By Amanda Moreno

I often run across people — friends, acquaintances and others — who have a policy of complete intolerance when it comes to anything Christian. I find this to be somewhat frustrating, although I can also understand it. Christianity has been at the helm of tremendous amounts of pain and suffering. At the same time, Jesus seems cool, be he real or mythological.

Photo by graywacke/A Landing a Day

Also, I love working with Mary. And when I tap into what I see as the heart of the religion, it is just that — a lot of heart. Love. Compassion. Forgiveness. That the shadows of those concepts seem to have taken hold is an unfortunate byproduct.

My earliest exposure to religion was through my father’s Catholicism. I was quite the devout, bible-school lovin’, Catholic Kindergarten attending little Catholic girl until my dad died when I was six. This left my religious education to my mom, who was your typical run-of-the-mill non-practicing Methodist. Although, to give credit where credit is due, she was in fact the one who oversaw my baptism in a friend’s kitchen sink. Practical and effective.

My mom never really had much of an interest in going to church, save for a few times she took my brother and me to one. My mom is actually the source of one of the most influential nuggets of advice anyone ever gave me in regards to religion when I was young. I was hiking with her and my brother, and she told me to be good to people and to myself; to act with kindness; and to learn as much as I could about all kinds of different religions, and then figure out what made sense to me based on my experience.

My best friend from fourth to seventh grades, however, was Vineyard Christian, a fundamentalist branch of the church that I absolutely adored. I realize in retrospect that what I really loved about going to church could be whittled down to two things: love of community and love of singing. Those Vineyard Christians incorporated song into everything — and not the stoic, formal hymns of the Catholic Church. Rather it was folky and reminded me of rock music and took place with the full congregation — including the kids. Which I thought was awesome.

So here I am, a late-thirties lady with fairly eclectic spiritual beliefs. I went through my days of absolute hate and disregard for the Christian church. I can still dredge quite a bit of that up when discussing the Catholic Church in particular, as I have very little tolerance for institutionalized child rape. But every once in a while it all comes back to those early days, and I’m able to recognize the early seeding of my current path as someone who anchors love here.

While riding the train yesterday I was compelled to do something that made me vaguely uncomfortable. But the more the thought stuck around, the more I realized I needed to just give into the compulsion. So I did it: I purchased and downloaded Amy Grant’s The Collection — a 1986 compilation of some of her ‘greatest hits’ along with a few new tracks that marked her exit from strict Christian music and into the pop world. Love songs that seemed fairly typical for the time, but yet could be said to be love songs to god. A really hip, 80s pop culture god.

To be clear, this album is Christian pop music. Amy Grant is apparently known as the “Queen of Christian Pop.” At least, she was prior to her crossover to regular pop music — and prior to allegations of an affair and a divorce that caused some Christian stations to stop playing her music. She also garnered criticism from the Christian community that she was too worldly and sexy. Reading that just now on her Wiki page made me like her even more.

So I found myself walking around Seattle’s hippest, most eclectic, alternative-culture wonderland neighborhood, listening to Amy sing her praises to the lord and smiling involuntarily and brightly because of it. It was cracking me up, and it was also filling me with all kinds of nostalgic joy.

Several things clicked into place as the music filled me up with a sense of totally unexpected euphoric happiness. Part of that was remembering how much I loved singing at church as a child, a habit that evolved into years spent in all kinds of choirs and performing in musicals. I also realized as I listened that my sister bought this particular Amy Grant album (or maybe I should call it what it really was: a cassette tape) for me shortly before my dad died.

And there it was — the thirtieth anniversary of my dad’s death is in a few weeks, and we are therefore in the Saturn return of the event. As I realized this, tears came to my eyes as I recognized what a healing salve this music must be for my inner six-year-old who was such a little love bug, who was devout and full of faith, and who was plunged smack-dab into the middle of the totally shocking and unexpected loss of her favorite person in the world.
My emotions — the good and the bad — shut down that day thirty years ago as I went into a state of complete overwhelm, as I sponged the emotions of my mom and brother and probably a bunch of other people too.

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That emotional side didn’t dare to resurface until I was 16, when something triggered the realization that I had never really cried over my dad’s death. Up until that point, what moved the emotions within me was cheesy pop music, and then as puberty set in, the more angsty music of Tori Amos and Nirvana as well as musicals like Les Miserables and Phantom of the Opera.

Christian rock, at least what I was exposed to three decades ago, is pretty straightforward. The lyrics claim that “love will find a way,” and talk about guardian angels and hope and joy. Really, they are themes that are still pretty relevant to my way of seeing and being in the world.

