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Capricorn Tag

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 1st and 2nd is 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 4th, 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 sensualityred 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 underworldrenewed, resolute, resplendent in her fierce beauty.

On January 15th 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 29th and will linger in her post-retrograde shadow until March 1st while Venus and Mars unite in the sign of the Mountain Goat on February 14tha tender embrace that signifies a new tempo in a soulful life.

All planetary archetypes portray our human experience of relationshipattachment, 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 usthe 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 usfriendships old and new, the intricacies and vagaries of family relationships, the encounters with our virtual tribe or colleagues at the officewe 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 13th-June 25th, 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

 

 

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Born in the USA—America’s Pluto Return—2008—2024

America is the only country that went from barbarism to decadence without civilization in between—Oscar Wilde

The sound of falling statues reverberates through the bones of slaves from Africa buried in mass graves. Bronze tyrants tumble from their pedestals, and the dolorous ghosts of millions of native Americans, great herds of buffalo and forests of giant Redwoods emerge into the waning light of this epoch.

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, and reborn. Pluto’s transits in our own birth charts, and in the charts of nations, are never tepid or benign. They are always slow, relentless, and transformative.

When Pluto entered Capricorn in 2008, the fissures in financial systems widened and the blight in governments exposed disturbing division and misuse of power. 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 nature. Mercury presides over communication, intelligence, propaganda, paranoia, media, and travel. The old certainties have become unmoored.

America is not the only modern nation to rise from a brutal past, but as people march through the streets, emboldened by anger and grief, Pluto irradiates Mercury in self-protective, emotive Cancer in the American birth chart of July 4th, 1776.

Pluto’s imminent Return in the American birth chart has cast a long shadow over events in America since 2017. Pluto edges ever closer to an exact opposition (until 2022) to President Trump’s Achilles heel—an excruciatingly painful Venus/Saturn conjunction, a well-defended place of personal vulnerability. It is unlikely that Trump will be re-elected, unless to bring the United States of America to its knees at Pluto’s behest. Neptune squares the President’s Gemini Sun and Sagittarius Moon till 2022; not a comfortable transit unless we surrender, accept, and bow our head to our compassionate heart.

As Pluto stirs up all that is putrefying in the basements of government and financial institutions, the scent of anarchy pervades the old order and a frisson of terror reverberates through the thick-piled carpets of the establishment. America declared its independence from Britain in 1776 when Pluto was moving through Capricorn and Mozart was composing music that roused passion and pain.

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. Jupiter and Saturn enter Aquarius as 2020 comes to an end and we (hopefully) begin to address the collective trauma that defines the experience of so many people whose lives are still curtailed by inequality and blatant injustice.

Herschel “discovered” Uranus, that planet associated with breakthroughs and revolution as Pluto moved through Aquarius. Both France and America come full circle. Back to a time of upheaval, revolution and epochal events that marked the late 1700s. France will have a Pluto Return when Pluto moves into Aquarius, a reminder of the 10 blood-stained years of terror that uprooted ancient institutions and shaped a new nation by the collective will of the people.

The first Industrial Revolution was under way 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 that now threatens our survival as a species.

We face into the collective uncertainty of a second wave of COVID-19 in some countries, and a global economic depression, as the  Pluto/Saturn/Jupiter conjunction square Eris of 2020 casts a long shadow over our lives.

In America, the intensity of the aftershock will reverberate for years to come as Saturn transits the American South Node (karma) awakening the ghosts from the past. Jupiter magnifies the need for social reform as it conjoins the Moon (the people) in the American birth chart, followed by a solidifying transit of Saturn in 2022 and a Chiron Return in 2025 which may bring a deep healing, a new sense of belonging and rooting in this Land of the Brave.

The coming years will reveal inconvenient truths and painful consequences for past actions.

Pluto’s Return in the birth chart of America symbolises the end of a status quo that has excluded so many for so long. Thomas Jefferson, who owned more than six hundred slaves wrote, “the price of freedom is eternal vigilance.”

The death rattle of the old order is amplified by political rhetoric and resistance to change …. law is often but the tyrant’s will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual, wrote Thomas Jefferson with supreme irony.

America’s Pluto Return heralds a new epoch, a new dream. For America. For us all.

For more information about Pluto’s transit through your own birth chart, please email: Ingrid@trueheartwork.com for a personal consultation.

 

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Shadowlands—Pluto Retrograde—April 25th—October 4th

For those who are just beginning to emerge from a surreal dreamscape after months of confinement, the world may seem freshly washed, the air intoxicatingly sweet. For those who are still marooned on uncertain ground, far from home, devoid of landmarks, suspended in a state of waiting, the long days melt into weeks. Time stretches like spun sugar.

It’s been almost a week now since Pluto, dark god of the Underworld stationed Retrograde (April 25th 24° Capricorn.) Pluto abducts us and takes us into the Shadowlands of our psyche, and draws up all that is foetid, rotten, in the world. As Pluto moved Retrograde, the tense square to Eris (Goddess of Discord) and Mercury (God of communication and increasingly our mental health), has once again highlighted the restrictions for the good of all (Saturn in Aquarius) that grip us tightly, shut us away from the hunger of the homeless.

Today is Beltane, May Day, a spring festival that has been celebrated with singing and dancing and feasting for centuries to celebrate nature’s greening as icing sugar white blossoms that flutter like confetti from the trees. Today, in some countries, naked emperors wrap our lives in rules and restrictions that sit uncomfortably for those of us who know the story of the Hand Maid’s Tale.

Mercury conjoins Uranus (7° Taurus) on May Day, reflecting perhaps stirrings of rebellion as our personal freedoms are curtailed, perhaps for some, a sense of liberation as we appreciate the small miracles that sparkle in the spaces of the day. This too shall pass. Yet, it doesn’t take a crystal ball or the metaphor of astrology to know that this is the end of a way of life for all of us, except the Plutocrats. Air travel, shopping, cruise ships and holidays will never be the same again. There will be many more widows who cook stones for their hungry children.

