Where Has All the Earth Gone?

By Dehyana

I’ve been looking at the sky lately and something caught my attention. Where has all the Earth gone? Right now, if we look at the planets through the tropical zodiac, there are planets in Fire signs, Air signs and Water signs. But none in Earth. Not one.

Now before we decide this explains everything that’s going on in the world—and God knows there’s plenty going on—I think it’s worth looking at what the elements actually mean. Because astrology isn’t only about planets and signs. Underneath it all are four very basic forces we live with every day. Fire. Earth. Air. Water.

And in some of the older Eastern teachings, the planets themselves also carry elemental qualities. Mars is associated with Fire, Mercury with Earth, Venus with Water, Saturn with Air and Jupiter with Ether or Space. So we have two different layers we can look at. What element is the sign carrying? And what element does the planet itself bring? That’s where things start getting interesting.

There’s a Lot of Fire Up There

Mars is currently in Leo. Mars already carries the nature of Fire in traditional Jyotish. Put Mars into Leo, another Fire sign, and we’ve got plenty of heat. Fire isn’t bad. We need Fire. It’s our courage, vitality, passion, creativity and willingness to act. Without Fire we’d probably all still be sitting in caves discussing whether someone should get up and invent the wheel.

But too much Fire? That’s another story. We become reactive. Impatient. Angry and dramatic. Everybody wants to be heard and nobody wants to listen. And Mars is currently opposing Pluto in Aquarius. I wrote about Pluto’s Polarity Point in a recent blog.

That adds another layer because now we’re dealing with individual will coming up against power, pressure and larger collective forces. I’ve noticed how quickly people seem to ignite lately. Maybe you have too.

Then There’s All That Air

Saturn is retrograde in Aries, Pluto is in Aquarius and Uranus is in Gemini. There’s plenty of Air represented in the sky. And we hardly need astrology to tell us we’re living in an Air-heavy world. Phones. Social media. AI. News. Podcasts. Notifications. Everybody talking, explaining and predicting what’s coming next. Our minds rarely get a day off.

In traditional Jyotish, Saturn itself is associated with Vayu, the Air principle. And with Saturn retrograde, I find myself thinking about what happens when all that movement turns inward. We think. And before you know it we begin to think about what we were thinking. And then soon after that we’re analysing why we were thinking it.

Then most likely we check YouTube to see if somebody else has made a video explaining what our thinking means. You know the drill. Too much Air can leave us completely unanchored, spinning in our head.

Water Is There Too

Venus is travelling through Scorpio right now. Venus carries an association with Jala, the Water principle, and Scorpio is a Water sign. So here again we have an element being emphasized. Water is our emotional life. Grief. Love. Attachment. Intuition. Memory. Desire. And Scorpio isn’t particularly interested in keeping things on the surface. It goes looking. What’s underneath this? Why am I reacting this way? What am I still holding onto? And what haven’t I allowed myself to feel? Water needs movement.

And sometimes that movement is nothing more mysterious than having a good cry, telling the truth about how you feel, or admitting that something still hurts. We don’t have to turn every emotion into a spiritual lesson. Sometimes we’re sad.

Mercury: The Missing Earth Element

This is where it gets really interesting to me. Mercury has just moved into Scorpio and is caught up in the tension between Mars and Pluto. Why does that interest me? Because in traditional Jyotish, Mercury is associated with Prithvi. Earth. So the planet carrying the Earth principle is sitting in Water and under pressure from Mars and Pluto while the tropical sky itself has no planets occupying Earth signs.

And I thought: Well, there’s our medicine. We need some ground.

What Does Earth Represent in Astrology?

Earth is wonderfully unimpressed with our theories. Earth is the body. The chair you’re sitting on. The food you eat. The bills that need paying. The laundry. The garden and the dog that needs walking. You can contemplate the future of humanity for six hours and still need to make dinner. You can analyse Pluto in Aquarius, the future of AI and the evolution of consciousness and still have to take the garbage out. There’s something rather comforting about that. Earth brings us back to what is actually here.

And I think that’s what we’re short of right now. Not more information and definitely not another prediction. Do we really need another person telling us that some enormous cosmic event is about to happen and we’d better get ready. Nope, we need to ground.

As Above, So Below?

I also find myself looking at what’s happening in nature. Fire. Flooding. Powerful winds and earthquakes. It’s tempting to draw a straight line between what’s happening astrologically and what’s happening physically on Earth. I’m careful about doing that because I don’t believe somebody’s unresolved grief caused a flood or our collective anxiety created a hurricane.

But I do believe in correspondence. It’s one of the oldest ideas in the mystical traditions. As above, so below. So when I see elemental extremes in nature, elemental patterns in the sky and people describing those same elements internally—feeling overheated, flooded, scattered or ungrounded—I pay attention. I don’t really need to decide what it means. Because noticing the pattern is enough.

How to Ground Yourself When Everything Feels Ungrounded

This is the part of astrology I’m most interested in these days. What do we do with what we see?

This is something I explored in my recent blog, Transits Without Fear. Astrology should help us understand what we’re experiencing, not leave us frightened of what’s coming next.

If there’s too much Fire, don’t feed every argument. If there’s too much Air, stop trying to figure everything out. If the Water is moving, let yourself feel what you’re feeling. And when there’s no Earth?

Go find some. Cook. Walk. Garden. Clean something. Make something with your hands. Sit outside. Turn off the phone. Come back into your body.

Do something wonderfully ordinary.

News Flash: sometimes the most spiritual thing you can do when everything feels ungrounded is stop trying to figure out the entire universe…and go make dinner.

Ready to Find Your Own Ground?

Your birth chart offers a unique perspective on how the elements work within you—and how current planetary transits may be influencing your life. In a personal astrology reading, we can explore what’s happening in your chart and how to work with it rather than feel overwhelmed by it.