(Astrobutterfly.com)

On June 12th, 2026, Uranus exactly squares the Nodal axis. 

While this aspect might easily get overlooked in an already eventful June – with Venus conjunct Jupiter, and both Chiron and Jupiter changing signs – it might actually be the big elephant in the room. 

When a planet is square the Nodal axis – which means it is simultaneously square the North Node and the South Node – astrologers call it a “skipped step”.

The Skipped Step

The skipped step is usually understood as unresolved developmental material from the past that needs to be addressed before a person can fully move forward.

“Unresolved” here is not to be confused with feeling stuck. Instead, it points to a dynamic where the conflict of the nodal opposition gets resolved through an outlet (the planet squaring it).

Just like in a T-square, we can look at the planet that squares the Nodes as the outside catalyst that resolves the tension of the opposition.

Oppositions and squares, while both classified as “hard aspects,” have very different functions.

An opposition is a “number 2” aspect – it divides the circle in 2: either, or. It’s internal, a constant pendulum between options. The tension is never resolved because this tension is exactly what makes the opposition an opposition: “either, or” – “this or that.”

The square, instead, is a “number 4” aspect – it divides the circle by 4, and 4 is the number of matter. This is why squares make things happen. They bring matters into the material world. 

So in a T-square, or a skipped-step type of dynamic, the planet that squares the opposition axis acts as the catalyst that makes things happen (like for real, in the 3D world). It’s like a fuse that suddenly goes off – and the tension of the opposition is finally addressed.

And this reframe of the square invites a slightly different way of thinking about the skipped step itself. 

Perhaps we’ve been taking the skipped step metaphor too seriously – but not literally enough.

And perhaps the easiest way to understand a skipped step is through an actual skipped step.

When you skip a step and stumble upon something, the script gets interrupted.

The skipped step not as something you’ve missed. But literally, as what happens when something occurs on the outside – the square – that resolves the problem of the opposition.

The Skipped Step And Snow White

And this takes us to the Snow White fairytale. 

Snow White grows up under the shadow of a jealous stepmother, the Queen. Unable to reconcile with the passing of her own beauty, the Queen poisons Snow White with an apple, sending her into a death-like sleep.

We could go on and on about the rich symbolism of this fairytale – from the mother-daughter dynamics and the little-discussed jealousy that can coexist with love, yet still poison the next generation with the regret of one’s own unfulfilled potential.

If we look at it through the lens of the Lunar Nodes, the poisoned apple becomes the generational heritage (this could include past-life content if we choose to look at the Nodes this way) that someone is born into.

We all have a North Node and a South Node – this is the one aspect, the one opposition, that regardless of the rest of the natal chart, everyone is born with.

We are all born into some sort of story, heritage, or unprocessed material (South Node) which exists in polarity with our North Node – a symbol of future directions and possibilities. 

The past and the future are continuously renegotiated, but unless a planet comes to activate this axis, nothing happens.