From May 11th, Venus, Jupiter, and Saturn prepare to loop backwards in Retrograde through the heavens. Expect reversals, lockdowns, slow starts. And if our leaders fail to learn from his-story, civil unrest.

As Pluto and Jupiter in Capricorn move in tandem through the heavens, (April 4th, June 30th and November 12th) we may see a resurgence of COVID-19, and certainly a second wave on the pandemic in some countries.

Pluto Retrograde cycles may drag us down, compel us to enter those forsaken places, where, as Dylan Thomas wrote, we “hold a beast, an angel, and a madman…”

In myth, Pluto demands surrender, the letting go of a way of life that now may feel like an uncomfortable fit as we inhabit the twilight of these in-between months. As we sit and wait.

In myth, Pluto’s realm was Hades, the place of death and darkness. Jupiter was a sky god; his realm limitless. Optimistic Jupiter lifts, expands, amplifies, and spreads. He may inflate our confidence and our hubris as Pluto draws out all that is hidden in the shadows and exposes all that is rotten in our communities and self-serving plutocracies.

These planets will both be in Retrograde as Venus emerges from her Retrograde period in Gemini, a sign that is associated with our lungs, with our well-washed hands. As this pandemic peaks or recedes in some countries, there may be a sense of breathing out, easing up, a gradual emerging into the world once more between May 14th and June 25th, at least until the final Pluto/Jupiter conjunction perfects on November 12th.  A volatile self-centred Mars will be in combustible Aries from June 27th to January 6th, 2021. Mars will be Retrograde from September 10th to November 13th, moving direct 10 days after the big reveal of the US elections.

Pluto transits are slow and often painful if our hearts are impatient, if our hands “grab”, and our eyes are too dim to see the hidden treasure concealed in things. Some nations are experiencing Pluto’s power of break-down and destructionthe UK since 2013 when Pluto began to conjoin the UK Sun and oppose the UK Moon. In America, the land of the free, Pluto opposes the US Mercury (communication, paranoia, truth and trust) from 2017 to 2024.

The American nation dances with the Fates as the nation’s Pluto Return (2022-23) marks the culmination of a cycle that began on July 4th, 1776 when America declared independence from Britain and pledged to uphold democracy and freedom.

Psychiatrist Dr Lise Van Susteren co-author of the book, Emotional Inflammation, describes the anticipatory anxiety and pre-traumatic stress that has emerged in this uncertain time, as emotional inflammation.

She reminds us that the parietal lobe of our brain lights up when we work collaboratively, when feel compassion, when we transcend our own feelings and reach out with generosity; when we become what she calls an “upstander” instead of a “bystander.”

Gandhi once said that when the people lead, the leaders will follow. Mohandas Gandhi was born under a Pluto/Jupiter conjunction in earthy Taurus, and in 1931 when Pluto and Jupiter met once more in Cancer, he defied the British ban against Indians collecting salt from the ocean and selling it, leading one of the world’s most powerful non-violent campaigns. Author Lynne Mc Taggart writes, “a single collective directed thought is all it takes to change the world.”

As we sit and wait, may we flex our courage, direct our thoughts. May we turn back towards the breathing earth, our Home.

Light breaks where no sun shines. Where no sea runs, the waters of the heart push their tides—Dylan Thomas

Please look out for my more regular Facebook posts or connect with me in person: Ingrid@trueheartwork.com

The Girl with the Pearl EarringBanksy.

 

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The Invitation―New Moon in Aries―March 24th

At this pivotal moment in our human story, the Sun and the Moon meet in the sign of the Ram today at 9.28 am GMT.

Aries is associated with courage and valour, with autonomy and individuality. With “me” rather than “we”. In the context of the Saturn, Pluto and Jupiter heavyweights in Capricorn, this New Moon invites us to bravely go within. The sky story tells of something much bigger, much more profound than the current pandemic. This is our opportunity to stop in our tracks. To radically change how we live on this earth. To downsize, de-clutter, those things that weigh down our lives, clog our psyches.

Saturn is about confinement, constriction, limitation. Pluto ruthlessly destroys what no longer serves our collective and personal evolution. Over the coming months, the pressure will increase.

This is a time of endings. A time of grieving. A time when our unresolved issues will surface. Our collective and personal shadows will stretch longer as we push the already demoted Pluto “out there” onto our partner, onto the government,or name it “the Chinese virus.” As the struggle for survival intensifies, there will be acts of heroism and selflessness. As things become darker, we will make music and send jokes across the internet. As our personal freedom is curtailed our social connections will become more important, more meaningful.

This New Moon conjoins Chiron, the Wounded Healer, symbolising the grief and suffering so many are feeling now as economies collapse; as we face environmental destruction and climate crisis. Many of us are still in a state of shock and numbness, as we obey government guidelines for social distancing, as we brace ourselves for more limitation and hardship.

This Chiron/New Moon is a signature for painful “self-isolation” but also an opportunity to transmute our pain and suffering into the healing we need for our bodies, our souls and for all the other species who live amongst us. As we lean into our discomfort, as we stay with the uncertainty, with chaos, the shakiness and the hopelessness, we will learn not to panic, remember to breathe out, and gently and compassionately reach out to help someone else with loving kindness.

Pluto (irrevocable endings, break down, eventual revival and deep healing) and Jupiter (amplification of the catastrophe) are still in conjunction square Eris (goddess of discord and strife) and my interpretation of the astrological symbolism is that this will be more of a marathon than a short sprint, with the months of April and May requiring our altruism, our generosity and our self-sacrifice, for the good of the collective so that healing may occur.

Pluto and Jupiter are in conjunction in Capricorn on March 23rd and March 24th. Mars conjoins Pluto at the start of this new week as we adapt to the impact of the disruption to our routines, our livelihood. Saturn (boundaries, restrictions, limitations and isolation) moved into Aquarius on Sunday for the first time in 30 years. Saturn is associated with the fear many of us may feel seeping through the collective consciousness. Saturn is the Hermit card in the Tarot. Saturn will remain in progressive and revolutionary Aquarius for the next two and a half years as new grass roots movements emerge hopefully to tackle the environmental crisis and huge disparity between the rich and the poor. Saturn is about what needs to be done, what really matters, rather than on what we would like to do.

