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Month of the Three Moons—May 2026

The moon can only fill up once it becomes empty. It can only shine in all its glory once it’s gone through its darkest expression—Carl Jung.

May’s blossoms flutter and fall from the brief embrace of greening branches. As the sun moves through Taurus, spring swoons in the warm exuberance of summer.  Daisies and golden buttercups dance across meadows. A froth of milkwhite cowslip flanks a woodland path. Whether we live in cities made bearable by parks and public gardens, or whether we have our own small patch of earth to tend, nature calls us back home.

The constellation of Taurus rose at the vernal equinox, accompanying nature’s re-birth around 4,000 BCE-1,700 BCE. Over thousands of years, the earth has wobbled, and the Sun has shifted in what is called precession of the equinoxes. Taurus which is not simply a personality trait or a list of keywords. Taurus is a metaphor for beauty, sensuality, and indulgence. Taurus invites us to attune to the slow circles of nature, to be receptive to those things that bring us pleasure and delight.

Encrypted in the sliver fire of the starry skies this month, are three important lunations: On the seasonal cross-quarter day of Mayday, (Beltane in the old religions) a Scorpio full moon, (Beltane, May 1^st )  a perfect time to prune and weed the garden, to place an intention of release and renewal into the soil as you dig in rich organic fertiliser. And on May 31^st, the second “blue moon” of the month blazes brightly through the fire sign of Sagittarius, her upward pull nurturing leafy greens and bright-coloured annuals. The moon empties, and in the darkness of a new Taurus moon on May 16^th  we’re invited to pause, to begin again, with a new sense of clarity as we cherish our belonging in the delicate web of life. Virginia Woolf remembers a moment of new moon grace in a garden in St Ives, “It seemed suddenly plain that the flower itself was a part of the earth, that a ring enclosed what was the flower, and that was the real flower, part earth, part flower.”

Taurus is a fixed sign, some might say stubborn, some might say determined. This new moon might offer an opportunity to graft something new to the rootstock of a belief that might be gnarled with dogma—unable to grow.

Where Taurus is in our birth chart is where we must work the ground, nurture our gifts and talents, attentively manage our resources, cherish those people and things we value. 

The moon is exulted in moist, fertile Taurus. If you have a herb or vegetable garden, this new moon is the best time to plant root vegetables and salad greens and ease back on the weeding. “Everything that slows us down and forces patience, everything that sets us back into the slow circles of nature, is a help. Gardening is an instrument of grace,” writes May Sarton.

This month, on May 8^th, David Attenborough celebrates his 100^th year on planet earth. His moving documentaries have enraptured us. His pioneering work in television has brought the beauty and fragility of nature into our living rooms. The sun was in Taurus when he was born. There is no official record of his birth time – see his birth chart below. The sun conjunct the Lot of Fortune, opposes Saturn Retrograde in Scorpio, signifying his resoluteness, his ability to endure the highs and the lows of filming in locations that were so often dangerous and uncomfortable. Again and again, he has brought our attention the urgency of the climate crisis and the existential threat to all life on earth as the burgeoning human population becomes unsustainable. “We can now destroy or we can cherish. The choice is ours,” he once said.

Transiting Saturn and Neptune have passed over his natal Venus in Aries, (Venus is the ruler of his Taurus sun) as he nears the end of his life.

Another important inflection in the cadence of this month is Pluto’s station Retrograde on May 6^th.

Pluto’s intense, complex energy has been hanging heavy in the collective since its ingress into Aquarius in 2023. Pluto transits deliver obsidian hard truths, strip us of those things, thoughts, habits, relationships, we no longer need. Pluto’s passage across the heavens is ponderous, and this turning point has been building for weeks now (Pluto has been moored at 5° Aquarius since the end of March and will creep slowly backwards, accentuating this area in your birth chart all through this year and next, as something emerges, comes to life again, in your psyche.)  In the darkness of space, Pluto will station direct on October 3^rd. For those of us who have angles or planets in early Aquarius, Taurus, Leo or Scorpio, something might have to “die”, or a hidden truth may be revealed. These Pluto transits cast a long shadow.

As we move through this new era of air and fire (Neptune and Saturn in the fire sign of Aries and Pluto and Uranus in the air signs of Aquarius and Gemini) many of us feel a tension in the collective nervous system, taut and charged with urgency. In response, our own  nervous systems have become dysregulated―stuck in dorsal shutdown―or hypervigilant. Author and yoga teacher, Zabie Yamasaki says, “So much of healing the nervous system is unpacking our relationship to urgency. Sometimes what the nervous system needs is less.”

