As I’ve mentioned before, I tend to dread this time of year. This time around, however, December has been pretty amazing. It’s also been incredibly busy and full of hustle and bustle and socializing and some delicious experimentation. I’ve been enjoying myself and loving life.

Photo by graywacke/A Landing a Day

I have, however, noticed a certain theme coming to my attention more than normal: that this time of year is ‘supposed’ to be about quiet, silence, reflection, ‘going inside,’ etc. I agree — normally I’m all about those things, especially right around now. But this year the hustle and bustle has felt good. I haven’t felt like I’ve been missing anything.

I went to a ‘sacred sexuality’ gathering this past weekend. It’s a group I’ve been meaning to attend for a few years, but hadn’t due to timing and apathy and general hesitance to walk into situations where I can’t gauge what the energy will be. The focus of the group this time around was “the fallow time,” and we just did some really simple ritual. Nothing at all sexy, although it was quite intimate.

When the lights went down for the ritual and the silence began, the simple candlelight brought me into that familiar light trance feeling. I realized there, in a small group of strangers, that I have been neglecting the inner in favor of the outer and that it’s important that I change that. I sank into how good the silence felt. Listening to a poem. Listening to personal offerings from my fellow ritualists. I just remained silent.

I realized that I had an instinct at the beginning of the month to plan for the last two weeks of the year to be quiet and reflective in honor of the torrent of change that has been 2014 (And much of 2013 too, for that matter. Well, shit. I guess it goes back to like 2009?). Time for integration and healing and hopefully some long steeps in tubs of hot water.

I also realized that I haven’t really committed at this point to doing anything like that at all. I see myself happiest in the forest with maybe a friend or lover and a lot of silent simplicity. I could probably keep rushing through the month and be just fine (although I can feel my immune system starting to disagree with that), but there are several astrological events in the next week or so that are such fantastic opportunities for ritual, intention setting, reflection and honoring of all that has happened this year.

I am hard pressed to let opportunities like these go by unmarked. The solstice, New Moon in Capricorn, and Uranus stationing direct all happen in the same day (today!). And then there’s that blessed event I’ve been giggling about for a month now — Saturn getting the hell out of Scorpio. Hooray!

Writing a weekly column on the topic of ‘spirituality’ has been an interesting adventure for the past six months. Most weeks I can find a thread that sparks my heart and makes the words flow. This week, however, I’ve felt a flatness whenever I try to write. Or a lack of time when inspired to write about something more in depth that could use some academic backup or research. I’ll admit, sexy explorations have trumped writing this week. My heart (and my body) is quite happy about that.

So in light of the above, and in reverence for the fact that we are heading into a week during which the astrology is inviting us to re-frame our narratives, as both Ms. Painter and Mr. Wallick have said, I have an invitation for myself and for any of you who’d like to join in.

Let’s make a point of reflecting in the next week, shall we? Perhaps that means an exploration into the events of the year and a re-collection so that we can begin the integration process. Perhaps it’s something deeper than that, an inquiry into our shadows and attachments so that we can consciously let things go during this potent phase. How can we reframe our personal stories, and how have we? How can we celebrate that?

Next week I’ll share with you what I’ve learned. I’m grateful for a forum like this that promotes accountability. I’d invite you also to share something about what you learn in the process, at whatever level you’re comfortable with. We have a wonderful container here at Planet Waves, and there’s nothing quite like the power of being witnessed.

May you find joy, comfort, silence, or whatever it is you need at this time.

By Sarah Taylor

For a long time, it felt like you were carrying it all alone; holding things together, shouldering the burden of an experience or task that seemed to give you space for little else.

Three of Disks, Nine of Disks, The World from The Röhrig Tarot deck, created by Carl-W. Röhrig. Click on the image for a larger version.

Now, things have shifted, and opened, and there is a feeling of that burden being shared — or at the very least a spaciousness that had heretofore eluded you.

You can look up, and see ahead of you; you can feel the support of those around you. Those, perhaps, who have been with you through your time of trial, but who were also caught up in their own “Work,” equally involved in a task that called for their attention.