Mars joins Saturn in progressive and revolutionary Aquarius on March 31st, symbolising decisive law enforcement and intensified lock down of movement and social engagement that will be the “new normal” of our lives. Mars (encompasses war, sporting events, action) Saturn (restrictions, limitations as we carve out new structures for our lives.)

Many people are limiting their intake of negative or fearful news. Some are choosing to avoid energy-draining encounters and rather place their focus on those people or activities that will boost morale. Mars conjunct Saturn on March 31st may mark a deeper descent as we are sucked into the undertow of fear and worry, yet this conjunction also marks a turning point which may strengthen our resolve, fortify our willpower, as we prioritise, pare down, cut away those things that drain our energy and resources.

The invitation at this new lunar cycle is to rest our bodies, still our minds, take stock, be accountable for our actions for the good of the whole.

 

In Love,
Ingrid

The pandemic will have long lasting financial and psychological implications. 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. If your income has been already affected, I will offer discounted sessions via Skype or Zoom.
ingrid@trueheartwork.com

Act as if what you do makes a difference. It does―William James

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Out of the Blue―Sun in Aries―March 20th

 

There are blue skies over the Great Wall of China. Bird song suffuses the silence in empty streets as a pathogen permeates the jangled air we breathe. For so many of us, Fate has intervened scuppering our travel plans, shaping the way we work, the way we touch, the way we kiss.

Like the Saturn/Pluto opposition of 9/11, the Saturn/Pluto conjunction in Capricorn (January 12th) has ushered in a year of planetary turmoil that will have an indelible effect on our collective psyche.

This conjunction is a celestial mirror of the isolation, the economic recession, the fear and uncertainty that is sweeping across most of the planet. The archetype of Saturn is redolent of prisons. Pluto is accompanied by a primal, shadowy fear that’s hard-wired in every living creature.

With Pluto we enter Jurassic Park. We learn about the cycle of life and death. We lose our innocence. We lose control.

In the final year of the carnage we now call WW1, a “Spanish flu” scythed through an estimated 100 million people. They were young, wage-earners.  In 1918, Pluto was in Cancer, the sign of home and family.

Pluto, Saturn, Jupiter and Mars are all now in Capricorn, a sign associated with the Elder, with commerce and large organisations. As some nurses and doctors on the front-lines compare the outbreak of Covid-19 to war-time triage, we may be reminded that at the last conjunction of Saturn and Pluto (in Libra, November 8th, 1982) the US entered a recessionary cycle and England sent her young men and women to war in the Falklands.

Rheinhold Ebertin, in his book, The Combination of Stellar Influences (COSI) suggests that Saturn/Pluto combinations can manifest as “perseverance, as well as diseases with causes difficult to ascertain.”

This month’s super-charged Super Moon in Virgo (March 9th) has illuminated the health crisis and the necessity for assiduous hygiene.

The Full Moon fell opposite a Sun/Neptune conjunction which precipitated the sudden drop in oil price and plummeting stock markets (Neptune’s domain is oil) and a surging swell in the pandemic (viruses and pandemics that permeate boundaries are ruled by Neptune). Neptune is about suffering, sacrifice and loss and as the pandemic spreads, many more people will grieve the deaths of loved ones. The cracks and flaws in our governments, health systems and social networks will be exposed. Pluto/Saturn energy focuses our ancient survival instincts, and although there is altruism and collective compassion (Neptune), most governments appear to be acting unilaterally and independently as fear fuels panic buying and hoarding.

Mercury, the god with white wings on his sandals, was the god of crossroads. He is associated with communication, with travel. On March 10th, Mercury turned direct and will be moving through the air sign of Aquarius (humanitarian issues) until Monday, March 16th when he slips back into the boundless waters of Pisces. On Friday, March 20th, the Sun emerges from the same deep waters and blazes a fiery trail through the sign of Aries. A new astrological year is born. In the North, the Vernal Equinox marks the beginning of spring. The symbolism of spring and the urgent thrust of new life is still relevant in the southern hemisphere, as the swallows return north and the sun-bleached vegetation contracts against the coming cold.

Aries marks a point of Beginning, which may be a lonely journey into the unknown as we face into many more months of turmoil and uncertainty. In Aries we encounter the mythic motif of conquest, which always implies an act of bravery and daring. Here we meet the mythic “Warrior” who sets off on a quest, the “Hero” who personifies courage and assertiveness. The leader who makes tough choices.  Aries is where we encounter our own autonomy, our ability to return to life, to find ourselves anew. The New Aries Moon on March 26th is supported by the impetus of Mars in Aries on the last day of March as Mercury clears his introverted Retrograde cycle, quickening events in our lives from March 31st.

The symbolism of the Jupiter/Pluto conjunction in Capricorn this month has cast a long shadow over our lives. The conjunction will intensify in early April. When Jupiter and Pluto combine issues of power (plutocracy) become amplified. Ebertin said that Jupiter/Pluto isn’t explicitly “success” or “good fortune” but desire for power; loss of social standing and wealth, the misfortune to lose everything.

Jupiter encompasses foreign travel, new adventures, religion, and faith. Jupiter moves into Retrograde from May 14th to September 13th   impacting summer holidays and grounding flights, signifying the demise of more airlines, an end to low-cost air travel. The impact on tourism and the economy will be immense.

As the painful process of unpicking the structures of governments and financial institutions which began with the banking crisis back in 2008 continues to continue, (symbolised by Pluto’s ingress into Capricorn) we may be facing into the stark necessity of realignment of  those things that represent structure and stability in our own lives. Pluto remains in Capricorn until 2023 and as we emerge from this process of break-down, we may discover that there are many ways to be brave in this world. We may find courage concealed in the small choices we make each new day―that act of will that gets us out of bed, the strength to put the kettle on, when all the colour has faded out of the world we once knew. We are not defined by external forces. We are not trapped in our his-story, the purgatory of our tribal mind. We can make new choices, as we cross this threshold into this new year. Leonard Cohen said, “To offer oneself at the critical moment when the emergency becomes articulate. Its only when the emergency becomes articulate can we create the willingness to serve.”

