One question astrologers often receive from clients is: “What does it mean?” That’s a fair question to ask, so long as you do not expect simply to be given a pat answer. In general, astrology does not provide clear-cut answers. What astrology affords instead is some context in which you might discover, and even create, meaning on and of your own.

The purpose of this particular column is to propose a context for the Full Moon in Gemini coming up later today (or early tomorrow, depending on where you live). Your role, should you choose to participate, will be to take that information and embark upon a very achievable voyage of discovery and creation.

Let’s start off with some basics. Every Full Moon is but one phase in a cycle of lunar phases that takes approximately one month to complete. Most astrologers consider an old lunar cycle to end (and a new lunar cycle simultaneously to begin) with what is called a New Moon.

Every New Moon takes place when the Sun and Moon occupy the same degree of the same sign, moving through the sky alongside each other basically one day a month. About two weeks after every New Moon (halfway through the monthly cycle), the Sun and Moon move to occupy the same degree of opposite signs. That’s a Full Moon, when the Sun and Moon are in opposite parts of the sky, again essentially once a month.

The Gemini Full Moon shortly after 7:05 pm EST this evening (which translates to about five minutes after midnight UTC tomorrow morning) will therefore be opposed by the Sun in Sagittarius.

To begin deriving a useful meaning for tonight’s Full Moon you should first place it into context with whatever initiated for you during the Sagittarius New Moon of Nov. 29. Having done that, you will also have an equal time frame to work within between now and the next New Moon, in Capricorn on Dec. 28.

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The last two weeks have come and gone. You can’t change what happened in the past. By the same token, however, what has happened since the last New Moon does not have to dictate what will happen until the next one.

If you want to know what the Gemini Full Moon tonight means for you, try sticking to the basics. You are now implicitly halfway through something.

What’s more, with just a little time to review the fortnight just past, you should be able to discover what that something is. Once you’ve made that discovery, you should also be able to at least envision how you would like that something to turn out.

Once you have that vision, you will have a context in which to act. By acting you can enhance the probability of an outcome dictated (at least in part) by your will. If you can do just that, you will have taken your first small step towards making the giant leap of never having to ask anybody else what any Full Moon means ever again. That, you must admit, would quite an achievement indeed.

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When it comes to the Sun’s role in astrology, the simpler the better. In his book Horoscope Symbols, the inestimable Robert Hand probably put it best, concisely referring to the Sun as “day, light and consciousness.” Over the next handful of days (at least) the astrology will function as if to emphasize the Sun’s central role in both tangible reality and metaphor.

Tomorrow, the Sun will share the same degree of Sagittarius with another of astrology’s emblems of executive function: Saturn. Interestingly, that conjunction will come with a supportive sextile aspect from symbolically sovereign Jupiter (ruler of Sagittarius) precisely sixty degrees away in Libra.

As if in counterpoint to the simultaneous props the Sun will receive from both Saturn and Jupiter tomorrow, there will be an amazingly timed encounter with an asteroid of nominal serendipity.

For astrologers who see fit to use them, smaller objects orbiting the Sun often serve to reiterate major planet themes while also adding informative detail. Tomorrow will be no exception. Among the solar system’s more compact members is a group called “Apollo asteroids”.

Like many figures of ancient mythology, Apollo was conceived of as a complex multi-tasking entity. Even so, there is no denying Apollo’s close association with day, light and its source: the Sun. To simplify things, Apollo asteroids are so named because their orbits come close to the Sun – often crossing Earth’s orbit in the process.

Tomorrow, the Apollo asteroid which (so far as we know) comes closest to the Sun will be making its nearest approach to Earth (about 6 million miles) until the end of this century. That object is named 3200 Phaethon, and its relatively close encounter with Earth will come as it is speeding through Aries, the sign in which astrologers consider the Sun to be “exalted”.

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In mythology, Phaethon was Apollo’s errant son who took the family car (the Sun – or solar chariot, if you will) for a spin even though his driving skills were less than adequate. Because poor Phaethon could not stay in his proverbial lane, Earth was nearly frozen and burnt over the course of one disastrous day, forcing Jupiter to dispatch him with a bolt of lighting.

For astrologers, Phaethon unavoidably invokes both the Sun and Jupiter, albeit as a contrasting motif. When taken in holistic context with the rest of our current and impending astrology, Phaethon’s role tomorrow would seem to emphasize the Sun most of all. The prominence of the Sun will then continue through next week and into the week after that, even though (for those of you in the Northern Hemisphere) this is the darkest time of year.

If you are reading a lot about the Sun’s role in astrology over the next couple weeks, you should not be surprised. In more ways than one, the Sun will be at center stage for some time. When you consider any such reports in the context of your own life, you would probably do best to keep things simple. To the extent that your place on Earth minimizes the time of day and light, consider responding by maximizing your focus on being alert and aware. If you can do just that, the Sun will be working for you around the clock.

