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Magician Tag

I Carry Your Heart—Virgo Full Moon—March 18th.

Some things in life cannot be fixed. They can only be carried―Megan Devine

As the year begins to tip and turn and balance briefly between light and shadow, V-shaped flocks of migrating birds follow ancient pathways in the skies, sweeping over holes torn in the earth and shards of cities split open. A Virgo Full Moon reflects the sunlight on March 18th pulling at the tides, tugging at our hearts as throngs of traumatised people cross borders into the unknown, and millions of compassionate hearts carry them into their new lives.

The symbolism of the Virgo archetype is strong medicine if we align ourselves with what must be healed within ourselves so that we can assimilate and digest the ultrafast events that pulse across our newsfeeds and penetrate our psyches. Virgo moves us to engage in practical ways with the world around us, to be present and willing to do what we must to serve others as the collective consciousness pulsates with profound sadness. Yet for those of us who have carry the salty pearl of sorrow in our heart, we may feel alienated in a world that wants us to “move on” after devastating loss.

Psychologist Megan Devine speaks to our culture of pervasive positivity, the fast-food platitudes we use to by-pass unresolved wounds, divert painful feelings into “spiritually enlightened” activity. “There is a pain in this world that you can’t be cheered out of. You don’t need solutions. You don’t need to move on from your grief. You need someone to see your grief, to acknowlege it. You need someone to hold your hands while you stand there in blinking horror, staring at the hole that was your life.”

This Virgo Full Moon opposes a gauzy Sun/Neptune conjunction in nebulous Pisces, heightening our sensitivity, dissolving facts, blurring fiction, fusing by trine with Pluto, that planetary archetype that strips us of our innocence, drags us into the underworld and strips us of all that we hold most dear. As she spills her silvery light over a troubled world, she follows the annual Sun/Neptune union (13th March at 23° Pisces) and heralds the meeting of the once-in-every-thirteen-years Neptune and Jupiter conjunction in Pisces (exact on April 12th.) This is the last lunation before the Equinox on March 20th.  Astrologer Dane Rudhyar’s Sabian Symbol for this Moon is “A bald headed man who has seized power.”

Some things just can’t be fixed. Yet Virgo is a mutable, transitional sign, bringing our attention to what is growing underground in the spring and what falls to the earth in the autumn. At this time of the equinox (March 20th) light and shadow are as binary as the choices we make when we can’t or won’t see the spaces in-between, when we allow ourselves to stay distracted, to look for rainbows before we have fully felt the sting of the rain. As the seasons change, we may sense a new momentum, a desire to springclean, rearrange,  prioritise,  prepare for a new rhythm in our inner lives. Mercury-ruled Virgo is also the alchemist and the magician who uses ingenuity and clear vision to guide us across the threshold of change as we stay present to our own grief, or acknowlege the grief of another.

Joseph Campbell called the Magician archetype “the mentor with supernatural aid” and as Mercury moves through Pisces, we may be re-imagining our lives, prioritising self-care and spiritual practice as the spoils of war impinge on the poorest in society; rising fuel and food prices prompt politicians to make pacts with new tyrants. Neptune (oil and gas) and Jupiter (high hopes) infuse the zeitgeist with compassion and altruism; amplify grief and loss; trail clouds of hype, euphoria, and befuddled delusion. Life assumes a trance-like quality as we sip a latte and imagine what it must be like to be sheltering in a damp basement as missiles rain from the skies.

Yesterday, as the Moon entered Virgo, Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s release from imprisonment plunges her into the light, out of the shadow. In 2016, Nazanin became a pawn in a political power struggle after visiting Iran for three days to stay with her parents. In the symbolic language of astrology, her transits speak of redemption (transiting Neptune and Sun opposing her natal Sun/North Node in Virgo, transiting Mars/Venus in Aquarius square her Scorpio Venus/Uranus and transiting Uranus opposing her Venus/Uranus—quite literally, freedom!)

