Astrology

February 13, 2022 In Astrology, General By Ingrid Hoffman

Red White and Blue—Reimagining America —As Pluto Returns.

And one by one the nights between our separated cities are joined to the night that unites us—Pablo Neruda.

Few of us go willingly into the kind of initiation that accompanies a Pluto transit. When Pluto stirs up all that has fermented, all that has been banished in the dark basement of our psyches, we emerge irrevocably changed.

When Pluto slowly moves across the horoscopes of nations, what has been collectively repressed, conveniently ignored, rises to the surface.

Pluto entered Capricorn in 2008 as the fissures in financial systems widened and the blight in governments exposed disturbing division and misuse of power. As Pluto razes down façades with relentless ruthlessness, it also regenerates, and in Capricorn this means governments, police, corporations, infrastructures.

As Leonard Cohen released his prophetic single, You Want It Darker in the September of 2016, Pluto and Jupiter were forming a square that intensified in January 2020 by conjunction. Neptune, purveyor of contagion, illusion, deception, and deceit, slipped in behind the green curtain, a making a slippery trine to Mercury in the US birth chart. The star-spangled banner fluttered in the winds of change.

Pluto’s opposition to Mercury in America’s birth chart (2017-24) reminds us that the foundations of The Land of the Free are dug deep into the black earth of genocide, slavery, and appalling exploitation of the natural world. Mercury presides over communication, intelligence, propaganda, paranoia, media, and travel. Old certainties are unmoored.

This month, America experiences its first Pluto Return (February 22^nd) as Pluto circles back to 27° Capricorn, returning to the place it started from on July 4^th, 1776 when the nation of America was born. Pluto moves slowly through the darkness of outer space, so we’re collectively steeped in Pluto’s darkness which permeates American culture well into the 2040s.

A Collective meeting with Fate.

Mercury, Venus, and Mars escort Pluto this month, accentuating the caution, contraction and discipline that has been attributed to the archetype of Capricorn, a sign ruled by frugal Saturn.

Banners of “freedom” flutter alongside boarded-up shops that offer cold comfort to the homeless as howling ghosts of debt haunt governments and the millions who have lost jobs and homes during the pandemic. As the rich continue to shore up colossal gains and coal factories continue to feed the illusionary bitcoin industry, grandiose Jupiter sails nonchalantly through the heavens, trailing promises of salvation.

Jupiter meets nebulous Neptune in early April, an obtuse union that inflates blind faith and optimism, engorges debt balloons that will explode as Jupiter moves into heated Aries in early May.

The triple conjunction of Venus, Mars and Pluto herald a sobering warning, perhaps a small crack in our collective denial, as Pluto returns to 27° Capricorn three times this year, (July and December.) This is a year that many believe is a make-or-painful-break year for Joe Biden as Pluto opposes his 8^th house Jupiter. Pluto also is in a tense T-square to Vice-President Kamala Harris’ Libra Sun/Aries Moon opposition.

As an impending catastrophe in Ukraine dominates mainstream media, the Moon makes her monthly round, ripening to fullness on February 16th in the sign of Leo.

Weeks of negotiation show no signs of progress and now as embassies hasten to withdraw their staff, and nations urge citizens to leave as Venus (diplomacy) and Mars (war) descend into Pluto’s blackness. Psychologist, Terry Real reminds us, “under patriarchy, you can be connected, or you can be powerful, but you can’t be both at the same time because power is power over, not power with, it is dominance. So, if you move into power, you lose connection.”

On March 6^th Venus and Mars move into Aquarius, activating the degree of the Saturn/Jupiter conjunction of December 21^st 2020, a union that symbolised the dawning of a new era.
Venus and Mars make a tense square to President Putin’s Venus in Scorpio from March 17th-23rd, energising his four Libran planets.

In our highly individuated narcissistic culture, we may ask what values are being unearthed… equality, liberty, diversity, or McCarthyism, Jim Crow, an idealised Camelot? As Pluto’s gravitational force dredges up the grisly truths that lie buried under streets and skyscrapers, America journeys down into the Underworld to be scooped out, humbled, reimagined and reborn. What do the colours of the American flag symbolise now as the earth shudders beneath our feet?

Pluto will be in Aquarius from 2024 to 2044 as we begin to make reparations for historic injustices and re-image a world where exploitation of people, animals and nature will be relegated to his-story and we (hopefully) begin to address the collective grief and trauma that defines the experience of so many people whose lives are still curtailed by inequality and blatant injustice.

The first Industrial Revolution was under way as Pluto moved through Aquarius. Herschel “discovered” Uranus, that planet associated with breakthroughs and revolution as Pluto moved through Aquarius. Captain Cook and William Bligh searched for new consumables in southern lands as Pluto’s passage through Aquarius marked the beginning of the climate crisis and a soulless sense of alienation and loneliness that now threatens our survival as a species.

Carl Jung used the word, Shadow to describe the repressed, denied aspects of our lives, and that the Shadow doesn’t lie languidly, waiting to be redeemed, it regresses, becomes scaled, archaic, clawed. It rattles through our homes, our streets and our nations. It emerges as school shootings, rape, gang violence, and suicide filmed on social media platforms. It screeches as mountains are gouged out for metals and coal, as oceans are scraped empty of fish, and underground creatures are bulldozed to make way for yet another mall or motel. It emerges in the sanctioned bloodletting of war, the slaughter of nameless innocents.

As we all experience the potent alchemy that strips us of our excess as we travel the via negativa, the road through the depths that leads us to what mythologist Michael Meade calls dark wisdom, may we trust Pluto’s power to pull from our souls what is most authentic and loving. May we transform our suffering into wisdom and compassion. May the monuments that we erect to our power and importance, topple.

Rilke speaks to the soul muscle and faith we all need in our grief-phobic, death-denying culture.

“…but the darkness pulls in everything: shapes and fires, animals and myself, how easily it gathers them—powers and people. And it is possible a great energy is moving near me. I have faith in nights.”

Please get in touch if you would like to book an astrology consultation or to find out more about webinars in 2022: ingrid@trueheartwork.com

February 1, 2022 In Astrology, Relationship, Self Growth By Ingrid Hoffman

Kiss from a Rose—Venus Emerging

Love is fearlessness in the midst of the sea of fear— Rumi

The first flurry of delicate blossom ushers spring’s joyful arrival as the Sun and Moon meet in the sign of Aquarius today.

New Moons denote entry points, like doors ajar that invite us to garner new experiences, to cross back and forth between the past and the future, to experience the joy of new beginnings and the ache of final endings.

This month begins on a New Moon in Aquarius, a sign that encompasses our participatory belonging to humankind. Aquarius’s wavy glyph suggests those powerful currents of energy that flow through the deepest stratum of our relationships with friends, family, and those intimate soul filled engagements.

The ancient cross-quarter festival of Imbolc on February 1^st and 2^ndis the first midpoint in the cycle of the year, welcoming the first tentative stirrings of spring, a guiding metaphor of new beginnings.

Saturn joins the new Moon today, and unites with the Sun at the week’s end, as Mercury turns direct on February 4^th, an invitation to attend to our responsibilities with patience, to seek fresh perspective as familiar themes circle and cycle in our own lives and in the world around us.

There’s a solemnity in the sky script as seven Saturn-ruled planets speak to the challenges of the literal events that absorb our attention, and those things that matter. As some governments try to find a way to move through the pandemic by removing mandates, tens of thousand tonnes of Covid waste spill from landfills, contaminate the air, and clog rivers and oceans, a dark counterpoint to our collective longing for play and pleasure.

