The sun now in Taurus, and the Taurus new moon the evening of April 22nd, has us yearning for that comfort, stability, and enjoyment of life that Taurus energy is all about. Yet, challenged by change and restriction now, we find ourselves grappling with uncertainty, anxiety, fear, isolation, separation, and even hopelessness, loss, and depression. 

The impossible to ignore presence of Uranus and Saturn is requiring we get creative with feeling the Venus-ruled earth vibes of this sign of creature comforts and enjoying life's little luxuries and pleasures, and at a time when we could all truly use free-flowing Taurus medicine. 

And the thing is, this isn't going away anytime soon. 

This weekend, on April 25th, Pluto kicks off the retrograde season by reversing direction where its been sitting now for a while at 24 degrees Capricorn. 

The retrogrades really get going just after the May 7th Scorpio full moon, with Saturn following Pluto's lead on May 10th, then Venus on May 13th, and finally Jupiter on May 14th.

Retrogrades are a time of review and reevaluation.  A planet in retrograde backtracks over the degrees recently covered for a period of time, then turns direct and goes back over that territory a third and final time. ​

Happy Earth Day and New Moon in Taurus!

The sun in Taurus, as of Sunday, April 19th, has us looking for stability.  However, the pressure coming from Wednesday evening's new moon, sitting with Uranus, a planet known for bringing change via disruption and sudden upheaval, and in square to the teacher and taskmaster, Saturn, in Aquarius, is making that hard to come by right now.

The sun freshly into Taurus turns our conscious focus to all things associated with this Venus-ruled sign of earth, including the earth itself, the environment, gardens, our food supply, land and property and all of the possessions and material things that give us a sense of security and stability, things that have to do with the senses and enjoying life from a sensory perspective such as aesthetic beauty, food and drink, dancing, singing, laughing, and love-making.  Taurus loves the creature comforts and life's little luxuries.  ​

The days following any full moon are always an adjustment period as we assimilate and integrate the new information received, and last week's lunar event was no exception.  In fact, due to being in hard aspect to Jupiter and Pluto, this full moon brought with it more debris to sort through than usual.  

Overshadowing the realizations around the relationship between self and other in our lives that a Libra full moon always brings were weightier themes coming from the Jupiter-Pluto conjunction in Capricorn.  Adding to this intensity were three asteroids in play - Magdalena, sitting in Cancer in opposition to Jupiter and Pluto, and Eris and Cybele, at 24 degrees Aries and Libra respectively, Eris sitting with the sun, and Cybele with the moon.   

Of particular interest right now in all of this is the asteroid Cybele.

On April 4th and 5th, just as Jupiter and Pluto were coming together in Capricorn, there was a global mass meditation taking place, during which time also Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi asked 1.3 billion Indian citizens to switch off electricity and pray.  On these two days, it was documented that the electromagnetic frequency of the earth, measured by the Schumann Resonance, spiked.  

Jupiter represents wealth and also in aspect amplifies, increases, and exaggerates whatever energies are at play.  Pluto rules over transformation, death and rebirth, deep psyche, power, sex, money, taboo, destruction, elimination, and uncovering/exposing what is hidden, secret, false, rotten, and decaying. These two planets came together in Capricorn and thus were expressing those traits through the filter of Capricorn energy.   Capricorn is Saturn-ruled earth and involves themes dealing with authority, the father, the patriarchy, rules, laws, and tradition.

The presence of Cybele (wild goddess of nature) in Libra (balance, harmony, justice) in square to Jupiter and Pluto in Capricorn brings up a fascinating connection with the meditation and spike in the earth's geomagnetic field.  

Cybele is an ancient Anatolian goddess who was both a mother goddess but also a goddess of the land and nature itself and of the wild feminine, who was adopted by the Greeks when they began settling in Anatolia. Although it is documented that the Greek's indeed took up worshiping this foreign goddess, there are questions as to how wholeheartedly they took this goddess in. 

