Episode 250 | Podathon Day One: Pluto in Leo with Linea Van Horn!
Announcer: It’s Podathon Week on the Big Sky Astrology Podcast! And for five big days in a row, we’re bringing you special episodes that put the fun in fundraising. Including the week’s planetary news, a closer look at the Moon, and special Podathon surprises! Plus, your chance to win prizes, people! So many prizes! And now, here’s your host, astrologer and author, April Elliott Kent!
April: Hello Invisible Friend, April here, and the date today is September 2nd, 2024. Welcome to Episode 250 of the Big Sky Astrology Podcast, and the first day of our fifth annual Big Sky Astrology Podathon.
What is a Podathon, you might ask? Well, this is the week each year when I bring you five daily episodes complete with the big astrological news of the week, and this year, interviews with fabulous astrologers from different Pluto generations. Of course, this is also the week when I make my appeal for donations, which help me cover the costs of producing the podcast.
Our first Podathon was held Labor Day Week 2020, a plan hatched by myself and then co-host Jen Braun to cover the expenses of producing the show, with a nod to the annual Jerry Lewis Labor Day Telethon of our youths. I hope you’ll be inspired to tune in each weekday during this Labor Day week. Now, before we get started with today’s episode, I really do need to take a moment to say thank you to everyone who’s helped the show over the past year, whether by making a donation, leaving a review, or to be honest, just by tuning in.
Listenership for the podcast continues to grow. And I’m thrilled to think that so many of you are tuning in and finding value in the show. I absolutely couldn’t or wouldn’t make this podcast without you invisible friends. And I truly appreciate your support, but while I do my best to run a tight ship, there are costs associated with producing this weekly show, and I would much rather turn to my listeners to help cover those costs than to take on advertising.
I’m a big podcast listener myself, and so many of the shows I love have turned to an advertising-heavy model that really interferes with the flow of the episodes and my enjoyment of them. And I’m going to assume that many of you feel the same way. And so, once a year, during Labor Day week, I bring you Podathon, and then the rest of the year, I don’t have to be talking about fundraising.
You can make a one-time donation in any amount, or become a regular monthly contributor, just by going to BigSkyAstropod.com. And to encourage your contributions, here are this year’s fantastic giveaways.
First, everyone who donates $25 or more, as well as our ongoing monthly Podpal contributors, will be entered in a drawing to win one of these prizes:
One grand prize winner will win a 90-minute reading with me, a $275 value. Two lucky listeners will win a 60-minute personal astrology reading with me, that’s a $215 value. Three lucky donors will win a copy of my Followed by a Moonshadow Eclipse Report, a $35 value, to help you get ready for the upcoming eclipses in September and October.
To be entered in the drawing to possibly win one of these prizes, you need to make your $25 donation at BigSkyAstropod. com no later than midnight on Monday, September 9th. The drawing will be held on September 10th, and winners will be notified by email.
“But April,” you might ask, “what if I can’t contribute that much?” I am so glad you asked. I’m also offering donors of $10 or more a brand new bonus for this year, a series of private YouTube videos covering new moons, going in-depth on big planetary transits or maybe giving a quarterly review. I’m still working out the details, but I think it’ll be a fun way to offer a little more value to those who are donating to the podcast.
I also want to say I realize that not everyone can contribute financially, and I get it. Here are a few easy, free ways you can show your love and support for the podcast.
If you like this show, please subscribe or follow the show on your app of choice. It is completely free, and this is the best way you can support the show and help it get seen by other potential listeners.
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However you show your appreciation, please know that I am deeply grateful.
And now for today’s episode.
In this week’s special daily episodes, I’ll be covering the week’s major astrological news, along with lunar happenings that I might not usually get to cover in a weekly podcast, and an interview with a fellow astrologer, each born in a different Pluto generation, Pluto in Leo, Virgo, Libra, Scorpio, and Sagittarius.
Today, I’m speaking with one of my very favorite astrologers and favorite people, Bay Area Astrologer Linea Van Horne, to represent for the Pluto in Leo generation. But first, let’s take a look at today’s planetary news.