I drew the Nine of Disks first, and put it at centre. Very clearly this is the point at which you find yourself. A lack of perceived equality in the Three of Disks (the card of apprenticeship to life) — a needing to learn — is in the past, and there is a dawning knowledge of a ‘standing together’, where each entity is its own, and nothing holds authority over anything else. The only authority to be held is one’s own, over oneself.

The landscape in the central card reflects this evolutionary step from Three to Nine (three times three; three figures bringing shared experience in the spirit of equality): fecund, blooming, the sky colours soft, a light radiating from the heads of the two men and woman, and from behind the mountain range in the distance. The inner light meeting the outer; as within, so without.

“the more I give the more I get,” “association of love wisdom and creativity.”

That connection was always there, but, bent double, it was nearly impossible to see or to know it. There is a ‘pay it forward’ feeling to the Nine, where all aspects are in co-operation to bring it about.

However, the central card would not have been possible without the card to its left. A card that combines both “effort” and “success.” The seeds of success were held in the effort itself. It might have felt like it was too much to carry, or that you were alone and forgotten. You were not. The Three and Nine are intrinsically linked, serving the same purpose, which becomes clearer in the final card to the right.

The World. The closing of one door and the opening of another. What better card to see in the Solstice? What better planetary correspondence (The World is associated with the planet Saturn) when Saturn is in the last degree of Scorpio, and just about to move into Sagittarius?

The writing on The World is in German, but one of the phrases stands out to me:

“The conclusion of karma.”

The woman, who is The World, is liberating herself from the chains of karma. You, who are your own world, are seeing yourself in this mirror. The snake is freed too, and works in unison with the woman: the unleashing of erotic energy that is held comfortably and yet allowed its own expression. There is no controlling; no runaway uprising.

Both are in co-operation — and this is reflected in the co-operation in the Nine of Disks. Except this time it is the co-operation of one aspect of self — a sense of place in one’s world that has been hard-won — with another: that mysterious, root connection to a primal creative force that lies at the foundation of everything.

This might feel strange at first — difficult, even. You have a handle on it; and if you don’t, you have the ability to acquire it. It is at your fingertips.

You can own this experience. You, and your band of brothers and sisters — whether inner, human, material- or resource-based — have been working a long time for this.

Astrology/Elemental correspondences: Three of Disks (Mars in Capricorn), Nine of Disks (Venus in Virgo), The World (Saturn)

If you want to experiment with tarot cards and don’t have any, we provide a free tarot spread generator using the Celtic Wings spread, which is based on the traditional Celtic Cross spread. This article explains how to use the spread.

by Judith Gayle | Political Waves

Hard to believe it’s only a handful of days until Christmas, Solstice traditionally setting the mood for a mindful — some might even say sacred — spiritual event. And although there are rampant examples of cutthroat consumption and humbug out there, this is one of the rare times in the year when the spotlight lingers on kindness, generosity and giving.

While that has the capacity to create a year-end more peaceful than the other eleven months have produced, we could heal much of what ails us by celebrating these attributes weekly, hourly, daily and without fail, year-round.

We weren’t all that mindful this year, I’m afraid. This year the winter celebration comes at a time when international news is spiking — perhaps anticipating Saturn’s coming slide into Sagittarius — and anxiety over the Republican takeover looms, though some of us are too entrenched in personal holiday angst to notice. And while it sounds counter-intuitive, let’s take some comfort in having reached enough maturity to understand that if we’re staring down our personal demons this holiday, that may be a very productive thing.

It’s all part and parcel of our project to become authentic. Time to observe not just the world around us, but ourselves. Time to give up the pretense that we don’t know when things are coming when we so obviously do. Despite blanket protestations about how shocked we are when pivotal happenings suddenly appear in our headlights — summoning our internal Drama Queens and a long list of ain’t-it-awful’s — humans really have to work at being oblivious to all that’s going on around them.

If a stranger gets in our personal space, for instance — violates our auric field — we can instantly feel the energy shift, sometimes strongly enough to raise our hackles and send us running for an exit, intent on hunting down a smudge stick. In short, our instincts are working even when we fail to hit the ‘on’ switch. Training ourselves to notice our feelings rather than stuff them down is critical to responding to circumstances, rather than reacting to them.