Cautious Saturn stands sentinel at the threshold of this month dedicated to Lovers as commerce pays homage to the brutally murdered martyr and unlikely lover, Valentinus with symbols of sensuality—red roses, dark chocolates wrapped in cerise or shiny scarlet foil, pretty cards that offer love’s promise. For those who may be grieving the loss of a loved one; for those who have been shamed and shunned, harmfully shocked, ignored or brutally intruded upon, the scar tissue that wraps around the heart may ache as lovers walk arm in arm in the soft light of spring.

For thousands of years, the spectacular cycles of Venus have been tracked and observed by our prehistoric ancestors. The Mayan and Mesoamericans timed wars when Venus emerged as the Wasp Star from the darkness of her 40 days and 40 nights sojourn in the underworld—renewed, resolute, resplendent in her fierce beauty.

On January 15^th Venus appeared, strengthened, transfigured, glistening like a diamond on dawn’s softly curved breast after her 40 days and 40 nights descent into the Underworld. Venus stationed direct on January 29^th and will linger in her post-retrograde shadow until March 1^st while Venus and Mars unite in the sign of the Mountain Goat on February 14^th—a tender embrace that signifies a new tempo in a soulful life.

All planetary archetypes portray our human experience of relationship—attachment, separation, autonomy, and dependence. Jungian analyst Ann Bedford Ulanov suggests that “as the instincts are to the body, so the archetypes are to the psyche.”

Our entire birth chart, and more specifically, the archetypes of Venus and Mars, describe our innate responses to our environment; the myriad ways we love or defend ourselves from the soul mate we long for. Mars is the warrior god. In so many cultures, he has been associated with the masculine principle, with fierce gods of war. To the Greeks he was Ares, his name emerging from the root, “to destroy” or to be “carried away” which is so often experienced in the ecstasy of falling into love when we are carried by our desire, within reach of our holy longing.

We may experience Mars energy vicariously through movies or sport; or in the narcissism of our times, embody Mars in impassioned exchanges on social media or through the windscreen of our vehicle when we’re stuck in traffic. In our culture of haste, as we lean in, stretch forward to the next bigger, better thing, it might now be helpful reflect on the rich symbolism of the current Venus Retrograde as she has revealed those things that pained us—the jagged schisms in our relationships, our concerns about money, our creative or sexual anorexia, our relationship with beauty and art, or angst about ageing. In myth, Venus was not faithful. She delighted in variety, she evoked jealousy. She defied the patriarchal Greek and Roman morality. In our birth chart, she leads us down to the Underworld to experience colourful explosion of passion, loss, and longing, to emerge once more bearing the marks of our initiation, willing to be utterly loved, shored up, supported as we offer our creative gifts to the world.

Spanish philosopher, Ortega y Gasset wrote that “no land in human topography is less explored than love.” It is the exploration of love’s landscape that is essential to the soul’s holy longing, and we must be brave wayfarers. The Venusian art of relating and healing the heart’s contraction has evolved from Agony Aunt columns and our urge to pathologize, improve or fix, into the collective experience of relationship therapy. The “telly-therapy” of Esther Perel and Orna Guralnik offers voyeuristic participation in couples therapy, revealing the archetype of Venus in all her guises, and inviting personal identification with couples who are living in the trauma world of fear, disconnection, and shame.

We expect so much from our partners, in love, and as we continue to live with the existential anxiety of the climate crisis, those relationships that have sustained us—friendships old and new, the intricacies and vagaries of family relationships, the encounters with our virtual tribe or colleagues at the office—we absorb and embody experiences that take us down the twists and turns, repeats and spirals, back to ancient themes.

We might pause in our focused busyness today on this New Aquarian Moon and follow a thread of memory back to the Venus Retrograde in the air-sign of Gemini that began on May 13^th-June 25^th, 2020—a cycle that was defined by the pandemic, worldwide lockdowns, economic recession, as well as major bushfires in Australia and the Western United States. We may pause to remember the brutal killing of George Floyd that unleashed the Black Lives Matter protest cry that bloomed and flowered all too briefly. We may ask ourselves what we have done to be kinder, more conscious, more tender. Now, as Venus emerges in the sign of Capricorn as a Morning Star may we replenish our faith in the unseen, may we trust that our gifts will be welcomed in love and appreciation, may we feel a sense of purpose and value in our community. May we cherish each other and find shelter in Love today.

For astrology consultations or more information about webinars, please get in touch: ingrid@trueheartwork.com

January 12, 2022 In Astrology, Relationships, Self Growth By Ingrid Hoffman

Watercourse—Full Moon in Cancer—January 17th

Now let us welcome the New Year, full of things that have never been—Rainer Maria Rilke.

January, named in honour of Janus the two-headed god of thresholds arrived without the usual swaggering bravado, or wishful “this year will be better”. An unpretentious New Moon in Saturn-ruled Capricorn welcomed in this first month of the calendar year, her silvery light swathed in darkness.

On January 17^th the Full Moon in Cancer gifts us with a luminous reminder of the opposing energies of Capricorn and Cancer—structures and boundaries, anchoring and love; or the shadowy qualities of muscular authoritarianism and alienation.

Already the days are growing longer and the primroses on the riverbanks turn their delicate yellow faces to the sun as we begin to resume the routines and rituals that ground us in our ordinary lives.

For forty days and forty nights of “quarantine”, Venus has been in the underworld, inviting us to turn within, to gather clarity, strength and commitment. She has been moving Retrograde since December 19^th when she united with Pluto at 26° Capricorn for the first of three intense encounters (December 19^th, December 25^th, and March 3^rd). We all have Venus in our birth chart, an archetype that reflects our heart’s initiations, our deep soulful attachments, our satiated fullness, and our tortured emptiness.

Venus has been moving through Capricorn for four months (she enters Aquarius on March 6^th) and during her time in the darkness, we may have been confronted with love’s shadows—loss of trust or hope in a relationship, changes in friendships that reflect our changing values and personal aspirations; separations and betrayals that ultimately lead us to a fuller experience of self-acceptance and a deeper understanding of what our soul yearns for. At the time of the New Moon, Venus disappeared as an Evening star and if you’re up early on January 15^th, Venus will rise resplendent, a bright star in the East, a vision of beauty and fertility and power; a moment that was welcomed by our ancestors.

Elusive Mercury switches direction and begins to apparently move in reverse across the skies in Retrograde (10° Aquarius) on January 14^th-February 3^rd, inviting us to listen more attentively, to reconnect with the archetypal realm of our imagination, the subtle prompts of our intuition, to acknowledge the power of our intention and the psychic energy we bring to our encounters with others. As winter’s frosty grip softens, our earth-born bodies respond to the light, new dreams seed themselves in our imagination as Jupiter floats through Pisces, a luminous star of Hope that shimmers in the west after sunset, with Saturn still close by.

Saturn accompanies rules and authorities; sober realisations that things may not turn out as we want them to. Saturn in modern times is associated with fate or destiny, with necessity and restraint, those things we have cast out in our mechanistic material culture where we, in our hubris and our self-inflation, believe that we are all powerful—we can fix, manifest, cut away, or buy our way out of any mess we make. This New Year, Saturn may lay his hand on a defining moment in your life. There may be no escape, except a shift in perception as we pare down our doomed to fail resolutions, hold ourselves tenderly as we work with what is, rather than what we wish it could be.