Sun approaching opposition to Saturn
First, the Sun is leading up to its annual opposition with Saturn this Saturday. We’ll talk about that on Friday’s episode, but just know that everything this week is already feeling a bit slowed down, blocked, possibly aggravated by that upcoming opposition with Saturn. Keep pushing for the things that are important to you, but don’t expect them to go all that smoothly.
Virgo New Moon (Sep. 2, 2024, 6:55 pm PDT)
And now it’s time for the Moon Report. And this Labor Day Monday brings the Virgo New Moon, at 6:55 pm Pacific Time, at 11º 4’ Virgo. The New Moon sets the stage for the new lunar month, emphasizing a particular sign, as well as the house of your birth chart, where that sign falls.
The Virgo New Moon is the annual reset point for matters related to health, daily work, and routines, and the ways in which we give ourselves in service to the world. If you’ve been feeling the need to turn over a new leaf in the way you treat your body, adapting your diet, getting more exercise, the Virgo New Moon is an appropriate time to do that, and maybe even more appropriate than at the New Year.
And all the Earth signs are related to the physical dimensions of life, including the physical body, but Virgo also brings an analytical piece to the puzzle of health and can help us come up with systems, strategies, maybe even spreadsheets for making ourselves feel better. And likewise, if your home feels untidy, disorganized, or overwhelmed by your possessions, this is the New Moon to begin to put things right.
And if the work you do each day doesn’t feel satisfying or meaningful, if you don’t feel you’re in a position to serve and to offer your very best qualities, maybe this is the lunar month when you begin to brush up your resume, or if you’re self-employed, to change your business model in an important way.
Remember that the New Moon is a time to begin anew, but it’s also a dark time with no light in the night sky. It may not be immediately obvious how to make the changes that we want to make. So, make many notes at this New Moon about what’s feeling truly important to you, even if it’s not among the things that I’ve mentioned.
Again, the New Moon emphasizes a particular house in your birth chart, and its matters are very important right now. And, over the coming three years, this particular New Moon will unfold in a new lunar phase family cycle, giving lots of time for this New Moon’s plans to gestate and blossom. Look for developments in these New Moon intentions at the First Quarter Moon on June 2nd, 2025, the Full Moon on March 3rd, 2026, and the Last Quarter Moon on November 30th, 2026.
Mars square Neptune (Sep. 2, 2024, 9:09 pm PDT)
Also today at 9:09 pm Pacific Time, Mars in Gemini squares Neptune in Pisces at 28º 59’ Gemini and Pisces. Square aspects are almost always contentious, and that can be motivating or it can be aggravating. Choose your intention on that one. Mars in Gemini wants to move fast. It’s like a race car driver. But Neptune in Pisces is a little bit like trying to drive your car fast underwater.
Try to let yourself slow down a little bit and be patient when circumstances take you off-road and in a direction that you weren’t expecting.
This is the opening action point in a Mars-Neptune cycle that began on April 14th, 2022, at 0º Pisces. That marked a moment of coming to terms with what, especially in work, reviewing whether our work felt meaningful and what changes we could make to improve that. Now is the time to take action.
Interview: Pluto in Leo with Linea Van Horn
Today’s interview will be particularly interesting to you if you were born as part of the Pluto in Leo generation. Pluto was in Leo from June 13, 1939 to June 10, 1958, with little peeks ahead into Virgo between October 19th, 1956 and January 14th, 1957, and between August 18th, 1957 and April 11th, 1958, for a total of nearly 19 years.
In the US, this was the most famous baby boom, following World War II and arguably into the early 1960s. Of course, astrologers would end this generation in 1958 when Pluto entered Virgo.
So much has been written about this large and powerful generation, which was raised during a time of prosperity and rapid changes in technology. A generation that changed popular music, experimented with drugs, and was politically and socially engaged, especially as men of that generation were conscripted into the unpopular conflict in Vietnam. Of course, this generation also revolutionized the field of astrology. Let’s hear from a member of that group.