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Venus enters Aquarius shortly before 10 am EST (14:51:00 UTC) tomorrow, Dec. 7, as if to teach a lesson. The instructive principle being referred to here will not be readily apparent in a chart for the ingress. Instead, this particular teaching will become evident only through the unique context time and patience can provide.

Broadly speaking, you would not be far off to say that Venus will convey an advocacy of patience when it leaves Capricorn behind and moves on to Aquarius. It would be even more accurate, however, to perceive an exhortation towards a long view.

A big part of the message Venus will carry into Aquarius has to do with its astrological complement: Mars. For astrologers, the relationship between Venus and Mars is not a contest for supremacy. It is instead a cyclical dynamic symbolically seeking equilibrium, which never repeats in quite the same way. As with most astrological cycles, the synodic period germane to Venus and Mars both ends and begins with a conjunction.

Speaking very roughly for the sake of simplicity, Venus and Mars come together in the same degree of the same sign to form a conjunction aspect every other year. Periodically, there are exceptions. Last year was a particularly special case. Venus and Mars conjoined three times in three different signs during 2015.

In 2017, Venus and Mars will return to form by conjoining just once. As is also more usual, their conjunction next year will take place when Venus (the fleeter of the two) catches Mars from behind to meet for a day before moving on to begin their next cycle. Were you to look at the chart for tomorrow’s Venus ingress all by itself, you might easily conclude that the next such merger of Venus and Mars was close at hand. That’s because Mars is also currently in Aquarius.

Indeed, when Venus reaches the first degree of Aquarius tomorrow, Mars will be only a bit more than 20 degrees ahead. If you consider that Mars takes roughly twice as long as Venus does to make one circuit of all 12 zodiac signs, and if you had only tomorrow’s ingress chart to look at, you could easily jump to an errant conclusion: that Venus and Mars would meet up as early as next month. In fact, the one exact 2017 conjunction from Venus and Mars will not take place until Oct. 5 — basically ten months from now.

That’s because Venus is even now slowing down on its way to station retrograde in Aries on March 4. By that time, Mars will have turned the usual tables and pulled away from Venus, almost (but not quite) catching up by the end of January.

When it comes to life themes that resonate with the yin-yang motif of Venus and Mars, you might want to keep their impending almost-but-not-quite in mind. What now seems like a done deal in the making could actually be only the beginning of either a merry or exhausting chase, which will not be resolved until late next year. Better to play the long game and enhance the possibility of merry.

Just as important for those of you who practice or aspire to astrology is to remember that one chart does not contain all the pertinent information needed to interpret its given moment. It’s also vital to consistently consult your trusty ephemeris and other resources so as to see how one event fits not only into the spatial context of the whole sky, but also into the temporal context an entire cycle — even an entire life.

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If you consider the distribution of sign-ruling planets, it’s evident that the zodiac is rather lopsided right now. Today the Sun, Moon, Mercury, Venus and Pluto are all clustered in either Sagittarius (ruled by Jupiter) or Capricorn (ruled by Saturn). That’s just one-sixth of the sky. But wait, there’s more.

Throw in Mars in Aquarius (traditionally ruled by Saturn, now co-ruled by Uranus), and Neptune in its modern Pisces domain (originally ruled by Jupiter) and you have eight of the ten sign-rulers in just one single quadrant of the zodiac.

The other two are Jupiter and Uranus. Jupiter is ensconced in Libra (ruled by Venus, which is now moving through Capricorn) until late next year. Uranus, for its part, is doing a significant deed with Eris in Aries (ruled by Mars). In other words, by either direct location or symbolic association, the roads being traced by the most astrologically significant objects in the solar system all lead back to either Jupiter or Saturn at this time. It is a situation that will continue through the end of this year and well into the 2017.

Jupiter and Saturn have an interesting relationship. You might consider them to be complementary, but on a different level from the very personal yin-yang dynamic that the relationship between Venus and Mars represents. When you consider both their size and orbital periods Jupiter and Saturn are evidently emblematic of something bigger and more enduring than purely personal concerns.

You would not be wrong to label Jupiter and Saturn interpersonal planets, corresponding to the concerns of entire generations. Jupiter, in the words of Robert Hand, “is a planet of growth and enlargement.” Its downside is excess.

Although ancient astrological tradition is not as kind to Saturn as it is to Jupiter, it also has a very real upside having to do with definition and structure. On its better-known downside, Saturn correlates with confinement and oppression. When their upsides are emphasized and in balance with each other, Jupiter and Saturn combine to represent the characteristics of both a healthy life and a functional society: enough expansiveness to be inclusive and enough structure to hold together.

