Tag Archives: Capricorn

astrology, divination, ingress, planetary aspects, Root Medicine of the Stars

Jupiter Ducks The Lintel

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The first decan of Capricorn, being ruled by Jupiter, somewhat smooths the path for the largest known planet of our solar system. Traditionally Jupiter is considered uncomfortable in the cardinal Earth sign – however…..

……although Jupiter will initially unbalance, magnify and grab our attention, especially in those areas of our lives signified by Capricorn in our chart, use this creatively, perhaps as a blessing in disguise if the experience is troubling.

Such matters are being raised now so that we can take advantage, a Jupiterian trait, of the positive potential of this next two months or so.

The negatives are there too but this is a time in which we can see a dynamic balance at work between the positives and negatives, the highs and lows. Keep to your whirling centre and, if nothing else dance, spin and gather momentum.

Then, it’s down to work, will and focused intent – there is magic to be had with Capricornian Jupiter but it requires clear knowledge of its objective and a well developed understanding of its protocols to work that magic well.

The coming period up until the middle of January 2020 is where our best preparation for the coming year can take place. Don’t rush in; take your time, remember to look where you are going, and don’t bang your head-on the way in…..

…..now is not the time for thunder.

As always, with Jupiter aim for the highest good, but be vigilant of your works – remember the story of the Sorcerer’s Apprentice…..

Blessed Be!

asteroids, astrology, Capricorn Cancer axis, culture, Earth healing, planetary aspects, Politics, Root Medicine of the Stars

The Mirror and The Stars

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Embedded high up in immense cliffs a beautiful convex mirror is held within the rock matrix. Appearing as an artifact from another world, its pitted surface belies the magic it holds within. Covered in the dust of ages, unrecognisable but for the circular shape of its rim, it is a living archetype. Concretised and held fast, it conceals memories,  stories and knowledge, fossilised yet reaching far back in time….and yet, its lensing face pointing towards the stars, it holds the promise of a greater vision brought to earth.

Far below, on the shores of a deep and winding river a vast cavern echoes with ancient voices.  Each word a luminous spark ascending from a hidden fire, their rhythmic chant rises through the old forests lining the deep valley to become myriad stars wheeling high above the towering cliffs.

Between these realms a great tree connects heaven and earth. Older than all the forests, its roots reaching into the deepest subterranian realms, its branches touching unseen worlds between the stars, it is wise in its silent presence, intelligent beyond all earthly knowing.

The Power Of Persuasion

Deep in the heart of Saturn’s realm the July full Moon illuminates a world of extremes. At 28° Capricorn it speaks of ‘high station’, a place of elevation where the bedrock of law and power oversee the stability of the material realm. Its role is to balance the ineluctable interior forces of the imaginal world, here illuminated and activated through the Sun’s position at 28° Cancer, against the exteriorising power of the intellect, the reasoning and formalising potential of Nous. It is a balance between the felt and the abstracted.

In Capricorn this is the degree of the ‘Statesperson’, the lawful arbiter upon whose speech the nation’s well-being rests, through which it is negotiated. In Plato’s ‘Statesman’ this wordweaving is the handwork of Athene, upon whose paradigm he posits the craft of ‘politics’. It augers the power of words to arbitrate the anomalous, to find a place within the ‘sanctified whole’ for what James Hillman, in referencing the dilema of Orestes, translates as the ‘resident alien'(1). Orestes is a victim of necessity, caught between the worlds having transgressed sacred boundaries at the command of higher powers. He is torn between archai. The paradox is manifest in Ananke.

A symbolic representation of Necessity’s fundamental archetypal power, Plato described Ananke as ‘narrowing’, both of circumstance and scope, like ‘walking through a ravine which is impassable, rugged and overgrown, and impedes motion’. As an archetypal power Ananke carries something of Saturn’s signature, but it also embodies the irrepressible forces constellated at the emotional centre of the psyche. If released, which they must be for integration to be achieved, these fierce forces can manifest as anomalous outbursts, and their latency is made clear through their etymological links with angst and anxiety.

And yet, in its very narrowness, if redeemed of its alien otherness, Ananke intimates a ‘close bond’, a fundamental kinship, and natural and moral ties between persons. The balance sought through this Moon’s process of ‘negotiation towards integration’ seeks not to obliterate the anomalous identity and its latent power but to ‘normalise’ it, by finding a place for it within the ‘divine order’. The quality of this Moon, for all its paradoxical stresses, carries potential for reconciliation and healing. The key lies in the power of words.

In the ‘Oresteia of Aeschylus’ (2) it is indeed Athena who arbitrates the fate of Orestes, and she does so through the power of Peitho, Persuasion. This is the core active element working through this full Moon, but, it also carries magical overtones, through association with incantation and ‘spell-work’ that are equally persuasive.  These are of a more  hidden nature than Athene’s applied framework of reason and rhetoric. In fact rhetoric can be as magically persuasive as the esoteric power of words suggest, but, at root their power is here sourced in Ananke, rather than Nous.

At the Sun’s degree in Cancer we find both interwoven.

The Inner Radiance

The Moon’s influence finds its counter balance and resolution in the Cancer Sun, a point of contrast carrying the emotive language of a deeply innate source. At 28° Cancer the protective shell of the dwelling place has taken on the symbolism of ‘the cave of the ancestors’, the womblike opening in the earth, where we find our greater family itself embedded within the matrix of the fertile valley of Life. Its inhabitants, existing ourside of time and Saturn’s realm, subsume the full Moon’s high position. Arising from common roots within the matrix of life, the achievements of high culture are enriched by the deeper meaning they can deliver. Reconciling the tension between these polarity points is an act of healing, which Athene achieves through persuasive influence and inclusivity. But, her presence here originates with the Sun, the force behind original identity, through the asteroid Athene. One degree from the solar disc at full Moon, Athene is also found conjunct the TNO (Trans-Neptunian Object) Varuna.

In Varuna we find the pervasive presence of the divine that is ‘behind everything’. Varuna, representing the fundamental spiritual power beyond perception, was one of the pre-Vedic creation deities and the first ‘named’ TNO to be discovered beyond Pluto’s orbit (3). In fact Varuna, like Athene, is also associated with the application of law, to those who do not keep their word. But, unlike Athene’s application through human law, Varuna’s are natural laws, an expression of the incomprehensible cosmic order, as opposed to the order of society. In essense, Varuna is akin to the background radiation that infuses all in the material world, out of sight, but here, and distinctly not ‘out of mind’.

The corollaries of Athene, Pallas and Minerva, also hold the balance of the earth and water signs at full Moon – Pallas is at 5° Pisces and Minerva opposes at 3° Virgo. The triumvirate goddess is coherent by element, Minerva and the Moon in earth, Pallas, Athene and the Sun in water. The triplicated water element holds sway – a reflection of the healing potential needing to be brought to the people, represented by the Moon, a restorative to the soul.

The third decan of Capricorn in which we find the full Moon is sub-ruled by Venus, now quincunxing Pallas and Neptune from early Leo. Along with Mercury, Venus also trines Saturn in Sagittarius and the message is clear. The feminine energy now emphasises the need to integrate Athene’s qualities of holding and receptivity into the greater whole.

This is a Moon that encourages the healing power of Capricorn to prevail, its higher order concieved through feeling connections rather than applying the fruits of ambition. The metaphysical nature of language can overcome the physical attributes of the Moon’s degree. In doing so the people are called upon to remind the statespeople of their essential role, not as aggressively defensive representatives of nationalistic indentity, but, as people whose words and rhetoric embody the most noble and reconciliatory responsibilities of their high office – the resolution of the apparently irreconcilable, the disfunctional seperation between the power of the State and the voice of the People.

