Posts tagged "Aquarius"
Astro News You Can Use! September 10, 2018

Karmic Evolution’s Astro News You Can Use!
September 10, 2018
We’re still under the auspices of September 9’s Virgo New Moon, so plant seeds of self-love & self-care, institute daily rituals such as meditation, and use the grounding nature of the current planetary energies to move forward with your plans to be of service not only to others but to YOURSELF now that Saturn’s direct!
September 10th Mars re-enters Aquarius and the pace quickens but watch out for any surprises on September 12 when Venus in Scorpio opposes Uranus in Taurus, which itself is squaring the karmic nodes right now.
This represents the first of three Venus oppositions to Uranus, since Venus will retrograde in Scorpio (& back into Libra) from October 5 through November 16.
The second Venus opposition to Uranus occurs late on October 30 or early on the 31st, depending on your time zone, between retrograde Venus in Scorpio & retrograde Uranus in Taurus. The third perfects when Venus is once again direct, but still in Libra, opposite Uranus retrograde in Aries on November 30.
Change is in the air, so pay heed to what needs to be REEVALUATED in life during this upcoming Venus retrograde period, about which we’ll glimpse our first sign on September 12. To help you begin to get unstuck now, recognize that change is part of the soul’s evolutionary process, especially since Mars is headed once again to square Uranus on September 18 & conjoin with the transiting Aquarius South Node September 22..
The Virgo Sun’s trine to Pluto in Capricorn on September 11 empowers us, so try not to succumb to any shell shock due to unexpected surprises born of the Venus/Uranus opposition on the 12th, OR to confusion when Mercury opposes Neptune on the 13th.
Rather, tune into messages from your unconscious & the divine realm, and rely on the fact that the messenger god should bring more clarity to your situation when he trines Pluto on the 15th.
Meanwhile, the lunar cycle continues to wax into a first quarter square September 16 when the Sagittarius Moon squares the Virgo Sun & we’ll begin to see whatever seeds we planted at the Virgo New Moon start to sprout.
Join me for more conversations about consciousness @ https://karmicevolution.com/astrologically-speaking/ & to learn about financial astrology from expert professional astrologer & author Georgia Stathis Thursday, September 13 @11 a.m. PT & 2 p.m. ET!
See you then, namaste…
August 20 – 26 Astro News You Can Use!

Astro News You Can Use from Karmic Evolution’s Astrologically Speaking!
The heavens are fairly quiet this week following August 11’s Leo New Moon lunar eclipse.
We’re still dealing with 7 retrograde planets, and since Mars retrograde re-entered the sign of Capricorn on August 12, the message is strategize, strategize, strategize, but don’t act yet!
While this may cause many of us irritation or frustration–if not outright anger–the switch over to Mars retrograde from Aquarius to Capricorn provides us the perfect opportunity to be less rebellious now, to keep our cool, and to plan rather than act.
Mars remains in Capricorn until August 27 when he stations direct in this earthy sign of fundamental security and success, and until he moves into Aquarius once again September 10.
Mercury stations direct at 11-degrees 32-minutes of Leo on August 18 or 19, depending on your time zone, and communication should begin to flow again. But with 6 planets still retrograde at that point, our focus should remain inward rather than outward.
A few hours prior to the Mercury station, the messenger god sextiles Venus in Libra, and this may help pave our way by easing us into Mercury’s direct motion with more kind, loving, peaceful, or soothing words than our frustration may have allowed us thus far this summer…
Meanwhile, philosophical & consciousness-oriented Jupiter in Scorpio trines exact spiritual & charitable Neptune in Pisces August 19. Right now we’re called toward humanitarianism, but cautioned against over-idealism. As I always say, all that glitters is not necessarily gold, so don’t gamble too heavily on what you want to be true; rather bank on what you know is true…
Join me Thursday, August 16, @ 11 a.m. PT & 2 p.m. ET when I’ll look at more listeners’ charts to decipher for them the meaning of this summer’s eclipses and more. See you then!
Namaste…
#astrology, #astronews, #station, Aquarius, Capricorn, Jupiter, Leo, Mars, Mercury, Neptune, pisces, retrograde, ScorpioLeo New Moon Solar Eclipse

“How People Treat You Is Their Karma; How You React Is Yours.” ~ Wayne Dyer
Let’s consider what the heavens are trying to tell us at this Leo New Moon solar eclipse at 18-degree 42-minutes, which occurred at 2:58 a.m. PT & 5:58 a.m. ET on August 11.
We astrologers know that no heavenly occurrence happens in a vacuum, and that it’s the faster moving planets that trigger the energies of slower moving ones into action at precisely the right time for each of us.
Such events—be they internal or external–are triggered into action depending on our ast karma. Our reactions to these events help us to move forward and create new, more positive karma through our decision to allow the heavens to assist us to symbiotically co-create our own futures as we move forward in this lifetime.
It’s important to remember there’s nothing we can do to change past karma, whether we trace such karma to this lifetime, past ones, or both. However, we must not let that keep us stuck in any mental, emotional, physical, or spiritual loops that serve only to reinforce self-blame, self-criticism, or self-judgment.
Rather, just as they are finding in the scientific world of neurobiology, we may create new mental grooves that help free us from past ideas, beliefs, assumptions, rationales–or anything else that no longer serves our greatest good moving forward.
When we remain stuck, we usually find outselves with one of two choices:
1) deciding we are the helpless, hapless, victim who blames everyone else for our own misfortune without taking responsibility for our own role in the energetic dynamic of our life; 2) continuing to move forward with externally-imposed beliefs, judgments, and criticisms that come not from our inner higher self (or soul) but rather from people and events that convinced us that such beliefs, etc., are right for us.
This Leo New Moon solar eclipse calls us all to look deep within our hearts (Leo=HEART!) and find the courage to discover what makes us uniquely special–regardless of what we were told, taught, or forced to believe by others or through our circumstances growing up.
It asks us also to look beyond our fixed world and to imagine a future free from such negative internal dialogues–be they conscious or unconscious–and to fill our lives with greater reverence for our own true light. Doing so allows us greater perspective on the fact that’s neither all our fault or the fault of others, but rather that we bear responsibility for hiding ourselves away out of fear of being noticed and thus drawing to ourselves additional victimization OR criticism & judgment…
“The Past Is The Present, Isn’t It? The Future, Too.”
~ Eugene O’Neill
All new and full Moon lunations may act as triggers, though they also set the tone for the remaining approximate 14-day period of the waxing lunar cycle (in the case of a new Moon) or waning lunar cycle (in the case of a full Moon.)
To best understand the energies of this August 11 Leo New Moon solar eclipse, let’s look back before we try to peer ahead…
Here’s what we already know:
- The July 12 Cancer New Moon solar eclipse called us to recognize our deepest emotional vulnerabilities, & to plant seeds of self-compassion that allow us to come out of emotional hibernation
- The July 27 Aquarius Full Moon lunar eclipse reminded us that we’re part of a greater whole—yes–but one that needs our individual, unique, creative, solar talents to help humankind survive & thrive
We also know that, according to astrologer Bernadette Brady in her bookPredictive Astrology, The Eagle & the Lark, the theme of both these eclipses was “action concerning relationships.” Brady points out that these eclipses may have brought about unfortunate news concerning separations or endings of friendships or relationships…however, due to quick action the final outcome may well be positive.
July 12’s Cancer New Moon solar eclipse asked to plant seeds that will grow into the healthy, strong desire to reveal to the world our emotional vulnerabilities without shame, blame, self-criticism or judgment.
Here are some questions we might ask ourselves since this eclipse:
- Where have I been forced to acknowledge my most vulnerable self?
- How did I deal with this and can I now be honest with both myself and others about what really hurts me most?’
- Can I feel the self-compassion necessary to recognize I am only human and that my capacity to feel hurt is something I share with every human being, regardless of the circumstances that created the hurt?
“Turn Your Face To The Sun And The Shadows
Fall Behind You.” ~ Maori Proverb
The July 27 Aquarius Full Moon lunar eclipse asked us to apply our growing sense of self compassion and ability to withstand hurts, slights, and emotional pain without resorting to negative past karma that drives us underground or back into hiding in our emotionally protective shell.
At a full Moon, the Sun’s light is reflected back to it.This serves as a reminder of both the positive and negative archetypal range of energies inherent in any given zodiacal Sun sign. At the same time, it reminds us that no archetypal energy exists in a vacuum because there’s always an archetypal polar opposite, in this case Aquarius.
