Check Point Eclipse: The Taurus Full Moon

 Kites flying (photo credit Jon Sullivan)

When we ‘back up’ and look at astrology as theory, the Sun is a yearly cycle which planets with cycles longer than a year ‘gather’ into blocks of various lengths represent steps in any given process.

We talked some about this in the recent blog on Saturn moving out of Libra and into Scorpio as a step in a greater process. That process is the twelve-part cycle we know as the zodiac.

So everybody here on Earth has just started a 2.5 year cycle of Saturn in Scorpio, during which time, Jupiter will move through two signs (Gemini and Cancer) and start into Leo. During that time, the Sun will go through all twelve signs twice….and be half way through another round.

One of the most touching things I’ve ever read about the ancient Maya is that they thought of the trees as our ‘cousins.’ This evidently comes down to us as part of a mystical belief they had which said that everything ‘comes from the stars’ and no matter what form something is in, its ‘essence’ – that we’d call energy – is never lost, no matter what happens. You can burn a log, a person may die. The essence of what they are both in temporal and spiritual terms – that, the Maya said – was never lost. It would change forms but never be lost.

That idea became part of my life many years ago. And probably because of it, I have come to think of human life as akin to tree rings. Science tells us that we can look at the rings of a tree which lived for thousands of years and see a record of what that tree went through.

Those rings are formed through the pattern of Earth’s cycles. Or to put it astrologically, the Sun going once through all twelve signs. Each round of the Sun through the signs thus describes a single chapter in the book of our lives.

We just don’t have rings. Well, except for those we wear on our fingers!

The point here is that within that yearly cycle of Sun-and-twelve-signs is are the cycles of the Moon. Every 29.53 days, the Moon goes through all twelve signs. Do the math and you’ll find that when you divide the number of days in a solar year (365.2422 days) by the Moon’s ‘standard’ lunar month (29.53 days) and you’ll find there are 12.36 lunar months every year.

Every time the Sun finishes its transit through a sign, figure that the Moon has moved through all twelve. That’s what it comes down to. Lunar astrology being all about our daily, most mortal life, the high points of the soli-lunar cycle thus represent the initiation and ‘high points’ (New and Full Moon) as part of the Sun’s monthly movement through each sign.

This month, the Sun is traversing Scorpio. So it’s time for our ‘Scorpio step’ in a greater social process we refer to as 2012…and you’ll be taking that interactive, emotion-provoking step through wherever Scorpio lies in your natal chart.

(Plus, yes – the placement and conditions of Mars and Pluto as Scorpio’s rulers, where Scorpio is in your solar return chart and any major Mars or Pluto transits which happen to be going on for you.)

What’s interesting (and worth thinking about) is how our secular calendar causes Sun and Moon cycles to overlap. The New Moon is always in the sign of the Sun (as the Moon conjuncts the Sun) and the Full Moon is always in the sign opposing that of the Sun, seeing as that’s where the Moon ‘openly faces’ the Moon and thus receives and reflects the greatest among of solar (metaphysical) ‘illumination.’

Thus we see the Full Moon as a time which is informative…and which reveals things.

But our calendar? Instead of ‘connecting’ the New and Full Moon as designed by the Sun moving through any given sign, our months connect the Full Moon of one sign which the New Moon of the next…which at some level seems like a philosophical process which by design is meant to move us forward.

In any case, this month’s Full Moon is positioned at 6 Taurus – which means the Sun is at 6 Scorpio…with the Moon at 6 Taurus, a degree known for its mental nature. But don’t confuse ‘mental’ with ‘thoughtful.’ Six Taurus is known as a degree where mentality is insightful, but since this occurs early in a sign which has a very distinct undeveloped-versus-developed side, whether anybody’s aim (or choices of the moment) come from their ‘primal need’ Taurus side or the more ‘matured’ ‘I know my succeeding depends on others’ Taurus knowing is entirely individual. The Sabian Symbol here is as follows: ‘THE WOMAN OF SAMARIA AT THE ANCESTRAL WELL’ which Marc Edmund Jones gives the following keynote to: the meeting of the traditional past and of the creative spirit, pointing to the future.