In my most centered state I tend to want to just pour heaping doses of love into the planet. It reminds me of a recent experience I had doing one of my favorite things — getting to know a new lover’s body through massage — and the feeling of just wanting to let the love flow through to my hands and into the other person’s body. I consider that feeling of euphoric love to be one of the best forms of erotic energy.

Perhaps that erotic energy is a bit far removed from the six-year-old part of me. But considering the upcoming anniversary, I thought the urge to listen to music I’ve rarely heard in thirty years seemed a fascinating synchronicity. And as I ponder themes of truth and judgment as they’re related to Saturn in Sagittarius, as well as revisit and rethink my desires and their motives as Mars starts its retrograde, I think I’ll pay some attention to what was forming for me thirty years ago.

By Amanda Moreno

I’m having one of those weeks where the writing is flowing in poetic juicy reveries, but the content is all far too personal to be published here. Sometimes I push through that, other times I don’t. Today falls into the latter category, so what follows is an attempt to make something cohesive out of random bits — I suppose that is at times what the journey of life feels like as well!

Photo by graywacke/A Landing a Day

Coming up against a deadline, I sat at my altar. I took some deep breaths and asked for guidance.

I pulled a tarot card and was not at all surprised to see the face of Isis staring back at me from the Tantric Dakini Oracle — the card traditionally represented by the High Priestess.

I then reached for the book at my bedside, Robert Powell’s The Sophia Teachings, and opened to a page, where I read these words:

The human soul mirrors the cosmic soul, Sophia. Raising the veil of Sophia or Isis, we gain a glimpse of profound star mysteries. This living wisdom of the stars is inspired by Divine Sophia herself, and will emerge during the course of the New Age. It will entail a living understanding of how the human being reincarnates, how the human being is related to the world of stars, and how, through reincarnation, human karma or destiny is carried over from one life to the next.

Now, let me backtrack a little. One of the phrases we’re constantly uttering in the world of Deep Memory Process — which is the form of past-life regression therapy that I practice — is, “You can’t make this shit up.” I’ve had several of those moments recently.

I taught a class on Mars Retrograde the other night, and in it we did four guided visualization exercises, all of which seemed to be really fruitful for all involved. There were several examples of the ways the archetypes speak through full sensory images, justifying for me the reasons I ask people to tune in to their own knowing before we cover what a transit or symbol or astrological configuration might mean.

For example, I had everyone visualize their chart and then imagine standing on their natal Mars. One person said they felt like they were drowning, like they couldn’t fight their way to the surface, and like their throat was constricted and they were unable to yell for help. Taking a look, we saw their Mars was in the 12th house (the ocean/water) in Gemini (words/communication). Furthermore, it was squaring Saturn (constriction) in the third house (communication). It was a perfect image for the symbolism. You can’t make this shit up.

Almost two years ago I spent five weeks living with my Deep Memory Process teacher. While there, I came across Powell’s book for the first time. I’d never really heard of Sophia, or Divine Wisdom, but it was everywhere I turned, and so when the book came my way I read it. In two sittings. I bawled through the second one. Reading it felt like a homecoming, and so many pieces began to click into place — I wrote about it briefly back then.

Looking at where the asteroid Sophia was transiting in my chart, I saw it was squaring my nodes — something unfinished being revisited. I also saw the asteroid conjunct my ascendant, squaring my Moon and opposing my Sun in my natal chart. This was confirmation for me that the story has a key role in my life. Indeed, it helped me to conceptualize some really important aspects of my own lineage and my place here on Earth.

I’ve worked with Sophia and her stories since I left Florida, but I’ve had this off-and-on, nagging sense that I’m not quite doing enough with it. Then, suddenly this past weekend, I was absolutely filled with the need to revisit Powell’s book, dropped what I was doing, and picked it up again. Later that day I looked at my transits — the asteroid is exactly conjunct my Venus in Pisces, opposing Saturn and squaring Neptune.

It’s always nice to see those synchronicities, even if I don’t spend time delineating what they “mean.” In Powell’s conception of the Sophia mythology, she has three forms that have developed over time to bring different forms of knowing to the Earth — first of power, then of wisdom, and finally of love or the heart. The second stage is represented by Isis. The final stage, which he believes we are heading into, is represented by Aphrodite (Venus) or perhaps the Virgin Mary, and speaks to the primacy of love and the wisdom of the heart.

Seeing the transiting asteroid on my Venus, then, was not surprising for me, nor was seeing the Isis card on my altar after I’d asked for guidance, specifically from Sophia.

