The Capricorn New Moon was a time to plant the seed of personal destiny—what public role can we take on that expresses our personal values and interests?  What do we have to contribute to our culture, our community and our world?  The sign of Capricorn sets up the collective structures that serve our needs.  The energy of Capricorn sets up the rules by which we decide how to live our lives.  Capricorn is the cardinal Earth sign, the Earth sign that wants to create movement and change within society.  Since Pluto went into Capricorn in late 2008, we’ve discovered that there’s quite a bit of corruption and decay in our society that needs our attention—not only the government’s attention, but every citizen’s attention.  If we want to be free, we have a responsibility to do something about it.  We have to become aware and responsible citizens.

            After a New Moon, the Sun and Moon begin to separate.  The Sun continues its journey through the sign it occupies, while the Moon sets off on a journey through other signs as its light grows until it stands opposite the Sun at the next full Moon.  As it travels, the Moon connects to the other planets and distributes their energy for our use to fulfill the promise of the New Moon seed.  The first planet the Moon contacted after the Capricorn New Moon was Uranus in Aries, reminding us that our freedom is up to us.  That contact sets the tone for the Moon’s growth.  Its message: Grow into your true identity.  Throughout these last two weeks, the Moon made contact with all the planets, bringing all parts of our cosmic instructions into play.   

            And during the waxing of the Moon from new to full, some of the other planets have been making connections.  The results of these interactions are picked up by the Moon as she sails by.  Venus, the planet of Love, connection, Wisdom and wholeness came into contact with 3 big astrological hitters. Venus and Uranus created some interesting fun moments, reminding us that innovation comes from the imagination and just being ourselves.  Then Venus joined with Pluto, bringing us face to face with our deepest desires and obsessions.  Hopefully, this conjunction gave us the insights we need to heal our old emotional wounds and get on with life.  Soon after that, Venus connected with Saturn, giving us the grounding we need to proceed with our plans.   Did you experience an awakening, a transformation and a renewal of your love energy these past two weeks? 

Venus is a big player in the Cosmic Story now.  Ever since her journey across the face of the Sun last June, we have been more aware of women’s issues than ever before.  My new book, Wisdom’s Daughters: How Women Can Change the World, explores how to access Wisdom as well as how we can reclaim our connection to Aphrodite/Venus, the goddess energy of feminine Wisdom.  Venus rules the heart chakra of love, connection and wisdom.  Venus transiting the face of the Sun gave us a visual of the new solar paradigm: the energy of Love and Wisdom is central to Life. With these important planetary connections coming after the Capricorn New Moon, the cosmos is instructing us to make space for women and feminine consciousness in policy making. 

Continue at: Wisdom of Astrology

Let My Country Awake

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high;
Where knowledge is free;
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls;
Where words come out from the depth of truth;
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection:
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the dreary desert sand of dead habit;
Where the mind is lead forward by thee into ever-widening thought and action -
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.

~ Rabindranath Tagore ~

            I missed writing the Cosmic Story for the Cancer Full Moon on December 28, 2012 because I was busy playing with my 10-month-old nephew.  Very appropriate for the Cancer Full Moon!  I remembered what it was like to be the mom of a newly incarnated soul.  It was delightful and oh so much fun!  So before I discuss this week’s Capricorn New Moon, I’d like to go back to the Cancer Full Moon for a moment.  

           Cancer is the Moon-ruled sign that sets the tone of our emotional intelligence.  Although there are twelve different Moon-signs, they all relate back to the Cancer archetype of the watery Mother Womb, the place where we grow our emotional bodies.  Capricorn, the Saturn-ruled sign that builds societies and all their various institutions, is supposed to be the material receptacle that creates a world in harmony with that all-important emotional body—the soul.

            Unfortunately, our patriarchal society does just the opposite.  The patriarchal Capricorn rules shape our emotional bodies to its ongoing drive for power, wealth and control, rejecting the notion of soul and its needs.  Perhaps that’s why our society is so dysfunctional—nobody is happy with it.  But now that Pluto is moving through Capricorn and finally pulling down the rotten structures and exposing the decay, perhaps we can free up our emotional bodies so that we connect to our soul’s real emotions and thoughts.  That’s the secret to changing society: we need to feel what we want out of life (and our society as the collective manifestation of life) and create institutions that support more balanced types of work, real equality between the sexes, closer communities, more in-depth relationships and more fulfilling avenues for personal expression that fit the adult expectations of freedom and creativity, and most importantly, love.

            With this in mind, this Capricorn New Moon gives us a chance to plant the seeds of a new vision for our society, one that definitely embraces a more feminine viewpoint.  We are going to be in the energy of the Pluto in Capricorn/ Uranus in Aries square for the next few years, so it’s not going to happen overnight, but each time we plant a new seed of change, vision and hope in our own lives, we become responsible for sharing it with our world.  And that change ripples out into our environment.

Continue the Capricorn New Moon at:Wisdom-of-Astrology

          Eclipses occur because the planes of the Earth, Moon and Sun come together at two nodal points in space.  We call these points lunar nodes and they stand opposite each other.   A double triple crossroads, if you will, between different states of being or different dimensions of reality.  Since triple crossroads mark fateful forks in the life’s journey, eclipses mark points where choices make a difference. 

Over time, these two lunar nodes move backwards through the zodiac and constellations.   Astrology holds that the North Node points to the future, while the South Node points to the past.  The choice offered is, do we move forward into the future or continue to cling to the past?    

From March 2011 to September 2012 the lunar nodes were in Sagittarius (North) and Gemini (South).  The cosmic lesson entailed transforming the Mind: from a too narrow mindset to a larger, expansive Truth, from old prejudices to more inclusiveness, from old stories about how the world works to new stories about our place in the Earth’s ecology.  At this last eclipse in the series, we get to see how far we’ve come in our personal task of transforming our mind.