When the downsides of Jupiter and Saturn are emphasized, or when they are out of balance with each other, things tend to get dysfunctional. That’s where you come in. It is people, both separately and collectively, who decide how and when to assert the combined qualities of Jupiter and Saturn. If you look at your life right now, you will probably see Jupiter and Saturn operating together for better or worse. Simply being aware means you can act as a moderating influence if necessary.

On the larger, interpersonal scale of current events, it is abundantly clear that the combined natures of Saturn and Jupiter are both evident and in need of moderation. Principles of inclusiveness are taking a beating. Where structure is not falling apart, it is serving to confine rather than helping to define vast numbers of people. Excess is everywhere. Simply being aware of those dysfunctions also serves as a guide towards which actions would be most timely and efficacious.

Weather permitting, the current distribution of visible planets makes for some good astronomical viewing, especially in the western sky just after dark. Astrologically, the picture is both bigger and deeper. Beyond the current symbolic dominance of Jupiter and Saturn, there is something more — a clear indication that simply looking on will not function to change anything at all.

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By the time this column is posted, the Sagittarius New Moon will be behind us. The Moon will remain in Sagittarius until Thursday. Over the next couple evenings, the Moon will also emerge from the shadows, reappearing as a thin crescent in the west just after sunset.

As this week comes to a close, the gradually waxing Moon will move on to Capricorn. At the same time, a more figurative shadow phase will begin — for Mercury, which is also currently in Sagittarius along with the Sun and Moon.

Just hours before Mercury makes ingress to Capricorn on Friday, it will enter what many call the ‘shadow phase’ preceding its next retrograde (which begins on Dec. 19). This period before retrograde is when Mercury is still in forward motion but gradually slowing down. It is moving in a section of the zodiac it will eventually retrace two more times — once in reverse, and one final time after resuming direct motion once again.

For many, the term ‘shadow’ carries negative connotations. That’s one reason Eric proposed a new description of Mercury’s prelude to retrograde years ago: its ‘echo phase’. As with so much of what we offer here at Planet Waves, the idea behind rephrasing Mercury’s period of preface is to empower you. For there is in fact nothing intrinsically foreboding about Mercury retrogrades, much less what leads up to or follows them.

By at least entertaining the term ‘echo phase’ you give yourself a chance to shed some unnecessary dread and take up with a useful tool for positive and creative engagement with the cosmos. Behind the idea is a cogent observation formalized by Albert Einstein (but assumed by astrologers long before): that time and space are equivalent, and not at all necessarily linear in nature.

With the advent of Mercury’s next echo phase, you will thus be presented with the opportunity to conduct a worthy experiment by simply making some observations of your own. All you have to do, to begin with, is pay closer attention to the world than usual and take note of what seem to be emerging themes. Then, during Mercury’s subsequent time of reversal, evaluate which of those topics (if any) manifest in practice.

You might think of your putative experiment as listening for an echo from the future, but in a very practical way it will entail something entirely different. It’s a chance to take a measure of your own mind, and its connection to your physical existence, relative to the world. Once you have that estimation, you will (much as the Moon is presently doing) have initiated a gradual and very real emergence from darkness into light. What you do or where you go from there will be entirely up to you.

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A being such as yourself can be defined in many ways. There are biological functions such as ingestion, respiration, excretion and reproduction. It could also be said that every living thing makes some sort of effort. If there were one word to express the motivation for every effort and the objective of every biological function, it might be “needs.”

Every life form has needs, and the means to get them met. The more self-aware a living being is, the better it can anticipate, prioritize and act towards that end. As a social being who lives in community, you have a specialized ability express your needs in abstract ways.

Astrology also has its specialized components, but not every astrologer refers to them. Admittedly, you can do a lot with just the luminaries — the Sun and Moon as they move through the signs and houses. The planets of ancient astrological traditions (Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn) can also be employed along with the Sun and Moon to plausibly interpret a great deal of your everyday experience.

In addition, relatively modern sign co-rulers revealed by use of the telescope (Uranus, Neptune and Pluto) are useful for placing your life in what you might call a broader context.

Sometimes, however, a broad context is not enough to deal with life’s complexity. Specificity is also important. Take language as an example. The larger the vocabulary, the more specific and clear a linguistic expression can be. If you see fit to call astrology a form of language, then the same principle must certainly apply. That’s where the so-called “minor” objects of astrology come in.

Among the hundreds of thousands of minor planets in our solar system, a very large number move in the main belt of asteroids located between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. Among the asteroids in that belt is the third one discovered there, named after the highest-ranking goddess of ancient Roman mythology: Juno.