Because this is a Full Moon, it is at this point that we will see signs of where our needs (the going to the well) are being met among others of ‘our kind.’ That refers to some ‘group’ we identify with. It could be our family. Or those of our heritage. The people we work with or a field we are accustomed to working in – or anything else where we are ‘one of the group.’ But whatever that group is (or whatever those groups are) because this is a Full Moon image, there is a distinct Scorpio quality being thrown into the mix. Life (the Sun) is saying that we must work with, or at least now be conscious of a greater group (whatever that may be) beyond our ‘pre-defined’ notion.

 A March Full Moon over Munster, Germany

(Kai Schreiber, March 2011)

How well we are integrated with them…those who we think of as ‘not me/mine’ defines to some degree our success now. And certainly the ease with which we move forward with our plans. That the Sabian Symbol for 6 Scorpio is DEEP-SEA DIVERS is a classic sort of ‘watery’ metaphysical commentary. Against the Moon (instinct, feelings) at 6 Taurus, this describes this Full Moon moment as a very plus-or-minus informing us where we are in the process of coming to understand that, as famously put, no man is an island.

That goes for women, too – obviously!

Any Taurus/Scorpio connection is always about how well we are able to interface with others and life and social systems and the various ‘gatekeepers’ in life so that they will support us in our aims.

And that would be that, except for three things.

One, Taurus and Scorpio are fixed and yin signs a combination which creates a polarity which tends to hold onto things - or things as they are, the ‘status quo’ (Taurus) because the process of (Scorpio) confrontation and emotion-provoking negotiation and compromise feels so personal. What to some might be a simple matter of give or take and ‘normal’ amounts of reluctance to give in…or to go through realizing you’re not right in abstract, or how to build towards some goal or aim…

Let’s face it: nobody likes being wrong. But when you get into Taurus/Scorpio territory (whether by natal chart placement or just in terms of the time of the year)…then the ‘right-versus-wrong’ becomes validation versus invalidation.

And that strikes us a whole lot deeper. That’s painful. Even scary.

And let’s remember…Saturn has just moved into Scorpio. So life is all about finding our chinks right now. The karma, the metaphysics – everything is primed to provoke some really deep fears.

Yet there is a positive point. And maybe…just maybe those among us who encounter the hardest times and the deepest feelings of invalidation are those who also have the chance to gain the most.

There’s a saying in metaphysics: that which you fear you will manifest. Why? Because life wants us to understand that the ‘worst’ can happen and we can still survive it.

So that’s the first thing. The second is simply that we’re now but a couple of weeks away from a solar eclipse which is also in Scorpio, which “compounds” this Full Moon in Taurus by ‘setting the stage’ for that to come. The subject may not be the same, but the emotional stirring is consistent.

For probably a month now…maybe a bit more, most of us have had this ‘lurking sense’ of something which isn’t working. It’s ‘coming apart’ at some level. Being that this incoming eclipse is going to occur at a (3rd decanate) degree between 20 and 29 of a sign, the likely ‘provocation’ is external.

But it’s to understand that ‘they’re’ not the problem. In fact, the mere fact that the more you struggle with ‘them’ the more implacable ‘they’ seem makes the whole struggle worse.

The answer here is pretty simple: their ‘implacability’ is due to the fact that the growing sense of ‘solar instability’ (life becoming destabilized) is not about them. It’s your feeling – it’s your issue. And since Full Moons tend to ‘highlight’ emotions, emotional events or emotional issues, the Full Moon which will occur on Monday, October 29 at 7:51 in the evening (UT/+0) is likely to unsettle things even more.

And for many, there’s more yet to come.