With Sagittarius, the search for Truth and Cosmic Law is paramount. In Gemini, all the myriad facts of life fascinate the mind, which wants to put them all into categories to better remember them.   Gemini believes that all knowledge is worth having, even if it doesn’t move us toward the truth of the matter.  That’s why people can manipulate facts to suit their needs.   Sagittarius moves beyond knowledge to gnosis, believing that the experience of knowledge leads to the discovery of Truth. 

This lunar eclipse offers us a chance to look at our old beliefs, old paradigms and old inner stories and see how small they’ve become for who we are now.   This eclipse can mark an end to indecision, since Gemini can be the most indecisive sign of the zodiac because everything is so interesting.   Once the Gemini Moon offers us a glimpse of what our old thought patterns hold onto, the Sagittarius Sun can forge our intention to find our inner Truth. 

Continued at:  Wisdom-of-Astrology

The Cosmic Story: Scorpio Solar Eclipse 2012

Cahron & Psyche: John Roddam Spencer Stanhope 

        Next Tuesday’s Scorpio New Moon is a solar eclipse, marking an ending and a new beginning for us all.  As you may have noticed, cosmic law dictates that we renew ourselves at different times, for change is the only constant in our marvelous Universe.  We renew ourselves each month at the new Moon and we also renew ourselves yearly at the 15*Scorpio power gate around Samhain or All Hallows’ Eve.  This is the time to let go of those things, projects, hopes and even people that no longer serve our life’s purpose.  We have to learn to die, to clear a space within us, so new life can come to us again next Spring.

          Scorpio’s power lies in the depth and strength of our feeling life.  Scorpios are known for their intense feelings.  This makes sense since Scorpio is a fixed water sign, meaning that there is a concentration of feeling energy that can become very stuck, thereby intensifying them. These stuck feelings turn into the dark, mucky water of stagnant repressed feelings. These dark feelings are often taboo in our society – rage, cruelty, twisted eroticism, revenge as well as our feelings of loss, betrayal, abandonment and sorrow.  That’s the Scorpio struggle – what do I do with these dark, un-digested feelings?    

This Scorpio solar eclipse can help us transform these energies; during a solar eclipse, the Sun’s energy flow is blocked, disrupting Earth’s energy field, breaking up old patterns within the Collective Unconscious.  Then it becomes our responsibility to incorporate this new energy pattern.  Each astrological sign holds the pattern of a different destiny, and so solar eclipses mark a time for a collective initiation to transform that particular pattern.  A solar eclipse in Scorpio can help us transform all our pent-up anger and despair over the state of the world into the determination to create positive change in our societies.    

All of us have some Scorpio issues to deal with, made evident in the house Scorpio occupies in your natal chart.  Scorpio’s initiation asks us to let go of those feelings that keep inflicting pain on ourselves and on others; those emotional wounds that keep us from intimacy with another; and those often unconscious beliefs that keep us chained to the past. 

Continued at: Wisdom of Astrology

The Cosmic Story: Taurus Full Moon 2012 

        This week’s Taurus Full Moon confronts us with the awareness of the cycles of life.  The sign of Taurus opens us to the beauty of Spring and initiates the beginning of the summer season in the northern hemisphere - the Celtic festival of Beltane on May 1^st is the beginning of summer.  The sign of Scorpio initiates the beginning of our winter season, with Samhain or Halloween marking the part of the cycle that honors death and winter.

         With this full Moon so close to All Hallows Eve, the veils between the worlds will be very thin.  Remember your ancestors and those beloveds who have passed beyond the veils this year.  Remember, honor, and recognize what values and talents they lived by.  Somewhere within you, you have those same traits.  What have you done with them?  Will you honor the departed by tending those inherited values and talents to share with the world?

        Taurus, a fixed earth sign, and Scorpio, a fixed water sign, are probably the two most stubborn signs of the zodiac.  It’s so easy to get stuck in our routines (Taurus) as well as in our feelings (Scorpio).  But each year, we get a chance to change all that.  With the Taurus Full Moon we become aware of what no longer serves life and we get a chance to transform old stuck energy and feelings and release them.  Leaving us open to new growth and energy once we go through the ‘letting go’ of the death cycle.

        Taurus’ journey is one of personal values.  Souls incarnate in Taurus to learn what is worth building into life, which can only be discovered when we understand our core values, our self-worth and our attitude toward money, security and the sensual pleasures of life.

        Scorpio’s journey is to discover where we share values with others.  In past lives, the Scorpio part of us has dealt with dark and hurtful experiences and comes into this lifetime with those stuck feelings unconsciously controlling how we relate to others.  Will we be betrayed again?  Hurt, rejected, terrorized?  Just as Taurus arrives with the Spring, bringing us hope of life, Scorpio looks at what he has experienced in that life and confronts us with our fears about relating to others.  This full Moon can help us understand that all these emotional wounds are really learning experiences that, once named and understood, can be released so we can move on to deeper intimacy. 

Continued at: Wisdom of Astrology

The Cosmic Story: Virgo New Moon, September 15-16, 2012:

Healing, Service and Our Authentic Talents

This above all – to thine own Self be true.

And it must follow, as the night the day

Thou canst not then be false to any man.

Hamlet, William Shakespeare

This month’s new Moon in Virgo initiates another few weeks of intense change.  So ready or not, here it comes! 

On September 17^th, Pluto turns to direct motion, intensifying its transformative energy.  Pluto, the planet of evolution, retrograde since April 10^th, is now ready to continue transforming our lives and our world.   Then on September 19^th, Pluto forms its second square to Uranus, marking another turning point in our collective evolution out of patriarchy and into true citizenship and grown-up responsibility.

This Virgo new Moon is a perfect time to check in with yourself to see how far you’ve come in your journey of self-knowledge and self-actualization.    