In the ever-changing sky, Saturn and Uranus are still in a discordant square all through 2022 and 2023, a celestial symbol of clashing points of view, polarities, and divisions, as these ancient mythic enemies confront each other in the heavens and an old order collides with the new. Saturn transits arrive as the henchmen of stasis that often thwart our efforts to move forward, yet they present as circumstances that grow us up, if we’re willing to learn. When these two archetypes face off in the heavens, they reflect tension, upheaval, limitations of freedom, resistance, and rebellion. In our own birth charts, transits of Uranus break us open, shatter and destabilise those things that are too tightly defended or have outlived their purpose.

Mars, the warrior god, joins forces with unpredictable Uranus in August and Pluto makes an opposition to Venus around then. So, although many of us are longing for some hope that the pandemic will end soon, Creation stories always tell of darkness and chaos that come before creation. The Pluto/Saturn conjunction of January 2020 has fermented all that is rotten in our world. The dross has risen to the surface and each one of us now faces the consequences of those things we have repressed or simply ignored. In the tumultuous confusion, perhaps something greater ushers humanity towards what is yet to be.

The discordant Saturn/Uranus energy is reflected in the cacophonous deluge of sentiment and divisive hate-speak that has reached its nadir as tennis star Novac Djokovic’s fate is now determined by Australia’s health minister. The agitation in Australia reflects our collective psychosis after almost two years of uncertainty, on/off lockdowns, and exposes the shadowy underbelly of an Establishment that continue to ignore the plight of incarcerated asylum seekers, and those who live on the edges of society, without the fame or financial resources to employ legal aid or seek release from their circumstances.

As tensions mount, scapegoats will be driven out, minorities become criminals. A Saturnian policing bill now targets Roma, Gypsy and Travellers in the UK if they “trespass” in places that have not been designated for them. In 1930 Saturn and Uranus were in Square and between 1933-1939, the Roma and Sinti were interned and murdered by the Nazi Regime.

As impetuous Mars and the North Node in Taurus aligns with Uranus (April, May, October and November) frustrations may intensify and spill over nebulous and overvalued cryptocurrency as governments (symbolised by Saturn) attempt to regulate this environmentally devastating disruptor to established banking systems.

A subtle backdrop this year is the idealistic union of Jupiter and Neptune (April 12^th), a rare meeting in Pisces and one that amplifies Piscean qualities of compassion, creativity, but also a celestial blind spot, something hidden in the collective midstream that may seduce or anesthetise, conceal a truth or weave a web of lies. Jupiter and Neptune co-rule Pisces. The fish are ephemeral, lacking in substance, intoxicating, seductive and illusionary, and perhaps swimming is futile. All we can do is to relax and float until we are sure that what we have seen is not a mirage.

Jupiter and Neptune were last united in Pisces in March 1856 as Wagner completed Die Walküre and Sigmund Freud was born. 1856 was a year of senseless warfare and sacrifice, ships were lost at sea, native communities were exterminated, and the barbarous Crimean war ended.

Piscean symbolism includes oceans, but also extremist ideologies that offer the promise of redemption from suffering. This combination of celestial energies may unleash a tsunami of pent-up grief and suffering; it may surge through cryptocurrencies, drown the hype, dissolve castles in the air, suffocate seabirds in sticky black oil as giant oil tankers run aground. This is the seductive energy of the speculator, a glimpse of hope that may be unfounded, perhaps, the realisation that as we drop the salvational fantasy we are freed up to sweetness of simple pleasures, self-acceptance, and a deeper appreciation of the poetics of life.

We may feel pulled apart by a longing to escape from it all as this expansive, boundaryless Jupiter-Neptune conjunction forms while the next constrictive and frustrating Mars/Saturn conjunction emerges; an echo of the Mars/Saturn conjunction of late March early April 2020 as the magnitude of the pandemic permeated through the collective and nations locked down.

The conjunction of Mars and Saturn of late March and early April 2022 signifies an ending of a cycle, and the start of a new one that occurred during the early outbreak of the pandemic and the early phases of the lockdown, and continued as Mars moved through Taurus, Leo, and Scorpio in 2021 and new COVID variants emerged accompanied by mandates and restrictions. The North Node entered Taurus on December 23^rd 2021, and will move through Taurus till July 12^th 2023, meeting Uranus this July. There’ll be a sprinkling of eclipses in Taurus on April 30^th, and November 8^th and in Scorpio on May 16^th and October 25^th, as Pluto returns to the place of its inception in the American birth chart this year. Modern astrologers tend to agree that eclipses are wild cards, and the effects are unpredictable, though solar eclipses tend to be externalised and lunar eclipses are subtler, more internal, often related to the past, to our emotions and perceptions.

As the archetypal energies of Taurus and Scorpio are energised in the coming months, in our own birth charts and in the birth charts of nations, we may be reminded of the bull-headed, flesh-eating half-man who lived in the centre of the labyrinth. This hideous monster, the Minotaur, was also called by another name. Asterion. Star.

As we welcome this brave new year and sit with the paradox of those things that stir our anger and release our tears, let’s pause for a while in the quiet shade of the unknown before we enter the fray.

This is the year of living bravely, soulfully, imaginatively, abandoning those things that are irretrievably broken and reimagining our place in the world, rooting back into the earth.

Poet and novelist, Ben Okri writes, “bad things will happen, and good things too. Your life will be full of surprises. Miracles happen only where there has been suffering. So, taste your grief to the fullest. Don’t try and press it down. Don’t hide from it. Don’t escape. It is Life too. It is truth. But it will pass, and time will put a strange honey in the bitterness. That’s the way life goes.”

For astrology consultations, please get in touch with me, I would love to hear from you: ingrid@trueheartwork.com

December 17, 2021 In Astrology, Relationship, Self Growth By Ingrid Hoffman

For All We Know—Full Moon in Gemini Moon—December 19th.

December, the diamond-frosted clasp linking twelve jewelled months to yet another year—Phyllis Nicholson.

This is the month when the Light returns on the longest, darkest day of the year.

In the black heart of winter, we may be standing at some new threshold, daring to cross a new frontier that will bring a different rhythm to a new stage of life.

December’s Full Moon invokes Gemini’s mercurial magic as we approach the Solstice on December 21^st. Now as we tend to the cherished customs and familiar rituals of this holy season, it may be easy to be distracted by busyness, overwhelmed with fatigue, whiplashed by unexpected events that leave us disorientated, discombobulated, emotionally drained, yearning for soul shelter amongst those simple things that bring us comfort and joy.

This Full Moon is Mercury-ruled. And in the Greco/Roman world, Mercury/Hermes presided over thresholds, crossroads, and boundaries. As we prepare ourselves for the challenge of crossing a new threshold, we may meet the spirit of Gemini in the wind that rustles the branches of the tree outside our window, a reminder that nothing is constant. Air is Gemini’s element, and Gemini moves through its two personas, appearing in those either-or choices we feel compelled to make, sometimes showing up at crossroad moments in our lives, when we stand poised to make a life-changing decision. This is the energy of the trickster—versatile, elusive, clever, playful, and infuriatingly inconsistent.

The cherished rituals of this season of comfort and joy assume a different cadence amidst new restrictions and mandates. This contradictory Gemini Full Moon casts her moonbeams between an ungainly quincunx to Venus and Pluto, which make the second of three conjunctions on Christmas Day, followed by the final one in early March 2022. For all we know, our plans to gather with friends and family this festive season may be suspended. What we had hoped for may not be possible this Christmas.

In myth, Venus is well practiced in dealing with Pluto’s dark, brooding presence, and their passionate union exposes any superficiality, stirs strong emotions, demands resilience and maturity. Venus is resplendent, glittering in her full regalia on the western horizon now. As you marvel at her radiance, set an intention for what you wish to manifest in your life. On the same day as this Full Moon, Venus turns Retrograde at 26° Capricorn and moves into the shadows (December 19^th-January 29^th).