My guest today, a distinguished representative of the Pluto in Leo generation, is one of my favorite astrologers and one of my favorite people, Linea Van Horn. Linea is a certified counseling astrologer. She holds NCGR PAA’s highest level four certification. She has been a professional astrologer since 1998, and she is the founder and president emeritus of the San Francisco Astrological Society.
Formerly employed in the astrology internet industry, Linea, is an experienced astrological advisor, respected teacher, published author, and dynamic public speaker. She currently devotes herself to client work, teaching, writing, and community building in the San Francisco Bay Area. As well as NCGRPAA, she is also certified through the Organization for Professional Astrology, also known as OPA. She’s a member of AFAN, ISAR, and OPA. And her website is astrologeratlarge.com, and we will link to that in the show notes for the episode.
Linea, I couldn’t be more thrilled to have you as my guest!
Linea: Hi, April. Thank you so much for this invitation. It’s been so fun to prepare for it. So, I was born in 1955, near the end, actually Pluto in Leo. And today the Sun is actually on my Pluto. I thought that was quite synchronistic.
April: Oh, indeed. Now, outside of astrology, we’re used to hearing ourselves assigned to certain age cohorts. The Baby Boomers, Gen X, Millennials. In astrology, of course, I think we’re more commonly thinking in terms of our Pluto sign. Pluto is by far the slowest moving planet and it groups us naturally into these distinctive groups. So that’s why I really wanted to talk to a representative from each of the Pluto generations that are currently practicing astrology and find out your thoughts about your generation’s contributions to the world and to astrology.
What is it that you feel characterizes the Pluto in Leo generation, especially as astrologers?
Linea: You know, Leo is a sign of the self, as we all know, and so it’s not at all surprising that during the Pluto in Leo years, and the people who were born at that time, have developed astrology as a tool for self-help, self-recognition, development of the self, learning about our own peccadilloes and psychological issues through the lens of astrology. So I think that the sort of reorienting of astrology as more of a mundane, dry research activity, to using astrology for the self. It has been a really key development that has occurred during my tenure as an astrologer with Pluto in Leo.
But that’s not the only thing, because Leo is also a sign of leadership. And this is an area where I feel that the Pluto in Leo generation has really excelled. We’ve developed so many different organizations, some small groups such as the one that I started in San Francisco, some international or national groups.
Lots of conferences, classes, publications, and through this leadership of the Pluto in Leo generation, astrology itself has become much more publicized, far more accepted than it ever used to be. People do not run or roll their eyes when they hear about astrology anymore. So it has taken on a more studious and serious air, I would say, during these years.
I should say also that the drive to restore or to retranslate ancient texts occurred with the Pluto in Leo generation, the three Robs, Rob Hand, Rob Zoller, and uh, who was the other one…
April: Schmidt, Robert Schmidt.
Linea: Robert Schmidt, there we go. You know, which were in the early days of the modern translation events. And I, at that time, I felt, oh, this is a distinct response or reaction to, “astrology for yourself”! You know, I felt like it was a sort of a response to that in order to get more acquainted with the historical text, but that has occurred with the Pluto in Leo generation.
And then, finally, the proliferation of the computer has revolutionized the field of astrology and those computers were largely designed by Pluto in Leo and then also Pluto in Virgo following up. So that has upended the study of astrology because it has made computation and research so much easier. It’s made the distribution of astrology so wide and vast.
You know, I used to work at Astrology.com way back in the early days. And we were the first site to run free horoscopes. You could get your chart for free by going to Astrology.com and going through a bunch of pages. But we would be so excited when there was like 10,000 charts in a day. And those numbers over the time I worked there just got bigger and bigger and bigger.
And you know, I would be talking with people in New Zealand and Australia and Japan and South Africa and from all over the world. And so, the computer has absolutely revolutionized the field of astrology, both in computation and research and in distribution. So these, I feel, are all really good contributions that have been made by the Pluto in Leo generation.
