“Love comes to you and you follow, lose one, on to the heart of the sunrise”
— Jon Anderson, Bill Bruford, Chris Square and Rick Wakeman (of Yes)

Shortly before 5:24 am EST (10:23:44 UTC) tomorrow, Venus leaves Aquarius behind to enter Pisces. The next day (Sunday) daylight savings time begins again in the U.S. and Canada. Strictly speaking, the two events are not related. Nonetheless, astrology reminds us that there are no coincidences, only correlations.

The start of daylight savings time is not a hardship for most, but it is a significant adjustment for many. It’s a small example of human endeavors that mess with both nature and your mind, even to the extent of feeling like a loss.

To have an hour suddenly displaced when the time “springs forward” from 2 am to 3 am Sunday morning will, in fact, result in a temporarily lost hour of sleep for many. Losing an hour of sleep is relatively minor compared to other forms of loss, but it is no small thing either.

Unless you prepare by going to bed an hour early on Saturday night (as if), and until you adjust, missing an hour of sleep can easily be experienced subjectively rather than objectively. It is even possible (and entirely human) for the perceived loss of sleep to evoke other perceived losses and leave you feeling a bit melancholy. All of which is not unlike what some of us sky watchers are feeling about how the ingress of Venus into Pisces correlates with events in the sky.

Just as with Mercury joining the Sun in Pisces back on March 5 (resulting in its visage being lost in the heart of the sunrise now), Venus entering Pisces means it is moving to pass behind the Sun from our earthly perspective. With each successive morning the amount of time Venus is visible in the pre-dawn sky grows shorter and shorter.

Soon, the solar glare will wash it out it out, and we won’t see Venus again until it reappears in the western sky after sunset later this year. Given the association Pisces has with the ocean (among other things), one might subjectively sense that Venus is sailing off over the eastern horizon on its way to travel around the world.

Very much as is the case with Mercury (and anybody cruising off to circumnavigate the globe), Venus will in fact not be lost, just out of sight for a while. Similarly, when the U.S. and Canada return to standard time later this year (on Nov. 6) the lost and missed hour will be returned. Such is the way of things in a world (and a universe) where cycles underlie much of reality.

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Remembering how the prevalence of cycles ultimately transforms many perceived losses into returns will help give you some perspective on Monday.

For, along with a missed hour of sleep, Monday will see Venus having progressed far enough into Pisces to square Mars in Sagittarius. The angular separation from Venus to Mars will evoke the three times last year when those same two planets danced in and out of occasions when they conjoined to share the same degree of the same sign.

What went with the three conjunctions of Venus and Mars last year will thus be implicit on Monday. If that implication results in correlations for you, there will be no need for melancholy.

Instead, know in your heart that all the proverbial wheels will continue to turn. Understand that what is out of sight is not necessarily lost. Remind yourself that whatever you miss will often return, in some way, somehow, even if you can’t see everything that is in fact going on and on, in the heart of the sunrise.

Offered In Service (and dedicated to those who lost loved ones at Fukushima five years ago today)    

For a beautiful and timely example of life on Earth imitating the astrology in our sky, you need not look any farther than a desert in California. That desert is called Death Valley. Most of the time the name is appropriate for an arid and desolate place where simply going for a walk can be lethal.

Right now as you read this, however, Death Valley is evincing a rare phenomenon some call a “super bloom.” For the first time since 2005, circumstances have combined to awaken seeds long dormant, covering the desert with a blanket of flowers.

Death Valley’s super bloom is taking place just as you are entering what has been previously (in this space) been called an “eclipse zone.” This particular eclipse zone begins with today’s New Moon and total solar eclipse in Pisces, and ends with the Libra Full Moon and lunar eclipse on March 23.

The super bloom in Death Valley is an explicit and tangible phenomenon. Uncounted flowers have bloomed, which will then yield the seeds of another such event sometime in the future. Implicitly speaking, the astrology at this time suggests the same potential might exist in your own life. Much as with seeds in the desert, potential needs the right combination of circumstances to sprout, flower and produce the seeds of renewal. Since it is your life, you must at least be the one to get things started.

