Astrological Weather Report

Forecast 2024

I am writing from my 4th House, Jupiter, in Sag retrograde. Jupiter is philosophy, so I hold that vibe by taking a philosophical approach to speak about the Jupiter-Uranus conjunction, which is pivotal next year.

The geologist, eco-philosopher, and theologian Thomas Berry expressed that we need a new story or cosmology to step back from the edge of catastrophic destruction. In his book, The Great Work, Thomas wrote,

“Our challenge is to create a new language, even a new sense of what it is to be human. It is to transcend not only national limitations, but even our species isolation, to enter into the larger community of living species. This brings about a completely new sense of reality and value…The Great Work now, as we move into a new millennium, is to carry out the transition from a period of human devastation of the Earth to a period when humans would be present to the planet in a mutually beneficial manner… everything has a right to be recognized and revered. Trees have tree rights, insects have insect rights, rivers have river rights, and mountains have mountain rights.”

—Thomas Berry

We’re standing at the threshold of a New Age. We have been told by prophets, seers, psychics, clairvoyants, metaphysicians, professors, and scientists that these times were coming. We are now experiencing the birth pangs of that destined future. The emergence of deadly viral infections, political polarity, and extreme economic disparities are all evidence of a world out of balance. As a species, we have plundered the Earth and stripped it of its life-sustaining resources for material gain. We have defiled the natural sacred abundance of our planetary home. Greed, materialism, unenlightened self-interest, and patriarchy have driven the headlong advance of science and technology at the high price of the Earth’s once-abundant natural resources. The European visitors who settled on our shores saw only that the natural resources were mined and profited by rather than recognizing the spiritual intelligence and communal lifestyle of the natives who had lived here for centuries. 

Jupiter and Uranus are the foundations of society. Jupiter is the abundance of the Earth, the manifest natural world. It is the expansion principle, the growth cycle. Sometimes, Jupiter’s growth cycle runs wild, trampling on boundaries. 

Uranus is the process of who we are becoming, driven by our higher intellect. It is our sense of community. Circumstances now conspire to raise our consciousness and reconnect to the healing potentials of the natural world. As these planetary forces of social expansion come together, the fourteen-year cycle unlocks the karmic necessity of what Thomas Berry calls the Great Work.

Jupiter and Sagittarius correlate to inherent restlessness. Change is the only constant. With Uranus in play, transformation is guaranteed. Jupiter expands whatever it touches. Jupiter makes whatever it touches bigger, not necessarily better. Uranus interrupts, disrupts, and dislodges outmoded behaviors and structures, clearing the space for new growth.

On April 20, 2024, Jupiter and Uranus will begin a fourteen—year cycle. The conjunctions will occur in March and April, but the two outer planet heavies will be in orb to each other from February to June, from early Spring to early Summer. The conjunction will come into orb and perfect in Taurus. The transit will conclude in Gemini. The conjunction occurs in Taurus, disposited (ruled) by Venus in Aries. Venus sits at the heart of a six-point stellium that spans the sign of Aries.

Jupiter measures the cycles of our lives in twelve-year chapters. Uranus formats the final state of the Fire triad of the self-actualization process. We are born in Aries, pure instinctive and non-cognitive. In Leo, we have a name. We know who we are, or at least we think we do. In Sagittarius, our developing self-awareness includes the multiverses of others. 

Jupiter is embodied in the sign Sagittarius, the centaur aiming his arrow high towards the sky. The intention is to reach out beyond our current understanding of the world around us, to connect with that which is greater than ourselves. We are a student of life. We can become a philosopher. We can become the teacher. 

Sagittarius and Jupiter correlate to our belief system. Jupiter’s enthusiasm and joie de vivre can become proselytizing. The ultimate truth found in Sagittarius can devolve into personal truth and opinion. Jupiter correlates to the “to be” processes now anchored in social interaction. Creativity can flourish. 

Jupiter/Sagittarius people need fun, joy, and a vital connection with life. They seek meaningful experience.

In Myth, Jupiter was the King of the Gods and ruled with his lightning-tipped spear. Ouranos (Uranus) was his grandfather. His father was Kronos (Saturn), whom he and his siblings murdered. Kronos also committed the patricide of Ouranos. The onus of patrimony hangs heavy over these generations of immortals. It’s a tale of actions motivated only by self-preservation.

Astrologically, Uranus is considered to be the Great Interrupter and Disrupter. It is the ruler of Aquarius, the sign that follows Capricorn, Saturn’s consensus reality domain. Saturn and Capricorn create structure and form. The maturation process belongs here. As structures age, they must be replaced and modified to support current conditions. Air element Uranus sends a fierce windstorm down upon what is outdated, uprooting it so that something new can grow. 

Uranus is the polarity to the sign of Leo. Leo is the process of “I know who I am.” Uranus is the process of “I know who I am becoming.” Sagittarius is the final segment of the self-actualization process that began in Aries and gathered in Leo.

When these two outer planets join forces, tremendous energies are released formatted by the sign in which the conjunction occurs. They can create significant reforms that transform society. 

This time, the conjunction occurs in Taurus. Taurus is about self-reliance, hunkering down, and establishing personal fortifications financially and emotionally, sometimes to the point of isolation. The primary concern is survival, at whatever cost. When Jupiter and Uranus meet in Taurus, they can produce dogmatic thinking. Sometimes, no attention is given to the consequences of their actions. There can be hubris and arrogance, with unforeseen consequences. 

“When Jupiter and a second planet enter into alignment, Jupiter’s archetypal influence seems to be one of magnifying and supporting the second planetary archetype expanding it, granting it success, bringing it to fruition. When that second planet is Uranus, representing the breaking down of existing modes of viewing and experiencing life and the bringing in of radical new approaches and perspectives, we can expect, in combination with Jupiter’s core association with the endless quest for meaning, peaks in the process of “restless exploration.”

—Richard Tarnas.

The American Revolution unfolded during the 1775 Jupiter–Uranus conjunction in Aries. World War I started under a Jupiter-Uranus conjunction in Aquarius. Carl Jung wrote the Red Book during the same transit, and Tolkien’s Middle Earth mythology emerged.

This is the chart of the celestial perfection. At the conjunction in April, six celestial bodies are clustered in the sign of Aries: Mercury in its retrograde condition, Venus, Eris, asteroid Hygeia, Chiron, and the lunar north node. 

The conjunction occurs in earthbound Taurus. Venus in Aries is the dispositor, the ruler, of the conjunction. This implies that there will be crises of awareness in our relationships with ourselves, others, and the Earth itself. Self-reliance is the Taurus catchphrase for our values and priorities, formatted by the quotient of the value of our self-worth. In Aries, this will funnel more attention to the self to fulfill essential needs. Our values and the resulting priorities will be focused on what we need to survive as a species. Venus is embedded at the heart of this six-point stellium that spans the sign of Aries. This chained series of planetary bodies acts as a single holistic multivalent frequency that together forms the foundation of the Jupiter-Uranus conjunction.  Each of the celestial components adds their voice to the cosmic chorus. 

Aries is the initiation point of the self-realization process that progresses through the Fire triad. The Fire element teaches us about the self instinctively, just like the child who touches a hot iron, even though they were warned not to, and learns through direct emotional and physical experience.