And you know, one unique thing about Pluto in Leo is that we happen to be born just as Pluto was accelerating through the signs. And so, well, as I was mentioning before in our pre-interview chat, I’m going to be 70 on my next birthday, which is completely shocking to me. I’ve been able to watch Pluto through not just Leo, but Virgo, I mean all these signs, like five signs.
Now we’re going into the sixth sign, which is something that people born in other decades will never experience. We just happen to be born right at that correct sweep of time. So that’s been a unique astrological life experience.
April: Well, tell me a little bit about what you think about that opposition, because as you say, not every generation will experience that until they’re very old.
Linea: Correct.
April: I was just talking to a Pluto and Libra person yesterday who has had the square. How do you see the opposition in the whole life cycle?
Linea: Well, it’s, it’s interesting, actually, even the order of those midlife transits that we get, the Pluto square Pluto, Uranus opposing Uranus and Neptune square Neptune, those transits happen in different orders. And for most of us, throughout most of the generations, the first thing that happened would be the Uranus opposition, followed by the Neptune square. And then finally, much later, the Pluto square. I think the age ranges that the Pluto square can happen are, like, the earliest is 31 and the latest is 90. I’m kind of pulling these numbers out of, out of a hat here. I remember Geraldine Hatch Hannon did this whole study on it.
So the range of ages at which people can experience the Pluto square is vast. And it just so happens that that particular cohort, the Pluto in Libra people are the ones who get it the earliest and it ends up being the first of their midlife transits. So to me, that indicates the need for that particular generation and that cohort to develop at a faster rate of speed than the others of us have been asked to do. Because the rest of us are preparing and no, these people just boom!… get shoved right into the middle of the Pluto square Pluto, which is arguably the most difficult of those transits.
So, in line with that, now that Pluto is entering Aquarius, the Pluto in Leo generation are starting to get their Pluto opposition, I mean, which is something that many people never ever will experience. So I do think that Pluto in Aquarius does have some news reports for Pluto in Leo. The number one thing, of course, is that it’s time for us to start kind of handing over the baton of leadership to future generations and to teach and guide them into ways of doing things. Because the Pluto in Leo generation, frankly, has had some pretty good success doing these groups, but dottery now and wanting to retire.
And so it is time for the baton to be passed, the torch to be passed, and for us to retire a little bit and take a step back and be those sources of wisdom, right? That people can still refer to, you know, hopefully. So there’s that factor.
April: What do you think are some of the downsides of Pluto in Leo? How have you experienced it on a personal level as sometimes being difficult?
Linea: I can’t say that I’ve ever noticed anything difficult, particularly about Pluto in Leo. I’m laughing because, of course, Pluto in Leo can be quite, you know, self-absorbed, self-involved, not necessarily that self-aware without some counseling or help or therapy or astrology or healing of some kind. So, I would say that the selfish aspect of Leo, it could really go a long way if you have a strong Pluto in the horoscope.
And I should kind of as an aside, I should say that I feel about Pluto and in fact Uranus and Neptune, and all three of the outer planets there, that unless in a personal horoscope, they’re really tied into that horoscope by actively aspecting the faster inner planets, that they may not have such a huge impact on a person’s life. They need to be roped into that horoscope in some way because they are transpersonal – across the personal. So we all have the badge of whatever our generation, our Pluto is in, but it’s going to affect millions and millions of people. And so it’s just difficult to make a blanket statement about Pluto in Leo that’s going to apply to every single person.
So, when I’m working with clients and so forth, you really, you’re really looking for when Pluto and all those outer planets are hooked into the horoscope by way of aspects to faster planets, yeah.
April: Oh yeah, you see one of those planets connecting with the Moon, especially, the Sun or Venus or something, it’s a whole different ball of wax.
Linea: Totally is. And really not what we’re talking about today, which is much broader, more, more generational.
April: In the time that you’ve been practicing astrology, what are some of the changes in the field itself that you have found really helpful for astrologers?
Linea: Well, just the increased availability, I would say, the ease of access.
When we started, it was books. There no podcasts. There were no weekly columns. It was difficult to find a class. My God, when I started to learn, you know, how to calculate a chart by hand, you would not believe how difficult that was. There just were not people who could teach it to me. Ran through like four teachers before I found somebody who had a method that I could actually produce good charts with.