In Plato’s conception of the State the balance between Nous and Ananke is vital, and Athene’s role in maintaining it paramount, but, there is a deeper and more cosmological meaning at work here as Plato also considered creation to arise not out of the elements, but out of the interweaving (an Athenian word) of Nous and Ananke. It is in Athene’s power of rhetoric to carry ‘change’ to its next level that her creative side is revealed. She brokers the deal by incorporating necessity, giving it a rightful place. In our pathological world this is tantamount to taking back antagonistic elements of our shadow from projection, of integrating its presence and subsuming its forces into a higher, that is to say more holistic, order of consciousness.

As political as we might expect a Capricorn Moon to be, in its deeply founded instincts, impersonal yet natural, Ananke embodies ‘driving necessities’, and their prevelance cannot be denied amongst the body politic. Ananke is fundamental ‘being’ whose powers cannot be subsumed in themselves, but, which can be given their appropriate place, honoured and recognised, without compromise to either their integrity or the integrity of the whole.

This pathological quality is also a political necessity that infuses this full Moon with a need to recognise the driving forces behind our current circumstances, as well as the wounds they may inflict through eruption, both indicated by sextiles from the Moon to Mars in Scorpio, and Chiron in Pisces. Along with the Sun, this kite configuration can fly aloft and achieve great heights, but it is in the Sun’s anchoring position that its healing capacity is most fully illuminated. Without the root, the thread of generative power rising from within its womb like cavern, the past and the future become dangerously cut adrift from reality – and, without the ancestral thread, the people lose identity.

In this full Moon is a poigniant reflection of the current political upheavals through which we are seeing diplomacy being heavily orchestrated by the tension between both globalised political realignments and restructuring, much of which remains hidden and out of the hands of the people, and terrorist outbreaks of violence which release powerful irrational forces within the populace and the force of necessity within the body politic.

The cracked and tarnished mirror must be retrieved, moistened and worked upon to restore its soul reflecting potential, and the highest offices of power restored with a transparency and integrity that is capable of reflecting the soul of the collective. As it is, the mirror, as the People, occupies the moral and ethical vantage point, but, it is encrusted with centuries if not millenia of calcified political and social wounds, held fast and obscured.

It is a vantage point from which the Moon reflects the dangers of a world in which even the highest levels of consciousness are prone to wrong use, where its aspirations have become entrapped in false ideologies and hubristic illusion. If over-indulgent of its own level of importance, its position’s highest value can become clouded by irrelevance, forgotten amidst a jaded sense of self justifying meaning. Cut lose from the necessities of the mundane and secular through misuse of force and power, as much as from the People themselves, it posits its own truth in the face of the apparent opposite. This is the degree of Capricorn where leadership can manifest its own shadow, perhaps as clear an indication of the flavour of the times as we can expect.

However, the complimentary gift of this degree is its capacity for taking the Saturnian qualities of focus and realisation to the next level, and for those who can aspire towards and work with that potential, as well as for the dreamer who would set the mirror of their own soul free from the binding constraints of worldly power and necessity, a more transcendant role is also offered here.

The Divine Gift

Etymologically Athene is connected with both ‘attainment’ and ‘holding’. In maritime lore hers is the place at the top of the mast, the ‘Tau’, where the lookout is stationed. At the base of the mast is the holding box, the ‘Kau’, which corresponds to the centre of balance for the vessel. The dynamic between the two is itself extreme, the one pitching with every wave, exaggerating the energy of the swelling ocean, the other pivotal and steady, keeping the vessel bouyant, balanced around a common centre. Her role is to weave together, to foster the crafting of life through navigating a sure course, in all events, reconciling its vicarious nature between these polarities.

She can be seen as the Mother figure of the State, even though in her mythology she remained childless and in ‘virgin’ state herself. She is the fierce protector, fully armoured and ready for combat, but, in her capacity for finding healing words and containment she brings the feminine and the masculine into balance. She represents the middle way, the center ground which is capable of embracing the ‘abnormal’ through inclusivity based upon steadfast intelligence.

Like Saturn her emphasis on discipline is dispassionate, however, her persuasive reasoning can bring both energy and direction, and inspire while formulating goals of a higher order. In this full Moon she offers the means for releasing the light of reason, as a vehicle for life affirming forces to become re-integrated into the world, at a time when the mirror is defiled and its reflection cracked.

These are primal innate forces that can neither be named or objectified, but, which give rise to all that has become incarnate. Their highest expression transcends boundaries, as symbolised in the Tree of Life, but, just as the lunar disc is dependant upon the solar disc’s radiance for its glory at full Moon, the people are dependant upon the endless stream of ancestral voices singing us into being. As Hillman says, “in the mouth of Athene speech becomes a curative hymn, a word which etymologically means ‘spun’ or ‘woven words'”(4). There is great power for the good to be found in this, an enchantment. The ancestors voices give us our root identity and their light lives on in Nature, both on Earth and amongst the stars. In retrieving the mirror of the soul from its bondage in the material, our work at its restoration and re-enchantment will bring their reflection back to Earth and illuminate our souls.

(1) & (4) Facing The Gods ~ James Hillman, Spring Publications 1980

(2) The Oresteia of Aeschylus ~ trans. G. Thompson, Cambridge University Press, 1938

(3) Varuna was discovered in the year 2,000; not the first minor planet to be observed beyond Pluto’s orbit, it was the first to be given a name. It has been designated the number 20000.

Asteroid Athene’s number is 881; Pallas is 2; Minerva is 93

The imagery at the head of this article came from a dream many years ago which arrived under a Capricorn full Moon and was fleshed out, its inner significance to this time confirmed, through meditations on the degrees for the Sun and Moon sourced in the Sabian symbols and the divinatory meaning given to these degrees through the Chandra symbols.

Root Medicine of the Stars

Reality Checks – First Quarter 2015

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cave nebula

The quarter between December Solstice and March Equinox began  with a new Moon and, just a few hours later, we saw Saturn entering tropical Sagittarius. Following the turning point of the solar cycle these lunar and planetary influences are now emerging with increasing effect. Against the backdrop of the final two squares between Pluto and Uranus, which frame this quarter, we are now poised at the beginning of a sea-change that will unfold throughout 2015 and beyond.

Planetary activation of the fire signs by Saturn, Jupiter and Uranus in particular will give pace and a radical edge to much of the year. But, it is the Saturn transit of Sagittarius, which takes us through 2017, that augers the predominant change of mood. Over the first half of this transit, we will see Saturn’s square to Neptune begin replacing Uranus square with Pluto as the most defining planetary aspect in the field. The first quarter of the 2015 solar cycle is a time in which this aspect will build, but, the lunar pulse through this time is most intriguing, showing us how we can optimise our personal path effectively.

The lunations up to equinox open and close on the cusps of Capricorn, Aquarius, Pisces and Aries. These are powerful lunations with the full Moons heavily aspected and, subsequently, the second and third of these will be given their own readings. In the context of this quarter the first lunation sets the template.

The 0º Capricorn lunation point, with Sun, Moon and Earth in synchronous transition into new land, marks this as a clearly defined point of renewal. Far from simply being a time for setting new intents for the year, this is also an opportunity to balance goals against our personal means of achieving them. Neither will this be about staying on familiar ground ~ prepare to expand your horizons over the next 2-3 years! As with any time of growth or journey into uncharted territory, preparation, foresight and provision of essentials is of the highest significance. Each lunation provides a strong focus in which to make the necessary adjustments and, with the Capricorn lunation, the primary area to focus upon is ‘personal power‘.

