At any given moment, you can plausibly say it’s been a long time until now. For all practical purposes you can also say that any ‘now’ is also the very beginning. Neither point of view excludes the other. Both perceptions are continually true. Being able to embrace and integrate both perspectives would appear to be at the heart of today’s Libra New Moon.

Three weeks ago today, Jupiter left more than a year in Virgo behind, simultaneously starting a similar tenure in Libra. One week ago today was the first full day of a new season, initiated when the Sun entered Libra on Sept. 22.

Now it’s Luna’s turn. First, the Moon briefly shared the same degree of Libra with Jupiter for the first time in well over a decade. Shortly after 8:11 pm EDT tonight (00:11:19 UTC tomorrow) the Moon will move on to merge with a Libra Sun for the first time in nearly a year. Today’s conjunction of the Sun and Moon will in turn begin a new monthly cycle of lunar phases. The result is many endings and beginnings connecting you with many other beings, times and places — all in the course of 24 hours.

Of course, you could plausibly make a similar case for any given day if you take the entire solar system into account. That being said, it is not every day that invokes cycles of the Sun, Moon and Jupiter intersecting by cyclical tangent through the auspices of airy, cardinal Libra.

The Sun is our central point of reference in the sky, symbolically associated with being awake and interactive in the world during daytime hours. The Moon is the other side of the solar coin, corresponding to the largely introspective consciousness which usually dominates while you are asleep. Jupiter is largest planet orbiting the Sun, its name indicating an ultimate source of aegis. To have all three implicitly imploring you to be present in the moment, while simultaneously evoking both closure of cycles past and the dawn of eras to come, represents something you might call transcendental.

To a large extent, that’s because Libra itself is transcendental. Cardinal signs are where new seasonal patterns begin. Furthermore, when the Sun enters a cardinal sign we are all quite literally connected in the same moment through a common solar experience. The air of Earth’s atmosphere circulates far and wide, forging a spatial connection between you and everyone else. Finally, Libra is the only sign represented by an inanimate symbol (balance-beam scales) representing a timeless, universal principle (the continuous process of all things oscillating into and out of equilibrium).

Eric’s new class, It’s All In the Houses, will be held on Oct. 8. Discover the key to truly understanding a chart. You may sign up here.

All of which is information you can use to orient your own life with this year’s Libra New Moon.

You might want to begin by contemplating what has finally gone around to begin coming around again for you. Then, you can look ahead to speculate about where the patterns of your life up to this point appear to be taking you.

Finally, you can take a little time and endeavor to focus exclusively on being present with anybody who (and everything which) has somehow come together from far and wide to be present with you now.

That may not sound like much. Not until you consider how so many days just fly by, amounting to something significant only as they accumulate. Rare are the days you will always remember, and even most of those are not made that way by your intent to make them so.

If you at least give some thought to consciously making today one of those you’ll never forget, you will have done the Sun, Moon, Jupiter, the world and your very own self some appropriate justice. On any given day, you could certainly do far worse.

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Once again, the interior of the solar system is moving to symbolically bring the farther and slower planets out of their usual background role and into the foreground of your life. With those moves come implications for you. Also, don’t be surprised if you soon begin to experience a bit of what the late, great Yogi Berra called “deja vu all over again.”

The process started in earnest last week when the Sun joined Jupiter in cardinal Libra to initiate a new season. Mars followed suit last night by entering cardinal Capricorn. The Libra New Moon on Friday, and Mercury’s ingress to Libra early next month, will further up the ante.

All of which brings to mind what started when Pluto entered Capricorn for the long run nearly eight years ago. You remember. You were there. Barack Obama had just been elected President of the United States.

Because the Sun’s annual cycle through the cardinal signs (Aries, Cancer, Libra and Capricorn) is synchronized with the sequence of Earth’s seasons, any other object entering a cardinal sign is thought to initiate a season of its own.

If you look at things that way, you can see how Pluto’s current position at the midpoint of Capricorn plausibly represents an era only halfway done. When you consider what happened during Pluto’s previous tenure in Capricorn (basically, from 1762 through 1777), it gives you an idea of what you are living in the midst of now.

While history is not destined to repeat, it does tend to rhyme. The result is what you might call a series of songs. Each tune evolves from a previous melody to integrate the gradually accumulating experience of humanity, and plays out along with the proverbial music of the spheres. It would now appear that the first verse of our current song is nearing completion and is about to offer a refrain.

Eric’s new class, It’s All In the Houses, will be held on Oct. 8. Discover the key to truly understanding a chart. You may sign up here.