So I would say that the accessibility of astrological information has been a really, really wonderful thing. And the computer, as I mentioned before, and the internet have been key in that distribution.
April: What do you think has been detrimental to good astrology in the time you’ve been practicing?
Linea: Well, mostly they’ve been good developments. One thing that troubles me just a tiny bit lately, more than a tiny bit, I would have to say, is that many people are now coming into astrology through certain online podcasts and features and there has been a resurgence in the interest in traditional astrology, which in itself is not a bad thing, but it seems to have come with inability to be willing to look at other forms of astrology, and so that sort of reflexive attachment to one and only one form, I don’t find to be very beneficial or very helpful.
Oh, and you were talking also about working with clients and having that as be a focus of a person’s practice rather than specific techniques. And, of course, you’re absolutely right. And that’s the reason why most of the certifying bodies have a consultation skills seminar or a requirement, certainly NCGR does, ISAR does, OPA does.
You have to sit through a class, even if you’re a very experienced astrologer, about counseling skills. And when I did that with OPA, I was surprised how much I learned. And, you know, that it really did shift the way that I worked with clients. And so those consultation skills classes are very, very valuable.
Even if you don’t want to certify, it’s very good to expose yourself to the tools and techniques of effective client interaction. Because the truth is, I’m on the board of examiners for NCGR, so I’m still grading exams for people who are going through that process. One of the things that I’ve said to several of these astrologers is that the purpose of client sessions is not to convey astrology, okay?
Ha ha! It’s to connect with the client. That is the purpose. It is to connect with the client using astrology as a tool. But astrology, you know, I’ve just seen incredible examples of clients will say something very meaningful, very deep, tears come, and the astrologer just kind of runs roughshod all over it and is like, okay, well, that makes sense with your horoscope. And, you know, let’s move on to the next thing and not having the skills to create that connection, which of course is where all the work is done. It’s in that connection with the client, not in the techniques that you are conveying to them. So client connection is a super important thing.
You know, it’s not like clients are going to run away if they ask a question and you don’t know the answer. You just say, “Oh, I don’t know. That’s really, that’s not my wheelhouse or I’m not an expert in that technique. So I could do some research for you. Let me find out.” But it’s not like if you don’t know something, clients are going to flee. They’re not. They’re paying you. They respect you. Wanna hear what you have to say.
April: That’s what I’ve always told students that have studied with me that are thinking of becoming professionals. I just say, you don’t have to know everything. Just don’t misrepresent what you know. And then you’re fine. And yeah, it’s always okay to say, I don’t know, And look into it.
Linea: So now of course we’re just leaving Pluto in Capricorn and of course people who were born with Pluto and Capricorn, it’s just, they’re still children. And so we really, it’s impossible to say, although we can certainly say, oh my God, they’ll probably have a great work ethic and take their lives and their work very seriously.
And one of the things I did was I pulled up that incredible Michael Lutin article from, I think 2006 in Vanity Fair.
April: And I’ll ask you to send me that link at some point too, so I can put that in the show notes if people want to look at it.
Linea: Oh, I will do. In fact, I have the whole article here. It was written in 2006, almost 20 years ago, and you go, oh my God, this guy, he had a crystal ball. It’s just incredible. So December 6, 2006, in Vanity Fair, and the article is called Special Alert Horoscope USA.
So he’s basically talking about the Pluto return of America. Pluto is, I think, at 27 of Capricorn in the U. S. chart, so we’re just now pulling out of our Pluto return, and as we all know, it’s been pretty friggin’ hairy, and he says certain things, you know, “the words during this interval that we’re discussing,” he said, “the words ‘patriot’ and ‘treason’ will lose their meaning, and in some case, they will become interchangeable.
“The country’s mood will become much darker and much more conservative. It’s not going to be a matter of Democrat or Republican anymore. Because new ideologies will bleed across party lines.” So, of course, that’s the area where, you know, Pluto is gonna go in and really disrupt things. And my favorite phrase for Pluto in Aquarius is Power to the people. Power to the people! Ooh! I have a chill down my spine when I say that. So, that’s my hope.