Virgo’s lessons and initiation involved alchemy, the union of opposing energies and the transformation of those energies through self-knowledge into a new sense of wholeness and Self-consciousness.   Virgo is the sign where we work to perfect ourselves, not by being perfect but by coming to understand how we see ourselves, what we value, how we process life, what our emotional body feels like and where our creative impulse lies. We weave ourselves together in Virgo, discerning what is us and what is not us.

Virgo is ‘ruled’ or inspired by Mercury as the healing energy of the Mind.  In Virgo, a more grounded Mercury than in Gemini, known variously as Hermes Trismegisthus, the EgyptianThoth, the alchemical Mercurius.  His virtues are ‘patience, purification and perfection, great technique, mastery and humility.’¹ Virgo works hard at perfecting her craft, in humble service to the work itself.  To do this, Virgo must balance her body, mind and spirit.  Earthy Virgo wants to make sure the body is given its due or else it becomes unhealthy.  And we need a healthy body now, because change is hard work, especially on the nervous system.

Continued at: Wisdom of Astrology

It is by going down into the abyss that we recover the treasures of life. Where you stumble, there lies your treasure.
Follow your bliss and the universe will open doors where there were only walls.

Joseph Campbell

      This week’s Pisces full Moon mixes the watery energies of the collective unconscious with our Virgo (Sun) self-knowledge.  Coming after the Leo new Moon, this full moon energy can make us aware of how committed we are to ‘following our bliss’ as well as how our bliss can serve our collective needs.  Don’t forget, we are (and will continue to be for many years) in the energetic vortex of the Uranus in Aries square to Pluto in Capricorn.  The patriarchy is dying, but it’s not ‘going gently into the night’.  The Cosmic Story is telling us that it’s up to each of us to first let our allegiance to patriarchy die within us.  When we step outside our patriarchal conditioning, we begin the quest for our bliss, our Holy Grail; we step into an unknown future.  We create it.  And if you’re reading this, you’re one of the people committed to creating a new world.   

      On August 16^th, we celebrated the 25^th anniversary of the Harmonic Convergence of August 16, 1987, which was my first awakening to the significance of 2012.  At the time, the 25-year time-frame seemed far away, but suddenly, here we are.  2012: a time of endings and beginnings.  The inner work we’ve done to become more self-aware these past 25 years wants to bear fruit now.  2012 doesn’t signify the literal end of the world.  It signifies an inner shift, the death of our patriarchal conditioning as well as a soul-healing that redeems our karmic debt.  It’s time to accept the experiences that shaped us, and see them as lessons we had to confront on our self-chosen Hero/ine’s Journey.  What have we learned???  Now let go of the past.  We have befriended our dragons, haven’t we?  It’s time to bring back the treasure and the story to our sisters and brothers so they can begin their own journeys.     

      Pisces is the last sign of the zodiac, the sign that symbolizes a return to Source, the collective unconscious.  If you know a Pisces, you understand that this is not as wildly exciting as it sounds!  These collective energies can reinvigorate us or they can dissolve our sense of self.  Creation and destruction are the foundational laws of our universe.  We have to be prepared to encounter either or both states when we enter Pisces’ watery realms.  The best way to navigate the energies of a Pisces Moon is to understand that feelings want to move like water, so remember all the different ways that water and emotions move: a river’s swift current, the power of ocean waves, the force of a waterfall, the calm stillness of a breezeless day, or the mysterious depths of a natural spring.  Observe your feelings; see how your emotional state flows or is blocked during the full Moon. 

      Then ask yourself – if I’m feeling this way, how is everyone else doing?  With the Moon in Pisces, we are part of the experience of the collective’s feelings.  If some of us know how to navigate these waters and channel them within ourselves, we can affect the whole emotional temperature of our times.  This is so important since I keep hearing that the West is set to go to war again.  Do we really want WWIII?  This is our moment to re-channel the collective unconscious towards peaceful, transformative healing archetypal energies, energies we must be willing to embody and manifest in the world.  

Continued at: Wisdom of Astrology

The Cosmic Story:  Cancer New Moon, July 19, 2012: Values to Live By

Love the earth and sun and the animals,
despise riches, give alms to everyone that asks,
stand up for the stupid and crazy,
devote your income and labor to others,
hate tyrants, argue not concerning God,
have patience and indulgence toward the people,
take off your hat to nothing known or unknown,
or to any man or number of men,
go freely with powerful uneducated persons,
and with the young, and with the mothers or families,
re-examine all you have been told in school or church or in any book,
and dismiss whatever insults your own soul;
and your very flesh shall be a great poem....

Preface to Leaves of Grass (excerpt) -- Walt Whitman

The Sign of Cancer

The zodiac sign of Cancer is the Cosmic Womb, Mother of all, the place of gestation and inner growth.  The constellation of Cancer is a nursery of galaxies. The creativity of Cancer is not limited to physical birth, however; the seeds Cancer gestates are creative seeds, the forms diverse and individual.  Cancer is associated with the waters of life, and its creativity lies in all aspects of life – biological, artistic, imaginative, practical, and mystical.  Cancer is our creative matrix: Cancer contains the powers of creation and destruction, life and death. 

The power of Cancer lies in the Moon, in its ability to give form and shape to the seeds of life.  While the Sun symbolizes Consciousness, the Moon symbolizes the Unconscious, both our unconscious behavior patterns as well as the magical cauldron of the Collective Unconscious.  The Moon’s light comes and goes, imaging the lunar consciousness of Feminine Spirit’s mystery and potential.  The Moon’s energy is related to our emotions, our intuitions and our need to nurture.  Like the tenacious Crab (watch out for her claws!), which is the symbol for Cancer, we tend to form strong emotional attachments to the things we create.  

