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At the Edge of an Age
Feb. 17th, 2025 12:58 pmWhen I first started writing this blog back in late 2021, it was intended to be a weekly journal of sorts. I had just moved to a new location in Western Wisconsin where I remain to this day. It was terra incognita then, and so it, in large part, is today. I have had much less time to explore my local area than I thought I would – the first year of residence here was active enough, although hampered by the extremely high gas prices for part of 2022. But since then, there were cascades of difficulties and troubles in my life that disrupted everything. In many ways, nothing has been the same in my life since 2023, and my adjustment to a new routine has been anything but smooth. Humans are creatures of habit and it took me a while just to recover from the shock of the troubles and to adjust to a new way of life, and this is a process still ongoing to this day. However, mercifully, 2024 was not as filled with troubles for me as the year before, and I at least had the chance to catch my breath. But it was not auspicious for a lot of exploration, apart from some trips with family and friends. It was auspicious for branching out in other ways, which I will have to discuss some other time as space will not permit it here.
I had always loved the nature writing of 20th century America, which popular authors like Aldo Leopold, Helen Hoover, Hal Borland and Sigurd Olson made famous, and I was dismayed at its decline – but not surprised, since spending time outside and enjoyment of nature are not nearly the part of American culture they once were. I wanted to keep that kind of writing alive if at all possible. No doubt, enjoyment of the outdoors is still alive to this day, but the country is far more urbanized, the people are less physically active or healthy, and the entertainments are taken mostly indoors these days. Nobody really reads that kind of writing because there is a smaller market able to enjoy it for its virtues. For my own part, I did not market this writing project very much, so there’s no audience to write to anyway. That last part could change, of course. The Ecosophian community where I started this anonymous online persona has actually grown, slowly but surely. There’s even a freelance occultist community that now provides blessings, prayers and divinations to its members free of charge, which means there’s a real egregore at work by now that we are starting to tap into. In a quiet and moderate way, I’m bullish on the future of this blog and the wider community it was meant to engage with.
And thus it is that this project has languished, and I’m only writing an update many months late at the tail end of the Aquarius Season of 2025, a full half-year since my last missive. But time has hardly stood still since that time. America is like much of the world these days, in a state of progressive disorder. Tribal hatreds have increased in the past decade and now show no signs of abating or cooling off. The last presidential administration was thrown unceremoniously out of office for its cavalier attitude toward inflation and its insistence that the economy was doing very well while only they seemed to believe it. There is no real prospect of America’s problems being solved by the new administration either, but they certainly have moved quickly to upset the apple cart and continue the revolution they began in 2017. As a “radical centrist” or “extreme moderate” in the tradition of Franklin, I have the strange experience of being unable and unwilling to partake of the tribal hatreds that America’s dire political divides have sown. I was no partisan of the previous administration, and in fact I think it will be justifiably remembered as one of the most disastrous reigns in our country’s history, but it’s naive to think that the incoming administration will be able to fix all that’s wrong with this country. The best they can hope for is to better manage an imperial system in decline. There is already a great deal of wailing about how things are being changed only a few weeks into the new era.
According to the teachings of the esoteric mystery schools in the 19th century, the Age of Aquarius began sometime in the last quarter of that century. Others say that the Age of Aquarius has only just begun since the Great Conjunction of 2020. Still others say that it has to be when the precession of the equinoxes moves the vernal equinox fully into Aquarius, and so we are still some ways off from its beginning. Wherever we happen to be, at the end of an old age or already in a new one, it’s clear that the energy is changing and very strongly at that. The Age of Pisces was an integral age – it was the time when unity was sought, politically under kings who were “leaders of the kindred”, religiously under institutional faiths founded by prophets and maintained by priests; it was the age in which all of humanity was again reunited by the means of water and began to freely mix once again after the Age of Aries split humanity into warring tribes and created strong distinction and division. It was the age of One True Faith and intolerance in politics and ideas, even though no one ever succeeded in uniting humanity under one banner, or in breeding a single global human race through mixing, though it was certainly tried. By all accounts, the ideals of the Piscean Age were strongly felt and pursued, but unattainable. The Age of Aquarius will have a very different emphasis. It’s an age in which there will be a progressive tendency toward atomization, and also a response by states to get more totalitarian to manage it. It will be an age of individual mavericks and rebels set against faceless systems of control. This captures both the Saturnine and Uranian aspects of Aquarius, in much the same way that expansive unification and unattainable ideals captured both the Jovial and Neptunian aspects of Pisces.
