Mercury’s retrograde from July 7th to the 31st joins the signs of Leo and Cancer, and includes a Full Moon/lunar eclipse in Capricorn (July 16th) and a Leo New Moon just hours before the retrograde ceases. Earth will also be receiving impactful energies from Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and Uranus.
I’ve put together some notes to help us meet these energies and support our physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual health:
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In a vacuum, there is nothing. And then, a point: o
It follows, there is a second point. And then, a line can exist. o—o
A third point, with connecting lines, allows for a plane, or face.
The plane, if tipped, turned, spun, or flipped, reveals that still it is nothing, still the vacuum. Existence requires dimension. So, the fourth point. And with it: space, form, and the capacity to exist.
Like the fourth point, the fourth sign of the Zodiac, Cancer, introduces depth, and with it, life. All who live spring from Root—the ancestors, the foundational root system of the Plant, the wombs of mothers—and this is exactly where Cancer energy is held.
Beginning with Solstice, the Sun traverses Cancer from June 21 to July 22, joined in part by Mercury, Venus, Mars, the North Node, and the Moon. Lessons and energies inherent to Cancer season, and those born within it:
BEING MINDFUL OF:
OPENING UP TO:
Cancerian blessings!
Phil
The Sun traverses Gemini from May 21st to June 21st, joined in part by Mercury, Venus, and the Moon (new on June 3rd). Lessons and energies inherent to this season, and those born within it:
Opening up to:
Being mindful of:
These paintings are birthed from the being and brush of artist Leah Fargo, who has Sun conjunct Venus in Gemini.
See my other writings:
Saturn and the South node conjoin on April 30, 2019, just as Saturn stations retrograde (the South Node’s primary direction). Usually, this once-per-twelve-year conjunction would only last about a week. But this time, they roll together in reverse, and Saturn is conjunct the South Node for six months! Thus, a short opportunity for karmic balancing becomes a major energetic influence.
Continue readingI have been cooking up some longer-form writings that go along with Saturn’s conjunction with the South Node from now through October. Intuitively, I was led to focus on this extended conjunction, and I have found a whole lot of meaning and focus—and even a shimmer of light for the world in the midst of the anthropocene. What follows was written in a burst following the writing of my previous post inspired by the book Of Water and the Spirit. It concerns Saturn’s role in the protection of indigenous and magical traditions and truths.
When I think of the sacred healing modalities in astrological terms, I see them reflected in the planets who orbit the Sun outside of Saturn. Uranus, the ruler of astrology; Neptune, a magnet of emotional and psychic insight; Chiron and soul-sprung healing; and Pluto of the underworld, where deep shifts and true transformation begin. These planets are not visible to the naked eye, and so were not discovered until thousands of years after astrology as we know it was first taking form. For these millenia, Saturn was known as the most distant planet in our solar system, and so it carried indications of endings, limits, boundaries, and borders.
The truth that revealed itself in time is that Saturn is a guardian of the magical outer planets, and so in order to properly harness and engage with their magic, a person must pass first through Saturn’s rites. Without enduring Saturn’s lessons, we cannot properly respect the power of the outer planets. In intact indigenous cultures, this equates to initiation. Of course, in dominant culture, we have nothing like initiation. But Saturn doesn’t care. Everyone who lives to see their thirties goes through a Saturn return, and this initiation is formed around the birth chart and life circumstances of each person.
Improper (and dangerous) practitioners of the divinities are those who lack a developed respect and reverence—Saturn lessons—for their tradition, be it astrology, tarot, shamanic journeying, energy work, etc. Saturn will always stand guard before the bridge that connects humankind with the magical practices and access to greater truth. In traditional cultures, rituals, initiations and tribal elders serve in this Saturnine role. In modern dominant culture, however, Saturn has become terribly polluted, and perhaps mortally injured, in its guardianship of the sacred.