Just as with performances of the greatest blues artists, the refrain will not entail repetition. We will almost certainly experience an evolutionary elaboration instead.

It is even more certain that you will somehow contribute to the further development of and embellishments to our ever-refining tune. Be aware of that. For if astrology has anything to say to you right now, it’s that you do not have the luxury of being a witness to history. For better or worse, you are a participant.

While you cannot ever go back to the beginning of a history and start over, you are now implicitly being afforded a rare opportunity to start our next verse for the better. You can see it happening in the world at large. No doubt you can see hints of the same process in your personal life as well.

Strictly speaking, it’s not a second chance. What’s has been written since 2008 will not be revised, but it can still be resolved, very much as with a melody.

Indications are that the song of our era is only halfway over. The final verse may not yet have begun, but at the very least we have reached what blues musicians call a “turnaround”: a musical phrase that functions to conclude one phase of the tune while also leading into the next. Make it yours, and look for a chance to turn at least a few things around yourself. By doing your part consciously, and with awareness, you can give our collective composition its own chance to play out at least a little better than it did the last time through.

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The astrology has been like a highlight reel lately. There were eclipses. There was a Mercury retrograde. Jupiter wound up more than a year in Virgo and moved on to Libra. Then the Sun followed Jupiter into Libra to precipitate a new season. After all of that and more, one might think Venus changing signs would not be very special. Think again.

Earlier today, Venus embarked upon a cruise through Scorpio’s fixed water. The tour will last until Oct. 18, when Venus will move on to Sagittarius. It’s not rare for Venus to visit Scorpio. Roughly speaking, it happens once a year.

Neither is Venus considered to be powerfully expressed in Scorpio. That’s because Scorpio is on the opposite side of the zodiac from Taurus. Along with Libra, Taurus is where Venus is said to be in its ‘domicile’. For astrologers, any planet opposed to its domicile (the sign it rules) is considered to be in ‘detriment’. Anything happening in Scorpio, however, is intrinsically going to defy simple interpretation.

Scorpio is complex. Water signs tend towards the enigmatic. Fixed signs can be resistant. The combination is often mysterious. With Scorpio being a feminine sign ruled by assertive Mars, there is an explicit polarity as well. Include a historical association between Scorpio and not only scorpions, but also eagles and snakes (to name just the most prominent corresponding animal totems) and the assertive nature of Mars is further emphasized.

Add on Pluto as Scorpio’s modern co-ruler and there is an implicit layering of meaning, which adds depth to the fixed quality while also provoking ambivalence and representing the counter-intuitive.

This particular traversal of Scorpio will feature Venus symbolically merging with both Black Moon Lilith (a calculated point in the Moon’s orbit) and the asteroid Juno — both of which represent powerfully independent facets of the feminine.

Eric’s new class, It’s All In the Houses, will be held on Oct. 8. Discover the key to truly understanding a chart. You may sign up here.

The implied consequence is that Venus opposed to its domicile this year will express as anything but domestic. Depending on your point of view, that lack of domestication for Venus may not be a detriment at all.

A larger context, which takes the entire zodiac into account, only furthers the impression that Venus in Scorpio this year will correspond with the feminine defying any confirmation with traditional expectations. To cite just two examples, consider the other signs where Mars is considered to be strong: Aries and Capricorn.

Aries, the other sign ruled by Mars, is currently hosting the background aspect against which the rest of the astrology is playing out: revolutionary Uranus sharing the same degree with disruptive Eris. Implicit in that conjunction is a symbolic indication of some rather big changes regarding everybody’s place in the order of things.

In addition, Mars itself will be moving on to its exaltation in Capricorn (and, ultimately, a conjunction with Pluto) early next week. Almost as if Mars is trying to add fuel to what’s going on in Scorpio.

In sum, don’t expect the 2016 tenure of Venus in Scorpio to correspond with sugar, spice and everything nice. Rather, look forward to a very special time, which can also be a very good time — so long as you do not limit yourself to traditional expectations.

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Astrology is not destiny. If you retain only one fact about astrology for the long run, remember that one. It is the key to freedom and the door to responsibility. The next thing to remember is that the type of astrology nearly always referenced here on Planet Waves (tropical astrology) is so named because it is synchronized with Earth’s seasons.

With a change of season only a few days away, it’s a good time to review valid principles and free yourself from invalid conclusions. Begin with the fact that the season you are experiencing at any given time depends on two factors.

The first factor that determines the season you experience is where Earth is in its orbit around the Sun. The second parameter is where you are on Earth. Those two variables function as they do because our Earth is tilted on its axis of rotation. The degree of tilt is essentially constant and steady at about 23-and-a-half degrees. In other words, Earth does not flop around like a fish.