Tomorrow the Sun will rise again. The moon will cast her silvery light across the contours of our Mother Earth. “The grand show is eternal. It is always sunrise somewhere, the dew is never all dried at once, a shower is forever falling, vapour ever rising…” wrote the man who inspired a nation and a president to set aside land for the magnificent American national parks, John Muir.

Things may not be solved. But we can offer ourselves. We can serve with brave hearts.

For personal astrology consultations on Skype or Whatsapp or to receive the more detailed regular astrological weather updates I post on
Facebook, please email me on ingrid@trueheartwork.com

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I’m Still Standing—Sun in Capricorn—22 December—20 January 20th

Everything does fall.

It must be gravity—Dan Brown, Angels & Demons

At the darkest point of the year, the frail old Sun lies like a feeble old patriarch, recumbent on the Northern horizon.

In the skeletal silence of mid-winter, in the crowded craziness of mid-summer, we may long to withdraw from the excessive festivities, from the chicanery of swaggering politicians who play snakes and ladders with our lives, from the ache in our heart as bush fires blaze against a backdrop of sepia sky.

Every year, the Sun arrives in Capricorn at the time of the mid-winter or mid-summer solstice. The days reverse their gathering of light and dark.This is the still point of the year.

In the silence of the night, we prepare to enter new ground.

Saturn-ruled Capricorn, like all astrological signs is complex and nuanced. It’s associated with fathers, and patriarchs. Tyrants and scapegoats. With ageing and death. With the resilience it takes to accept a new reality. With the wry humour it takes to sing I’m Still Standing when we’re lying down.

In myth, the horned goat, Capricornus, is a cousin of Pan, a lewd, lusty, music-loving Satyr who incited “panic” and contagious pandemonium among those who travelled through the dark woods.

There may be ghosts of loss that haunt us as the bells of Christmas ring. Fears that unbalance us as we stumble into the darkness of despair. A fog of loneliness that drapes itself over our shoulders like a heavy coat.

In her new book, Tea and Cake with Demons: A Buddhist Guide to Feeling Worthy, personal development coach Adreanna Limbach writes about those gnarly aspects of ourselves that tend to come to the forefront when we’re overwhelmed, frazzled with exhaustion. Adreanna advises, “get close to the earth in case of turbulence” as we grapple with the challenges of being human, when everything around us seems to be whirling too fast, too loudly.

 

As the painful process of unpicking the structures of governments and financial institutions which began with the banking crisis back in 2008 continues to continue, (symbolised by Pluto’s ingress into Capricorn) we may be facing into the stark necessity of realignment of  those things that represent structure and stability in our own lives. Pluto remains in Capricorn until 2023, and those new babies who will be incarnating next year will arrive as Saturn and Jupiter amplify and concretise the changes that must be made on our home planet as the environmental emergency becomes even more compelling.

There’s a special New Moon on December 26th.  The last solar eclipse of 2019 pulses through a frayed circle of strange light.

We may be grappling with a difficult choice that leads us away from a path well-travelled. Eclipses are points of re calibration, turnstile moments that accompany a crisis;  turning points when we must befriend our fears, identify what feels authentic and true.

So often eclipses are harbingers of irreversible events that may ripple through our lives for years to come. If this eclipse aspects an axis or a planet in our own birth chart, tensions may already be rising and we may not yet be able to see clearly as the Moon obscures the sun’s light. We may need to sit quietly, attune to our breath. Seek our moment of  solitude amidst the tinsel and bright Christmas lights.

Author J.K Rowling describes a turnstile moment as she writes, “I was set free because my greatest fear had been realised. I still had a daughter who I adored, and I had an old typewriter and a big idea. And so rock bottom became a solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.”

For those of us who have planets or angles at 4° Capricorn, what we thought was solid and sure may be tested, we may be forced to rearrange our  priorities over the coming year; re-focus our energy, pay attention to what we want to manifest in our life.

This eclipse is part of a Saros Cycle 132 that began on August 13th, 1208 during the time of the crusades. There is a sense of fatedness, accountability, responsibility about the concentration of Saturn-ruled planets, and also the potential of wounding as this New Moon and Mercury square Chiron activating our sense of rejection, abandonment, deprivation, silent suffering and loss.

Mercury’s ingress into the sign of the Mer-Goat on December 29th accents the ticking of the cosmic clock as we approach this year’s ending, and the mountainous Saturn/Pluto conjunction of January 12th, 2020.

Saturn/Pluto delivers a concentrated clout of energy, much like this month’s super-charged new moon. This conjunction contains the finality of endings entwined with the promise of new beginnings.

The last conjunction of Saturn and Pluto was in the air sign of Libra on November 8th, 1982. The US entered a recessionary cycle and England sent her young men and women to war in the Falklands.

The January 12th conjunction will carry a sense of accountability, a sense of fatefulness, a sense of destiny, a feeling of an immovable force that propels us onward, that will pervade our lives all through 2020.

 

For those of us with planets between 21 and 24 Aries, Cancer, Libra or Capricorn, themes of endings may be prominent. And so often endings are wrapped in fear that unravels, catches us off-guard. Our resilience will be tested, the durability of our bodies. We may have to leave something or someone behind. Capricorn rules the teeth, the bones, the skin and especially the knees.We may feel the need lower our gravitational centre. Kneel. Give thanks for those who have allowed us to open our hearts wide this year. For those rock bottoms that have become solid foundations for new beginnings. For Elton John, and I’m Still Standing.

Thank you all for your support this year, and for keeping in touch. I post regularly on Facebook, but if you would like me to send you more regular updates in a private email I will do so with pleasure.

Just connect with me via my website www.trueheartwork.com  or by email: ingrid@trueheartwork.com I would love to hear from you.

Solstice Blessings and Love,

Ingrid.