Perhaps that’s not quite as hard-hitting a “you can’t make this shit up” example as others I’ve experienced. But these tiny synchronicities do all link together to keep things interesting and to keep me feeling a sense of connection to something greater than myself. How I work with it varies. Sometimes just that confirmation is enough. Today, I saw Isis and instantly thought to use my intuition — what is needed in this moment? I grabbed a fluorite palm stone and placed it over my heart. The relief made me sigh.

Find out what the Mars retrograde will mean for you in Eric’s 2016 Spring Reading. You may pre-order all 12 signs here for less than $40. Includes video readings!

Mars retrograde is bringing all kinds of talk about desire and motivation. One primary desire has risen up far and above all others for me. It’s obvious and it’s a straightforward interpretation of my own astrology — and it makes me want to run and hide because of all of the fear surrounding it.

I’ve felt disempowered and a bit heartsick over it, honestly. Heart dysfunction for a person who bases everything on “grounding it in love” is always a pretty big bummer. When the heart becomes a place of fear it takes away a lot of will and drive, at least for me.

So, there was a reminder in the cards for me today that is perhaps a reminder for you as well: Trust your intuition, or do what you can slowly and gently to learn how. Give yourself a good dose of heart healing — whether that’s by the laying on of the stones (I highly recommend fluorite) or something else. And, if you’re open to it, remember that our souls have been playing these themes out — these desires and these paths — for long periods of time.

We have learned about power. We have learned about the wisdom that comes from the mind and learning to use that power to direct our will. Maybe now it is time to return all of it to the heart, to come from that place of grounded love.

I hear some of my own desires and biases coming through in that. So I’ll be doing what I’ve been advising my clients to do for the next few months: re-examining those desires, particularly in terms of my motivations. Such fun words to write, and such easy advice to give. We’ll see how it all plays out.

Sometimes I feel like I wander between worlds. I’m sensitive to and in some ways a part of many different subcultures, and yet feel like an outsider in some ways with all of them. Maybe that’s a typical human experience. Or just an Aquarian one.

Photo by graywacke/A Landing a Day

This tendency to be a part of so many networks while at the same time on the outskirts has given me the opportunity to give myself permission to just be weird, have fun, and embrace how I learn how to use my ‘woo’ tools — or perhaps more respectfully, my consciousness-raising tools — in whatever way I want.

This means I’m often doing different practices on the train and the bus or over whiskey and with crayons and flash cards. I have a hearty respect for lineage and rules, but if I were to wait for the right structured learning mechanism to come along I’d never get anywhere. I figure a lot of things out myself, through studying and listening but also just through diving in and experiencing — and giving myself permission to play.

I was recently meeting with a group of lovely beings, all of whom are licensed therapists (myself being the exception to that rule), who use some kind of spiritual practices in our work with clients — whether that’s astrology or hypnotherapy or shamanic practices or art therapy. We meet to support each other, consult about clients, and often do some kind of experiential exercise.

This past week, we did an exercise one of the group members called word salad. She would read of an open-ended sentence, and then we spent three minutes letting words flow onto paper, with the only rule being that we couldn’t let our pens stop.

Three minutes is not a lot of time, but by the third round I was pretty well into the groove. The sentence was: “A part of my shadow that is coming into the light now is…” I immediately tapped into an image that I could see quite clearly in my mind’s eye, and feel pulsating in my abdomen. It was not pleasant, and after three minutes I was aware that I had tapped into my shadow, or a component of it, in a strong way.

My background is steeped in the Jungian tradition, and so when I refer to “shadow” I am very much referring to it in the Jungian sense. My little Jung for Beginners comic strip book defines ‘shadow’ as:

An unconscious part of the personality characterized by traits and attitudes, whether negative or positive, which the conscious ego tends to reject or ignore; the inferior part of the personality; sum of all personal and collective psychic elements which, because of their incompatibility with the chosen conscious attitude, are denied expression in life and therefore coalesce into a relatively autonomous “splinter personality” with contrary tendencies in the unconscious. The shadow behaves compensatorily to consciousness; hence its effects can be positive as well as negative. In dreams, the shadow figure is always of the same sex as the dreamer.

It’s important for me to note that my understanding also runs parallel to Jung’s discussions in that I believe that the shadow can never be removed, nor does it ever go away; there is, instead, an ethical imperative to acknowledge it and take creative responsibility for it. This means that a large part of my own shadow work has to do with becoming familiar with how my shadow or my shadow parts feel when they’re being triggered or constellated, so that I can recognize what is happening and use that energy constructively rather than flinging it out as projection.