The first circumstance necessary to produce seeds of renewal in your life is awareness — that’s where astrology comes in. The Pisces New Moon and solar eclipse taking place today (or tomorrow, depending on your time zone) is happening while the Moon is very near the point of its orbit where it is closest to Earth. That’s why some call this a “super” New Moon. Because interpretations of astrology are based on observation and correlation, any astrologer would tell you that a rare super bloom in Death Valley taking place at the same time with a super New Moon is not coincidental, but indicative of circumstances everywhere.

Combine the correlation of a super bloom and a super New Moon with the fact that every New Moon represents the end of an old monthly cycle and the beginning of a new one, and the correspondence is reinforced. If you consider another (and longer) cycle that will both end and begin again before you emerge from this particular eclipse zone, the image of seeding renewal is furthered.

For the first time in nearly a decade, this particular eclipse zone will contain within it (like a seed long dormant) the end of an old yearly cycle and the beginning of a new one called the Vernal Equinox. On March 19 (or March 20, again depending on where you live) the Sun will enter Aries to begin a new astrological year. At the same time, a new season will initiate on Earth. For those of us north of the equator, it will be the first day of spring. For those of you down under, it will be the first day of autumn.

You have a new lunar cycle, a new season, a new astrological year and the implied beginning of even longer cycles combining with a seldom-seen spectacle of nature to help make you aware. Assuming that you now have that awareness, you might ask, “What next?”

What follows awareness, if anything is to become of it, must necessarily be action. In this particular case, the symbol of seeds being renewed provides you with some clues as to what sorts of action would be appropriate.

In order to sprout and bloom, any seed must receive and take in a combination of circumstances. There must be rain so that the dry seed can take in moisture, swell and crack open. Sunlight is then required to provide the energy necessary for growth. Finally, there must be grounding and nourishment from the soil so growth can be sustained long enough to produce the next cycle of seeds.

Should it be your intent to follow the example of the seeds in Death Valley, the implication is that you should be taking in a few things yourself. Beyond breathing deeply, drinking plenty of water and eating nourishing food, what you take in to foment the seeds of your own renewal at this time would probably include some information and support. For those additional requirements, you might endeavor to look beyond what you yourself can provide.

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Implicitly, you should look to further your education in some way. Additionally, you might seek to expand your consciousness.

How you do that would depend both on what you are interested in and what your community has to offer. It could be as simple as a trip to your local library, or as complex as enrolling for some sort of formal schooling.

You could even travel outside of your community. You might consider leaving the familiarity of where you live to engage with, and learn from, the life circumstances of others. In all probability, you need not go far (although that possibility exists) in order to experience different food being served, unfamiliar languages being spoken, and other ways of both believing and living.

So use your imagination. Follow your curiosity. Make an effort, however small, to emerge from who and what you are, even if you are content with your circumstances. Because if there is anything to astrology, it’s time for you start something new over the next two weeks or so. More to the point, if you have anything in common with those flowers in Death Valley (which you do), what you start will demonstrate that you and your life have a point at this time: to somehow sprout, grow, bloom and produce the seeds of renewal once again. It’s time for what has been dormant within you to come out.

Offered In Service

Your life is now engaging with the meat of the astrology Eric worked so long to address in his Vision Quest readings for 2016. In addition to availing yourself of those readings, you can put today’s Capricorn Moon to use by considering both the creator and some of the content of a vision manifested nearly 80 years ago.

It was on the Capricorn Solstice of 1937 that Walt Disney Studios premiered the first full-length animated feature film: Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. 

It was a success in every sense of the word, but you might not have thought so during the four years between Disney’s announcement of his vision and its final realization. First off, like all of us, Walt Disney had his flaws. Some of his imperfections resonate in the motion picture industry to this day. Any one of Disney’s personality defects could also have resulted in the failure of his vision to elevate cartoons into movies.