The ancients tracked the passage of Venus in a perfect pentagram across the skies, ascribing her disappearance in the skies to her descent into the Underworld. For the ancient Sumerians, the Retrograde period of Venus was a powerful symbol of rebirth and transformation. The pre-Colombian Mayans believed that kingdoms were unstable, regimes might topple, and so her emergence signified an auspicious time to begin a war. In myth, Innana (Venus) is deprived of all her valued regalia and exquisite clothing. She enters the Underworld vulnerable and exposed, stripped bare of beauty as she surrenders to the darkness of the night.

For so many, this has been a difficult year. A year that has tested our patience, our integrity, our ability to temper our desires. We may have found ourselves in a strange landscape—a world that has changed. Friendships may have altered, truths may have shapeshifted, divisions deepened. Free floating anxiety clouds political agendas and a stealthy manoeuvring for power continues as Pluto moves through Capricorn and Saturn presses his boot heel on pleasure and possibility. Yet, for all we know, beneath the surface of our lives something is emerging, inching its way forward, as we transition into a new way of being.

As we adapt and improvise, Saturn and Uranus are still in a uneasy waning square and will meet again on December 24^th (11° Aquarius) brushing the birth charts of nations and individuals in various degrees of potency all through 2022. The North Node enters Taurus on December 23^rd, will form a square to Saturn on April 16^th, and unite with Uranus in Taurus on July 23^rd. The Solar Eclipse of April 30^th squares Saturn, as does the Lunar Eclipse of November 8th, 2022.

Saturn/Uranus aspects accompany jarring change and disruption, civil unrest, radicalisation, gains or losses of freedom and human rights. In recent his-story, this cycle began in 1988, then reached a square in 1999, and opposition between 2008-2011 with the next cycle beginning in 2032. In fact, the waning Saturn-Uranus square is still with us and is the defining cosmic influence throughout the entire year ahead.

There is a quality of the absolute that lingers and settles over us that is reminiscent of the 80s. Yet this phase is different. The weight of climate emergency presses our lives.
Extreme weather sucks us into the undertow, upending what we believed was safe and sure. Increasingly autocratic right-wing governments claim the liberties we took for granted before the intense Saturn/Pluto alignment of 2020, which amplified our personal and collective shadow and unconscious complexes as we responded to the pandemic.

As the days reverse their darkness, December 21^st marks the Solstice. A pale primrose Sun joins Mercury, Pluto, and Venus in cautious Capricorn, and we take refuge in those things that bring us comfort and joy. Jupiter arrives with a soft touch to the hard edges of life as he slides back into watery Pisces (December 28^th-May 10^th 2022) blessing us all with compassion and the profound serenity that accompanies surrender to the power of Now.

As we gaze up at the voluptuous Moon tonight whisper a prayer, send a blessing, gave thanks for the gifts and the challenges that this year has brought. We may have been forced to simplify and streamline our lives, uproot from desolate workplaces, or the cataclysmic disorder of a relationship. We are standing at a new threshold, so take a moment of quiet amidst the noise of commercial Christmas and let’s find peace in our hearts, miracles in the darkness, and an epiphany of gratitude as we send our blessings and our prayers out into the world these holy days.

My heartfelt thanks to you all for all your love and support this year.

Solstice Blessings and Much Much Love.

Ingrid.

If you would like to find out more about booking an astrology consultation for 2022 or about my forthcoming webinar events, please get in touch: ingrid@trueheartwork.com

November 25, 2021 In Astrology, Relationship By Ingrid Hoffman

Burning Moon—New Moon in Sagittarius—December 4th

Sometimes you need to scorch everything to the ground and start over. After the burning the soil is richer, and new things can grow. People are like that, too. They start over. They find a way―Celeste Ng. Little Fires Everywhere.

A fiery Sagittarius Moon blocks out the sunlight today. For a few brief moments, her dazzling dark shadow breaks over the soft curve of the earth. The natural order upturns, the Sun swaddled in darkness.

The Moon cradles our deepest desires, our cherished memories, the somatic imprint of our past; while the Sun represents our vitality, our outward thrust into a world that is now in a process of tumultuous change.

Eclipses unwrap what is concealed in the shadow. For so many, this year has been a year of living on the edge of something new.

This Solar Eclipse in the element of fire may be the spark that sets fire to a desiccated relationship and thaws a frozen silence, it may be the impetus to loosen the bonds that bind us to a job that leaches our joy. When the light of the Sun is obscured by the body of the Moon, our emotions may be heightened, a truth slaps us in the face.

This is the last eclipse of 2021 and it drops into in a mutable fire sign. For those with personal planets in Gemini, Virgo, Sagittarius, and Pisces between 12-13° degrees, this sign eclipse may incinerate old habits, unexamined biases, burn away veils of illusion, singe untenable situations or scorch everything to the ground so that something new can root and grow.

As we look back over a year hallmarked by an uncompromising Saturn/Uranus square that expanded surveillance, entrenched mandates, constructed godheads of science and technology, deepened divisions and ignited civil unrest, we may feel flatlined, weary, vaguely uneasy as to what the next twelve months will bring. A new series of eclipses in the intractable Taurus/Scorpio polarity, will provoke the epic clash between Saturn and Uranus, the old and the new, and elucidate conflict and tension throughout 2022, but most particularly in the eclipse season―April-November 2022. In May 2022 (Nodes square Saturn) through to July/August/September/October/November 2022 when Uranus will conjoin the South Node in Taurus, and we will collectively and personally need to confront our fire-breathing dragons.

April is also the month of the heralded 13-year Neptune/Jupiter union, which some astrologers predict will bring light and love and sweet salvation to humankind; a better, brighter future in a Metaverse of virtual reality and Zuckerberg’s chilling vision of a digital future that will cling-wrap us to our screens. I would suggest that another upsurge in contagion and illness, and that watery Neptune, god of the oceans riding in tandem with fickle Jupiter in shape-shifting Pisces may bring more hysteria, illusion, delusion, or an outpouring of compassion in the wake of another extreme weather event that washes away our hubris.

Jupiter, the astrological ruler of Sagittarius and Pisces, is an archetype so often imbued with a tincture of loss and longing. Despite our prayers, despite our positive affirmations, the veils of illusion go up in flames, our lives are scorched to the ground.

On November 22^nd, the Sun in profligate Sagittarius rose from Scorpio’s generative mud and took flight. In Sagittarius we soar above the triviality of daily routine. We become explorers, adventurers, pilgrims, seeking signs, finding meaning. We challenge our bodies and our minds as we reach for the stars, dream the impossible dream, lifted and struck by the faith that it will all work out in the end. Sagittarius is ruled by portly Jupiter, who so often evokes the kind of laughter that brings tears to our eyes and softens the hard edges of the world. We invoke the buoyancy and resilience of Jupiter when we keep the faith, when we look up, when we notice the silver lining in the dark clouds of circumstance.

Excess and extravagance accompany the Sun’s flaming chariot through the heavens this month as we give thanks to the gods of commerce on Cyber Monday and Black Friday, although the storm clouds gather over contracting economies, broken supply chains, joblessness, and rising costs.