There are many ways to unpack our relationship to urgency, unplug from the collective current, and turn towards  the simplicity of less. We might take ourselves on an “artist’s date”, allow ourselves to be seduced by beauty when we visit an art gallery. We might let music fill our senses. Wrap our arms around a tree. We might start this new day with a cup of tea or coffee in a beautiful porcelain cup; a fresh flower picked from the garden in a vase on our breakfast table. We might walk bare footed into the garden and sit in silence. Neurologist, Oliver Sacks once said, “in forty years of medical practice, I have found only two types of non-pharmaceutical “therapy” to be vitally important for patients with chronic neurological diseases―music and gardens.”

Cheryl Strayed reminds us, “there’s always a sunrise and always a sunset and it’s up to you to choose to be there for it… put yourself in the way of beauty.”

To book a personal astrology reading, please get in touch: ingrid@trueheartwork.com

Fearless—Sun enters Aries—Spring Equinox—March 20 th

What would you do if you weren’t afraid? Spencer Johnson.

March. Martius. Named after the war-deity, Mars. March was the first month in the Roman calendar. In March, as nature blossomed and food supplies became plentiful, Romans went to war.

Mars was venerated as the founding god of the Roman Empire, father of Romulus and Remus. The might and ruthlessness, the pragmatism of the Roman military machine attests to the importance of Mars.

We may notice Mars energy all around us this month. Survival and procreation are embodied in the natural world as the urgent thrust of spring spills over the land in a cascade of colour and sweet song.

In the language of astrology, Mars represents our instinctual nature, our personal potency, our innate need to fight for our territory.

On March 20^th, the Sun slips into Mars-ruled Aries, marking the spring Equinox, the start of the new astrological year. The quality of light is different now. The sun rises earlier, lingers later now, as the year balances between seasons.

On Thursday, March 19^th  a compassionate Pisces new moon symbolises gentle new beginnings wrapped in the darkness of endings. Capricious Mercury turns direct (8º Pisces) the next day, emerging now as the Magician, not the Trickster. At this turning time of the year, we may still be struggling with an internal war as we face an important choice. This new moon, and Mercury now moving direct, symbolises some kind of resolution. Mars wades through the opaque waters of Pisces now, his ardour swamped by disturbing cross-currents of emotion, his vitality beleaguered by clammy fears. Mars in Pisces is subtle, more Tai Chi than karate, the kneeling warrior who transmutes brute aggression into service for the greater good.

Jupiter also moves direct (from March 11^th), exulted in Cancer, ameliorating perhaps painful or challenging circumstances. Although like all the planetary archetypes, Jupiter is multifaceted, not simplistically a “Greater Benefic”.

In May and June, as Jupiter transits Trump’s painfully vulnerable Saturn/Venus conjunction and makes a Jupiter Return in the (1971) birth chart of Iran, Jupiter’s complexity and mythic erratic bouts of rage and spite will become evident in the euphemistically called theatre of war. If we are waiting for “good luck” with an approaching Jupiter transit, we might be disappointed when lives are not enhanced in any way. Yet as we engage hindsight and insight to unlock meaning of illness, separation and loss, Jupiter’s passage through Cancer may soothe.

Saturn (fear, restriction, contraction) and Neptune (oil, gas, confusion) are still travelling in tandem through fiery Aries. Lethal drones and missiles rupture the skies over the Middle East and Ukraine. Whether we are aware of it or not, we are all bathed in the collective trauma of war. Those caught in the crossfire are mostly women and children. The economic fallout of the US-Israeli assault and Tehran’s retaliation is already impacting the cost of petrol and food prices.

Aries exemplifies the hero/warrior archetype, and its shadow, the bully-destroyer—depicted today by belligerent politicians turned commanders-in-chief. As the bedrock of our civilization shifts and cracks, revealing a new landscape, a new archetype emerges: activist digital warriors, who call for global change—Malala Yousafzai, Elizabeth Wathuti, Amanda Nguyen, Marielle Franco, are speaking out bravely against human ignorance and cruelty.

As the Victorian era ended, a 40 year old woman, armed only with a note book and pen, boarded a train heading for Bloemfontein. She was heading into a warzone.  Emily Hobhouse was born in Cornwall on April 9^th, 1860, as the sun and Mercury Rx moved through Aries making a trine to Saturn in Leo. 

