Chiron and Eris conjunction: healing the wounded warrior goddess
I don’t love the phrase “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger”. Among the many lessons we are learning as the current structures fail is that our personal resourcefulness may be proportional to the trauma we have endured - but only to a point. We have reached the max point of fatigue from exercising resourcefulness, and are realizing we need help before our bodies and nervous systems collapse along with the systems and structures.
In the current astrology, this breaking point is flagged with urgency, as asteroid Chiron and dwarf planet Eris meet for the third and final time in Aries in our lifetime on March 19th. The urgency stems from Aries, and how fitting this conjunction occurs days after the vernal equinox. Dane Rudhyar writes in Astrological Insights into the Spiritual Life:
Aries is passion of life. At the vernal equinox, death and birth meet in the symbolic Easter. In this meeting there is power, joy - incomprehension also.
I can feel the collective incomprehension. We don’t want to give up, yet we wonder what living will look like in the after-times?
You may have heard of Chiron, because it is part of the mid-life curriculum of transits, as Chiron in the sky returns to where it was at your birth around age 51. Chiron represents where you have experienced a core wound that is resistant to complete healing. In nursing your own wound, you learn how to help others with similar wounds to the body, mind, or soul. This may look like witnessing someone’s pain, grief, or disconnection without turning away. It may look like becoming a healer or carer. It may look like connecting people back to nature and natural rhythms. The modalities and means are many: one-to one, groups, community places, writing, podcasting, teaching, mentoring, friendship, connection with divine energy in all its forms.
With Chiron, we learn the art and science of not pushing through, and of experiencing healing as love.
In mythology, Eris was Ares’ (Mars) sister and followed Ares into battle, fighting as as fiercely as Ares. She is known as the goddess of strife and discord. This label is one interpretation of the cause of the Trojan War. Eris was the only goddess not invited to the wedding of Pelius and Thetis. She is said to have been so angry that she crashed the wedding virtually, throwing a golden apple with the inscription “To the fairest” into the celebration, which caused Hera, Aphrodite, and Athena to begin a rivalry and sequence of events leading to the Trojan war.
There is a back story, though. The reason Zeus banned her from the guest list is that she wasn’t quiet about her opposition to the way the patriarchy, under Zeus’s leadership, was displacing the goddess worshipping culture.
It is fitting that Eris’s discovery in 2005 started a debate among astrophysicists as to the scientific definition of a planet (up until then Pluto was designated as a planet, which raised a dilemma about what to call Eris, basically a twin in size to Pluto).
This correlation to Pluto in size extends to the characteristics of Eris astrologically. Pluto brings lessons around the use of power in pursuing one’s soul desire (individually and collectively). As with Pluto, there is a component of soul desire, but similar to Mars’, there is also an embodied component. Mars is a personal embodiment of the soul’s desire (via the Sun and Moon), while Eris appears to bring an embodiment of the collective’s desires, especially in the sign of Aries, where Eris has been since 1922.
Although astrologers are still learning about Eris’ meaning, in the birth chart, Eris appears to represent a compulsion to delve into the psyche in order to live out one’s soul purpose, or dharma, once it is brought from the unconscious to the conscious. Therefore there is a transformative element similar to Pluto, and a strong drive like Mars, but with a paradigm shifting bent. Individuals with a strong Eris “…will fight for what they believe in and that they must follow their own inner compass in so doing. Their mission comes from deep inside them and could be equated with what I have been calling “soul purpose” — that which, once you are aware of it, you cannot refrain from doing.”1
Considering the various components of Eris’s energy - warrior goddess, truth-to-power, soul purpose embodiment, paradigm shifter - over the last 100 years or so in Aries, we might conclude these energies have largely been repressed as the values of capitalism have dominated. Ah, but there is an element to Eris of how others see you, and how you navigate any blowback. We have certainly seen examples of blowback, and perhaps internalized the examples and kept quiet. Yet, the energy remains, even when unspoken and disembodied. This is perhaps where Chiron will help. Will we find a way to listen to the ugly truths as they continue to emerge, to hold space for the anger and grief of the oppressed and exploited? And then creatively and lovingly find ways to heal ourselves and each other in an embodied way? In careful and thorough collective healing, we will see how to live in the after-times.
Eris was discovered in 2005 and classified a planet in 2006. It is Pluto’s twin in size, and lies in the Kaiper Belt, 3 times farther from our sun than Pluto. Its orbit is 557 years.
In today’s Conscious Curiosities podcast episode, I further discuss the astrological context of the conjunction of Chiron to Eris in Aries, which has been exact three times: 5/26/25, 10/8/25 retrograde, and will be exact again March 19th, for the last time in the sign of Aries in our lifetime.
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From Henry Seltzer’s article first published in the Mountain Astrologer, 2015 / 08.07.2020
Once again, you offer insight into the energies that influence us - whether we believe in said energies or not! (Like climate change). My 51st year was one of profound change, a reconsideration of a conventional life. I am hopeful for the collective energy of Eris in this challenging landscape. A wonderful post, thank you!
Maria, this is a fascinating post. Thank you! I'm going to come back and listen to your podcast episode. One of the many interesting points you share is about Chiron being active when we are 51. You wrote about that age causing us to be especially aware of an essential wound (my paraphrase), and learning to offer healing to others with that wound. For me, that was around ten years ago, after I'd left institutional teaching in order to write. In that same period, I also found myself embarking on a path to train and build a practice helping others to heed their own unique, creative calling. How cool to think of Chiron at play in that mid-life transit! The coaching piece had been a surprise to me.