Last time I shared my notes on how Uranus works with the Evolutionary Axis of Pluto and the nodes to liberate you from old conditioning on the path of individuation. This process unfolds in stages throughout your life but can also be mapped across multiple lifetimes. In this post, we’ll explore the different stages of evolution as outlined by Jeff Green in his book Pluto: the Evolutionary Journey of the Soul, Vol 1.

The evolution of the soul is driven by two coexisting desires: one to separate from the Source that created it (i.e. God), and the other to return to the Source, as described by Jeff Green:

“…the Soul’s evolution is principally based upon the progressive elimination of all separating desires. As these separating desires are eliminated, the desire for return to the Source becomes stronger and more dominant in our consciousness.”

Eventually, the desire to return will be the only desire left. You want God more than you want anything else. But along the way, these desires can create an enormous amount of inner conflict as you resist the process of change.

“The desire for separateness can lead to an effort to maintain the past, while the desire for return to the Source promotes a focusing on the future (the polarity point of Pluto).”

Resistance to change keeps you anchored in the past but this is often subconscious so you won’t realise what you’re doing until you find yourself in a pickle. The process of change tends to become cataclysmic when you resist, and the greater the resistance, the greater the cataclysm. Once you start to ask why the same problems keep coming up you become more open to change, and then you can evolve in a more gradual (and dignified!) way.

The process plays out through attraction and repulsion, manifested through the house position of Pluto, as well as through planets that are in aspect to Pluto. Planets aspecting Pluto are on a fast track, evolutionary speaking, as Jeff Green says, they:

“have been, and continue to be, subject to an intensified and accelerated evolutionary metamorphosis.”

The type of aspect will show how intense or problematic that evolution is likely to be with non-stressful or harmonious aspects producing less resistance and smoother growth. Stressful aspects like conjunctions, squares and oppositions produce greater resistance so the process of change will be more intense:

“leading to cyclic cataclysms and restful states.”

The number of aspects to Pluto also shows the evolutionary pace – the more there are, the more you’re trying to process in one life. More aspects also tend to correlate with cataclysmic change and a stronger desire to return to Source, even if that’s unconscious, while:

“People with fewer aspects to Pluto are taking a break from the intensity of evolutionary and karmic necessities.”

I don’t know what counts as fewer or more aspects. I have three, or four if you count Uranus, with: Mercury conjunct Pluto, Uranus conjunct Pluto, Saturn trine Pluto and Neptune sextile Pluto. So that makes two of each type, hence the mix of both cataclysmic and progressive change that I’ve experienced.

There’s another thing you need to take into account when interpreting your Pluto placement and that’s the evolutionary condition of your soul. The state of your soul development determines how you respond to the evolutionary demands of Pluto and the nodes. This can’t be seen in the birth chart so it’s something that has to be intuited. Jeff Green says the idea originated in ancient India and he updates the descriptions in his book for the modern world.

There are four evolutionary conditions which are each subdivided into another three levels within those states. There’s movement between these states and within them so you can be transitioning between two states and have some characteristics of both. The four stages of evolution are:

1. The ‘Dimly Evolved’ State: about 3–4% of all souls who are just evolving into being human from other kingdoms or have de-evolved due to karmic causes.
2. The ‘Consensus’ State: about 70% of all souls who identify with social norms, beliefs and taboos and don’t question them. Those who’ve spent a long time in this state can become leaders.
3. The ‘Individuated’ State: 20% of all souls who question the social norms and beliefs of society and want to discover their own beliefs and values for themselves so they can act on them.
4. The ‘Spiritual’ State: 4–6% of all souls who want to understand their life and other’s lives in a holistic or universal context and align themselves with timeless values, beliefs and truths. The highest in this state are the masters like Jesus and Buddha.

The percentages come from the School of Evolutionary Astrology website where you can read more about each of these states, but I’ll give an overview here based on that text. None of what follows is meant to be taken as judgemental – it’s simply the action of karma at work.

First, we have the ‘Dimly Evolved’ souls who have very limited self-awareness and are often joyful and innocent. They may have various genetic defects that cause learning difficulties and retardation in their development, and their main evolutionary desire is to be normal – i.e. part of the ‘Consensus’ state.

This group also includes ‘De-evolved’ souls who have slipped back into this state from ‘higher’ levels because they’ve transgressed karmic laws. They’re often very angry and can cause a lot of problems for other people until they get their shit together and start evolving again.

Next, we have souls in the ‘Consensus’ state who conform to society’s values, norms and beliefs according to the culture that they’re born into. Their consciousness is highly conditioned by external authorities and social structures and they tend not to question the ideas that underpin those structures. Their main evolutionary desire is to get ahead and achieve in worldly terms, as defined by the society in which they live.

In the first subdivision the soul has limited self-awareness and can be self-righteous and judgemental. They want more for themselves and this pushes them to evolve into the second subdivision by learning more about how society works. This increases their self-awareness and they begin to learn more about the community in which they live. Some of these souls then become leaders of the pack and enter the third subdivision where they gain more power and prestige.

This process of growth involves a gradual expansion of their self-awareness to include other people but without questioning the nature of their own ego. Eventually a soul in this state will begin to question the meaning of what they’re doing and this nudges them into the next state.

Next, we have ‘Individuated’ souls who desire to liberate themselves from all external conditioning so their self-awareness begins to expand internally as well as externally. They rebel against the consensus and detach from society in order to think for themselves and discover who they are. This allows them to find their own meaning and they may begin to explore other cultures and new ideas that open up their thinking and identity.