The sun seared across a cloudless sky as she travelled through a devasted landscape of scorched veldt and grotesquely bloated corpses of hamstrung cattle and abandoned farmlands. She had yet to see the starved corpses of children held in the arms of their emaciated mothers. She had yet to be branded a traitor, publicly dismissed by Colonial Secretary, Joseph Chamberlain, who stated that Britian’s empire was not “threatened by a hysterical spinster of mature age.” Yet still, she mustered the bravery contained in the fiery essence of Aries energy to expose war-crimes against women and children. Over 154,000 people, mainly women and children, were interned in British concentration camps during the Second Boer War (1899-1902.)

“I call this camp system a wholesale cruelty…  It can never be wiped out of the memories of the people,” she wrote.

Although a commission corroborated her findings, she was deported from South Africa. No explanation was given. Her humanitarian work was never acknowledged by the British government.

In South Africa, she is the “Angel of Love”. A woman with a notebook who challenged the might of the British military and revealed the true cost of war. Emily’s exalted Mars in Capricorn is the master warrior, tenacious in the face of obstacles.

For most of us, our hero’s or heroine’s quest is not a muscular or spectacularly brave response to the challenges of life. For some of us, an ordinary life, lived with as much consciousness and courage we can muster, is heroic even when things seem so bleak, so hopeless.  For some of us, the taming of our fears, the tempering of our innate human aggression and competitive survival instincts is a work in progress. And even though there are times when it takes every last spark of courage to unearth something positive, anything hopeful, to hold onto, as we turn towards each other in the darkness of this moonless night, Cheryl Strayed offers these words of comfort, “you go on by doing the best you can. You go on by being generous. You go on by being true. You go on by offering comfort to others who can’t go on. You go on by allowing the unbearable days to pass and by allowing the pleasure in other days. You go on by finding a channel for your love and another for your rage”.

To book your astrology reading, please get in touch: ingrid@trueheartwork.com

In memory of Emily Hobhouse, unsung hero, traitor and humanitarian, a woman who waged battle with the British Empire Builders and revealed the true cost of war.

Black Moon—Total Lunar Eclipse—March 3rd

At the epicentre of this month’s sky story, two eclipses cast out their cosmic energy like fishing lines, electrifying the collective nervous system.

On February 17^th, a new moon solar eclipse in Aquarius squared volatile Uranus, as seismic change rocks and rattles our realities. Just three days later, the Saturn/Neptune conjunction in Aries signified the seeding of a new era. Eclipses feature powerfully in the birth charts of the British Royals, and this one fatefully fell within orb of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor’s sun, activating his sun opposite Pluto and the 8^th and 2^nd houses in his birth chart – conjunct the cusp of the 8^th house and the second house Pluto opposition (second house: money, values, self-esteem, personal possessions; eighth house: other peoples’ money, death and rebirth, sex, and at best the recognition that radical change is needed.)  The rush of incoming energy from this eclipse (North Node in Pisces/South Node in Virgo) was shocking and undermining. Pisces is a sign associated with the victim archetype, with release and sacrifice. Virgo attends to the details with thoroughness and attention to detail. Andrew is the first British Royal to be arrested since Charles 1^st nearly 400 years ago. The House of Windsor (an expedient re-branding from the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha prompted by anti-German sentiment during the first world war) has, in true Plutonic fashion, closed ranks, casting disgraced Andrew into the maw of the paparazzi, and the slow grind of the law.

Mercury is now moving Rx (February 26^th-March 20^th) and a powerful Mars squares Uranus—an accelerant that ignites Trump’s Ascendant and his own tumescent Mars in Leo.

Poet, Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer writes in these jagged lines:

Illogic. deploying bombs
to achieve lasting peace—
like planting barbed wire
and expecting to grow
a rose bush.

As violence erupts and things fall apart, this month’s lunar eclipse falls on Saturn Rx in the 1979 chart of Iran. News of the Ayatollah Ali Khameini’s death in an air attack permeates the media. Astrologers tend to use two birth charts for Iran. This one is drawn for the time that Ayatollah Ali Khameini returned to Tehran, February 1^st, 1979, and seems most appropriate given the US-Israeli wave of attacks “in the heart of Tehran.”

The explosive Mars/Uranus aspect becomes muted, more ambiguous, this week as Mars moves into Pisces (March 2^nd) and Venus joins Neptune and Saturn (March 7^th and 8^th.)