This month, the primordial gods of Love and War, Venus and Mars, are sailing in tandem across the heavens in the humanitarian sign of Aquarius, activating the degree point of the Saturn/Jupiter Conjunction of December 21st, 2020, that initiated a new era for humankind. The Venus/Mars combination that lasts until April is a potent union. In myth, Aphrodite (Venus) and Ares (Mars) have many children: Phobos (fright and panic) Deimos (terror), as well as Eros and Harmonia. In Roman times, altars to Mars were placed outside city gates. As we sip our herbal tea, we can project our own aggression outwards, wage war internally as neurosis, or carry these opposing forces in our hearts, invite them inside our own psychic city gates.

When the Full Moon awakens our Virgo planets or illuminates that part of our birth chart that is Virgo, shadowy traits emerge as we stumble into the seductive archetype of “The Harlot/Prostitute. We sell ourselves short, fail honour the commitments we make to ourselves, collapse into the fear of survival and clutch onto security at any cost. In our service to others, like the foolish Virgin, we neglect to fill the oil or trim the wick of our own lantern.

At this time of transition, we humbly begin again, staying present with our grief, rooted and connected to our deepest source.

Where do we begin? Begin with the heart,” wrote anchoress Julian of Norwich who was walled up in a small cell built onto the church for most of her life. In so many ways, this woman who took on the name of the church she was quite literally attached to, epitomises the humility and reclusiveness of the Virgo archetype and activates the Magician, the Earth Goddess, the Warrior in us all.

Let’s begin with the heart.

“here is the deepest secret nobody knows

here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud

and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows

higher than soul can hope or mind can hide

and this is the wonder that’s keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)

e.e. cummings.

 

For astrology consultations, please get in touch: Ingrid@trueheartwork.com

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Force of Nature—Uranus returns to Taurus—March 6th

0b1272a595b4667197dd90e774fc1235And now you’ll be telling stories
of my coming back
and they won’t be false, and they won’t be true
but they’ll be real―Mary Oliver

We cannot ignore the wind of change that is blowing across the world right now. We cannot ignore the fierce rattle at the windows of economies and governments. We’re living at a tipping point of turbulence and transformation that will test our spiritual mettle.

These winds that shake the barley may blast us from the echo chamber of our minds, unstop our ears, open our hearts. As Einstein said, “no problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it.”  Now more than ever we require a new dimension to our consciousness, a new way of Being in a world where nothing is certain.

4ebf9930465d786077af8bf6736b47f5Most of us doggedly resist change, pay lip-service to diversity, avoid new beginnings. We’re hard-wired to take the path well-travelled.  And yet, on some level, most of us know that the external props in our lives are as flimsy as straws when the wild wind blows. Nothing and everything has changed.

Our initiatives and ambitions may be undermined this week, visibility obscured. Mercury—Magician and Trickster—begins to swim backwards in Pisces on March 5th, entering a three-week Retrograde period until March 30th, during which Mercury also conjoins Neptune for the third time. Mercury Retrograde cycles offer us a new perspective, an opportunity to retrace our steps, to rethink, repair, redo, return perhaps to where we started from. Mercury rules data, information, communication, travel, mechanical things.  Mercury in Pisces floats and dreams, softening sharp edges, blurring what we believe is the truth. On March 6th Civil, a new platform for investigative independent journalism is launched, born on the winged sandals of Mercury, the messenger, the net-worker, the communicator. We’re coming back with real stories.

Mercury Retrograde cycles have gained notoriety for miscommunication, transport delays, and technology that malfunctions.  But if we allow ourselves to yield; if we sigh out, soften; if we can relinquish our tight grip of structure and schedules, we may be astonished. Mercury Retrograde periods are times to notice how the outer world reflects our inner world.

The New Moon in Pisces on March 6th signals an expectant new beginning, that may draw us deeper into concealed currents of emotion. In Pisces, we don’t pare down, divide or analyse; rather, boundaries dissolve, colours run, everything empties into One.

As we return once more to that pure potent energy of freshness, we feel shiny and new.  The Sun conjunct Neptune swells the surge of fresh water, softening the sharp edges of our personal will, seeping through our defenses, stirring compassion, imagination, and our child-like belief in whimsy, in mystery, in magic.

