There is simply no way that a Chiron Return relationship will be a reboot of any former production. If you’re dating at this point, you’re not seeking a repeat performance – if you are, rethink. And you’re presumably not seeking a partner to have children with or bail you out financially – you want a genuine companion.
There is a high chance that you’ve acquired some wisdom and are mature enough to be independent, not needy. The mid-life romance of the artist Francoise Gilot and the virologist Jonas Salk was famously individuated. Devoted to one another, they nonetheless spent significant time apart. It was the opposite case for the musician Lou Reed – he met the avant-garde composer Laurie Anderson practically on the night of his Chiron Return and they were rarely apart from that moment on.
(FYI, for her it was the once-in-a-lifetime Pluto-Venus opposition aka Big Love.)
Like the better-known Saturn Return, Chiron Return is cyclical, experienced by everyone in their late 40s/early 50s. When Chiron comes back to its natal placement, it’s like cracking your own code.
This transit has the eccentricity of Uranus Opposition but far less of the wildness; maybe because you have little need for performative rebel stunts. And of course you’re unlikely to hare halfway across the world (or even your neighborhood) for sub-optimal sex or dubious validation.
While it has that Uranian edge of disregard for how people in general/society perceive your choices, Chiron Return has more spiritual gravity. If you’ve decided that you want a new partner at this time, it’s both confronting and exciting. You’re weirdly probably the best equipped for a quality relationship that you’ve ever been yet the social and media consensus opinion can be demoralizing.
Married friends or family can also be less than helpful, with some assuming that their status is the template and everything else a deviation. Yet who knows how often some of them secretly envy your autonomy? There are obviously no “shoulds” or “should-nots” in the world of Chiron Return Dating but here are some broad tips/suggestions.
(1) Your Vibe Rules.
Being at Chiron Return means you’re seasoned and presumably have well-honed instincts from decades of dealing with d-heads, trolls, litigants, toxicity and standover tactics in boardrooms, backstage, at bus-stops etc. Money, health and existential crisis situations that would previously have had you in a spinning frenzy are now mere irritants. So, if you think someone seems suss, they probably are. Respect your instincts and value your trust/personal space to not let others in casually.
(2) You Don’t “Need” A Partner
If you want to abdicate from dating/mating in favor of self-love, travel, creativity, reading, compassionate causes, friends/kids, animals, a solitary spiritual path or any combo of the above, do it. There is no obligation to have “a companion” – no matter what lifestyle inserts and insurance ads imply. It’s no more an indicator of psychological wellness than being a parent or not being a parent. Embodying this makes you more likely to attract a quality relationship rather than someone to simply help you avoid a dreaded ‘single status.’
(3) Don’t Discount Money
Grifters automatically assume that anyone past Chiron Return is loaded and that only some carefully applied sycophancy or sensual patter stands between them and your cash or other resources. Lol. Flick them as soon as it is apparent. It’s not that you’re seeking wealthy people to spend quality time with – it’s more that financial sanity and independence are imperative. Fiscal neediness or confusing a companion with a wallet is not attractive. If a person seems like they’re more interested in a ‘nurse or a purse’ – opt out.
(4) Zero Tolerance For Energy Vampires
In some cases, you can end up knowing so much about a prospective partner/date, that you could win a quiz show with them as the subject. “Yes!” This is when you bang the buzzer that signals you know the answer. “At the age of 9, they moved interstate but didn’t like the house because it was weatherboard.” Next question – you know the answer again! “I know the ex-wife’s occupation and where she went to school!” If the conversation is totally skewed toward the other person all the time or you realize that you’re expected to be an unpaid therapist, flick them. If that’s them in “courtship” mode, imagine what it would be like when familiarity set in. And at Chiron Return or after, they’re unlikely to snap out of this conduct.
(5) Broaden Your Approach
Online dating can be hideous for people of any age and for a variety of well-documented reasons. If you’re not feeling it, take a broader approach and simply set out to broaden your social circle or network more. Think of your quest as an expansion that will naturally draw in more ‘you’ type people rather than thinking ‘pursuit’ or in the narrow metrics of ‘partnership.’ One of my aunts met and married a wonderful man at her Chiron Return when plunged into semi-obsessive gardening after a difficult divorce/professional era – he was the fern expert and it grew gradually.