The shape of the chart is a Sling with a Gibbous Virgo Moon handle. Experience is wound up and spun around by the Moon. The Moon is our emotional body. We will ride a roller coaster of emotional crises, challenges, and perhaps breakthroughs if we can hold it all together and not break down. This is the nature of the karmic process that underlines this 14-year-long celestial moment. The underlying direction will be the work on the self through direct emotional experience. The Earth demands the work, as does our psyches. The Earth is our home in the Universe. The Moon is our moment-to-moment connection to the waves of impulses from Source. It is our most conscious part. 

Pluto emotionally empowers the Moon. Jupiter expands the tension of the emotional content of the moment. There is a sense that justice must be served. 

Venus in Aries, the dispositer of the conjunction, applies to a (waxing) Balsamic Semisextile to Jupiter. There is a crisis of awareness of our relationships with ourselves, others, and the Earth itself. Self-reliance is embedded in our values and priorities, according to the emotional map drawn by the value of our self-worth. In Aries, this will funnel more attention to the self to fulfill essential needs.

Mercury correlates to the nature of our cognitive awareness, how we speak, and how we think. Mercury is a collector of data and people. Sagittarius becomes cosmology, but Mercury assembles ideas and opinions. Mercury retrograde will bring our attention back to what has transpired not just over days or weeks but over centuries. The sons and daughters have carried forward the ills of the fathers. 

The cognitive awareness emerges that we are approaching a non-negotiable horizon line.  Mercury shows the promise of a new way of thinking. Pallas Athene shakes things up with a new, more natural way of approaching the ongoing issues. Eris might throw a wrench into the works to accelerate the changes. The lunar nodes actively seek to pull a different rabbit out of the hat for the future. 

In the I Ching, Book of Changes, Hexagram 7, Shih, The Army, one of the moving lines reveals, 

“Perchance the army carries corpses in the wagon. Misfortune.

The implication is that what has decayed is still part of the collective narrative being carried into the future. 

Mars in Pisces forms a partile (exact) Balsamic Sextile to Jupiter and separates from a waning balsamic sextile to Uranus. Mars is armed and ready for battle. A waxing septile to Pluto is a siren’s song of fate and destiny. A waning septile to asteroid Astraea hints at justice served. There will be circumstances that demand a broader vision and more conscious choices. Mars in Pisces will require that we face complex and confusing circumstances that can only be understood with a broader vision and higher consciousness. It is lunacy to think that the same failed decisions will lead to a different outcome. The recognition must occur that we are a global community. Partisan agendas are no longer a viable option. There is a fated quality to the way events are unfolding. A new sense of empowerment activates a sacred commitment to our priorities. 

Eris separates from New Phase conjunctions to the Sun and Mercury. Venus, Chiron, and the Lunar North Node apply to Balsamic conjunctions to Eris. Balsamic conjunctions require closure. Slowly advancing through her 530-year orbit, Eris is the unexpected guest who will show up unannounced, bearing provocative gifts. Mythically, she is a rogue personality hellbent on punishing transgression. She fertilizes the timeline with karmic necessities. The path to this moment has been long and hard. The path that looms going forward is steep and demands absolute dedication to what we need to survive.

Chiron in Aries applies to a waxing Balsamic Semisextile to Jupiter, conveying a sense of wounding. This correlates to the emergence of new healing methodologies for healing the planet. Chiron will present cutting-edge homeopathic remedies to heal our global community and Mother Earth. Hard choices need to be addressed. We must learn how to save ourselves. There can be no shirking of responsibility. 

Asteroid Hygeia separates from a waning Balsamic Semisquare to Jupiter. Proactive self-care Hygeia suggests that health crises reflect how we have ignored sacred tasks. We are getting higher mind downloads. All disease begins in the spiritual body. From there, imbalances seek neural pathways to the mental body. From there, it progresses to the emotional body, and the physical body becomes ill. Often too late. Hygeia supports hands-on self-care. Since COVID, the medical community has dwindled in number, and now, the ability to obtain high-value healthcare has diminished. We must learn to advocate for ourselves.

The Lunar North Node in Aries applies to a balsamic conjunction to Mercury retrograde. This profound combination ensures that close attention will be paid to future needs. It magnetizes the future with instincts and intentions to stabilize the earth that is shifting beneath our feet. Our potential future reveals a wide range of possible outcomes. What we will experience will be determined by the choices we make at this moment. There is no longer any room for error. 

The Lunar South Node in Libra forms a partile (exact) BiQuintile to Jupiter. We will have multiple opportunities to rebalance the past and create a more stable and balanced future. New creativity and individuality can flourish, but the opportunities must be recognized when they surface and act upon—Carpe diem.

Minor planet Ceres separates from a waning Last Quarter Trine to Jupiter. Her message is that no one is coming to save us. We are learning the hard lesson that self-nurture is the only viable option in the future. We cannot trust corporate farming. The food we eat, the water we drink, and the air we breathe are all under attack by corporate agendas. When I was growing up in the fifties and sixties, you could walk through any aisle in the supermarket without needing to check the healthiness of what was on the shelves. That is no longer the case. We must learn that each of us is responsible for our well-being.

Asteroid Vesta forms a partile (exact) Balsamic Semisextile to Jupiter. The Goddess of the Sacred Fire opens a new sense of authenticity for individuals and communities. The Medieval mindset that has driven society for millennia has taken us to the point of no return. Extinction looms on the event horizon. Vesta is the Goddess of the Sacred Fire, which correlates to enlightened self-interest and commitment to personal authenticity. We have active support from our higher self and the part of us that connects to our Soul. 

Asteroid Juno applies to waxing 1^st Quarter BiSeptile to Jupiter. She was the co-ruler of Olympus, disempowered by her husband. Her unfailing sense of faithfulness dictates that we must each make a new commitment to a sustainable lifestyle that supports the environment and our community. We must commit to our highest priorities for health and well-being. The time of the lone wolf is past. We must join together as a community to reverse the effects of what has happened during the twentieth century. 

Mystical point Black Moon Lilith applies to a waxing 1^st Quarter Trine to Jupiter. Black Moon Lilith tells us that we have become exiled from the natural world that birthed us. We must now find the way home.

Minor planet Sedna separates from a New Phase Conjunction to Jupiter. This newly discovered planet holds the promise of higher consciousness. Alan Clay tells us that we will experience the pain of the crisis of transcendence, where we are forced to let go of our old spiritual framework and rise to a new consciousness.

Neptune adds some confusion to the moment. Confusion serves an essential purpose. It forces us to reexamine what is going on and make different choices. It opens the doorway to intuition, higher knowledge, and transcendence. 

As the next decades unfold, we will experience opportunities for personal and collective growth, new creativity and individuality, and a new worldview. We will experience challenges to our well-being physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually. All of this will awaken a higher awareness. We must take responsibility for our thoughts, deeds, and actions, with the intense array of Aries energy embedded over the next few years as Neptune ingresses Aries. We need to recognize that we are not just people cohabiting on the planet. We are a single conscious entity whose spirit is connected to the Anima Mundi of the Earth and the local and global communities we are a part of. World events will drive home the understanding, through karmic necessity, that there is only one of us on the planet.

“The deepest crises experienced by any society are those moments of change when the story becomes inadequate for meeting the survival demands of a present situation. Until technologists learn reverence for the earth, there will be no possibility of bringing a healing or a new creative age to the earth.”