This is also the day that Uranus returns to Taurus. We may begin to trace our footsteps along a road that winds back to the months between May and November 2018.

We may take a moment to revisit the discomfort of adjustment to new circumstance, the choices, the decisions, the roads we travelled.

702d922c275d18fffd1354899350fefaUranus remains in Taurus until 2026, shaking and jolting us from the steady rhythm of our cossetted lives, widening the fault lines in our relationships, swallowing the earth from under our feet. As we ricochet from our rut, Uranus may escort epiphanies that separate us from what we love and value, pushing us over the edge. Uranus destabilises, brings anarchy, chaos, revolution and rebellion. Uranus is the Sky god who brings innovation on winds of change.

As Uranus moves through Taurus, cracks will appear in financial systems. Where we’ve been holding on greedily to possessions and those things we think we value, we may experience sudden losses, upsets, that unchain us from those things that bind us. In the West, our worship of materialism, our lust for power, and insatiable craving for more and more is the wound that cuts us off from Mother Earth, from the natural rhythm of our bodies. Uranus in Taurus will highlight our physicality, our inter-connectedness with all living things and the cycles of Nature. Taurus is associated with cattle. The BBC Four series, Secret Life of Farm Animals shows how cows thrive in the wild, intuitively eating those herbs and shrubs that aid digestion and control parasites, how they love music and problem solving, how they tenderly nurture their young. As Uranus moves through Taurus, the conditions of cattle in the meat and dairy industries will have consequences.  Yuval Noah Harari writes, You want to know how super-intelligent cyborgs might treat ordinary flesh-and-blood humans? Better start by investigating how humans treat their less intelligent animal cousins. It’s not a perfect analogy, of course, but it is the best archetype we can actually observe rather than just imagine.” Uranus in Taurus 2

As Uranus moves through Taurus, climate change and erratic weather patterns will remind us of the inter-connectedness of all things. As Uranus moves through Taurus, we may encounter the Minotaur at the centre of the labyrinth: that part of ourselves, or the society we live in, that has been secreted away, feared, disowned, denied. With Uranus we may feel a sense of alienation, of being an outcast. We may feel restless, distraught, utterly alone. Uranus is associated with breakthroughs, the kind of breaking through that breaks us open, brings us to our kneesthe sudden death of a loved one, the shocking news that upends our world, the lightning-bolt encounter that electrifies us, shifts our perspective.

Uranus in Taurus 10When we’re shook up and shattered, on our knees, we may receive a flash of insight that directs us to a new bend in the road.

To live authentically in this new world, we will require grit and integrity and the spiritual strength to hold the tension of opposites. To enter, as the Spanish mystic, Teresa of Avila, who lived in the burning times of The Inquisition (1500s) said: “let us remember that within us there is a palace of immense magnificence”. 

For astrology workshops in the UK and consultations on Skype or Whatsapp, please email me―ingrid@trueheartwork.com

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White on White—Mercury the Magician

White on white 22Marriage is not a ritual or an end.

It is a long, intricate, intimate dance together and nothing matters more than your own sense of balance and your choice of partnerAmy Bloom.

Fairy Tale Weddings are compelling in their sentimental perfection. The flowers, cake, months of meticulous preparation. The dress, tiara, spray-on tan, flowers in the button holes.

In our desire for the perfect wedding we so often find the golden apple of Discord. The Trickster appears to knock the bouquet off the altar of tradition. The fainting bride, the glitch in the sound system, little page boy who squeals just as the vows are pronounced. A flaw in the perfection of the meticulously planned occasion that brings laughter, and that may be the prelude of a profound agitation of two entwined souls. Like actors on a stage, bride and groom, play out the old scripts of the marriages before them. In their own lives, or in the matrix of their family history.

The compelling mystery of Marriage is that it can flay and brand, or softly kiss our soul. It is through our sentimentality, our innocence, our insistence in the “happily ever after” and the romantic dream of the marriage made in heaven, that we meet the dark challenges that a soul-ful union.  It’s through the difficulties, often the sojourns in hell, that we refine the prima materia, the raw stuff of life, and experience the phases of Love in all their complexity.