Perhaps the one single thing that brought Walt Disney’s vision to a successful result was that he believed in it even when others did not. Disney’s closest relationships (his wife and brother) didn’t believe. Neither did prospective financial supporters. Disney had to mortgage his home to make the film. Of course, his competitors in the motion picture industry had a field day mocking him. For some reason we may never understand, however, this visionary persisted in what nearly everybody else thought was a fool’s quest.

Whatever visions you now entertain for your life, you might take some inspiration from Walt Disney, and not just his personal example. Whether intentionally or not, a group of characters in his first, grand, realized vision can provide you with some inspiration as well. 

Featured prominently in Snow White were seven apparently foolish characters: the dwarfs. It is perhaps significant that each one of those dwarf characters separately — and all of them in combination — represent some important personality attributes that you might consider emulating when you face the challenge of making your visions real.

You can begin with the two ostensible leaders: Doc and Grumpy. Doc’s mind moved faster than he could form the words to express his thoughts. Nevertheless, Doc was the type of thoughtful personality you need to be to prevail in a world where so many are so utterly thoughtless. Grumpy, for his part, was more a healthy skeptic than a grouch. That skepticism grounded him and provided the discernment represented by his squinty eye; another trait you will need to to discern fact from fantasy, if you wish to to nurture and achieve what you believe.

Sleepy knew the value of chilling out and getting what rest he could when he could — a valuable asset as regards to keeping yourself from feeling overwhelmed or coming down sick as you pursue your visions. Happy provided evidence of how a personal relationship with joy can make a big difference for you in a world that can easily be perceived as a dark and discouraging place. Bashful, for his part, demonstrated the importance of how humility can keep you both tolerant and tolerable when the brash wear out their welcome. Sneezy knew the value of expelling that which is potentially toxic before it can cause a problem.

Last but not least, there is Dopey, who was mysteriously mute but definitely not dumb. Dopey was the only dwarf without a beard, evincing the value of embracing the timeless potential of youth within (which, like a baby, can express without speaking), while bringing up the rear without umbrage.

As a cohesive whole, the seven dwarfs demonstrated a daily commitment to the consistent industriousness Walt Disney and his collaborators employed to mine their vision and extract tangible value from it. In addition, the doughty dwarfs showed the abundant courage necessary to defend that which they valued and overcome the most nightmarish scenario.

Finally, each of the seven dwarfs had a soft and faithful heart. They did not have the heart to bury Snow White even when all seemed lost and anybody else would have resigned to grim reality. In the end, it was the collective preservation of tenderness and love inside that made it possible for the return of the same in the world on the outside.

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So can it be for you. In spite of how a well-known bully derides being soft as a liability, you know better.

Your body is not made of iron. Your mind is not computer hardware. Your softness is not just unavoidable, it is your greatest strength. As with water and rocks, the softest things endure and prevail over the hardest things in this world’s final realities.

A vision is a very soft and vulnerable thing, just as your love and your heart are. The jewels Eric spent so much time last year mining are available for you here to help you prevail. But none of what Eric wrote in Vision Quest can help you unless you can bring to his astrological guidance both your vision and the qualities that Walt Disney and his dwarfs exemplified. You have all that (and probably more) within you. It would do the rest of us a lot of good if you could show it.

Offered In Service   

Shortly before 6:11 pm EST (23:10:38 UTC) today the Sagittarius Moon will square the Pisces Sun. At that time the Moon will be in its last quarter phase, which many see as a countdown to when the Sun and Moon next share the same degree of the same sign to begin a new lunar cycle (a New Moon).

In the case of this particular last quarter Moon, however, you might consider yourself to be counting up. That’s because the next week, leading up to the Pisces New Moon and solar eclipse, will be quite auspicious astrologically.

Perhaps the two most significant events taking place before the Moon eclipses the Sun next Tuesday will be Mercury and Mars changing signs. Mercury will leave Aquarius behind to enter Pisces at about 5:24 am EST (10:23:25 UTC) on Saturday.

