New Moon Solar Eclipse in Virgo

This is tomorrow morning, the 1st September, at about 10 am GMT.

We have a lot going on in the sky this month, ushered in by this harsh and intense solar eclipse in Virgo. I think September will ask a lot of us. It looks stressful, weird, anxious, head-melting. Things are in flux in a big way. People with a lot of planets in the mutable signs (Pisces, Gemini, Virgo, Sagittarius) will be especially hard hit.

The good thing is, there is a very clear and defined way through, and it is built into the chart of this new moon: keep doing your Virgo. Keep doing the jobs that need doing, quietly and humbly. Keep fine-tuning your routines, keep adapting to change in a simple, straightforward, constructive way. If you're having an existential crisis, do the dishes or mop the floor or walk the dog. There is always something (or someone) that needs taking care of.

Keep your focus on the humble, the everyday, the functional...even (or especially) in the midst of chaos and uncertainty about the future. If you try to think too far ahead these days, or on too large a scale, you're liable to get depressed or overwhelmed – or to be flat-out deluding yourself. So just attend to the boring, everyday, small stuff as it comes up, however fucking irritating it may be. Boring and mundane is the way to go here.

Also, we are dealing with a lot of mutable energy here – so adaptability and flexibility are important. If you hit roadblocks, delays and annoyances this month (which you will!), try to accept them with humility and grace. Find a way around them; be willing to alter your plans. And have some faith that the fog will dissipate sometime, and the road ahead will become clearer.

The other thing I'd say is – try to have a sense of perspective (Saturn in Sagittarius) about your anxieties (Virgo). I know that people are facing difficulties at this time – but there are problems and PROBLEMS. If you are not fleeing a war zone right now or holding onto your kids in an overcrowded dingy in the Mediterranean, you're relatively lucky.

Remember your situation is probably workable no matter how hard it feels. It's important to try to find a way to work with it, because running away from difficulties or trying to ignore them is not going to go so well under this sky. Throwing up your hands in despair and giving up is also not really an option. I mean, you could do that, but it will only lead you into worse trouble. You have got to deal with the choices you've made and the messes that need clearing up.

This new moon eclipse opposes Neptune and the south node in Pisces, so escapism will pull at us. (Beware drink, drugs and romantic delusion.) It also squares the Saturn-Mars conjunction in Sagittarius, meaning we'll likely be feeling like miserable, frustrated, angry shit on a stick.

Keeping the focus practical and reality-based under this kind of moody cosmic weather will be hard, but very beneficial.

Big stuff this month:

We have a Mercury retrograde through Virgo that started yesterday (August 30th) and will go on till the 22nd September. Expect the usual Mercury retrograde stuff: jangled nerves, jumbled-up communication, information overload, glitches in devices and travel plans. Plus brain fog, anxiety and distraction courtesy of the Saturn-Neptune square. Fun stuff!

We have Jupiter ending his yearlong residency in Virgo on the 9th of September, and entering Libra. This is a big shift, and it actually looks like a nice one. Jupiter in Libra will be about balance, justice and harmony, especially in close relationships.

This new moon is Jupiter in Virgo's last big party – and he exits the sign conjunct Venus and Mercury, which is great for cleaning up your relationship messes via precise, effective communication before he enters Libra. If you've been doing your Virgo work, you'll benefit from this.

The next day, we'll have the third and final Saturn-Neptune square, exact on the 10th of September. This is a reality (Saturn) dissolving (Neptune) influence – potentially very disillusioning and disorienting. It looks like it could involve some relationship nastiness and power plays – Venus squares Pluto the next day. So be warned.

Saturn square Neptune is really the event of the month - the aspect that colors everything. Truth, clarity, rules and limits (Saturn) vs. bullshit, dreams, addiction and escapism (Neptune) - and I've already told you ad nauseam which side of the equation you want to be on, with the north node in reality-based Virgo.

Then we have a full moon eclipse in Pisces on the 16th September, and it looks fairly emotionally wounding. Painful stuff. I'll get to that closer to the time.

