like an upgrade — your chart doesn’t change, it evolves. And that evolution? It’s your story to tell.


The hard aspects don’t mean you’re broken. They mean you’re being initiated. Somewhere in your chart, there’s also a balm — a Venus, a Jupiter, a North Node — ready to guide you through the fire. I hope you find that light. And when you do, I hope you let it in.

  • Writer: Samantha Jo
    Samantha Jo
  • Apr 7, 2025
  • 5 min read

How Lilith Taught Me to Stop Shrinking Myself





A journey of unshrinking, self-trust, and spiritual embodiment

For a long time, I thought power meant silence. That being graceful meant shrinking. I learned early that taking up space—real space—made people uncomfortable, and somewhere along the way, I began to believe that discomfort was my fault. I muted my truths, softened my voice, and let parts of myself go quiet so I could stay safe, stay loved, stay included.


But Lilith had other plans. She came roaring through my chart like a wildfire in Sagittarius, reminding me that my presence isn’t a problem—it’s a prophecy. This is the story of how I stopped shrinking myself and started standing in the full flame of who I am.


Many Black children have carried the weight of words that were meant to discipline or "toughen them up," but instead caused emotional wounding, silencing, or a sense of invisibility. These sayings often came from adults who were themselves trying to protect children from a harsh world—but they still left a lasting impact. And while my experience is rooted in being a Black child, I know I am not alone in hearing:


"Only speak when spoken to."

"Stay in a child's place."

"You talk too much."

"Stop crying before I give you something to cry about."

"What goes on in this house stays in this house."

"That ain't none of your business."


Not many people know that I used to stutter quite a bit as a child. It was hard for me to get out a simple "hello." This affected my confidence when it came to public speaking, but even as a social kid, I still tried out for school plays and loved using my voice in theater. Later, I learned that stuttering doesn’t just disappear—we learn to navigate it through practice and persistence.


In 2022, my mother and I traveled to Accra, Ghana. There, we met a Black woman from Baltimore—a professor and speech pathologist—who told us about her work. Her words brought up so many memories of my childhood struggles with speech. She reminded me that stuttering doesn't go away completely; we just get better at managing it. And when I realized I still do stutter, just not as much, something clicked. I had learned to speak fluently by practicing—but also by surviving the pressure to stay quiet.


There were times I didn’t speak up. I shut down instead of trying to push through. I never realized how much those early experiences shaped my voice today.


As a Virgo Mercury and Gemini Mars, I’ve always known the importance of words. I’ve had to learn how to wield them wisely—not just carefully. Over the years, I’ve stopped aligning my voice with worry and judgment and instead, anchored it in truth.


I am a generational cycle breaker. It ran into me, and I had to rise to meet it. My voice needed to be activated in order to break chains and rewrite old patterns. I can’t just move in faith—I have to speak it, too. My twenties were filled with internal dialogue, but as I entered my 29th year, I made myself a promise to my 30's: to spend more time outside my head and be present with my voice.


Dating a Scorpio activated my voice in unexpected ways. The intensity of that relationship brought so many things to the surface—things I didn’t want, didn’t like, or had kept buried. That relationship was followed by lessons in my friendships, and eventually a hard season with family between 2023 and 2024. We are still relearning how to speak truth together. I needed my voice to do that.


Understanding my natal chart helped me realize why my voice is not just necessary—it’s sacred. There are gifts hidden in the shadows of our charts, and many of mine were left with my inner teen. My voice is helping me recover them, including my spiritual gifts of seeing and knowing. Once, I told someone I could see and hear things others couldn’t. That moment wasn’t received well, and so I shut it down and hid those parts of myself. But now, I’m calling them back.





Living the Embodiment

Lilith in Sagittarius in the 1st house is a placement of wild, untamed expression. It speaks to the sacred rebellion of truth-telling, of refusing to conform, of taking up space with your full being. Sagittarius energy is philosophical, bold, and ever-seeking, while the 1st house represents the self—how you appear, how you move, how you are.


When Lilith sits here, there is often early life messaging that says "your truth is too much," or "tone it down if you want to be loved." People with this placement may have felt punished, judged, or isolated for being outspoken, spiritual in unconventional ways, or simply visible.

But this placement is also an invitation: to reclaim the body, the voice, the philosophy, the presence. To lead with fire and let it be fuel, not fear.


And if Lilith is the wildfire that demands we stop shrinking, then the North Node in Aquarius in the 3rd House is the guiding wind that shows where and how to speak. It has pushed me to communicate more often, more openly, and in ways that serve collective healing. This node says: Use your voice to build bridges. Don't just speak to be heard—speak to connect.


Now, in the time of Aquarius, this placement is being activated more than ever. If you share this North Node, it’s your time. Time to honor this part of your purpose. Time to speak from the soul and guide others to their own revelations through your voice.


Reclaiming your Lilith means learning to trust that you won’t be abandoned for being who you are. It means letting the volume rise on your voice, even if it trembles. It means showing up for your own needs without the need to perform.


You don’t need to be polished. You don’t need to be palatable. You just need to be true.

For those with similar placements—Lilith in Sagittarius, Lilith in the 1st house, or fire sign Liliths—this message echoes: Your body is not too loud. Your beliefs are not too radical. Your truth is not too much.


Let it break the spell.


Ways to Work With This Energy

  • Speak before you're ready. Share your truth in your voice, not the one you think will be accepted.

  • Move your body freely. Dance, walk, stretch in a way that takes up space. Let your hips lead.

  • Write unfiltered. Journal or blog without editing for approval. Let your inner fire have the first word.

  • Dress in alignment. Lilith in the 1st wants you to feel yourself. Let your style be part of your reclamation.

  • Practice spiritual autonomy. Define your own path, even if it doesn’t look like your teachers’.





Now at 34, I am a talking machine. I may not always get it right in confrontation, but I can roudly say: I’m learning. This is challenging work that many run away from. But during the lockdown, some of us uncovered our talents. Mine was my voice.


Coming out of that relationship in January 2020 was the beginning of a rebirth. My voice had been waiting for me. I began to romanticize my life, become my own muse, and share my experiences. Writing more. Teaching more. Showing up.


It was uncomfortable at first. My Egun were leading me, and I didn’t always understand where I was being guided. But trusting the process led me to create my apothecary, launch the Healing in the Balm Yard podcast, and teach workshops rooted in the medicine I’ve lived.


My voice saved my life. My gifts from the shadow became the light of my life.


If you’ve ever been told you're too much—too loud, too big, too emotional, too intense, too wild—know this: you were never too much. You were just ahead of your time.


This is your invitation to return to your fire. To let your truth be embodied. To unlearn the shame around your voice and step fully into your sacred presence. Lilith isn't here to destroy you. She's here to remind you that you were never broken.


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