Cancer can give rise to positive mother-love, the much-needed bond a child or a project needs to thrive; giving support to the child’s development, talents and goals.   But like the playful, shifting moonlight, pure light can turn to darkness if we hold on too long.  The mother needs to let go at the right time for her child to mature, or the child gets stuck in the negative Mother complex – the dark, devouring Mother who is never satisfied.  The Moon teaches us the rhythms of attachment and release, of ebb and flow.  The waters of the Earth, and of our bodies, dance to the rhythm of the Moon.

Continue at: Wisdom of Astrology

Well, this next week we can definitely say, the 60s are BACK! 

The first of 7 squares between revolutionary Uranus and transformer Pluto takes place on June 24^th, Mid-Summer’s Day.  In the 60s, these two planets of evolution (Pluto) and revolution (Uranus) joined together to birth a new age.  Like a new Moon, a new cycle was started.  As you’ll see below, these planets’ cycle have kept us moving forward in our evolution throughout the ages – metaphorically and literally.  The 60s began a new era for these change-bringers, though, because for the first time in centuries, they began their cycle in an Earth sign, letting us know the time is right to bring all our bright ideals and humanity’s highest promise into manifestation.  The work we do now at this first quarter phase of their cycle can, over the next decades, give rise to that beautiful vision of the kingdom of heaven here on earth.  We can create a fair and just society where the world’s basic needs are met and survival doesn’t only belong to the fittest.  We have the know-how and we have the consciousness.  We just need the vision, the will and the compassion to do it.  Let the peaceful Revolution begin!

Life is moving forward swiftly now since last month’s eclipses and the Venus transit.  And it will rush through the rest of June and into July with all the cosmic changes in the air.  Jupiter moved into Gemini on June 11^th, super-charging the Mind for the next year.  Summer Solstice in the North arrives on June 20^th, the day after this new Moon.  Our dwarf planet Ceres, Goddess of the harvest, moves into Gemini on June 23^rd, offering us a harvest of new fruitful paradigms (Gemini) through which to see our world.  June 24^th brings on the energized square of Pluto and Uranus.  Saturn stations and turns direct on June 25^th and Venus turns direct on June 27^th. Mars finally leaves Virgo after 8 months and goes into Libra on July 3^rd, urging us to get our acts together so we can be centered with others in the coming years.

Whew!  Don’t bother to try to control things now. The only thing to do is go with the flow and discover what life is asking of you.

Second New Moon in Gemini – flipping the cycle

This is a special new Moon in many ways.  Coming before all the cosmic rush, it will certainly be the container of all these energies, and as it moves through the zodiac this month, it will disperse the energies throughout your chart.  If you know your birth chart, pay attention this month to when the Moon aspects one or more of your natal planets.   This will tell you when the new energies are being planted in your psyche.   And ask for a dream.  It might inform you of how you’re integrating these cosmic energies – or not!

This new Moon is opposed to the Galactic Center at 27* Sagittarius, bringing in a larger galactic consciousness – time to grow up if we want to become free citizens of our world.  It is also conjunct one of the brightest stars in the heavens – Betelgeuse is the shoulder star in the constellation of Orion the Hunter.  In ancient times, Betelgeuse was believed to bestow martial honour, advancement and wealth.  With the Sun, one of its gifts is an interest in and ability for psychic and mystical subjects. So turn your minds to the great unknown!  With the Moon, it enhances the Mind, the Will, and Rebellion and can bestow great Power.  This great power is sourced in the Cosmos and we can use it for a peaceful revolution if we stay conscious.  So use the higher powers of perception to strengthen your will and your mind and stand up for Truth.

There’s something different about the new Moon.  Perhaps you’ve noticed.  This new Moon is the 2^nd new Moon in Gemini, who loves to double things up.  This new Moon marks a change in the rhythms of the soli-lunar cycle until July-August 2013.  Instead of a new Moon in a Sun sign coming before the full Moon in its opposite sign, the cycle will now have the full Moon opposition before the new Moon.  After this Gemini new Moon, we’ll have a Capricorn/Cancer full Moon on July 3^rd and a Cancer new Moon on July 18-19^th. 

Continued at: Wisdom of Astrology

Sagittarius Lunar Eclipse, June 4, 2012

Gemini, the sign of the Twins, exemplifies how the Mind perceives the world as a play of opposites: light and dark, man and woman, left and right, good and bad, spirit and matter, life and death, yin and yang.  Tao says that these opposites contain a spark of each other.   What appears to be separate is really related.  The best way to understand an opposition is to see that each side complements and balances the other side to create a greater whole.

The full Moon is an opposition between the Sun and the Moon, a moment in their cosmic circle dance when they face each other fully.  It’s interesting that we read the result of that dance on the face of the feminine Moon rather than the masculine Sun.  The Moon records what the Sun’s been up to.  The Moon releases what‘s unconscious in the psyche.  The Moon draws our eyes and opens our imaginations to what could be.  Thanks to the life-giving light of the Sun.   

Astrological signs come in opposites too.  The loner Aries is balanced by the partner Libra, sensual Taurus with passionate Scorpio, intellectual Gemini with wise Sagittarius.  There are 12 signs and the 6 pairs of signs create a dynamic that keeps them on their toes.

For the rest of the Cosmic Story, please go to:Sagittarius Lunar Eclipse

On June 5^th, there will be a cosmic event that you don’t want to miss.   The planet Venus travels across the face of the Sun.  (See link for viewing details)

The Cosmic Story  

Astrology is an art as well as a science, using metaphor as its language and cosmic law as its metaphysics.  Our solar system spins, drawing us into the center, together.   Each planet and asteroid circling the Sun energizes a force at play in the world.  Along with the force of gravity, all bodies in our solar system hold onto each other energetically and so affect each other.  That’s why the ancients named the planets after their gods and goddesses – their experience of the world acknowledged and accepted the connection between matter, the imagination and spirit.  And the connective energy of the Universe is symbolized by Venus, both the goddess and the planet.  It seems Love is the irresistible force that holds everything and everyone together.