May the nourishment of the earth be yours,
may the clarity of light be yours,
may the fluency of the ocean be yours,
may the protection of the ancestors be yours.
And so may a slow
wind work these words
of love around you,
an invisible cloak
to mind your life―John O’Donohue

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Tender Heart—Sun in Cancer—June 21st to July 23rd

Cancer feature pic 9As summer thrusts sunlight into the receptive hollows of the earth here in the north, and the benediction of winter silence presses into the cold soils of the south, the Sun moves into the sign of Cancer on June 21st and pauses at the threshold in the year. Margaret Atwood reminds us, “This is the Solstice, the still point of the Sun, its cusp and midnight, the year’s threshold and unlocking, where the past lets go of and becomes the future. The place of caught breath.”

Our Earth is girdled with contrast, bejewelled with the shimmer of light and the stillness of darkness. Spiritual teacher Gary Zukav describes the Solstices as “the opposition of light and dark, expansion and contraction, that characterize our experiences in the Earth school so that we can recognize our options as we move through our lives.”

At the solstice, and right now in our human his-story, we stand at a threshold, and at a time of unlocking, which promises the release of pent-up energy, the slaying of old dragons, shedding of old skins. Between June 21st to July 23rd, against the backdrop of the widening gyre, the Sun rides his chariot through Cancer, that segment of the zodiac associated with home, with family, with safety and security. We have a choice to expand, or contract against the forces of change that swirl around us all.

Like all astrological archetypes, Cancer is nuanced. The little crab knows about defensive armouring and threatening claws. As the shards of life piece our tender hearts, embed themselves in our sweet spots, we may be acutely aware of our vulnerability.

This ancient dweller of this liminal, in-between place where the great oceans meet the shoreline is an adaptable scavenger, a brave opponent.  We all have Cancer somewhere in our birth chart. Cancer is the place of our tender heart. This is where we close the curtains, turn down the lights. This where we long for the comfort of soul food, or the ache for the soft bosom of an all-loving Mother. This is the place we protect with claws and pincers that flay against life when it presses in too hard.

cancer mother

We may feel uneasy, exposed, as an unyielding triumvirate in Capricorn—Pluto, Saturn and the South Node—threaten to break the fragile thread of security we have cast into the world. As silver-back politicians jostle for power, as bellicose tweets ricochet across our future lives, and invisible hackers prey on our most intimate and tender communication, hijacking our accounts, we may be feeling a kind of sea-sick. Tension mounts in Iran. Stock markets shiver. An epidemic of homelessness is a stark reminder of the widening chasm between the rich and the poor. Cancer is associated our human capacity to heal, to nourish and nurture. Cancer is associated with the stomach. As those who wield power avoid answering inconvenient truths about the climate crisis and the increased use of pesticides, we may be feeling a little queasy as we realise that we are eating a credit card sized portion of micro-plastics each week.

The world may feel volatile as Mars in Cancer joins forces with Mercury and the North Node to oppose the Capricorn planets (Saturn, South Node and Pluto—June 12th —June 23rd) rocking our cradle of comfort.

Cancer feature pic 3In contrast to the earthy Capricorn knot, all though this year a tidal surge of a very different kind of energy is swirling across the skies as Jupiter, that planet associated with big dreams, grandiosity and faith meets Neptune where we yearn to escape, be rescued from the burnt out ends of our human existence, where we long for romance, ecstatic spiritual experience; yet in real life we do the laundry, walk the dog and come home to relationships that, as John Welwood suggests in his book, Journey of the Heart, “will inevitably penetrate our usual shield of defenses, exposing our most tender and sensitive spots, and leaving us feeling vulnerable—literally, able to be wounded.”

We may have been consciously or deeply unconsciously threading strands of this Neptune/Jupiter square through our lives since January this year. (January—14° Sagittarius/14° Pisces; June—19° Sagittarius/Pisces; September 17° —Sagittarius/Pisces) This waning square is often accompanied by the deep bruise of loss, a sinkhole of disappointment, or the dissolution of a high-flying dream. Neptune yearns for the ineffable, the ideal. This aspect brought Theresa May’s career as leader of the Tory Party to an end. It’s difficult to get things accomplished under this kind of energy. We may be undermined, duped, deluded. It’s the illusive green curtain behind which the Wizard of Oz directs the affairs of state and promises deliverance. For us all, there are opportunities to tumble into the ache of our heart, or to feel the brush of an angel’s wing as we soften in acceptance of the way things are. As Byron Katie, who has Jupiter Retrograde in Cancer, suggests, “When we stop opposing reality, action becomes simple, fluid, kind, and fearless.”

The ancient god  Dionysus stretches and yawns when we enter Neptune’s nebulous realm of music, dance and intoxication; as we enter the non-ordinary; as we engage with magic and mystics; as everything empties into One. Neptune is Retrograde from June 21st to November 27th. This is our invitation to find deeper meaning in a renewed sense of purpose. This is our invitation to take off those rose-coloured glasses. To see more clearly a larger vision. This is our invitation to feel compassion, as we “suffer with” and our hearts open wider.

Cancer feature pic 4Venus  makes a T-square to the Jupiter/Neptune square June 23rd – 24th to offer us the gift of soul-union with a lover, artistic inspiration, the ability to be selfless, to see the beauty growing out of the cracks in the pavements, the black delta of mould in the subways. It also can signify the tsunami of grief and loss at the ending of a relationship or the realisation that we have been unrealistic or too naïve concerning our finances or what we hold dear to our heart.

Mars changes sign from Cancer into Leo and the eclipse season begins on July 2nd with a total eclipse of the Sun. This eclipse is at 10° Cancer and is followed on July 16th by a by a partial lunar eclipse at 24° Capricorn (conjunct Pluto and opposing Mercury and Mars.) These are celestial power-points that drop into our consciousness and will re-calibrate national and global events.

