Saturn Return Journal: Sophia Somerville
Sophia Somerville is a brilliant writer, tarot diviner and the head witch at Southern Spells. I had the pleasure of reading her chart twice while she was in her Saturn Return and I have a lot of time and respect for this legend. Sophia embodies my favourite Sagittarian qualities; humour, a broad and independent mind, charisma and a knowledge bank that comes from digesting her own intel and grounding it into her own language. She is the tarot reader that I recommend to all of my friends.
Where is Saturn in your natal chat?
Saturn in Capricorn in the 6th House.
What were some of the themes of your Saturn Return?
Health, Career, Boundaries, Marriage.
Any stories that you would like to share that illuminate these themes?
Two experiences stand out as bookends to my Saturn Return. The first was a little before my return began. Even though I was approaching this pivotal time I was still living in the half-baked mode of a younger self; part of me felt invincible, like I had nine lives. I barely looked when I crossed the street, I didn't budget, I had never broken a bone. Being a Sag I've always been pretty lucky, but at that time I was being reckless with my luck, playing with fire. It was Mardi Gras and I was at a big party at the Metro Theatre. Around midnight, after a few too many gin and tonics, I fell headfirst down the stairs and knocked my front tooth out and cut my lip open. (I've since heard that teeth have significance to Saturn and Capricorn? Curious about this). It was a pretty rough, painful, expensive and comical road to recovery (and into my Saturn Return) from there. The second was right at the end of this transit - December of 2020. I closed out my Saturn Return, and a batshit crazy year, by marrying the love of my life in the backyard. The day itself felt like a beautiful reward for all the internal work I had done around letting a big group of people - our shared community - witness such an intimate thing. Letting that amount of love in took a lot of inner preparation (and honestly, grieving) for me. In the end it was glorious and I surprised myself by how much I was able to enjoy the moment.
Having the beauty of hindsight, what was this initiatory period teaching you?
At first I thought my Saturn Return was punishing me for something - for being 'wrong' or 'bad' or making mistakes. Over time though, it transformed into a central lesson around self-responsibility. After my Mardi Gras initiation I could no longer get away with disassociating from my body, having one foot in the real world and one in the ether. I can see now how much I needed to develop personal boundaries and ground my life. My marriage and home helped tether me to this body and this life in a way that turned out to be way more exciting than escaping all of the time. The structured and rather blunt language of my Saturn Return also helped me commit to my own unique path of work (which included several detours where I said yes to jobs that were oh-so-wrong for me) and finally understand that I can do whatever the fuck I want when it comes to what I do and the way I structure my time. At the core, my Saturn Return helped me come to terms with being alive. There was something deeply and undeniably healing about working with this transit in a (mostly) intentional way which I am very grateful for...and boy oh boy am I glad it is done. Not chill in the slightest.
You can find Sophia here or on the gram @southernspells
As I hope you are beginning to see with these interviews, Saturn has some strong, archetypal themes and yet, the way they manifest is as individual as the person walking their Return. Doors have opened to the Saturn Return Course, if you are in yours and wish to pin point the themes of your Return, this course will deliver that with clarity and a practical and grounded understanding of how to use this rite of passage as an ally. Details over here.