Following Mercury’s ingress to Pisces, Mars will leave Scorpio behind to enter Sagittarius at about 9:29 pm EST Sunday (02:28:32 UTC Monday, for those of you on the other side of the pond).

Two sign-ruling planets changing signs during the last week of a lunar cycle is a big deal. When you consider that the successive ingresses of Mercury and Mars are leading up to something even bigger (the first eclipse of the year), the net image is more of accumulation than attrition. It is as though a table is being set before a meal, rather than cleared after dining. Thus the perception of counting up.

We have a hint from the sky about how to approach the Pisces New Moon and solar eclipse, which occurs at about 8:55 pm EST on March 8 (01:54:26 UTC on March 9). Think of it as a right of passage you have earned, like a college student accumulating credits toward a graduation and a diploma. That way, you can spend the next week in an ambitious and productive state of mind, working your way towards what you want to achieve as you go into the next lunar cycle.

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Far better to be ambitious and productive than to waste the next seven days worrying about things that will probably never happen. More healthy to work towards gaining something than to fear losing something.

Let Mercury and Mars show you the way. Move forward toward something new during this next week. Don’t withdraw with an anticipation of defeat. Enter a new part of your life that you have (in one way or another) been working toward, and looking forward to, for a long time.

That way, even though you may not be positioned to see next week’s total solar eclipse (visible mostly over the Pacific Ocean), you will be in the best possible place to feel that where it will be taking you is where you want to go. It’s a new month, everybody knows that. Why not also make it an ascending path towards a new life?

Offered In Service     

You have probably seen your share of what might broadly be called optical illusions. One of the most famous and straightforward examples (linked here) shows either a vase or two faces, depending on who you are and how you look at the picture.

Most of you can alternate how you look at the picture to either see a vase against a black background or two silhouetted faces separated by a white background. It’s not so easy to see both at once.

If there is anything to what’s indicated by the astrology at this time, the perceptual challenge of seeing both the vase and faces at once is reflected in (and by) your life. Perhaps that is no accident. It could be that your lifetime is a very important time in human history precisely because such challenges to perception exist.

You might very well find yourself cycling rapidly, alternating between what to focus on at any given time and what to relegate to the background. When you consider how modern innovations such as text messaging constantly pull your attention away from one part of your life into another, it can be dizzying to even contemplate. In addition, with so many things vying for your attention and energy, you may often find yourself wondering whether it is necessary (or even advisable) to keep up with everything all at once. Yet, there also seems to be an imperative to perceive everything as a connected whole so that each part can be better understood.

How to respond to such apparently authentic but also daunting perceptions? Astrology appears to be providing you with some clues.

For astrologers, the outer planets, which take many years to go around the Sun (and through the zodiac cycle of signs), have often symbolized the background. That background contains subject matter represented by generations, nations, cultural institutions and other long-term phenomena. The so-called “personal planets” — the Sun, Moon, Mercury, Venus and (maybe) Mars — on the other hand, have usually been relegated to correlate with cycles that repeat many times in the course of a typical human life. Actual experience, however, does not seem so simple anymore.

Ever since Pluto entered Capricorn in 2008 (and perhaps going back even further to when Pluto and Neptune began a seemingly perpetual separation of about sixty degrees in the middle of the 20th Century), distinctions between long-term and short-term have less meaning. As Eric has often noted, “everything at once” has become more the rule than the exception. The same sort of coalescence has also taken place between the public and private parts of many (if not most) lives.

Now, with Neptune in Pisces for the last five years or so, the phenomenon of “everything at once” accompanied by a blurring of the lines between personal and political issues is reaching a crescendo. The idea is to see that as both a good and a necessary thing. As the personal planets move in rapid succession between major aspects to Pluto, Neptune and Uranus (which is in Aries), the celestial message seems to be that you must find your own way to make life manageable rather than rely on ways of the past.

