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The Water Bearer—Aquarius full moon—August 11th, 2022.

Water is the driving force of all natureLeonardo da Vinci.

 

A halo-crowned moon drifts through a silver bank of cloud tonight calling to the salty waves, the ripple of the lakes and the rivers, to the watery memory of all living things.

Aquarius is the water bearer. To the ancients, Aquarius signified the cool life-giving waters of life that have shaped the cycles of human civilizations for eons. Tonight, the moon’s otherworldly luminosity is somewhat circumscribed by a union with realistic Saturn (now Retrograde but moving direct on October 18th), an intransigent square to revolutionary Uranus (Retrograde August 24th), an agitated Mars, and a resolute North Node that speaks unfashionably of fate and destiny in a world where we naively believe that we’re in charge. As Uranus, Mars and the North Node align in the heavens, they trigger a tempestuous energy that may feel disruptive and explosive but will herald a wash of new energy that will spill over as the year unfolds.

Here in the north, an unblinking Leo Sun scalds a meagre crop of blackberries that droop in the hedgerows and greedily sucks any moisture from the streams that still trickle. The great rivers, named after ancient goddesses, barely move.

This moon in Aquarius, its image an elegant urn filled to the brim with regenerative water, is a reminder that throughout his-story there have been cycles of destruction and renewal.

The astrology suggests that we are in a cycle of turbulence and destruction. We may keep afloat if we have global co-operation, but the waves of change will be tumultuous, even for those who can afford a first-class cabin.

The effects of Pluto’s passage through Capricorn and America’s Pluto Return will linger like the smoke of an expensive cigar for decades. When Pluto entered Capricorn, the Establishment shuddered. Financial systems toppled. Decadent Plutocrats took centre stage. Pluto will be travelling between Capricorn and Aquarius next year, settling in Aquarius, the sign of the common people, in 2024 for a decade that promises to be momentous for Silicon Valley, social media, and our rather naïve thought that technology can solve everything. Neptune is in his own sign of Pisces until 2025, swirling in a sea-change that has washed up the flotsam and jetsam of fake news, conspiracy theories, Botoxed influencers, magic mushrooms, memes, gender fluidity, spiritual awakening, and utter confusion. As Uranus shakes and shudders through the earth sign of Taurus (until 2025) the earth moves, and fires, floods, and melting ice caps signal a tipping point that has already toppled.

As the old winner takes all “masculine” paradigm of competition and scarcity still permeates our culture, and the unspeakable barbarism of war still dominates the news, we notice that Venus, a faceted jewel on the breast of dawn now, moves into Leo on August 12th, the day after this full moon. We may remember that in myth, Venus is both an evening and a morning star. She has two faces. To the Mayans, the Aztecs, and star watchers of Mesopotamia and Mongolia, when Venus appeared as a morning star, she was dressed for battle.

Mars, the mythic war lord, takes the verbal sword when he enters Gemini, a sign associated with duality and choice, on August 20th, and will remain in this restless airy realm until March 25th, 2023. How we respond to this sudden gust of hot air depends on our natal Mars placement. The pace is likely to quicken in terms of negotiations, and dealssabre rattlingin Gemini, Mars wears winged sandals, instinctively rushing into heated arguments, throwing out (so often unconsidered and regretfully painful) comments on social media, over-stimulated nervous systems, and difficulty in surrendering to the sweet release of sleep. A wilful Mars is easily provoked as he accompanies unpredictable Uranus and the North Node this month (until August 15th) across the starry skies. Mars is our primal life force that emerges like a flame when we feel threatened, or when we muster up the courage to ask for what we want, and battle with those shadowy qualities that lurk within us all.

