The essential meaning of Mars with respect to the human psyche may be described as Actualizing Will.  This is the will to achieve fulfillment.  It stems from the desire to make the potential manifest.  It is closely linked to the concept of Being in that this will is the will to bring something into being.  Thus, Mars should be seen as a solar planet.  There is a subtle distinction between Beingness and the will to bring something into being.  Being, or Essence, precedes manifestation.  As it states in the Qur’an, “when Allah determines the coming into being of a thing, He says concerning it: Be! And it is.”  It is clear from this statement that what is brought into being, what is manifested, proceeds from Beingness itself. 

The first act of Will is to bring into existence, or to manifest.  We qualify the word “existence” here because, in reality, there is only one Existent and, therefore, all that “exists” in multiplicity is but the illusion of self-existence.  Certain Sufis and others term what is manifested as “non-existent” to describe its real state.  Nevertheless, conventionally, we use the word “exist” to describe what has been manifested out of the Existent.

Astrologically, we see this first act of Will reflected in Mars’ rulership of Aries, whose primary need is the will to be, the need to assert one’s existence in the world.  The coming into being of the self is also the first act of assertion for the psyche and from this stems Mars’ association with assertion and assertiveness.  Assertion can be viewed as having two qualities—constant and periodic.  As an assertion of being or self, assertion is constant.  The self must assert its own existence at every moment for, if it does not, it will be overwhelmed by non-being.  To the extent that the self is identified with the ego, this need for constant assertion forms the basis for all doctrines of self-assertiveness.

We can see this Mars energy reflected in the chart of Ayn Rand, who developed a philosophy based upon the dominance of the individual.  Mars is in its dominion in Scorpio and in the fourth house in her chart.  Although, traditionally, the fourth house may be seen as a weak placement for Mars, it places this energy at the root of her consciousness.  Mars is square the Sun, which is in Aquarius in the seventh house.  The square indicates psychic pressure to express the Mars energy, particularly in relation to the “other” and also can be viewed as blocking the Aquarian drive toward individuation and substituting for this the drive for independence and individualism. 

Aries is inhabited by Jupiter in the tenth house.  Thus, Rand’s worldview is colored by the Aries/Mars drive to assert the self and is pointed toward the need to achieve, to compete for success.  Her Mars is also trine Neptune in the eleventh house, compatible with a linking of her will to self-assert with an intention to dissolve and disintegrate social constructs and to view the will to cooperate in human endeavor as only an illusion.  Finally, her Mars is sextile her North Node in the third house, providing opportunity to communicate her individualistic philosophy to the world in order to fulfill her destiny in life.

Though Ayn Rand conceptualized a philosophy of extreme individualism, the drive to constantly assert our existence is expressed in many commonly held belief systems, particularly but not exclusively in the modern West.  We see this drive reflected in the Darwinian notion of the struggle for survival.  The competitive doctrine that underscores modern capitalism is another expression of the Martian need for constant self-assertion.  It is not only philosophies of rugged individualism that stem from the human need to constantly assert our own existence.  There is also the idea that the self must constantly overcome the forces of chaos and non-Being in order to exist.

To overcome these forces of chaos requires existential courage, the courage to be.  This is the initial manifestation of the Martian quality of courage or bravery.  This is also the seed of Mars’ association with war and all things warlike.  The archetypal battle is the battle to exist and the archetypal display of courage in battle is the courage to face the darkness of non-Being and assert our existence. 

The next battle we must face is the battle for control of our soul (our spiritual attention).  It has been described that the soul has two opposing tendencies—downward and outward or upward and inward.  Our life on the material planes can be described as a battle between these two tendencies.  The battle is constant and, if we are not vigilant, we will be pulled down into the darkness.  Indeed, the human problem is that we have been pulled down into the darkness of spiritual ignorance and we are either in the process of fighting our way out of that darkness or of sinking further into its entanglements.  This is the prototypal war between Good and Evil (so brilliantly portrayed in Tolkien’s Ring trilogy, as well as in C.S. Lewis’ Narnia series). 