Instead, the orientation of Earth to the Sun changes as the Earth orbits the Sun. Once a year, for one day, at one and only one part of Earth’s orbit around the Sun, the northern pole of Earth’s axis is pointing directly at the Sun. On that day, the Sun is shining directly overhead at about 23-and-a-half degrees latitude north of the equator. That latitude is called the Tropic of Cancer, and on that day the Sun enters the sign of tropical Cancer. From the surface of the Earth we see the Sun rise and set as far north as it will ever get on that day, which is called a solstice.

See how it works? The same principle holds true for the one day (about six months after the Cancer solstice) when the southern pole of Earth’s axis is pointing directly at the Sun. When that happens, we see the Sun rise and set as far south as it will ever get. The Sun is directly overhead at the latitude commonly called the Tropic of Capricorn, precisely as astrology’s symbolic Sun enters the sign of tropical Capricorn to mark the southern solstice.

In between solstices we have two equinoxes. You guessed it, that’s when the Sun is directly overhead at the equator. One day each year we get the Aries equinox, which takes place when the Sun’s risings and settings are about half way through the process of moving north, and the Sun is entering tropical Aries. Then, as if to balance things out, about six months after the Aries equinox comes the Libra equinox, which will be taking place in two days.

On Thursday, shortly after 10:21 am EDT (14:21:03 UTC) the Sun will be directly overhead at the equator, about halfway through its process of rising and setting farther and farther towards the south. At that time, the Earth’s poles will be pointed neither toward nor away from the Sun. From the surface of Earth you will see the Sun rise directly East and set precisely West no matter where you are. On that day, everybody — no matter where they are — will get the same length of day and the same amount of night as everybody else.

Equator. Equal. Equinox. Who needs groundless speculation about destiny and fate when you have such amazing and undeniable facts? It is a fact that we will all literally be equal under the Sun on Thursday, the first day of solar Libra. It is a reminder from the cosmos that our place in the universe is defined in part by equality, which is the basis of justice, which is essential for peace. In peace, cooperation is made possible. With peace, communities can thrive.

Cooperation and community is how we survived this long. If we are to survive any longer, cooperation and peace are what we will have to practice. And it all comes from the Sun and its relationship to the surface of Earth where we all live. It’s that simple. One would think we could remember it.

One might think we could finally understand that destiny is the cumulative result of choice. Your choices, their choices, his choices, her choices, all flowing together to create fate. Astrology can help you to make those choices, but not if you give your powerful place in the universe away to astrology. Astrology can only be of constructive use when you take your power from it.

Take your power in order to practice cooperation. Take your power in order to form and strengthen communities. That is what we are here to do. It’s so simple. If we forget more often than not, it is not because we are destined to do so. It is a choice, and we can get better at making it. If you can remember only one thing to think about on Thursday, think about that.

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This live audio class covers the most basic level of astrology: where things happen, the houses. If you understand the houses as environments and groups of themes, you can read a chart. We will hold the class by teleconference at noon EDT on Saturday, Oct. 8, 2016. You may sign up here.

As Eric has mentioned numerous times, planets further removed from the Sun become more astrologically accessible when they are in aspect from planets closer to the Sun. For example, today’s Full Moon and lunar eclipse in late Pisces is making Chiron (also in late Pisces) a more strongly felt factor.

Because of a combination of factors, the same principle will continue to be true this weekend as Venus moves through late Libra. First off, Libra is one of the two signs (along with Taurus) where Venus is considered to be the so-called ‘ruler’.

When a planet is moving through a sign it rules, the qualities of the object in question tend to be more strongly expressed here on Earth. Because human beings have been aware of Venus for a long time, its qualities are many. To begin with, astrologer Robert Hand has succinctly noted how, “In its highest manifestation, Venus is love, the emotion that brings people together without force or compulsion.”

In the context of today’s Pisces Full Moon and lunar eclipse, emotions are likely to be of immediate concern for the near future. Venus moving in late Libra to oppose the Aries conjunction of far-out Uranus and even more ‘out there’ Eris in Aries over the weekend would seem to provide some context in turn — beginning with the aspect itself. Planets in opposition can conceivably imply conflict, but that’s not usually the case. More commonly, astrological oppositions indicate something of a complementary reflection.

Of course, the most familiar and prototypical representation of an opposition is a Full Moon. Full Moons happen when the Sun opposes the Moon from across the sky (which is also to say, from across the zodiac circle), with Earth moving somewhere between the two. Hence, from our perspective a Full Moon reflects the Sun’s light fully, like a great, big mirror.