(6) Beware Time-Tripping
Your lovers from decades ago can seem appealing all of a sudden but just as you’re not the same person you were then – unless you’ve congealed – nor are they. And if it’s more about them being a touchstone for past memories, no. Nostalgia is aging and if you let it get out of hand, it will calcify your psyche. In the same vein, consider editing down your narrative of “the past” so it’s more a precis or a summary than a ten-volume textbook. People do sometimes re-unite with their teenage lover and it’s fantastic but trawling the archives for a dopamine hit can lead to a psychic hangover.
(7) Clarify Your Desires
Do you want a full-blown, share-everything partnership or someone to grumble about the government with and sleep with twice a week? A Tantric soulmate or companion to attend one another’s work/family functions with? Person to help you build a sanctuary or simpatico nomad? What factors would have this hypothetical lover off your list – eg: a specific religious affiliation, habitual drug use, political opinions etc? Being clear on this will save you a lot of time and cognitive energy.
(8) Ignore Age or Appearance Concerns
Yes it’s difficult when people use terms like “back on the market” or you can’t help but compare yourself with the other people seeking partners on an online dating site, for example. But every age has its pleasures and its disadvantages. Trying to control things you literally cannot – time itself – is futile. As would be trying to wow people who would hold the very fact of your age – aka survival – against you. Looking your best, yes – why not? It’s a morale thing but at Chiron Return, you’re not cast as ‘the ingenue’ – you’re beyond playing any relationship role other than yourself.
Thoughts?
Image: Devil Girl From Mars
Is there a connection between the Chiron Return and the Saturn Return? I just started dating at 49, now 50 and almost everyone I match with is in the 28-30 range which seems strange but feel right somehow. I feel like I’m reliving my life from that time in a healthier way. Does that make sense? And what would the Saturn Return person be getting from it?
Uuuggghhhh Mystic, I had my 41st birthday on Jan 27. I’ve been single by choice for 5 years and have not had any interest to become involved with yet another *broken* person. Yet, for some strange reason, I find myself joining an online dating site (I swore I would never online date again after the last one from 5 yrs ago). I refuse to pay money, so I can only see blurry pictures and read descriptions.
It’s like being able to smell the truth through the spaces between words… this one is a gambling addict, this one suppresses his anger, this one ‘drinks’. Most of them wouldn’t know themselves if they slapped themself with a dead wet fish. *groan*
However, it has got me thinking about starting an online dating site for a completely different caliber of person. Not this shite *elite singles* BS… elite? in what way are the profiles I’m perusing elite?
A site for people who are purposefully conscious, perhaps decline the hoochie juice and opt for straight celery and only plant based options. Creative folks, hippie folks, down to earth *not shaving my legs* folks… Toxin free and ‘woke’ without the hashtags.
Perhaps because Saturn is direct or that the season is changing, but I’m feeling more optimistic about the prospect of dating again. Saturn has one more pass to make over my moon and I really hope I’ve got the lessons, finally. The Toro and I finished up in April and I’ve done plenty of soul mining since then. Not sure I would go online again but I am opening myself to seeing opportunity around me. It has to be about shared values, that’s where the chemistry will have to come from next time around. Otherwise pretty happy to stay solo. I always had the Neptune sq Venus fairy tale relationship fantasy but in reality I don’t know if I’m suited for a conventional relationship. Venus in Aqua conj dsc, Cap moon-Lilith.
This is actually solid dating advice for any age, era or aspect.
I get to do my Chiron Return three times. Natal Chiron at 2 Aries and this nifty Chiron Rx going on. The run-up to the initial return was brutal, an ego shedding, a lot of time alone, a lot of letting go letting go letting go, all kinds of physical issues. Dating during that time was non-existent or a lesson in “no, not that.” I believed sex would never happen again. I believed I was meant to be alone. I was adjusting.
Things have changed and there’s someone along for the ride and I’m enjoying the hell out of it.
Well I feel all of the above but I am also a 5th house cusp in Capricon and I am “enjoying” Saturn transit and Pluto transit so everything vaguely “flimsy” does not stand a chance to raise the faintest interest on my side.
Chiron return/conjunct 1 exact at 18.33 degrees in my 8th house and as Pluto was crossing my descendant – 29 March 2015 = discovered my husband at the time was viewing porn for hours at a time whilst alone at home with my disabled non-verbal daughter. One of my biggest fears for her safety confronting me with a wallop. Other secrets came out so fast it was the closest I ever came to a breakdown. Chiron is also opposite my Mars by less than 1 degree.