Now, I’ll be honest: when it came to the part of the group activity when we were going to make some kind of art representing a portion of our word salad, I wanted to just breeze by the shadow stuff and go for the easier part — the image of an eagle soaring high up in the sky that had come earlier in the exercise. Partially because I was running out of time and partially because…well, I am a bit out of practice with the shadow work thing and also a bit weary. I began looking for images to make a quick collage, as I only had 20 minutes to get the project done.

Nothing was popping out at me, however, and my eye kept going to a box of nice, thick, multi-colored pieces of really good chalk. After a bit of back-and-forthing, I knew that I needed to use one of the dark grey pieces to put the shadow image onto paper. I went with the urge, smudging and smearing and externalizing the sensations the image conveyed onto the paper.

I then realized what a powerful image it was for me, and recognized that I didn’t really want to just leave it at that. But was also hesitant to just drop my long list of plans for the day to do some shadow work.

So I compromised with myself.

I wrote a line of three prayers that I made up on the spot around the border of the image, setting my intention for the work I plan to do with that part of myself; the last of which led up to the top of the page where I pasted magazine images of glowing hot air balloons and other balls of light to symbolize the merging of light and dark. Finally, I used deep blue, teal, purple and a little bit of orange to shade in the remaining white parts of the page, ensuring the shadow image was fully surrounded with a rainbow of solid, loving color.

Find out what the Mars retrograde will mean for you in Eric’s 2016 Spring Reading. You may pre-order all 12 signs here for less than $40. Includes video readings!

I giggled at myself as I wrapped up the process, because of the silliness, the simplicity, and also the knowledge of what a big chunk of really heavy work had just emerged.

I forgot about the image for a spell until two days later when I awoke from a series of intensely disturbing dreams in which a sociopathic-feeling, cold, calculating female was enacting horrible things on the other residents of the dream. As I walked to the train that morning, I was reflecting on the dream and the fact that I had felt like a zombie for the previous two days, when all of a sudden the image came back into my mind.

Suddenly my dull, exhausted affect and pretty horrendous dreams made more sense. I also recognized that regardless of the causes for my exhausted state, I’d made a plan to do further work with what had emerged and needed to stick to it.

The shadow work thing is not for everyone. I’m fascinated by it, however, and have regularly gained a wealth of benefits from diving in when and as I’m able — or sometimes because I am thrown in head first by life and seem to have no choice. This work is part of my own spiritual path. And during those times when I’m able to incorporate play and a sense of whimsy, I feel fortunate; because that is not always the case.

One thing is for sure, however: I will be investing in a nice set of chalk pastels. That stuff gets the job done.

Occasionally in this forum I will begin to articulate new insights and ideas — this piece is one of them. I offer that at the top, dear reader, in acknowledgment of the fact that these thoughts are works in progress and in invitation to discuss the themes in the comments.

Photo by graywacke/A Landing a Day

Although I’ve dabbled in more “magical” practices, such as Golden Dawn and various Pagan traditions, I realized a while back that I’m not really a practitioner of magic, be it ceremonial or witchy.

There are subtleties to be worked out there, as I definitely use ritual frequently — often in the intention-setting sense — but I have strayed away from more active will-enforcing-supporting pursuits. One reason of several is that I just don’t think I’m any good at that kind of magic — and it’s not anything I aspire to. Another is that it’s just felt too loaded. A break in my understanding of this inner conflict came about a year ago as I was contemplating it in a session with my therapist.

As I pondered my aversions to ritual magic, my therapist pointed out the difference between the magical path and the mystical path. We were nearing the end of the session and his resulting over-generalization was that the magical path is about asserting one’s will whereas the mystical path was about radical acceptance of all that is or radical retreat from all that is. Although I knew the dynamics were more complex, the statement gave me a good starting point. I recognized myself as being more on the mystical path than the magical, with some overlap — a designation that became startlingly more clear to me this past weekend.

I was sitting in a conversation that was all over the occult-y, magical and worldview map, when the concept of using magic came up in a specific context that I was was very uncomfortable with. A paraphrase of the basic example given was that if, say, an individual is suffering at the hands of an abuser, lives with some kind of physical disability, and is unable to realistically get away, it might be time for the ‘magician’ to just cut the shit and work some magic in order to get the abuser out of the picture, forcefully and without regard for the abuser’s well being.

I asked the speaker why they would use magical workings in that way as opposed to, say, performing some kind of magical work that would serve to separate the two people in ways that serve the highest good of all involved, leaving it to the dictates of the universe to determine the details. Why was force the kind of magic that was called for? Not to mention, as a friend later pointed out after the fact, why not just call social services or intervene in a more practical, non-magical way?