There will be much clearing of both psychic and physical energy fields in the first lunation of 2015 and looking after your health and well-being will be paramount, not least as this is the foundation upon which personal power rests and becomes manifest. Trust that whatever comes up in this clearing process is right and, while allowing nature to do the work, do take note of what is happening – issues arising within this lunation are indicating areas in which personal power needs attention, especially in relation to how it is applied in the world. Finances and knowledge, as well as health, are very much a part of this assessment and you can here include the strength of your connections, the wealth of support you have across the worlds, in this appraisal as well – this will become especially clear around and after full Moon when Venus and Mercury enter Aquarius.

If you do find deficiencies examine why that is so; this is a year in which you can make the necessary corrections in relation to these and it begins through encountering the tangible evidence. Make good use of the diagnostic tools you have at your disposal and, if stuck for answers or clues, compare notes, seek a second opinion, get a reading and, most importantly, commune with nature – the answers will come; often it is ourselves that is preventing them from being seen. Ironically, when personal power is under the spotlight, it is all too often stoic refusal to ask for help or share our dilema that is the stumbling block!

The Jan 5th full Moon in Cancer is opposite the Sun+Pluto square Uranus and the lunar nodes. If you are feeling a strong desire to break out of current circumstances the key to making this happen is not through force of will, but, through higher guidance and learning. Aim to expand your knowledge base. The three days around the January full Moon can be a profound time for making sacred space and allowing the psychic energy of the lunation to clear and cleanse your subtle and energy bodies. This is especially powerful as, at the highest point of intensity, the Moon conjuncts Sirius, the soul star to our own Sun, and the greater perspective of our own higher self and our chief guides in the other-worlds can be called upon to lead the way.  If you make this connection stronger what you perceive in the process holds the key to understanding just what you have been missing out on being and doing, as well as what you might well be have been avoiding accomplishing, as an earth bound soul.

The time between this and the next full Moon can be used to align worldly means with soul’s natural desire in this lifetime. This desire is an expression of a choice already made in coming here, a choice and potential that may have become overlooked or that you have lost touch with on the journey.

Often enough we resist the soul’s desire because it signifies growing beyond our comfort zone, expanding our being, and involves having our personal power fully tested. Habitual responses alone do not cut it here ~ instinct and courage, as well as sharp intellect and discernment are necessary. These will be elements of personal power that will be needed to navigate the whole of the Saturn transit, for which, we can be assured, Saturn will provide plenty of reality checks to test them out. As distinct from the heart’s desires, the Soul’s desire is a magnetic attraction that pulls us, at the most instinctive and natural level, towards that which is outside of the known, that which we most need to grow into ~ personal power finds its raison d’etre in this.

Soul is the wild animal of our being, and, like all things wild, it is deeply connected with and belongs to the realms of Nature. Over the last few years in particular Nature has become the battle ground in which the misuse of power has become fully exposed. Equally, the roots of Nature’s own power is coming more tangibly into consciousness – in other words, as Barbara Hand Clow puts it, “We are becoming more conscious of the unconscious”. The soul’s health is deeply tied in with the healthy balance of power in Nature, a balance based on mutual co-operation and respect rather than exploitation and usury and, collectively, the growing awareness that we are out of balance is making us increasingly sick at heart of this disfunction. What we do for ourselves, in this respect, helps restore this balance and the impetus to be pro-active in this is aided and abetted by these lunations and planetary matrix. Aligning our own life with Nature has become a revolutionary act of healing!

How we can personally satisfy the needs of this aspect of ourselves and the world is further brought into focus during the second lunation of this quarter.

Shortly after the opening of the second lunation Mercury stations retrograde and, six weeks later, the inner-most planet will clear the retrograde shadow zone, just before the full Moon of the third lunation. This retrograde period will be a test to our collective cohesion, the reality check that could see freedoms of speech and connection across the internet challenged. At the heart of the lunation the full Moon is conjunct Jupiter in Leo, at the head of a yod from Mars+Chiron in Pisces sextile Pluto in Capricorn ~ the evolving complexity of the matrix has the Sun at the reaction point of the yod, quintile Saturn, with Saturn squaring Neptune. We will look to this chart in its own reading, but, the whole issue of aims, goals and self-authority is under the spotlight here. The field for this lunation favours adjusting our thinking, allowing strategies to emerge that support the strengthening of intents. These are intents which allow our personal power to become more focused and put in service to the higher ideals necessary to our times and personal paths. This may also bring up tests upon personal patience and collective confidence. Wise leadership again comes under the spotlight, both as a collective and personal question.

The true test of those ideals and the collective direction they represent begins to come out through the third lunation of the quarter as, at its high point, Sun+Chiron oppose the Virgo full Moon. We can heal the rift between our human and animal selves if Nature is listened to.

The yod to Jupiter is again active, this time formed through Sun+Chiron sextile Pluto, with Mercury, now direct and free of the retro-zone, at the reaction point in Aquarius. The emphasis on leadership has by this time swung to a global perspective and where we find persistent autocratic rule at work there will be vociferous backlash. We will almost certainly encounter this ‘reality check’ as a need to stand deeply rooted in our natural personal power and collectively make our voices heard. The mandate will be to ensure that no stone be left unturned in bringing healing and renewal to the world.

In the third lunation we also find Mars conjunct the south lunar node, close on Uranus conjunct Venus at full Moon. Again, this adds up to a complex planetary matrix, but, spiritual growth is promised if the higher guidance of perennial wisdom is acted upon and followed through. As we approach equinox the voices of the ancestors become strong – utilise their guidance in breaking free of the shackles of the past. Globally we could be seeing some old scores and karmic debts settled here, but, it is the grounded and well informed elder’s voice of reason that will carry the initiative.

The third quarter closes with a new Moon in the final degree of Pisces. This will be a total solar eclipse, visible in totality through an arc that begins south of Greenland and sweeps through the northern Atlantic towards the north pole; Europe, north Africa and much of northern and central Asia will see this as a partial eclipse, but, globally, this signals a moment of spiritual crisis that augers significant spiritual emergence. As the Saturn Neptune square closes, and as Uranus and Pluto square off exactly for the seventh and last time, the pressure will be on to tip the balance on initiating meaningful and lasting change where it is most needed in the world.

We’ll close here by returning briefly to Saturn in Sagittarius as the underlying theme emerging here is in many ways encapsulated in this transit.

Saturn has finally left Scorpio and is bringing the reality principle to bear on Jovian qualities. This brings the beliefs, ideals and philosophies we hold most dear under test of Saturn’s grounding influence. Saturn will transit briefly back into Scorpio between mid June and mid September, but, this will serve to tie up lose ends from what has gone before and to clear our emotional bodies for the greater undertaking that lies ahead.

The positive aspect of this transit will kick-in more fully as the year closes and is exemplified in grounding our greater potential and long held dreams in reality. We can make use of the next three years to manifest those dreams, to undertake the things we have always wanted to do, but, somehow have kept on the back-burner, perhaps in spite of ourselves. This will be the time to break out of this pattern. It will entail hard but constructive work, a sustained focus and will require the commitment to keep ourselves and our goals on track. The benefits promised are immense and, apart from changing how we live on our home planet for the better, the collective need in our times, these are fully in line with the impulse and direction of the lunations through this  quarter.