Lunar eclipses (such as the one today) happen when Earth is moving precisely between the Sun and Moon so as to both throw a shadow on the Moon and also make their prototypical opposition aspect more emphatic.

Venus is now moving to follow the act of a Full Moon and lunar eclipse, symbolically adding still more emphasis. Given that Uranus last met up with Eris in Aries nearly 90 years ago, the implications of Venus in opposition to them would seem to extend today’s Full Moon through time while providing a more specific context.

Among other things, the qualities associated with Uranus tend to be on the revolutionary side. When interviewed for the October/November issue of The Mountain Astrologer, Robert Hand even went so far as to call Uranus a “crazy planet.” Even though Eris was discovered and named only in this century, it would appear to be proving itself rather intense as well — especially as regards to issues of identity.

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When you take into account that any opposition between Aries and Libra has relationship implications, the total picture of the two oppositions (Virgo Sun to Pisces Moon, followed by Venus in Libra opposing both Uranus and Eris in Aries), becomes more focused. In its highest manifestation, the emphasis would seem to include how love can be a revolutionary act that functions to reflect on who you are.

Fortunately, love is not against the law in most earthly jurisdictions. Therefore, both showing and being open to receiving some love this weekend would appear to be a safe and sound way to flow with the astrology. Just remember one thing: what works for you may not work so well for the object of your affections.

By all means, show your love, but in a gentle (even subtle) way — at least until reciprocal signals are reflected back to you. Don’t love anybody into a corner. Love so as to show who you are while simultaneously allowing others the freedom to be who they are. You might be pleasantly surprised by what happens. Similarly, if you are the object of love from another, endeavor to receive it graciously while also practicing self-respect.

When you consider all the other stuff going on in the world (and undoubtedly, in your life), you could do a lot worse than to be brought together with others without force or compulsion this weekend. Who knows, with morning’s echo on Monday, your life could quite conceivably have become a lot better as result.

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It’s almost as if there is a contest in the sky right now. One could almost say it’s a conflict, just like in the old days. That is to say, the really, really old days before legend — the days of myth. But wait, it can’t be that way because at least some of the evident contestants now were not evident way back then.

No, what’s going on now simply cannot be a throwback to ancient times. We have not been displaced to an antiquity when human beings recorded themselves as hapless, and helplessly at the mercy of warring deities.

Yes, it’s just us. Or perhaps it would be more appropriate to say “justice.” Either way, and from appearances, we can still find astrology useful even if we can no longer project our experience on the sky.

We are still part of the solar system. As with any system, one part can tell us something of any other part, and of the whole. That’s pretty darn impressive when you consider how detached many of us have become from our very bodies, much less the sky. Our main task as human beings right now is to be just as impressive in turn.

It would not be impressive if we were to revert back to the really, really old days and transfer responsibility for our destiny to deities above. Nor would it be especially imposing if we were to continue our more recent history of giving our power away to human beings whom we allow to wield godlike authority. Nope, the only way through everything that now seems impossibly crazy is for you and every individual person to accept an appropriate share of what, after all, we have striven for and finally won.

What we have won after thousands of years of evolution is an independence of sorts. With that freedom from gods, from kings, and finally from what has become a hapless plutocracy must unavoidably come a certain set of responsibilities. First and foremost in that set is an obligation to let yourself be human.

In a way, it is almost as if humanity is no longer childlike but still highly impressionable. If that’s actually true, and if we are to make the most of our situation, we each have to be okay with that. You must accept yourself as being capable of awe, wonder and even being overcome without using your vulnerability as an excuse to revert back to being childlike. After all, we have each individually been through something like this before.

You can remember. Most of our parents were not terribly explicit about it. Upon emerging from our individual childhoods, many of us were at least vaguely informed, however. Upon entering adolescence, many of us were told that were were about to go through a big change. Then we saw it happen in our very bodies.

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What’s going on now is something similar, except it is all of us together at once. Just as with our individual emergence into adulthood, this collective maturing is both unavoidable and visceral. It’s a good thing, too.

Indeed, even if the current state in human evolution is every bit as trying as the individual going through the experience of adolescence, it’s also better because none of us need feel like we are alone. It’s happening to everybody, and there is correspondence in the sky.

Pluto in Capricorn correlates with the inevitability. Neptune in Pisces corresponds with how you wake from unreal dreams into a world that sometimes seems even less real. Uranus conjunct Eris in Aries is emblematic of the revolutionary change in identity. Saturn in Sagittarius connects with how limits can actually be employed to define, rather than allowed to confine.