Cancer 632Mercury turns Retrograde (4° Leo) on July 8th, stirring up the silt from the shadowy waters of the previous sign of Cancer. We may be prompted to be more introspective, to be mindful of just how we choose to wield our authority, how we bring forth our vision and creativity.  As we stand at the Still-Point of the year, may our path be gentle. May we learn to pause and appreciate the simple pleasures, the exquisite beauty, the Love that is all around us.

I post astrology updates on Facebook and offer private readings.  I’d love to hear from you—ingrid@trueheartwork.com

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Dance me to the end of Love—The Tango of Venus and Mars

Every true lover knows that the moment of greatest satisfaction comes when ecstasy is long over.  And he beholds before him the flower which has blossomed beneath his touch―Don Juan DeMarco

Valentines day 6Love is an act of the imagination. We daub our lover with our oldest longing. We paint his lips with our most noble and generous magnificence. Love photo-shops her imperfections. Love ennobles his good qualities, assigns them with mythical powers. In our love’s vow we talk, we touch, we seal our dreams with a kiss. We know that we are beautiful. We feel young again. Alive, in a way that we haven’t felt in years.

In the warm nascence of Love, we touch our holy longing. In the Mystery of barely knowing him we travel the world, design our new home, merge in our anticipation of something new, something more. As the sun rises on new beginnings, we bask in possibility. Yet according to research on neurobiology, the potent alchemy of attraction is spiked with dopamine, norepinephrine, and serotonin. Our intense emotional and physical fusion is only possible with someone we do not yet really know.

We are as changeable as chameleons, as contrary as Mary. In order to feel fully alive, we need a sprinkling of mystery. We require a dash of novelty. We need a splash of change, blended with just enough safety and continuity to ground us. Risk and Fear. Safety and Adventure. We fluctuate like clouds that shape shift across a summer sky.

When we commit to each other, marry, or cohabit, our brains produce the bonding chemicals, oxytocin and vasopressin. We want togetherness—and difference to keep things interesting. Yet in the otherness of our partner we so often respond with judgement. Or we set the bar high for an athletic leap of great expectations which breaks the legs of spiritual growth and sprains our soul’s warm desire.

Our heightened dependence on just one person makes us vulnerable. So, we stack up the sandbags against the rising waters of uncertainty. We construct a prison of predictability in our relationships and choose to stay behind narrow bars of bland neutrality. Our script of staid of assumptions goes something like this: “I always know what you’re thinking” or “he doesn’t talk about emotions,” or the stolidly dependable “she always takes care of all our finances.”

37a9c247dec1879d5415b8a5d76d3d11We dis-own our passion and vitality, clutch at things we feel we can control. We blinker our eyes and stop being curious. Our entire birth chart, and more specifically, the archetypes of Venus and Mars, describe the myriad ways we love embrace, or avoid, Love and Erotic Desire. 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 orgies of love and humiliating loss, then urges us to emerge again, re-newed, stronger, wiser, eyes wide open.

Mars is the warrior god. And for those of us who sit behind computer screens all day, or push the vacuum cleaner across the floor, we may experience our lust for sex and violence vicariously through movies or sport, or we may morph into a Berserker when we’re stuck in traffic, sniping at our partner for leaving a wet towel on the floor when we arrive home.

Venus is in Capricorn this Valentine’s Day. Venus interpretations so often become stereotypes that don’t embrace the myriad variables of the birth chart. Some astrologers would describe a Capricorn Venus as cool and calculating, earthy and responsible. This week, Venus slips off Capricorn’s crisp classic clothing in celebration of Love. Mars  is in conjunction with Uranus—February 13 and 14th— in the final degrees of Aries, an edgy, erotic combination, associated with lightening bolts and the heated rush of Desire. Within Love’s new beginnings are also endings, as desire and excitement fade into committed Love that lasts until the music dies.Valentines day 14

Venus then conjoins both Saturn and Pluto between February 18-22 th—prompting a new direction in the dance of Love. Mars/Uranus aspects are those lightening bolts that jolt, shake, electrify us, with a love that burns.
Venus in steady Capricorn meets both Saturn and Pluto, describing the serious power struggles that inevitably ensue after the youthful romantic stage of Romeo and Juliet Love dies the scripted, inevitable death.

Risk and Fear are the Guardians at the gate of Love. We cannot be truly intimate or sexually playful when we are vigilant, guarded, or fearful. We cannot be truly intimate or sexually adventurous when we do not take a risk.

Our relationships work, for a while, within a bounded space, enclosed by children and pets, in-laws, work, social responsibility. Until they don’t. Until something happens to shatter the thin veneer of compromise.Until a raging torrent rushes through the aridity of our life. Until the brittle sacrifices implode in a shower of dust. It may be a death, a health-scare, an affair, the loss of a business, our child leaving home. The comfort of fireside companionship, the tangible solidity of the things we own, and the cadence of routine now does not feed our hunger. We go online and gorge, like starving anorexics feasting on chocolate sundae. Or in the seductive gaze of our work colleague or the children’s music teacher, we delight in the sweetness we have denied ourselves for decades. We become alive again.

Val 2Love is a creative act of the Imagination. Its realm is rarefied, intangible, briefly captured like an exquisite butterfly where it flutters to the sound of music, poetry, the wind whispering through the trees.

Intimacy waits patiently for Love’s transient rapture to disperse. Intimacy requires time, repetition and the ability to choose each other, again and again. Intimacy is a practiced dance where two dancers move across the floor, present and focused, moving as one, yet firm in our own foot work. The dance of Intimacy requires tenderness and some acceptance. It requires routine and a sense of safety. It requires trust and an ability to create an emotional connection.

Yet so often as we spin our soft cocoon of companionable safety, Eros feels swaddled. He becomes a pudgy Cupid, not a virile Lover.

Sex therapist David Schnarch writes, “We’ve reduced adults to infants and infants to a frail ghost of their resilience, reduced marriage to providing safety, security, and compensation for childhood disappointments. We remove our essential drives for autonomy and freedom.”