The bottom line is that we are here to break with the destructive patterns of the past and Rick Tarnas puts this into a much larger perspective when he describes the patriarchal epoch as “the 5,000 year birth canal for the Great Mother Goddess”! We can integrate every aspect of our lives into this process and make it as soulfull and deeply meaningful as it suggests and promises. The ructions will continue, such is the need of the process, but, we can now look to these as the contractions that precede the birth. This is about midwifing ‘the way of the Soul’, in tune with and integral within Nature, to become the template for positive and intentional living. In order to evolve beyond the new age idealism this conjures up, Saturn will bring reality checks to bear at every turn of the road, with the frequency needed to become skilled and imbued with enough self-knowledge to live up to the potential of that ideal.

With Uranus becoming free as the year progresses to innovate and inspire, if this becomes manifest as a collective process, which is now the distinct possibility, it can change the face of human life and our footprint upon our home planet. We probably have a five year window at max before we hit crunch time, Saturn conjunct Pluto in Capricorn. The challenge is to take advantage of the positive up-beat and Saturn’s reality checks will provide incentives to become knowing self-leaders, sovereign and empowered in the process. At the same time, the reality principle will apply equally to global leaders and self appointed autocrats who continually abuse their wealth and power. As the opening lunation intimates, re-balancing of worldly power is the core issue.

Uranus and Pluto’s series of squares have fractured the illusions of reality that have maintained the status quo regardless the collective will, and have exposed the rot at the root of the dominant power structures in this world. While they have not brought outright and decisive revolution, they have certainly brought reality enough into the light of day to incite rebellion and this mood is now carried forward through the lens of Saturn and Neptune’s square across Sagittarius and Pisces. The halmark of this aspect is the testing of the relationship between the limitations placed upon realising the full potential of self-authority and the sharing our visionary and spiritual freedoms.

In the mundane, Saturn rules responsibility and hard facts, and Neptune rules imagination and deception; what those in power stand for they will be held accountable to ~ we could see significant financial and political re-centering and power re-distribution begin coming into being across the globe through this year. If this is to be a renewal of democratised power, a sharing of resource as well as vision, it also rests upon the very real ability of each of us to grow, both in wisdom, empowerment and beyond our comfort zones.

The first quarter of 2015 is where the wheels of renewal are set in motion ~ as has been said before, it all begins in the present, under our own two feet, but, now we stand to see the creative power of the individual mobilised collectively, to decisive effect. The question is who will you be following……almost certainly, the answer lies within.

In the coming posts we will take a deeper look into the esoteric side of the Saturn transit through Sagittarius and, subsequently, how the effects of the square between Neptune and Saturn will change how we see the world.

Root Medicine of the Stars

Venus In Furs

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venus in furs

Venus in Capricorn brings us face to face with the empowered woman. What is the image that is conjured in those two powerful words? We might imagine a ‘successful’ individual, one who has reached personal pinnacles and challenges our notions of power itself, against the prevailing odds. In Capricorn Venus is emphasising the role of the empowered woman and, if we must ask ‘what are her symbols’, we must go beyond the image of the CEO or stateswoman, as, is this not simply a projection of male values. However, Venus in cardinal earth does not ask, or wait, for an answer; She Knows. And that is Her fundamental Truth. No wonder the corporatocracy is rife with glass ceilings.

In a world and time such as ours the planetary Goddess resonates with much deeper truths, manifests first, asks questions after, if at all ~ She is the living memory of earth, untamed within its crystalised forms, as much present in the wild wind and waters, as the volcanic plumes and rivers of molten rock. If we do encounter her in the mundane, on the hustings and frontlines facing the violators of Nature, whether with megaphone in hand, giving it her all, or feather and drum, holding the memory intact, chances are she is fired up with that ‘knowing’, pushing for change in the face of violation and usury. There is great passion coursing through her veins, pushing the boundaries of the world to grow out of its complacence and apathy. If invoked, She calls up the roots of change itself in her being. And Her faces are many, have endured time and tide.

She can be present in spirit and in body as the Wild Woman, the Huntress, whose powers are timeless, even when distorted, as she has become in the dominatrix and louche seductress. Pluto, who is centred in Capricorn in this time, has much to answer for here, but, he is himself transformed in her presence and, as Ceres, whose asteroid is presently close on the Sun, She drives the hard bargain that draws upon her own pragmatic nature, demanding equality where, otherwise, no deal may be struck. She looks after her own, her children as well as those who look after her, give to her their fealty.

She is, for all her political nous,  a fierce lover in Capricorn. Her power is deep, sensual, charged with earthiness, and demands parity in her lover. She is also the creatrix, ruling over the most fundamental natural laws of manifestation within the Life/ Death/Life cycle. In her most fecund state She can be seen in the most ancient art, caught in an ambiguous embrace with the Bull headed man in Chauvet caves, brought out of the living rock and clay of her own body in countless ‘Venus’ carvings and figures. The shaman knows the deal.

She reminds us here of that which endures like no other, in memory and presence, and holds fast the root of humanity in her being. But, She also holds the protectorship of the animal world as Mother of the Animals, active as the central figure in indigenous knowledge, as She who must be petitioned by the hunter for a good hunt, and, as the bestower of blessings, health and nourishment upon the tribe and community, must be herself respected, fed and shown due care, before She will reciprocate.

Sedna’s story pulls into hard focus the egotism and disrespect shown by the paternal line; her fingers, severed as she fights for her life, become the creatures of the oceanic realms into which she has sunk, over which she subsequently rules. When, on the 5th of December, planetary Venus aspected Neptune by quintile, shortly before entering Capricorn, Sedna’s asteroid was quincunx Venus from Taurus, her sign by rulership. A report emerged on that date that echoes with the tragedy of this story, revealing that Pacific Killer Whales have suffered a 100% mortality rate amongst their off-spring this year on the West Coast of the Americas. This brings a devastating reflection, through the fertility giving apsect of the quintile to Neptune’s oceanic lens and the hard reality checking quincunx to asteroid Sedna, that reveals the underlying story at work in our times. She is speaking directly to us here, of ecocide and its inherent dangers. She will protect her own, her children, but, it is ‘we’ who will pay the price if we do not listen.

This is far from being the first indication of the story behind the disease and disturbance at the heart of the global ‘eco-system’, as it is reflected within the Pacific Ocean. Alongside Starfish ‘dissolving’ in their thousands, mass beachings of Whales, Dolphins and Seals, many dead on arrival at the shore, showing chronic skin wounds and sores, are pointing back towards pollution and irradiation of the oceans. The reality of this is being heavily censored in the mass media channels, but, is not escaping the awareness of independant reportage and monitoring. It is time to stop the carnage, even if it looks too late…..not least as the power of the planetary Goddess will prevail, regardless the disregard She has been shown, and, whether we are here to witness her resurgence, or not.

In contemporary life under the dominant culture Her role has become forgotten, overlooked and distorted. For the most part, amidst the decadence of western hegemonies, where the Capricornian Venus is present, she is demeaned, hoisted upon a pedestal and made an object of masculine fantasy. Amidst the ruinous distortions and photoshopping of western patriarchal ideology Her root power is suppressed, its source exploited as matter, glamourised and manipulated out of meaning and devoid of respectful understanding.

The millenia of the Piscean age have seen war waged upon Her and her lovers, but, she is an archetypal Spirit, and her essense, pushed into subterranean realms of both consciousness and emotional energy, if disconnected from the pursuit and embodiment of power as the misogynists have framed it, is all the more dangerous, unbound beneath the surface. Her power cannot be repressed without consequence. The glass ceilings of the power-broker’s world are a false prison, in constant need of re-assertion in the face of her own irrepressible nature ~ and, in the heart of the city, the citadels of plutocratic rule, even in the most arid of places, She inhabits the understrata of the land, the culture, its human root, holding its memory in seed form, waiting to push open the cracks in concretions of power with her wild and indestructible beauty.

