Nowadays, there are tons of websites that do the calculations for you. But in some cases the output of these sites is ambiguous (or you're ambitious and want to learn moar).
For example, you want to check the date and duration of the development stage called Saturn Return. You input your birth data and receive a starting and an ending date, which often consists of a month and a year. Does that mean Saturn Return will start as soon as 00:01 of the first day of a specific month? Will it last all those months from the starting one to the ending one? Or maybe there is going to be a break in-between?
Here I'm going to show you (with pictures!) a small DYI tutorial on how to calculate the EXACT dates for any specific transit you would like. We will discuss the distance orb and the timing orb.
1. Theory
*Skip to Section 4 (page 2 of this article) if you are familiar with ephemeris'
Transit is a technical term describing the movement of a planet on the ecliptic, which would be the zodiac sign wheel on the natal chart. Planets move counter-clockwise, either forward or backwards (retrograde motion). The trick is to know when a particular transiting planet will come close to a point where it triggers the natal chart planets. This "trigger point" will determine the type and quality of this transit, thus we can deal with e.g. a conjunction, sextile, square, trine or opposition (and quincunx).
As an example I'm going to use the natal chart of Rod Stewart on an astro.com template (I did some minor editing). Let's see when Rod will have his Pluto transits.
2. Ephemeris are your friends
First we need to track the exact movement of Pluto in the sky. We can do that by checking the ephemeris - a table showing the position of planets (by degree) in the zodiac signs on any given day. You can download them for free on astro.com, here's the link.
Pick the time frame that interests you and download the ephemeris PDF of a particular year.
3. Checking the transit dates
Here's how the table looks for one of the months. We look at the Pluto glyph and see its movement. On 1st January transiting Pluto is in 20 degrees 36' Capricorn, and on 31st Jan it's 21 degrees 36' of the same sign.
Now we look at the natal planets degrees. The easiest way to discover if we have a transit at all is to look at the numeric values i.e. does Rod Stewart have planets around 20 degree of any sign. Let us take a range of 3 degrees +/-, thus 17-23 degrees for now.
Rod has his natal Sun at 20 degrees 16' Capricorn. This is the same sign, so we are dealing with a conjunction. If Rod's Sun would be in Aries/Libra, we would deal with a square etc. So we can say that transiting Pluto has already touched the natal Sun. If we look at 2018 ephemeris, we will notice that on 22nd December transiting Pluto reached 20 degrees 16' Capricorn - this is THE day.
Keep in mind that planets (exclude Sun and Moon) can move backwards on the ecliptic. So it is very likely that transiting Pluto will touch Rod's natal Sun several times, 3x or even 5x times. This was exactly the case with Rod, who's natal Sun was touched three times: on 17th Feb. 2018, 2nd July 2018 and on December 2018.
So if you would like to track all of your transits, you would have to repeat this procedure and compare each transiting planet with the natal ones. For a practical point of view, astrologers usually track the transits from Mars onward (Jupiter, Saturn, onward etc.)
4. How long does the transit last?
So we have listed all of the special days when a transiting planet will precisely touch a natal planet. We can judge the longevity of a transit by looking at the degrees (distance orb).
The common rule is that a transit is tangibly felt 3 degrees before touching the natal planet and 1-3 degrees after making contact with it.
Let's get back to our example. Rod has his natal Sun at 20 degrees 16' Capricorn. So anytime the transiting planet (which would be transiting Pluto in Capricorn in our example) is within 17 degrees and 21 (23) degrees Capricorn, that transit will be active. Outside of this orb (established distance range, in degrees), the transiting planet hasn't got enough power.
So if we wanted to be really precise with the dates, we would have to check the days transiting Pluto touched the 17th and 21 (23) degree. Usually there is no need for such a detailed approach (unless we are into exact predictions). So what astrologers (and website generators) do is they check the month any particular planet will be "in orb" i.e. in distance. The "special days" only show the peak moments of the transit.
There is also something called a timing orb. The special days are NOT an indicator of something happening that particular day. Such a precision requires the usage of multiple techniques. Because of that, many use the timing orb. Let's use Rod's example again. One of his special days is 22nd December 2018, but in case of Pluto transit I would expect events to happen +/- one week from that day. So the time distance is 15-29 December 2018.
Here's my list of the timing orbs for transiting planet:
Mars: +/- 1 day
Jupiter, Saturn: +/- 3,4 days
Uranus, Neptune, Pluto: +/- 7,10 days
5. Saturn Return dates
Let's talk about the nuances of tracking the transit dates by looking at the Saturn Return period.
Saturn Return:
a) is one of the key development process in our life - it marks the various stages of our maturity.
b) starts once the transiting Saturn enters the same sign as our natal Saturn. And ends when finally leaving that sign (and not returning to it months later).
c) lasts about 2,5 years - this is how much time transiting Saturn needs to pass through one zodiac sign.
d) is basically a Saturn transit. So when various generators/websites offer the calculations for the Saturn Return period, they are referring to the exact moments of transiting Saturn touching (conjunct) the natal Saturn. Now you can do that too by browsing the ephemeris, knowing the degree of your natal Saturn.
e) lasts about 2,5 years. To calculate its time period means to pinpoint the peak moments of that process.
Source: https://www.astro.com/astro-databank/Swift,_Taylor; hour unconfirmed
This is Taylor's Swift natal chart. Let's check her Saturn Return period, shall we?
She has natal Saturn in Capricorn, so we have to look up when transiting Saturn enters Capricorn (the first Return would occur around 2018-2020). Natal Saturn is at 13 degrees 28' Capricorn, so what interest us the most is the period between 10 - 14 (16) degrees Capricorn.
According to the ephemeris, transiting Saturn will touch her natal Saturn only once around 18th January. This is the special day. Saturn enters the 10th degree around the late December 2018 (this is the starting point). So far so good eh, but check out this one:
Transiting Saturn movement through the mid Capricorn degrees is as follows: 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, ... 19 ,20, 19, 18, 17, ... 13 degrees 55', 14, 15... onward.
From December 2018 we are dealing with the start of Saturn Return's peak period. The ending is not quite apparent. Around February 2019 transiting Saturn enters the 16th degree, not being in the necessarily orb for the transit to have power. But then on July 2019 Saturn enters the 16th degree Capricorn again, being in range, only to get very close to natal Saturn's position, but not quite there. November 2019 is the last time Saturn will enter the 16th degree.
Conclusion: Taylor Swift's Saturn Return lasts aprox. 2,5 years, with its peak period between December 2018 and November 2019. The special day would be 18th January 2019, or around 14-22nd January if we were to use the time orb.
If we wanted to be more precise, the peak period of her Saturn Return would lasts from December 2018 to February 2019 and from July to November 2019.
Those "breaks" from planetary influences are experienced as "periods of relief", which can be confusion if we assume the challenges have ended, while in fact they are out of our sight.
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