Jupiter is the roll of the fickle dice, the ever-spinning Wheel of Fortune, the jovial Father Christmas who delivers a casserole dish when we wanted perfume. In myth, Jupiter didn’t stay around long, he was always off, chasing the next conquest, taking what he wanted, when he wanted to, just because he could. The shadow that stretches behind Jupiter’s cheery positivity is self-absorbed grandiosity, a cavalier entitlement, which may be highlighted this month as Mercury moves into Sagittarius on November 25^th and the divisions that have widened during the Saturn/Uranus square this year become exacerbated by the square of Mercury to Neptune on the New Moon Solar Eclipse. Our version of the truth may not be true for somebody else. Our entitled quest for autonomy may be deeply embedded in the tribal mind. Writes Marion Woodman, “there’s is no sense talking about ‘being true to yourself’ until you are sure what voice you are being true to. It takes hard work to differentiate the voices of the unconscious.”

So, let’s go gently, with as much awareness and presence as we can muster as the weeks gather momentum for the crescendo of the solstice on December 21^st. Amidst the Christmas carols that loop repetitively from sound systems in shopping malls and supermarkets, let’s draw warmth from the symbolism of this fiery New Moon and savour small miracles concealed in the darkness. Anna Quindlen reminds us that “life is made up of moments, small pieces of glittering mica in a long stretch of gray cement. It would be wonderful if they came to us unsummoned, but particularly in lives as busy as the ones most of us lead now, that won’t happen. We have to teach ourselves how to make room for them, to love them, and to live, really live.”

For astrology consultations in 2022 please get in touch: ingrid@trueheartwork.com

November 12, 2021 In Astrology, Relationships By Ingrid Hoffman

Heaven and Earth⁠—Full Moon in Taurus⁠—November 19th

My joy, my grief, my hope, my love, did within this circle move―Edmund Waller.

We are not the first generation to live in disquieting times. Yet, there may be days when the roar of the world unravels our calm. When worry drains our joy and the silent sob of collective grief surges through us, spilling over our morbid preoccupation with illness, our unspoken fear of death.

Ever-changing protocols hang like a miasma over our lives as politicians panic and numbers rise. American deer are now infected, amidst concern for cross species transmission and the emergence of new variants. We may feel stuck in a daily round of gloom. Yet as we lift our eyes to the heavens the luminous orb of the Moon reminds us that there are circles and cycles in our own lives and in his-story and that just when we think we have arrived, we must begin again.

As the last golden leaves of autumn flutter to the ground, the fading light reveals a landscape stripped of pretence. At this culmination of the lunar cycle, we may need to draw inward, rest, replenish. Revive our energy in a circle of calm.

In the mandala of the zodiac, the partial Lunar Eclipse on November 19^th is a harbinger for the eclipse cycle of 2022 which sprinkles over the Taurus/Scorpio Axis, an initiation of what’s about to unfold in the new calendar year. The changing Moon will be the last lunar eclipse of this year and as the Moon passes into the Shadow of the Earth, the eclipse will be visible from Europe, Asia, Australia, North and South America, and North/West Africa.

Eclipses are times of recalibration; self-nurture to rekindle our creative fire, time to dream, to pray, to stay still so that our energy may flow freely again. These are symbolic power points that hold the impetus to generate something new in listless situations, to cradle ourselves gently. The effects are felt most strongly on the day, but often within two weeks of the eclipse, so observe events as they unfold in our own lives and on the world stage between now and up to the New Moon in fiery Sagittarius on December 4^th. A series of Scorpio/Taurus eclipses dropped across the heavens in 2003/2004. In Scorpio we encounter the inevitable: death and taxes. In Taurus we dig deep into earthly matters. We may experience profound changes in our finances and in our shared material resources. Climate continues to plunder our home planet.

“Things do not change, we change,” wrote Henry David Thoreau, a pioneer in minimalism and authentic living, a man who knew the seasons of nature intimately. As we seek our quiet centre at this monthly moment of eclipse, we may see more clearly all the ways we have changed.

As the steadfast earthy Full Moon shines her light on the Sun and Mercury in Scorpio, she sketches a T-Square in the skies with Jupiter, an offering of faith, patience, and persistence.

Mars in Scorpio opposes Uranus and forms a T-Square with Saturn, and as the laws of Heaven and Earth circumvent our ordinary lives, we may have to humbly learn our limits, defer our dreams, take a detour, or return to where we began.

There are no planets in fire until the Sun enters Sagittarius on November 22^nd, just a few days after the Full Moon, so the mood may feel intense and volatile as we are forced to take a slower path, avoid loud and aggressive persons, as American writer Max Ehrmann suggests in Desiderata.

Our virtual and close encounters with others will be highlighted as Venus in pragmatic Capricorn enters her Retrograde Shadow on November 19^th and will encounter Pluto as she moves Retrograde from December 19^th– January 29^th. We may have to listen more deeply, honour our differences, speak our truth quietly.

Ancient adversaries, Saturn (boundaries, restrictions, fear, control, authority, stability) and defiant Uranus (insurrection, disruption, idealism, innovation) are still in a tense square, a square that has been building through 2020 and will still be in alignment till December 2021, edging close once more in October 2022 and in effect all through 2023.This waning square reflects the tension of opposites, a polarised force that may infuse the silent spaces in our relationships and root there.

Our ancestors knew about circles and spirals and the soulful journey of life. They carved them into the unyielding granite at sacred sites, they fashioned rounded drums that resonated with the heartbeat of the earth; they built languorous labyrinths and mysterious mazes.

Saturn/Uranus alignments coincide with periods of civil unrest, economic collapse, revolution, radicalisation, and the collapse of systems that no longer serve their purpose. If we look back in history, the Saturn/Uranus square of 1928/1933 heralded the Wall Street Crash, the Great Depression, and the establishment of The Third Reich. Now, it seems likely there will be record levels of unemployment that will again precede enormous social change. Like the interwoven spirals and coils of Celtic knot-work, the astrology of our times is threaded with the amalgam of the past.

The earthy symbolism of Taurus encircles the natural world. When our Taurus house is activated by the motion of the Moon, we may seek simplicity, yearn for peace, and calm. Henry David Thoreau’s ground-breaking novel, Walden, the quintessential book about living simply in nature, down-sizing, getting off the treadmill, was written as transiting Saturn conjoined Uranus during turbulent times of xenophobia and polarised opinions about slavery in America.

Thoreau was born during a Saturn/Uranus square (Saturn in Pisces square Uranus in Sagittarius) and as Saturn now conjoins the comfort zone of the US South Node (burdens, old beliefs that are familiar and safe, though not always beneficial for growth) this quote may resonate with us all as we struggle to shed the skins of old beliefs and revalue our material possessions: “as a single footstep will not make a path on the earth, so a single thought will not make a pathway in the mind. To make a deep physical path, we walk again and again. To make a deep mental path, we must think over and over the kind of thoughts we wish to dominate our lives.”

To live authentically in this new world, we will require grit and integrity and an interior life that contains us in turbulent world. .

Etty Hillesum, who was murdered at Auschwitz at just 29 years old, her first Saturn Return, wrote this in her diary, “when you have an interior life, it certainly doesn’t matter what side of the prison fence you’re on. . . I’ve already died a thousand times in a thousand concentration camps. I know everything. There is no new information to trouble me. One way or another, I already know everything. And yet, I find this life beautiful and rich in meaning. At every moment.”

To book a personal astrology consultations please email me―ingrid@trueheartwork.com

October 29, 2021 In Astrology, Relationship By Ingrid Hoffman

Incantation—New Moon in Scorpio—November 4th.

All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves. We must die to one life before we can enter another—Anatole France.

Leaves of copper and gold blanket the black earth, and kelp-scented sea mists bejewel the fragile webs of spiders at this time when the veil between the worlds shimmers, gossamer thin.