On a less personal level, when we hear about things being done by our government that rub us wrong, or injustices occurring in our community or neighborhood that shame or disturb us, we have a choice to respond or do nothing, but pretending these happenings don’t have ramifications on our daily lives is sheer nonsense. This kind of behavior not only invalidates any surprise on the horizon when similar events repeat later, but creates a platform for alternative realities that have no basis in truth or integrity. They’re illustrative of Stephen Colbert’s (how I’ll miss him!) ‘truthiness’.

There have been such amazing examples of that this week that it’s worth appreciation for the sheer chutzpah of it all. For example, it’s pretty difficult to turn away from unwanted truth when we hear that the President has signed legislation ending Social Security benefit checks for Nazis.

“Nazis?” you ask? To be sure, and only a handful were ever denaturalized (read: deported, but still receiving government payments), although we took in plenty of them after the war. Look up Operation Paperclip and think of it as the tip of the iceberg. This nation is no stranger to the truthiness concept. So much for our abhorrence of tyranny and torture.

And then there’s the Cuban situation, covered so expertly by Eric in the subscription offering this week. Marco Rubio, Floridian, son of Cuban immigrants and probable presidential candidate, says that the President’s deal with the Castros to launch an end to fifty years of punitive ideological blockade is yet another example of Obama’s “tyranny,” and that he is “… willfully ignorant of the way the world truly works.” Rubio insists that he knows “… the Cuban regime and its true nature better than this president does or anybody in his administration does,” speaking to his hatred of Castro’s political oppression, civil rights violations and continuing allegations of torture.

This is the kind of commentary that makes me throw things at the television screen (happily, my household is littered with soft squeaky pet toys that bounce harmlessly.) Turning to Comedy Central for validation of my insights, I almost always get them.

Jon Stewart, carrying the flag for the daily exposé of hypocrisy alone now, jumped on Rubio’s outrage like a duck on a bug, waving a thick copy of the recently released Torture Report in his hand. Fidel Castro may be all that Rubio imagines him to be but I think it’s safe to say that we can put our homegrown team of Bush/Cheney in his league without a moment’s hesitation — with Marco a foot soldier of their ideology.

And of course there’s the e-mail hack of Sony Pictures that has Hollywood peeking behind its trash bins hoping to spot North Korean assassins. Seth Rogan’s most recent movie, The Interview, is a farce that’s annoyed third-generation dictator Kim Jong Un. This L’il Kim (to me, each of them is a L’il Kim) has carried on the work his forbearers began by systemically terrorizing his people to the point of semi-consciousness. This most recent tantrum over a movie he calls a “declaration of war” belies the fact that the majority of his cowed followers will never see it. In Kim’s kingdom, it’s worth one’s life to try — seriously.

And now that the entertainment industry has had a fit and fallen in it, we may never see The Interview either. Sony — red-faced from leaked e-mails that show some of their executives to be as petty as the rags that cover their news bites — cancelled premiers and pulled the picture entirely when hackers mentioned the dreaded “9/11.”

Scrambling for a replacement in lieu of this anticipated holiday offering, some theatres announced they would show Team America: World Police, a biting, satirical puppet-show movie presentation, North Korea pivotal in its plot, released some years ago by the South Park writing team, Trey Parker and Matt Stone. That idea was quickly nixed by a spooked Paramount Pictures, who want no truck with L’il Kim’s gulags, beheadings and — now — hacking.

While this successfully calls cyber terrorism to our attention, it has reportedly set national security scrambling to find some link to Iran, reported to have hacked into an extensive casino system earlier this year. Clearly, cyber-war is being declared by rogue nation-states as a way to impact powers stronger than themselves, and — like guerilla warfare — this allows a handful of techies to potentially wreak havoc on banking systems, the electrical grid or even nuclear installations. But, knotty as is this challenge, Obama has to handle it carefully, quickly, quietly — and we may never know the totality of his response.