Carl Jung thought that the ancient god/desses had become psychological complexes in modern man.  And he also believed that at the center of these complexes were archetypes, human behaviors that are inborn and instinctual.  To dream, to conceive, to engender, to birth, to protect, to love, to die.  These archetypal energies also express themselves on a cosmic level, joining our energies with the other inhabitants of Earth, with our solar system and with galaxies.   It seems the Universe lays out the basic conditions for life and for death, for stars and for humans, and gifts us with them, daring us to play along.¹    

The planet Venus represents one of the universal archetypes, the archetype of Connection.  Under patriarchy, Venus energizes the realm of sexual love, beauty and companionship, the acceptable (to men) aspect of her energies.  But her deepest nature represents an essential archetype, the mystery of life expressed through Love and Wisdom, Connection and Wholeness.  

Continue the blog at:Wisdom of Astrology

Now is the Time -- Hafiz
Now is the time to know That all that you do is sacred.
Now, why not consider A lasting truce with yourself and God.
Now is the time to understand That all your ideas of right and wrong
Were just a child's training wheels To be laid aside
When you finally live With veracity And love.

My dear, please tell me, Why do you still Throw sticks at your heart And God?
What is it in that sweet voice inside That incites you to fear?
Now is the time for the world to know That every thought and action is sacred.
This is the time For you to compute the impossibility That there is anything But Grace.
Now is the season to know That everything you do Is sacred.
                                 (The Gift - versions of Hafiz by Daniel Ladinsky)

Total Annular Solar Eclipse    

            May 20^th’s Gemini New Moon joins with the south lunar node, engendering the first annular eclipse in 18 years – an eclipse that appears to have a ‘ring of light’ around the Sun.  The eclipse starts in southern China, passes through Japan and ends in the western US.  In other parts of the world in daylight, the Moon will partially cover the Sun.  The eclipse starts on May 20^th at 8:56pm UT (Universal Time) and ends on May 21^st at 2:49am UT. For more information on the timing for your area, you can go to: http://www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/solar-eclipse-may-2012.html.  For the US, that means it starts at 1:56pm PDT/ 4:56pm EDT.  And it is total at 4:48pm PDT/ 7:48pm EDT.

            So now that the technical information is out of the way, just what does the Gemini solar eclipse have in store for us?  A solar eclipse is a special new Moon, when the Sun and Moon and Earth line up on the same plane in space.  This line-up disrupts the ‘usual’ energy, dissolving old complexes/behavior patterns and allowing new archetypal energies to emerge from the unconscious (the light of the Sun/consciousness is blocked).  The south node of the Moon indicates where our comfort no longer serves us and points to what we have to release.   In Gemini, the energy that needs releasing is the way our culture has trained us to think about things.  As Hafiz says, “Now is the time to understand that all your ideas of right and wrong were just a child's training wheels, to be laid aside when you finally live with veracity and love.”  The US President just came out of the closet in support of gay marriage – a new perspective on partnerships that is sorely needed (Saturn in Libra is helping this along).  

           With the new Moon on the south node in Gemini, our old perceptions, thought patterns and knowledge can dissipate , leaving us open to perceive, think and know in new ways.  These old habits of mind no longer reflect the new realities of life, and so they no longer serve life.  Despite any uncomfortable feelings, release these old concepts, and try to see the world with a compassionate heart. “Now is the time for the world to know that every thought and action is sacred.”  I think we’re all ready for that, don’t you?

            The sign of Gemini relates to the Mind, highly curious and hungry for knowledge, and how we use the Mind to think, gather knowledge and communicate.  The sign of the Twins, one mortal and one immortal, implies that there are many ways to understand life, from common sense to the most complex mathematics.  This eclipse can do away with the patriarchal misconception that only factual knowledge is ‘real’.  Be open to your own unique way of learning, see what you discover and when necessary, share it.

Continued at: Wisdom of Astrology

Beltane and Wesak

This year’s Scorpio Full Moon arrives during Beltane (May 1-5), the Celtic earth festival that celebrates the beginning of Summer.   The Wheel of the Year describes the process of life, death and rebirth here on Earth.  Beltane is the time when "sweet desire weds wild delight."  It is a time for our hearts to rejoice in life and love and passion.  We are called to engage in the wild flow of life, our blood pumping through our veins with renewed strength, our hearts opening to delight as we become one with the blossoming Earth.

            At Beltane, we dance around the Maypole, weaving the masculine and feminine energies of life and love, hope and expectation.  And so, each year Life is renewed.  Beltane is another fire festival, symbolizing the next leap of light here in the northern hemisphere.  You’ll notice that the light will increase dramatically now as high summer approaches.  The bonfires we light at Beltane give us back the light of renewed hope for the coming year.   When we leap over the Beltane fire, it cleanses us of any lingering darkness, and brings us luck and fertility.  It is during Beltane that the veils between the worlds open and the Faerie folk come out to dance with us.  So go outside and enjoy this time of beauty and delight.  

            This Scorpio Full Moon is also called the Wesak Moon, the most auspicious day in Buddhism, for it celebrates the birth, enlightenment and death of Buddha.  In this energetic opposition between Taurus and Scorpio, we are all called to the great union with Nature and the heavens, celebrating the Divine within Nature and within ourselves.  Like the Buddha, we are called to acknowledge the divine spirit in our human nature as we overcome and release the emotional demons that plague us and separate us from our spiritual inheritance.

Taurus and Scorpio

            Taurus and Scorpio are both powerful signs, fixed in nature, strong in intent.  Fixed signs (Taurus, Leo, Scorpio, Aquarius) ensure the continuity and solidarity of life.  They concentrate the energies of the four seasons.  Taurus concentrates the dynamic springtime fire of Aries into viable life forms.  Scorpio concentrates the dynamic autumnal energies into emotional strength.