—Thomas Berry.

Lunar North Node Conjunct Eris

Eris has been a major player in our personal lives and world affairs since its discovery in 2005. We have realized that it has been a base note, like Pluto, to all of the significant evolutionary changes in our world since that time.

Since March this year, the Lunar North Node in Aries has conjoined rogue planet Eris. Eris is cast as the uninvited guest. She is mythologically held accountable for starting the Trojan War, the conflagration that ended the Greek Classical Age. That dubious honor belongs to Helen of Troy, who ran off with Paris, the son of Priam, King of Troy, knowing full well that when she married the Spartan King Menelaus, a pact had been signed declaring that if anyone interfered with the marriage, a war would be the result. 

Eris did not bring about the demise of the Greek Classical Age. Eris was, in actuality, responsible for founding the Roman Empire. One of the Trojan War survivors, Aeneas, a royal Trojan who was the son of Aphrodite and Anchises, sailed to Italy and married into the ruling bloodline. His posterity founded the city of Rome, which still stands today and holds worldwide influence after more than 2000 years.

The orbit of Eris is two Pluto distances from the Sun, taking approximately 530 years to complete. Everyone on the planet right now has Eris in Aries. The current Eris Aries ingress occurred in April 1924. One month later, Uranus conjoined Eris, setting the stage for the Stock Market Crash of 1929, the Great Depression, and the rise of Fascism. From 1933 to 1936, Uranus in Taurus, squaring Pluto in Cancer with Eris in Aries, laid the groundwork for World War II. Cancer is the archetype of nationalism, devotion, and allegiance to the mother country. Uranus is again in Taurus right now.

A square is a 90° angle between two planets. It is a crisis point such as driving 60 miles an hour and suddenly realizing that you must make a hard left turn without braking. Uranus in Cancer squared Eris from 1948 to 1952, underscoring the Korean War. Uranus conjunct Pluto throughout the 1960s brought the War in Vietnam, radical antiwar protest, and the Kennedy and Martin Luther King assassinations. A conjunction is a blending of two planetary archetypes. Pluto is about karma and power. Uranus generates what often results in an unexpected, cataclysmic change of the order and structure of things.

The gradual expansion of the State of Israel occupying land that was once Palestine has generated friction and hostility between Israel and the Arab communities for 75 years. It is a tangled web. The two states are biblical brothers. They both worship the patriarch Abraham, the father of both Isaac and Allah. The map of Israel is shaped like a knife. Some say that the British mandated the State of Israel as a “national home for the Jewish people” in Palestine via the Balfour Declaration to punish the Ottoman Empire for their resistance to become subjugated to British rule.

As Uranus and Pluto opposed Eris in the 1970s, the Yom Kippur War erupted in the Middle East. 

The Uranus-Eris square in the 1990s brought the Dissolution of the Soviet Union. Like a third Russian Revolution, the Communist social experiment crumbled like the Berlin Wall.

The Uranus Pluto square through the late 1990s and early 2000s brought the ascendancy of cyberspace to Spaceship Earth with all of its positive and negative potentialities. We live in our email and social media that now faces an unknown future as AI becomes more widespread and invisible.

As Uranus again squared Pluto and Uranus conjoined Eris in the 2010s, the world suffered COVID. The US was haunted by Donald Trump and the ascendency of fascism from the far right. Pluto has been in square aspect to Eris since 2017 and will remain in orb until May of next year. This has been a volatile combination of powerful metamorphosis and transformation. 

Since its ingress into Aries in the early 1920s, Eris has aligned with the lunar north node through

• The Great Depression
• The Korean War,
• The tumultuous 60s
• The Reagan years

Uranus is not just progressive. It can also be regressive. Promethean and Epimethean. At any given time, approximately one-third of the population promotes progressive change. One-third want things to change by returning to how things used to be. One-third are on the fence, in the middle, unable to choose. The transformations brought about by Uranus and Pluto reawakened regressive politics and a conservative revolution as a reaction to the populist liberalism of the 60s and 70s, the aftermath of 911 with the Patriot Act and the “hardening” of democracy, and most recently, the surfacing of a politically fortified ultra-right wing that has been under construction since the Reagan years.

The Eris nodal conjunction will perfect on November 27, 2023. It has been in orb with the Aries lunar north node since March and will persist until May 2024. Eris in her retrograde condtion implies that events from the past will be revisited in the future. We are witnessing the threat of a wider global conflict with a potentially more drastic outcome. The financial talking heads are dispensing cautious warnings about the possibility of an economic downturn. Health crises, including new COVID variants, continue to emerge below the surface of headline news. Increasingly gun violence is increasing, targeting ethnic and religious groups and sometimes just innocent people in public spaces. Donald Trump is still out on the streets working his agenda in overtime. The next US Presidential election looms large with increasingly uncomfortable potential outcomes. 

The US Chart is also under pressure. Transiting Eris-LNN is in opposition to the US 1^st House Moon. In mundane astrology, the astrology of nations, the Moon correlates to the general welfare of the people and the condition of the people at large. An opposition is like a “full moon” event where something critical is at a tipping point of balance.  Full moons are accompanied by manifestations of events that have been developing over time. Any city police force will testify that at the full moon, things can go sideways.  

Eris is squaring US Pluto (long term) which I wrote about several months ago. The United States is having its Pluto Return. Pluto is now in Capricorn, where it was when the country was founded. Eris is squaring both transiting Pluto and US Pluto. When Pluto squared Eris five times between 2020 and 2021, the world was in the throes of COVID-19. Transiting Pluto will soon move out of orb with transiting Eris. However, US Pluto is stationary, and because the transit of Eris is long and slow, the two will remain in aspect to each other until 2072, perfecting nine times between 2026 and 2030.

Uranus is squaring US Eris. Uranus tears down what is old and outdated. It can also generate a reactive response to promote what is established despite being outdated. The US is the first nation since ancient Greece to attempt to exercise the social experiment called democracy: government by the governed. Some argue that the experiment has been flawed since the beginning with political structures like private political parties and the electoral college, which act as intermediaries in determining who the candidates will be. The Founding Fathers, perhaps rightfully so, were aware of the frailties of humanity and sought to protect the system from discriminatory self-interest. The intermediate political agencies themselves may be guilty of such self-centered behavior. 

The underlying archetypal polarity that underscores any astrological timeline is the lunar nodes, which are two points in space where the ecliptic, the path of the Earth’s orbit around the Sun, and the path of the orbit of the Moon around the Earth intersect.  The moon correlates to our emotional body. The lunar south node correlates to the emotional nature of what has come before. It describes the habitual, non-cognitive process that operates below the surface of our awareness resulting from past emotional experiences. It is our innate learned behavior. 

The lunar north node is the behavior pattern and accompanying choices the Soul has laid out as a potential future direction. There is more than one variation of the future that can be realized. In the present, the archetypal nature of the Moon in the current lifetime is the determinant. We map our future through our emotional responses to the world in each moment. The moon has cycles of animation and withdrawal through eight phases. We can make different choices at any turn if we have the supporting emotional experiences in our current lifetime.

The lunar nodes are currently in the signs of Aries, Cardinal Fire, and Libra, Cardinal Air. Aries, ruled by Mars,  learns about itself through trial and error, acting on purely non-cognitive instinct. Aries learns from the outcomes of its choices and builds a catalog of emotional experiences that guide it toward self-actualization. 