The Star Card in the Tarot is often associated with Aquarius. And the myth of the beautiful, but curious Pandora who searches for the truth, dares to open the forbidden casket, and releases a swarm of stinging, biting insects that fill the world with darkness; primal cold-blooded creatures that bite, puncture, and goadterrible afflictions that infect mankind. Pandora kneels at the casket, her long-lashed eyes raised heavenward as she gazes at a shining star, for Hope remains in a corner of the chest, still there amidst all the confusion, despair, and suffering. And as old structures teeter and fall, as we sift through the rubble of broken promises, shattered dreams, landscapes blighted by drought or caught in the flames of war, the Moon completes her round in the heavens and turns her luminous face to the earth, she shines on us all, reminding us that we are inextricably linked by sensory information that floats with the star dust and settles in the water we drink, and the food that has been touched by someone’s hands. Like the ebb and flow of the tides, war lords will grow weary of battle, those who acquire and accumulate will begin to find a deeper connection to their hearts and souls.

The earth is changing beneath our feet.  As we look to the moon tonight, may our hopelessness be transfigured by an infusion of lustrous moonlight, our dreams and visions of rivers and glistening oceans teaming with life, cities where children play amidst tall trees, their little bare feet planted on green grass, their tiny lungs gulping clean air.

May we do everything we can do to be in right relation with this precious pale blue dot, this earth, and all sentient creatures. It’s been twenty-eight years since Carl Sagan spoke these compelling words:

Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark.

In our obscurityin all this vastnessthere is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we’ve ever known.”

If you would like a private astrology consultation, please get in touch: ingrid@trueheartwork.com

 

 

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A New Day Has Come

Hush now. See the Light in the sky.  A new day has come. The year is re-born.

The life-giving Sun stands still today, this day of the Capricorn Solstice – midwinter in the northern hemisphere, as the Sun lies low over the horizon. Here, in the south, at approximately 7:30am on December 22nd the Sun at its brilliant zenith, big blue skies, the brilliance of midsummer.

At the Solstice, the sun literally stands still. There is no movement. Our life-giving Star rests. Ancient stones placed on sacred sites now swathed in myth and mystery, still stand as silent sentinels to the pathway of the new born Sun, signifying survival in the famine months of the cruel winter. The Winter Solstice, the shortest day of the year was celebrated by ancient cultures. In more recent history, the ancient Greeks made merry on Lenaia; in ancient Rome, Bacchus the god of wine was honoured and, later, the Romans overturned social conventions at the festival of Saturnalia (the feast of Saturn, god of agriculture) a time of excess and merry making.  

New beginnings… beneath the Victorian trappings and commercialism of Christmas, the glitter of lights in celebration of Diwali and Hannukah, what we are all celebrating is the re-birth of Light, of a new day, the risen christ consciousness within us all.

“Go placidly amid the noise and haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence…” *   Many of us are efforting, pushing on beyond exhaustion, as this calendar year scurries to an end. Adrenal fatigue, crankiness, a frozen sea of aloneness amidst the frenetic agitation of the supermarkets and striving of the shopping malls. Family gatherings trigger explosive arguments as septic tensions ooze beneath the tinsel and baubles of festive cheer. The spectre of loneliness shadows the conviviality of office parties, with dinner for one on Christmas day.  And yet, the celestial symbolism of astrology brings glad tidings. Jupiter, “benefic” planet of expansion and largesse, turns direct on Christmas Day, with the Capricorn New Moon on Christmas Eve, a lunation heralding a symbolic new beginning, as she marries the New Sun.Capricorn is an earth sign, so use the energy of the element of earth to ground new seeds of hopes, dreams, and intentions for the coming year. Place Hope and Faith at the centrepiece of your festive table. Bow your head to your heart this new day. Pause. Sit quietly and allow the soul to enter in its dappled brilliance. Sup on Gratitude for the year gone by. Raise your glass to Hope, on this New Day. “With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NaGLVS5b_ZY

Celine Dion, A New Day Has Come

Desiderata

Go placidly amid the noise and the haste,
and remember what peace there may be in silence.

As far as possible, without surrender,
be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly;
and listen to others,
even to the dull and the ignorant;
they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons;
they are vexatious to the spirit.

Therefore be at peace with God,
whatever you conceive Him to be.
And whatever your labors and aspirations,
in the noisy confusion of life,
keep peace in your soul.

With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.

Max Ehrmann.


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All Along the Watchtower

 

Ten years ago, I made a conscious decision to step aside from the torrent of fear that gushes from the media.  I have not watched TV news, read a newspaper. I’ve shunned magazines, except a desultory glance at those stacked along the shelf at the hair dresser.