Continued at: http://www.wisdom-of-astrology.com/astrostarsarticles/scorpio-full-moon-beltane-2012

“Will you teach your children what we have taught our children? That the earth is our mother? What befalls the earth befalls all the sons of the earth.

This we know: the earth does not belong to man, man belongs to the earth. All things are connected like the blood that unites us all. Man did not weave the web of life, he is merely a strand in it. Whatever he does to the web, he does to himself."
   Attributed to Chief Seattle

Just in time to celebrate Earth Day, the Taurus New Moon arrives on Saturday, April 21 at 12:18 am PDT/ 3:18am EDT/ 7:18am GMT.  This Taurus New Moon evokes the Goddess of the Earth, our home.  This New Moon energy calls forth the new King who belongs to the Earth – Taurus as the Bull of the Mother.  This new King is the Earth’s defender, a new consciousness that will focus on doing what is necessary rather than maintaining the old user and abuser system by continuing to hurt the Earth and hurt ourselves. 

Listen to your bit of Earth this weekend.  Visit a garden, a window-box, a forest, a mountain or a farm; go to a lake, the ocean, a river or stream. Smell and taste the air which is full of Spring here in the north and Fall in the southern hemisphere.   Open your senses and your heart and ask our mother the Earth what she needs from you.  And then do it, because it’s necessary and you’re the only one who can do it.  You’ll find companions along the way that have heard the same voice and are also doing what is necessary.

Taurus is the sign of the zodiac concerned with the Earth and being good stewards of the Earth.  Unfortunately, more and more people are losing touch with Nature, staying indoors, focused on technological toys rather than opening themselves to the healing influence of Mother Nature.  Taurus is a good time to turn off our computers and TVs, put away our iPhones and just go outside! 

Please Continue at:
http://www.wisdom-of-astrology.com/astrostarsarticles/taurus-new-moon-april-21-2012-earth-day

Emerging Archetypal Themes:

Whale Rider, Aries and the Female Leader.

            While the sign of Aries conjures up images of warriors such as the Greek hero Jason with his golden fleece, and virgin huntresses such as the Greek Artemis and The Hunger Games heroine Katniss, it is also the sign of leadership.  Aries, which rules the head, gives the gift of strategy and leadership to its children. 

            Today our world is in need of good leaders, people who will take the part of the people over the powerful, leaders who know how to spark the enthusiasm and creativity of everyone to help create a new world of peaceful coexistence and good stewardship of the Earth.  The world especially needs female leaders who are not molded by the patriarchy.   We do not need female leaders who stand for the old patriarchal vision of hierarchical power, domination and greed, but rather women who know how to access their own feminine wisdom and who lead from the heart.

            Niki Caro’s 2002 movie Whale Rider speaks about this need for new feminine leadership in a heart-rending story about the death and regeneration of a culture.  I believe it speaks to our own times and culture; it also speaks of the transformative power of Feminine Spirit to bring this new birth to life.   

            The archetypal Feminine Spirit symbolizes “the origin of life; all phases of cosmic life, uniting all the elements, both the celestial and chthonic; the Queen of Heaven, Mother of God, opener of the way; the keeper of the keys of fertility and the gates of birth, death, and rebirth.  As the Moon Goddess she is perpetual renewal, the measure of time, the weaver of fate.  As Queen of Heaven, she is archetypal wholeness, the mother of all wisdom, self-mastery and redemption through illumination and transformation.”  (J.C. Cooper, Encyclopedia of Symbols, pp. 108-109.)   These are certainly qualities we need to nurture if we’re going to transform our society.  It is always the Goddess who presides over birth, death and rebirth.  When we have women leaders who remember their feminine gifts, I believe wisdom and life will blossom in the cultural deserts of our modern world.  Very much like what happens at the end of our story.

            The mythological background of Whale Rider is important to the story, because our ‘creation stories’ help us understand our place in the universe.   On the east coast of New Zealand, the Whangara people believe their presence there dates back a thousand years or more to a single ancestor, Paikea, who escaped death when his canoe capsized by riding to shore on the back of a whale. From then on, Whangara chiefs, always the first-born, always male, have been considered Paikea's direct descendants.

          Whale Rider begins with scenes of a hard birth and the death of the mother of twins, a boy and a girl, and the death of the baby boy. The patriarch of the family, who is tribal chief, has been waiting for the birth of this young boy, believing he will be the long-awaited new leader of the tribe. Porourangi, the twins’ father, will not bend to his father’s wish that he become tribal leader, and he leaves his baby girl, whom he defiantly names Paikea, to be raised by her grandparents.  While her grandfather, Koro, mourns the loss of the boy child, Paikea is immediately loved and cared for by her grandmother, Nanny Flowers.  As the years go by, even Koro learns to love his intelligent, curious and loving granddaughter.

            Years later, twelve-year old Pai is caught between her love for her increasingly bitter grandfather and her love of and heart-felt link to her ancient traditions.  Koro is troubled because he needs to train a new leader for the tribe.  He is fiercely dedicated to the old ways, even as the tribe itself flounders in modern misery. Neither of Koro’s sons were willing or able to take on the mantle of leadership, and this makes Koro even more rigid in his belief that he has to find a boy to take his place.

                Meanwhile, Pai feels her connection to the whales and is so certain of her calling that she defies her grandfather and secretly sets out to learn the ancient lore of the tribal leaders, which her grandfather believes is reserved only for males. When she is banished from the lessons her grandfather sets up for the boys of the tribe, she secretly listens in and learns.  She gets her uncle to teach her how to use a traditional Maori weapon and even defeats the young boy who is beginning to stand out as a leader.  When Koro finds Pai fighting him, he sends her home in disgrace.  He feels as if she is the cause of all the trouble the tribe is having, never once looking at himself and the kind of leader he is.