On March 3^rd, the delicate light of the full moon in Virgo is obscured by the body of the earth, pulling us towards change, tying us all to a rhythmic cosmic process, directing our attention to where something is complete. Shadows may loom larger during eclipse season; revelations flash into our consciousness. Our dreams are wild or bewildering, our body calls out for deeper healing, our partner’s identity crisis detonates our marriage.

The astrological moon symbolises the soul. Author Thomas Moore, in his book, Care of the Soul, distinguishes between the spirit and the soul. Spirit seeks to rise, to transcend the personal. Soul draws us down, through the portal of the heart, into our emotions and the aquifer of melancholy that so often lies beneath our personas. In our dreams, in our off-guarded imaginings, we may become aware of a sense, a feeling, a life unlived.

Matt Licata writes, so  beautifully, “there is a movement on the path of awakening that does not lead upward at all. It moves downward into the  body, into memory, into what has been waiting.”

This full moon makes an aspect to Jupiter Rx and the Saturn/Neptune conjunction still looms large, emphasising the collective fear, confusion. Our wise bodies respond to  full moons, our instincts, emotions, visceral responses, and this full moon will be super-charged, emphasising the qualities of discerning Virgo and compassionate Pisces. Mercury-ruled Virgo’s domain is our working lives, our routines, the health of our minds and bodies. Pisces domain is poetic, soulful. This is where the aquifer of grief and compassion lie.

Air strikes and bombings continue in Iran and spreads today to Lebanon and beyond. The Sabian symbol for this eclipse (13º Virgo) is chilling: A powerful statesman overcomes a state of political hysteria – disorder takes over when affairs are not controlled with firmness and resolve.

As this full moon eclipse brushes across the imprint of our own birth chart, she accompanies us on our own tender transition as we withdraw from the hard edges of the world and assimilate, metabolise, dream, all we have experienced since the solar eclipse in Aquarius on the new moon.  Nothing is immutable in this dynamically changing world. All around us there is change and movement even though we may feel stuck or trapped in a situation right now. “Life is simple,” writes Bryon Katie pragmatically. “Everything happens at the exactly the right moment, neither too soon nor too late. You don’t have to like it. It’s just easier if you do.”

For a personal astrology consultation, please get in touch: ingrid@trueheartwork.com

Source for this horoscope for Iran, grateful thanks to The Book of World Horoscopes, Nicholas Campion, 1995.

Fire and Air— Astrology of 2026.

Learning compassion, understanding love, and experiencing joy. That’s our purpose, our reason for being here. That’s our true mission on this planet—Melody Beattie.

January is Capricorn’s month. As we pack away sparkling decorations and prepare to cross the threshold into this next year, we may feel the austere pragmatic presence of Saturn, Capricorn’s ruling planet; we may sense the archaic presence of Janus, the two-headed god as we glance backwards and remember the highlights and the lowlights of 2025. As we imagine the blank slate of this year yet to be, a tide of cosmic changes gathers to scatter star dust over all humankind.

At the start of the calendar year, we may be looking ahead, yet the mood this month is introspective, sluggish, even as many of us may be feeling low in mood or energy. Mercury ushers in this New Year, crossing into the pragmatic sign of Capricorn as we focus on what feels solid and sure enough for us to carry into this new year. Chiron turns direct (22º Aries) on January 2^nd as we attend to our physical and mental health. Depending on where this degree point sits in your own birth chart, this could be time to hold a tender curiosity for what still needs to be healed, what needs our attention and compassion, what we need to support us in our healing journey.

A full moon in Cancer conjunct Jupiter (13º Cancer) on Saturday, January 3^rd, may stir deep feelings, illuminate unresolved, self-limiting beliefs that might have their roots in our family of origin.  A new moon in Capricorn on January 18^th, aligns with Mercury, Venus, Mars, and Pluto; and opposes Jupiter as we focus on our professional lives or a material goal. This month, we might sense what feels sustainable, what supports our journey as we hold a soft curiosity for the beauty and grace that is all around us.  For many, energy levels may still be low. Jupiter is still moving backwards in Cancer and will turn direct in March; Saturn and Neptune are both lingering painfully in the final degree of Pisces, as we move through a time of sorrow, a time of physical or emotional exhaustion or despair, if our own birth chart is activated by these slow-moving planets. Erratic Uranus moves sluggishly, Retrograde, as we might question how tightly we hold onto what might feel safe and secure, whether this safety and security, predictability or routine really serves us. We might be redefining our relationships, our way of working, our personal happiness as Uranus moves direct on February 4^th.