Jupiter now in Libra relates to our having greater capacities of balance than we imagined. Mars approaching conjunction with the Galactic Core in Sagittarius would parallel with our need to bridge from the boundless energy of childhood to the newfound desires of an adult. Venus in Libra might very well represent the values we need to guide us, especially when it comes to evolving from “just us” to “justice.” Mercury, especially retrograde and in the depths of Virgo, is the very image of being impressionable.

Finally, the culmination of the Sun and Moon not only opposing for a Full Moon, but eclipsing on Friday is indicative of an outcome aligned with all of us here on Earth. And it’s all one picture. It’s a whole, not any one planet or aspect alone.

The sky is not jiving. Neither should we. Humanity is going through the big change, and we must individually and collectively be our own parents, our own kings and queens, our own gods and goddesses. At the same time, however, we must each respect the realities of our physical existence.

Let that need for mutual respect be your guide. When in doubt, take care of your physical needs, and do your best to help as many others do the same as you can. If you can do just that, you will have done justice to yourself, to others and to our time — for the time being. After all, we do need to take this big change one step at a time.

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Astrology rarely tracks with the civil calendar. Take the concept of a New Year for one example. You seldom see a substantial astrological cycle beginning on Jan. 1. For astrologers, New Year’s Day is more like the Sun entering Aries on (or about) March 21 to start another cycle of the 12 signs.

So it happens that today and tomorrow, while of little note on the civil calendar, do represent a significant turning point for astrologers. Earlier today, Jupiter left its year-plus in Virgo behind, and started anew for about 13 months in Libra.

Tomorrow, Saturn in Sagittarius and Neptune in Pisces reach 90 degrees of separation (what astrologers call a ‘square’ aspect) for the third and final time. This begins closure on a pattern that started late last year.

The pattern referred to here is the mutable T-square that distinguished at least some of the deep background astrology for 2016. Broadly, but appropriately speaking, Jupiter’s tenure in mutable Virgo found it opposing Neptune in mutable Pisces to form what one might call the upper part of the ‘T’ configuration. The ‘leg’ of the motif was Saturn, widely squaring both Jupiter and Neptune from mutable Sagittarius.

As combined aspects go, the mutable T-square of 2016 was as informative as it was challenging. Of course, some of the biggest challenges this year were more fairly related to Mars, oscillating between Scorpio and Sagittarius for its first retrograde involving two signs in almost a decade. Neither should we forget the ongoing Aries conjunction from Uranus to Eris. One might also mention that echoes of the period during which Uranus in Aries and Pluto in Capricorn exchanged seven square aspects (roughly 2012 to 2015) have not yet faded.

BALANCE, our exciting 12-sign Midyear Reading on forthcoming astrology, including Jupiter in Libra, is available for instant access. Get all 12 signs here, or choose your individual signs.

All that being said, it is likely that we will look back on the mutable T-square of 2016 as a time when the term ‘this changes everything’ really was something more than hype. With time, the full effect will become more clear.

Even so, you can see some of the results already. It would be reasonable to say that presidential elections in the U.S. have passed a point from which they are unlikely to return. An even larger and probably more historically significant turning point came with the passage of a British referendum to separate from the European Union.

Now, as Jupiter moves on, so do each and all of us. Don’t be mistaken. This is not an entirely abrupt point of departure. Saturn and Neptune still have some alchemy to work during the year to come. Even if the shocks that arrived with Mars retrograde are not soon repeated, we are almost certainly in for some more awe.

To make the most of what’s ahead (and not just for yourself), think of yourself as a champion golfer. Nearly a decade ago you emerged from a clubhouse of the ages to start this round. Now, you have reached the halfway point, turning onto the back nine. As awesome as the course has been, what’s distinguished this round most of all are the players. While some have turned back, and others have disappeared into the rough, you are still in the running — perhaps even on the leader board. That is no accident.

You are not moving to tee off onto the tenth fairway now by chance; you are here because you are worthy. You made the cut. Now it’s time to put on a charge and let the gallery know what you are made of. Strike the ball firmly. Walk with confidence. Combine strength and suppleness to drive for show. Steady your nerves and putt for dough. You were born to be the awe in this tournament and return to the clubhouse with satisfaction.

As is the case with golf, this is not really a contest between you and other people. You are contending only with yourself. The game is within. The trees, bunkers, ponds, sand traps and putting greens are but a representation of your inner terrain. By now you know that. Show what you know, and you will have at least achieved on par with anybody and everybody else.

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