              Koro represents the Senex, the old patriarchal man who can become so rigid in his thinking that he never allows anything new to flourish.  This type of attitude causes people to rebel against the old ways instead of honoring them, because instead of living those ways with feeling and depth, the Senex uses rules and discipline to make people obey him.   We see this happening in our political system.  One side wants to go back to ‘the good old days’ and sees anything new as dangerous to the system.  And of course it is dangerous, mainly because the system doesn’t work anymore and has to be replaced.

Please continue at:The Bard's Grove: Whale Rider for more on this movie, the Aries archetype and  dreams about the path to female leadership.

With the Libra Full Moon falling on the weekend of both Passover and Easter, the spiritual importance of this full Moon is emphasized.  All full Moons highlight our relationships, and the Aries/Libra full Moon is the archetypal relationship full Moon since the two signs energize self (Aries) and other (Libra).  This first full Moon of the year shows us the emotional issues we face as we relate to each other.  Since it is also a super moon – closest to the Earth – it will exert a stronger influence on both the ocean’s tides and our inner tides.  This is the full Moon to be conscious of ‘all our relations’ in our dealings.  And a good place to start is to examine how you act towards others.  

Both the signs of Aries and Libra stand at the gateway of the Equinoxes, when night and day are of equal length.  Aries at the gateway of Spring exemplifies the new strength of the returning Sun (in the northern hemisphere), bringing us the potential of our individual new life.  Libra stands at the gateway of the Autumn, when we unite as a community to bring in the harvest as we prepare for longer nights and colder weather.  Aries and Libra stand across the Zodiac from each other, and so it is their job to unite both sides of this opposition.  Libra is better at compromise than Aries, so it is up to the Libra Moon this month to get the Aries Sun to listen. 

Libra is good at striking a balance if she has a bit of Aries backbone.  Libra is good at diplomacy if she uses her Venus-bestowed innate charm and social skills.  Libra is about fairness because she can see both sides of the issue.  Uranus in Aries is charging us with the cosmic energy to do our part in creating a better future; Saturn in Libra is pressuring us to stand up for justice for and between all people.  We must stretch ourselves and become more than we’ve been before if we want to make the most of this potent full Moon time.  What we learn about ourselves now will affect how we handle the rest of this year’s powerful energies.    

continue at: Wisdom-of-Astrology

            Since the patriarchy is giving way to a new sense of equality and partnership between men and women, I don’t want to give you the impression that The Hunger Games is only about the new feminine Hera.  It is also about the new masculine Hero.  Uranus in Aries is waking us all up to a new sense of identity, a new sense that we are all the heroes and heras of our own destiny.  And that destiny involves being there for each other, with respect and ingenuity.

            I was going to use the books and movies of The Lord of the Rings to talk about the image of the new masculine hero.  Tolkien presents us with so many characters to choose from.  There is Strider/Aragon, the hidden king who is protector and warrior, lover and king.  There is Gandalf, the wizard who puts forth all his power to protect and defend his companions and Middle Earth.  There is Gimli and Legolas, the dwarf and elf who become boon companions through their defense of the realm in its fight against the dark lord, Sauron.  And of course, there’s Frodo and Sam, Merry and Pippin, small heroes who accomplish what the mighty ones cannot do.  Tolkien’s characters exemplify all that is good and true in human beings when we are faced with ultimate evil. 

            Peeta, the hero in The Hunger Games, does not have the magical powers of Gandalf nor the endurance of the hobbits.  What he does have is the determination to help and protect Katniss with his life until his death.  Peeta is an example of who a new masculine hero might be and what a new masculine hero might do.  And yet, this hero isn’t so new at all.  Ancient warriors have fought to the death to protect those they love.  Even a God was willing to give up his life so that we all could have eternal life.  So in a way, Peeta represents a renewal of the archetype of the masculine hero.  Like the dummling youngest son in fairy tales, he forges ahead into his adventure leading with his heart.  That’s what helps him to win the day.  He’s the hero with heart!

            Peeta is a kind and caring young man, despite the harshness of his own life.  He has compassion for Katniss when she’s hungry, even when he doesn’t have the courage to hand her the loaf of bread his mother would rather feed to the pigs.  He takes delight in his work, decorating cakes, and uses his artistry to help him survive during the Games by blending into the background.  He made his arm look like a tree trunk!  How clever is that?

Continue at: http://thebardsgrove.blogspot.com

EMERGING ARCHETYPAL THEMES:

The Hunger Games

The Female Heroine: Uranus in Aries: The Courage to Be Yourself

By

Cathy Pagano

Aries, considered the first sign of the Zodiac, begins when the Sun comes north of the equator at Spring Equinox.  When the Sun resumes its journey here in the north each year, we experience a new beginning, a return of green, growing life.  Many religious holidays celebrate this season as a time of new life, of Resurrection and Freedom.  The reverse is true of our friends south of the equator.  They’ve just celebrated the harvest and the coming death of the year at Autumn Equinox as the Sun moves away from their southern homelands.

Just as the sign of Aries starts the astrological year, the energy of Aries is all about new beginnings and a new sense of identity.  Aries’ energy is energizing, exciting, driven, self-confident and enthusiastic.   Aries are the explorers, the pioneers, the scouts, and the leaders of the Zodiac. 

And this year, Aries carries a primal spark of lightning, because the planet Uranus is moving through the early degrees of Aries.  Uranus symbolizes the energy of awakening, of innovation, of rebellion and originality.  In the sign of Aries, Uranus is energizing us with a new sense of ourselves, an awakened sense of ourselves, as if we’ve been hit by a lightning bolt.  With its square to Pluto in Capricorn coming up, the call to discover a new identity includes using that new identity to help recreate our society.