The July 27 Aquarius Full Moon lunar eclipse highlighted back to the Leo Sun that we must jettison whatever it is about the Leo archetype that no longer serves our highest and best interest. At the same time, it reminded us that if we let go of any negative Leo traits (arrogance, excessive pride, selfishness, etc.), we may find it easier to integrate our own unique creative specialness into the collective.
Since this eclipse was about relationships as well, we might now ask ourselves these questions:
- Where do I still need to let go of friends, groups, associations, whose ideological beliefs I don’t truly share?
- How I can both honor AND integrate my own creative unique talents & abilities into my community, tribe, family, groups, etc., without losing a strong sense of myself?
- What will it take to allow me to see myself more clearly and objectively, without feeling either too small or too large a part of this world?
In short, the Aquarius Full Moon lunar eclipse reminded the Leo Sun to individuate. Yet how can we individuate without knowing and fully appreciating who we truly are, and by possessing true Cancerian self-compassion for that true soul within us?
Releasing that which keeps us tied to society, the collective, personal groups, tribes, associations, and/or friends who don’t allow us to express our solar gifts–or worse yet, denigrate or ignore such talents—will not serve us as we create more positive future karma…
By the same token, we’re not necessarily to demand being treated like a star, but rather accept our place as a cog in the wheel of a society that needs our talents and gifts to help promote the betterment of humankind.
“It’s During Our Darkest Moments That We Must Focus
To See The Light.” ~Aristotle
The third eclipse in this series, the August 11 Leo New Moon solar eclipse, returns once again to the seed planting theme. Now that we’ve received the message that we must develop true self-compassion to release our fears around being part of any group in a meaningful way, we can work on developing & expressing our unique creative identity.
Bernadette Brady reveals that this eclipse may well result in the collapse of “plans or life-styles,” and that this may result in confusion. However, “the long-term effects are those of rebuilding and transformation,” which can result in long-lasting consequences. “This eclipse family changes a person’s direction through the sudden collapse of an existing structure,” Brady concludes
As the Sun and the Moon come together in the Sun’s dignified sign of Leo, we’re reminded it’s always darkest before the dawn. It takes faith to hang on to the hope that we’ll be able to glimpse that miraculous first sliver of light as the Moon begins to pull ahead of the Sun.
Meanwhile, Uranus in Taurus, newly retrograde as of August 7, squares the transiting Nodes, and is squared by retrograde Mars in Uranus-ruled Aquarius at this eclipse, a strong signal that change is in the air, like it or not…
Uranus remains in retrograde motion until January 6, 2019 & brings to a total 7 planets appearing to move backward through the heavens right now. Together with Mercury, Mars, Saturn, Neptune, Pluto, & Chiron, Uranus asks us to withdraw inward and do a bit of soul searching.
With so many planets retrograde, we know it’s not a time for action, but rather one to plan, strategize, think, analyze, and generally plot our future instead of simply stumbling forward aimlessly. As noted, Mars’ retrograde through Aquarius–the sign ruled by Uranus—since June 26 placed emphasis on the message not to fly off the handle right now, but rather to take everything as slowly as possible to allow mental revelations to happen.
The symbiosis between these two planets and their movements tells us we’ve been reviewing the ideological basis upon which we formulate both our values and our actions.
Mars moves back into the sign of Capricorn on August 12, where the warrior god should be far less impetuous, anxious, or accident prone, & more capable of planning for future security. However, we must remember that he’s still square Uranus in the sky right now, which may make us yearn for some type of action, and in the absence of our ability to act, cause us irritation and annoyance.
I Forgot I Had A Choice…
The Leo Sun, Moon, & Mercury (now retrograde) waxed into frictional quincunxes with evolutionary Pluto retrograde in Capricorn at this Leo New Moon solar eclipse, confirming that this lunation is indeed a part of our evolutionary process.
To me this energy feels a bit like the Nine of Wands in the tarot, which depictsthat we may feel depleted, exhausted, depressed, discouraged, or weary at this stage of our evolutionary journey. However, if we can muster jut one more ounce of energy, simply make one final push forward, we can meet successfully whatever challenges life has thrown at us thus far.
Though irritated, annoyed, or aggravated, we must remember that the only alternative to evolution is extinction.
Meanwhile, this lunation also squares a Juno/Jupiter opposition, confirming again the theme of a possible break in relationships. Juno=Hera, the wife of Jupiter=Zeus in Roman & Greek mythologies respectively, and they enter the limelight now since both square the transiting Nodes we well…
Jupiter trines Neptune, however, signaling that it’s possible altruism can win the day, especially if we focus our efforts on sharing those gifts of ours with those to whom we are connected by virtue of being human.
Venus in Libra, her own sign, squared Saturn in Capricorn at this lunation & eclipse, highlighting that obligatory issues in our partnerships may factor heavily at this time.
Where do we do what we what we think we must in our relationships vs. doing what we truly desire? The answer to this question is bound to allow us to proceed further along our evolutionary journey by allowing us to express our true desires vis-à-vis relationships, rather than simply follow an arbitrarily decided upon set of “rules.”
When Mercury stations direct August 18, Mars does the same August 27, and Saturn moves forward again on September 6, we should begin to see the momentum pick up in terms of our outward actions and expression…at least until Venus stations retrograde in Scorpio October 5…
The good news? Venus will join only Uranus, Neptune, & Chiron retrograde then, though Juno will join the backward parade October 12 as well, so be sure to stay tuned!
Here’s Katy Perry’s ROAR, which seems an appropriate example of how to move away from hiding one’s light under a bushel, whether that opportunity is granted us
by choiceor by circumstance…
Katy Perry
“I used to bite my tongue and hold my breath
Scared to rock the boat and make a mess
So I sat quietly
Agreed politely
I guess that I forgot I had a choice
I let you push me past the breaking point
I stood for nothing
So I fell for everything
You held me down, but I got up
Already brushing off the dust
You hear my voice, you hear that sound
Like thunder gonna shake the ground
You held me down, but I got up
Get ready ’cause I’ve had enough
I see it all, I see it now
I got the eye of the tiger, a fighter,
dancing through the fire
Cause I am a champion and
You’re gonna hear me ROAR
Louder, louder than a lion
Cause I am a champion and
You’re gonna hear me ROAR
Oh oh oh oh oh oh
You’re gonna hear me roar
Now I’m floating like a butterfly
Stinging like a bee I earned my stripes
I went from zero, to my own hero
You held me down, but I got up
Already brushing off the dust
You hear my voice, you hear that sound
Like thunder gonna shake the ground
You held me down, but I got up
Get ready ’cause I’ve had enough
I see it all, I see it now
I got the eye of the tiger, a fighter,
dancing through the fire
Cause I am a champion and
You’re gonna hear me ROAR
Louder, louder than a lion
Cause I am a champion and
You’re gonna hear me ROAR
Oh oh oh oh oh oh
You’re gonna hear me roar
Roar-or, roar-or, roar-or…”
Aquarius Full Moon Lunar Eclipse July 27

Shock To The System
All full Moons are about release, and this Aquarius Full Moon is no different. However, this one is also a lunar eclipse, occurring at 4-degrees 45-minutes of Aquarius–at 1:20 pm PT & 4:20 pm ET–whereby the Moon teams up with Mars & the South Node in Aquarius to oppose the Leo Sun conjunct the North Node.
To top it all off, the planet Uranus—modern ruler of Aquarius—is squared by both luminaries, the Nodes, and Mars…
So, when the Moon meets Mars, which has been retrograde in Aquarius sinceJune 26 & traveling off and on with the Aquarius South Node, there is the likelihood some sparks may fly.
Aquarius=air; Leo=fire. Together these two elements represent a potentiallycombustible or explosive energetic combination that can cause events to move swiftly. Often the fast-moving Moon (the Moon moves one degree every two hours) triggers events into action and, since Mars won’t exact square Uranus until August 1, the likelihood for such action is ongoing for the short term.
So, if it turns out the that the world remains calm at this lunation, chalk it up to a close call. However, it’s more likely we may see fireworks somewhere in the world between now and August 1 that set into motion change of some kind.
The slightly scary part is that the meeting of the Aquarius Moon/Mars/South Node consolidates energy around past karma, confirming not only that change MUST happen, but also that change may arrive with quite a jolt.
The more impactful the shock, the greater we know is our need for change. But, the more we’ve clung to our past, the harder change will be to handle. This is particularly true for those of us with planets, angles, or sensitive points in early fixed signs of Taurus, Leo, Scorpio, & Aquarius.
To fixity—and this Aquarius Full Moon lunar eclipse is undoubtedly fixed in nature–change is anathema. This means the more we deny, sublimate, project, procrastinate, or otherwise defend against change, the harder it will be to consciously acknowledge that change is the only constant.