I’ve allowed those friends who choose to live in a miasma fear to slip out of my life. I’ve smiled as people have called me an ostrich, unpatriotic, because I do not watch Carte Blanche, or gorge on the maggot-ridden garbage tossed out by crooked politicians. I question conspiracy theories. I choose to eschew urban myths. I am aware that there is a very noxious, very dark Shadow on this earth. I am aware of gluttonous greed, a surfeit of suffering. I choose the messages I feed my mind, because I like my serotonin high. I know what the stress chemical, cortisol does to my body.

Today, I came across an eloquently written blog which made me feel like the ugly duckling who finds her swans. It is worth a read.

We are living in challenging times. Novelist Charles Dickens wrote A Tale of Two Cities in 1859, during a time of huge social and political upheaval and violent revolution.  It was the best of times, it was the worst of times”, and in 1846, it was time for the planet Neptune to be “discovered”. Now as then: “It was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us…”

 The celestial markers of our human journey, Neptune and Chiron have been in tight conjunction in the sign of Aquarius all through 2009. Together, they dipped briefly into the compassionate, ouroboric waters of Pisces for the first time, in April 2011. Neptune fully enters Pisces in February 2012  and remains there until 2025. Neptune is about sacrifice, victim consciousness, addiction, pain, renunciation, delusion, romance, spirituality, a longing to transcend this earthly realm. Neptune can embalm us in a glutinous cocoon of immobility. Or lift us up spiritually and creatively. Neptune also symbolises the energy of Christ Consciousness and compassion.  Chiron was “discovered” in 1977. Like Dorothy’s Ruby Slippers, it was silently, invisibly there all the time. Chiron embraces the archetype of the “wounded healer” or Shaman, and compels each one of us to imbibe the sacred medicine of suffering as an initiation into our wisdom and conscious understanding on  our spiritual journey.

Times are tough on so many levels for so many. As above so below, the macrocosm is reflected in the microcosm of our lives when we open the Pandora’s Box of relationships and intimacy. We fear we are not loveable enough, not good enough, beautiful enough, young enough … the shoulds, musts, and the buts, which entomb us in a mausoleum of self-imposed limitations fly out, shrieking. We keep ourselves small, in the darkness.  Though inner saboteur and the inner critic have their place in our psyche, their voices need now to be silenced as we follow our hearts, trust our intuition and cast off the self-imposed shackles that bind. Fear hides behind perfectionism. Fear lurks behind cruelty.  We fear death, change, poverty, love and loss. We fear happiness. We fear the pleasure of sensuality and the soul connection of sex. We fear telling the truth, or making those smallest behaviour changes that will save our relationships from tumbling over the dark abyss. We fear reaching across the expanse of the bed in the dark of the night to hold our lover’s hand after a fierce argument. We fear saying, “I’m  sorry” or “I forgive you.”

So we continue to continue… leaking leak vital energy; remaining trapped in what Eckhart Tolle calls the “pain body”. We use the instrument of our minds to scare ourselves with repetitive and useless terrors that corrode our joy and leach our life force. Says Marianne Williamson, in A Return to Love, “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be?”

I’m going on a fear fast while Mercury is in retrograde until December 14th. Would you be willing to join me? To commit to being aware when you shame or criticise yourself. To watch for the “Victim/Persecutor” dance in your relationships.  To avoid watching or reading “the news”. To lovingly examine the hidden agendas in the melodramas in your own life and in the lives of those around you. To choose to set aside time each day to focus on those things that nourish your spirit.  To stop scaring yourself. 

Open your heart; embrace the changes and challenges in your life with a sense of curiosity and wonder. Know that you are held and supported at all times on this rollercoaster of life. Remember, that after all the evils of the world had flown out of Pandora’s Box, it was Hope that remained.

Hope and All shall be well, all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.” St. Teresa of Avila.

All Along the Watchtower, written by Bob Dylan: YouTube

“There must be some kind of way out of here,
Said the joker to the thief,
There’s too much confusion,
I can’t get no relief.”

 

 

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