The third thing is that this Full Moon comes to us with the image of a kite:

 
The grand trine (in blue) is all in water signs – an indication of ongoing or deep seated emotions or topics which set off our emotionalism.

Ceres asks us to plan, or represents ‘our plans.’ Mirzam represents a moment which is evocative or touching…or sometimes touchy. That Mirzam sits so close to Alhena by nature speaks to how others feel about our Purpose and how we feel about whether we are fulfilling that which is either our human-prescribed purpose or our Divinely ordained Purpose - which for most of us are two very different things.

And therein lies a quandary.

In Pisces, sign of feeling ourselves confronted by our feelings, Niobe conjunct Fomalhaut/Bali and Chiron (with Chiron in retrograde) we're concerned about hurting ourselves further, about vulnerabilities - even shame we may not be willing to feel or confront...we're aware, however remotely of being caught between our  need to go forward and things we need to go back and truly deal with.

The third corner of this grand trine starts (and ends) with the Sun – our life, the will and energy with which we live our life, and with which we face in life. The highest number here (9 Scorpio) is occupied by Industria and Pandora: the complications involved in some situation against the very will (and reasons) we have to try and get that ‘something’ done.

Are we proving something to others? Or to our Self? Are we waging some valid fight, or are we just trying not to feel some truth we can’t bear to think we truly need to confront?

Remember: the temptation is to think the issue, the problem, the ‘wrongness’ is in them. The right way through this moment involves putting their right or wrongness aside for the moment in favor of understanding where your quaking is coming from.

With Arachne in this grand trine mix, the indication is that we’re all caught up in what we’re doing even if we would like to (or know we should) be doing something else. There’s something (Tantalus) so tempting that we’re likely to go way over the line with it.

Or maybe we already have.

The top of this kite formation is Hamal conjunct Moon in the sign of Taurus. Here we have described a matter of choice mostly because of the sextile (the green dotted lines) to Fomalhaut on one side and Mirzam-Alhena on the other.

By itself, Hamal/Moon in Taurus would be ‘I have a right to my feelings.’ And that well may be true regardless. But the double sextile to fixed stars here clearly speak to the choice and the question as to whether what we’re doing is what we should be doing. And are we doing it the right way? Or have we succumbed to temptations and compromising or even harming others in the process of trying to achieve some greater aim.

Here’s a spiritual thought to go with all this: that which humans demand often requires…and seems to condone actions and choices which we know are less than what we want them to be while that which is truly Ordained through our creation frees us to be who we are without compromise.

So…while we are freely human, are we the evolved human or not?

That would seem to be the question of the season – and we are being reminded of it now, as the days and weeks unwind before us. We head not to some cataclysm of life, but one of self-respect – without which hope dies and life becomes really not much worth living.

One last note: this Full Moon occurs just a couple of hours after Mercury enters Sagittarius.

Mercury in Sagittarius as its own idea is another post for another day. (Say, tomorrow?) Meanwhile, suffice it to say the combination of this Mercury shift from Scorpio into Sagittarius at the moment of a Full Moon marks this as a time when feelings may well surface as opinions. Or for unexpected emotional outbursts. It also adds to feelings of fervency and conviction, pro or con, right or wrong. Those who seek to fool others may find out that they're only fooling themselves.

Under the best of conditions, Mercury in Sagittarius can indicate rash statements and haste in decisions. Yet when we see Mercury entering Sagittarius in tandem with a figure such as the kite, those 'steering' said kite by its tail will do well.

The 'tail' of this kite is all about thinking without falling prey to temptations where you find them. Since this kite tail is part of a grand trine, the whole of that trine is in play here.

 The Omega or Swan Nebula, 5500 LY from Earth and part of Sagittarius

(NASA, ESA, J. Hester-ASU, April 2003)

So much depends on what we are aiming to do now. Are we living to please other humans? Or are we following the path we were made to follow? Neither are necessarily easy. In fact, both may be equally hard. 

It all comes down to why we're doing things.

But then, it generally does.  
.
.
.