She taps Capricorn’s catalysing motivation for manifestation with a subtle power that can and will absorb all in Her path ~ she is the transmuting power of the earth, rich, fecund and ancient. But, she can wear many faces here too ~ even in the most tender of flowers she is present, ineluctable, fresh and filled with deceptively subversive potential, to grow and spread. She grounds us, stimulates our own roots, smudges our subtle body with odours of Vetiver and Sage-brush, imbued with the stings of Thorn and Rose beneath her white and red robes.

When Venus entered Capricorn, on December 10th, the cracks began to show and she mirrored back to us the erronious nature of her detractors – witness…..

Ice

……on December 10th, just hours after the release of the CIA’s ‘torture report’, Japan introduced a new Secrecy Law making investigative journalism, leakage and whistleblowing of facts surrounding the Fukushima disaster a criminal act carrying heavy penalties of up to10 years incarceration. Simultaneously, reports of lobbying of the US government by the UK company Oxitec for the release of GM mosquitos into the environment began to surface in the alternative media, and, on the same day Spain announced gagging laws which threaten to make public protest illegal and severely limit freedom of speech.

In the USA, Congressional staff staged a walkout on this day in protest of the Garner and Brown cases, highlighting the unaccountability of fatal police actions against unarmed civilians, racial discrimination and the widening gulf between the People and the agencies of State and Law.

Since then we have seen the US Senate move to legislate stripping the Apache nation, the largest landholder amongst Native American tribes, of their ancestral landrights in favour of giving Resolution Copper, an anglo-australian subsidiary of Rio Tinto, access for mining to 2,400 acres of the Tonto National Forest, as well as ceremonial and burial grounds within the Apache reservation. Rio Tinto is responsible for Uranium mining operations in Africa, amongst other global actions which threaten land, people and environment alike, and which also involve foreign investment from countries such as Iran and China.

Also coming to light during this time, the World Health Organisation’s dissemination of an ongoing and historical programme of fertility reducing vaccination throughout Africa, the development of nano-robotic vaccines, proceedures for renouncing citizenship appearing in social networks, figures showing child poverty to be at its highest recorded level in the USA, have been revealed.

All this, and much more, within the space of a week has signalled an intensification in diametrically opposed interests between, on the one hand, the People and, on the other, the ruling powers of government, the legal system and their corporate cohorts…..if it isn’t apparent yet, if the dots have not yet been joined between all these events, we are in the midst of an assualt that, while appearing so diverse as to create an incoherent kaleidoscope of effects, reflects a far from disparate attempt upon the personal and collective freedoms, as well as the very well-being, of us all. Venus in Capricorn tests our values, and the judgements we base upon them.

Venus brings our attention to values that we experience in the arena of the everyday world. Capricorn throws us into the midst of the arena and asks us to fight for what we ‘know’ is right, that reflects those values. We can see the pressure rising within the zone of earthly power and its already manifest forms of initiation within the material world. The connections between such value systems and Nature, the environmental concerns this brings up, as well as imbalances of power inherent within this arena is obvious, the more so with Venus now approaching Pluto in mid-Capricorn. Venus will conjunct Pluto just as Uranus, squaring Pluto, turns direct, right on the solstice. With Mercury, the Sun and Moon joining Venus and Pluto in Capricorn at the turning point in the solar cycle we can expect an uptick in these issues, but, keep your eyes peeled as the season’s festivities get underway – there is a fine line between reality and illusion, and we need to have the eyes of the seer.

shamanVenus has just passed exact sextile with Neptune in Pisces as this goes to press and, if we care to see it, we can see the more sinister effect of this focus coming to light.

The illusion is failing that Fukushima, the ultimate symbol of the payback that reckless disrespect for Life brings, is in any way benign in relation to these events and, with senior scientists from the Japanese nuclear industry now admitting that the situation at and arising from Fukushima is exponentialy worse than Chernobyl, the attempts of the Japanese government to quash the truth is brought into full perspective. But, this effect is not confined to Japan. A greater part of the illusion, outside of criminalising ‘truth’, which the PTB are attempting  to deliver in full swing, is to marginalise such information, reduce it to the level of ‘conspiracy theories’, for example. 100% fatalities amongst creatures directly affected by thousands of tons of irradiated water being released everyday into the Pacific says otherwise. The water cycle alone tells us Fukushima is a global event that cannot be avoided, but, how much of a counter to this reality can we raise? Venus in Capricorn challenges us to ask ourselves, and to re-evaluate and work from our most heart held notions before we answer.

Neptune as a planetary influence is directly associated with widespread dissemination, as well as the propagation of illusion. The negative influence shows through unboundaried viral and epidemic effects. The Ebola illusion is that it is a virus, and, all this while the truth has been plastered, in plain sight, all over the media where the chosen image of Ebola is of a worm-like creature ~ the truth is that Ebola is a parasitic organism, against which vaccines are useless. In the light of the current vaccine programmes you can draw your own conclusions from this.

But Neptunes influence here has a positive counterpart as well, through connection with the worlds of imagination and non-physical realities, bringing energy to the unexpergated Venusian realms of creativity that we can tap into in our art and dreaming. Neptune’s positive corrollary in the mundane world is also visible in fashions and trending, but, with Uranus direct, in a world of global connectivity through Uranian technology,  this can become the field through which the counter-punch is delivered. Censorship of the internet or not, the energy is unleashed.

Under such conditions, perhaps the Orcas have a deeper message to deliver in this respect……if are we party to their infanticide, we are also a party to our own, as a species. Sedna has spoken and the message pulls us into the dreaming powers we are so much in danger of forgetting.

The Whales carry and connect us with something unique in the animal realms, a far reaching and ranging role that reflects a deeper truth native to our planet and beyond, a gift inherited by all Her children. We are all here for a very special reason, which imagination, connection in spirit and creativity make conscious and visible. In the animal medicines the Whales are here to connect us with that positive Neptunian attribute ~ they connect us to the cosmic source, the Dreaming. In this they are the essential part of Earth-Life that is ever-present in the Wild Woman’s kenning, as keepers of inherent knowledge of this connection, as it manifests within both natural and Natural law. It is said that piebald and spotted animals embody a link with the stellar realms ~ and, in the medicines, the Orcas are the fierce protectors of this cosmological connection. They work through the balance of life and death within Life as our planetary connection with the Dreaming.

With the loss of a generation comes serious reflection – augeries can be found in all things, but, if we were to look to the Orcas we would find a clear indication that the link is now seriously endangered. This not only applies as an animal mirror of the medicines within the wheel of Life, but, as a true reflection of what the gagging orders, limits on our movements and freedom of speech seek to prevent coming to light. The mass protests are also an expression of the unrest that rises when the stories held in the Dreaming are themselves censored. We are in the midst of chaos out of which arises their resurgence and re-telling. This has been an ongoing theme over the months on this site, but, the truth is in plain sight as organisations and official bodies responsible for clandestine programmes of eugenics, genocide, ecocide etc etc, clearly no longer consider it a responsibility to be accountable to the People, let alone the truth that our emerging mythos is seeking to enshrine for future generations. But, let us not forget, Orcas are also the Hunters of the Whale nation.

If Sagittarian influences, the realm of the Archer, are expanding consciousness through the Sun and Mercury in this time, Venus journey through Capricorn energises those issues that have already been disclosed that are most crucial for earthly life to continue, and, with the planetary Goddess meeting Pluto, the underworld deity, these issues will undoubtedly manifest their radical nature, equally demanding a deeper appreciation and commitment.