Finally, we have Pluto stationing direct in Capricorn on the 25th September. This looks OK! It's about deep structural change though, which is never exactly comfortable.

The upshot is, we don't come out of September the same as we went in. This month, is a scene-changer, and maybe you'll find yourself in a different play altogether by the end of it.

Keep in mind, plenty of people are not going to be in their right minds this month. Maybe cut them some slack unless they're going around shooting people. And if it's you that's going crazy - focus on the practical, and please get some kind of help if things are really bad. Your issues are workable, and they're not unique to you - other people can help! But it'll be easy to lose sight of that fact.

Full Moon in Aquarius

 

 

 

This is tomorrow, the 18^th August, at 10:26 am (GMT). It is – very marginally – an eclipse, which ramps up the usual full moon intensity a bit.

It doesn't need to be any more intense – this looks like a zinger. Aquarius is about shock, novelty, upheaval. For this full moon, the sign's ruler, Uranus, is beneficially aspecting the sun and moon, meaning the shocks involved may be liberating. You might just go off in an entirely new direction; you might just take a big gamble, and it might just work out.

But it looks very crazy and unpredictable. All bets are off! This full moon is part of a yod – a tense, weird aspect pattern. This one looks like it's about a need for personal freedom and authenticity (moon in Aquarius sextile Uranus in Aries), conflicting very uncomfortably with dutiful, routine-bound Mercury and Jupiter in Virgo. It's nervous breakdown stuff.

If that were the only nervous breakdown stuff we were dealing with, it'd be enough. But there's more! There's Neptune on the south node, pulling us backward into utter escapist madness and addiction. There's Mars conjunct Saturn in Sagittarius: truth, consequences and inescapable, harsh realities re. the road ahead. There's Venus in Virgo harshly aspecting all these planets, making relationship and money issues feel simultaneously delusive, unreal, constraining and inescapable. There's Chiron in Pisces opposing Mercury and Jupiter in Virgo – a big existential wound to our minds and capacity to find meaning in existence.

All in all, a total headfuck – and it's not going to just disappear. This is some heavy mental shit and it will get heavier as we move toward the new moon eclipse in Virgo on the 1^st September, which looks frankly awful for anyone of a sensitive or nervous disposition.

That eclipse ushers in a month of mental health weirdness, but the next couple of weeks are no picnic either. We have a Mars-Saturn conjunction on the 24^th August, which will feel like hitting a wall of karma – lies and hype will be exposed. We have Mars squaring Neptune, exact on the 26^th August, which will make heroin addiction seem like a viable life option. We have a Mercury retrograde through Virgo starting the 31^st August, which will probably feel like this:

 

 

 

only even less comprehensible.

And then after the new moon eclipse, we will have Saturn squaring Neptune on the 10^th September – a profoundly disillusioning (and disorienting, and depressing) influence.

I know I am being very dire. I could try to put a positive spin on it all, but I don't see what good that'd do anyone. This stuff looks very painful and disturbing, and it is in play till the end of the year – and people should be aware of it.

Mutable sign people especially (Gemini, Virgo, Sagittarius, Pisces) – please don't commit suicide. Try to ride the next few months out, one day at a time. One foot in front of the other; one small, mundane, routine task after the other – even when your brain is a mess and you can't see the purpose of any of it. If you try to look too far ahead you're liable to get dizzy and lose your footing – so keep the focus narrow, on what needs doing in the here-and-now.

And if you need some outside help, please GET IT. From friends, therapists, religion, meds, the suicide hotline - whatever works. Don't try to keep your craziness all bottled up and expect it will just disappear. If you start to feel the walls closing in on you, talk to someone. You are not the only fuck-up on planet Earth.

OK, having said all that – it's not all bad. I wrote at the new moon in Leo a couple weeks ago that our theme this month was new beginnings beset by roadblocks.

Those new beginnings are still pretty solid! Just we are hitting the roadblocks about now, and they are considerable. And some karmic backlash is hitting, for those who've been pretending to be what they're not. It's a shock allright.