To the Greeks, Cybele was wild and uncivilized - not only a goddess of nature but a force of nature.  As invaders colonizing a foreign land, it is quite possible they adopted her for social reasons to appease the Anatolian people they had conquered, and/or out of superstition/fear finding themselves in a strange new landscape that motivated them to appease and pay homage to the local deity ruling over that land.  (The Gaulish goddess Epona and Celtic Rhiannon were both also associated with the land and therefore it was they who granted any ruler actual sovereignty over the land itself and not just the people.)

The earth responded positively to last weekend's mass meditation (and/or blackout) with a raised geomagnetic field.  The mass meditation and resulting increase in electromagnetic frequency of the earth occurred in tandem with the Jupiter-Pluto conjunction in Capricorn at odds with asteroid Cybele, the uncivilized Anatolian goddess of the wild whom the Greeks did not fully embrace, yet still paid homage in an effort to in some way likely appease her and/or gain her blessings and protection. 

Could the mass meditation and blackout have served as our modern way of appeasing the goddess of the Earth and nature? 

This theme also ties into Uranus, the ruler of Aquarius and the fourth dimension and planet of the future, innovation, reformation, rebellion, and change via sudden upheaval, natural disaster, and/or sudden insight, now transiting Venus-ruled earth sign Taurus for the coming years. 

Uranus is like a bolt of lightning. This outer planet is future-minded and brings revolutionary change and liberation.  Taurus is about material things and possessions and feeling solid and secure surrounded by our creature comforts enjoying life's little luxuries.  Uranus in Taurus will demand (by 2026) that we learn to travel lighter and find our security and comfort within ourselves and derive pleasure from the experience of living life in our bodies rather than from material objects surrounding us. 

We are seeing now how the combination of Saturn transiting Aquarius and Uranus transiting Taurus is resulting in sudden change and upheaval that has disrupted our daily lives (Uranus) due to fear of an illness (Saturn) threatening the collective (Aquarius) requiring boundaries in the form of mass forced isolation and restriction (Saturn) that in turn seems to be relieving at least some of the pressures that humanity and modern civilization (Aquarius) put on the environment and the earth (Taurus).  

Our challenge right now is to maintain our center - that foundation of our inner landscape - while the winds of change swirl around us.  This involves strengthening our sense of self and our ability to stay in our personal power, maintain healthy boundaries, and avoid being drawn into power struggles, and over the following months as we move into the summer eclipse season and several planets turn retrograde, we will be getting help with this, and I will be expanding on this theme as we go.

Over the coming months, we are being called to look within and become crystal clear on who we are and what we most value, as individuals and as humanity as a whole. 

Uranus and Pluto are now ensuring that taking temporary comfort and solace in any kind of false security will no longer be allowed.

Uranus in Taurus through 2026, will bring radical change to all things related to how we feel comfortable and secure - Taurus is Venus-ruled earth and associated with the second house of resources - Taurus can be overly fixated on deriving its sense of security from material possessions. 

At the same time, we have Pluto nearing the end of its transit of Capricorn - another earth sign, but this one is Saturn-ruled, carrying the energy of the archetypal father and the patriarchy.  Capricorn represents a wise authority that brings lessons around the necessity to be responsible and disciplined.  It focuses our attention on creating solid foundations and protect those with healthy boundaries.  But this energy can go to extremes with rules, laws, and restrictions, especially when those are applied through large societal political, financial, and governmental systems.  Pluto is power, but also transformation and regeneration - the cycle of destruction and creation, death and rebirth.  During a transit Pluto shakes the foundations and exposes what is false, rotten, and decaying that before remained hidden from our awareness.  Pluto began its transit of Capricorn in 2008 and will be finishing its work there over the next few years - as we look back over what has been exposed as false, crumbling, rotten, and decaying in our large societal systems over this time period, we start to get a sense of where Pluto is headed with this transit.  In 2024 Pluto then begins its transition into Aquarius, following along the same path Saturn is on now, where it will begin a new cycle of transformation working through that particular energy until 2044.  

