When Saturn comes calling by transit it’s time for some hard work. Often it involves hands-on work now that builds something for the future.
It passed over my 2nd-house Scorpio Sun a few weeks ago but I still feel the effects. Honestly, I expected some minor aches and pains because attention is supposed to be put on the physical body, often necessitating a slowing down in order to be open to hearing it. Right now I’m having minor stuff in each shoulder and how I’m compensating is affecting all of my upper body. But I know it will pass.
Another effect I expected was to need to do something challenging (Saturn) and gain a new skill or improve an old one (Scorpio in the 2nd house). It turns out that among other things this transit for me is about getting into lapidary arts.
Lapidary arts means working with gem stones – so for my Saturn transit to the Sun I’m learning to break rocks.
And make them pretty.
It began around a year ago when I had the idea to source pieces of tiger iron for my clients and students. Many of them are working hard get deeply grounded, open to and trust intuition, clear out the past, develop more self-confidence, and other things this stone supports. I use one when I channel spirit guides and Ascended Master Djehuty and I want others to have one if they want because the stone really helps.
Sources I located offered pieces too thin or little, meant for jewelry, or too big (rough pieces – uncut), meant for eventually making into slabs and then into jewelry. I looked and looked, going back to web searches and in a few stores periodically. Then I decided to look up local lapidary-related classes and found the Old Pueblo (a name for Tuscon) Lapidary Club, a couple of miles from where I live.
So now I’m a member of OPLC and have learned to make cabochons … and now have in my possession a 4.5-lb. piece of tiger iron rough that soon will be cut into pieces so I can make a round of stones available to others. Not the best pictures but they give you an idea of it -side and bottom:
I’m hoping to get a guy at the club Tuesday to cut it into pieces I can polish. I have to try to catch the workshop monitor when he’s not busy as I can’t operate the big saws, apparently. Once that happens I can create a bunch of tiger iron pieces to offer others to help with grounding and all those other things mentioned above.
A new project – a hands-on project to break up my phone and desk work. Cutting and polishing rocks to help others get grounded.
For a few weeks (since becoming aware of the club and how I could do all this pretty simply) I wondered about taking stuff out of the Earth. From being in areas previously and currently dominated by the mining industry I know that taking a lot out of the Earth alters the energetic health of a place. When I go to mining towns I’m nauseous and sick to my stomach, have vertigo, and feel my 6th chakra opening way too much and getting headaches, which are rare occurrences for me. These areas of the Earth are not balanced and peaceful unless people do something after the mining stops to bring balance back. The Earth itself doesn’t suffer but all the life in the area will be affected in one way or another.
I asked Djehuty and he answered that the Earth provides tools for us to use. He said that me doing this helps other people improve their relationships with themselves and with the planet, so it’s a great thing to do. He gave me the image of Shel Silverstein’s The Giving Tree and told me to run with it while being grateful for it.
Over the coming weeks I’ll post more (and better) pictures of the process of cutting this stone and polishing the pieces. I’ll also write more about the properties of tiger iron (including the 3 stones that make it up: hematite, red jasper, and gold tiger eye) and why/how I use it. It is definitely a great tool to have with you for cleaning up the past, getting clear in the present, release, and developing confidence and focus.