And, in such denial, we reinforce our own resistance to progressing into a more productive, co-created karma in this lifetime—future karma that sets us up for an easier time both during the remainder of our life now, and in our next incarnation.
You Say You Want A Revolution
The Aquarius Full Moon lunar eclipse takes the Leo Sun to task as it reflects back to it its own light, a reminder that the Leo archetype cannot live in isolation because each of us comprises part of the greater whole of humankind.
Whatever talents, creativity, generosity, and pride we have deep in our hearts that make us individual entities is supposed to be shared and not hoarded or hidden, so we may contribute to the greater good of all wo/mankind.
At the same time, however, this lunation reminds us also–because we are part of a greater whole—not lose ourselves in “groupthink,” but rather to stay true to our own solar identities for the same reason: so we may contribute our talents to the group.
Some of us may keep our lights hidden under a bushel for a variety of reasons, not the least of which may be fear. Fear of not being accepted, fear of being perceived as eccentric or different, fear of being excluded, exiled, shunned, or cast out from a particular group or groups…
However, by not sharing our individual creativity with the collective we avoid doing our part as a member of society. Individuation is a huge part of our soul’s mission in this lifetime so first we mustbelieve that simply by being alive we have creative worth!
Next, we may release our fears around exposing our true creative selves to the rest of the world. Only then may we claim our individual gifts and utilize them to make life better, not just for ourselves, but for everyone.
The battle royal—or revolution, if you will–at this lunation and eclipse occurs between our ability to honor ourselves as creative, unique, special, solar, divinely-inspired individuals AND yet remain part of a larger group without losing our individual identity.
Without such an individual identity, or solar consciousness, we may fall into the grip of “groupthink,” an energy that leaves little room for honoring the individual solar self.
In her book The Art of Stealing Fire, Jungian astrologer Liz Greene writes: “…the special brand of suffering that Uranus can reflect springs from the fact that the person cannot express a sense of individuality. He or she may be dominated or driven by a revelation or world-view that is collective.”
It may be a revolutionary or transformative perspective on life, but it is collective nonetheless…if someone is trapped in such receptivity to the collective, without any individual sense of self to monitor, sift, or shape the revelation, he or she may lose touch with what is nourishing and creative on an inner level, and many important aspects of personal life may be unwittingly crushed,” according to Greene.
“In its most negative form, these are the polemics of the terrorist, or the polemics of any mass movement…aimed at destroying institutions or structures…deemed in need of radical change,” Greene continues. “Recognizing the need for change may be right and appropriate—although sometimes, like beauty, it may be in the eye of the beholder.”
A Word About Trauma…
It’s the work of evolutionary astrologer of Mark Jones that enlightened me about the significance of both Uranian and Aquarian archetypes as potential trauma signatures in our charts. His work around trauma is brilliant, imo, and some of it can be found on youtube.
His significant work includes providing those of us interested in using astrology as a metaphysical tool an understanding of how trauma can hold us back fromexperiencing joy in our lives–on either a mental, physical, emotional or spiritual level, or perhaps even all of the above…
Jones notes that an Aquarius South Node in an individual’s chart, or Uranus square the Nodes, may indicate traumatic experiences either from this lifetime or past lives.
“Such experiences of trauma are the basis for splitting off parts of the psyche in order to protect the integrity of the whole,” he writes in Healing The Soul, Pluto, Uranus, and the Lunar Nodes.
“The traumatic component of past experience can exaggerate the necessary detachment that arises in this placement, leading instead to dissociated states and psychological dissolution,” Jones adds.
Again, to return to this Aquarius Full Moon lunar eclipse where the Moon & Mars band together to pull us back toward the Aquarius South Node’s potentially traumatized karmic past, the Leo Sun & North Node beckon us forward toward a more cohesive, less fractured ego identity.
It will pay now to look at where we’ve been traumatized in the past. The irony is that Uranus/Aquarius energy often gets interpreted as “alternative” or “different,” but as Liz Greene points out it’s often far more difficult for an individual to march to the beat of her own drummer than it is easy to join in with the crowd.
Past wounding or trauma may center around our ideological beliefs, since the rational, fixed, air sign Aquarius bears the negative connotation of group think and the inability to break away from friends, groups, or association that carry philosophies they believe to be right & true to the exclusion of all others.
It’s these negative past experiences that may make us afraid now to move toward the Leo Sun & North Node at this lunation, and to remain safely back in the comfort and habitual realm of the Aquarius Moon & South Node. After all, when the Moon’s concerned we’re always looking for security. The trouble is that what makes us feel secure because it’s part of the past is not always what makes us strongest, healthiest, or most conscious.
It’s this lunation that may trigger an internal revolt in all of us to move away from safety in numbers and find greater value in our individual selves…
The Only Way Out Is Through
Still, reliving past trauma is by no means fun!
My work as a past life regressionist has proven to me that we can learn uncanny information about our soul’s journey thus far in its travels, and often such information proves reveletory to us.
Trauma centers around feelings, thoughts, & beliefs that our soul has adopted through its past experiences. Often, history has shown that these experiences may not have been pleasant ones. In fact, they may have traumatized us to such a degree that we’ve buried them deep within so that we do not have to relive them EVER–not now, not in the future!
But astrology is the study of cycles, and what goes around comes around. This make it difficult to bury or hide any kind of trauma for too long. And if that’s true, then we know that sometime in our current life’s journey through this physical incarnation that some trauma will resurface from time to time.
This Aquarius Full Moon lunar eclipse provides us one of those times now. We may well see it through the collective, an excellent way to watch the current energy of the heavens reflect back to us both the energy of the collective and our individual lives.
Here are some questions you might ask yourself now:
· What battle have I been too afraid to fight?
· Where does my alignment with groups or the collective (read: beliefs or philosophies) impede expression of my own true, solar, creative, individual self?
· How can I step out from behind the bushel and shine more brightly without anxiety, fear, shame, blame, or the need to play the victim?
The Home Of The Brave
Mercury stationed retrograde in Leo on July 26. This makes six planets appearing to swim backwards in the heavens right now.
The significance of this is that it’s not time for action. It’s a time to review, re-analyze, re-strategize, continue to plan but not to act, and just to generally allow yourself to receive rather than make waves, either in your personal life or within society in general.
Mercury’s backward motion between July 26 & August 18/19, combined with Pluto, Saturn, Neptune, & Chiron currently retrograde, always asks us to chill so that we may recognize that our brain is attempting to bring information that’s been embedded in our subconscious into consciousness.
This lends greater validity to the conclusion that this lunation’s revolutionary energy is meant to be internal! We’re called toward thought, contemplation, review, etc., in order to decipher and plan how to move forward–eventually.
Mercury retrograde in Leo, a fire sign, asks us to go deep about the source ofour inspiration. Fire is life, the spark necessary to sustain us, it gives us our creative ideas which we may take and run with.
While you’re slowing down during these hazy, lazy, crazy days of summer you might meditate upon from where you draw the greatest inspiration in your life and see where your passion truly lies. Passion and purpose go hand in hand, and through greater identification with both, we can all progress on our path toward individuation, or the freedom to be exactly who we came here to be!
The more we work on this now, the less impactful any shocks will be, especially at the August 1 Mars retrograde exact square to Uranus—so no time to waste!
The revolution in which we’re asked to participate at this Aquarius Full Moon lunar eclipse involves releasing any fears around either not being special enough, or thinking we’re SO special that we’re better than everyone else.
This requires bravery, but the good news is that courage is the Leo Sun’s mission! We’re all here to develop the kind of courage it takes to allow our individual Suns (regardless of zodiacal sign) to shine.
It’s now we are to rethink, review, re-strategize how we communicate our specialness to the world. If we’ve fallen into the pit of Leo’s dark side archetypal energy, we may be too proud, too selfish, too arrogant, or too unaware that we’re connected to the whole of mankind.
If we believe we deserve more attention than anyone else, hog the spotlight, think we our specialness is greater than anyone else’s, then we defy our divine right to create and express in order to SHARE our gifts willingly and generously with the world.
We must remember, however, that it’s this connection to our Sun that gives us our purpose for being! We cannot live in a microcosm—we can be the greatest thing since sliced bread, but if there’s no one there to appreciate us, to notice us, what’s it all for?
We have to fight now for our right to consider ourselves unique, special, divinely-inspired individuals, but the fight for the moment is an internal one–a heart-centered one, because that is where we truly find out home of the brave…
The Summer of Love
Appropriate to personifying this lunation’s energy is natal Aquarius South Node Jimi Hendrix, the famed rock guitarist who gave us his famed electric version of The Star Spangled Banner at Woodstock in the summer of 1969.