Libra seeks to understand itself in the mirror of others. Astrologically, Venus, the ruler of Libra, correlates to magnetism. Relationships form through magnetic interactions with others. The magnetic attraction can be either favorable for both individuals or advantageous to only one to the disadvantage of the other. The determinant is the quality of their self-esteem and self-reliance. The need for a relationship derives from the Yang Libran expression of Venus. The quotient of self-esteem derives from the Yin Taurus expression of Venus. 

Essentially, the Aries Libra polarity is about finding balance with ourselves and others. It is the archetypal full moon experience as the Moon reflects the Sun’s full light, sharing and achieving a balance between the two luminaries. A distortion occurs when the magnetic attraction malfunctions. In human experiences, the consciousness of each individual or party is the determinant. The quality of each individual’s self-love quotient holds the frequency. If the frequency emits low self-esteem, they will most likely attract someone who wants to mine that low self-esteem. If anger, jealousy, greed, revenge, hatred, or any other distorted emotion is the MO, the relationship will go out of balance. At first, the relationship seems fine, but over time, it deteriorates until it is realized that an exit strategy is needed. This describes how the Lunar North Node- Eris conjunction can manifest in our personal lives. 

Generally, Aries, ruled by the Greek God of War, is self-oriented and aggressive. Libra, ruled by Venus Aphrodite, is loving and relational. Either archetype can express its polarity as well. This dynamic underscores the world at large for this current transit; different players express contrasting perspectives on the field. 

Eris is not to blame. There is no one to blame. Eris seeks to remedy injustice. The lunar north node is the soul intention going forward in our lives. Anima Mundi, the world soul, is also playing her part. 

“All that is visible must grow beyond itself, extend into the realm of the invisible. Thereby it receives its true consecration and clarity and takes firm root in the cosmic order.” 

—Wilhelm Baynes Edition 50 Ting /The Caldron

“Everything we call real is made of things that cannot be regarded as real.” —Niels Bohr

The Universe is mental. Thoughts become actions. Actions become deeds. Our nighttime dreams are more real than our waking bad dreams. We don’t see the outer world. We observe what we project onto it. Realize that you are just seeing the projection. Trust. Keep working on the dream.

“It is going to be okay in the end. If it is not okay, it is not the end.”     —Fernando Sabino

Apocalypse Now?

As the Earth’s shadow falls across the moon, a partial lunar eclipse occurs at 05° 09’ Taurus on October 28th at 2:24 pm in the northern hemisphere and at 7:24 am on October 29th in the southern hemisphere.

Taurus is about self-reliance determined by the individual values and priorities we deem requisite for survival. Taureans are stubbornly independent, charting their own course through life. Compromise is rarely an option for Taurus. The inner directness of their perspective makes it difficult for them to accept the opinions, ideas, and beliefs of others. As a result, a sense of isolation surrounds them as their protective wall of security. 

This is the second and last of the eclipses in this eclipse season. The first was the “Great American Eclipse,” a Libra annular solar eclipse that perfected across North and South America. This partial lunar eclipse will be visible across a portion of the Americas, all of Europe and Africa, and most of Asia and Australia.

Since the solar eclipse two weeks earlier, world events have escalated to a precipitous level not experienced in decades. Hamas’s sudden attack on Israel has galvanized the already disintegrating international political climate, with each side sending armaments and humanitarian aid while at the same time attempting to find a peaceful resolution. The increased polarization has exhumed the specter of a nuclear holocaust. 

At the lunation, a Taurus Moon applies to a balsamic conjunction to Jupiter retrograde, the planet of growth and expansion. It is a common belief that somehow Jupiter makes everything better. In reality, it generally makes things bigger. Retrograde and conjunct the Lunar South Node, Jupiter unearths the past in search of what needs revision. 

Venus is the ruler of Taurus. In the lunar eclipse chart, Venus is in the sign of Virgo. The earthbound combination of the two signs, Taurus and Virgo, deepens the intractability. It generates a hard-line posture to hunker down in criticism and resistance rather than critical thinking. Venus is conjunct Lilith, the mythic point correlating to self-exile and rogue behavior, deepening the immersion into self-centered viewpoints.  Eris retrograde applies to a partile conjunction to the Lunar North Node in Aries, adding another layer of highly individuated, non-conforming behavior. The Lunar North Node holds latent future potential. One of the reasons that eclipses are so powerful is because at the eclipse, the lunar nodes are standing still, amplifying the moment with critical intensity because the lunar nodes delineate the karmic/evolutionary trajectory from past to future, played out in the present through direct emotional experience.

The Moon applies to a new phase conjunction to the Lunar North Node in Aries. The Moon applies to a 1^st quarter “crisis in action” square to Pluto in authoritative Capricorn. Pluto takes no prisoners. 

Mars and Mercury separate from a new phase conjunction to the Sun in Scorpio, ruled by Pluto. Mars, the lower octave of Pluto, rules Aries. Roman Mars was the protector of the city. Greek Ares was the God of blood lust. Mercury supports these dynamics with self-identifying ideas and opinions. As the polarity to Taurus, the archetype of Scorpio is even more deeply embedded in sacrosanct commitment. Scorpio can manifest as evil, releasing violence and destruction in the world. 

“Since the Hamas attack on Israeli citizens two weeks ago and Israel’s subsequent bombing campaign on Gaza, protesters have flooded American streets. Emotional debates have deeply unsettled Jewish and Palestinian communities and divided college campuses. Threats against synagogues and mosques have spiked, and a 6-year-old Palestinian-American boy in Chicago was stabbed to death.”

— https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/21/us/united-states-israel-ukraine-war.html

Critical choices regarding the planet’s immediate and future direction are on the table. The experience of these world parameters is not meant to create fear, though clearly, the atmosphere is full of anxiety. We are being warned. The next wave of karmic necessities is developing near the prophetic city of Megiddo. 

Our country’s governance is mired in political deadlock and the resurfacing of 250 years of racism, bigotry, and misogyny. Globally, six thousand years of patriarchal distortion are being called on the mat through traumatic awareness. Pluto correlates to metamorphosis. The world stands on a ledge as the King of the Underworld prepares to enter Aquarius, the archetype of revolution, alienation, mass trauma, and group hysteria. It is true that Aquarius progressively creates a new order. But it generally does this by uprooting and shattering the existing structures.

This eclipse is in sequence with Saros 146, which last occurred in October 2005. In that year:

• Eris was discovered, resulting in the International Astronomical Union defining the definition of a planet for the first time since Galileo, upending the worlds of astronomy and astrology.
• North Korea announced that it had nuclear weapons.
• Hurricane Katrina made landfall along the U.S. Gulf Coast, causing severe damage, killing over a thousand people and an estimated $108 billion in damage.
• A stampede in Baghdad, Iraq, killed 953 Shia Muslim pilgrims celebrating a religious festival.
• Israel demolished multiple settlements in the Gaza Strip.

Neptune in Pisces correlates to prophesy. Prophesy is not hearsay or delusion. It is a paranormal download from the etheric field. The Wheel of Fortune is spinning, seemingly out of control. What is happening is that the Fifth World is emerging as the Fourth World goes away. We chose to be here. What we value is changing. New priorities are emerging. Now, we must choose how we are going to survive. There are no easy answers. Venus rules the heart. Choose your path accordingly.

