Nao's 'Saturn' Speaks To The Unpredictability of Love, Faith in Spirituality
Love begins and ends with a choice. Every day, partners choose to be together, this agreement often unspoken. We simply trust one another. And no matter how we try to eliminate the chance to design our best lives, our relationships will always be unpredictable variables because humans are neither controllable nor telepathic. We simply trust one another. When love fails, it is often attributed to a fracture in that trust.
Nao’s Saturn reflects on how we grapple with finding and sustaining trust in the unpredictability of love through faith and emotional maturity.
Saturn situates itself within the astrological phenomenon known as Saturn’s Return. Nao includes an interlude that explains the event and its purpose:
“Saturn's shift is an astrological episode that occurs when the planet Saturn returns to the position it occupied relative to your birth. It reaches this position after approximately 29 or 30 years. It's about letting go of what doesn't serve you. You know, letting go of relationships, jobs, any past regrets.”
Saturn’s Return is a time for transition, and for Nao, this comes in the form of the end of a long-term relationship. “‘Another Lifetime' came out of a tumultuous and conflicted period in my life. A long term relationship ended without that closure you get from disliking the other person and it took a very long time to come to terms with that,” she told the Fader. The album opener throws us right into the narrative of a love’s ending without emotional closure. Nao initially resists this change by believing that the relationship isn’t really over yet. Nao idealizes an impending rebirth to give her the chance she needs to make this relationship work the second time around. There is no way to ever truly know what another person thinks or feels, so we trust in one another’s transparency to grow and sustain relationships based on this mutual trust. When she suddenly loses this trust (and lover) without warning, she romanticizes the situation through this cosmic happening. She is wary of the loss of a constant in her life because doing such would waver her trust in the sincerity of her partner’s love. But, the faith she resists is also the path to clarity and growth.
In “Make It Out Alive” Nao laments over the changes she’s experiencing and looks for an explanation through spirituality (“Call on God, maybe tarots and cards deliver me from fear”). “If You Ever” reads like a last-ditch effort before Nao throws herself into her period of spiritual transformation and emotional maturation—the album reaching a turning point in “When Saturn Returns - Interlude.”
The process of the planet Saturn’s return to its position at one’s birth takes about 29.5 years, meaning that Saturn’s Return coincides with the milestone of turning 30 years of age. Both events mark maturity and coming into one’s self. The emotional maturity that we develop by this point in our lives allows us to find peace with failing relationships. The concept of soulmates and similar natural connections we share offer the language to make this trust tangible. We can believe that we will find our person when we are meant to and that the best we can do is try to manifest a connection when we feel drawn to someone else. We can juxtapose “Another Lifetime” and “Orbit” to understand how Nao expresses this newfound belief system:
He released me into orbit
Still I found a way to gravitate to you
Oh no
Please don't say you're desertin', oh
Don't leave me revolving
I'm nearly dissolving, it's true
Please don't lie like the last time
Left me barely holding on
“Orbit”
How I wish perfect was enough
For my own heart
Sometimes I swear it was enough
For my own heart
I guess I'll wait another lifetime
Meet us in another lifetime
I guess I'll wait another lifetime
'Cause there I will stay, my darling
I swear I won't run from you”
“Another Lifetime”
”Another Lifetime” tries to force a dying love through pleading and compromise while “Orbit” finds peace with that past situation and accepts this new lover as the result of divine planning. When this new love begins to fade, she only urges them to give her emotional closure. She no longer works to manipulate the situation and accepts that she is not at fault.
“Saturn is the planet of karma. You will find yourself with spiritual realizations you couldn’t have even contemplated in earlier stages of your life.”
In her Saturn Return, Nao learns to love freely without unrealistic expectations. She understands that the good she puts out into the universe will return to her. She accepts that she is not responsible for the way others fail to love her. In “Curiosity” she relinquishes control over her body to a lover, and “Don’t Change” lets a lover leave peacefully and enthusiastically. Nao allows herself to find pleasure in her own inhibitions and trust in love, if only for a season.
Even if you haven’t reached your own Saturn’s Return, Saturn offers inalienable truths about how we can grow from heartbreak and trust in love even when it breaks us. We should not fear love. Love grows and dies as it is meant to, all determined by unpredictable circumstances. The best we can do is simply trust one another.