This is a liminal time, halfway between the autumn equinox and the winter solstice. A time when we may notice an unsettling shift in the seasons. A time when melancholy wraps itself around the wan light of the dying year and ghoulish costumes create a safe diversion from our squeamishness about death. This is the month when the dead come calling—Día de los Muertos, Day of the Dead. Hallowe’en, loud and gaudy, prickling with single-use plastic, once Allhallowtide, a time in the liturgical year that was dedicated to the departed. Soft-bred pumpkins grimace with menacing faces; bonfires consume summer’s fruitfulness, light-hearted tricks and sugary treats sweeten the older tradition of guising (disguising ourselves from sinister wandering spirits) while ruby-red toffee apples symbolise the potent symbol of the pentagram that lives in secret within every store-bought apple; incantations against the supernatural, rituals for protection against the descent into the dark of the year.

The truth is that the triple faced Cailleach drapes herself in her misty mantle at Samhain. She emerges from rocks of ancient granite and the smooth folds of glistening basalt to run her fingernails across the iron-grey belly of the sky, scraping loose bitter weather. Samhain is the Celtic celebration of summer’s end. A time when the Aos sí emerge from grassy fairy forts to traverse the “thin veil” into the world of humans. At Samhain, we seek to honour the dead who have walked before us. We engage in communal warding off those things that remind us of the fragility of life, the proximity of death.

For those of us who have witnessed the dying process of a cherished pet or a loved one, for those of us who have pared down to the bone after the dismemberment of a divorce, or the devastation of illness that has altered our lives forever know the pain of those irrevocable endings, those radical severances that bring us to our knees, rip off our layers of protection, leave us naked and defenseless. As we stand at the edge of winter, perhaps there is a deep sadness that still lies wetly over our hearts, a remnant of eternal timelines interlaced with others who have lived before us.

For so many of us it is the dying of the earth as we know it that haunts our dreams, intrudes on our walk through the woodlands or on the beach where the corpses of tiny turtles blacken in the sun. As we keep company with the collective grief, we may be brought to tears by an act of kindness, a soft word of sympathy from a stranger—reminders that people are kind, caring. That we are not alone in our sadness. As the invisible threat of the pandemic, the existential crisis of climate crisis continues to strain our limbic system, tire our brains, keep us on high alert, psychologist Emma Kavanagh writes, “this phase we are in now, where everyone feels kind of on the edge, but no one can really articulate why—is what happens when you survive a disaster. When you live through what we have lived through, the net result means being broken by tiny catastrophes.”

As Nature withdraws, the fading Sun slips into the shade of Scorpio and couples in darkness with the Moon on November 4^th, sombre Saturn squares the luminaries, a melancholic reminder of all that has been lost since those first reports of a strange new pathogen emerged from Wuhan. Minimalism, restraint, austerity, checks and balances, will be imperative as hollow men gather in Glasgow to talk, yet again, about the climate crisis. Missing in action will be collaboration and altruism, the solvents that ensure the survival of our species.

It was sixty years ago that Rachel Carson, ill with cancer and in great pain, wrote Silent Spring, a book that was denounced and vilified by the major chemical companies. She said then, “I think we’re challenged as mankind has never been challenged before to prove our maturity and our mastery, not of nature, but of ourselves”.

Re-reading her words, now, two full Saturn cycles later, as we continue to beat nature into submission like little dictators, it is hard to imagine that we will have the maturity to change our behaviours; to comprehend that we are only a small thread in the web of life.

Yet, innovative, radical Uranus makes an opposition to this New Moon and Venus moves into serious Capricorn as Mercury enters Scorpio on November 6^th, adding a colourwash of practicality and depth to our human interactions this month.

Pluto and Mars are invoked when we talk about the Scorpion. Mars moves fearlessly into the blackness of Scorpio on October 30^th followed by fleet-footed Mercury, and though we talk glibly of transformation, Pluto, still moving through Capricorn and square to Eris, coils around that over-used cliché. When we enter the realm of Scorpio, the mystery of life and death are at work. Snakes shed their skins and feathered phoenixes emerge from scorching flames in a world that is no longer pristine and pure, but is still breathtakingly beautiful even as microplastics and chemicals seep through the earth’s capillaries, and the wild flowers and butterflies we knew when we were young have gone.

Scorpio, in its true essence, asks us to dive deep into waters diffuse and dark; to dredge up what lies beneath: a collective fear that concretises into protocols and incantations that we hope will keep us safe; a collective scarcity that clutches and clings; the fragile vulnerability of the top predator with imposter syndrome who has forgotten the interconnection and interdependence of all living things.

Writes Rachel Carson, “the more clearly we can focus our attention on the wonders and realities of the universe, the less taste we shall have for destruction.”

As the light slips softly off the hillsides, we stand now in the potent darkness of this New Moon. New Moons are generative times. Seeding moments when we plant wishes in the darkness and wait patiently, expectantly, for them to grow. Rachel Carson invites us to consider this: “one way to open your eyes is to ask yourself, “What if I had never seen this before? What if I knew I would never see it again?”

For astrology readings and more information about forthcoming virtual workshops please email me directly: ingrid@trueheartwork.com

October 19, 2021 In Astrology, Relationship By Ingrid Hoffman

Born this Way—Full Moon in Aries—October 20th.

“Being different, it’s easy. But to be unique, it’s a complicated thing.”
― Lady Gaga

The last Full Moon of October burns brightly in the sign of The Ram. Aries is where we encounter our own autonomy, our sense of Self in a world where being different has a price and uniqueness is rare.

In Aries we encounter the mythic motif of conquest, which always implies an act of bravery, daring and autonomy. The leader who makes split-second choices in situations that could tip either way… the employee who dares to speak out, the parent who takes a stand against bullying, the friend who leans closer when others turn away.

For most of us, the battle for autonomy is enacted in those held-breath moments of choice, our fingers poised to respond to words that invade the temenos of our minds―other people’s opinions that school our eyes, ignite archaic reactions, fuel fears and insecurities that thread through our nervous systems.

We may discover that autonomy is concealed in the small choices we make each new day and that the hardest battle is with our self as e.e cummings, Sun in Libra and Aries Moon wrote, “To be nobody-but-yourself—in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else—means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight.”

As the Full Moon on October 20^th ignites Aries in our birth charts, we may dare to re-imagine ourselves and those who hold different opinions in a new light. In a world that may feel split and polarised, where being congruent, uniquely ourselves, the daily battle is seldom tidy or neat as our dopamine levels are stroked by algorithms. “In ancient times, having power meant having access to data. Today having power means knowing what to ignore,” writes historian Yuval Noah Harari.

As Mercury approached the midpoint of this three-week Retrograde cycle (October 7^th-8^th) a “configuration error” silenced Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp for almost six hours. This was one of many outages that have occurred over the years that have highlighted our collective reliance on a complex and outdated web that some joke is “older than the Spice Girls; designed on the back of a napkin.”

Perhaps a more important symbol of Mercury Retrograde in Libra is that former Facebook data scientist, Frances Haugen, has dared to speak out and say what most of us know: that the loudest voices re-route their rage and their pernicious pain through the lightning rods of social media.

Her indictment of the careless theft of time, self-esteem and profitable personal data by the big tech companies is one of many little fires that will inevitably become a conflagration as Pluto moves through Aquarius (March 2023-January 2044) fanning profound social and technological metamorphosis as we journey through the age of the Anthropocene.