I don’t recall the exact response, but there was some murmur in the room of how all of that “goodness and light” stuff isn’t always the answer, and that sometimes there are darker things at work that must be combated — like attracts like, I suppose. There was a deeper thread there, too, which encompasses a worldview in which perhaps magic works and exists in darker ways, therefore requiring liberation through magical intervention. It reminded me of stories of South American Shamans who store projectiles — the ‘amoral’ spirits of dead insects or shrubs — in their energy fields to be flung at enemies at will.

In that moment, I realized with crystal clarity that enacting my will — in that kind of magical manner at least — is not at all anything that I am interested in. I located myself more radically on the mystical path than ever before, even if in response to my further crystallizing aversion to magical practice.

Find out what the Mars retrograde will mean for you in Eric’s 2016 Spring Reading, which we’ll publish in mid-April. You may pre-order all 12 signs here.

The subject matter moved on to discussing the use of magic and ritual when it comes to affecting world events, potentially in ways that are not based in love and “the highest good.” And again, I realized how far I’ve swung to the “love and light” side of the fence.

I understand that the shadow of the New Age movement lies very much in using crystals and bubbles of light as a form of bypassing and avoidance. That is not at all what I mean when I speak of my own basic precept of choosing love first. I’m not afraid of the dark — well, at least not in general — nor has my life been absent of it. My encounters with the dark continually make me more convinced of the importance of coming from a place of love; and the experience of just how integral heart-centered focus is in times of dark comprises the fundamental essence of who I am.

I do not shy away from the Martian/Aries thrust of will, but using it in that kind of magician/sorcerer sense just makes me question whether it is an ethical manipulation, even if it is not overt, and even when wielded with the best of intentions. It also seems to be dancing awfully closely with the potential for overblown ego identification and megalomania, the latter of which are reasons I got out of the Golden Dawn/Western Hermetic tradition after a few months of being initiated — too much mental activity, not enough embodied reality.

Furthermore, my thoughts turned to the Karpman drama triangle, as I realized that playing savior or hero in these ways essentially enmeshes one in the triangle, reinforcing the loop that will ultimately make hero into victim into perpetrator and on and on.

Despite my crystal clarity as to the reasons I am magic-averse, I’m still aware that I’m not a mystic in the radical acceptance or retreat sense. What comes to mind here is my use of shamanic techniques.

When I first started studying Shamanism, I associated it largely with the Scorpio archetype. I still see that in many ways, but I’ve also had a teacher who associates Shamanism with the Virgo-Pisces axis (and perhaps the entire mutable cross). I had a difficult time latching onto that at first. Shamanic themes seemed so inherently Scorpionic to me — going into the underworld, the dark, into dismemberment and regeneration. Scorpio represented what I’d come to know as the healing crisis of the Shaman and their ability to face transformation and death.

As I moved along in my studies, however, I ended up in a workshop where we learned Shamanic extraction techniques. This was, of course, a generic teaching, gleaned from several different cultures, and is not representative of all Shamanism. But one of the basic tenets of that teaching was the importance of merging with a powerful healing ally and dedicating the work to the compassionate healing of the individual involved. Everything was based in that intention of compassion and healing.

That form of Shamanic work seems very Pisces/Compassion-Virgo/Healing to me. As I integrated that new understanding, I began to wonder if perhaps the Scorpio archetype is associated more with the sorcerer than the Shaman. I began to think in terms of Scorpio’s relationship with Mars — representing the desires of the will and the ego — as being a distinctly different form of Shamanism, perhaps one more overtly focused on the individual’s will and specific power dynamics than what I was being taught.

Of course, the Pisces shadow is nothing to mess around with either — it is, after all, associated with the Typhon — a half-human, half-snake monster created by the Titans as a last-ditch effort to prevent the takeover of the Olympians. Pisces is one of those signs whose vast shadow can get overlooked in favor of its capacity for transcendence and ecstasy. Pisces contains the unqualified act of a predator stalking its prey, not because it is evil, but because that is what happens in nature.

This mental meandering does remind me of a basic precept I’ve seen in discussions on Facebook and in personal communiques lately, one which resonates very highly for me — ‘first, do no harm.’ Who am I to say what lessons are being learned in any given dynamic? How am I to know what my limited perspective is missing?

Is it ethical or even loving of me to intervene in another person’s life in a forceful way, even if it’s from behind the scenes? Setting the intention for my magical practice, whatever it looks like, as well as my healing practice to have the ongoing intention of doing no harm seems like solid practice to me.

