Sun Into Libra | Equinox - the Sun begins to fall, bringing things into balance, natural cycles, those pesky other people, the beauty in everyday things

BAGO by schude

At 4:01PM EDT today the Sun moves into Libra - a day with an equal balance of daylight and dark.

The Sun begins to fall (weakens) as we move into longer nights and shorter days. It is the opposite down under (the Sun begins to strengthen). Western astrology is based on the Northern hemisphere where we move into Fall - which is not only about leaves!

I have had a few emails from people linking me to videos about the end of days (meaning the end of all our days!) being 9/23. But don't fill up the credit cards just yet folks. I could imagine the end of civilization, maybe some kind of ice age, coming during the Age of Capricorn. But we have a couple thousand years of the Age of Aquarius between us and then.

I know we are mostly exhausted, but let's not give up just yet. Saturn has been stopped for a long time and this is really zapping many people's drive. There have been losses and roadblocks and it is going to take work to get to where we want to be. It is like we are saying to ourselves, "I see these possibilities over THERE, but they are going to take alot of work and I am tired and not sure I want to do it anymore." Let's use nature's cycles to realize whatever it happening in our own life is a cycle, too. It seems that whenever the energy starts to feel like this - those doomsday prophecies are picked up by the news.

Don't forget we are all in this together. Even at times when it feels like we are all alone! Sometimes we just need to be shaken so our resting energy is provoked. Maybe we are like that bottle of ketchup and would get all clumped up without some agitation.

If we have tripped or "fallen" maybe we could try thanking this 'trigger', this 'benchmark' for what we are learning. I know it is hard to do that! And I have to somewhat spit those words out right now myself - sorry if I hit you!

But imagine a life where everything went our way all the time. Would we really want that? And we know we don't, because if we collectively did, we would have that. This doesn't mean we want whatever is happening to us to happen to us when things go wrong - but the more we focus on what we don't want, the more "don't want" there is to focus on.

The Sun in Libra is excellent energy to focus on beauty - where is the beauty in our life?

Can we use all these laser-focused planets in Virgo to see (Mercury), feel (Venus) and touch (Mars) the real beauty in our lives? Can we see the beauty in the stories behind our wrinkles and gray hairs? Can we see how the stories make those lines and twisted follicles beautiful? And now that we have seen that in ourselves can we see the beauty in other people's scars and blemishes, too?

We still have alot of inner planets in Virgo so the Virgo practicality and putting one foot in front of the other will still be a focus, but now the Sun (our life force) shifts into the sign of balance, compromise, relationships and fairness.

A light (the Sun) will be shone on what is out-of-balance or what is unfair, particularly within relationships. The curtain is drawn back and our Libra houses (and their themes) wake up. 

In some ways, because Libra is about weighing things out (nothing is cut and dried here like the wheat during Virgo season) things are harder when the Sun is in Libra. Libras sometimes (not always) appear wishy-washy, but it is because they were born between Summer and Winter - they can see both sides of everything!

With the Sun in Libra we will all be burning Libra fuel. We move ahead through balance, compromise and through our relationships with other people. 

We move into the shadow of Libra when we are passive-aggressive, pouring pink paint on garbage and pretending it is a Barbie dream house and putting what everyone else needs/wants ahead of ourselves thus building deep pockets of resentment that will explode all over us and everyone else by the time we get into Scorpio season. These are our no-no's now. Keep an eye out.

(the North Node is still in Leo - oxygen mask on our own face first)

Write your Autumn bucket list. What do you want to do, see, experience? Think about that.

xo all

Sun Sextile Ceres, Venus Sesquiquadrate Pluto | spreading seeds, feels like a hug, back to square one with something, vampires suck, maybe stop looking for the reason, last day of summer ... sniffle

goodbye by Ciril

The Sun, about to make his move into Libra and kick off a brand new season tomorrow, has a comforting sextile (opportunity) with mothering Ceres today (Goddess of the seasons!) at 29 degrees. Whenever universal timing offers up something like this (synchronicity) it pays to pay attention.