This sense of quickening is accelerated when an archetypal story helps give this new energy a structure to coalesce around.  A story gives meaning to what we’re doing, as well as providing clues on how to ‘pass the tests’ of the issues being raised.  The Aries quest is that of being true to your original Self.   We are here at this moment in our history to meet the challenges and deal with the issues facing our world, and we will need to find the hero and heroine within ourselves.  Uranus in Aries can inspire us to find and embrace our archetypal identity.

So this month’s blog is about one of the Aries lessons that help us discover our true identities.  This is the lesson of finding the courage and self-confidence to be ourselves, even under fire.   

The Hunger Games

I was delighted to discover that the movie version of The Hunger Games was almost as good as the book.  I chose it as my example of Aries’ courage and self-confidence because its main character, Katniss Everdeen, is a beautiful example of a young woman finding the courage to meet her destiny and the self-confidence to do it in a truly feminine way.

Continued at: <http://thebardsgrove.blogspot.com/>;

‘The Last Wave’: The Archetypal Tidal Wave

Cathy Pagano

 "There are times when people need stories more than they need nourishment, because the stories feed something deeper than the needs of the body." 

                                                        Charles DeLint, The Onion Girl

       The World is full of magic and mystery, if we will only believe. Life is arrayed in beauty and possibilities, if we will only see.  Our imagination interprets the world for us.  It's how we communicate with Nature and how we sense each other.  We are here to experience in full what human life has to offer: lessons of wonder and creativity, pain and suffering, love and companionship, trials and rewards, responsibilities and pleasures.  And though each of us is a unique individual, we all go through the same trials and joys of life here on Earth. That's why we need stories to help us understand our shared experiences.  Stories are born so we don't have to constantly re-invent the wheel. 

        Human Beings have always made sense of our shared experiences through this amazing form of Wisdom called Story.  Stories pass down tribal wisdom.  Stories help us compare notes with girlfriends. Stories shape the way we see and experience the world. Stories tell us how to meet the darkness. If a story is good and true, it will wake up your imagination and teach you something new about life.

        But of course, it depends on if the story speaks to that something deeper that is looking for nourishment.  Unfortunately, many of our modern movies and books don't speak to our hearts nor awaken our imaginations.  Instead they seem to put us to sleep.

        This happens when a people's stories no longer help them meet life. 

        The truth is that many of our old collective stories are worn out; losing their vitality they become stereotypes (despite the obsessive insistence of the truth of those stories by some people).  Archetypes, although eternal, need symbolic renewing from age to age.  When the old form of the story has lost its enchantment for us, it no longer serves its true function of helping us cope with life.  Our modern world is too different and so much more complex than our ancestors' worlds. The times are changing.  We need new stories!

            Especially in times of unrest and instability, we need stories to help us make sense of our lives. We are living in those times when ‘people need stories more than they need nourishment. . .’   Unfortunately, even though stories are available to us 24/7 – now available on your phone! - most of our communal stories don’t satisfy us on a deep level. We are stuffed with stories, but are we inspired by them?  Do we find the deep wisdom in them that can change our lives? And when we do find a story that inspires us, do we treat it as a pleasant fantasy or do we allow it to grow into something unique and splendidly different in our lives?  Do we make it our own?

We can also come to know ourselves through our dream stories.  We all are fascinated by our dreams.  I can vouch for that – when people hear I’m a dreamworker, they are eager to share their dreams.  But since we’ve been taught by our culture that dreams have no real meaning, most of those people don’t respect the story messages that their dreams bring them every night. We no longer remember the symbolic language of dreams and metaphors, humanity’s original language that we seem to have lost building the Tower of Babel.  When we lose our child-like ability to imagine and fully inhabit a symbolic understanding of life, we lose our capacity to digest our stories so that they ‘feed something deeper than the needs of the body’.    

We’ve also lost our separate cultural stories along the way, those ‘folk stories’ and folk wisdom that get passed down through families and cultures.  Too often, our modern ‘myths’ can’t help us create and deal with real change in our lives and our world like the old stories did for past generations.   Our educational system, as well as our modern media, so often sever this connection to our cultural stories and to the mythic imagination, leaving us in danger of losing our ancient wisdom traditions as well as our own ability to create new stories and discover new wisdom. 

But a strong connection to the Creative Imagination within us can change that.  This is our untapped gift, another lens on our world that can help us navigate the changes coming our way.  We still have our dreams, if we are willing to respect their messages.  We still have great storytellers, who study the ancient stories and birth the new ones.  The great cosmic laws of life are still at play in the world and within us, even when we don’t recognize them.

          While we all have the potential to engage this Creative Imagination, not all of us can do it in equal measure.  It is the true storytellers who have the gift to tap into these cosmic laws on an imaginal level and who pass it on to us through songs and stories that open us to cosmic truth on a heart level.  

           Peter Weir is one of those great storytellers.  He’s brought us Picnic at Hanging Rock, Gallipoli, Year of Living Dangerously, Witness, and Dead Poets Society to name just a few of his marvelous movies.

The Last Wave: An Archetypal Movie about a Change in Consciousness

         Peter Weir’s 1977 movie The Last Wave is a moody, mysterious story about personal and cultural change.  Two men from different worlds are confronted by a mystery;  they both respond to it with honesty and integrity.  This mystery seemingly centers around a mysterious death involving Australian Aborigines.  But the real mystery forces one of these men to confront a rejected part of his inner psyche, an aspect of human life which western man has worked hard to make irrelevant.  

          It is the mystery of the psychic dimensions of life, our sixth sense that opens us to unseen realities, which are considered ‘primitive’ by rational standards.  Our left-brained culture often chooses to ignore and vilify the reality of this right-brain imagination.  This story points out the fact that without both views of life, we die.

Continue at: Star of the Bards: The Last Wave