Where the concept of will is concerned, I spend a lot of time talking about the importance of figuring out and sticking up for one’s own needs and going after what we want — getting out in front of our creations — but what is the best or most effective way to do that?

Once again, I’m left with a bunch of questions that likely do not have cut-and-dried answers. But this week, I feel more aware of the nature of my own path, and I’m happy to add a strongly annunciated “First, do no harm” to my already standard “Just look for love in it.”

By Amanda Moreno

For me, this eclipse season has been a big tangle of all kinds of inertia, revving up some deep inner voice that loves to tell me I’m lazy, even after a full day’s work. I’ll admit, though, I found myself frequently sitting in my home office on a big, overstuffed chair, just scrolling through Facebook or looking for something mindless to watch — the act of deciding which show to choose being no match for my inertia bubble.

Photo by graywacke/A Landing a Day

Therefore, I decided to use this past weekend for deep spring equinox cleaning purposes. Time to liven up my space, clear it out, do my quarterly altar re-build, and make way for the moment when the inertia will lift (it will, won’t it?).

As part of my space-cleansing and blessing, I decided I wanted to play the music of Krishna Das through my three-day process. I needed something without words I can understand in order to enable a sense of devotional presence, and I love this music’s ability to allow for release at the same time as I’m filled with some kind of divine presence — a sense of complexity, life and hope.

Aside from being the ultimate form of medicine for my soul and an integral part of my spirituality, music is perhaps my primary memory-trigger. My relationships with certain songs and albums are some of the most long-standing in my life. I’m aware that I’m a very scent-oriented rememberer as well, but music plucks on my heartstrings in a way that makes me sigh or gasp audibly to process whatever strand of feeling is moving through.

As I pushed ‘play’ on a Krishna Das album this weekend, a gasp did escape. Followed by a cringe. Suddenly, I was doubled over in pain. I realized, then, why I have been avoiding Krishna Das: it was the music that got me through the first half of last year. As I was going through major transformation — including the dissolution of an incredibly intense and important relationship, a plunge into deep, permeating doubt surrounding my place on the path of a healer, and an accompaniment of body woes to go with it all — I used this music as a cocoon of constant prayer.

I can remember days when I would be vigilant about having my earphones in before I left the house, knowing how acutely sensitive my whole being was to everything around me — most specifically other people’s energy — and how painful half-hour bus rides had become because of it. I was learning about energetic boundaries because I absolutely had to, rather than out of the curiosity that had fueled my previous studies.

I was being asked to let it all move through me, rather than shielding against it or allowing it to become lodged within, and I was constantly over-stimulated. As I walked to the bus stop, I would begin to visualize whatever mantra the music was putting forth (this one specifically comes to mind) as words swirling around my field. I would change the colors and the speed according to my intuition. This practice gave me something to focus on, to learn from, and cushioned me enough to gather my composure for whatever job or event I was headed to.

In the past few days, as I’ve let that music back in, I’ve been fascinated with just how powerfully it takes me back to that time in my life in visceral, full-body memory. It’s not painful anymore, but I am so intrigued by the way it feels. It feels as if whispers of joy and pain and sorrow are funneling through my veins, out of my heart, and into my body in a loosening process, hopefully facilitating more letting go. It feels healing, but also totally shocking.

This process has also reminded me of just how enchanted and magical that period of my life felt. Of all the things I’ve gone through in my life, it was one of the most painful and challenging, but there was a constant sense of the sacred — even when I wanted to give up on it. The music played a large part in that; but there was also so much ritual and ceremony, so much focusing on astrology as a tool of guidance and timing, and such a strong group of healers and mentors around me.

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Looking back on it now, I think I can attribute to that period of time what I’m experiencing lately as a return to trusting the universe.

I remember doing a ritual at the ocean about a year ago. I left the house where I was staying with a Krishna Das song in my head, allowing the mantra to repeat over and over, and walked out onto the beach, towards the ocean, surrounded by guides. I performed the ritual I’d created from within that container, and at the end had a quick little conversation with Grandmother Ocean.

I pretty much just gave my gratitude for her constant healing presence in my life, and let her know I was going to leave in a few minutes, adding that although I wasn’t expecting any sign or recognition, if she wanted to send one to let me know she’d heard, that would be great.

I immediately looked over and saw three deer playing in the surf. Tears and laughter ensued.

There were other times, with other animal friends sending clear and direct messages of recognition and support. As I’ve reflected on all of this, there is some sense of longing for that level of connection and meaning — although I’ve no desire to return to that state and am quite enjoying my current life. There will be time for more plunges, I’m sure.