 

 

The important thing is to follow your personal truth, your vision for the future – YOURS, not anyone else's. And to keep on truckin', even if your onward progress is stalled for now. Keep the faith – small, careful steps will carry you toward the goal, even if you can barely make out your own feet through the fog.

New Moon in Leo

This is later today, the 2nd August, at 9:45 pm GMT.

New moons represent beginnings. Leo is about creativity, pride, self-expression, bling, romance, childlike enthusiasm, look-at-me DRAMA, ego! And hair, of course. Leo people work very hard on their manes. If you know one who claims not to care about their hair or isn't using it to make some kind of statement - well something is off.

(Leo rising)

Leo people can also be very childishly thin-skinned, highly sensitive to criticism and perceived slights. Best not to disrespect the hair.

OK, but more abstractly - and seriously - Leo is about the divine, radiating through the medium of individual personality. It is associated with the heart – the core of who we are. Everyone is the star of their own show, and has to express their core essence.

The sign is ruled by the sun, which can't help but radiate. And in doing so, it keeps life as we know it going – it is the star of the whole melodrama. The boss, the central heavyweight every entity in the solar system orbits around and relies upon.

So in addition to being about creativity and showmanship and personal expression, Leo stands for boss-energy, inherently organizational and entrepreneurial.

Anyway, a new moon in Leo signifies a new beginning in creative / romantic / business endeavours. It's a great time to start a new artistic, romantic, or entrepreneurial project.

This new moon will prove especially good for initiating new projects: the sun and moon will beneficially aspect Saturn in Sagittarius. This gives whatever you begin this month weight, staying power, and a realistic sense of the road ahead.

2 of wands - see here 

It doesn't mean it's all going to be smooth sailing. It's not, needless to say. The sky is setting up some major roadblocks this month – there will be a need for sustained effort, even when things look  hopeless, confusing and stuck.

All in all, though, there is great promise and potential here. But the future will have to be worked for. Saturn is involved, and Saturn is about karma and hard work. You'll get back what you put in. If you aren't willing to put in sustained work toward making something real, don't be surprised when your dreams turn out to be substanceless.

Reinforcing the theme of new beginnings in creative / romantic / money-related endeavours, Venus in Leo is beneficially aspecting Uranus in Aries (exact 1st August). This is a fiery, impulsive influence – it has to do with going after what we really want.

But here is the roadblock part: Uranus stationed retrograde on the 29th July. So bear in mind that the new beginnings being considered here may be stalled / under reconsideration till the direct station in late December. A seed has been planted, but it might take a while to germinate.

Also reinforcing the theme of new beginnings (and roadblocks), Mars moves from Scorpio into Sagittarius a few hours before the new moon. This is a big deal! It marks the end of a long and difficult transit recapitulating Saturn's transit through Scorpio from 2012-2015.

--Think back to where you were psychologically this time last summer, with Saturn grinding his way through the last degrees of Scorpio. Plenty of people were dealing with some fairly nasty crap. Plenty of toxicity was erupting from the depths. Saturn in Scorpio was some ugly, karmic stuff, and the difficulty of the transit was heightened by the Uranus-Pluto squares during the same period – the whole setup was like a wrecking ball.

Anyway, Mars has spent much of the past year going over the still-raw wounds of the Saturn transit through Scorpio, squeezing out the last of the pus, cutting away the dead flesh, putting in the sutures. It has not exactly been pleasant. Surgical procedures aren't meant to be.

But on the day of this new moon in Leo, Mars moves from deep, dark, psychologically intense Scorpio to Sagittarius – a sign which is all about new vistas, exploration and enthusiasm. Meaning: it's time to leave the past behind and move on. There is no longer anything to be gained in revisiting it. What could be repaired – has been. What was broken will remain broken, and it might just be a blessing. (The word “blessing”, incidentally, comes from the French for “wound”.)

It doesn't mean that the losses disappear. An amputee can learn to function just fine in her new reality, but still feel the ghost of the missing limb.

It also doesn't mean the consequences of past actions can be evaded - and in fact Mars is going to hit a wall of heavy consequences later this month. (I'll get to that in a minute.)