Today the FBI formally accused North Korea of the cyber-crime, with speculation that China’s hands may be dirty as well. No news on Iran, although I’m sure Homeland is digging furiously to make the Neocons happy. And I am extremely pleased to post this strongly-worded commentary from the President, in which he suggests that Sony made a mistake in reacting so quickly:

We cannot have a society in which some dictator someplace can start imposing censorship here in the United States,” Obama said. “If somebody’s able to intimidate folks out of releasing a satirical movie, imagine what they start doing when they see a documentary they don’t like, or news reports they don’t like. Or even worse, imagine if producers and distributors and others start engaging in self-censorship because they don’t want to offend the sensibilities of someone whose sensibilities probably need to be offended.

It’s interesting that George Clooney, shortly after reports of Sony’s predicament, tried to rally the studios to stand firm against this attack on free speech, but he had no takers. Now the North Korean GOP (Guardians of Peace, go figure!) has told Sony to eliminate all signs of The Interview or more of their sensitive material will be published. Apparently blackmail is working nicely here, with Sony cowering behind the rampant fears that are making it possible for as ridiculous a figure as L’il Kim to be in charge of what Americans can watch on the silver screen.

It’s a pretty sad day when we wimp out on an entertainment blockbuster in order to placate a chubby little dude with a cherub’s face, a bowl haircut, the instincts of a blood-maddened piranha and an opinion of himself to make the Gods roar with laughter. And it’s worth noting that it’s the business class that’s caving today, despite their tough-guy persona and their party line that “these colors don’t run” (ummmm — except in the case of cyber-threat.)

As painful as it is, all this talk of human rights and tyranny comes at a perfect time, doesn’t it? Our world becomes more conflicted by the day, with examples like the siege in Sidney and the Taliban attack on children in Pakistan, in some sick effort to “share the pain.” Yet, with so many examples of not just our national failings, but our own human failings, on parade, any defense of holding the moral high ground rings false facing the facts on the ground. We are not just surrounded by violence, the kind that’s turned viral and systemic, but here in our nation, we approve it:

New polls show that 54% of Americans think torture is OK “sometimes.” And that’s just the Democrats.

There have been more than a hundred school shootings since Sandy Hook, and the NRA is still pretending none of this is about them. Guns and ammo are big sellers this Christmas season.

Missouri now equals Texas in executions, Ohio and Oklahoma falling just behind. Faulty chemical compounds and lowered standards of mental awareness in prisoners notwithstanding, state-approved vengeance is celebrated by those who think killing keeps us safe.

And in one of those divine coincidences so many of us see as messengers from a higher intelligence, Oprah Winfrey’s civil rights movie, Selma, is premiering at a time when the whole world is watching the struggle between black citizens in America and a policing presence that is targeting people of color system-wide, and with prejudice.

We can’t pretend we don’t know all this is going on around us. We can’t “un-know” something, after the fact. Truthiness is still an option, but that’s not just an unwise choice, it’s become obviously neurotic, archaic behavior. So I invite you to feel around within the larger space we all inhabit, here on planet Terra, and tell me if you feel what I feel: we’re in the midst of a major game change.

While it’s hard to dig out the particulars of our current challenges to name as either good or bad, moment by moment — and while this is surely not what we envisioned when we voted for hope and change — even though all the information ain’t in yet, it feels as though we may have finally entered a positive, if painful, period of transition. Energy is moving in a big way.

Remember, we asked for change; all of us, in one way or another. It was provoked by a decade or two of mindless accumulation and nose-to-the-grindstone pursuit of the good life, seemingly gone wrong right after the century turned. Truth be told, some of us began that process of release earlier by years, so we weren’t caught, gob-smacked, when the Supreme Court opened the lid on long-awaited mayhem, a decade to follow that felt like somebody slammed the gear shift in reverse. We’d already seen the cracks in the façade. We’d already charted the astrology that stood in the corridor of our future, awaiting us.

So, as we try not to notice what’s going on in the news this holiday season, let’s at least acknowledge that this is only grist for the mill, grinding slowly; that we don’t know how it’s going to look as it plays out but we’re putting our faith in our higher angels and this process of refinement we find ourselves within.

