Pluto

Pluto is linked with our least conscious part, our “underworld”, and with our unconscious drives. It is the generating form that reproduces and creates new forms such as the metamorphosis of the caterpillar, which shrouds itself within a chrysalis and then sheds to become a butterfly. Pluto is associated with physical and spiritual birth., with death and resurrection. It symbolizes old patterns that hold us down and need to be eliminated if we are to grow and develop.

Once the old shell of the personality is freed, we can develop the identity, we have chosen for this life. Pluto appears to be operate through experiences which happen to the individual, and which in some way force us to undergo a death of some kind. There is always a rebirth after death and the new form is always greater than the old. Pluto is especially significant in the sphere of relationships, for it is n this sphere that so many people undergo emotional deaths and rebirths. Pluto is also connected to sexuality, in the way that the sexual act symbolizes, the death of the individual separateness in the experience of the other, and the new creative life force running through both of them.

The creation of new life will always bring a death of some kind, psychologically the procreation of a child will inevitably produce this type of change in the psyche, one has changed from the child into the parent, who has given birth to a child, and a new phase of life has begun. When Pluto contacts a planet or other point in the chart it seems to deepen and intensify those things that the planet represents. With the hard aspects the expression of Pluto will seems to be at odds with the other planet. Pluto often seems to bury or kill the other planet. When a planet touches Pluto often we feel as though the things signified by that planet have been violated, invaded, taken by force, we may feel persecuted and powerless.

Pluto the lord of the underworld symbolizes all that is unseen, unconscious and invisible. Those things that are hidden are always the most powerful, the way that the most unconscious parts of our psyche are potentially the most dangerous. Pluto’s job is to strip away all that has outgrown it’s usefulness and bring to light anything that has been repressed by our psyche: our feelings of unresolved anger, jealousy, greed, envy, and loathing. It forces us to come to terms with the darker more instinctive side of our nature.

Pluto on a larger scale symbolizes what is taboo in society issues of abuse, crime, violence and murder all fall under Pluto’s domain. Victims of crime feel ashamed. The abuse or shame is kept buried. Through such experiences a person becomes mistrustful and frightened and fiercely protective of themselves. The function of Pluto is to give power to our life’s purpose. It compels us to recognize the root causes and to explore hidden depths, so that we may emerge from the darkness into new life, transforming ourselves when the time is right.

Psychologically Pluto represents the compulsion to deal with whatever may be troubling us at a subliminal level, whatever has chained us to our past patterns of behavior, so that these may be consciously acknowledged and dealt with. Pluto is a symbol of the urge towards self transformation, there exists with the psyche an impulse towards growth. A although all this is an undoubtedly painful process, slowly something emerges in us that promises a new lease on life. And here is Pluto’s gift, opening up hidden resources of wisdom, and enabling us to acquire a rich storehouse of inner experience. Pluto represents soul growth and transformational experiences, and the symbolic death process that is involved may ultimately result in clarity, growth and profound capacity to live life to it’s fullest.