But losses and consequences aside, you have a life to be getting on with and new things are happening. Remember that, please, when you feel like wallowing in nostalgia or self-pity. There is no going back to the way things were; you are here in your life now, and it is never going to be perfect (and it never WAS, however ideal the rear-view mirror makes it seem). But there is still plenty to be done.

I feel obliged to say that, because this new moon is hit hard by an inconjunct to Neptune in Pisces. And Neptune – planet of idealisation, delusion and fog – will be close to the south node in Pisces for the rest of the year. So it'll be easy to get pulled backward into dreams of what might have been; romantic fantasy; poisonous nostalgia; idealisation of scenarios and people that are, in fact, not so ideal...

So Neptune is another of our roadblocks under this sky - or more like a swamp you'll get stuck in. Beware of escapism and self-serving fantasy. (Plus - substance alert, in effect now and for the rest of the year. Drink and drugs are more dangerous than usual these days. You'll need to keep your wits about you and your boundaries intact, so please be careful with the boundary-dissolving substances.)

OK, re. roadblocks - this is important. Mars, planet of will, desire and forward drive, is going to hit a huge one later this month as I've said. Saturn, lord of consequences, resumes direct motion in Sagittarius on the 13th August – and then Mars runs smack into him on the 24th August. This is likely to feel like hitting a big wall of karma at high speed. It will hurt.

I think people who've been insulated against the consequences of their crappy behavior under Saturn in Scorpio are going to feel this more than most – they will have to pay the piper here. Also, inflated ego types who do not walk their talk are likely to be exposed as frauds. (This is a Saturn in Sagittarius theme.)

But really everyone will be affected. Please take blockages and delays as a matter of course, because it's unlikely that forward motion will be easy over the next month. It's important to try to stay calm and humble and keep working toward your goals even if progress seems impossible. Getting angry over it will only make things worse. This stuff looks intensely frustrating; there is plenty of potential for violence and cruelty. People will be lashing out.

And it won't help that we'll have a nervewracking mutable t-square in effect again (as in June), involving Mars, Saturn, Neptune and a succession of planets in Virgo. Or that Mercury (mind and communication) will be right in the crossfire of this mutable t-square for much of August, before retrograding back into it in September. (Head-wrecking!)

--Or that we are headed into eclipse season, with an extremely uncomfortable-looking solar eclipse in Virgo on the 1st September.

--Or that we are approaching the third (and final) pass of the Saturn-Neptune square, exact on the 10th September. Saturn is about structure, Neptune is about dissolution – and with these planets squaring each other over the past year, we have been seeing instability, uncertainty about the future and terror spreading like contagion.

I think things are set to get worse this month and into September. Nice as this new moon looks, we are not headed into a nice stretch of time – we are headed into more crazy / violent, and I think everybody can feel it. It's frightening.

My take on getting through all this is the same as it's been all year: the important thing is to keep doing your Virgo. The north node and Jupiter in Virgo point the way forward.

And after Venus moves into Virgo on the 5th August, we'll be looking at a stellium in this sign for the rest of the month. So Virgo is extra-highlighted.

In many ways this Virgo party will be Jupiter in Virgo's last hurrah – he moves from Virgo to Libra on the 9th of September, having spent a year in the sign of humility, detail work and service.

Jupiter is about what enriches and blesses us - where our luck comes from. From now till the 9th September, our luck and blessings are in Virgo.

So however crazy things get and however crazy and powerless you may feel, keep doing your Virgo. Keep your head down and your mind on the everyday tasks at hand. Clean the house, weed the garden, walk the dog, go to work, stay humble and grounded and focused on the small stuff. Restrain your ego and serve others as much as you can.

And clean up your relationship karma – make sure your relationships are clear and balanced and fair. Pay attention to the details and clear up the misunderstandings and injustices. Because Jupiter in Libra is going to be all about relationships... and justice.

It's hard to avoid the feeling that a lot of karma will be coming due over the next few months. We'll see what happens. It is sure to be interesting, anyway - as in the curse "may you live in interesting times". We do!