On October 14, 2023, an Annular Solar Eclipse will occur at 21° Libra 07’. A solar eclipse is an energetically magnified new moon. An annular solar eclipse happens when the Moon is at or near its apogee or farthest point from Earth and the Sun. As it passes between the Sun and the Earth, the Moon appears slightly smaller than the Sun in the sky, creating a ring of fire around the moon. Monthly lunations set a karmic agenda for the current lunar cycle every 29.5 days. Eclipses set the agenda for the next six months. 

It is an interesting enigma that from the Earth’s vantage point, the Sun, the Moon, and the Earth’s shadow appear to be the same size. We experience this mystery at each total eclipse as the Moon covers the Sun at a solar eclipse, and the shadow of the Earth covers the Moon at a lunar eclipse. I rank this enigma equal to how the ancients knew that the planets embodied the archetypal characteristics that they do and how these vibrations mirror terrestrial life experiences.  

Eclipses occur across the axis of the lunar nodes, where the ecliptic, the circle created by the Earth’s orbit around the Sun, intersects the path of the Moon’s orbit around the Earth. An eclipse occurs when the new or full moon occurs within 18° of the lunar nodes.  These two powerful pathways mark liminal time and space as the Moon and the Earth weave their planetary frequencies in diurnal motion. 

The intensity of eclipses is because the lunar nodal axis correlates directly to the karmic/evolutionary path itself, from past to future, synthesized in the present through the direct emotional experiences of the Moon in the current lifetime. Eclipses are breakdown or breakthrough events. Significant people enter and leave the planet when the celestial portals are open during the four-week eclipse period. 

The lunar south node applies to the Sun and Moon in Libra at this exceptional new moon. The past looms large in our awareness. Mercury conjunct Pallas Athene in Libra applies to a balsamic conjunction to the Sun and Moon, forming a Libra stellium. We cannot change the past, but we can alter our understanding of the karmic necessities that created it. Higher knowledge can be discovered by listening to the still, small voice within. Mars in Scorpio separates from the Libran planetary merger, generating the necessity to make better, more conscious choices regarding our relationships with ourselves, others, and the planet going forward. 

The outer planets weigh in heavily on this event. The eclipse applies to a last quarter “crisis in consciousness” square to Pluto in Capricorn. The God of the Underworld is moving direct again after his recent annual retrograde cycle and approaches his entry into Aquarius, where he will reside for the next twenty years. Capricorn materializes, initiates, substantiates, and manifests. All the ongoing structuring will now be completed in these final degrees of the sign. What has been planted and cultivated over the last twenty years has reached fruition and is ready for harvest. Make conscious choices. Gather up only what is essential. Weed out what is harmful and recycle it back into the Earth.  

The eclipse applies to a last quarter (waning) trine to Saturn retrograde in Pisces, encouraging a more compassionate understanding of how things are. The impetus is to review and restructure what has come before, where necessary. To mentally and emotionally rebalance and find new footing. The eclipse applies to a gibbous (waxing) inconjunct to Neptune retrograde in Pisces and a full phase (waning) inconjunct to Uranus retrograde in Taurus. These internal pressures stipulate commitment to sustaining what is essential for survival and finding the necessary self-forgiveness and self-reliance to strive to do the right thing going forward. 

The Lunar North Node applies to rogue planet Eris retrograde in Aries. Though the future seems hazy and insecure, a karmic drama is unfolding that compels change, even if it appears to be an uninvited guest. 

We are see-sawing back and forth, retreating from the past and apprehensive of the future. We must find the balance point and come to terms with the past while dreaming the future with stronger intentions. If the image is still fuzzy around the edges, we have not yet visualized it into focus. The universe is a mental metaverse. We can awaken the lucid dream.

This eclipse will be visible for millions of people in the Western Hemisphere. On Oct. 14, 2023, an annular solar eclipse will cross North, Central, and South America. 

“I feel the Earth move under my feet

I feel the sky tumbling down

I feel my heart start to tremble

Whenever Uranus comes around.”

—Paraphrased from Carole King

On August 28^th, 2023, Uranus stands still at 23° Taurus 04′ and joins Mercury, Venus, Chiron, Saturn, Neptune, Pluto, Eris, and asteroid Hygeia retrograde in the sky from an earthbound geocentric perspective.

The outer planets, Saturn through Eris, only retrograde once a year, and it is common for several of them to be retrograde simultaneously. But having eight in retrograde condition is a rare occurrence. 

At the station retrograde, Pluto in Capricorn retrograde and Pallas Athene in Virgo form an Earth Grand Trine with Uranus. The higher mind is activated. Ceres conjoins the Lunar South Node in Libra and casts a challenging partile gibbous inconjunct at Uranus. What has been lost is counted and measured. 

Contrary to some astrological forecasting, retrograde does not mean a lessening or diminution of the planetary energies. It is an intensification, as the planet stands still, focused over a single zodiacal point, drilling down like the Sun through a magnifying glass until what is at the focal point bursts into flames. This planetary behavior is what creates erratic, sometimes difficult circumstances. 

Uranus is often a rogue personality to begin with. It is the ruler of Aquarius, the sign that follows Capricorn in the zodiacal wheel. Capricorn is the generative cardinal Earth sign. It creates form and structure. It correlates to consensus authority and maturity, or growing old. There is crystallization and resistance to change. Things get stuck. A law of physics states that two things cannot occupy the same space at the same time. Aquarius comes along and shakes up the crystallized forms, shatters them so that something else, usually more progressive, can take their place. 

This is why Aquarius and Uranus correlate to rebellion and revolution. Uranus was discovered at the time of the American Revolution, the founding of the United States, and the drafting and ratification of the US Constitution. The Founding Fathers stated their intention to be the first republic of government by the governed since Ancient Greece. It has not necessarily unfolded that way, but that is another story. It is also true that the US did not become united until after the American Civil War. Up until that time, it was a loose confederation of individual states. It has become apparent in recent history that the union is still incomplete. Six nations of Iroquois Indians formed a functioning democracy, the Iroquois Confederacy, “People Building a Long House,” sometime between 1000 and 1450 AD. Benjamin Franklin hoped to use that model to structure the emerging American nation.

Astrologers are now becoming aware of the astrological coincidences of both the American Revolution and the Civil War through the current transits of Neptune and Pluto to the charts cast for the founding of the United States. The upcoming twenty-year transit of Pluto through the sign of Aquarius will echo these frequencies throughout history for decades to come.^,

The base note of all of these retrogrades is Pluto. Pluto correlates directly to the Soul. It is the lexicon of our karmic responsibilities in this lifetime, as individuals and as a collective. Any retrograde archetype is a revisitation of what is unresolved. As the balance of 2023 unfolds, we will have ample opportunities to revisit the unfinished work on ourselves and the world in general. The crises and stresses that have been visited upon us are the pressure points meant to leverage action, new priorities, and new choices. There is a non-negotiable extinction horizon that we are approaching from climate change, nuclear war, pandemics, and food and water shortages, to name a few. Any one of these can potentially eliminate much of our planet’s life. The Earth itself will survive. We will experience a mass awakening of consciousness that predicates the New Earth we have been promised. My vision is that the Capricorn and Aquarius generations now coming onto the planet will provide the impetus, methodologies, and solutions for what we have wrought over too many centuries, albeit millennia. 