Chiron return 2 – 27 September 2015 = I don’t remember but every day during the last 3 months of that year seemed to be a Uranus influenced craziness. A bloke hiding in my backyard overnight, bomb scares, keys almost falling into a metre deep drain, a crazy neighbour living in a divorce fantasy……I started documenting for a while it was so crazy. But I met it with humour. The fear of loss of control of my own world was being flung at me every day, but I was slowly gaining a new social life.
Chiron return 27 January 2016 = an invitation for a trip with girlfriends from my past out of the blue and unexpected money landing in my account so I was able to go. A beautiful healing week in March of fun and laugher and pretending we were still all 19. That week saved my soul.
Meeting a bloke who’s Chiron was EXACTLY the same placement as mine and yet we weren’t born in the same year. The most loving, affectionate and interesting man I’d met in my life who became a monster of mind games and power plays. The best lover I’d ever have and probably every will have but he used sex and orgasms as a control tool. He almost broke me but he taught me many, many lessons about myself and how to restructure my communication so as not to offend.
Post Chiron-lesson bloke and I had a short stint with one who kept banging on with self-sympathy about past failed relationships. He was turfed way before familiarity set in and I did warn him before so. “I live in the now” I said, “and the present is us, not him and an ex discussion”. He occasionally wanders past the back gate yelling something from his car, and it doesn’t sound like “I love you and miss you”, lol!!
Chiron taught me a lot and I value those lessons greatly but I’m glad I’m not going through those times again. I’m a bit afraid of the upcoming Chiron conjunct Mars in Aries though! I hope all of the lessons from Chiron crossing my four 8th house planets and opposite my 3 planets in the 2nd house have prepared me in case I become a big mouth out of control.
Reading your post felt like watching a dramatic movie.
The highlight was acting like you were still 19. LOL !
😊 it reminded me of what I wanted to be and still could be. It was beautiful and changed my whole focus. Chiron is a bitch and a gift.
It’s been a tough old ride for sure. I’m amazed how we deal with all this shizzz
A few weeks after my 50th birthday and during my Chiron return (Chiron at 26 Pisces in the 10th), I met my current bf, with a couple starts and stops, and now we live together and in a whole new city. I hadn’t been in a significant relationship in a very long time, like over 15 years. We’re together now 1 year and 8 months. This resonated:
“it’s got that Uranian edge of not remotely caring for how people/society perceive your choices. And then it has a spiritual gravity and gentle confrontation of the facts which feels super-Saturnine.” So, my bf is significantly younger than i am and, yeah, I really don’t care what people think and I’ve heard all the conventional stuff from some of my friends that people say about this type of relationship, but also most people in my life are pretty accepting of it. He’s not after my money because I don’t have any! Uranian: He and I have Sun (mine )/ Moon (his) conjunct in Aquarius, and my natal Uranus conjuncts his Sun and his, mine. I feel the ‘time’/Saturn factor, too, and I feel ok with it. It makes things more immediate and less taking for granted. We both have Saturn in early Aries, conjunct by 4 degrees.
I have Venus in Capricorn, too, which I think we’ve discussed here can create dating older when younger, and younger when older, and I am a textbook example of this looking at my dating/relationship history.
Hey that is so cool!
well done you!
xx
Thanks! xx
Good for you. It sounds with the synastry like it’s a perfect pairing for a very different relationship. Who said it was same age same neighbourhood same colour same creed same old same old?! I think if your auras connect go for it. Sounds wonderful to me.
Ahh this is lovely to hear as I remember you weren’t travelling so well for while, romance-wise xx
I just turned 50 myself, and applaud you and your relationship, long may it wave.
Thanks, all! I appreciate your votes of confidence!
Enjoy, don’t analyse flower child.
Feeling this so much lately..
so much so that the idea of dating has not been remotely attractive this whole year and I don’t feel even a little bit tempted to break my fast yet
I just turned 47 so is it too early?
Chiron is currently very near my natal Chiron position.
The again, so is Virgo, the sun, mercury, mars and Jupiter. I have never enjoyed a moment astrologically as much as I’m enjoying this one. And it’s odd because I’m not enjoying anything par se- I’m more not doing than doing. I seem to be defined more by things I have let go of lately, things I can do without and waiting for that south node to completely disengage enough that my north node starts giving me directions.
My natal Chiron is in the fifth and in Aries (as now)
there’s a lot of inner child rescue work that I’ve done both in therapy and just on my own volition. Not self sabotaging her, letting her live in peace as she always wanted to.
I think the next step is implementing structure and a plan.
