A Plutonic Lunar Eclipse

The Alchemist by William Fettes Douglas (1853)

With shadows cast and reflections invoked, so we move through the last couple of tense days towards the eclipsing of our inner emotional positions. Occurring at 25 Libra, that eclipse occurs on April 15th – and as it does, Pluto goes retrograde.

That’s a serious astrological combination.

Known for flooding emotions and events which often serve as life markers, lunar eclipses aren’t ordinarily associated with life changing events. Well, at least not in the moment – not unless some other major transit is happening on your individual chart in the area of the eclipse, which in this instance means 25 Libra.

Underwritten by the precept that to not ‘do,’ act, ask or care about who we’re being in life, Libra teaches that failure to take others into account ultimately either gets us nowhere or puts us at odds with Self or others. Thus all things Libra teach some part of why we cannot know unless we ask – even though there is that unsettling reality which says that when we ask, we must be prepared for answers we may not like, want, expect or feel prepared (or even understand how) to comply with.

As a degree in Libra’s last ten degrees (the  third ‘decan’) the lunar eclipse emphasizes connections with others and our world.

But then there’s the Pluto side of this equation, a segment of the conversation which starts with the idea that any station (planetary or otherwise) gets an allowance of several days – it having become this particular astrologer’s choice to say two days prior and two days after the moment of station, if not a little more.

All of which is fine and normal – or as normal as anything referring to Pluto tends to be. As a marker of transformative energetics, Pluto represents that which fascinates us, attracts us, obsesses us…even that which interests us – with our personal (birth chart) Pluto giving us a description of the challenges we face in such a regard. Are we someone who gets totally over-the-top obsessed to our own detriment? With Pluto (regardless of natal sign), those tendencies emerge so often as terrible feelings about our Self. Or sometimes we project that fear of not being able to love ourselves onto others in the form of  shame, embarrassment, denial or those ever-so-popular (if never really what you think they are) human choices known as revenge and retribution.

It’s never about ‘them.’ What we experience in life is always about us. That’s why vengeance doesn’t work – and why humans have learned enough to have coined the expression “revenge is a dish best served cold,” as that’s the only way to emerge from any or all things Plutonic (which would connect to matters 8th house and Scorpionic) with satisfaction and any sense of lasting validation.

You know…the kind of self respect and true self esteem which allows us to advance through life growing in positive attribute instead of simply becoming that most negative of Pluto images, Pluto as rapist – most of all of our own emotional stability and self worth.

At the moment, with Pluto going station-retrograde at 13 Capricorn (Sabian Symbol: 'AN ANCIENT BAS-RELIEF CARVED IN GRANITE REMAINS A WITNESS TO A LONG-FORGOTTEN CULTURE') in combination with a lunar eclipse we can expect an emotional shift (transformation)…or to be ‘shifted’ (diverted from something else, perhaps). The obvious combination of two cardinal signs speaks to action, decisions and taking something on (or committing to something) whatever that may mean in your life, with the square-by-sign between lunar eclipse and Pluto..

…giving us to know that there is a balance of some sort (the square) which is required between where we are ‘going’ and how where we are ‘going’ will affect others, or even who we are or are taken to be.

The Sabian symbol having been discussed elsewhere (you can use the world cloud to find the other posts focused on 13 Capricorn), given Pluto’s position just shy of fixed star Vega (charisma) there is a great deal of ‘pulling back’ (going into retrograde) from the certainty that something we have thought of as ‘charismatic’ is not exactly what we thought it would be: it is becoming transformed in our (emotional/lunar) regard…and thus we are being ‘brought back into balance’ with the necessities of (earthy/Capricorn) reality exerting – or at least beginning to exert a ‘balancing’ pressure on some sort of mass (3rd decan) action or reaction to some (Libra as air sign) idea.

In other words, something is becoming charismatic...or ending its life as a charismatic influence.

Or maybe we're just losing our shine. That happens too. Anyone with any natal axis point, nodal position or planet within a couple of degrees of 13 Capricorn, Libra, Aries or Cancer has been feeling life fluctuating for quite some time now...and this will be a particularly trying and/or insightful passage.

One figures it will be a little easier on those whose charts are unaffected...but we do live on the same planet, after all. And such things count.

Lunar Eclipse at 25 Libra (text chart)

April 15, 2014 - 7:43 a.m. (UT/+0) - Aries Wheel (location not specific)

Lunar Eclipse at 25 Libra (glyph chart)

April 15, 2014 - 7:43 a.m. (UT/+0) - Aries Wheel (location not specific)

Lunar eclipses are typified as ‘high emotional water marks’ which can be tsunami like. Or they can create something more akin to a mental or life-affecting undertow. Where solar eclipses take three years to ‘mature’ and manifest fully, lunar eclipses hit us hard and from there ebb off, generally becoming a factor we understand to cope with over the next three months.