Pluto was also moving through Aquarius when the wealth of Europe and America was accumulated on the bodies of African slaves, and the Conquistadors plundered the riches of South America. It’s looking likely that bots will be the new slaves; our personal data the new gold; and that malware and cyber warfare will topple our digital infrastructure in seconds.

On October 18^th, both Mercury and Jupiter reversed their Retrograde motions as we circumambulate the curves and the rough ridges of life, as we sense the emergence of something new. Opportunistic Jupiter moves direct at 22° Aquarius, accompanied by Mercury at 10° Libra invoking a new impetus to bring more of our matchless and truthful selves to our relationships, and to be curious and welcoming to those who dare to be vulnerably unique.

As the ardent Aries Moon blazes across the skies, spreading her light, she may spark glistening embers of passion, setting a-blaze all that is caged and conformist. This Full Moon is a symbolic challenge to seize new opportunities; dare to break out of the tired old roles that keep us cornered in our relationships.

This Full Moon activates Eris and the square to Pluto, an aspect which has been in effect all through 2020. Eris stirs up latent competition and jarring discord. And when she makes a catalytic square to Pluto, Lord of the Underworld, all that is repugnant and buried emerges from the darkness of the collective mire. The cosmic masculine, the Sun and Mars, confront the fierce feminine. This Moon symbolises the courage of Queen Boudica, who dared to challenge the might of Rome, yet Boudica was flogged. Her beautiful daughters, raped. In the end, she took poison, rather than become enslaved. It may be worth remembering that the glyph for Aries is the Ram. And Rams are sacrificial animals, their holy golden fleeces, held aloft by conquering heroes. The Moon’s sextile to Jupiter may stoke volatility as hot-headed Mars makes a confrontational square to Pluto on October 22^nd and 23^rd arousing ruthlessness or violence, so it may be wise to temper rugged individualism with empathy and compassion.

The swallows have flown south. Crows, strung like necklaces of obsidian, perch darkly on the wires in the lessening light. The beauty of summer feeds the flames of bonfires that attend summer’s end. May we bask in the generative heat of fire as we fortify our willpower, strengthen our resolve, dare to be nobody but ourselves as we strive to make a difference in the world today.

For there is always light, if only we’re brave enough to see it…brave enough to be it―Amanda Gorman.

Please drop me a private email if you would like to find out more about the whys and the hows in your own life and in the world, from an astrological perspective. I offer sessions via Skype or Zoom.
ingrid@trueheartwork.com

September 9, 2021 In Astrology, Relationship, Self Growth By Ingrid Hoffman

Ring of Love—Crescent Moon—September 11th

The world is indeed full of peril, and in it there are many dark places; but still there is much that is fair, and though in all lands love is now mingled with grief, it grows perhaps the greater—Haldir.

A shimmering crescent of silver light holds the mystery of promise contained in the fertile darkness of the Crescent Moon tonight. She opposes unpredictable Uranus as she moves through the sign of the Scorpion, a sign that attends the great mysteries in life, death, rebirth, and the shape-shifting shadows that we turn from when we gaze only at the light.

The Moon is in her waxing Crescent phase now. She gathers the psychic energy we sent out into the world at the New Moon on September 7th.

It’s been twenty years since we watched in stunned disbelief, the dark smoke rising from those flaming Twin Towers. The Moon was moving through Gemini at the time of the first attack. She was in her sharply angular Third Quarter phase, signifying strong beliefs, inflexibility, and a likelihood of putting those beliefs into action.

As we reflect on this calamitous event that stripped us of our innocence, we may remember that there were 21 years between the “war to end all wars”, and insanity of mass violence that began on September 1^st, 1939, when Germany invaded Poland. It was in the reeking mud and terror of the trenches at the Battle of the Somme, that J.R.R Tolkien succumbed to trench fever and was shipped back to England. Only a few of his comrades-in-arms survived the carnage.

In a letter to his son, Christopher, he reminisced, “in those days chaps joined up, or were scorned publicly. It was a nasty cleft to be in for a young man with too much imagination and little physical courage.”

J.R.R. Tolkien was born in Bloemfontein, South Africa, on a waxing Pisces Crescent Moon. He began writing The Hobbit and the first two volumes of The Lord of the Rings after the insanity of the first World War. The Lord of the Rings was first published in 1954, as Saturn and Uranus were separating from their square (1952/53) inciting crisis, uncertainty, civil unrest, and repressive authoritarian reprisals.

As news of an invisible air-borne virus emerged from China, our collective “Shires” clouded over. Fear drove us into shadowy places. And the Ring of Power pressed its weight into our daily lives.

The fall-out from 2020 is still in the air as swirling sea mists chaperon the changing seasons, soaking russet leaves and weighting spider webs with glimmering orbs of dew. As we learn to adapt to life in changing times, new warnings of waning immunity, emerging strains, more waves and mutations, accompany this recent crisis in our human his-story. All through 2021 Uranus and Saturn are in conflict. This waning square is in effect all year, symbolising eruptions of repressive crackdowns (Saturn) and uprisings (Uranus.) The Great Depression and the rise of Hitler were also in the shadow of a Saturn and Uranus waning square (1930-32), and then, like now, a long and arduous journey lay ahead. The chaotic nature of this Saturn/Uranus cycle presents us with polarities, extremism, instability, and new choices.

As we grieve, as we remember those who died, those whose lives were irrevocably changed, on 9/11 Aragorn reminds us, “this day does not belong to one man but to all. Let us together rebuild this world that we may share in the days of peace.” The slender Crescent Moon of September 11th, 2021, offers us the opportunity to love, to rebuild this world. To share in the days of peace.

As we honour the rings that encircle our human story, the Moon arrives, ripely round, full-bellied, on September 21st. This is the last Full Moon before the Equinox on September 23rd. This Full Moon falls in the final degrees of nebulous Pisces, an archetype associated mystics and dreamers, artists and blank-eyed addicts who cannot bear the jagged edges of this world. Pisces is where we retreat from the shrillness of life, where we withdraw to weave our dreams. Pisces is where we dissolve into love and faith and Oneness with all living things. As this Pisces Moon floats through the skies, we may be drawn to our soul place, through a dream, a feeling, the waft of a scent that transports us to a place where “oft hope is born when all is forlorn,” as Legolas reminds us.

Our human struggle between the ring-of-love and the ring-of-power is poignantly portrayed in Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings and in Wagner’s Der Ring des Nibelungen, which took twenty years to complete. It’s a story of misuse of power and the utter destruction of the universe, yet from this catastrophe there is some hope of understanding and the possibility of redemption and a revisioning of a world where the ring-of-power is replaced by a ring-of-love. The humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan is a stark reminder to us all of the ring-of-power that we may consciously or unconsciously re-enact in our encounters with others.

Writes Linda Schierse Leonard in her book, On the Way to the Wedding, “only in the ring of power do we ask another to give up his or her centre or give it up ourselves, and this usually happens out of our fears and desires, our dependency, projections and power needs.”

On September 6^th, Mercury entered its pre-Retrograde shadow period, in readiness for this last Retrograde cycle of 2021. Mercury will be moving Retrograde in Libra (September 27-October 17th) as we choose to wear rings-of-love or the rings-of-power in our soul encounters.

As the seasons turn, and the cycles of nature begin a-new, may we embrace life’s energy in the rapture of spring’s blossoms and in the ruby and gold ripened leaves that flutter to the ground as summer’s extravagant beauty dies.

As we honour this 20th anniversary of 9/11 and ready ourselves for the decent into the darkness of winter, may we return again in the spring, more open, more generous, more loving. May we vow to encircle our earth and all living things with a golden Ring of Love.