As the days of May unfurl like bright-coloured scarves tossed by the wind, Mercury guides us across the threshold of change and the ritual of Marriage. Mercury is associated with the Trickster and the Magician archetype, and is the patron of youth, of new possibilities, new perceptions, offering us the gift of ingenuity and intellect.ae6b30abe4584b2f97890bbee2582c6a

Mercury has been riding tandem with Uranus for the past few days, a high-voltage energy, so perfectly typified by the spectacle of this year’s Eurovision song contest, and the win by Israel’s Netta Barzilai who celebrated diversity in her confident delivery. Mercury changes sign this week, slipping into Taurus on May 14th.  Taurus embodies an earthly, sensual, resourceful energy, and as Mercury changes into the richly sensual clothing of Venus-ruled Taurus, this ingress signifies a phase of cerebral creativity for us all on some level.

The Taurus New Moon on May 15th heralds a threshold crossing, corresponding with Uranus’ ingress, the start of a new seven-year cycle, as Uranus penetrates the calm solidity of Taurus. Uranus, associated with upheaval, with sudden change that uproots the past, shatters the status quo. This marks an unfolding journey for us personally, and collectively, that will initiate us into unexpected change, fresh starts, and new challenges, just as the ritual of marriage marks a turning point in our lives, an initiation into an ancient covenant.

Uranus in Taurus featured pixAmidst the blush of cherry blossom and the pristine purity of white-thorn, tradition and ceremony, street parties; amidst the flags strung against blue skies in celebration of the Royal Wedding, the stage is set for a sequence of astrological aspects that herald unexpected events and an opportunity to stretch and bend with changing circumstances in our lives.

Mars, the planet associated with action, with severance, moves into Aquarius, squaring Uranus, on May 16th creating the potential for a destabilising energy that urges us to break apart, to separate from something that may have grown too stuck, too staid, too stultifying. Mercury squares the Nodal axis, symbolising a “fatedness” a sense of “destiny” that’s embedded in the ceremony and tradition that will be enacted on May 19th.

Uranus was last in the sign of Taurus between 1934 and 1941, and these next seven years will have implications for those of us with planets or angles in the late degrees of Cardinal signs and the early degrees of fixed signs. Meghan Markle (North Node, Mercury and Sun in early degrees Leo) and her popular Prince (Pluto at 00 degrees Scorpio and Moon in Taurus) will not be exempt.  Uranus energy feels like an electric current that sizzles uncomfortably and the more we resist the more we may feel we are being electrocuted. As new revelations compel us to marry the polarities in our lives, or cast away the old, and bravely say, “I do”, the symbolism of the Royal Wedding on May 19th invites us all to look beneath the spectacle, to notice the signs and the symbols, to be curious about the road ahead.df12ebdbd4816f8a81b0dd3618f92b9e

For some, there’s something reassuring about ceremony, securely tied like bright bunting, to poles of upright tradition. For a few hours of revelry and wonder, the strains of struggle and uncertainty will be soothed by splendour and spectacle. Even though our lives may continue to continue, we may feel a little differently, a little changed, perhaps, more open, more perceptive and curious about the world we see. On a metaphysical level, the ritual of Marriage is sacred. It’s a rite of passage, through which we metamorphose into a deeper, more soulful self.  It’s an alchemical process though which we have the opportunity to integrate the masculine and the feminine within. Soon, we may  discover that he or she is not the god/goddess we believed they were. Soon we may discover we cannot depend on our partner to make us whole, to love us forever and ever. Author Mignon McLaughlin observes, “a successful marriage requires falling in love many times, always with the same person.”

In the unfolding of our love, we may discover that marriage is a threshold into a mansion of self-discovery. A home-renovation project that takes us to the foundations of our  past. And as we witness this Royal Wedding, something ancient within us all will unfurl like bright bunting, as we raise our glasses to Hope.

white on white 8For astrology readings on Skype or in person, and for information on womens’ workshops, please contact meingrid@trueheartwork.com

 

 

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