Part of finding your way is determining a middle ground between foreground and background. It is no longer either advisable or possible to hide away from the world, if indeed it ever was. By the same token, it is more than any human being can manage to keep up with everything at the same time, all the time.

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Rather, it is up to you to select what to focus on, but not to compartmentalize your life. Separation is no longer a realistic approach. Instead, it is consistent with the world’s realities to discern what areas and types of involvement will keep you conversant with the whole while not overwhelming you.

In other words, you can’t do it all and shouldn’t elect to do nothing at all. There is another way that you can contribute to developing, thereby furthering the evolution of our kind. It is a middle way, in which each individual releases attachment to being separate, while also embracing the potential to emerge from the background — as called for to make a difference when too many others retreat into anonymity and non-involvement.

Your middle way does not require a rapid oscillation between one state and another. Quite the contrary. It is determining where you are at, and finding the rest of the world there with you. It will not be easy. It is possible, and efforts of the astrologically conversant (such as Eric and others you read here at Planet Waves) can guide your contribution to make it so.

Offered In Service

You probably felt something with yesterday’s Full Moon in early Virgo. You may also have seen the Virgo Moon and Jupiter appear quite close together in the sky last night. Now, it is time to make a connection between what you saw and what you felt, so as to breathe again.

For no matter what sign they may be in, the fully lit Moon next to bright Jupiter is a breathtaking sight for anybody with both the eyes to see and a heart to feel the event.

Conversely, nearly any Full Moon in Virgo (whether or not it is in the same sign with Jupiter, or even seen) can easily correspond with having your breath taken away or held, due to some sort of exertion — whether pleasant or otherwise. That correspondence is explained (at least in part) by what both Virgo and the Moon represent for astrologers.

If you are a solar Virgo, or know any, you have probably noticed that Virgo consciousness often includes a certain diligence. Since everybody has Virgo represented somewhere in their personal astrology, that conscious framework is somehow part of who you are.

The assiduous part of a Virgo’s nature may translate into either the huffing and puffing of hard work, or a breathless exasperation deriving (at least in part) from the fact that Virgo is an earth sign. That’s because, of Western astrology’s four elements (fire, earth, air and water, which contribute to individuate the 12 signs of the zodiac), earth usually confers the upside of a more grounded and practical perspective than the other three. It also presents strong attachments as a possible downside.

Yet, and sometimes paradoxically, Virgo is also a mutable sign. Among the three astrological qualities (cardinal, fixed and mutable), which combine with the four elements to make each sign unique, mutability usually provides a more flexible nature than the other two. That adaptability, in turn, confers Virgos especially with an enhanced ability to release attachments in comparison to the other two earth signs, Capricorn and Taurus.

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As for the Moon, in all of its subtle complexities there is always an underlying correspondence to emotion and feeling — especially as perceived by the physical body. At no time is its physically emotional component more powerfully felt than when the Moon is full.

And in no way do emotions express in the body more tellingly than through the breath.

That’s how yesterday’s Virgo Full Moon probably correlated with some powerful emotional experience, urgency or attachment. You might still be feeling it in your chest.

Hence your probable imperative for today. It’s time to breathe. It’s not only appropriate, but important that you begin to let go somehow. If something from yesterday is either keeping you from catching your breath today, or has you holding your breath, the true nature of your work at this time is to begin releasing its hold on you. Fully and freely breathe again.

Offered In Service      

In spite of what an allegedly ancient Asian proverb implies, it is not necessarily a curse to live in interesting times. Perhaps more accurately, it is a challenge. The biggest part of that challenge, especially in our current and ostensibly fascinating times, has to do with information and perspective.

In an age of information glut combined with instant electronic communication, part of the challenge is separating fact from fiction. One example is how difficult it is to ascertain veracity with the more-and-more-common occurrence of hoaxes purveyed through social media.

A more subtle (and more insidious) challenge has to do with the elevation and exaltation of what amounts to trivia. Indeed, it would appear that large segments of modern culture worldwide are devoted to, and consist largely of, ephemeral (if symptomatic) minutiae.