According to Wikipedia: “Although his mainstream career spanned only four years, he is widely regarded as one of the most influential electric guitarists in the history of popular music, and one of the most celebrated musicians of the 20th century. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame describes him as “arguably the greatest instrumentalist in the history of rock music.”
Hendrix’s performance [at Woodstock] featured a rendition of the U.S. national anthem, “The Star-Spangled Banner”, during which he used copious amounts of amplifier feedback, distortion, and sustain to replicate the sounds made by rockets and bombs.”
Although contemporary political pundits described his interpretation as a statement against the Vietnam War, three weeks laterHendrix explained its meaning: ‘We’re all Americans … it was like ‘Go America!’… We play it the way the air is in America today. The air is slightly static, see.'”
Immortalized in the 1970 documentary film, Woodstock, his guitar-driven version would become part of the sixties Zeitgeist. Pop critic Al Aronowitz of the New York Post wrote: “It was the most electrifying moment of Woodstock, and it was probably the single greatest moment of the sixties.”
Images of the performance showing Hendrix wearing a blue-beaded white leather jacket with fringe, a red head-scarf, and blue jeans are widely regarded as iconic pictures that capture a defining moment of the era.”
Please note: I choose a video version of this song that includes footage of both the historical U.S. civil rights movement of the 1950’s & 1960’s & scenes from the Viet Nam war. Please be forewarned that some of the images may be upsetting so please watch at your own discretion!
The Star Spangled Banner
Jimi Hendrix
In addition, lest you doubt Hendrix’s influence upon future generations (Aquarius South Node!) of guitar players, here’s another clip of musicians inspired by his electric rendition of
The Star Spangled Banner
Enjoy!
Aquarius New Moon Solar Eclipse February 15

Free To Be Who You Are
The Aquarius New Moon highlights this archetypal sign of friendship and community. In essence, it’s the sign of humanitarianism–love for the collective, not in a spiritually empathic Neptunian “there but the for the grace of God go I” sense, but rather through a “united we stand, divided we fall” ideology.
The English language has but one word to describe “love.” In reality, however, when you think about it, love comes in several different forms–from romantic to erotic, from comradely love to love of family, community, country, etc.
As such, this Aquarius New Moon presents us with a time during which we mayplant seeds around our commitment to groups and their causes, and to those toward whom we feel brotherly/sisterly love.
However, there’s a paradox here. Above all, Aquarius energy represents our commitment to our own sense of individuality, our freedom to individuate and to be who we truly came here to be.
Jungian analyst and astrologer Richard Idemon defines Uranian/Aquarian love in his book “Through the Looking Glass” as agape, which brings with it the ability to say “I love you enough to let you more fully and completely be who you are. Indeed, the more you are fully and completely yourself, the more I love you; and this is because the more you are completely who you are, the more I can be fully and completely who I am.
“The image associated with Aquarius is the water bearer, a god pouring water or a fluidlike substance from an urn,” explains Idemon. “The urn and its contents represent love as a gift from the gods…the urge of agape is for each one of us to offer as a form of love those things we have learned through our individual journeys and our suffering…
“Heroes and heroines go through their heroic journey and then bring back the gifts of truth, freedom, enlightenment, cleansing or redemption to share with humanity,” according to Idemon. Agape awakens and frees us at the same time because it has “a kind of Humpty Dumpty effect—it hits us and off the wall we fall…if we are truly living in process, if we are growing and evolving, we must expect and accept that change is part of life.”
What About The Solar Eclipse?
This partial solar eclipse at the Aquarius New Moon occurs at 27-degrees and 7-minutes of the sign of the water bearer. This is within two degrees of opposition to last year’s August 21 total solar eclipse at 28-degrees 53-minutes of Leo.
Solar eclipses are, in general, more likely to manifest externally while lunar eclipses may bring forth more hidden internal emotional issues. This partial solar eclipse is part of a pair—it falls under the same auspices as the January 31 Leo Full Moon total lunar eclipse, and so it carries the same theme.
That theme includes new ideas, according to astrologer Bernadette Brady, who wrote in her book “Predictive Astrology: The Eagle and the Lark” that “if this eclipse affects your chart, you will be flooded with new ideas or options. There may seem to be an element of haste, but if you can go with the new ideas, they will have positive outcomes.”
A solar eclipse occurs at a New Moon when the Moon passes between Earth and the Sun, causing the light of the Sun to be obscured. A total solar eclipse obscure’s the whole of the Sun’s light from the vantage point of Earth, while a partial solar eclipse allows only a portion of the Sun’s light to either shine or be hidden.
Whether an eclipse is total or partial is determined by the orb (number of degrees) between the Sun and the transiting Nodes of the Moon. Ergo, it’s the position of the transiting Nodes that determines whether or not any given New Moon is a solar eclipse or not.
Either way, it’s still important to recognize where an eclipse occurs in your chart (in what house this eclipse degree falls), and to note whether or not it touches any sensitive points (planets, angles, etc.) in your own horoscope.
Remember, at this partial solar eclipse we’re all about planting those new seeds, some of which will come in the form of ideas. Since the same energy has been in play since January 31’s total lunar eclipse—though that was a time of release—let’s ask ourselves what we’ve been able to let go of in the form of ideas that no longer serve us well in order to make room for newer, more exciting or revelatory ones.
Now is the time for beginnings. People, external events, or circumstances may prompt new ideas that will allow you to shine that light of yours defiantly and proudly out into the world in a way that benefits not just yourself but others too!
What About Us?
It’s our individuality that makes us special and unique, and it’s our specific hero’s journey that enlightens us about exactly how unique we are, in what ways, and how this differentiates us from the herd.
At this Aquarius New Moon, we’re asked to dig deeply into the water bearer’s urn and discern and assess exactly what’s in it. Joseph Campbell called this the “boon” or “elixir” that we search for as part of our hero’s journey quest.
Why?
Because this is how we make our greatest contribution to the collective. It’s how we add our own specific and special individual divinely-inspired gifts to the group by first defining our gift or gifts, and then releasing them into the group for its betterment–the betterment of wo/mankind.
The message of the transiting nodal axis is still the same as it’s been since May 9, 2017 when it shifted regressively into new signs—the South Node into Aquarius, the North Node into Leo. We’re to take our special gifts, those that we simultaneously brought to the group and those that set us apart from the collective, and bring them forth in ways that allow us to shine as individuals.
Supporting this Aquarius New Moon in its mission are Mars and Vesta in Sagittarius (the latter symbolic of the eternal flame lighting the prodigal son’s way home) sextile the South Node and trine the North Node. This “easy” energy may just provide the necessary push (read: opportunity) to remind us of our true goal.
At the same time, Mercury in Aquarius (aligned now with the Moon, Sun, & Juno—the archetypal “wife” or partner) sextiles Aquarian ruler Uranus in Aries. Opportunities for new ideas—no matter how fast or from how far out of the blue they come—may be just the match we need to help us light our own special divinely-inspired fires and shine them into the world.
Also, a sextile between Venus in Pisces and Saturn in Capricorn provides a groundedness and welcome balance to the airy energy of this Aquarius New Moon. It asks us to ponder: where can we find opportunity through our compassion and empathy to carry out our duty to family, friends, colleagues, community—but most of all to ourselves—without sacrificing our individuality now?
Nothing To Fear But Fear Itself
You might want to keep this in mind, as well, as Mars approaches a square to Neptune at this Aquarius New Moon. This square will exact on February 17, the day before the Sun moves into the sign of Pisces and, leading up til then, may well have us doubting ourselves, especially in terms of our physical energy.
Mars square Neptune can bring fatigue and depression, but greater trouble may result from our own tendency to second guess our intuitions and allow ourselves to fall prey to the deceitful words or actions of another or others.
Don’t get sucked into believing that a group’s cause is the same as your own if that group does not appreciate the special gifts you bring to it!
In his book “Planets In Transit,” astrologer Rob Hand warns of “low physical energies” with this transit, and to “watch out for fevers, cuts, burns, infections and the like, along with allergies and excessive physical strain.”
How can we better utilize the Mars square Neptune energy? The key lies with the fact that this square can also endow us with great intuitive power. Allow your feelings to guide you, but maintain strong enough boundaries so as to not fall into any deceitful trap or—worse yet–beat yourself up if you do!
Rather, allow yourself to forgive yourself for any sob story you may have bought from others, any metaphorical Brooklyn Bridges you may have purchased. In doing so you’ll be able—at least eventually—to forgive your deceivers as well.