Just as with all objects discovered by telescope, it’s probably best not to put too much stock in the mythology behind Juno’s name. Better for Juno to prove its own place in the language of astrology, and in your life. Interestingly, just such a “proving moment” (as Eric calls it) is coming up next week. Specifically, that moment will come with the New Moon, which will take place in the eighth degree of Sagittarius on Tuesday, just after 7:18 am EST (12:18:09 UTC).

A New Moon takes place roughly once a month when the Sun and Moon occupy the same degree of the same sign for what astrologers call a conjunction. All conjunctions represent at least three things.

First, a conjunction is an example of one cycle completing and a new one starting. Next, the two objects participating in a conjunction are thought to at least temporarily merge their identifying energies. Finally, with two objects in such close astrological quarters, it’s difficult to see all of the specific complexities that their new cycle will eventually reveal.

It’s relatively rare for a third object to occupy precisely the same degree of the conjoined luminaries at the time of a New Moon. Tuesday will be just such an occasion. Juno will be that third object, sharing the same degree of Sagittarius with the Sun and Moon, and providing you with a proving moment to call your own.

To derive your personal proof on Tuesday, there will be just a few things to keep in mind in addition to the three most probable meanings of a conjunction. It would be useful to think of the Sun as concisely as famed astrologer Robert Hand does, namely symbolizing “day, light and consciousness.” Then, consider the Moon as representing a complementary principle: that which is just below the level of waking conscious awareness — such as feelings, intuitions and the dreams that come with sleep.

You might also allow yourself to draw upon Eric’s cogent perception of Juno’s place in astrology as having to do with both the needs that distinguish all living things, and the relatively higher function of expressing them clearly. Last but not least, let the final and truest proof of Juno’s pudding be the objective observations, subjective thoughts, choices and actions that constitute your unique experience of the world.

Even though there is a New Moon roughly once a month, no two New Moons are the same. Each conjunction of the luminaries takes place in a different context, providing a unique perspective of your place in both the continuum of life on Earth and as part the cyclical system we call solar. Assuming you participate with conscious awareness, the Sagittarius New Moon on Tuesday should allow you to come away with a larger vocabulary for better understanding your own needs, and better making them known.

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Today is the first full day under a mutable Sagittarius Sun. The waning Moon will continue to move through the latter half of mutable Virgo all day today, and will not transition to cardinal Libra until shortly before 2:42 pm EDT (19:41:55 UTC) tomorrow. With such a combination you could be excused if you feel like you are on shaky ground.

Add a decelerating (read: symbolically hesitant) Mercury approaching its conjunction with Saturn in mid-Sagittarius tomorrow, and you could not be blamed if you are scrutinizing the near future with what proverb calls a “jaundiced eye.”

There is no doubt that a little skepticism is always a healthy thing. In addition, it is well within the realm of possibility that being critical can serve a constructive purpose. Indeed, when consciously employed with caution, even cynicism can be used as a means to make a point. Even so, if there is anything to seeing our astrology this week holistically, you might not want to allow censorious means to become an end in themselves. That’s because there is something else going on

Operating on a level below the explicit uncertainty of our times is something implicitly deeper. You might call it a “long game.” As this week goes on, keep your eyes, ears, mind and heart open for signs that a transition from one state to another is subtly working its way towards becoming more plainly evident.

Astrologically, there are indications of a subtle liminality gradually unfolding beneath superficially evident trends. Appropriately, those emblematic intimations are taking place in cardinal signs, where the Sun moves to initiate new seasons.

As Eric has oft-mentioned, the deep background of our current times is represented by what’s going on in cardinal Aries. Uranus and Eris are not even close to completing their long continuum of an Aries conjunction, which on the surface may seem only disruptive. Fortunately, Ceres has recently become part of the Uranus-Eris merger as if to show a more fecund side of transmutation.

In perfect harmony with the Aries stellium, Venus is even now closing in on what might fairly be called a provocatively erotic merger with Pluto in cardinal Capricorn. Furthering to provide symbolic amplification is Jupiter in cardinal Libra, now only a few days away from a square aspect (a separation of 90 degrees) with both Venus and Pluto.

All told, the holiday weekend coming up should provide you an ample opportunity to witness something more sublime than food, football and dysfunctional relationships revisited. All you will have to do is be patient and perceive deeply into that which nearly everybody else will be taking for granted.

Watch the ice melt in your drinking glass. Take note of the steam rising from your hot beverage. Feel the hints of a new season coming on, and think about what you might do to put yourself in the flow of such deceptively prosaic processes. In each case, the inevitable result is an equilibrium that reliably and always gives rise to yet another turn. Who knows, you might even feel a bit of a transition yourself — from being shaken by events to being stirred into action.

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