For numerous off-base reasons, dominant culture teaches little-to-no respect for the aging population. Their wisdom is dismissed as out-of-touch with a rapidly-changing world with limited capacity for the creative reflection which would translate elders’ lessons into applicable teachings. Dominant culture has replaced elderhood with institutional, dueling authorities on Truth: science and religion. The integrity of these institutions is constantly derailed by their adherence to modern times’ hulkingest power and the most tragic manifestation of Saturn: colonialist capitalism, its foundation of false scarcity leading to greed and competition, and the cruelty inherent.
For the time over which these trends have developed, the divinities have been skillfully casted into irrelevance by manifestations of the polluted Saturn. Nonetheless, they still exist in some form, and are practiced and appreciated by a small portion of the population. Saturn’s 2020 conjunctions with Pluto will perhaps help heal dominant culture’s darkly mutated forms of the planet, and the journey toward a more healthy Saturn may indeed begin. But whether or not this occurs, spiritual practitioners have a duty to uphold their traditions, and to pass their ancient knowledge on to descending generations. Along with the world’s intact traditional cultures, these orphaned diviners—outside of the rare, misaligned practitioners—still have some semblance or variation of a properly functioning, spirit-protecting Saturn. And perhaps that will serve the world to come as our disconnected populations search for grounding.
I recently received an astrology question that I felt worthy of a fleshed-out answer. So, it’s time for another installment of the Q & A blog series.
Question: I’m not trained in astrology but I’m curious about why it is that astrologers seem to stay fixated on the natal chart? Wouldn’t that just be a snapshot of what you entered this plane of existence with? Or would the progressed chart be more of what you have the opportunity to develop internally?? I’m just thinking about how transit charts are usually drawn up in relation to the natal and not the progressed. You came to mind during these intuitions so I thought I’d ask what your reflections or thoughts are about that.
Answer: I appreciate your thoughtfulness and questioning of convention. The layers of your questions here beg for unpacking. In my astrological pursuits, I’m always trying out ideas to see how/if they work, and really I would recommend you do the same here. Try comparing transiting planets to your progressed chart, and see if something clicks. Certainly it won’t work the same as transiting planets around the natal chart. But perhaps something of value awaits you there.
I look at the progressed chart as an unfolding of a person’s greater life narrative. The energies presented there definitely touch on personal evolution sprung from within, but just like astrology as a whole, they also reflect one’s narrative outside of inner life. I’ve seen health issues culminate and relationships come in, as well as rises to prominence and shifts into hermitude in progressed charts. My main resource on how to approach progressed charts is Bernadette Brady’s amazing book on predictive astrology The Eagle and the Lark. She is so incredibly thorough and attentive. And I recall her asserting that one’s progressed chart does not receive energetic influence from transiting planets. I had the same curiosity as you, but I decided to blindly trust her. She is so convincing! Or perhaps to give myself some credit, my inner being knew she was right, as I had some feint recollection of experimenting with it myself. This doesn’t mean that you aren’t being pulled to look into this for some reason.
Astrology was not always fixated on the natal chart. It developed very slowly, as the planets facillitated. And most astrologers/astronomers were concerned with the stars’ bearing on their collective/tribe/community moreso than on the individual (this is called “mundane astrology” in current language). I suppose times have changed! The first natal chart was drawn a little over two millenia ago, and now, natal astrology has taken over the entire field, aside from small interest in mundane, horary, and electional astrology. It makes sense, given all of the healing we need on the individual level at this time, perhaps in order to progress into some newly tinted ancient ways of living (it helps me to idealize the future). There is so much work to be done toward healing the planet, but I believe it has to start with the self, otherwise one’s work will be rendered ineffective by their unaddressed pain.
And yes, the natal chart is exactly a “snapshot of what you entered this plane of existence with.” A moment chosen by the higher self. We are born and develop into some version of the being reflected in that soul map, and the fully actualized self is the one who is most integrated with it. Why does it work when we compare transiting energies to this snapshot? Within the current knowledge paradigm, we can’t answer this with certainty. I started studying astrology as a doubter, but very quickly I grew comfortable with its built-in leaps of faith. So, generally, when I’m asked any number of questions about why astrology does this and that, instead of some other thing (and the debate goes on and on, even among astrologers’ nitpicking of techniques and house systems), I tend to encourage exploration. Because a lot of stuff works. And sometimes, a technique clicks and makes sense to one person, while to someone else it’s a jumbled mess. Astrology is a form of divination, and we ourselves are divine. There could be infinite applications! Just seek with reverence and the planets will respond.