Venus is approaching Neptune now (exact conjunction on February 21), and we know that if we have the capability to feel compassion for ourselves in the form of forgiveness, we may then feel the same toward others.
This is key! Remember, fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me! Use this energy to become conscious of your patterns and to transform them from the kind of deficit inherent in continually playing the victim into the empowerment and strength necessary for self-forgiveness…
At this time, Neptune also forms a quincunx to the Leo North Node, challenging us to remember that one way to reward ourselves when we’re able to pierce any bubble of negativity in which we may be hiding or existing is through creative expression, or the enjoyment of another’s creativity.
Make music–or simply listen to it–attend a dance event or simply dance, read or write, drum, meditate, pray, paint or go to a museum. In short, appreciate that the universe surrounds you with beautiful, pleasurable experiences as long as you take the time and opportunity to stop and smell those roses…above all, best to heed Rob Hand’s warning now to “try not to become demoralized! Conserve your energies, confront your fears!”
Here’s Pink’s What About Us, an appropriate question to ask as we all ponder past changes in our lives and if it’s time now for us to stand up and be counted:
What About Us
Pink
“We are searchlights, we can see in the dark
We are rockets, pointed up at the stars
We are billions of beautiful hearts
And you sold us down the river too far…
What about us?
What about all the times you said you had the answers?
What about us?
What about all the broken happy ever afters?
What about us?
What about all the plans that ended in disaster?
What about love? What about trust?
What about us?
We are problems that want to be solved
We are children that need to be loved
We were willin’, we came when you called
But man, you fooled us, enough is enough, oh
What about us?
What about all the times you said you had the answers?
What about us?
What about all the broken happy ever afters?
Oh, what about us?
What about all the plans that ended in disaster?
Oh, what about love? What about trust?
What about us?
Oh, what about us?
What about all the plans that ended in disaster?
What about love? What about trust?
What about us?
Sticks and stones, they may break these bones
But then I’ll be ready, are you ready?
It’s the start of us, waking up come on
Are you ready? I’ll be ready
I don’t want control, I want to let go
Are you ready? I’ll be ready
‘Cause now it’s time to let them know
We are ready, what about us?
What about us?
What about all the times you said you had the answers?
So what about us?
What about all the broken happy ever afters?
Oh, what about us?
What about all the plans that ended in disaster?
Oh, what about love? What about trust?
What about us?”
Namaste…
Leo Full Moon Total Lunar Eclipse

Full Super Blue Blood Moon Total Wha?
Ok, first let’s dispense with the astronomy!
January 31’s Full Super Blue Blood Leo Moon total lunar eclipse (say that three times fast, I dare ya!) is so named because it’s a:
- Full Moon: the 11-degree 37-minute Leo Moon opposes the Aquarius Sun at the same degree and conjoins with the lunar Nodes making this event a total lunar eclipse
- Blue Moon: the second Full Moon in one calendar month
- Super Moon: The Moon’s orbiting between 14-30% closer to the Earth—called perigee–which makes the Moon appear larger and brighter than during a normal lunar orbit
- Blood Moon: During the lunar eclipse, when the Earth comes between the Sun & Moon, the moon will glide into Earth’s shadow, gradually turning the white disk of light to orange or red, according to Phys.org
“That red light you see is sunlight that has skimmed and bent through Earth’s atmosphere and continued on through space to the moon,” notes Alan MacRobert of Sky and Telescope magazine. “In other words, it’s from all the sunrises and sunsets that ring the world at the moment.”
One take-away here has to do with the potential potency of this total lunar eclipse and the archetypal energies involved. Remember that eclipses can act like jump starts to a car, and jolt us into a new direction, way of thinking, or some kind of change, etc.
They can lead to sudden, unexpected events or revelations (especially this one on the Leo/Aquarius axis), that will likely manifest in the areas of your chart (houses) where the Sun & Moon fall at this time. Eclipses generally manifest between three weeks before and six months after, though they have been known to extend their effects for several years, depending…
Another message coming from this Leo Super Full Moon (closer to the Earth, remember?) may come in larger than life drama queen scenes, so be on the lookout now for displays of over the top emotion or histrionics. It’s like a “normal” full Moon on steroids, so this Super Moon’s closeness to Earth can make us even more “lunatic” (read: loo-nah-tic!) now, which is to say we may feel this energy more strongly than usual…
Since Full Moons are always about release, a simultaneous total lunar eclipse indicates endings as well. Eclipses run in what’s known as the Saros Cycles and have been traced back through the ages by many astrologers, among them Bernadette Brady.
Brady notes in “Predictive Astrology, The Eagle and the Lark,” that this particular Leo Full Moon total lunar eclipse (Saros Series 1 South) “is concerned with ideas and their enthusiastic expression,” and that “if this eclipse affects your chart, you will be flooded with ideas or options. There may seem to be an element of haste, but if you can go with new ideas, they will have positive outcomes.”
Hmm…sounds like in order to allow in such new ideas, we’ll probably have to release some older ones, eh? And that this may happen naturally. Be aware of where this eclipse is hitting your chart and you’ll be able to guesstimate into what area of life your new ideas will come…
Let There Be Light…
This Leo Full Moon is a lunar eclipse because the Aquarius Sun joins Venus, Hygeia, Juno, and the Aquarius South Node (past karma), while the Leo Moon aligns with Ceres & the Leo North Node in opposition.
As we feel the strong pull of Aquarian South Node energy to the past, we notice that only the Leo Moon & Ceres are aligned with the North Node, the direction of our future destiny. Let’s review how we might move forward consciously.
When the Leo Moon reflects back to the Aquarius Sun its own bright light, we’re reminded–while the Sun moves this month through this group-oriented, humanitarian, aha! moment sign–that the whole collective of humanity is comprised of separate individuals.
However mindful of this we remain, we also must recall that all full Moon energies require integration and balance to operate optimally.
What does this energetic integration look like?
First of all, what’s wounded you in terms of the Aquarian archetype either in early life or past life karma, particularly in the area of breaking away (or not!) from a group or tribe (i.e., family, religion, school, community, etc.) and their particular way of thinking. What’s got you clinging to an old way of dealing with issues around health and/or partnership?
You might have been ostracized (which could lead to self-ostracizing, aptly espoused by Groucho Marx’s famous quip: “I don’t wanna be a member of any group that’ll have me as a member!”) Perhaps you were ahead of your time and everyone around you thought you were crazy. Maybe you were, or you became crazy as a result, doubting your own intuitive or intellectual knowledge.
Or, alternatively, you stuck with the group (and its way of thinking) out of habit, or a sense of guilt or betrayal should you decide to leave, but you knew at some point that the group’s philosophy varied greatly from your own.
The results of sticking with that group or collective energy over time might have pushed you into a position of authority—one from which it became harder and harder to escape. So now you’re living a life that doesn’t include being true to yourself or your own individual beliefs, and which doesn’t leave you feeling truly happy or secure.
This Leo Full Moon lunar eclipse calls us all to think about why we align with those we do, whether they constitute a literal group or simply a particular philosophy or set of beliefs or rules–and whether this way of thinking benefits your freedom of self-expression, health, or one-on-one partnerships.
We’re drawn back now toward releasing old negative philosophical Aquarian collective ideas &/or trauma-related karma in order to move forward toward honoring our future solar creative individual selves…
I Glory In The Me Yet To Come
The Sun will shine, regardless. You get to decide how much you want your individual light to shine, and whether or not you need the group or collective to be able to do this.
We all walk that fine line between being accepted and being ourselves. Many of us—for whatever reason—feel we must hide our true inner selves for fear of being shamed, blamed, or otherwise deemed “different.”
The Leo Moon/Ceres/North Node call us to utilize what we’ve learned from any group or tribe to which we belong or previously belonged, and to bring it forward in our lives. Dwarf planet Ceres’ connotation is around sustenance, be it literal or metaphorical, so now is the time to figure out how to self-nurture by shining one’s own creative, solar light out into the world in order to fulfill one’s karmic destiny–without fear.
I’ve noted before that Jungian astrologer Liz Greene points out that the dilemma for those who carry Aquarian energy is about separating from the collective. Since we all have Uranus (Aquarius’s ruler) somewhere in our chart, the house or houses with this sign prominent represent areas where our ability to express our emotional and instinctive individual needs is being tested.