Uranus will station direct again on January 27, 2024 at 19° Taurus 05′.

It’s going to be okay in the end. If it isn’t OK, it is because it is not the end. 

And anyway, the Masters tell us that we don’t die.

Namaste.

Mercury Retrograde 2023 Part 2

On August 23, 2023, Mercury will appear to stand still in the sky at 21° Virgo 51’ S and begin its second retrograde cycle for this year. Contrary to popular belief, a retrograde condition is not a lessening of the intensity of the archetype. It is an intensification as the planet drills down over an extended period like holding a magnifying glass up to the Sun to focus its rays on a single spot until it bursts into flame. 

Virgo might be Mercury’s residence, sequestered, comfortably ensconced in his nuances and perceived imperfections. Virgo is the mutable version of the Earth element, adaptable and able to ground change. Like its outward-directed counterpart, Mercury in Gemini, receptivity permeates thinking, gathering data with mental fluidity, but unlike Gemini, the perspective is a pensive and critical inward gaze. 

It is a little-recognized fact that Virgo is a very creative archetype. Virgo rules the hands. Its natives are expert craftsmen and designers, giving attention to the smallest detail and able to create exquisite handiwork. 

Virgo is a very spiritual sign. In Pisces, its polarity, we go to the mountaintop seeking divinity. In Virgo, we come back down from the mountain inspired by that spiritual experience to work on ourselves and perform the rituals and ceremonies that celebrate and express our spirituality.  

Mercury is in close company at the station retrograde with asteroid Pallas Athene and Mars. I recently wrote a forecast about Mercury conjunct Pallas Athene. Asteroid Pallas Athene acts as an “octave transformer,” integrating left-brain conceptions with right-brain prototypes. Irrational ideas become workable rational solutions. 

The intensity deepens as Mercury applies to a 1^st Quarter (waxing) Trine to Pluto retrograde in Capricorn. Mentation takes on the responsibility of descending below the surface to discern where the work needs to be done. 

Mercury applies to a challenging Gibbous (waxing) Opposition to Neptune in Pisces, also retrograde. Rationality and its confining boundaries dissolve, suggesting new pathways to self-understanding. 

Additional retrograde energy is instilled as Mercury separates from a Gibbous Inconjunct to Chiron and applies to Gibbous Inconjuncts to Eris, conjunct the Lunar North Node stationed direct in Aries. It has been suggested by a number of astrologers that Chiron, which is Greek for hand, and connected with homeopathic hands-on healing, is the ruler of Virgo. Rogue personality Eris challenges us to color outside the box as we explore new possibilities for the future selves we are becoming.

Mercury applies to New Phase Semisextile Ceres conjunct the Lunar South Node stationed direct in Libra. Our self-evaluation is painfully reminded of what we have lost or discarded. 

The Moon in Scorpio forms a partile (exact) Full Phase Opposition to Uranus in Taurus. The emotional intensities generated by Mercury’s retrograde station shake the foundation of what we have taken for granted about ourselves and forces us to rethink our direction and who we are becoming.

This Mercury retrograde cycle will last for 23 days.  

• August 26 ~ Mercury conjoins Pallas Athene for a second time.
• August 30 ~ Mercury perfects to the Gibbous (waxing) Inconjunct to Chiron.
• September 4 ~ Mercury perfects to a 1st Quarter (waxing) Trine to Jupiter conjunct the Moon and Aquarius.
• September 6 ~ Mercury perfects to a Gibbous (waxing) Sesquisquare to Pluto.
• September 6 ~ Mercury makes its Inferior Conjunction with the Sun.
• September 7 ~ Mercury perfects to Full Phase (waning) Inconjunct to asteroid Hygeia potentially coincides with a new COVID variant.
• September 8 ~ Mercury perfects to a Balsamic (waning) Semisquare to Ceres.
• September 9 ~ Mercury perfects to a Last Quarter (waxing) Square to the Lunar South Node Rx in Libra and a 1st Quarter (waxing) Sesquisquare to the Lunar North Node in Aries.September 10 Mercury perfects to a Gibbous (waxing) Sesquisquare to Eris Ex in Aries.
• September 15 ~ Mercury Stations Direct at 8° Virgo 0’.
• Mercury exits its shadow on September 30.  

We can navigate this transit best by:

Remembering that Hermes is the only God who can enter and leave the Underworld unharmed.

Letting go of the fear that our equipment and appliances will fail.

Letting go of the resistance to look inward at what work needs to be done.

Opening up to the higher frequencies of the outer planets and letting them work their magic.

Being kind to ourselves and others if any of those things do occur.

Today, August 15^th, 2023, Donald Trump and 18 allies were indicted on RICO charges by Georgia grand jury. RICO stands for Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, created to combine multiple criminal acts for organized crime into a single case. This is the fourth and most serious of the pending judicial cases against the former president.

The implications of this event will reverberate forward and backward through history and will transform the unfolding future of the United States. This monumental judicial event occurred at the onset of a new lunar cycle. The new moon and full moon charts reflect intense karmic/evolutionary influences on the country’s present and future, reflecting a timeline that stretches back to the country’s earliest days, born in revolution and tempered into union by civil war. 

• The Leo New Moon of August 16^th, 2023, closely conjoins the US Lunar North Node in Leo, opposing the US South Node in Aquarius. 
• The transiting Aries Lunar North Node conjunct rogue personality Eris in Aries forms partile Last Quarter Trine to the US Lunar North Node. It separates from a partile Last Quarter Sextile to the Lunar South Node. The transiting Libra Lunar South Node applies to a Balsamic Conjunction to the US Moon in Libra. The US Moon applies to a Crescent Sextile to the US Lunar North Node completing a Mystic Rectangle configuration.

The lunar nodes are the karmic evolutionary trajectory from the past to the future. The lunar south node holds the emotional reverberation from the past. The past has already happened, but its effects are still in the zeitgeist, mostly below the surface of awareness. The lunar north node is a probable future to be determined by choices made in the present influenced by the current Libra Moon. The lessons are listening to the essential needs of others and finding balance, unity, and commonality. 

• Transiting Pluto applies to US Pluto in Capricorn conjunct asteroid Vesta, intensifying the current US Pluto Return.
• Transiting Neptune retrograde in Pisces applies to a Full Phase Opposition to US Neptune, the condition it was in at the attack on Fort Sumpter in 1861 and the onset of the American Civil War.

These are strong indications that history is repeating itself. The issues of human rights, freedom of expression, “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” are on the agenda.

• Transiting Uranus in Taurus applies (within 2°) to a Fixed T-Square with the stationed retrograde US Lunar Nodal axis.
• Transiting Uranus separates from a partile fated Septile to the US Sun in Cancer. 
• Transiting Uranus is only one year from being in orb of the US Uranus Return.

A new cycle of tearing down what has become crystallized is underway. Uranus is the planetary archetype of rebellion and revolution. We have always thought that revolution would come from the progressive Left. The inconvenient truth is that not only is it the right that feels disenfranchised, but for the most part, they are the ones with the guns.

• Transiting Mars in Virgo separates from a New Phase Conjunction to US Neptune, days away from a Mars Return.