Because this pairing links the Moon and Pluto, the darker sides of human nature (and vulnerabilities), we can expect to see revelations, ‘outbreaks’ and ‘unearthings' of every sort - good or bad. There will be those attempt to obscure and ‘bury’ much which people can’t bring themselves to deal with the truth of...and though some may be deceitful, many people will simply think they’re doing something good even when in some 'occulted' (hidden) way they are somehow part of the problem.

Those who are open to the type of inspiration and insight which allows them to see both sides of every problem, situation and dynamic will do well here...though there will be some temptation to simply give in or hold on (depending on what mode you come to this time in).

Where Pluto is concerned, to face our potentials as well as our flaws is ultimate strength; those very human but very real emotional frailties which cannot face its own reality will attract whatever will reveal the hidden truth...delicious or deliciously awful (or both) as it may be.

For effectiveness and otherwise it's fortunate that there is a ‘rule’ for handling All Things Pluto. It’s a curious sort of rule, and one which goes right back to that ‘served cold’ concept. Every sign has a challenge and with Scorpio, that challenge is not to lose ourselves to our emotions – which is why as ‘outcome ruler’ of Scorpio, Pluto events (and transits) carry such high human price tags.

Yes, unfortunately it seems to take more and more to get our attention these days. Some like to ‘blame’ such things on the internet or other modern technologies. That such blaming goes on is plainly ‘new age, new page’ unfamiliarity – we humans scream loudly for change, then run from it in person. Our new age (the Aquarian Age) moves all things which were emotionally based into a theoretical and economic mode.

For those down on war, take heart – it’ll probably all become economic. People will still die of course, they’ll just die of economic neglect...and if you don't like that statement welcome to the passionately dispassionate realm of Aquarius and its qualitative Aquarian test: to be an individual while being part of the whole…to use one’s individuality in the advancing of that whole, as one among equals.

No, no elitism is allowed…and we can all expect that ‘lacks of responsibility,’ especially those which are based in economics (individual or systemic, purposeful or accidental, personally moderated or automated, individual and ‘mass market’) are going to become ever more costly.

Lack of responsibility under the Aquarian precept says ‘I must do what I must do because that is what is required in this life.’ Not MY life, not the ‘next’ life…this life.

Astrology…like all other belief systems…is ultimately about what it means to be a human being. We are given rules not so that we can impose them on others but so we can acknowledge them within the scope of our conscious Self and thus be the better person worthy of this life.

Where Pluto is concerned, we must always know what our ‘fact’ is. It may be right or wrong in any other context, but we must know what it is and we must be capable of stating it, simply and clearly, despite what is being said or held forth by others.

If you are being affected by this eclipse/station pairing, you will be feeling this need to understand and clarify your thoughts. It may be the moment for you to feel your feelings and think…or this may be the moment to make your choice or act.

That’s individual.
 

 

That the ongoing Pluto-Uranus-Jupiter t-square is being opposed by transiting

retrograde Mars (in Libra) is a sign of too many issues or options. We will 'need' to take care of many issues...and through trying to prioritize those things (because they can't all be taken care of at once) we will come to know more about our Self - in particular, our most human (lunar) and feeling Self. This isn't defined astrologically as a comfortable process, but it can have a very good outcome.  

Whichever way you go, you will probably encounter some degree of resistance, conflict, objections – any such measures. You may be questioning yourself…and then again, you may find yourself ranged against any number of others who may or may not agree with you.

The Plutonic instruction is simple: know your truth and state it clearly – ONCE. Then be quiet.

After the noise dies down, after the ‘temperature’ falls…then the real fact (or facts) win out. That’s the Pluto equation. Pluto operates positively when and where emotionality is not just controlled, but understood by the one subject to their own emotionality.

And it’s a cycle…just as Pluto has been so likened to the earthly process of volcanism, things must ‘get heated’ in order for them to cool off – which is why you’ll see many people with Scorpio heavily presented in their chart go through such emotionality as part of their personal process.

Did you think it’s about you? No – Scorpio is all about eliciting your reaction so that in learning about others the Scorpio(nic) entity learns more about being comfortable in their own life and skin.

Warning us of that? That’s a premier Pluto manifestation, which makes understanding just that much…?

Well, that may be the whole point at the moment, considering the impending Taurus solar eclipse. We’re experiencing a time which asks us kindly to examine the state and nature of our own self worth.

And if we won’t kindly do that…then life will be unkind in its asking of us to do that much.

Fortunately, there is a good side to all this – which is the grace of all things Pluto: when we can bring ourselves to be kind, that very process…the process of being brave enough to feel another’s hurt as our own…that not only heals them, it heals us through triggering the innate power of sustaining, regenerative energy.

You know…the reward of inner warmth which brings such human comfort in the midst of what can otherwise feel like a terribly inhuman or inhumane life.
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