The combined energies of Pluto and Venus bring us face to face with the wild Animal Mother, She who unleashes the fearless energy of the Huntress and governs the creative principles of Life and Death through Nature. These are times for us to bring her energy into our hearts and feel Her own deep truths speaking to and through us.

The need to bring this fierce and unbounded love for Life into our own lives, where death to one world means birth into another, needs no mirror and is inherent within all of us who have been born through her body, but, nevertheless, mirrors we have in abundance when Venus and Pluto meet, and the flip-side of this combination is equally provocative and revealing.

Old woman

When Venus conjoins with Pluto she also sextiles Chiron. Here She can disclose subconscious inner feelings, neurotic wounding and experiences of inadequacy, of the unnatural desire for sado-masocistic interactions as an expression of relationship. In many ways Chiron amplifies the dark side of both Pluto and Venus played out through exploitation and the creation of victim/violator roles in which subjugation reaches damaging and critical levels. These are levels in which psychoses manifest their dynamic, and we might well be seeing this at work in the disfunctional and destructive examples cited above. But, it is precisely in their positive counterpart that they find their nemesis. The Chironic embodiment of animal and human frame in one being is also the realm of the Wild Woman and her pack.

She can be Venus in Furs in both senses, but, regardless the scenario, the choice is ours ~ do we roll over and suffer the degradation, allowing the dominators free rein, or do we let the blood rise and burn with a deep and fierce energy in our hearts. As dramatic as it may sound, in reality the choice, like Orca’s markings, is becoming very black and white for us now, clearly polarised. But, the onus now, in anticipation of the coming season of powerful Moons and the final Pluto Uranus square, is to realise the values represented by both sides of the equation, to hunt down meaning and understanding within their midst, in order to find a path of realism, one that promises a better future. The question is are you moved to take up the Orca’s call, the call of the Wild Woman and Hunter, and, in entering their circle, invoke and bring their medicines into your own life and circle……

It is a choice between being the hunter and the hunted ~ one thing is certain, either way; She is the ancient heart of the world who sees all…..

Top image : Susan Seddon Boulet

Root Medicine of the Stars

The Samhain Stars ~ Castra, the Moon and the Origins of Capricorn

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Shaman

The turning of the Great Wheel through precession ushers in the new astrological ages and, with their advent, the stars show us how the change in human culture and experience also manifests a shift of focus. We are transiting now from the age of Pisces into the age of Aquarius.

As is so often the way of things with major transitions, and as the world around us shows clearly, ‘the light is darkest before the dawn’. But, the new is born from the husk of the old and, already present in our world, the seeds of the Aquarian age are being sown and have begun to germinate. In the first stages of growth there must be a breaching of old boundaries and, for the seed to grow, the husk must be broken open ~ here and in the following posts we’ll reflect on the stellar signs of how this process is now playing out. Through the positions of the planets and luminaries in the present, as reflected through the lens of Samhain 2014 and some of the myths that have come down to us which tell of Capricorn’s origins, we can see the macrocosm and microcosm working together.

Samhain sees the Sun align in the heavens with the constellation of Virgo, travelling from the legs and feet of the goddess towards meeting at full Moon with the fixed star Zuben Elgenubi, the ‘southern claw of the Scorpion’ in the constellation of Libra. In our times, this star has become integrated into the scales of ‘the balance’ now associated with the sign of Libra and Zuben Elgenubi indicates ‘the southern scale of the balance’.  The qualities brought  by the star remain unchanged – it is the socio-cultural setting that has changed and influenced how we interpret those qualities.

Within the ongoing process the Sun’s transition from the benevolent stars in the feet of the goddess to the claw of the Scorpion covers the time of the second quarter in the Moon’s 11th lunation 2014 and the full Moon gives a clear indication of the most developed nature of the change at work here. At the height of the lunation the Moon will oppose the Sun on the 6th November, in alignment with the star Menkar in the constellation Cetus, the whale or sea monster. However, the change in character of these celestial influences behind the Sun and Moon becomes clearer when we look to the stars involved with the Moon at Samhain. At zero hour of Samhain on November 1st the Moon is in the 21st degree of Aquarius in the tropical zodiac, aligned with the tail of the sea-goat in the constellation of Capricorn. The star associated with this degree is Castra. To get into the significance of Castra we need first to explore the origin myths surrounding Capricorn.

The birth of Capricorn

We can learn some interesting things about Capricorn, from both contemporary and ancient star lore, concerning how this celestial figure became established and what it signifies at this time. In our time, George Noonan tells us, “the constellation Capricorn has a great influence over human affairs portending major changes in such areas as climate and political customs. Along with the sign, the constellation is also noted as the “Mansion of Kings.” (1). The imperative need ‘for transformative action to become embodied’ is reflected by Robson’s reading of the myths when he states  that…..

…..”During their war with the giants, the Gods were driven into Egypt and pursued by Typhon. In order to escape, each was forced to change his shape, and Pan, leaping into the Nile, turned the upper part of his body into a goat and the lower part into a fish, a shape considered by Jupiter worthy of commemoration in the heavens.” (2)

Capricorn is here recognised through Jupiter’s mythical intervention.

Typhon is also associated with Set in Egypt, the nemesis of Osiris, and the shift from one age into another is very much a part of the egyptian story as well as the emergence of a new religious order, a shift of power base.

Their are many myths and stories from around the world that tell of these events, too many to recall in this article, however, I’m focusing on the greco-roman myths here as they so strongly underpin the psychological dynamics of the dominant culture in our times ~ this is where the destructive psychoses we now see playing out globaly have their root, and it is their shadow, hardened into the husk of the old world and all its attendant pitfalls, that we must break through if new growth is to flourish.

The intervention of Jupiter in giving Capricorn a home in the skies reveals how the politico-religious rewriting of the myths suited the dominant powers of the time. The gods are very much the instrument of change here, but, they are invariably given the spin that suits the victors…..Typhon warred with Zeus, and Zeus, after becoming re-instated, was superceded by Jupiter reflecting the insurgence of roman culture. Hermes helped restored Zeus to the heavens after Typhon had ripped out Zeus sinews and cast him into the earth during their battle. The figure of goat-Pan links with Dionysus and, through the assistance of Hermes/Mercury, the figure of Capricorn was born. We could get something here from remembering Ariadne’s story from the preceding post ~ after Theseus had successfully overcome the Minotaur and navigated the labyrinth with Ariadne’s help, the lovers eloped. The greek sources originally tell us that Theseus left Ariadne, having first sired a child in her. Theseus abandoned her on the island of Naxos, Dionysus sacred ground. In seeking to absolve the hero of such betrayal the later interpreters changed the story making Theseus the victim of a storm while at sea ~ we will soon see an echo of this in Capricorn’s story.

There are strong intimations in this drama of cosmological changes at work which radically affected the terrestrial plane, indications that powerful forces were wielded between celestial bodies and the earth which initated major shifts in both the environment and the collective of mind of the people. Hermes intervention tells us of a change of mentality, a new way of thinking and of an accompanying shift in relationship with the deities. When we look more closely into Typhon’s background the resonances become stronger.

typhon usagiTyphon was the most fearsome of monsters, associated, as his name suggests, with destruction and upheaval through powerful winds and a fire that flashed from his eyes – our word ‘typhoon’ may well have its origins in Typhon. His partner was the cthonic Echidna, the ‘mother of all monsters’ who had the body of a dragon and the torso and head of a woman. She was the daughter of Ceto, linking us with the constellation Cetus in our story. Their off-spring included the Sphinx, the Chimera, Cerberus and the Caucasian Eagle summoned by Zeus to daily eat the liver of Prometheus, who is commonly associate with Uranian powers. The birth of such a brood is indicative of archetypal changes within collective psyche, has an echo in it of suppression of innate psychic energies and earth energies, and, what seeded this is revealed through Typhon’s appearance.