I’m still waiting for my orders tho
oh wow yes
just realised my venus has also progressed into Libra now. It’s been in virgo for the longest time (hence using my natal venus in leo placement for WERK in my former career-that feels like an-other lifetime/s) now just BEing feels quietly powerful. That quietness is a feeling of needing to keep things real.
earth stoic is the new bling #uranusintaurus
Get through it, get past it and you will go ‘wow, look at me and what I can do”.
This is all apt for myself and I’m in my Uranus opposition – have had enough of the wildness though. But this new beau is just coming into his own Uranus opp and is very balanced despite it? Or all previous beaus were just total narcs. As always, very decent advice, Mystic. Loving it.
This is an apt description of dating in midlife!! My b.s. tolerance is in the negatives, and guys who monopolize the first meet-up describing how great they are do not get a second time. I’ve seen some things so many times that I don’t even have to think twice about certain decisions. I never imagined being in this space in my 20s!
Not quite there yet but in the run up to return I have Chiron currently on my moon opposite Pluto, with mercury and Venus having just tralala’d over, next comes Venus then the sun.
Only just this week I thought if all the “lovers” I’ve had who started out as amazing musical or artistic or intellectual relationships but fizzed into hookups or got left behind when they entered partnerships.
That creative tension is not something I was ever taught to navigate, raised by depression-era “until death” Catholics. Not blame, just, learning curve. Unlearning dependence to foster cocreativity. Should be interesting.
Unlearning seems to take a long time but I sometimes wonder if it’s an optical illusion or a mind trick and maybe the thing that takes a while is the letting go and being willing to ditch and start again. Idk – it’s absolutely personal for everyone and this is just one of my many possible theories for things that spring forth from my mind/mouth 😉
My mutable nature resists absolutes until my Cap planets hold a secret board room meeting with my Asc and they quietly call the shots – sometimes I’ve caught them out busy building a legacy whether the rest of the chart likes it or not haha.
You just reminded me that Chiron is trine my Sun and SN. And we’re Sun Moon trine.
Having Pluto and then Saturn square the lot from the 4th has been a rewind I didn’t know I had to take. I’d been in impulse/untouchable medication land long enough to see things they’d never have had access too but will have to train diligently to access the way to live/use with what I learned. If I decide to.
This is the part in the movie where I train somewhere with someone. Rocky and remote. Or I can just still live at dads.
Unrelated, or maybe totally related I’m almost at ten years of celibacy. So it would take some hybrid of humanity I’ve yet to encounter to get me to couple up. I still listen to emotional singer songwriters, that feels like some weird hold over. The psyche is a curious thing, protecting me I suppose. Maybe that’s the anti fragile vibe, don’t get hard or you’ll crack. Do sags crack? I can’t imagine.
The 4th can be an underestimated house I think. Not in the obvious ways. It’s not til you start digging….
That’s my Pluto Uranus and since moving back to my home state it’s been something I can’t yet succinctly sum up but easy ain’t it. Perfect Segway into ‘do Sags crack?’ and how to answer that. Broadly yep I think so and I’ve seen it beyond the fiery tanty, which we’re all quite good at particularly if you throw a bit of righteousness in! Personally, I’ve skated some edges and fallen off. I can’t absolutely say why the cracks haven’t become the chasms they have for others but it could be Cap 8th and the personal planet cluster there, mainly (maybe) Mars. Some things are too mysterious to explain.
You’re in athlete training mode. You’re aware of choice and there’s a freedom in that. Space isn’t always a void that needs to be filled and watching for signposts is an active choice not passive if we’re plotting a new map. We trust that the winds will come and in the meantime we repair our fishing nets eh.
I think celibacy can be a good way to get in touch with your own energy in an uncompromised way. It’s handy to learn what feels are our own – another tool for the box. Anything that isn’t is coming from outside and that can assist with boundaries. The human experience is a mystery. There is no separation (we are all one) yet we come here for an individuated (separate) experience. Celibacy, not necessarily isolation or lack of connection as that can be a bit too useful for Neptune thinking. Mingling energies do blend over time and there’s nothing wrong with that either but if the sense of where we end and another begins isn’t clear it can get hard to identify what’s ours and what isn’t. That’s also a 4th house theme that starts young so we’re often unconscious to it’s effects until we start our individuation journey.
I’m happily in my own groove since my last relationship and that’s been my MO forever aside from Chiron. I take space and I don’t define space as this is long enough or too long etc. It’ll change when I get the scent on the wind that it’s time.
It feels so close to simple.