You remember, um, Barbault. Well, he’s, he’s a French astrologer who’s dead now and I’m not gonna get too far afield, I promise. But he had this way of looking at time according to the aspects and the conditions between planets.
And he would have, you know, up periods and down periods, and this chart is pretty interesting because, for this particular century, you can see that there’s a huge downswing, right when the Pluto-Jupiter-Saturn conjunction occurred at the end of Capricorn, there was this huge, like, , you know, really down, like on his horoscope, and then it’s just going up, up, up.
And in fact, he felt that the years 2025 and 2026 will be some of the best years of this century as we recover and we climb out of that hole that was created by COVID, that was created by all the financial and social implications that COVID produced in terms of social distancing and supply line problems and all the economic problems that occurred. So we’re busy, you know, climbing out of here, but it’s an uphill climb, and uphill climbs are arduous and hard, and they take a lot of energy,
And actually, it’s a really good time to note, because Pluto is not the only planet changing signs, all four of the outer planets are changing signs, Within a few months next year – Pluto. in January, Pluto will have finally moved into Aquarius for good. All the rest of the planets are changing signs next year, which is to me a huge indicator that we are jumping towards a quantum leap forward.
April: Is there anything else that you wanted to share as we’re wrapping up our time together here?
Linea: I don’t think so. I mean, there’s, oh, you know, one little thing I do have here with the Pluto in Sagittarius in particular. It’s that these younger people are way more open to astrology than previous generations. So I think that in the end, you know, after all is said and done, that we may be able to depend on the Pluto in Sagittarius people. The openness of young people to astrology and the aid that it can offer their lives and the non-judgment with which they approach it, I think is really, really awesome and really helpful and will continue to spread out through that generation.
So, we end on a positive upswing there.
April: Yes. Oh, Linea, it’s been so wonderful to talk to you and thank you so much for all of your insights. And I could do an entire hour chatting with you, but I think this is where we should probably wrap it up. Again, you can find Linea at her website, astrologeratlarge.com, and we will put that link and others in the show notes so people can get in touch with you. Thank you so much.
Linea: Oh, thank you for the opportunity, April. It’s been really fun to think about and to discuss this with you, and so I’m super grateful for the opportunity. So thanks, dear.
April: I hope you enjoyed this interview! This interview and a couple others were about an hour long originally, and it was a big project to decide what to cut out for the podcast episodes, which I try to keep to about 30 minutes. It’s possible I will make the full interviews available to donors in the coming months, we’ll see how that goes.
Wrap-up
Well, that is everything I have on my show sheet, so I’m going to wrap this one up. Thank you for listening to the Big Sky Astrology Podcast and for joining me for the first episode in this Fifth annual Podathon! This weekly podcast is audience-funded, and your generous donations help me keep the podcast coming to you free of ads.
To make your donation, please go to BigSkyAstropod.com. Anyone who donates $10 or more will receive access to a series of private YouTube videos throughout the year. And if you donate $25 or more, you’ll automatically be entered in my raffle for a chance to win one of these prizes. One lucky donor will win a 90-minute reading with me, two other donors will win a 60-minute reading with me, and three lucky donors will win my “Followed by a Moonshadow” eclipse report.
As longtime listeners know, I love to thank all my financial donors on the air over the next 12 months. If you don’t want me to mention your name, please email me, April (at) BigSkyAstrology (dot) com. You’ll also receive a donor email that will have this information, but I just wanted to mention it here, too.
Thanks very much, Invisible Friend, for helping me kick off this 5th Annual Podathon. Join me again bright and early tomorrow morning for another episode, including an interview with Pluto in Virgo astrologer Armand Diaz. And until then, keep your feet on the ground and your eyes on the stars.
Announcer: That’s it for today. Don’t forget to make your donation at BigSkyAstropod.com and join us each Labor Day weekday for another very special episode of the Big Sky Astrology Podcast!
