Welcome to my Astro Advice Column! If you subscribe to my Astro-Kats or Star Kids Club groups you are able to ask me questions about astrology for this advice column.


I have an 8th house retrograde Jupiter in Capricorn, which is also a 1996 nodal bender... How can I learn to work with this challenging placement? What questions should I be asking myself + my natal Jupiter? I attended one of your Wounded Jupiter workshops which was super comforting, but I'm still not sure what role this planet plays in my life. If a disadvantaged Jupiter has trouble accessing dreams and power, how can I shift my perspective to see this as an opportunity? How might this manifest in terms of a shadowy 8th house placement? Thank you in advance!!

–Ultra-Distressed Jupiter


I remember this really funny moment in The Astrology Podcast’s episode on Jupiter with Sam Reynolds. I was listening at night while doing other work like admin or something so my attention was drifting in and out. Then, I remember my attention tuned in right when Chris asked Sam “can you give an example of a debilitated Jupiter?” and Sam replied with something like, “something like Jupiter retrograde in Virgo, which is the sign of its detriment, in the eighth house.”

I have Jupiter in Virgo, retrograde, in the eighth. Couldn’t help but laugh.

Debilitated placements are not character flaws or magic spells of doom. They’re pieces of us that know suffering. They’re pieces that, because they know suffering, have great pits of creative expertise. They’re also pieces of us that need support. They need to understand that, despite knowing suffering, that they do not see the whole picture of who we are because they are parts with a limited perspective.

What does your Jupiter know, Ultra-Distressed Jupiter? How did it come to know these things? And are there some things that it doesn’t know?

I have a faint idea of what my Jupiter is about. I’m from Henan which is a place that was inflicted with two consecutive famines in the last century. This is recent ancestral stuff. My grandparents grew up eating bark and weeds and saw people starve. This region of China was robbed by its own local officials who sent out all of its grain to more important regions like Beijing. It’s a region that is known for its trickery and brutishness. Henanese people are said to be too direct but also tricksters who also scam rather than selling an honest product. Comedic skits about Henanese people like the one Zhao Benshan made for CCTV make fun of us for our almost poetic sense of dishonesty. Some of my family members hide the fact that they are Henanese.

So, I barely believe anything. I don’t trust the teacher when I take a class. I don’t believe in religion. I don’t believe in government. Maybe you share some of these sentiments as a distressed Jupiter.

So, debilitated Jupiters know what it’s like to struggle with power and imagination. It doesn’t mean that we have no imagination. It means that our imaginations have an edge to them—it’s the edge that struggling gives something. There’s a waywardness and a sly creativity. We don’t entrust our imaginations to those who have power over us.

Why should we? We barely trust our own power. Having power makes us feel rageful, sad, or even disgusted. Having power makes us feel powerless.

Dignified Jupiters are not free from battlements with power, mind you. I do think that there is a certain trust and joy and euphoria that dignified Jupiters experience when they find their imaginations empowered. Domicile Jupiters maybe know how to entrust a magical system just enough for a moment to see what it’s all about. They know they can change their mind later. For us with debilitated Juptiers, cynicism is our first strategy. We are afraid of bewitching ourselves.

Your Jupiter is in fall. That’s different from what I just shared from my own perspective as a detriment Jupiter person. Planets in fall are often more about cultural falls or losses of faith. You know which very problematic person has just happens to have Jupiter in fall? Eminem. Watch his video for Beautiful. It’s all about the fall of Detroit. He knows what it’s like to live in a fallen city.

There’s a beautiful grief to fallen Jupiters. There’s a knowingness. That’s imagination. Imagination is here to access not just the future but also the past.

Last time Jupiter fell, there was a global pandemic. The time before that, there was a global recession. We lost things both times and we also realized certain things. There’s a realism to Jupiter in Capricorn, sure, but I like to think that there is imagination as well. Jupiter in Capricorn is about creating hope out of hopelessness.

I don’t think imagination was ever as big and deep as it’s been when Jupiter falls. There’s a sense of sharedness that happens with this placement. You “get” other people in a way that isn’t about pretense. That’s what allows you to enlarge your imagination.

So thank you for this question, Ultra-Distressed Jupiter. Maybe you’ll never quite feel resolved around power. That’s okay. The point of astrology isn’t to create accurate forecasts. The point is to know yourself. And your Jupiter changes all the time because you’re living life. That’s the point of living—to change. Get to know your distressed Jupiter. What kind of power does it know? What is it distressed about? What kind of power does it not know yet?