Typhon’s lower half was also serpentine. His head was 100 serpents, his body being covered with wings, and red scales and spikes covered his back. He sounds very demonic, and the later projection of a ‘satanic’ shadow upon such a figure is clear. However, the underlying theme comes not only from how his powers were experienced, but, from how they were metabolised in the process. Typhon’s was a power of cosmological dimensions that affected earth through cthonic forces and my speculation is that we are seeing in the battle with Zeus/Jupiter an event involving telluric and electric forces which, in their earthly symbolism, the serpent represents.

The many headed serpent, amongst other similar symbols, can realistically indicate telluric pathways and electrical discharge between two charged celestial bodies….are we seeing a representation of a global catastrophe initiated in the heavens here, that affected the land and brought flooding and upheaval? Is Typhon representing the catastrophic nature of this upheaval as it was experienced? Typhon’s defeat saw him banished by Zeus to the volcanic regions and, while there is some correlation in this with Plutonic symbolism, the story makes sense when we consider what role such dramatic environmental change would have forced upon the people. The gods themselves were forced to change shape….

The aftermath of such terrestrial change would undoubtedly be profound and order would have been sought out of chaos. In the writings of Manilius, we find a description of what this may have installed in the wake of the shape shifting that brought Capricorn into existance.

“In her shrine Vesta tends your fires, Capricorn: and from her you derive your skills and callings. For whatever needs fire to function and demands a renewal of flame for its work must be counted as of your domain. To pry for hidden metals, to smelt out riches deposited in the veins of the earth, to fold sure-handed the malleable mass—these skills will come from you, as will aught which is fashioned of silver or gold. That hot furnaces melt iron and bronze, and ovens give to the wheat its final form, will come as gifts from you. You also give a fondness for clothes and wares which dispel the cold, since your lot falls for all time in winter’s season, wherein you shorten the nights you have brought to their greatest length and give birth to a new year by enlarging the daylight hours. Hence comes a restless quality in their lives and a mind which is often changed and floats this way and that; the first half of the sign is the slave of Venus, and that with guilt involved, but a more virtuous old age is promised by the conjoined fish below.” (3)

The “restless quality in their lives and a mind which is often changed” is especialy noteworthy and the strength of the leader would have been crucial. Vesta played a key role in the regulation of rulership, her priestesses, the Vestal Virgins, keeping the eternal flame alive within the holy of holies, and it was they that reminded the ruler of the sacred duty, afforded him by his position (and this is during the rise of the patriarchy), of serving the people. The political head was still religiously governed and this was a significant power afforded the Vestals, giving them a political as well as a sacred edge that could not be ignored. The Priestesses of Vesta had precidence in renewing the solar power of the ruler, and Capricorn is the cardinal cusp upon which the Sun, from whom the ruler assumed the divine power of his station, is reborn at solstice. In Manilius quote is a clear indication of Vesta’s importance on the mundane level as well, and, in it we find intimations of the advent of metalurgy as a sacred technology, as well as the relation to agrarian states that were born of climatic change. Behind all this is a carefully encoded allusion to a preceding global shift.

But, why would Venus enslave?! Venus too has been represented as a celestial body with fiery serpentine hair streaming from her head, the great comet that swept by earth in ancient times, bringing great change. The time we are looking to here is unclear in chronologically formatted western histories, but, Kronos establishment as Saturn who rules our mechanistic interpretation of time is also indicted here ~ Saturn, electric universe cosmology tells us, was transformed from a Brown Dwarf star to its present state through the intervention of a second Sun, our present one, and Venus advent came after the interaction, just as Aphrodite was born from the spume of Uranus who Saturn/Kronos castrated. Again, here is a shift from the era of the eternal presence of cyclical time, the ‘Golden Age’, to the linear chronological time with which Saturn is now associated. The planet Saturn’s present state, as represented in this cosmology of myth, is the outcome of immense upheaval  and comes at the tail end of the story that Capricorn unfolds.

The memories of that time were passed down to us in the myths and the stars can aid us in recalling them ~ and, at Samhain it is one star in particular that is highlighted by the Moon’s degree.

The stars in the tail of Capricorn have a much more benevolent nature than those in the head and belly, the lore tells us, and, as the connection is with the diluvian half of the sea-goat’s story the intimation is that it is here that we will find the Samhain Moon’s relevance to the present.

And so we come to Castra in the tail of the sea-goat.

Castra – 21 Aquarius

Robson tells us that Castra is “Of the nature of Saturn and Jupiter. It gives malevolence, destructiveness, an uncontrollable temper” (4), but, Noonan corrects this saying “the star Castra is of beneficial influence, although some modern astrologers such as Robson mistake this star as being in the belly (of the goat) and thereby gave it a malevolent nature [this star, epsilon, ε, is positioned in the fish-tail of the goat; Robson has incorrectly said it is on the belly]” (5).

The Moon’s alignment with Castra at the turning point of Samhain brings beneficial influences into play in connection with the origin myth of Capricorn. The forces that resulted in the change of the ages initiated a shape-shift that brought about a new way of living, relating to the celestial as well the cthonic powers as they were perceived. The age in question may well be connected with the sign of Cancer, ruled by the Moon, whose cusp marks the solstice opposite Capricorn. In my own journey I have heard the story relating to the advent of Venus from within the oral traditions passed down amongst indigenous mentors, the timeline they have related corresponding to the cusp of Cancer. But the present calls us to be mindful of the meaning over the timing and, being in the tail of the sea-goat, Castra brings the post-diluvial aftermath of these events to bear, a matter of no small import when we look to the changes now underway in our times.

When in tropical Aquarius the Moon brings the collective fields of communication and Uranian qualities of electric potential and invention together with the psycho-somatic sensitivites of the People. In the 21st degree of Aquarius these initiate the theme associated with third decan of Aquarius. While the lore behind the decans shows that the Moon rules the third decan of Aquarius, this decan carries the most revolutionary impulses of Aquarius, where science and transcendance meet, and the spiral in the tail of the sea-goat is the dynamic representation of the forces at work. Some have named this section of Aquarius the ‘Gateway of the Gods’, an epithet fitting to the mythical story-line given above. There are creative cosmological energies at work here, the spiral energies of creation that push the seed to germinate, and, if the transition into the Aquarian Age is mirrored in this it presages great advancements in how we relate to the use of technologies. We are looking to working in co-operation, as a people, with the innate powers of Nature, rather than exploiting them.

This ecological movement, as much spiritual as it is material, has to find expression that can both harmonise our ways of living with each other and with Nature, and expose the errors that have denied us this right. The imperative is to transcend from an age in which the misuse of power through force and technology has underpinned terrestrial life through their negative impact upon the environment, our freedoms and our health. The revolution envisioned is akin to a shape shift that addresses the networking and co-operative nature of Aquarius and, in the of growth of globalism, the corporate rulership of the body politic, as well as its accompanying  hegemony of suppression, we find the nemesis of Aquarian individualism and the freedom to initiate change. Make no mistake, this is a call to actualise a shift in consciousness, an embodied awareness, as the continued blinkering of this awareness will bring out the Aquarian shadow. That way lies a monocultural globalism, a form of collectivism that is ruled over more in the name of Leonine forms of rulership, into which the power of the shadow is projected, than owned, shared and recognised in empowered individuals. And, we should not forget that while Uranus is the modern ruler of Aquarius, Saturn was the tradtional ruler of both Aquarius and Capricorn.

tree-66465_640-1-352x198

While Samhain 2014 is but an eyeblink in the change of ages, there is in this immediate time an urgency about actualising the initiation of a collective change that will see the transformations necessary to the revolution realised. If this requires movement en-masse it also requires that this be realised through individuality, the right to be ones-self. The Moon, the signs and the stars highlight this interweaving. From the individual’s perspective the scale of this task is immense, a fact reflected back  to us by the fact that on the precise entry point of Samhain the Moon will exactly oppose Jupiter in tropical Leo, and both will form a T square with Saturn in late Scorpio, all within the last decans of the respective signs.