As noted above, keeping our attention turned toward the Divine, in a positive direction, requires constant vigilance.  Another name for constant vigilance is devotion.  Actually, devotion is vigilance motivated by love.  This is an area where we see the interaction between Mars and Venus, for the Venusian function of buddhi is necessary in order to discriminate between the two tendencies of the soul and to choose the upward path.  An aid in making this choice is the assignment of an overriding value to the goal of realizing our oneness with the Divine and, thus, creating love and affection for that state of Divine Bliss.  It is this ingredient which, combined with constant vigilance, produces devotion. 

Devotion, then, is the highest octave of the psychic motivation to actualize.  In the case of true devotion, what is desired to be brought into being is our oneness with the Divine, our return to our original state of spiritual Bliss, the process of God-realization.  Thus, devotion can be viewed as the highest quality of the motivational component of Mars’ essential function of the will to bring into being, of actualization. 

Of course, devotion is only rarely directed toward its highest end.  The buddhi has not only has not often reached that final level of discrimination.  Instead, it is focused somewhere along the continuum of relative negative and positive choices.  The buddhi can only present these choices, however.  It is the will that chooses and that then pursues the chosen path.  Will is influenced by desire (and often led by desire).  Desire, essentially, is for something to be actualized, for something or some condition to be brought into being, to manifest in our experience of the material world.  The mechanisms—motivation and taking action—comprising the will to bring into being are discussed further below.

Periodic assertion exists only in the realm of the manifest—for our purposes the material plane of existence—which is our experience and the realm for which astrology is valid.  Periodicity denotes the state of being transitory.  Everything in the manifest world is transitory.  Periodic assertion, therefore, applies in the realm of what we consider to be everyday life.

Of course, though unreal ontologically, everyday life appears to be very real while we are living it.  Everything is relative, however, and all of the laws governing the world that we inhabit are relative to this material plane.  Just as Newtonian physics works perfectly well in this middle-dimensional existence (with Einsteinian physics operational at macro-distances and quantum physics operational at the micro-scale), so astrology operates in our “illusory” everyday existence.

Practically speaking, what do we mean by periodic assertion?  What we mean by this is action taken in time.  This pertains to our simplest acts such as walking around and otherwise moving our bodies.  It also applies to the more complex actions that involve intentional will in pursuit of some objective and may entail any number of steps undertaken over some duration of time.  The fact remains that these actions are limited in time.  They have a distinct beginning and ending.

How these actions come about involves a collaboration of psychic functions symbolized by the personal planets, but Mars is the “prime mover” or direct actor in this phenomenon.  Let us return to Venus for a moment.  We discussed that the Venusian buddhi constructs a value system based on likes and dislikes, broadly defined.  The buddhi evaluates our outer and inner environment with reference to our value system and determines what is attractive to us and what is not.  However, what we are left with at the end of this process is simply a collection of decisions or preferences.  In order to actualize these preferences, we need the psychic function symbolized by Mars.

Mars moves from evaluation to fulfillment in two steps.  From Venus, Mars receives a matrix of preferences relative to our environment (which we define broadly as our awareness of space and time—our space and time).  This matrix is not just bi-dimensional—like or dislike.  It has depth or intensity.  Thus, we like or are attracted to some things more than others. 

The Mars function picks up on our more intense attractions and creates desire.  Desire propels or motivates the psyche toward action.  Thus, the first step toward actualization is desire; the second step is action—both qualities that are strongly associated with Mars.

Desire can be described as an emotional motivation.  Desire is not rational.  It is essentially irrational.  We may rationalize our desires, and this is where Mercury may play a role.  The desire itself, however, is an urge, a type of feeling.  The stronger our desire, the stronger the feeling that we experience. 

This feeling of desire is not monolithic, though.  It is colored or shaped by its object.  Sexual desire, for instance, is qualitatively different than a desire for fame or power.  A strong desire for fame is definitely felt, but felt in a certain way, with a characteristic feeling.  All such feelings—feelings that impel us—are Martian.  They include lust, ambition, greed, envy, righteousness (a desire for justice), patriotism and any number of other feelings.  Whatever feeling causes us to act, whatever feeling is connected with some motivation, some desire, is Martian.