Mars is the God of War. Aries, ruled by Mars, correlates to self-interest and non-cognitive impulsive reaction. Virgo is the archetype of “growth through crisis” brought about by direct emotional experience.

• The New Moon applies to a Balsamic Conjunction to Transiting Venus in Leo, the ruler of the US Chart (Libra rising).

This has an overarching effect on the general population and their common welfare.

• Transiting Jupiter in Taurus separates from Last Quarter “crisis in consciousness” Square to US Mercury, ruler of the US 9^th House (the judicial system) and the US 12^th House (hidden enemies).
• Transiting Saturn in Pisces retrograde applies to a Balsamic Conjunction to US Lunar South Node.

The time has come to take responsibility, re-image what has happened, and learn from past mistakes.

• Transiting and US Pluto are applying to a Balsamic Conjunction to transiting Eris retrograde in Aries.

Eris is an evolutionary catalyst. Nine perfections of Eris to US Pluto will occur from 2026 to 2030. They will continue to move in and out of square to each other for another 32 years until 2052.

Most of these conditions will persist at the Pisces Full Moon on August 30^th, 2023. 

• The full moon forms a Mutable T-Square with US Uranus. 

An indication of more than usual public unrest.

• The Pisces Moon will separate from a New Phase Conjunction to Saturn. 

• A crisis-laden Yod, “Finger of God,” points US Venus and the Lunar North Node from Neptune retrograde in Pisces and Pluto retrograde in Capricorn.

This indicates intense pressures on the population’s mood as a result of the emergence of subconscious insecurities about the future. 

• Jupiter applies to a fated partile Crescent Septile to the US Sun. 

Destiny meets the US justice system. 

• Mars applies to a partile New Phase Conjunction to US Saturn.

Opportunities arise for new choices that fulfill the promise of 

“Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”

I will leave it to the reader to intuitively discern the future of our country and the world at large. Like the times of the American Revolution, and the Civil War, foreign agencies are watching events in this country with an eye to what is to their best advantage. We must find a source of trust and understanding of the unfolding events. I can only add that “Man plans, and God laughs.” Take that for what it is worth.

On August 16, 2023, a new moon occurs at  23° Leo 17’ at 5:38 am EDT. Leo is the fixed condition of self-actualization, which initiates in cardinal Aries and culminates in mutable Sagittarius. Ruled by the Sun, Leo channels solar energy that permeates us with Life Force. This intense male frequency is balanced with feminine energy from Venus transiting through her retrograde cycle and Black Moon Lilith, the secondary focal point of the Moon’s elliptical orbit, sublimating a retroactive rogue quality to this lunation.

All of the personal planets, Mercury, Venus, Mars, and the Sun and Moon, occupy the first six houses of the natural zodiac, which implies that the lunation is the beginning of a new cycle of personal development. Anchored by the fifth and sixth houses, the baseline is work on the self and growth through crisis. 

The heavy outer planets, Saturn, Neptune, and Pluto, are in their annual retrograde cycles deepening and intensifying personal work. Their transits through the last quadrant of the natural zodiac correlate to collective experiences that express individual authenticity, both for better and for worse. Self-organizing groups are increasingly coalescing around shared beliefs. 

Pluto continues to square the lunar nodes generating necessities for fulfilling incomplete karmic responsibilities. Juno at 0° Leo instills more distaff energy as it completes a grand cross, opposing Pluto and squaring the lunar nodes. Juno was the wife of Zeus, who was of equal rank to her husband among the Olympians but denied its expression. Zeus was a prolific philanderer, causing great distress in his relationship with Hera. Hera was the Olympian queen of the gods, and the goddess of marriage, women, the sky, and the stars of heaven.¹ Despite it all, she remained faithful to him, committed to their marriage. 

The new moon separates from a waxing partile (exact) 1^st Quarter “crisis in action” Square to Uranus retrograde in Taurus. Sun and Moon apply to a waxing facilitating 1^st Quarter Trine to the Aries Lunar North Node and waxing Crescent Sextile to the Libra Lunar South Node.

There are karmic implications that this lunation directs us to renew and be unwavering in our commitment to our self-development, who we are, and who we are becoming. 

“The only person you are destined to become is the person you decide to be. Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.”

– Ralph Waldo Emerson

1. https://www.theoi.com/Olympios/Hera.html ↩︎

Mercury 

Mercury, the planet closest to the sun, rules two signs. Mercury’s outward-directed Yang expression is Gemini, the world of words and ideas. In its Yin expression, energy moving inward toward the center, Mercury rules Virgo, the sacred space of ritual and ceremony, and work on the self.  

Who Was Athena?

On August 8, 2023, Mercury will conjoin asteroid Pallas Athene at 14° Virgo, Mercury’s Yin, introspective expression. Athena was second only to Zeus in the Greek pantheon, above Apollo. Athena was born parthenogenetically from her father’s crown chakra. A soothsayer had prophesied that the second child he bore would be more powerful than him, so he swallowed Metis, whose name means wisdom, Athena’s mother. One day, he was in a field with his son  Hephaestus, the Greek god of armor and metalwork, and was seized by a violent headache. He asked Hephaestus to use his battle axe to cleave his skull to release the pain, and Athena leaped out, fully clad in golden armor, waving her spear and shouting a battle cry. She was a virgin goddess. She resisted all amorous advances, had neither consort nor offspring and was given the attribution parthenos, meaning a chaste maiden. This name became the Parthenon in Athens. 

There was a contest to determine the patron of Athens between Athena and Poseidon. Poseidon struck the ground and created a spring of fresh water for the city. Athena instead planted an olive tree to represent peace and won the contest.

Athena was the patron goddess of household crafts, sewing and weaving, and pottery which allowed cooking. She gave men the bridle to harness horses for their work. 

Athene was a peace activist and would always try to negotiate peace, but she never shunned from taking up arms and going to battle. In Homer’s Iliad, she fought alongside the Greek war god Ares and the heroes of the Greek classical age.  She represents the intellectual and civilized side of war and the virtues of justice and skill, whereas Ares represents mere blood lust. She wore the aegis, her father’s breastplate when she goes to war which represented fear, strife, defense, and assault. She was associated with birds, particularly the owl, which became famous as the city’s own symbol, and with the snake. 

Mercury and Pallas Athene

Planet Mercury and asteroid Pallas Athene have an important relationship with each other. Astrologically, there is a principle known as planetary octaves. Uranus, as the illogical, irrational higher mind, correlates to the higher octave of Mercury, which is the lower rational mind. Pallas Athene holds a special place in this archetypal structure as the octave transformer between lower mind Mercury and higher mind Uranus. As the Goddess of Wisdom and Strategy, Pallas Athene can transform the sometimes seemingly impossible mental downloads from Uranus into rational, workable strategies. As these two mental forces conjoin, the potential for mental inspiration is magnified.

The Conjunction of Mercury and Pallas Athene in Virgo

Due to Mercury’s retrograde cycles, the conjunction will occur three times: 

• August 8, 2023, at 22° Virgo
• August 26, 2023, at 21° Virgo Rx
• October 12, 2023, at 13° Libra

This current Mercury-Pallas cycle will persist until January 21, 2025.