The tensions being played out here are infused within the global dramas of this time and take on monumental proportions. However, it is through the individual, you and I, that the change will come and the future will be seeded with Aquarian potential. In this, the Samhain alignments become sign-posts, encouraging us to be open to the messages left by our ancestors. Through the myths being activated in our psycho-somatic nature we are called to shape-shift spiritually as well as materially, to take advantage of the qualities of the moment at the thinning of the veils. This means bringing a closer level of co-operation into our relationships with the otherworlds. The thinning of the veils and the ‘gateway of the gods’ coincide ~ for the spiritual activist this is the prime opportunity to activate the gateway with powerful intent and seek assistance from the ancestral and divine powers, the spirits. They will not fail us, but, we must each play our part.

In the next post we will look at how the T square between the Moon, Jupiter and Saturn further illuminates our course of action.

(1)(5) Fixed Stars and Judicial Astrology, George Noonan, 1990

(2)(4) The Fixed Stars and Constellations in Astrology, Robson 1923

(3) Astronomica, Manilius, 1st century AD

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Shaman : Susan Seddon Boulet

Typhoon Uriga

Under the Moontree

Root Medicine of the Stars

A Most Mysterious Time

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sk master bl back

On January 1st 2014 around 11:12 am UTC the Moon exactly aligns with the Sun in the 11th degree of Capricorn in the tropical Zodiac. With Capricorn hosting Mercury, Pluto, the Sun and Moon all within 2 degrees of arc, that is a lot of psychic and mental energy, drive and power focused into initiating the new lunar cycle, and it does so from a strong Cardinal Earth foundation. The desire to initiate a new basis for expressing and embodying our personal power is emerging. It may not be wholly visible en-masses, but……this is about moving a mountain, one rock, pebble and grain at a time……and, while it is a process that involves us all, it is by virtue of this fact that its collective power is most potently expressed at a personal level. And that is a power that it is growing exponentially. This, like the following Moon, is a ‘supermoon’, initiating an intensified lunation – can you feel it? Our world may be under duress, but, ‘our time’, we can surely sense, is upon us!

On an individual level the will to express fundamental truths, to cut through the crap and get at the core of what matters most to each of us will be very strong during this lunation, but, there is also a strong note of caution here. While this is initiating a renewal time for ‘walking our talk’, it is also one in which we would first do well to be content to observe, to gather the facts and knowledge that we know to be real, that truly belong to us. Only after doing this to a point of ‘knowing’ can any one of us have the absolute certainty that ‘the talk we are walking’ is undeniably ours, and not borrowed, learned or the result of conditioning and programming. If you think you’ve heard this before, well, you have – get used to it! This is crucial not only for staying with our personal truth, in our integrity, but, for what will follow in the coming months……the crunch line of this lunation builds on the previous full Moon, and that is that “the ‘true revolution’, the one that really matters, is within, each of us“. If the impulse at the height of that lunation was galactic, now its well and truly Earthed.

This new Moon stellium is squared by Mars in Libra and Uranus in Aries, an oppositional combination that is likely to shoot first and ask questions later. Look out for provocation – be and stay cool!Sudden insights that might force our tongue can easily backfire, so, ‘keeping one’s council’ when those insights come firing across our bows is the watch-word, at least for the  time being. Get street-wise to the vibe that’s building……its not about being re-actionary, it’s a matter of heart……

Venus is also in Capricorn, unaspected, but, she’s at the beginning of possibly her most significant retrograde period in over 250 years. The inward working Venusian energies will help us to get to the heart of all matters upon which we bring that psychic, mental and will power to bear. Venus is now in complete sync with the solar seasonal cycle, stationing on the December solstice and following cross quarter festival of Imbolc, for the first time since 1762. But, listen up, and, before we go head to head with life’s challenges, it is essential that we ‘look with the eyes of the heart’ and not the ego here, to bring the necessary balance and equilibrium to our findings and what we witness. Why? Because the heart knows the truth. Trust in yours. Its in our nature to do so.

Jupiter retrograde in Cancer is trined with Saturn in Scorpio and in that on-going aspect we can find an emotional stability and ability to face the truth. Even when it is emotionally most challenging, when the words get hottest, we can find the dignity to retreat, knowing there’s no disgrace in doing so. In fact, while there is a mood of brooding tension here, if we call in the elder-self present with and within each of us, we will see our patience pay off. Here is one of the key differences between those who advocate the old power structures, which are primarily based upon the use of force for the maintenance of power and authority, and the incoming ones, those who advocate the empowered individual, the one who ‘knows’! There is a return of something deeply ancestral at work in this, something with a very old root.

The most subterranean energies carry the deepest charges. Earth will show us the truth of this. But, individually it bodes us well to co-operate creatively with those energies, to merge our own drum-beats with their own. Yet, while the old gods and goddesses speak through our unconscious, and while the unconscious is ever present, can throw us at a moments notice and have us dropping our guard when we least expect it, not only can that same water trine can help us navigate the flow of deeper energies through our lives here, but,  Venus also emphasises the very real power of love and compassionate forgiveness in meeting those deeper energies when they do arise. They are hurting too, mostly, it would seem, through neglect – we are all in this together! Time come…….

As we transit this potentially unsettling yet immensely significant and rewarding time what does all that mean on the ground? Put simply it means, once again, first and foremost, not buying into other people’s shit!! We know that is not why we are here, any of us…..and we should rest assured, something much more significant is at work. If it was seeded one year ago……now it is, like Venus, shedding its final veil. A most mysterious time……for all apparent the drama! Isn’t it always the way…….one day, if we heed the times now, we will look back in both laughter and wonder……..

Venus will track back to 13 Capricorn and station just as the current lunar cycle evolves into the next at the end of January. The Sabian symbol for that degree tells us of a fundamental ancestral truth coming into the world, something that has been overshadowed, overlooked and buried by the mindless accretions of ‘progress’, something that yet remains at the foundation of our essential humanity. Once Imbolc arrives this will mark the real turning point for all our inner focus and energy  to evolve out of that ancestral core.

The energy, information and inner strength and connections we have built up over this lunation will always be available to begin working its magic in the world, but, will you pay heed, will you hold your own council, follow the drumbeat within, and prepare yourself with due diligence, because, if you do, walking your talk will become a walk of true power. And that is what we most need in this world – people who can bring their own truth and sovereignty to bear on their own lives and stand beside those of like minds, spirit and heart, as brothers, sisters, people of many colours and, in this sense, of one source.

This is where the ‘revolution’ has its deepest tap root. It is all about the true foundations of power on earth – they are sourced in Nature, and this lunation is a signal moment for throwing off whatever shackles are holding us back and proclaiming our own true nature.

Mars regroups opposite Uranus, squaring both Pluto and Jupiter shortly before Beltane, so we have an opportunity to sense now what will be in the making then – but, by that time, we should be ready to make all this truly count……