At the start of this new year, we will need to devote time and focus to what is quietly forming, we will need to ready ourselves to adapt to unprecedented change and transformation, both personally and collectively. Take it slow. The pace will quicken in the summer.

2026 is billed as the Chinese year of the fire horse, a year that brings rapid change, innovation, and opportunity, and “luck.”

We’re entering a new astrological cycle of fire and air, two elements that may swirl through the collective psyche in a heated rush that may scald and burn, or propel us to cherish the moments, all of them, the highs and the lows and not speak too glibly of “trans-formation” as these great cosmic cycles within cycles and spirals swirl. David Whyte once said, “transformation is to hit current reality at high velocity and energy and watch it break apart into a million tiny pieces at impact.”

This year we will be offered a new dimension of meaning and new possibilities. We may confront experiences that alter our consciousness, or reconnect with issues that we didn’t manage to deal with the last time this cycle was seeded. The tempo is fast, the tone is loud, so stay focused on what we wish to bring into our lives—our health, our relationships, our work, or simply finding peace and contentment in a world where everything seems to be moving so fast. Practice discernment this year. Don’t scrape AI “facts” off the internet and repeat superficialities. This year, the images we consume on social media, the thoughts we think, the beliefs we digest, will be as important as the food we eat. Take time to pause amidst the busyness of life. To dare to be still and present with what is.

Both Saturn and Neptune move into fiery Aries in January and conjoin in February, Uranus enters airy Gemini in April, and Jupiter enters fiery Leo in June. As the outer planets change signs, they reflect the emergence of archetypal patters in the collective psyche coinciding with major world events.

Marion Woodman reminds us, “there’s no sense talking about ‘being true to yourself’ until you are sure what voice you are being true to. It takes hard work to differentiate the voices of the unconscious.”

2026 brings four eclipses: an annular solar eclipse in Aquarius on February 17^th, a total lunar eclipse in Virgo on March 3^rd, a total solar eclipse in Leo on August 12^th, and a partial lunar eclipse in Pisces on August 28^th. The Nodes of Destiny enter Aquarius and Leo on July 26^th.

Mercury turns Retrograde in the three water signs (Pisces, Cancer, and Scorpio) from February-March in Pisces, June-July in Cancer, and October- November in Scorpio, adding more steam to the heat, but also offering us time to reflect, to pause, to retrace our steps.

Venus is Retrograde between October 3^rd and November 13^th, moving between introspective Scorpio and relational Libra as we balance the delicate art of relating to others with our own needs. Mars slows throughout December, turning Retrograde on January 10^th, 2027.

Already the days are growing longer. Primroses on the riverbanks turn their delicate yellow faces to the sun as we begin to resume the routines and rituals that ground us in our ordinary lives. As winter’s frosty grip softens, our earth-born bodies respond to the light, new dreams seed themselves in our imagination. Silently, irrevocably, the great cycles of birth, life, death, and regeneration are at work.

Our birth charts respond to the cycles of our bodies and souls, and what we have lived in the years gone by is still present within us, the joy, and the sadness, the resilience and the strength we have accumulated, the courage that has brought us here to the threshold of this new year, the love that is all around us. There will be highs and lows this new year. Cherish them all. Look for what is right in the world around us. Practice, daily, kindness and generosity. Be brave. Honour the ending as this year draws to a close…

“General opinion’s starting to make out that we live in a world of hatred and greed, but I don’t see that. It seems to me that love is everywhere. Often, it’s not particularly dignified or newsworthy, but it’s always there – fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, husbands and wives, boyfriends, girlfriends, old friends. When the planes hit the Twin Towers, as far as I know, none of the phone calls from the people on board were messages of hate or revenge – they were all messages of love. If you look for it, I’ve got a sneaky feeling you’ll find that love, actually, is all around. ” Love Actually.

Wishing you all love-filled new year.  Let the journey unfold.

For personal astrology readings please get in touch: ingrid@trueheartwork.com

Resolute—Sun Enters Scorpio—23rd October.

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

In October, leaves of gold turn to mulch. Shimmering spiderwebs sparkle in coppery hedgerows. The sunlit days, charged with beauty, are more precious now as the light begins to dim.