Whatever our perspective on the current events, whether we believe this is a force of nature, evolution, an act of God, the return of the Divine Feminine, the planet bringing itself back into balance, or corrupt power at work, we have been forced to slow down - actually, humanity as it functions in modern society has been brought to a complete standstill.  We have paused long enough and become still and quiet enough over the past few weeks to actually hear the earth itself speak to us and receive that message.  We have stopped long enough to reconnect with that forgotten goddess that is our mother - the earth - the environment which sustains our physical life. 

The sun will soon move into Taurus, shifting our conscious focus to our need to feel secure and comfortable, and our ability to enjoy creature comforts and life's little luxuries.  However, with Uranus sitting with the upcoming Taurus new moon in hard aspect to Saturn in Aquarius, we are being challenged over the coming lunar cycle to  find new and innovative ways in which to do this. 

And we will.

On April 5th, Jupiter and Pluto came together at 24 degrees Capricorn, along with asteroid Pallas (Athena) in square (challenging aspect) to asteroid Eris at 24 degrees Aries.  

There is an interesting myth featuring Heracles, Eris, and Athena.  (Hercules is the Roman version of the Greek Heracles/Herakles, just so there is no confusion.)

Heracles, the big strapping hero, son of Zeus, was strolling along one day and saw something of which he wasn't completely sure what to make.  He did not recognize this small object in his path - it was not familiar to him - and so he did not know whether it was dangerous to him or not.

Being the confident warrior he was, Heracles decided to haul off and smack it with his club.  To his surprise, the object promptly doubled in size right before his eyes.  Taken aback by this strange new phenomenon, Heracles hit the object again with his club, with twice the force as before.  To his dismay, the object doubled in size yet again.

Heracles was about to hit the defiant object a third time, even harder, when he heard a voice whispering in his ear.  It was Athena, goddess of wisdom.  Athena told Heracles that the object was the work of Eris, goddess of strife and discord, and that if he hit it again, it would only double in size once again.  

With her wise words, Athena brought light to the situation at hand.  The only danger, in this case, was Heracles being tempted to interact with the strange object before him along his path.   If the object was ignored, the encounter would be of no consequence; but if engaged with, the whole thing would "blow up", so to speak.

Heracles' nature, as a warrior and protector, a "hero", was to be on alert for possible danger and react defensively...even offensively.  However, in this case, it would only continue to make the situation worse - as Heracles was actually engaging not with an unfamiliar small object, but the powerful goddess of war and chaos herself, Eris. 

On April 5th, 2020, Jupiter, the god of amplification, and Pluto, Lord of the Underworld and the god of intensity, power, and transformation via death and rebirth, came together for the first of three conjunctions in Capricorn, sign of authority, rules, political and financial systems, traditions, responsibility, limits, and boundaries (and the patriarchy).  Athena was sitting with these two heavy hitters, while they all received applied pressure from Eris, in the sign of the warrior, Aries, no less. 

With this astrology, the myth of Heracles and Eris carries significance, especially in this time of uncertainty and fear we are experiencing.

Eris was counting on Heracles to be true to his nature and play the part of the hero.  And why wouldn't he?  He was an accomplished warrior and the son of Zeus.  But still, there were things out there that were absolutely bigger and more powerful than he - things that not only were truly not worth engaging with in the first place, but that were completely unnecessary to engage with at all. 

How often do we react to things when we would be better off not engaging at all?  How often do we lock in with some energy that comes up in our daily life, in work, in relationship, in traffic even, and it ends up being a huge deal, when if we had just ignored it, it would have been nothing?  

When we lock in with an energy - when there is a fear, a charge, a reaction - we engage with it and we give it power.  In the myth of Heracles and Eris, Heracles, although a powerful warrior, actually gave away power by engaging with and spending energy on this strange object he came upon in his path.  Furthermore, he most likely would have never noticed the object at all if he was not on that consciousness level of always being on the lookout for danger or a fight.  

In times of big energy, it is even more important to remember that our power comes from our center, our knowing, our truth, our wisdom and love.  We are unseated from the throne of our heart any time we allow anything in our exterior world to unseat us and draw us into a situation where our time and attention ends up feeding that thing that just keeps growing and draining our power.  

Don't hit it just because you don't understand it.