People with the Sun sextile Ceres in their natal charts are often generous with their gifts/talents/resources. They are fertile. Maybe not always in the pro-creation of actual children, but they are able to spread their seeds (gifts, talents, resources) and have those seeds germinate. Conflicted, they also make great hoarders.

With this energy in play today for all of us it would be good time to take action with the seeds we are spreading (this could be a good time for a mailing or email campaign, but we would have to be quick about it since the Sun changes signs tomorrow at 4PM EDT). And also with the stuff we are hanging onto that has outgrown its season.

This could show up today as something that feels like a hug ... I hope we all get one! Maybe some good advice, a warm cup of coffee, a smile just when we need it!

The other thing we have going on today - besides all the stuff I wrote about in the weekly - is Venus (now in Virgo) sesquiquadrate Pluto (in Capricorn).

Sesquiquadrates are 135 degree aspects and are considered 'minor' aspects. I usually don't write about them here, because I don't have time to look and there is so much else to write about, but I find when talking to someone about their natal chart that it is often the minor aspects that give them those Oprah "aha" moments.

Sesquiquadrates fall between the trine (90 degrees) and the inconjunct (150 degrees). With trines we find things falling into place smoothly, talent we don't have to work for, stuff comes to us easy-peasy and we often take this stuff for granted. With inconjuncts things are out of balance, the two energies are not congruent, they don't get along, they can't work together, one side needs to adjust to the other, win-wins don't happen.

Sesquiquadrates are the middle ground. There is ready ability here but without the balance to have the success we are looking for. In the natal chart they lead to faulty planning or difficulties through inflexibility. They give us a kind of tunnel vision. We have an urge to do something or to cause something to happen in a very specific and very controlled way. We don't always look at the real circumstances clearly - which are always changing! - because we are too focused on the "goal". We don't adjust when the situation changes. We don't see how this could all work so much easier if we just adjust!

So sesquiquadrates usually require some kind of disappointment or loss that forces us to be FLEXIBLE.

So, Venus (freshly into Virgo) and Pluto (9 years into his 16 year journey through Capricorn) are 135 degrees apart today.

This could be the time when a loss or disappointment shows up to teach us the gift of flexibility.  

Maybe we could have put alot of energy into the details of something and it feels like we did it all for nothing. We could be back at square one. Maybe we are trying to make the environment conform to our plan and that is not really how life works. Ugh!

So now, moving forward, our planning will be more realistic, more flexible, more allowing of life to take its course and get us to the place we are wanting to be!

This could also be, since this is Venus/Pluto - about toxic relationships. Vampires (energy suckers, time suckers, resource suckers), obsessions, power plays are all themes of Plutonian relationship dynamics. Maybe the blinders come off. Remember we can only change our own behavior, not anyone else's.

Since the Sun is still in Virgo now the way through are those small, practical steps - if you are not a terribly practical person ask yourself what a practical person would do, or find one and actually ask them. Find a routine. Take it one day and one thing at a time.

Sometimes it is best to let go of trying to find the "reason" something is happening or the "lesson" in the loss. You have absorbed it. Trust that you have grown from it. You don't have to analyze (Virgo!) the thing to death.

And remember the North Node of our collective way forward is in heart ruled Leo and a healthy heart is passionately self-loving. If we wouldn't want it for someone we love we shouldn't allow it for ourselves either. Keep this in mind.

More info about the energies at play this week in the weekly forecast HERE

xo all - enjoy this last day of summer (or winter if you are down under)!

New Moon in Virgo | looking past what isn't working, cleaning up, doing the mending, moving on from the mess

cake go boom by schude

If the Leo Solar Eclipse on August 21st had been a regular New Moon this would be the day we would be putting that energy to bed.

Instead the Solar Eclipse energy is in play until at least the next eclipse in Aquarius in mid February,

but in some ways we are moving on now, especially after we get through the next couple days

(I find specific eclipse events, especially losses, sometimes happen almost exactly to the day one month before or after the actual eclipse, sometimes two months).