This eclipse window has felt so intimately connected to the one that occurred around this time last year. It makes sense that these themes would arise, and that the memories feel like they come from ten years ago…or just yesterday. Whatever the case, I am forever humbled by the power of music to evoke memory, to heal and hold, and to remain a constant ally. It’s quite the blessing, and I need to remind myself more often what a potent form of medication it can be.

By Amanda Moreno

Well, my friends, I’ve begun to tune back into the world stage — specifically in terms of politics — for the first time in a while, in preparation for some good old caucusing fun on March 26. I’ve kept my exposure limited to specific candidates I might potentially be caucusing for, and have experienced some pleasant surprises. For example, I was heartened to learn that Mr. Sanders voted against the Patriot Act both times.

Photo by graywacke/A Landing a Day

Imagine that: a leader who believes and acts in the interests of our constitutional rights. At least twice.

I have, at the same time, felt my curiosity rise as to how my conservative family members are faring — would they really go so far as to vote for Trump? I don’t know why I’d be surprised, really, as they’ve never ceased to amaze me before, but I went ahead and asked my liberal mom how the fam seems to be doing. She said that one of them (the one I purposely and explicitly don’t talk to for reasons related to the 2008 election) says that he’s pissed off that he “might be forced to vote for Trump.”

Wow. What a way to compound all of the hate, fear and violent rage already being constellated within that sector of the American public. He’s going to come up with reasons why it’s liberal America’s fault that he has to vote for someone like Trump, and use it to fuel his anger. Of course, my interpretation could be wrong, but what a sobering display of stubborn hatred. Also? What a sobering display of the ways our political system is undeniably akin to a football game.

For reasons not directly related to American politics, I’ve been studying the archetype of ‘Evil’ lately, predominantly in terms of the asteroid Lucifer. It’s something I’ve been called to do for several years, but have been avoiding and putting off. Alas, the universe can be tricky, and its efforts to force the issue finally paid off (just as transiting Lucifer comes in for a nice conjunction with my North Node). Here I’ve been for the past two nights, learning about Evil right before bedtime.

Something that has been at the front of my mind today is the idea that Evil hides behind God. Bin Laden hid behind Islam. Dubya hid behind Christianity. Look at how much evil has been enacted in the name of religion throughout history. Evil tends to hide behind causes that many get behind; it manifests through seduction; it preys on feelings of victimization in those who allow their fears and insecurities to be anesthetized by a charismatic figure who takes control.

Now, how anyone can see Trump as charismatic is something I’ll never be able to understand, but as I walked around the city today I kept thinking about this notion of Evil hiding behind God and wondered how that made sense in terms of Trump. I mean, I’m pretty sure he proclaims to be some form of Christian, but is that a cornerstone of his platform? I don’t think I’ve seen him proclaiming to be doing God’s work — although that might be a byproduct of the fact that I’ve watched zero live-action shots of the man in recent years and tend to only buzz by his headlines.

He is, however, strongly associated with the main God of our culture: money. Is that it? As we’ve stripped our culture of ancient systems of belief, we’ve put all of our drive to discover, seek and make meaning into the pursuit of making money, worshipping goods and status. Is that in effect what Evil is now hiding behind? Doesn’t seem too much of a long shot. Then again, perhaps I’m stretching it. These thoughts are just coming out onto the page here, without a lot of dissection.

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Once again, however, I’m compelled to reflect on our culture’s death wish, which seems to be exponentially increasing as of late. I link that to a lack of coherent spiritual systems that connect us with each other and our hearts.

Just before I began working on this piece, I came across the following quote by Sogyal Rinpoche, from The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying:

I have come to realize that the disastrous effects of the denial of death go far beyond the individual: They affect the whole planet. Believing fundamentally that this life is the only one, modern people have no sense of long-term vision. So there is nothing restraining them from plundering the planet for their own immediate ends and from living in a selfish way that could prove fatal for the future.

It called to mind for me the relativity of a concept like ‘Evil’. Certainly it exists and can be pointed out in its most explicit forms — the Holocaust comes to mind. But isn’t there a quality of evil to the long-term plundering of the planet, which can also be linked to that inability to tap into a long-term vision? Is it Evil that stripped us of our ways of relating to the afterlife and vital meaning-making skills, or just our own ignorance? Is it evil that we have chosen to move forward in a godless society? How are these things connected?