Fortunately, the ancient art of astrology (which has survived precisely because it is not trivial, in spite of what some very unscientific scientists might say), provides both some rather compelling (if implicit) data and a very long-term, holistic perspective. The Sun’s ingress to Pisces today (or last night, depending on where you live), combined with the Virgo Full Moon coming on Monday, is one example of both symbolic representations and insight provided by a very big temporal picture.

First off, there is no bigger picture than that implied by the Sun in Pisces. Just as the end of all streams and rivers is the ocean, solar Pisces is the vast sea at the end of the zodiac that collects all of the continuum which has flowed down from the previous vernal equinox. Speaking of which, Monday’s Full Moon at 3+ Virgo (which will oppose the Sun at 3+ Pisces) is part of an unusual and implicitly indicative pattern of continuation going back to last year.

The Full Moon on Oct. 27, 2015, took place at 3+ Taurus (which is both the discovery degree of Chiron and the exaltation degree of the Moon). That opposition of the luminaries (Sun and Moon) was followed by a Full Moon at 3+ Gemini on Nov. 25, 2015. Then came a Full Moon at 3+ Cancer on Christmas day, and a Full Moon at 3+ Leo at the end of January.

The pattern of sequential Full Moons at 3+ degrees will continue with next month’s lunar eclipse at 3+ Libra. Nearly half a year’s worth of Full Moons continuously repeating in the same degree of successive signs is unusual and thus (by astrological standards) represents information. While the floor is left open here to interpret the meaning of that sequence of Full Moons, it can at the very least be said that (like all occurrences of repetition) it begs to get your attention. Provided one is paying attention and not distracted by trivia, that is.

Then there is what has been long lined up in the first several degrees of both Virgo and Pisces to combine with Monday’s opposition of the luminaries. First, there is the fixed star Regulus which, as result of the long, slow precession of Earth’s axis, entered Virgo (after more than two thousand years in Leo) sometime between 2011 and 2012 — depending on which reference you use. That’s a big deal. Big enough so that it would probably be appropriate to give Regulus a new name that does not imply Leo.

Then there is the calculated point Transpluto (explained more fully here in 2013) which, because of retrograde motion, took from 2011 to 2014 to finally end nearly 80 years in Leo, and settle into Virgo alongside Regulus. That is also a big deal from an astrologer’s perspective.

Finally, there is the slow-moving centaur object Nessus (extensively elaborated on by Amanda Painter yesterday) which took from April of 2014 to February of 2015 to complete a long tenure in Aquarius, and begin an even longer traversal of Pisces. Nessus does so with a prolonged opposition to Regulus and Transpluto in Virgo — an astrologically big deal as well.

The written readings for all 12 signs of Vision Quest are available for instant access, and so are the audio astrology and rune readings! Order all 12 signs here, or select individual signs here.

Finally, come Monday, the Sun and Moon will conclude months of trying to get your attention by swinging around to oppose each other in rather precise alignment with Regulis, Transpluto and Nessus. That’s quite a combination, especially coming at a time when the world of electronic information seems to be completely distracted by so much “he said” and “she said,” which nobody will care about by this time next year.

Indeed, the depths of interpreting Monday’s oppositions along the cusp-axis of Virgo and Pisces might take until next year to sort out. One thing seems clear, however: the sky is implicitly begging us to see the whole of what we are in the midst of.

We are being asked to notice that these challenging times indicate a confluence of long periods flowing into an ocean of even greater duration, in preparation for a type of vernal turnaround that implies the obsolescence of even how stars are named. Implicitly indicated is not only a change of seasons represented by the Sun in a mutable sign (Pisces), but also the concurrent turnover of entire eras, epochs and ages beyond the perspective of almost anything other than astrology. It would behoove us to at least be aware of that, and consider how lucky we are to be alive to do something about and with it while it is happening.

It might be a million lifetimes before anybody else is so fortunate as to live in such interesting times. Try not to be so distracted by the trivia that you miss it.

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