In The Art of Stealing Fire, Uranus in the Horoscope, Greene cautions against considering unconventionality equal to individuality. She writes: “…please try to rid yourselves of the association of Uranus with individuality,” because “unconventional does not mean individual…because the act of rebelling against something means that tone is in some way deeply bound up with, and subtly dominated by, the very things one is fighting. This is not an expression of individuality, because that comes from within, and is not dictated by attempting to be the opposite of something one perceives in the outer world.”
She adds: “One needs to be able to say, ‘hang on a minute. This is a wonderful and inspiring vision of the future, but does it apply to the world in which I am presently living? Is it viable in terms of my experience of life and human nature? Do I believe it with my heart and gut, as well as my head?…Can I contribute anything truly individual to making it work?’
“Without this kind of perspective, Uranus may wipe out individual values and individual authenticity, and what we have left is polemics. In its most negative form, these are the polemics of the terrorist, or the polemics of any mass movement which is aimed at destroying institutions or structures which are deemed in need of radical change.”
Green concludes, “if someone is trapped in such receptivity to the collective, without any individual sense of self to monitor, sift, and shape the revelation, he or she may lose touch with what is nourishing and creative on an inner level, and many important aspects of personal life may be unwittingly crushed.”
Creating My Own Tomorrow
The Moon quincunxes Neptune at this Leo Full Moon lunar eclipse, which says we may be confused, easily deceived, or put our faith into something Quixotic; however, we may still continue to dream of what we can someday become…
It pays now to remember “from chaos comes clarity,” and that as long as we’re aware this is the dream stage and not the actuality, we should be fine. Quincunx is tantamount to an annoyance which, through its irritation, causes us to adjust something or other in our immediate environment.
So, when dealing with the more impersonal Aquarian energy prevalent right now, we can remind ourselves that through this Moon/Neptune quincunx we can adjust to any annoyances by allowing ourselves freedom of creative and emotional expression as at least a brief respite. This is preferable over putting too much faith in others and ending up deceived.
In addition, Mercury moves just after this Leo Full Moon from “work hard,” “keep the status quo,” and “don’t rock the boat” Capricorn energy into more objectively forward thinking, impartial, collective Aquarius energy, and we may have to put on our thinking caps to ascertain if what’s being said (or what we’re saying to others) is what we truly think or feel.
When I Become One With The Sun
The courage and strength to think and feel freely is the right and proper integration of the Aquarius and Leo energies prevalent now.
The message inherent in this Leo Full Moon lunar eclipse is that we must sustain ourselves by shining our true light up and outward and, in doing so follow our hearts regardless of the strong pull of the collective right now.
Though the Aquarian archetype often likes its external battles—think Prometheus and his defiance of Zeus when he stole fire to give to mankind–the battle now is within, not without.
It’s about finding that liminal space inside where you sing your own song, paint your own picture, dance your own dance, and generally simply follow your heart…
Why?
Because it’s your heart that knows whether it’s on the “right” road or not, even if it’s not the permanent road. And it’s your heart that cannot sacrifice its individual unique means of expression, or sublimate its feelings to any particular group or the collective as a whole, to be lost to anonymity forever…
Here’s a song that sprang to mind when writing this piece that I feel aptly describes the energy of this Leo Full Moon total lunar eclipse & its potential integrative energies…note how there’s an orchestra (group) AND soloists (individuals) ALL expressing themselves creatively! (Sorry the film’s a bit fuzzy in places, but I couldn’t find a clearer version…)
I Sing The Body Electric
From the movie “Fame”
“I sing the body electric
I celebrate the me yet to come
I toast to my own reunion
When I become one with the sun
And I’ll look back on Venus
I’ll look back on Mars
And I’ll burn with the fire of ten million stars
And in time, and in time we will all be stars
I sing the body electric
I glory in the glow of rebirth
Creating my own tomorrow
When I shall embody the earth
And I’ll serenade Venus
I’ll serenade Mars
And I’ll burn with the fire of ten million stars
And in time, and in time we will all be stars
We are the emperors now and we are the czars
And in time, and in time we will all be stars
I sing the body electric
I celebrate the me yet to come
I toast to my own reunion
When I become one with the sun
And I’ll look back on Venus
I’ll look back on Mars
And I’ll burn with the fire of ten million stars
And in time, and in time we will all be stars
And in time, and in time we will all be stars…”
Capricorn New Moon January 16, Venus & Sun Move Into Aquarius!

Do You Know What You Don’t Know?
Tonight’s Capricorn New Moon @26-degrees 54-minutes in the sign of the goat calls us to get serious about both what we KNOW and what we have still to learn.
Capricorn, ruled by authoritative serious taskmaster Saturn, is never in it for the kicks. Rather, this is an archetypal energy that’s old and rigid when it’s born and slowly relaxes to become more flexible as it ages.
What does that mean?
It means that right now we find the ruler of this perigee (closer to Earth than most full moons), blue (two full moons in the same month) Capricorn Full Moon large, in charge, & relentless in its goal to make us wiser…
This is particularly true now not only because the Moon & Sun, but also Saturn, Mercury, Venus, & Pluto are in the same sign—hoo boy, that’s a lotta Cappyenergy! In addition, and at least until March 8 when Jupiter stations retrograde— all planets are in forward motion now.
Most astrologers liken Capricorn energy to serious, success-oriented, and goal-driven behaviors, and all of this is true. Capricorn energy possesses a propensity for hard work, organization, upward mobility, and maintaining a positive reputation in a particular field, specific industry, or the wider world in general.
Astrologer & Jungian analyst Liz Greene tells us in her book “Saturn: A New Look at an Old Devil” that Saturn’s placement in our birth chart informs us where we came into this lifetime feeling inadequate. Likewise, any house (or houses) ruled by Saturn’s Capricorn are likely to be areas where our personal inadequacies rear their ugly heads.
Where Saturn resides in our chart (by house & sign), and the house or houses ruled by this mentor figure, tells us where we’re likely to feel frustrated, thwarted in our self-expression, and/or to meet with difficulties.
However, here’s the good news: We come in with a road map—where Saturn lives in our chart (and the house or houses ruled by him) is where we’re CONSCIOUS of our self-perceived inadequacies. For this reason, many of us spend a large part of our early lives feeling flawed, but aware of our feelings, which eventually allows us to change them.
And how do we do that?
Simple: we learn!
“The frustrating experiences connected with Saturn are obviously necessary, as they are educational in a practical, as well as psychological, sense,” Greene states.
At this Capricorn New Moon, we’re all being asked to discover what we DON’T know, and how to best learn it. Likewise, we’re called to own what we DO know—what we’ve studied or worked hard to learn, whether it’s on an intellectual, emotional, physical, or spiritual basis.
Live & Learn From Fools & From Sages
In this day and age, I doubt there’s much dispute that different people learn best in a variety of different ways. So, some of us may have been handed our lessons from the harsher more subjective school of hard knocks as opposed to an objective, factual, logical, empirical, classroom & book-learned setting.
Capricorn is, after all, a practical earth sign, and it’s possible our lessons were learned through physical or mental repetition, whether in a classroom or out on the streets.
You know, repeating the same thing over and over until you finally “get” it…
Any way you slice it, Saturn-ruled Capricorn is about coming into this lifetime with a perceived deficit, and turning it—through hard work, dedication, and a desire to be the BEST you possible—into your metaphorical treasure chest.
Saturn represents lead. In the middle ages, alchemists attempted to change lead into gold. Little did they know this is impossible, and that what they were really attempting was to find external physical “proof” of the internal intangible metaphysical notion of transformation.
Whether we start out life thinking we possess a physical, emotional, mental or intellectual deficit doesn’t really matter. What’s important is that when we look back we recognize the slow, steady, determined, progress we’ve made to overcome being saddled with, or hampered by, this “deficit.”
This Capricorn New Moon’s exact message depends on the stage of your individual Saturnian journey, or where you’re at in the transformation of lead—or your perceived short-comings–into metaphorical gold.
However, whether we’re still young and working on it, middle-aged and more accomplished, or post-second Saturn return, it’s time for self-validation and to admit to ourselves that we have learned a thing or two from our painful past experiences.
If these experiences hurt us deeply enough, they likely propelled us into some level of self-awareness. If so, then Saturn’s done his job. However, what you dowith this newfound self-awareness ultimately makes the difference between “real” success and its mere outer trappings.
Sometimes it’s discerning between these two that presents the most serious Saturnian challenge.
Our lessons can come from anywhere—a parent, family member, teacher, friend, cleric, cop, lawyer/judge, colleague, boss, etc. Hell, we might even occasionally hear words of wisdom from our car mechanic or that dude on the checkout line in the grocery store…
It’s not where you hear it, it’s whether or not it applies…
You Got To Lose To Know How To Win
Pain is the mightiest teacher, as Liz Greene states, and it can teach us to become bitter, cold, and non-caring, or kind, appreciative, loving, and compassionate. Most of all, it teaches us self-compassion, something many of us may believe is unnecessary.