Psychologist Esther Perel suggests that too much closeness restricts the sense of freedom and autonomy we need for sexual pleasure. “When intimacy collapses into fusion it is not lack of closeness but too much closeness that impedes desire.” She maintains that intimacy only sometimes begets sexuality and that our need for togetherness exists alongside our need for separateness. With too much distance there can be no connection and with too much fusion (the soul mate theory) there is no one to connect with. “Increased emotional stability ironically what makes for good intimacy, does not make for good sex.”

Valentines day 9Anais Nin wrote so poignantly, “Love never dies a natural death. It dies because we do not know how to replenish its source.” So how do we replenish Love’s source? David Schnarch writes, love and desire are “not a matter of peeling away the layers but of developing them—growing ourselves up to be mature and resourceful adults who can solve our current problems.”

Love requires an artist’s eye, a poet’s sensibility, a gourmet’s palate. The willingness to be curious, to engage in the mystery, to re-ignite the flame of Eros with the spark of our human imagination. Perhaps in the break-down of all we know is safe and sure, we discover that it is our partner who has been taking care of our marriage after all. In stretching out of our familiar roles, seeing each other with new eyes, we rebuild a relationship that has collapsed under the heavy weight of our control. We allow Love to awaken in our life. And we begin to dance again.

I post regularly on Face Book. If you would prefer me to send you these posts privately, or if you would like to book a private astrology consultations please connect with me: ingrid@trueheartwork.com

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Stand by Me—New Moon and Solar Eclipse—January 6th

58e3a4b6369c9faccf6acb7d5d409372When the night has come
And the land is dark
And the moon is the only light we’ll see
No I won’t be afraid, no I won’t be afraid
Just as long as you stand, stand by me
Benjamin Earl King.

The first month of the calendar year, is named in honour of Janus, two-headed god of thresholds.

“This year will be better…” we say hopefully, perhaps as a talisman to ward off the aftertaste of the year gone by.

As the effervescent bubbles of New Year’s Eve flatten into the sober days of January and we minister to the minutiae of our daily lives, Fate may enter softly through the open door, catching us unprepared. She brings news that that skids and spins us off the smooth tarmac of our carefully scheduled New Year planner. For many of us this year, we will have to bow our heads to the necessity of getting out of bed each day and finding something to be truly grateful for. We will yoke ourselves to the inevitability of change: children who leave home, a lover who no longer loves us, a dear friend who moves far away, a beloved parent who now needs the same vigilant caring as a toddler. As we eat of the bitter herb, may we know that there is milk and honey also, in the acceptance of things as they are.

1e5ab0ada433d9e43612a48815ca7cd3Our ancestors lived close to the cycles of the seasons, the rhythm of Life. During the unrelenting grip of famine or displacement by war, flood or fire, they walked with the primordial goddess of Necessity. She was Ananke, also called Force or Constraint; she was mother to three daughters, the Moirai, the Fates. As omniscient goddess of all circumstance, greatly respected by mortals and gods, it was she who ruled the pattern of the life line of threads of inevitable, irrational, fated events in our lives. Ananke determined what each soul had chosen for its lot to be necessary—not as an accident, not as something good or bad, but as something necessary to be lived, endured, experienced. Necessity has been outcast in our mechanistic material culture where we, in our hubris and our self-inflation, actually believe that are all powerful—we can fix, manifest, cut away, or buy our way out of any mess we make. Ananke is an ancient goddess, and the resonance of her name has its tap root in the ancient tongues of the Chaldean, Egyptian, the Hebrew, for “narrow,” “throat”, “strangle” and the cruel yokes that were fastened around the necks of captives. Ananke always takes us by the throat, imprisons, enslaves, and stops us in our tracks, for a while. There is no escape. She is unyielding, and it is we who must excavate from the depths of our being, our courage, tenacity, and acceptance of what is.

Midnight Kiss, 1989This New Year, Necessity may lay her hand on a defining moment in your life. The ending of a love affair, the barren womb, the not-so-exciting job that pays the bills. She may still the tug-o’-war of the heart’s calling, block the mind’s plan, and fasten the collar around our neck. There may be no escape, except a shift in perception, and the courage to accept that which cannot be otherwise and a resilience to stay the course and just do it. Author, Doris Lessing once said, “whatever you’re meant to do, do it now. The conditions are always impossible.”

On January 1st, we cross over the burning ground where our intentions, our resolutions, are ignited. Mars emerges from the luminescent waters of Pisces and brashly unsheathes his sword. Mars is in Aries until Valentine’s day. Bodyguard of the Sun, Mars triggers a release of wilful determination that may aid the ingestion of a sugarless spoonful of realism.

The Sun, Saturn, Pluto are in Capricorn this month, harbingers of a year that may bring financial austerity, new laws and restrictions imposed by those in authority. We confront the cold facts, the consequences, the karma of our thoughts and our actions. This is the month we white knuckle down to those tedious but necessary tasks that stretch our resolve, take us to the edge of our endurance. Capricorn, like all astrological archetypes, is complex and nuanced. Here we meet the energy of The Master, the Father, the Law Giver, the Tyrant, and the Scapegoat. There are no short cuts this month, the celestial injunction is to bunker down, be responsible, exercise caution and self-mastery.

9a5147206ccd668439e24575e0ce99cbMercury moves into Capricorn on the eve of a Capricorn New Moon and Solar Eclipse. The Solar Eclipse plumps up the seeds of our intentions, and in Capricorn we must choose wisely where we plant them. Mercury in Capricorn brings a seriousness to our thoughts and words, we may focus on the importance the promises we make and our commitment to duty, no matter how arduous or unpleasant. Venus changes sign on January 8th, accelerating her dance through the heavens in fiery Sagittarius and joining Jupiter, that planet associated with excess and grandiosity on January 22nd. Jupiter and Neptune are in square between January 12th and 16th and, on January 21st, Venus square to Neptune may gorge hedonistically on sweet dreams and empty promises. She may languish in the half light of the opium den or pursue the glittering lights of the casino. This is the classic bankruptcy signature, so be wary of the siren call to buy more of what you want but don’t really need at the January sales. Be conservative in affairs of business. Be aware of the regressive pull back into unconscious drives and infantile appetites in relationships that demand instant gratification.

eb49f22c899eb8cad9709d47975bb123This New Moon and Solar Eclipse contains the seed for temperance, austerity and prudence that will be necessary companions in 2019.