October is when we turn towards the quiet darkness of winter. This is the season of dying things, a time of shadows. The season of Scorpio brings two powerful forces into sharp focus: life and death. This is a liminal time, halfway between the autumn equinox and the winter solstice. A time when we may notice an unsettling shift in the seasons. A time when melancholy wraps itself around the wan light of the dying year and ghoulish costumes create a safe diversion from our squeamishness about death. This is the month when the dead come calling—Día de los Muertos, Day of the Dead with roots that twist down through the centuries to Aztec death rites.

Hallowe’en, loud and gaudy, prickling with single-use plastic, was once Allhallowtide, a time in the liturgical year that was dedicated to the departed, before that, the Celtic festival of Samhain.

Soft-bred pumpkins grimace with menacing faces; bonfires consume summer’s fruitfulness, light-hearted tricks and sugary treats sweeten the older tradition of guising (disguising ourselves from sinister wandering spirits) while ruby-red toffee apples symbolise the potent symbol of the pentagram that lives in secret within every store-bought apple; incantations against the supernatural, rituals for protection against the descent into the dark of the year.

As the sun moves through the sign of the scorpion this month, we may become acutely aware that our time here is finite, as we ask ourselves, “what is really important to me?”

It was the serpent, not the scorpion, that ancient Hebrew and Egyptian astrologers associated with the qualities of the modern archetype of Scorpio. Snakes, in ancient times, were associated with wisdom, prophecy, and healing as well as destruction. The cyclical shedding of the snake’s skin was thought to be symbolic of renewal and immortality. In modern times, Scorpio is associated with the far-sighted eagle that soars high above the mayhem. The mythical Phoenix that soared from flames and ashes. Now, as the sun moves through Scorpio, we may be letting something or someone go, rebuilding, starting anew.

When confrontational Mars and communicative Mercury, both personal planets, meet in the still waters of Scorpio this month, they can deliver a nasty bite that wounds. Power struggles, Machiavellian betrayals, buried truths emerge. Snakes and scorpions move easily through the darkness.

On the world stage, Mars/Mercury themes have played out in the truce violations in Gaza and the unspeakable horrors of torture, executions that continue to ravage any hope of peace. As Mars and Mercury move through Scorpio, a sign connected simplistically with the regenerative act sex, comes the unsurprising revelation that Prince Andrew hired internet “trolls” to harass Virginia Giuffre, the courageous advocate for justice for the survivors of sex trafficking, who committed suicide in April this year. As new sordid allegations emerge, Prince Andrew is stripped of his royal titles, just as transiting Mars and Mercury travel in tandem across his secretive Scorpio moon, and Saturn (law, responsibility, accountability) conjoins his fated south node (the past, karma) and Chiron lingers over his Midheaven (reputation and status). It is unlikely that he has willingly and generously given up his prestigious titles. This decision has been made to bolster the power and reputation of the Royal Family brand. Prince Andrew continues to resolutely deny his part in the abuse and sexual assault of Virginia Giuffre.

Cosmic static begins this month as  Mercury has entered its Retrograde shadow (misunderstandings, travel delays, technology glitches all start creeping in—notably the major website outage experienced globally on Monday, October 20^th)  and will station Retrograde in fiery Sagittarius on November 9^th, finally moving direct in watery Scorpio on November 29^th. With Mercury moving Retrograde in Scorpio, we may feel a strong desire to withdraw from the world. Our dreams may be intensely disturbing or revealing. This is a cosmic nudge to slow down, focus, pay attention, repair, heal, before moving forward. Fact-check what you post online before you send it, resolve an old argument with a loved one, attend to the tedious admin, read the fine print before signing a document.

Scorpio carries enormous power, for good or ill. The deadly sting or painful bite may self-inflicted.

“Just as splinters can get embedded in our body, old emotions and beliefs can act like toxins and become embedded in us too. We may have picked up residue along the way, beliefs we didn’t consciously choose, feelings we weren’t safe enough to feel, toxins from the world around us”  Melody Beattie writes. “What hurts? What are you remembering? Who has come back into your life? Sometimes the process will sting just a bit when you pull out the splinter, or the process of releasing old toxins can be as gentle and natural as the way a flower or tree grows with sunshine and rain.”

Scorpio is associated with the element of water, so tune into what flows and what feels frozen and immovable in your life. Pay attention to what rises to the surface now, what is worth holding onto, and what must be allowed to die.