What I’m learning about the asteroid Lucifer is similar to what I’ve learned about any tense aspect of an astrological signature: the challenge is to recognize and bring awareness to how it works in your life, to recognize your emotional weak links and understand when they are becoming distorted and magnified, so that you can respond accordingly. That’s something I can work on at the same time as I grapple with the many layers of my own hesitance to use a term like ‘Evil’ to describe a man like Donald Trump, or to announce its presence in general — or to spend time studying it for that matter.

If Evil preys on the innocent in insidious and seductive ways, I take heart that I know so many people in the world are committed to kindness and love. I know a good number as well who are committed to doing the kind of work that involves looking within to identify where Evil might be at work inside. But sometimes I wonder: what about everyone else? Is there something more active to be done to help them? Do they need help? Do we just focus on changing ourselves and what we can change outside of ourselves, and hope for the best? Is that a form of denial in and of itself?

Once again, I’m leaving this space with questions that don’t have simple answers. Just some food for thought — and in closing, a heaping dose of love.

By Amanda Moreno

It’s been a while since I’ve done any ‘shamanic’ journeying, so I decided to make a solar eclipse ritual out of it. I think that sometimes people shy away from ritual because they think it needs to be a certain way. I figured I’d take this opportunity to give you a glimpse into my often whimsical process of creating a ritual.

Photo by graywacke/A Landing a Day

In my very simple, often spontaneous method the basic structure of a ritual comprises a beginning, middle and end. Pretty easy, right?

For this one I began by smudging first myself then my space with some sage. I lit some candles, started an oil burner with some essences to promote purification (rosemary, lavender) and easier breathing (fir needle), and then called in some allies from the four (or five…or was it seven?) directions. I then sat and went through a grounding and centering visualization to infuse myself and my space with some grounded cosmic love vibes.

The intention I set for the ritual was for it to promote gentle release of what is not serving me in the area of relationships — being that this New Moon and solar eclipse took place in my 7th house — and for general healing at all levels. During the journeying, which made up the middle of the ritual, I planned on traveling to a place I go sometimes to receive healing from my guides and to do a visualization exercise I call “Walking around my chart.”

I went ahead and put on a drumming track that would loop for about 45 minutes, lay down and closed my eyes, and called on Eagle to bring me to the upper worlds. I ended up at a slightly different spot from where I intended to go, yet one I’m also familiar with. It became clear to me then that ‘purification’ was going to be a somewhat unanticipated theme of the journey as I found myself immersed in water.

Normally at this stage in the game I head towards a waterfall that I know quite well. This time, however, I realized that not only was I compelled to dive deep into the water, I was enjoying the sensation of going with that instinct. The feeling of swimming deeper and then experiencing the buoyancy combined with the pressure of the depths — especially knowing I didn’t have to worry about breathing — brought about a sense of vibrancy at my root and sacral chakras that seemed to undulate through my spine. Soon, a spirit animal friend arrived and we were tossing about in the water together, alive with the sensuality of it, and then rising to the surface to take a swim.

Eventually I redirected myself, remembering my initial goal. Energetic cleansing and re-balancing occurred under the guidance of my guides, and I allowed some kind of releasing process to convene without really understanding what was being let go, but rather trusting the process. I’ve found lately that my ability to trust these things is heightened, a welcome change and something I have been working on for years.

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Finally, I decided to take a little walk around my chart. I visualized my chart spanning out in front of me as if I were standing on the spot where the eclipse was occurring.

I tuned in to my left where, about 90 degrees away, my natal Neptune seemed to be erupting in torrents of fluid fire in a cushion of pure indigo blue. It felt energizing, smooth, and quite sultry and sexy — like a much-needed infusion of a spritely romantic surge — carrying the tones of the 5th house, Sagittarius and Neptune.

It was one of those ‘duh’ moments when I had a full-bodied sense of just how much fire infuses my Piscean 8th house Venus through this square to Neptune, and how boundary-less that energy sometimes wants to be — and for good reason. It feels incredible!

I then walked around to several other key spots in the chart and uncovered some insights there as well; for example, how much more slowly my 4th house Scorpio Moon reveals what is going on with it than that Neptune. I was also able to locate a feeling of friction and crankiness I’ve been experiencing lately, thereby giving me some insight into what area of my chart I can work with to better understand what has been arising there.

I eventually called Eagle back in to take me back to this world, and then to end my ritual I gave thanks, released the directions and washed my hands.

Afterwards I felt a need for calm, for quiet, and for a social media break. It’s amazing to me how these days it seems that sometimes I forget how to do those three things together. Instead of turning on something mindless, I decided to use my post spontaneous eclipse ritual time to write up the experience, just in case it’s of some value to you. Whatever the case, now that we’re officially in it — happy eclipse season!