The other day I was writing (somewhere) about how a death of a central figure in a family often decimates that family. Regardless of how people become estranged, once you lose the connection to a person or persons and time starts to pass, the connection will dissolve.
I’ve seen this with power struggles or some other kinds of stalemate between siblings or friends. While you may never truly sever a blood connection, I think it’s a mistake to believe you can pick up the phone in five or ten years and put things back the way they were, after a long time has passed.
Relationships strengthen when you invest in them. If you pull out of a relationship and someone has fared without you for five or ten years, you should not be surprised to learn that your presence in their life is not that important.
With Saturn ready to leave Libra, I can’t emphasize this enough: Invest in the people you value. Maintain that bond.
Is there someone you are estranged some, when you know it shouldn’t be?
Elsa, estrangement from close circles of people is a major theme in my life at this time, I’ve been cutting myself off quite successfully. I know it to be wrong and it is due to a lot of anxiety and lack of confidence on my part. Could you please shed some light on the impact of Saturn leaving Libra. Do my actions mean I’m avoiding my possible “graduation from relationships” or am I actually graduating by using such a destructive route?
This is what I have been going through since my husband passed, leaving me to raise two kids. Most connections with both my husbands family and friends did dissolve, mostly out of my own self protection from people who had way too many expectations of a widow. I also had to cut myself off from my very catholic family who thought “I deserved what I got” by getting remarried after being divorced. I do not have as many relationships as I used to, but I know the ones that have remained are real and true. There are people I have not been in contact with for 10 years and I expect to never hear from them again. The real lesson was that I was the one running and taking care of everyone else. I created boundaries, (Saturn in Libra?) my only purpose had to be taking care of what was left of my little family. Anything else just had to fall away. It was a hard lesson, but ultimately liberating.
Good morning, Elsa and thanks for the reminder and encouragement to invest in the ones I value. I have a family situation that is a perfect living example of what that means. Being mother and sister to a son and brother who continue to blow on the legacy of pride and stand-off, I was visited in dream by my Mother, the Pisces Mediator Mom. In the flesh and in that dream she lived with generosity genes to calm and hold the family together.
She passed more than twenty years ago. I have mediated, and see what a job that is. It’s that Pisces ability to know how to swim in shallow water that reminds me (the Scorpio deep sea diver) to dog paddle. I love both the brother and the son, invest in them with that generosity gene without choosing and spare myself in the process, too.
To answer the question, no. Everyone I have cut out of my life needs to stay out of my life. I do not regret my decisions. It is not something I do lightly.
Unfortunately, the above-described scenario has been completely true in my life. When my grandmothers on each side of the family died, the entire family fell apart.
On my father’s side, people I saw my entire life suddenly disappeared out of my life because my father wouldn’t socialize with his own family (his problem, not theirs). I communicate through mail and email with one uncle and one cousin.
On my mother’s side, our family was already tiny, however, I cut off my aunt and cousins. The stress of dealing with them was too great for me to handle at that point in my life. My grandmother’s death ripped away my stability on Earth, so I was already vulnerable. My aunt expected me to follow through with the toxic family dynamic, but I refused. I saved myself and my kids.
Uranus was Conjunct my ASC, and Trans Pluto was in my 10th. I knew that the amputations I made at that time were likely to be permanent.
I can’t think of anyone I’m estranged from that I would want to reconnect with. What Saturn in Libra taught me was that my friendships were very unbalanced. I needed to invest more or accept more in almost all of my relationships. As it nears the end of Libra, I’m grateful for what I’ve learned and the effort to balance my relationships has improved them very much. Thank you Saturn.
The people who are estranged from me seem perfectly fine with this, thanks. They have either drifted off/moved on, or in the case of my dad’s relatives, never liked me in the first place and now they aren’t obligated to put up with me.
Reconnecting with ex-friends doesn’t really seem to work because well, they have moved on. I think it shouldn’t be, but clearly they don’t agree!
I don’t know…once people are gone, they’re gone.
Thanks I needed this reminder. While there’s no one I’m estranged from that I need to reconnect with, I need to strengthen the bonds with those I am connected to.