This morning's earthy New Moon in Virgo (Sun and Moon in Virgo at 27 degrees) AND also Mars, Mercury and Venus, this is very unusual - imagine a baby's chart if born today(!) - moves us past the last two New Moons that were both in fiery Leo. We also have both Saturn and Uranus going to enter earth signs (Capricorn and Taurus) over the next few months.

Earth is the new black. We can certainly feel that one!

That last New Moon (Solar Eclipse), and the energies at play before and after, has drop-kicked our attention right where it needs to be. And now here we are in Virgo, trying to clean up Leo's mess ... again. This is why the Pluto in Virgo generation is exhausted - imagine being charged with a lifetime of this!

This Moon is complicated. It is opposing Chiron (in emotional Pisces). The Virgo/Pisces polarity of healing and surrender (letting go) is very much activated. Chiron is the wound that can't be healed. Something here can't be fixed/cleaned up no matter how hard Virgo tries to make it work. Something will require an acceptance of an imperfection or acceptance of a vulnerability.

Maybe we just don't have the right info/tools/skills/resources/timing - whatever this is.

The Moon is inconjunct unpredictable Uranus (in Aries). This could create a sense of urgency. We need to fix this thing right now. Or maybe the problem itself hits us out-of-the-blue. Either way, the inconjunct tells us there is no perfect fix here. The signs involved - in this case Virgo and Aries have no middle ground. There is no real fix. There is just an adjustment we will need to live with. In astrology you will always find important points being made multiple times. You will see one thing in a chart that says something and then you will find another aspect that says the same thing (sometimes you will see things three times).

Today's chart is defined by the fact that we can't put Humpty Dumpty together again.

Mercury (in Virgo) is opposing Neptune (in Pisces) now. And because Mercury is ruler of this New Moon (rules Virgo) and Pisces is activated via the Moon (and Sun's) opposition to Chiron in Pisces - this Mercury/Neptune opposition's importance is increased. Probably alot. Neptune rules our imagination and opposing Mercury (our mind) we know that not all is as it seems now.

I could even be totally misreading today's chart - keep this in mind!

This is not a good time to make an important decision because things can look better, or worse, than they actually are. Nothing will feel certain. 

This is our brain (Mercury) on drugs (Neptune), but in the same way people who are drunk can't always tell they are drunk, we could think we are making stone cold sober decisions when we aren't. The facts can be skewed. We could get side-tracked away from what is real.

We could be very tempted to do what is easy rather than what is right. This is one apple we don't want to bite.

The best use of this New Moon energy is to do our Virgo!

We might have to respond to something that we can't make 100% better, but we will still have to respond. Focus on the details. Use commonsense. Do one thing at a time. Do your best. Know that it won't be perfect. Nothing in nature is perfect. Know that perfect isn't the point.

Even though with all this Virgo - it's going to feel like it is!

There is talk in the media about a doomsday of September 23rd. I don't see anymore of an astrological doomsday on this date than any other date lately. There are many places we could be living that feel like doomsday right now! When the energy on planet Earth reaches a certain crisis point the Earth itself will make changes. Keeping ourselves centered and balanced helps everyone. Note - this doesn't mean pouring pink paint on our problems and pretending they don't exist. It's Virgo season we are going to have to do the work. 

For more info check the weekly HERE.

New Moon Guidelines

Set your intentions and make your affirmations for Virgo themes (or your natal Virgo house theme!) for the best outcomes - health, quality over quantity, service to others, attention to details, work, co-workers, employees, day to day activities, cleaning, organizing, pets.

INTENTION TIPS: Let the earth guide you this month, plant your feet firmly on the ground, clear your head, write what your physical self, grounded by the earth, wants - not what you think you should write. Write your intentions down by hand in script on a blank piece of paper, speak the words out loud, maybe burn the paper and give the ashes back to the earth - release your attention from these things knowing your intention is known.

Life has heard you. Know these things are already yours.  

What do you do next? Do what is right in front of you.

xo all

(I find setting my intentions when I see that first little piece of the waxing Moon works best)