Action can either be automatic or intentional.  In our discussion of Venus, we spoke of the automatic evaluative function, evaluation which goes on subconsciously so that we do not have to constantly repeat our daily (or momentary) decisions.  With Mars, too, we have an automatic system of subconscious desire that leads to automatic action.  This system is precisely in tune with the Venusian system of automatic evaluation so that we automatically actualize that which is beneficial and necessary for our functioning in the material world.  This system governs all muscle movement, whether voluntary or involuntary.  Mercury, the nervous system, acts as a carrier of information between the Venusian evaluative system and the Martian motivation-action system.  Mercury’s role here, too, is automatic and neutral. 

There is a continuum of automation present in this system.  At one end of the continuum are movements that are completely automatic, such as the pumping of the heart or the contraction and expansion of the diaphragm.  At the other end are actions for which there is some degree of conscious will involved, such as reaching for a glass of water.  All of these automatic actions share the quality of being motivated by preferences of low intensity, even extremely low intensity. 

As the level of evaluative intensity rises, the level of automatic action generally declines.  At some point on the scale, action will not be taken unless a conscious decision is made to do so.  In between, we have actions that are taken reactively.  These reactive actions correspond to those evaluations that we make habitually and/or under the influence of our conditioning.  As we have noted in our discussion of Venus, this is where we can see the Moon playing a role.

Reaction can be defined as a subconscious activation of the desire-action mechanism that is programmed to occur when certain stimuli are present.  When the stimuli carry a strong emotional charge, there may still be an automatic response even when the level of evaluative intensity is high.  Although other planetary functions play a role, the reaction itself (the responsive action) is governed by Mars. 

Included in the category of reaction is impulsivity.  Impulsive actions are those that arise subconsciously in the form of an uncontrolled reaction.  Mars, of course, is famously associated with impulsiveness. 

Impulsiveness and other forms of reaction are often the cause of accidents, which Mars governs.  Accidents happen when we act without thinking, when we act without the full consciousness that would otherwise detect the danger in our environment.  When we react, we are by definition acting without thinking.

Accidents also happen when our desires blind us to what is happening in our environment.  We become so focused on actualizing our desire that we ignore everything else (or at least our awareness of whatever is not contributing to actualizing our desire is lessened).  Pursuing our desire, we miscalculate, we take unnecessary risks and the result is accident. 

Accidents also happen, of course, due to our karmas.  Karma literally means action in Sanskrit.  Karmas are the effects of actions performed in the past and all actions performed have consequence or effect.  Thus, while Saturn and also the South Node are frequently identified with karma, from the standpoint of karma simply being the play of action and reaction, Mars too has an association.

Another type of reaction is the uncontrolled display of emotion.  Specifically, we are talking about emotion that is triggered by external or internal events.  In this category we can place anger and all of its variants.  We can also place here the emotional spectrum associated with the fight or flight mechanism and all forms of emotion accompanied by or caused by adrenalin rush. 

Intentional action also runs along a continuum which is associated with the level of evaluative intensity.  At one end of the spectrum, we have the example of reaching for a glass of water, which was referenced earlier.  Here, we find a desire that is usually conscious—the desire to quench thirst, or the desire to remain hydrated.  Of course, if we are not being mindful, we may reach for the glass of water habitually, such as when we are eating a meal.  At any rate, the intensity of the desire for water will usually be relatively low.  Motivating the action to occur does not take much will and the orchestration of the actions that need to occur in order for the glass of water to be drank go on automatically or semi-automatically.

At the other end of the spectrum we have some objective that requires not only conscious desire to obtain but a complex set of actions in order to achieve.  An extreme example might be running for the presidency of a nation.  We have here an abundance of ambition motivating the actions that will need to occur.  Ambition may be described as sustained desire motivating will. 

However, no matter how strong the ambition, action in such a situation will not happen automatically.  A high level of intention needs to present.  Therefore, the functions represented by Mercury must be engaged with the Mars function if ambition is to be realized successfully.  We can, therefore, speculate that the astrological relationship between Mars and Mercury can tell us much about how the mental faculties may guide one’s actions. 

The degree to which we engage our intellect when determining what actions to take and how to take them is only one factor that suggests how a person is predisposed to act.  Other astrological signifiers of how we tend to act are found in Mars’ sign placement, aspects and rulerships or depositorships.  Mars’ house placement suggests where our actions tend to be most focused.  Of course, these astrological metrics also shape the probable nature and focus of our desires.