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.”

As we honour Necessity, we can choose which threads, which colours we wish to weave into the cloth of our lives. 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 in the dark of the Moon.

In loving memory of Denise Marine. March 29th 1940—December 27th 2018. Thank you for standing by me.

For personal astrology readings please contact me on ingrid@trueheartwork.com or visit my website: www.trueheartwork.com
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I post regular astrology updates on Facebook. If you have social media fatigue, I will gladly send these to you directly by email.

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Lionheart—Sun in Leo 22nd July—23rd August

Sun in Leo 5

It’s a funny thing about life.

If you refuse to settle for anything less than the best, that’s what it will give you—W. Somerset Maugham.

Passion lifts us on the thermal of those before-and-after choices that change the trajectory of our lives. When passion enters, pressing itself, hot and urgent against those places we haven’t touched in years, we remember our wings, and we soar.

As leaders of nations distract us with  displays of crass grandiosity, as economies and social structures are dismembered, we journey around the archetypal wheel of the zodiac to encounter what has  churned, sea-smoothed and sculptured, beneath the reflective waters of Cancer.

Amidst  ideological rhetoric and comatose decision-making, the transits of the outer planets draw out the sepsis from society. The archetypes of Pluto and Saturn in Capricorn continue to draw up all that is rotten to the surface of patriarchy. Our role models and leaders reflect our own greed, arrogance and bigotry. The dispassionate sky-god Uranus, promises the “perfect society”, and things fall apart.

The Sun moves into Leo on Sunday, offering the gift of optimism and vitality. Leo encapsulates passion, creativity, and spontaneity. Leo’s quest is courage.

Leo is associated with the heart—le coeur. That sacred repository of joy that contains the delicious delight, the audacious longing that emboldens us to rise up strong. Old astrologers link Leo royalty. With Sun kings, with leaders of nations and performers—Leo is the rock star of the zodiac—egoistic, charismatic, and commanding. I would associate Leo with the Divine Child, spontaneous, engaged in pleasure and play, fully alive. When the Sun is in Leo, our Camino is the way of  wholehearted self-expression and joy.

Leo 3

The archetype of Leo reminds us that every experience has the potential to rouse us to passion and purpose, that it’s laughter and creativity that sweeten the heroine’s journey. That lions spend most of their time sleeping, and a good night’s sleep will do much to  ease our stretched-out-frazzled nerves. That laughter and play thaw the frozen terror and passion  immolates the sinuous coil of fear in our belly.

This month is flanked by two eclipses—the Cancer New Moon Partial Solar Eclipse on July 13th brushed the Sun, with a top note of intensity that may be illuminated by the Total Lunar Eclipse and  Aquarius Full Moon Solar Eclipse,  on July 27th.

Lunar Eclipses draw us into the instinctual realm of “gut feel”. They stir primordial energy. Solar Eclipses feel external, they cast a spotlight on global events and personal issues. We may experience hardship and enormous tension— or  the release of suppressed energy in the aftermath of a volcanic eruption in our lives.

Leo Cara_Delevigne-1

Eclipses have importance in terms of world events. The partial solar eclipse was a preview to what will unfold from January 6th 2019—a cluster of eclipses in the Capricorn/Cancer polarity. July’s Partial Solar Eclipse fell on the moon of the UK chart, emphasising survival and safety. It coincided with Donald Trump’s visit to the UK.

Bernadette Brady writes of the July 13th eclipse (Saros Series 2 North) “if this family of eclipses affects a chart, the person will experience the sudden collapse of plans or life-styles… after the dust has settled, the rebuilding starts, and the consequences of this reshaping will have far-reaching effects. This eclipse family changes a person’s direction through the sudden collapse of an existing structure.”

Eclipses, even if they don’t spotlight any personal planets in our birth charts or in the charts of our relationships, highlight motifs, offer opportunities for re-calibration. They’re guide posts. Points of reference. cat leo sun

Reflect back to the much-heralded solar eclipse on August 21st, 2017 at 28 degrees Leo. Again the Leo/Aquarius axis was accented as the players on the political stage  performed their macabre roles like players in an Elizabethan Revenge Drama. There’s another eclipse on the Aquarius/Leo axis on August 11th at 18 degrees Leo and the final eclipse in this Leo/Aquarius family on January 21st, 2019 at 00 degrees Leouncompromising grandiosity, puffed up pride and arrogance, drama, hot-headed ideology, as naked Emperors strutand the counterpointcourage, spontaneity, and ability to be Present.

Mercury goes Retrograde on July 26th, at 23 degrees Leo, a harbinger of the full moon lunar eclipse on 27 July 2018 which falls at 4 degrees Aquarius,  making a striking T-square with Mars square Uranus. She nestles between Mars Retrograde and the South Node in Aquarius, like a poultice on a wound, bringing things to the surface, marking a completion, illuminating personal and world events in a dramatic and disruptive manner. Both Mars and the South Node bring a sense of severance, purifying, separating, purging. Mars is the surgeon’s knife that cuts, accelerating new growth and healing. Mars is also the war-lord’s sword that maims and destroys.

Sun in Leo 2In the cutting loose, the withdrawal from the brouhaha of the dramatics of politics, we’re invited to take centre stage in our own lives. To be loyal and steadfast to our own performance and to  abandon ourselves to our own unique passion that transcends the petty actions of the bit players who enter and leave through the sliding doors of political office. To adorn our heart’s desire with the deep, enduring energy that infuses all life.

I offer astrology readings and workshops for women, and post regular updates on Facebook. Please contact me ingrid@trueheartwork.com

Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark, in the hopeless swamps of the not-quite, the not-yet, and the not-at-all. Do not let the hero in your soul perish in lonely frustration for the life you deserved and have never been able to reach. The world you desire can be won. It exists. It is real. It is possible. It is yours—Ayn Rand.

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