May it be a light to you in dark places, when all other lights go out—Galadriel.

Love Apples—Celebrating the Sacred Feminine in Astrology and in Fairy Tale—Saturday 25th September 2021—14.30 BST.

Some day you will be old enough to start reading fairy tales again—C.S. Lewis.

Fairy Tales were fireside stories told by women to women. These were stories of envy and revenge. These were stories of love and enormous courage. As we move through the painful birth pangs of this new era, fairy tales and the metaphor of astrology offer guidance and hope at a time when rewilding the psyche is so urgent.

Join me at this time of changing seasons and personal harvest. We’ll meet Snow White and learn more about the regenerative power of matriarchal goddesses, Venus and Eris in our own birth charts.

Set aside 90 minutes on Saturday afternoon for a virtual treat. Nothing to do. Just curl up on the sofa and gather together with other wise and wonderful women. We’ll begin at 14.30 BST and the date to diarise is September 25th. There will be rich and nourishing sharing and lively discussion afterwards if you wish to stay on longer.

If you aren’t able to join us on the day, I’ll send you a recording.

Cost is £40. I will send a PayPal request which converts to local currency, or banking details if you prefer. Please pop me an email: ingrid@trueheartwork.com to book your place on the day.

In Love,

Ingrid.

August 18, 2021 In Astrology, Relationship By Ingrid Hoffman

Bolt from the Blue—Full Moon in Aquarius—August 22nd

We may not be responsible for the world that created our minds, but we can take responsibility for the mind with which we create our world—Gabor Maté.

Dew-spangled spiderwebs glisten from the hedgerows. The rosehips and blackberries have ripened, and burnished bracken flecked with shocks of gold covers the hillsides. As the Sun melts across the dome of the horizon, Jupiter, a dazzling bright star, and a primrose yellow Saturn, accompany the graceful presence of a pregnant Moon.

This August Full Moon in the humanitarian sign of Aquarius falls at the powerful 29^th degree, which carries a charge of energy and seems to define the intensity and changeability of our feelings and circumstances. Aquarius like all astrological signs, draws deeply from the minds that created the world millennia ago.

For thousands of years, The Water Bearer has been identified with the invigorating waters that bring renewal and hope from Heaven. Now the waters have become airwaves and modern minds have assigned two rulers to Aquarius: Saturn, the autocratic authority figure, and Uranus, a planet that could have been more aptly named as Prometheus, the Trickster Titan who dared to steal fire from the gods—and paid the price.

This lunation is charged with the unexpected as she gathers in Jupiter’s overblown, expansive energy. Jupiter in Aquarius is moving Retrograde (between June 20^th and October 17^th) amplifying the shadowy side of Aquarius—misuse of science and technology, fanaticism; the callous crushing of individual freedom and human rights under the boot heel of ideology or in the “interests of public safety”. This Full Moon symbolises our collective trauma, our private heart ache; the loss of autonomy as the impending heat death of our earth home overshadows humanity.

In Kabul, fear and grief hang heavy over the city as lives are obliterated, women raped and beaten into silent submission.

We are still in the eye of the storm, a dark night of the soul as Pluto moves through Capricorn and the dark stain of hardline patriarchal power continues to infuse our lives. Pluto, god of the Underworld who abducted and raped Persephone in Greek myth, squares Eris, chthonic Goddess who holds the stories of countless women silenced and forgotten. The so-called witches and whores. The unacknowledged healers and midwives. Those who made bold bids for freedom and justice. Those who paid the price with their lives.

As the wheel of his-story turns, the disorientating Uranus/Saturn square may be making its presence felt in discord in those personal relationships that ache to stretch and grow beyond the silences and painful stasis. The energy of this capricious square has unsettled financial markets, destabilised economic structures, jarred us from a sense of complacency as the climate crisis blazes into our awareness with increasing urgency.

Uranus arrives like a bolt from the blue, shattering our innocent illusions, upturning those structures that are ripe for change. Saturn at best brings stability and structure, and at worst contracts, concretises, mires us in fear.

Richard Tarnas, author of Cosmos and Psyche, writes, “Our time is pervaded by a great paradox. On the one hand, we see signs of an unprecedented level of engaged global awareness, moral sensitivity to the human and non-human community, psychological self-awareness, and spiritually informed philosophical pluralism. On the other hand, we confront the most critical, and in some respects catastrophic, state of the Earth in human history. Both these conditions have emerged directly from the modern age, whose light and shadow consequences now affect every part of the planet.”

Uranus begins to switch back and will move Retrograde on August 20^th (14° Taurus) and will move direct on January 18^th 2022 at 10° of the same sign as we respond to the external events in our lives. Mercury, god of communication, and Mars, god of war, make a harmonious trine to this unpredictable planet, offering at best new possibilities, new information, and the impetus to take the initiative. If used unconsciously, carelessly, this energy takes on a speedy trajectory prompting reactivity, sudden decisions, painful words that twist in mid-air and harpoon our hearts.

Mercury meets Mars again on October 9^th in Libra and November 10^th in Scorpio. The current meeting is in the discerning sign of Virgo, which can have a waspish quality if not moderated by compassionate listening and some thought about how our words will land. “I always say that if people’s physical appearance matched their emotional age, human behaviour would be a lot easier to understand,” writes Gabor Maté.

Virgo also presides over our health—what we ingest into our bodies and our minds. As we remain rooted in the essentials of what matters, may we be rooted, in “the life of significant soil” as T.S Eliot reminds us in Four Quartets.

Poet and novelist, Ben Okri writes, “bad things will happen, and good things too. Your life will be full of surprises. Miracles happen only where there has been suffering. So, taste your grief to the fullest. Don’t try and press it down. Don’t hide from it. Don’t escape. It is Life too. It is truth. But it will pass, and time will put a strange honey in the bitterness. That’s the way life goes.”

This Full Moon will reflect the state of our relationships. The bonds of love and loyalty that nourish us. The untethered ambiguity of those casual encounters that so easily tilt and topple. Tsoknyi Rinpoche writes so beautifully, “Every time you connect, a little bit more clarity stays around the love, a little bit more space opens up around it. Your mind becomes clearer. You experience expanded possibilities.”

We can discover the Miracle in the suffering, we can taste the strange honey in the bitterness of our grief as we feel what needs to be felt—in the light and the beauty of this Full Moon.

Love Apples—Celebrating the Sacred Feminine in Astrology and in Fairy Tale—Saturday 25^th September 2021—14.30 BST.

Feast of Fairy Tale and Sky Stories—Take 90 minutes just for you.

“Without leaps of imagination or dreaming, we lose the excitement of possibilities. Dreaming, after all is a form of planning”―Gloria Steinem.

This is a time of seasonal change and perhaps a time of profound change or challenge in our own lives. As Hope unfurls her bright wings to settle upon new green shoots in the south, or a shimmering spiral of golden leaves here in the North, let’s get together to discover the practical wisdom of fairy tales, and the ancient messages encoded in the language of astrology.

Together let’s dream, imagine, plan―as we encounter feisty heroines, narcissistic stepmothers, poisoned red apples, and apples of pure gold.

Together we can celebrate the sisterhood of kindness and radical strength of empathy as we meet at this time of trial or celebration in our own personal journey.

Payment is £40 via PayPal. Discounts are available, if your income has been affected by the pandemic so do please get in touch. Everyone is very welcome. I will send you payment details if you e-mail me at ingrid@trueheartwork.com to book your place on the day. If you can’t join us, I’ll send you a recording to savour later.

With Love,

Ingrid.