Changes in the world here below are often written in the stars above. The Grand Mutation of 2020 was the first of such changes. And I must say, the change in the outside world since that event has been profound. Among other things, the occult revival really took off after that – and so did the rebellion of the working classes. It’s not nearly finished. Others have delineated the meaning of that chart in detail and so I won’t retread old ground, but much of what was predicted by that event is already in evidence only a few years later. There’s another, more momentous conjunction looming on the horizon. That’s a Saturn-Neptune conjunction in 0 degrees Aries. In the Greco-Roman system of astrology which I use, Aries is the midheaven of the universe (not the ascendant as it is in the equinoctial systems used by most modern occultists). But, a conjunction of outer planets in the first degree of any of the cardines of the universe is a very significant event. The last time there was such an event was just before what became known as the Axial Age, which was an era of cultural awakening that transformed the known world and ushered in the civilized Age of Pisces. There is good reason to imagine such a momentous change will take place once more, but since John Michael Greer plans to give a delineation of that event as it gets closer I will leave it to someone who does such things professionally to describe in more detail.
There are more mundane and material reasons to believe that a shift to a new age is coming anyway. The cult of progress is still paid lip service, but its boosters seem more and more insincere. True believers in progress have long since turned to zealotry as it continues to lose its potency as a way of making sense of the world. The long age of Western dominance is slowly falling apart. The industrial age has largely done all of the things it could have done, it has explored all of the possibilities. The world is crying out for a cleansing and it is coming. That said, as some writers have pointed out, the only way we’ve known how to talk about this for the longest time is with two stories – progress or disaster. As we enter this new era, it looks as if we will get the option most people have no idea what to make of: stagnation, slow decline. The world of today is only possible with fossil fuels; the nuclear and green options are expensive distractions. Fossil fuels are now in decline, but it might be a very long decline, we just don’t know. Other kinds of extraction are reaching their peaks as well. The economic growth so long relied upon can no longer be taken as a given. Economic stress has lowered the birth rates across the world and the population will someday adjust downward. All the material indications are that we are entering a new era. But people are even more hysterically denying this than they do the astrological signs saying the same thing in a different language.
It will take time for the reality of the new era to sink in. In the meantime, those of us still here would do well to keep calm and carry on. Over here Western Wisconsin, we have had a cold and dry winter in great contrast to the unbelievable mild of the last winter. Hysteria aside, it appears that the weathermen got it right this time: El Nino ended, La Nina started, and we have a colder winter as a result. But the storm track has gone well south of us for most of the winter, and so we have had an abnormally low amount of snow. The cold, dry conditions have kept us indoors more, and contributed to an air of stir-craziness that is partly responsible for this article. It has been about all I can do to manage my responsibilities, get a bit of leisure in on the side, and do my best to keep the wildlife alive with feeding through several stretches of polar vortex cold. As I write this, the wind chill outside is about -25 fahrenheit. The big changes coming to the world already hit my life in the past few years, so I can only ride the waves from here and try to hang on as best I can, same with anyone else. Over the coming months and years, look for more regular updates to this project. Like the Chinese curse said, we live in interesting times, far too engrossing to go unchronicled. If I have been remiss in my duties that’s all the more reason to take them seriously now. The topics discussed will also, likely, be more extensive than before, but with a respect for the past also. As a proud Ecosophian, I will never abandon my interest in nature or the occult, especially not in an era when its ripe for rediscovery and original creations.
I had always loved the nature writing of 20th century America, which popular authors like Aldo Leopold, Helen Hoover, Hal Borland and Sigurd Olson made famous, and I was dismayed at its decline – but not surprised, since spending time outside and enjoyment of nature are not nearly the part of American culture they once were. I wanted to keep that kind of writing alive if at all possible. No doubt, enjoyment of the outdoors is still alive to this day, but the country is far more urbanized, the people are less physically active or healthy, and the entertainments are taken mostly indoors these days. Nobody really reads that kind of writing because there is a smaller market able to enjoy it for its virtues. For my own part, I did not market this writing project very much, so there’s no audience to write to anyway. That last part could change, of course. The Ecosophian community where I started this anonymous online persona has actually grown, slowly but surely. There’s even a freelance occultist community that now provides blessings, prayers and divinations to its members free of charge, which means there’s a real egregore at work by now that we are starting to tap into. In a quiet and moderate way, I’m bullish on the future of this blog and the wider community it was meant to engage with.
And thus it is that this project has languished, and I’m only writing an update many months late at the tail end of the Aquarius Season of 2025, a full half-year since my last missive. But time has hardly stood still since that time. America is like much of the world these days, in a state of progressive disorder. Tribal hatreds have increased in the past decade and now show no signs of abating or cooling off. The last presidential administration was thrown unceremoniously out of office for its cavalier attitude toward inflation and its insistence that the economy was doing very well while only they seemed to believe it. There is no real prospect of America’s problems being solved by the new administration either, but they certainly have moved quickly to upset the apple cart and continue the revolution they began in 2017. As a “radical centrist” or “extreme moderate” in the tradition of Franklin, I have the strange experience of being unable and unwilling to partake of the tribal hatreds that America’s dire political divides have sown. I was no partisan of the previous administration, and in fact I think it will be justifiably remembered as one of the most disastrous reigns in our country’s history, but it’s naive to think that the incoming administration will be able to fix all that’s wrong with this country. The best they can hope for is to better manage an imperial system in decline. There is already a great deal of wailing about how things are being changed only a few weeks into the new era.