Action may be internally motivated or it may be externally experienced.  As noted above, karma (which we associate with things happening to us) literally means action.  We have talked thus far about action that is internally motivated—action that springs from desire and will, influenced by the evaluations of our buddhi and facilitated by our intellect (if conscious) or by the automatic nervous system (if reflexive and unconscious).  Although, as we will explain shortly, all action can be conceived as emanating from desire and will, we experience action externally as events. 

Events are actions taken by others that happen to us.  If they do not happen to us, we ignore them and do not recognize them as events.  Neither are they events (for us) until we become conscious of them, in one way or another (not necessarily immediately or with full awareness).  “Others” here is used extremely broadly, referring not only to persons but to any “actor,” even those to which we do not ascribe consciousness (such as nature, systems or historical circumstances).  Regardless or their source or how we experience them, events are the result of some action that has occurred. 

Thus, astrologically, Mars rules events and occurrences.  The transiting or progressed motions of Mars are said to by synchronistic with events.  We associate Mars, particularly, with events that occur suddenly, or without seeming explanation, or forcefully.  However, all events, all actions, can be said to be governed by Mars.

Karma theory supplies the connection between Mars as the desire principle and Mars as ruler of external events.  According to the theory of karma, everyone must experience the consequence of every action performed.  The corollary is that every consequence is the result of an action (every effect has a cause).  Every action is the result of some desire; and, therefore, every consequence or event we experience is the result of some past desire. 

Another precept of the karma theory is that, if we die with unfulfilled desires, the universe is so generous that It will, eventually, provide a means for those desires to be fulfilled—in another birth, resulting in more action and more karma.

We can now shift gears and explore the genesis of Mars’ association with the masculine archetype.  In the chapter on Venus, we discussed the association of the feminine archetype with Duality and the presence of Duality being fundamental to the evaluative process.  We also discussed that, in this context, it is the masculine principal that would appear first.  Although from a metaphysical perspective, it is the initial manifestation that creates Duality, from the perspective of being in the manifest world, the manifestation or bringing into being of something is the first step toward its subsequent development and fulfillment.  It is an assertive act, one which actualizes the potential of the thing. 

We find the masculine archetype in its primal form being associated with this assertive principle, the will to actualize.  From this, we find masculinity associated with initiation or the one who initiates.  It is action taken as opposed to action received (which relates to the feminine archetype).  The Mars/masculine archetype relationship is somewhat complex because all of the associations that have been assigned to Mars—assertiveness, ambition, impulsiveness, warrior qualities, etc.—are all by reference assigned to the masculine archetype.  Yet masculinity itself is elaborated upon by societal and cultural expectations and conditioning.  We could say that the masculine archetype forms the core or ideal of masculinity but that the idea of masculinity is a step beyond the masculine archetype.

Mars represents both: the masculine archetype and masculinity,  It is masculinity, however, that is most shaped by or suggested by the astrological placements of Mars.  These can shed light on how one’s masculinity is conceived and expressed.  As noted above, the qualities included in the masculine archetype are also a part of the concept of masculinity and Mars’ placements and aspects also can elucidate how those qualities are expressed as a part of one’s masculinity.

Because Mars governs masculinity, it is also viewed as representing significant male figures in a person’s life.  This may particularly be true if one is female.  The masculine archetype (Mars) by nature interacts with the feminine archetype (Venus) [although this interaction may be muted, absent, or manifested differently in persons of non-heterosexual orientation].  We all have both Mars and Venus in our charts, of course.  This symbolizes the presence in every psyche of both animus (the masculine principle) and anima (the feminine principle), as Jung proposed.  Thus, if one is female (or identifying as female), Venus will represent one’s femininity while Mars, though it may be externalized as outer male, symbolizes the animus that is also active within the psyche.  Similarly, if one is male (or identifying as male), Mars symbolizes one’s masculinity while Venus, though it may be externalized as outer female, represents the anima within one’s psyche.

For each gender, a challenge is to recognize and develop the opposite gender principle within the psyche.  As this realization occurs, the two gender identity poles are brought into balance and, ultimately, reconciled.  Thus, we can see the consummation of the Sacred Alchemical Marriage—the union of opposites and the attainment of Wholenessa—as a higher mission of the Mars function.

This is the fifth in a series exploring the essential meanings of the planets in depth.  For earlier chapters, beginning with the Sun, go to the archives.

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