This Capricorn New Moon calls us to realign our thinking on this matter. First of all, where are you in your Saturnian journey? Do you use your self-perceived deficit to beat yourself up mentally or emotionally by thinking you’re not good enough and never will be?
For some, it’s time to continue to learn things for the first time, and this Capricorn New Moon asks you to commit to overcoming any personally-perceived inadequacies by moving forward and not giving up.
Giving up is not usually part of Capricorn’s lexicon, although initially this energy is capable of dragging us down farther than it is of lifting us up.
No matter how strong the downward pull toward negative thinking or depression becomes, it pays to remember that there’s another meaning to this energy. While negative past experiences may have hurt us deeply—partners leave, jobs end, possessions and/or money disappear—the message is often a deeply Saturnian one.
Initially, these painful losses most likely strengthened our conviction that we suck big time at something or other in life.
However, the truth is that those people, circumstances, or things are/were not instrumental to our future growth and that to achieve our highest goals we’re better off without them.
In fact, over time, you may understand how it was these external people or circumstances that dragged you down in the first place…
In fact, some of us may too often fast forward to feeling another’s pain, but lack the ability to acknowledge our own pain and learn self-sympathy as a result. This can seriously trip us up as we’re faced with learning life’s lessons.
It pays to remember there’s an alchemical process at work here.
This Capricorn New Moon may depress us, slow us down, or make us exceptionally cautious; however, it teaches us also that slow and steady wins the race.
While some of us may feel inert, depressed, or as if the world has turned an even darker shade of black at this time, we can remind ourselves that we’re in the middle of a transformative process…
Perhaps we can conceive that our thoughts have a grander purpose–one that can assist us to find a raison d’etre in the microcosm or macrocosm of our life at any given point, or help us recognize our true path forward…
…one that’s meant to lead us to our internal metaphorical gold.
We metaphysicians call this “soul growth.”
Dream On
For others, the impetus behind self-improvement initiatives resulted in the feeling that you’ve “arrived.” You’ve learned what there is to know in any particular area of life and now you’re ready to become a mentor.
Helping us out at this Capricorn New Moon, regardless of which pattern fits your life right now, is Jupiter in Scorpio’s sextile to Pluto in Capricorn providing us the opportunity to expand our own consciousness through self-empowerment.
Remember that Pluto, the slowest moving planet in our galaxy, set the Capricorn backbeat in 2008 when he first moved into this sign I like to call “business as usual.” At that time, we experienced here in the U.S. a great recession, as housing prices tumbled and many home owners fell into debt.
We’ve come back from that now, but Pluto’s journey through Capricorn has a few more years still to go. Last December he was joined by Saturn moving into its own sign, which strengthens this Capricorn theme even more for at least the next three years.
The other planets in Cap at this Capricorn New Moon are a definite statement that our chickens have come home to roost and that the piper must be paid…no longer can we run from our perceived inadequacies by sweeping them under the rug or pretending they don’t bother us.
Now is the time to plant seeds that will grow into greater self-empowerment, not despite our perceived inadequacies or flaws, but because of them!
Insecurity is insecurity whether you let it drag you down into the quicksand or you turn it inside out and mask it behind a facade of superiority. Either way, you’re burdened by not being true to yourself…
“If you worship money and things, if they are where you tap real meaning in ife, then you will never have enough, never feel you have enough. It’s the truth. Worship your body and beauty and sexual allure and you will always feel ugly. And when time and age start showing, you will die a million deaths before they finally grieve you. On one level, we all know this stuff already. It’s been codified as myths, proverbs, cliches, epigrams, parables; the skeleton of very great story. Teh whole trick is keeping the trugh up front in daily consciousness.“ ~ David Foster Wallace
Outside The Box Structure
At this Capricorn New Moon, we also have Mars quincunx Uranus, the planet of unexpected change, reminding us not to move too carelessly or too fast.
Aquarius energy, when deemed to be ruled by Uranus, is conceived of as revelatory and revolutionary. When we consider Saturn to be the ruler of Aquarius, we find a recipe for building or rebuilding new structure from within.
A Capricorn New Moon would not call for revolution, even when followed so closely by the Sun’s ingress into Aquarius, the sign of humanity.
Rather, the signs seem to point–as Mars moves into a trine to wounded healer Chiron, that we use our own willpower to shift around some of our internal energies. If we bring them into greater alignment little by little, we can face our future boldly and without fear.
When Venus moves into Aquarius on January 17, our relationships become a bit more daring and less conventional. The Sun follows Venus into the sign of the water bearer on January 19, and it’s then we’ll be called to take this Capricorn New Moon’s commitment to build a stronger sense of internal security to heart.
How?
Through knowing that if we’re ever left totally on our own WE WILL SURVIVE!
And that, if the foundation under our feet crumbles away unexpectedly, we’ll soldier on, and rebuild it stronger and better than it was originally. It’s this kind of knowledge that helps us become a little less fearful day by day…
Remember the Capricorn backbeat–all else springs from, reverberates around, and resonates to this bass line. When we attribute Saturn’s rulership to forward-thinking, ahead of its time Aquarius, we can rest assured we’ll download how to rebuild or restructure any system by tapping into something greater than ourselves…
Steven Tyler‘s song/video Dream On seems to have the perfect lyrics to capture this Capricorn New Moon energy’s message that as time goes by, we live and we learn…
Dream On
“Every time when I look in the mirror
All these lines on my face getting clearer
The past is gone
It went by, like dusk to dawn
Isn’t that the way
Everybody’s got the dues in life to pay
I know nobody knows
Where it comes and where it goes
I know it’s everybody sin
You got to lose to know how to win
Half my life’s in books, written pages
Live and learn from fools and from sages
You know it’s true, oh
All the things come back to you
Sing with me, sing for a year
Sing for the laughter, and sing for my tear
Sing with me, if it’s just for today
Maybe tomorrow, the good Lord will take you away
Yeah, sing with me, sing for the year
Sing for the laughter, and sing for the tear
Sing it with me, if it’s just for today
Maybe tomorrow, the good Lord will take you away
Dream on, Dream on, Dream on
Dream until the dream comes true…”
~ Steven Tyler
Namaste…
Gemini New Moon – May 25

Duality: As Within So Without
The energy of this 4-5 degrees’ Gemini New Moon puts both luminaries strongly under the influence of the decidedly mutable archetypal sign often depicted as twins and therefore representative of duality.
Inherent in Gemini is an archetypal split that mirrors back to us this concept of duality.
The earliest stories set down in writing, as far back in history as we can remember, recount tales of brother vs. brother (think Cain and Abel), good vs. evil (think God vs. the Devil), dark vs. light (think night vs. day), and more…
The messenger god Mercury, ruler of this Gemini New Moon, is also the god of travelers and therefore often depicted at crossroads, or places where one has the choice to travel left or right, north or south, east or west.
Able to transport himself between worlds—that of the living and the dead, as well as to Mt. Olympus, home of the gods and goddesses in Greek mythology—Mercury’s a solid representation not only of metaphorical duality but of the kind with which we deal daily.
In addition to twins, Mercury rules pairs, such as hands, feet, lungs, etc. Mercury’s talents extend to sleight of hand and magic tricks, such as shell games you find out on the street in major cities like New York. For that (in part) he’s earned the reputation of a trickster, or one who loves to pull pranks on people or to confuse them mentally.
The Bigger Picture
Of the three rational air signs—Gemini, Libra, and Aquarius—it’s Gemini that’s most prone to the downside of mutable energy: confusion.
I always picture Geminian energy run amuck as a dog chasing his tail. Spend a moment or two imagining or visualizing such a scene, and I’m sure you’ll get what I mean…he doesn’t know if he’s coming or going and, eventually, he loses sight of what he was doing as the round and round makes him both forgetful and dizzy…
In similar fashion, those who carry a large amount of Gemini energy, or at times like a Gemini New Moon, may find it difficult to recognize the forest from the trees, so to speak.
We have a choice at this Gemini New Moon: we may plant a seed of confusion–or one of understanding.
Understanding what?
That it’s the bits and pieces of information which, if we allow ourselves to view them as a confusing conglomeration of disconnected, differentiated, and potentially disorienting separates with no inter-connected meaning, will never show us a coherent bigger picture that makes sense to us.