Swedish archaeologist Cornelius Holtorf observes, in a field of work where preservation is so valued, that accepting loss and change can be important in fostering resilience. Holtorf believes that seeing things fall apart may help us recognise that life is not static. He warns that we can all be drawn into the swamplands of melancholy, rabid nationalism, fanaticism, ghoulish witch hunts, in the name of keeping things “as they were”.

As we prepare for the coming of winter, the sky-story carries a message of hope and regeneration through its association with the snake that sheds its skin, the mythical phoenix that rises from dust and ashes, and the all-seeing eagle that soars above the beauty and the suffering. Let’s enter this Scorpio season of change with the willingness to trust the process of shedding, embrace the sorrow of  loss. Let’s turn towards life with grateful hearts.

To schedule a virtual astrology reading, please email: ingrid@trueheartwork.com

Season of Eclipses—September 2025.

Hope has holes in its pockets. It leaves little crumb trails so that we, when anxious, can follow it. Hope’s secret: it doesn’t know the destination–it knows only that all roads begin with one foot in front of the other—Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer.

All too soon, leaves of crimson and gold flutter and fall.

As the seasons turn, September arrives accompanied by two eclipses that rhyme with the changes in our lives.  We may be moving through our own season of metamorphosis as summer ends. Change, even change that is longed for, unstitches us from all we know, unravels those things that offer familiar comfort. A beloved child leaves home, a relationship strips us of our innocence, a retrenchment escorts us to a crossroads of choice.

On September 7^th, a super-charged full moon daubs her silver light across our earth. As the moon slips between the earth and the sun, she blocks the sun’s light and energy, a temporary power outage, a cosmic punctuation point that marks an ending and an in-between space for a new beginning. Full moon eclipses catapult us from those soft places of comfort. Like an escape room experience, we must find our way in the darkness for a while, and then quite suddenly, something is revealed.

Eclipses often accompany resolute shifts in consciousness, changes of heart. Relationships are illuminated at full moon times and more intensely at full moon eclipses. We may realise our own role in a power struggle or misunderstanding. Quite suddenly, the grace of a  gentle compassion settles. We forgive ourselves and the one who has bruised our heart.

During these next few days as the eclipse energy builds, and we attune to this powerful cosmic energy, we may find ourselves assimilating what we have taken in during the hopeful days of spring, and the sun-saturated days of summer. This lunation gifts us with a serving of practical Virgoan self sufficiency as we realise we are much stronger than we think.

This eclipse carries the poignancy of endings, the hopeful promise of fresh starts. As life coach, Martha Beck, writes so beautifully in her book, Steering by Starlight, “no matter how many years have been stolen from you by your own ignorance, by cruel fate, or by the acts of others, you have a clean, broad slate before you. In this instant—this one now—you can begin steering by starlight, and if you do, the rest of creation will conspire to guide, teach, and help you.”

If this eclipse sensitises your natal moon, a house move, a birth in the family, or a situation pertaining to a woman will be emphasised. The moon in our birth chart is delegated to our most intimate, private life, our security, as well as our popular appeal if we are a public figure. Eclipses begin a cosmic process that take time to ripen. Some astrologers suggest that the effect of an eclipse to a personal planet may linger for up to three and a half years. In 2001, before the insider trading scandal broke in 2003, an eclipse fell on the moon of the ultimate Homemaker, Martha Stewart. Her public popularity was about to be eclipsed.

Another note to the cosmic symphony in this season of change is Saturn’s Retrograde into Pisces on September 1^st. One final pass, one last opportunity to lay to rest what we experienced between March 2023 and May 2025 when Saturn moved through this soulful sign.

On September 6^th, Uranus makes its first station in Gemini, a precursor to what will unfold for the world and for us personally,  until 2033.

Birth charts with placements in early degrees of Pisces, Gemini, Virgo, or Sagittarius will encounter this unpredictable Uranian energy that accompanies change, sudden awakenings, shocking revelations. There will be opportunities to open our hearts wider. Take those small resolute steps into unchartered territory.

Just days before the autumn Equinox on September 21^st, a Partial Solar Eclipse at the final degree of Virgo offers a powerful opportunity for inner house keeping. Now is the time for clearing, healing and repair. This new moon eclipse opposes cautious Saturn, now backtracking through Pisces for one last time: a cosmic intruction to clear the decks, prepare for change, to begin anew. Even as the sly rogue thought lands with a reproachful “what’s the point?” Virgo energy supports us as we clear our thoughts, declutter our homes, tidy our desks. In this clear bright space, something new is possible. All roads begin with putting one foot in front of another.