A)I and everyone else deserves love
B) I love everyone and everything
C) the way I learned HoW to love us different from others and uncomfortable for me.
Ergo
D) learn new ways to love and be loved
With no expectations
Easy peasy
🙂 xx
lol the image is the perfect description of what my dating life feels like sometimes…. I feel like the one in red at the coffee table….
this is my favorite scene in that movie
even better than the cafeteria on the death star :->
Maybe just maybe because I have Chiron conjunction Saturn on my asc that I have always had the ‘this is me, take it or leave it’ running through my internal monologue even dialogue. It’s only now (53y) that I know who they can take or leave !!
Chiron conj Saturn on your ascendant?
Holy crap!
that is hardcore
Errrrr well yes. It’s been a walk in the park, or it would have been if I’d have read ever antifragile manual by the age of two months old !! You’ll laugh because opposing that is Pluto Uranus bang on conjunction on my dc. Just for added zest
I mean truly God was having a laugh !
My money might be on the see-sawing of that axis which is most definitely not the kind of see-saw you’ll find on walk through an every day park.
It’s a rollercoaster with loops !
Yep 🙂
wow
just shaking my head and laughing with you
A top post, Mystic. Thank you 💓
Love, Love, love this. Having just moved through my Chiron return this speaks so well to how I’m thinking about partnering. Thanks for your sage insights, Mystic!
46, single parenting of a 15 year old and in menopause !
All the hormones and none of them
What a time to be alive! 🙂
Chiron return has a strong element of coming home. Full circle !
Brilliant
Brillo advice!
I am one of the some who think that Chiron is a bridge between. I like your description.
My thinking has been the sort of learning | initiation | stripping back that Chiron brings is necessary to really integrate elements of acceptance. Broad strokes and loose words as I attempt to describe the elusive missing ingredient that arrives without instruction or an obvious use. The ingredient that changes the dial to accessing you’re own Saturn or Uranus in new ways, peaceful ways, accepting ways and that opens up their possibilities.
We grow up with those two planets as external experiences eg lessons, crisis, restriction, authority, alienation (all of the a-typical associations) and a sense of not being in control of these outside events, perhaps even ourselves. We begin with an idea that we have to endure or rebel perhaps. Chiron return brings that link or ingredient and he is as much a key as a bridge and each one is personalised like each soul’s experience. A unique soul is forged through the process.
Editing down the narrative of the past gets my nod. Exactly.
Nostalgia is aging is also a nice snappy reminder.
I was pondering how nostalgia looks for each sign or how it plays out with elements and modalities. Water probably wins out or is that weeps out, earth might bury it but it’s still there and fire… well fire can burn and run and look free but is that a bitter taste from the ash in your mouth? Hahaha perhaps. Fixed water 7th says that this stuff gets in the cracks and every time you do a spring clean you find a little more silt to wash away.
Beautiful reply Centaurus.
Necessary to integrate elements of acceptance – so true.
Thanks mate 🙂
I just realised I left out air in my skip through nostalgia and that’s perhaps how they might visit it, by omission . Or with some forward momentum and plenty of air under their feet and from their mouth a sunny or superficial narrative woven in around the real story so neatly you can barely notice the difference – but if you do oops… they’ve skipped off in a different direction and you’ll have to recalibrate your theory.. quickly now, keep up!. My Gem Jupiter agrees emphatically.
I’m on “team bridge”, too. And just think we had 40 years of Chiron/Uranus opposition (with sometimes Saturn thrown in the mix “just for fun”). This multigenerational transit, I believe, was a game changer for relationships, the aspect mimics the axis of 1H/7H after all. For those born after 1991, when Chiron broke free, their Chiron returns will have a very different theme. xx
Team bridge 🙂
Yes, it’s interesting to think what later returns will be like actually. There will be some similarities with the Saturn fun in 1992 as the opposition sets up with Saturn for the lucky few xx
Brilliant expose Mystic. Again.
Such great advice (for any age?). I’m not fifty yet but the last time I set out dating I went to a psychologist and ran all my choices past her. It was enlightening! I can highly recommend that approach too if you find a professional you trust and who has a sense of humour.
Also thanks Mystic for putting into words something I’ve always felt. Nostalgia is aging! That emotion is a waste of time.
Good lord This advice should be handed out to everyone who is coming 50. I don’t think I can add anything apart from read it and believe it !
Great advice. Didn’t even know I was doing a Chiron Return. Go 50!
And how’s it going for you?