If, however, we can realize through Sagittarius, Gemini’s polar opposite, that those seemingly simple and disparate bits of information are really part of a larger, whole picture, we may begin to gain enough perspective to see and understand the larger tapestry…
In short, too much Gemini mutable energy gets caught up in, and unable to move toward, Sagittarian conclusions.
Set If Off
Let’s keep in mind that this Gemini New Moon is not only highly mutable, but also unaspected. However, it is decidedly not alone…
What stands out most clearly to me at this Gemini New Moon is the rising tension building as Mars approaches an opposition to Saturn. In traditional astrology, these are the two malefics, the baddest of the bad boys.
But even if we take a more modern psychological view on the subject of these two planets in frictional aspect to one another in the sky—as I am wont to do-there’s a whole lot of growing frustration…
What we’ve had brewing, leading up to today’s Gemini New Moon, is a waxing mutable T-square between Mars in Gemini opposite Saturn in Sagittarius and squaring Chiron in Pisces.
Mars’ approach to Saturn and square to Chiron has been building in tension for more than a week now. On May 18, when the Moon in Aquarius approached its monthly meetup with the South Node, newly in Aquarius, the Taurus Sun waxed into a square with the transiting Nodes, designators of collective karma.
At the same time, Mars came within 10 degrees of its opposition to Saturn and square to Chiron. This astrologer doesn’t get crazy about orbs, or insist that planets must be within a certain degree range before they can influence human nature. Rather, she observes…
When Mars, the faster moving planet, shifts into frictional aspect with Saturn, always it holds the capability for ignition, or the potential to set off an explosion.
On May 18, 26-year-old Richard Rojas drove his maroon Honda Accord 100 miles an hour through midtown Manhattan, jumped the curb at 42nd Street & Seventh Avenue, and raced at breakneck speed along the sidewalk for three blocks running over anyone and anything in his path.
Traveling “at a fast rate of speed,” according to bystander, “to me it looked like it was trying to hit as many people as possible. People were trying to jump out of the way.”
In Rojas’ path was 18-year-old Elyssa Elsman of Portage, Michigan, her 13-year-old sister, and 21 others. Elyssa was killed before Rojas’ car upended after crashing into a road barrier on 45th Street and Broadway, near the midtown Marriot Marquis Hotel.
“She just hit the floor and he went over her,” a nearby security guard told A New York Times’ reporter.
When taken into custody, police determined Rojas was high on PCP and delusional (and not an international terrorist.) He reportedly told police he’d “wanted people to die.”
Between A Rock & A Hard Place
As Mars continued to wax into frictional aspect with Saturn and Chiron, we saw another example of this energy’s potential for violence when a suicide bomber killed 22 people and wounded 59 others at an Ariana Grande concert in Manchester, England, on May 22.
The tension continues to build at this Gemini New Moon as Mars moves fast through Gemini, and Saturn in Sagittarius holds tightly to his religious and/or philosophical ideology.
Saturn is lead, or the rock, Mars the hard place in which we may find
ourselves squirming uncomfortably as frustration over any given situation in our lives continues to build.
Meanwhile, Chiron in Pisces cries I’m hurt! Leave me alone! I just want to escape and fantasize about a better world—one where I’m rewarded through the retribution of those who are/were the cause of my suffering.
Strapping a bomb loaded with nails to yourself and detonating in it in the name of a cause is indicative of the lowest form of energies inherent in this still waxing T-square.
As Mars approaches exact opposition to Saturn on May 28/29 (depending on your location), it can make us feel like we’re between a rock and a hard place as the tension caused by this opposition comes to ahead and pops like a pimple or a boil.
Those of us with planets and/or angles caught in this T-square’s energy are being asked to look at any trauma ignited now as a “replay” of past trauma, be
it from this lifetime or past life karma…
Only then can we begin to figure out how to heal—or continue to heal— such traumas.
I Am Not Your Rolling Wheels…
Duality…in the crossroad walkway connecting the Manchester arena and the local train station, a suicide bomber detonated himself at the end of an Ariana Grande concert filled with young people.
Gemini represents youth. This archetype is sometimes referred to as the puer aeternus, or the Peter Pan energy of one who resists growing up, preferring instead to remain eternally young.
Mars is always about taking action, regardless of what kind or its potential outcome, and often represents anything heated, such as bombs, guns, fire, blades, etc.
Saturn in Sagittarius—the sign of belief systems—is lead, or heavy metal, while Chiron, the wounded healer, in Pisces can symbolize an energy apt to weep pity me, I’m a victim, woe to me, how can I bear this terrible suffering?
When I synthesize these mutable energies, I get the image of one who is among, shall we say, the “walking wounded.” An individual who, rather than try to heal his own wounds by going out and helping others heal, feels he has no choice but to sacrifice himself in order to alleviate whatever mortal pain he’s in.
What great irony that someone angry about victimization (Chiron in Pisces) packed himself with explosives made of metal nails in the name of a religious cause (Saturn in Sadge) and set alight a bomb that targeted young people near a place of local transportation.
You can’t make this sh#t up…☹
…I Am The Highway
So, what will be ignited at this Gemini New Moon or shortly thereafter? I believe we need only look at the world around us to become conscious of what’s mirrored back.
Saturn always asks us to be our own best parent, while Chiron asks us to heal the split between our more primitive nature and physical bodies, and our cognitive capabilities and spiritual knowing.
This growing opposition and square from Mars is the match–however, what we do with that flame is up to us!
My recommendation is to use whatever ignites now as a torch to light your way to greater consciousness about issues that surround you so that you may more clearly see how to heal for your future…
What’s wounded you in terms of past restrictions or abandonment in your life? Where or how might you have turned such wounding into the kind of victim stance that prevents you from taking right and appropriate action and/or keeps you stuck in preferring either to be saved by–or to save–another or others?
Mars square Chiron is about how your personal will was stifled and/or you were prevented from taking action. While on the surface, both Mars’ aspects to Saturn and Chiron may translate into similarly wounding pasts, the challenge with the aspect to Chiron is for us to be able to discover where we are all brothers and sisters under the skin and to develop compassion for both ourselves and our perpetrators, whether their sins were of commission or omission…
Once we recognize the humanity of our past traumatic situations, we can view them less from the point of view of a “victim” or “savior,” and more from that of one who recognizes we’re all human. After all, it’s healthier to grieve, heal, and move on, than to carry the torch of our past suffering with us everywhere we go…
Another opportunity is presented to us by the fact that Mars is waxing into a sextile to Uranus at this Gemini New Moon, which provides the chance for us to see more clearly as well through sudden insights that strike with lightning bolt clarity.
Use these insights well—they may be secrets surfacing or resurfacing or simple facts about which you were previously unaware—and they may come out through an argument with another or others, we don’t know…
What we do know is that the opportunity is always there to make lemonade out of lemons!
Lo ng & Weary My Road Has Been
The inexplicable senselessness of terrorist incidents (whether in the name of a “cause” or due to mental health issues) in the end highlights for us all that–for better or for worse–we are all traveling the same road toward consciousness.
The fact that some deny this journey by veering off onto a more delusional path is likewise inexplicably sad, especially when they have the sheer unmitigated gall to inflict pain upon innocents. For all those affected by the recent events outlined above, as well as those going through their own personal tragedies, I extend my sincerest condolences and send out to all light and love… Like many others, I choose the path about which the late great John Lennon wrote–to imagine all the people living life in peace…
Here’s a look at an Audioslave song/video of the late Chris Cornell’s which I feel reflects nicely his Sadge Moon opposite Mars & Venus in Gemini’s understanding of duality…(if you’ve never heard him before, stick with it as the vocal gets better as it goes–he’s one of the great voices of rock n’ roll & will be sorely missed…)
May he, and all victims everywhere, be their deaths self-imposed or otherwise, rest in peace…
Like a Highway
Chris Cornell
“Pearls and swine bereft of me
Long and weary my road has been
I was lost in the cities along in the hills
No sorrow or pity for leaving I feel…
I am not your rolling wheels, I am the highway
I am not your carpet ride, I am the sky
I am not your blowing wind, I am the lightning
I am not your autumn moon, I am the sky…
Friends and liars don’t wait for me
I’ll get on all by myself
I put millions of miles under my heels
And still too close to you I feel…
I am not your rolling wheels, I am the highway
I am not your carpet ride, I am the sky
I am not your blowing wind, I am the lightning
I am not your autumn moon, I am the sky…
And, if you’re a Chris Cornell or a John Lennon fan, you may also enjoy Cornell’s cover of Lennon’s Imagine
Gemini Full Moon December 13

Gemini Full Moon: Super Moon Super Important?
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