My nephew. He just didn’t want to talk to me after he figured out I have depression/anxiety. It came as a shock to him. He couldn’t take it that I’m human and have a flaw so I cut him out of my life. I don’t need people who only care about ‘perfect’ people. Asta Lavista Baby! 🙂
But to answer your question, people who are out of my life I don’t regret cutting them out.
I’m with those who are out of my life staying that way, too. Life is like a highway, we meet up with people, travel on for a while, then go different directions.
We incarnate in groups anyway, so do we really believe we are EVER rid of anyone?
Unfortunately, the only people I am estranged from, I definitely should be.
When my father died, I believed that I was finally free of the negative judgement and fear that had colored my life for 40 years. Then, my brother made it very clear that, in spite of knowing how harmful it had been to me to live that way, the family line of “ruth is so difficult, she doesn’t deserve” (born simply because I was the truth teller of the family), was such an important part of how he defined himself, that it was going to continue ad infinitum. I haven’t looked back. I need/deserve people in my life who support me, who like me, who think I am good. Believe me, I am. No ego, just simple truth. One cousin tried to tell me that “your brother loves you so much, why just yesterday he was telling me what a shame it was that you never lived up to your potential”. Nope, I can live without that in my life.
“Could you please shed some light on the impact of Saturn leaving Libra.”
@MalleTelle – My feeling is decisions you make, specifically in the realm of relationships, have long term consequences (for good or ill).
I come from such a large family (on both sides), that keeping contact can be hard (but not too hard thanks to FB). Connections with relatives slowly vanishes after my grandparents died and my cousins began families of their own. Things happen. Things change. I only feel guilty not reaching out to those who have tried reaching out to me. But I’m starting to come around.
Great advice, perfect timing. I’m working to strengthen the bonds within our own family.
Unfortunately I know this situation all to well. Truth be known when my mom passed parts of her remaining family just didn’t know what to do. Then her oldest living sibling passed and then. Things got even more difficult it is like the glue in the fabric of our family is dissolving. I am trying my damnedest to keep it together and so is a couple of the other cousins but connecting is really hard to do. Then when my father passed and my oldest brother on the same day 12 hours apart my older sister has not talked to me since very odd. I have tried on numerous occasions. She is not in the best of heath either so I am concerned but obviously she does not want any contact with us very sad really.
I have since stopped trying even I can take a hint when they more or less slam the door in your face so to speak.
Sometimes our charts mesh better with our friends when we’re both children than when we’re both adults. Regrets are unhealthy, and feeling bad about what can’t be helped is useless. I’m lucky and grateful for the time that was and that’s that.
There are two that I would like to have in my life, but that don’t seem to care, so I’m not going to worry about it. I’m living without them just fine.
I’ve estranged from people over the years and never looked back.
More recently, I have become estranged from my son and my mother as I made a choice to not be a part of what he was doing and my mother decided that I could see reason if she laid a huge guilt trip on me about it.
To an extent, I’ve had to pull back from the extended family in order to not get them involved and to tend to my Cancer side inside my shell.
I’m deeply saddened by it all, but I strongly doub it could ever go back to anything close to what it once was.
There’s very minimla contact and it’s pretty shallow on my end – shallow for my own protection, not that I don’t care, I just can’t let myself be involved.
Thank you for raising this question. I have been pondering a couple of family relationships that I am not sure I want to invest in further.
one of the silver linings of my grandfather’s death was my willingness to try to restart dialogue with my mother when i became pregnant two years later. i had not spoken with her in seven years.
losing him was an enormously grounding experience. eventually. made me realize how petty certain things were in relation to family. especially as an adult.
Yes. I’ve been trying to re-invest in some relationships, but as I’m going through a Pluto transit, it seems these folks cut me off for good. I’m being responsible (saturn) about my relationships (libra) and that includes accepting some losses and learning to build other connections from where I am today.
I don’t know if this is a Saturn in Libra thing, but I’m having to deal with my relationship to myself. If I’m honoring myself, I can no longer keep my relationship with my dad, who has been abusive my entire life. This is not going over well with the family. My mother is trying to lay down the guilt to keep things as they were, but if “I” am to survive, I have to let this go. My family will never be the same again. That’s ok. I wanted to die to for so long, and I’ve finally seen the light.
This is so sad for me. I became estranged from my uncle and cousin after my dad passed away. He called me the other day. I’d did not want to be estranged in any way but it happened