According to the teachings of the esoteric mystery schools in the 19th century, the Age of Aquarius began sometime in the last quarter of that century. Others say that the Age of Aquarius has only just begun since the Great Conjunction of 2020. Still others say that it has to be when the precession of the equinoxes moves the vernal equinox fully into Aquarius, and so we are still some ways off from its beginning. Wherever we happen to be, at the end of an old age or already in a new one, it’s clear that the energy is changing and very strongly at that. The Age of Pisces was an integral age – it was the time when unity was sought, politically under kings who were “leaders of the kindred”, religiously under institutional faiths founded by prophets and maintained by priests; it was the age in which all of humanity was again reunited by the means of water and began to freely mix once again after the Age of Aries split humanity into warring tribes and created strong distinction and division. It was the age of One True Faith and intolerance in politics and ideas, even though no one ever succeeded in uniting humanity under one banner, or in breeding a single global human race through mixing, though it was certainly tried. By all accounts, the ideals of the Piscean Age were strongly felt and pursued, but unattainable. The Age of Aquarius will have a very different emphasis. It’s an age in which there will be a progressive tendency toward atomization, and also a response by states to get more totalitarian to manage it. It will be an age of individual mavericks and rebels set against faceless systems of control. This captures both the Saturnine and Uranian aspects of Aquarius, in much the same way that expansive unification and unattainable ideals captured both the Jovial and Neptunian aspects of Pisces.
Changes in the world here below are often written in the stars above. The Grand Mutation of 2020 was the first of such changes. And I must say, the change in the outside world since that event has been profound. Among other things, the occult revival really took off after that – and so did the rebellion of the working classes. It’s not nearly finished. Others have delineated the meaning of that chart in detail and so I won’t retread old ground, but much of what was predicted by that event is already in evidence only a few years later. There’s another, more momentous conjunction looming on the horizon. That’s a Saturn-Neptune conjunction in 0 degrees Aries. In the Greco-Roman system of astrology which I use, Aries is the midheaven of the universe (not the ascendant as it is in the equinoctial systems used by most modern occultists). But, a conjunction of outer planets in the first degree of any of the cardines of the universe is a very significant event. The last time there was such an event was just before what became known as the Axial Age, which was an era of cultural awakening that transformed the known world and ushered in the civilized Age of Pisces. There is good reason to imagine such a momentous change will take place once more, but since John Michael Greer plans to give a delineation of that event as it gets closer I will leave it to someone who does such things professionally to describe in more detail.
There are more mundane and material reasons to believe that a shift to a new age is coming anyway. The cult of progress is still paid lip service, but its boosters seem more and more insincere. True believers in progress have long since turned to zealotry as it continues to lose its potency as a way of making sense of the world. The long age of Western dominance is slowly falling apart. The industrial age has largely done all of the things it could have done, it has explored all of the possibilities. The world is crying out for a cleansing and it is coming. That said, as some writers have pointed out, the only way we’ve known how to talk about this for the longest time is with two stories – progress or disaster. As we enter this new era, it looks as if we will get the option most people have no idea what to make of: stagnation, slow decline. The world of today is only possible with fossil fuels; the nuclear and green options are expensive distractions. Fossil fuels are now in decline, but it might be a very long decline, we just don’t know. Other kinds of extraction are reaching their peaks as well. The economic growth so long relied upon can no longer be taken as a given. Economic stress has lowered the birth rates across the world and the population will someday adjust downward. All the material indications are that we are entering a new era. But people are even more hysterically denying this than they do the astrological signs saying the same thing in a different language.
It will take time for the reality of the new era to sink in. In the meantime, those of us still here would do well to keep calm and carry on. Over here Western Wisconsin, we have had a cold and dry winter in great contrast to the unbelievable mild of the last winter. Hysteria aside, it appears that the weathermen got it right this time: El Nino ended, La Nina started, and we have a colder winter as a result. But the storm track has gone well south of us for most of the winter, and so we have had an abnormally low amount of snow. The cold, dry conditions have kept us indoors more, and contributed to an air of stir-craziness that is partly responsible for this article. It has been about all I can do to manage my responsibilities, get a bit of leisure in on the side, and do my best to keep the wildlife alive with feeding through several stretches of polar vortex cold. As I write this, the wind chill outside is about -25 fahrenheit. The big changes coming to the world already hit my life in the past few years, so I can only ride the waves from here and try to hang on as best I can, same with anyone else. Over the coming months and years, look for more regular updates to this project. Like the Chinese curse said, we live in interesting times, far too engrossing to go unchronicled. If I have been remiss in my duties that’s all the more reason to take them seriously now. The topics discussed will also, likely, be more extensive than before, but with a respect for the past also. As a proud Ecosophian, I will never abandon my interest in nature or the occult, especially not in an era when its ripe for rediscovery and original creations.