Virgo

Virgo sets the tone for this series of conjunctions. Virgo pertains to work on the self. It is growth through crisis. We can study foreign languages and learn mathematics or rocket science, but what we truly master are the lessons that we learn by direct emotional experience. If we are smokers, we do not stop because everyone tells us to. We only stop when we have a serious health crisis, sometimes, it takes more than one. 

A rich repository of opportunities for work on the self will persist throughout this 18-month cycle with intuitive support. The three conjunctions will utilize personal introspection to establish both mental clarity and self-compassion, which is free of emotional imbalances. Mercury’s retrograde cycle will drive us deeper into our psyches to expose what we need to work on and how to do it. 

Intuitive messages from Pallas are sometimes startling in their synchronicity. We are more likely to react rather than respond or ignore them. Our first reaction might be dismissal. Our rational mind says, “That’s impossible.” Awareness of mental impulses increases, and we become more receptive to mental downloads. It is never necessary to jump on any bandwagons with banners unfurled, but become the observer and watch to see who and what shows up in your outer world. 

The first Hermetic Principle is that the Universe is mental. Ideas are seed thoughts that, over time, sprout roots and leaves. Our eyes are not receivers, they are projectors. Our thoughts script the events of our lives. Our reality is projected on our outer world. The world around us does not control us. Like the stars that circle overhead, our outer world is our reflection.

1^st Conjunction

At the 1^st conjunction, Mercury and Pallas: 

• Separate from a waning Full Phase Opposition to Saturn retrograde in Pisces.
• Apply to a waxing 1^st Quarter trine to Jupiter conjunct Uranus in Taurus. 
• Apply to a waxing 1^st Quarter square to asteroid Vesta in Gemini.
• Though the Moon does not form any aspect to Mercury-Pallas, it separates from a conjunction only 2° degrees away from Uranus.

A push-me/pull-me condition exists. We can feel stuck between divergent ideas and pathways forward. The struggle is between what our heart tells us to do and what we think necessity demands. A mental startle reflex activates. The cognitive terrain is rocky and uneven, and we might feel “lost at sea.” The higher mind struggles to do “the right thing,” stick to what is “essential,” “The right thing” is elusive, and what is “essential” may not be. This crisis catalyzes our instinctual nature requiring that we examine where we are and where we are going. 

Pluto retrograde in Capricorn squares the lunar nodes requiring the resolution of unresolved karmic issues. An internal discussion ignites the spark that initiates personal growth. Venus, retrograde in the sign of Leo, suggests that these unresolved issues concern our relationships with ourselves and others.

2^nd Conjunction

During Mercury’s retrograde cycle, a second conjunction occurs on August 26^th at 22° Virgo. 

• A mutable grand cross is briefly drawn across the sky as Mercury-Pallas in Virgo applies to a gibbous opposition to Neptune retrograde in Pisces. 
• A Sagittarius Moon separates from full phase opposition to asteroid Vesta in Gemini. 

Mercurial energies continue to saturate the atmosphere. Conversations, gossip, innuendo, and lies swirl through the zeitgeist like ribbons on a maypole. The Moon emotionally accelerates the mental maelstrom inside our heads. We can silence our ideas, but it is much harder to sublimate our emotions.

A facilitating grand trine in the earth signs helps Mercury become more receptive to Pallas, as the conjunction by aspect separates from Pluto and applies to Uranus. Discussions are grounded in issues regarding self-empowerment and implementing structured innovation. 

The Libra Lunar North Node triangulates compatible frequencies from Saturn in Pisces and Vesta in Gemini to Mercury and Pallas. Any intention for the future needs to include taking ownership of authenticity and a sacred commitment to self. 

Thor’s Hammer strikes Venus retrograde in Leo from a Sagittarius Moon and Neptune retrograde in his native water world of Pisces. Our emotional experiences with the emerging world around us are reshaping our values and priorities. We are going to learn to sink or swim, one way or another.

Thor’s Hammer strikes Mars in Gemini from Jupiter in Taurus and asteroid Hygeia retrograde in Aquarius. Pointed discussions about our choices continue to populate the airwaves, discussions with others, and inside our heads. 

3^rd Conjunction

As Mercury returns to her forward progression across the ecliptic, the third conjunction occurs on October 12, 2023, at 14 ° Libra. Goddess Athene and her Hermetic partner are supercharged, especially after their recent meetup with the Libran Sun. What do I see in you that I see in myself? I am listening. What can you tell me? What do I need to know? How can we stop the madness?

Destiny Balances In The Air

A Full Moon at 9° Aquarius 15’ occurs on August 1, 2023, at 2:31 pm EDT. The Moon forms a fated bi-septile to the Lunar South Node in Libra and Uranus in Taurus. Destiny balances in the air like the precipitousness of a coming thunderstorm. There is a concentration of retrograde energies between Chiron, Eris, and the Lunar North Node in Aries. Something rogue and unexpected threatens to either wound or enlighten us. The Moon squares Jupiter. The ground is shaking beneath our feet. 

Mercury, Mars, and Pallas Athene in Virgo propose uncomfortable non-negotiable choices. There are reports that COVID is re-emerging. This current record-breaking summer heatwave is the elephant in the room. It has thrust climate change into our critical awareness. 

Why is the sign of Aquarius associated with rebellion and revolution? How do we individuate and become our authentic selves? Capricorn is the sign that precedes Aquarius. Capricorn is Cardinal Earth. Ruled by Saturn, it creates form and structure. It correlates to maturity and the aging process. What happens is that the structures Saturn creates become crystallized, hardened, and stuck. The hurricane-force winds of Aquarius shatter the crystallization creating the space for something new to awaken. Innovation reveals new ways of dealing with old issues. This process occurs cyclicly within societies and ourselves. 

Change is disruptive. The security of what is believed and known is threatened as the ground shifts. Change is the only constant. Everything is in a constant state of imperceptible growth. Sometimes change is unexpected and startling. 

Polarity is the basic format of the Universe. Everything that exists is in contrast to what it is not. Astrological archetypes exist as polarities. The polarity of Aquarius is Leo, the fixed archetype of the self-actualization process. Our ego, or self-image, realized in the sign of Cancer, is projected outward in Leo as our personality. Leo is who we are. Aquarius is who we are becoming. Most often, gradual growth is hard to observe day to day. We do not necessarily detect change when we look at ourselves daily in the mirror. We would see our startling changes more clearly if we viewed a stream of Timelapse photography over many days, months, or years.

Many of us anticipate the Age of Aquarius. There is much disagreement about that timeline. What might it look like? Would it be a gentle, gradual change process or sudden, cataclysmic, and disruptive?

Astrologically we are standing at the threshold of Pluto’s transit through Aquarius. We have already had a taste of what to expect as Jupiter and Saturn transited the sign of individuation over the last decade. Climate change, Donald Trump, and COVID are the benchmarks of our current time. Each of these events has also changed the world around us and our lives. 

The Sabian Symbol for Aquarius 10 reads: 

“A MAN WHO HAD FOR A TIME BECOME THE EMBODIMENT OF A POPULAR IDEAL IS MADE TO REALIZE THAT AS A PERSON HE IS NOT THIS IDEAL.”

Native American prophesy tells us that the Earth has been destroyed three times. Each time the “faithful” were delivered by going underground. This time, we will not need to retreat underground. The Fourth World is emerging even as the Third World goes away. But we will only each survive by becoming as strong as we can physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. The clock is ticking. The wake-up alarm is already ringing.