In the first subdivision the soul still feels awkward about breaking free of the consensus so tries to appear normal and fit in. This makes them feel insecure but as they continue to question societal norms they grow in confidence until they move into the second subdivision. Here the soul rejects society and feels alienated because they don’t want to fit in with the ‘normies.’ This creates a crisis that forces them to reintegrate into society while retaining their individuality without compromising their values.

When they can do this, they enter the third subdivision where they live in society as an individuated person and can express their own unique gifts and talents. They can also help others to evolve in the same way. Their consciousness opens up to include more beings and the cosmos at large and they begin to transition into the next state.

Next, we have the ‘Spiritual’ souls who desire to know and unite with the Source/God and not just believe in it. Their centre of gravity slowly starts to shift from the ego to the soul as they move through the subdivisions in this state. This involves gradually eliminating all separating and externalising desires until they reach cosmic consciousness and become a mystic, saint or spiritual master. Final liberation is achieved once the soul has evolved through all three subdivisions of the Spiritual state.

In the first subdivision the soul starts to become aware of the cosmic reality in which it lives and the ego is humbled through a desire to serve others. They may become highly critical of themselves as they realise how imperfect they are – sounds like Pluto in Virgo. This creates resistance to the spiritual path because they don’t feel ready. At this stage they’re still centred on the ego but are beginning to feel the pull towards the soul.

The soul enters the second subdivision as their consciousness expands and they begin to flipflop between the ego and the soul. This can lead to the development of a spiritual ego as the soul falls into spiritual narcissism and feels called to a special mission or task. They may set themselves up as a guru or teacher and pretend to be humbler than they are – the internet is awash with these types!

At this stage the soul still sees itself as separate from the Source which creates all manner of problems and distortions. It occurs to me that this might include experiences of a dark night of the soul, or multiple dark nights, as the soul struggles to free itself from the grip of the ego.

Eventually the spiritual ego will be popped and brought down to size through guilt and a fall from grace which sends the soul into the third subdivision through a need to atone. Here the centre of gravity shifts to the soul and they desire to serve the Source and be guided by God’s will to do whatever is required of them. They begin the process of eliminating all the remaining separating desires that stand between the soul and unity with God.

The soul can now start to do its work in the world without ulterior motives distorting its actions. They tend to be very wise, humble and unassuming and are only interested in pointing the way home to help others. These souls will attract those who need their help and guidance, as well as negative projections from those who feel threatened by the light they carry. Obviously, there are few souls at the highest level, such as Jesus or Buddha, on Earth right now, although you wouldn’t necessarily hear about them.

Whenever a soul transitions into a new state or subdivision within a state, it can produce crises and cataclysmic changes, depending on the level of resistance. If the resistance is too great, it could lead to stagnation and the soul becoming stuck at a particular stage. And I guess it’s also possible to de-evolve and slip backwards if the soul fails the challenge of transformation.

For example, an ‘Individuated’ soul may fail to establish themselves and lose confidence and then give up and return to the ‘Consensus’ state. Or a ‘Spiritual’ soul may become overwhelmed by the process of purification and retreat into the relative safety of the ‘Individuated’ state and pay lip service to the spiritual path they’ve abandoned. Some of these could even set themselves up as spiritual teachers in an act of bad faith.

Another important point to mention is that nobody is born in an Individuated or Spiritual state (except a few rare masters). Most have to grow into these stages, with the Conformist stage of development starting once the ego takes root at around age 6 or so. You can’t develop into the Individuated state until you’re capable of self-reflection and that doesn’t kick in until you’re a teenager.

To individuate you have to evolve beyond ego identification and that doesn’t generally start to happen until late teens or early twenties. Teenagers can appear to be rebellious but this isn’t true individuation which requires more emotional maturity. They’re reacting against parents and society and forming identities based on tribal groups that are just as conformist as the ones they’re reacting against. In the end, most remain rooted in ego conformity due to social pressure.

I’ve written a whole series about the evolution of consciousness based on the integral model which follows a similar pattern to these stages. You can read more about growth up to the ego stage here and growth beyond the ego stage here.

It’s fun to play “Which Stage Am I At?” but unless you’re some kind of saint you’re probably going to overestimate your level of development. Of course, if you’re a hopeless neurotic like me then you’re more likely to underestimate yourself!

As far as I can tell, I was in the first subdivision of the Individuated state by my late teens but had so little self-confidence that I assumed there was something wrong with me for not being normal. I was catapulted into individuating following the breakdown in my early 20s which collapsed my false self. This happened when my progressed Sun moved to conjunct Pluto.

This experience also introduced an awareness of the spiritual side of life that I didn’t have the capacity to understand at the time. I had to do a lot of work to rebuild my sense of self and wasn’t ready to embrace the spiritual path until much later. As soon as I was ready – judged not by me but by my soul – I received the grace of my first satori and was plunged into the Spiritual stage of development. This happened when Uranus was conjunct my north node in Pisces.

I’m currently either stuck in the first subdivision and berating myself for not having the courage to surrender. Or flipflopping fiercely between the ego and the soul at the second subdivision and navigating through a seemingly endless dark night of the soul. Perhaps I’m somewhere between these subdivisions – I don’t know.

Finally, writing this post has raised questions about the nature of the soul and who exactly is incarnating and evolving. But we’ll have to leave that for next time...

Read whole series here

Images: Mountain; Timelapse; Stage

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