Attachment

The psyche invests its energy in various structures, functions, approaches to life that it believes will meet its needs and protect it from harm. Its choices are based to some extent upon its natural abilities and inclinations, and to some extent upon environmental opportunities and pressures. Once established, a psychological structure develops a certain amount of inertia that resists change.

In astrological terms, Saturn makes these choices, approving of and supporting or disapproving of and opposing the natural tendencies of the psyche as seen in the overall birth chart. Saturn is primarily concerned with assuring survival by maintaining and enhancing the individual's status quo. Security and stability are valued; change is feared and resisted. Thus it does whatever it can to maintain and defend already established psychological and behavioral structures. This strategy works reasonably well in a static environment. In a changing one, however, familiar approaches to life may begin to fail. This generates anxiety, which is simply the urge of the overall psyche to rearrange its energy to better adapt to the environment. Saturn tends to interpret this feeling as a danger signal. It marshalls its resources to defend the very structures that need to transform. This defensive process is attachment - holding on to the old and familiar despite its maladaptiveness.

Saturn's primary ally in this battle is the South Node. By channeling energy to this most familiar and developed function, the overall pattern of the psyche is held together. I call the South Node the "linchpin of the ego". It provides a fundamental approach to life that orients and stabilizes the rest of the psyche. By emphasizing the South Node, attachment is maintained, ironically to the detriment of suvival, as well as to personal development and social evolution.

It does not have to be this way. A strong and healthy Saturn, while initially opposing change, will eventually see that its overall function to ensure individual and collective survival is best served by letting go of attachment and allowing the psyche to acknowledge the current reality and to reorganize. When the attachment to the South Node is released, a new center of orientation at the North Node naturally emerges.