Let that be our Christmas present to one another, as in being ‘present’ in our lives and in our national consciousness, one moment at a time and with intent to contribute our portion to the process of Shift.

The season offers its own challenges, of course. Those of us who are reduced to painful memories of difficult holidays past, or wonderful ones far behind us, must find that place of peace in which we can hold a vision for a better future while not allowing our baggage to contribute to a miserable present. If we get out of our heads — the seat of judgment — and into our hearts — the seat of the Soul — we can begin to breathe again, and find the expanding joy in these last days of 2014.

One of the stories that remind us how to accomplish that is a Taoist folktale. I’m sure you’ve heard it before:

Once upon a time a farmer let his old, but only, horse go free, deciding the beast deserved its last days of freedom. Neighbors commiserated with his poor fortune in no longer having a horse to pull his plow. His response? “We shall see.”

Several weeks later, the horse, now refreshed, returned to him bringing several wild horses with him. The neighbors were stunned by the mans good fortune, but again he said only, “We shall see.”

Not long afterward, the farmer’s son broke a leg trying to ride one of the unbroken horses. The neighbors were very distressed at this sad turn of events, asking the man how he might accomplish his work, but the farmer only said, “We shall see.”

And not long after that, the local warlord came to the village to conscript the able-bodied to fight in an epic battle. Neither the man nor his son were deemed fit, but most all of the other men and boys were taken into service. The neighbors sympathized with the farmer’s loss of face, reflecting the sad truth that his household capacity had so diminished that he was unable to participate. The farmer simply nodded. He would wait and see.

Soon it was learned that the warlord had been badly beaten, and few of the villagers had survived to return to their families. The farmer and his son were among the few capable of working the land, and as he was able to prosper, he helped all those around him in need. The town folk assumed that he must be very happy at this turn of events, and you know the rest …

We know what the farmer would say about his circumstances: he would acknowledge the same truth we must tell ourselves if we are to put pain behind, if we are to keep our peace in these conflicted times. Circumstances come and go, but the journey leads us forward to that which will refine our understanding and grow our Soul. Our ability to find our own peaceful center of gratitude and contentment does not depend on external changes but on our willingness to touch down lightly on the events of the day, never closing ourselves off from our good.

Photo by Judith Gayle

As A Course In Miracles has it, much as there is peace and war, there is love and fear: if we give the day to love, there can be no fear in it. So here, as the holy days come closer and the Shift of Ages continues to produce a kaleidoscope of changing circumstance, my wish for you this holiday is one of abiding love, of kindness extended and kindness felt.

I offer you Solstice stars and Christmas gingerbread in celebration of the Is, and I want for you the small material gifts that please you and larger ones that include courageous acts of forgiveness and radical acts of love in this splendid season of Light. You are not just loved, this holiday season, you ARE love — the very expression of the Divine Creative in a  world eager for your compassionate contribution. Whatever your traditions, old or new, may you catch a glimpse of joy this holiday, keep the spark alive in the months ahead. And lastly, I affirm bright blessings for us all, which — I’m quite sure — we shall see.

Saturn’s enters Sagittarius at 11:34 am EST (16:34 UT) Tuesday, less than 48 hours after Sunday’s Capricorn solstice and New Moon. That’s arguably close enough timing to make Saturn’s first of two forays into Sagittarius a solstice occurrence rather than taking it separately.

Additionally, if you compare Saturn’s impending ingress to Sagittarius with Amanda’s analysis of the Capricorn solstice and New Moon published here on Planet Waves yesterday, it makes sense, and takes nothing away from either event to interpret both in the same terms. 

For example, if you consider Saturn’s limiting nature along with Saturn about to end two continuous years of slogging through Scorpio, the issue of “how much you let the past define you” (as Amanda put it) will implicitly come up.

By the same token, to have Saturn’s correspondence with structure move from a fixed water sign (Scorpio) to a mutable fire sign (Sagittarius) evokes Amanda’s encouragement towards “re-framing your narratives.”

If you are open to the possibility of re-framing your personal stories, it’s sort of like being open to seeing Saturn’s impending ingress to Sagittarius as part of this year’s Capricorn solstice. 