I recently read the outstanding and revelatory book Of Water and the Spirit: Ritual, Magic, and Initiation in the Life of an African Shaman by Malidoma Patrice Some. The book is an autobiographical narrative which gives amazing details on Malidoma’s adolescence and initiation into adulthood in the Dagara tribe in Burkina Faso. As Malidoma begins his initiation, gathered around a fire with a group of other young tribesmen, a Dagaran elder offers the brilliant teachings of their tribal concept of the circle.
As I read this, I was immediately struck by the insights provided into astrology’s layout of the birth chart, and specifically the four angles or pivots around which the birth chart is arranged (Ascendent, Midheaven, Descendent, and Anticulminate). The elder’s teaching is paraphrased by Malidoma and then translated from Dagaran into English—an amazing feat in itself—and was delivered to the Dagaran initiates seated around this fire in the mid-1970s.
But first, Malidoma Some introduces the teaching. “What he said was this: the place where he was standing was the center. Each one of us possessed a center that he had grown away from after birth. To be born was to lose contact with our center, and to grow from childhood to adulthood was to walk away from it.”
Roughly, the birth chart is a circular astronomical map capturing a moment in space and time, with the center of the circle being the native in their birthplace. Imagine the native lying on her back, feet facing south. If she rolls to her left, she will see the eastern horizon, or the ascending point. Rolling to her right, she will see the descending point. All that is below the native is shown in the lower half of the chart, and all that is in the sky is shown above the Ascendent/Descendent axis, or horizon. When interpreted, the chart’s tellings are a reflection of the native in the center.
Continue readingIf the declination of Mars in a chart is greater than 23 degrees and 27 minutes north or south, this is considered Mars out of bounds. So what can this tell us about a person?
In astrology, we understand Mars as a representative of energies that are associated with modern masculinity, whether tainted or divine. In Mars we see the light and dark sides of ambition, desire, action, confidence, raw energy, conflict, the assertiveness/aggression spectrum, speed, leadership, advocacy, selfishness, fear/fear-mongering…
When Mars is out of bounds in a birth chart, the martial energies can appear quite evolved if Mars has been properly worked with. Or, when left unaddressed, these energies can appear rather depraved. For better or worse, Mars out of bounds is very empowered by its positioning outside of the ecliptic’s borders.
When Mars out of bounds is further bolstered by a strong placement in the birth chart—on the ascendant, midheaven, or descendent, in a dignified (Capricorn, Aries, Scorpio) sign, or in positive angular relationship to another strong planet—well, watch out, world.
Continue readingplus Chiron spirit channelings from Sacha Louise of BareRootAwakenings.com
Notes from the video:
Messages from the Chiron spirits channeled by Sacha Louise:
– “How do you heal a wound you yourself have not felt?”
– “Wounds do not come without healing and healing does not come without wounds.”
– “Medicine for the humble and the joyful, to be humble and joyful.”
– “Go offer a giggle and laugh to the next wound you see, knowing the only place to go from here is healing. Because it has been done before and it will happen again.”
– “This is the presence of sanity.”
I received an e-mail question from a client recently that I found myself answering very thoroughly. Ever since I have been “out” as an astrologer, people have expressed their reservations about an inherent lack of Free Will in astrology. This is part of a bigger problem of astrologers presenting the planets as causing events or feelings, rather than reflecting what is occurring. I could go on about the root of this instinct being lip service to the current patriarchical scientific paradigm of “knowledge”, but let’s just talk about free will, determinism, and astrology for now.
I paraphrase the e-mail quandary regarding astrology and free will:
Sometimes I have a perception of astrology as foretelling things that have already been written with little room for free will. This just isn’t actually very helpful or empowering for me. I’m curious about your approach to a life overview reading, and what your thoughts on free will vs. determinism are.
First off, let me say that I love receiving e-mails like this. E-mail me about your issues or questions with astrology!
And here are my thoughts in response:
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