Transit (Gochar)
Gochar is the movement of the planets through the zodiac today, read against your birth chart. Transits show the passing influences of the moment, and Vedic astrology counts them mainly from your Moon sign.
Also known as: gochara, planetary transit
As the planets move, each passes through your houses in turn. Classical texts list the favourable houses for each, counted from the natal Moon: Jupiter is welcome in the 2nd, 5th, 7th, 9th and 11th, while Saturn, Mars, Rahu and Ketu do best in the 3rd, 6th and 11th. Vedha (obstruction) points can cancel a good or bad transit.
Slow planets set the long themes. Saturn spends about two and a half years in a sign, Rahu and Ketu about eighteen months and Jupiter about a year, while the Sun takes a month and the Moon two and a quarter days. Saturn’s passage over and around your natal Moon is the well-known Sade Sati.
Transits act on what the birth chart and running dasha already promise; they rarely deliver what the natal chart does not show. Astrologers refine them with Ashtakavarga scores and also count from the ascendant. A tough transit is a season to navigate with care, not a sentence.