And suddenly you know: It’s time to start something new and trust the magic of beginnings. Meister Eckhart.

To book an astrology consultation, please get in touch: ingrid@trueheartwork.com

Rewind—Mercury Retrograde—July 18th-August 11th.

There is always a risk in increasing your awareness. You risk seeing things you might rather not notice. You risk feelings you might rather avoid. You risk having to change what you think and worse—having to change what you do. Betty Martin.

July’s green days stretch drowsily into the endless arc of a china-blue sky. School’s out here in the North. Families flock to golden beaches, children make hearts and angels in the sand. Stunned by the glut of sunlight, hordes of visitors amble slowly along promenades, slump in deck chairs, grateful for any distraction from the ache of the world.

 A brave new moon in Leo on July 24^th accompanies Mercury Retrograde passage in Leo. This lunation accents the powerful emotions we cradle in our hearts; what we love, and the anticipatory clench of what we fear. Leo rules the heart in medical astrology, so clasped within the darkness of this new moon lie heart-directed choices, opportunities to begin again. Pluto (irrevocable endings), opposes this lunation, adding a charge of potency to what we initiate this week as every bright promise of a beginning requires a little death.

Pluto demands honest soul searching. If you have planets or angles in early degrees Taurus, Leo, Scorpio or Aquarius, you will be unable to avoid having to change course, you will be compelled to increase your awareness. Change will be an evolutionary imperative. And for us all, this is a year of life-changing ingresses―Pluto in Aquarius, Jupiter in Cancer, Neptune and Saturn now moving in tandem through Aries―an uncomfortable medley of distinctly different energies  swirling through the collective and impacting on our own lives in some way.

Disruptive, inventive Uranus entered changeable Gemini on July 7^th agitating the frequency around us all, ushering sudden change and chaos to societies, as borders and boundaries are shattered. As our children play in the sunshine, our thoughts may turn to the children who endure the unspeakable terror of war.

Uranus is associated with innovation, civil unrest, revolution, and those shocking “wake up calls” that jolt us from our complacency. Uranus will hurtle through the sign of Gemini over the next eight years, accompanied by an unprecedented acceleration of technical momentum as AI appropriates our autonomy, requisitions our work, presses—unbidden—into our awareness.

This week, as Mercury (intellect, nervous system, transport, and communication) backtracks through Leo, the Trump administration signs executive orders to take the guard rails off AI, dismantling safeguards and standards that will protect us from hate speak and othering. The “Build Baby Build” also plan dismantles environmental and land use regulations to bolster the vast AI infrastructure, and the energy needed to power it.

Dharna Noor sounds the alarm in an article in The Guardian, “the AI sector is already depleting land and water rescources and taking a massive toll on climate, with AI-powered large language models such as ChatGPT taking up to 10 times more energy than a regular Google search, according to an estimate by the Electric Power Research Institute.” Good news for the Billionaire Tech Bros. An accelerant for global warming.

We know that when fear curls tightly in our nervous system it hooks us in anticipation of what lies ahead. When we feel the awful squeeze of fear, we become self-centred, we lose our capacity for caring and empathy. We are locked in developmental arrest.

They’re calling it the age of anxiety, says Kristen Lee, author of Worth the Risk: how to micro-dose bravery and grow resilience. Yet, amidst the overwhelming pain and chaos of it all, we may be moved to do something noble, gracious, kind today.

As the sun shines brightly and our children make sand angels on the beach, we may be reminded of what Mark Twain famously said: The worse things in my life never actually happened.

Mercury Rx periods so often bring to our awareness those thoughts that are entryways into a state of fear. We may linger in the past, fret about the future.

Spiritual teachers ask that we bring our fear to our awareness and tend to it like a timid wild creature. The shamans say that when we name a fear, it loses its power over us. Science corroborates this. We activate the pre-frontal cortex, calm the limbic system, when we can gently name and turn towards our fear.

The vibratory signature of this regenerative New Moon may light the way, even if dimly at first, to a flowering of purpose, a deeper way of listening, a different way of seeing, an outward rush of a life force that floods through us even in the darkness. “Despair is our chance to wrestle with fire and come through,” writes Christina Baldwin.

Today, let’s risk seeing things we might rather not notice. Bring to our awareness those feelings we would much rather avoid. Practice wishful thinking.

Please get in touch if you would like a personal astrology reading: ingrid@trueheartwork.com