Framing Saturn’s first entrance to Saturn as a solstice event makes a useful and mutually reinforcing connection. Similarly, restructuring your perception of yourself makes new and potentially fortifying connections between you and a world and a life you might make more of.

The question is what to make of a new personal story. At least one way to begin answering that question is to examine to what extent you have heretofore taken on your identity from others.

It’s not necessarily wrong to use your surname, or to identify yourself by your nationality, or to live a narrative that you took on from somebody else. It is, however, appropriate to be consciously aware of when, where and how you take — as well as the potential for you to make.

Equipped with such an awareness, you can see options. Knowing your options clarifies your choices. Making choices always shapes your character, and making different choices shapes your character differently. Finally, re-shaping your character is the surest way to make a different life, and contribute to remaking the world.

Unless you feel the world is okay the way it is, Saturn is going to provide you with plenty of time to answer the question of what to make (or remake) of a new personal story. That’s because Saturn will not behave as it did after entering Scorpio on Oct. 5, 2012.

When Saturn entered Scorpio more than two years ago, it didn’t look back. It was the beginning of a long and winding road of continuous and uninterrupted Scorpio tenure. Saturn will begin its traversal of Sagittarius in a very different way.

Saturn will enter Sagittarius twice. After its initial ingress on Tuesday, Saturn will station retrograde about 5 degrees into its new territory in the middle of March 2015. It will return to Scorpio in the middle of June.

After stationing direct at 28+ Scorpio to begin August 2015, Saturn will enter Sagittarius a second time in the middle of September. Implicit in all of that entering, exiting and entering Sagittarius again is a chance for you to review how much the past (especially the recent past) has defined you, and an opportunity to evaluate what making some different connections might yield.

Also indicated by making Saturn’s first exquisitely timed ingress to Sagittarius one with the Capricorn solstice and New Moon is that you can make yourself one with the cosmos.

For you are part of the same system as the Sun, Moon and Saturn — the solar system. Hence, movements of the Sun, Moon and planets are by definition somehow correlated with your movements through life. 

Since you are a sentient being with apparently free will, it’s possible for you first to apprehend the correlations through the timeframes and symbols astrology provides, and then to make some choices of your own. That’s a whole lot better fate than simply taking what life gives you.

Offered In Service

Len is available for astrology readings. You can contact him at lenwallick [at] gmail [dot] com.

This Sunday is the Capricorn solstice, marked this year by the Capricorn New Moon. It’s an energetic chart — though not so much in the vein of the cultural excess (and the reminder of lack it creates for some people) that marks this time of year.

Photo by Amanda Painter

The Sun leaves Sagittarius for Capricorn at 6:03 pm EST Dec. 21: the day of the solstice, which in the Northern hemisphere is the shortest day of the year. Winter begins here in the Northern Hemisphere, along with the days (gradually) getting longer (with the opposite true Down Under.

The Moon enters Capricorn shortly thereafter at 8:25 pm EST. Just eleven minutes later, at 8:36 pm EST, the Sun and Moon conjoin for the Capricorn New Moon.

Capricorn is a cardinal sign, associated with taking initiative in your own life, just like cardinal signs begin seasons. The Capricorn New Moon and solstice chart has some incredible energy for beginnings. Partly that’s due to fully half the sign-ruling planets being in Capricorn Sunday: Sun, Moon, Mercury, Pluto and Venus (plus asteroid Vesta, which does not rule a sign).

Having all those planets there emphasizes the past (a Capricorn theme) — specifically, tearing it down (thanks to Pluto) and initiating new structures (thanks to everything else in the sign).

Or to put it more gently, since I know many people are in a lot of pain and truly struggling with Pluto’s effects, this chart is about re-framing your narratives about the past and how much you let your past define you. Mercury right near the New Moon looks like some solid intention setting around that theme, and solstices are a natural time to set intentions for the season.

Continue reading →

It’s been a long, a long time coming, but I know a change gonna come.
— Sam Cooke

Intent is a powerful thing. Mercury enters Capricorn at 10:53 pm EST tonight (3:53 UT tomorrow), symbolically inviting you to prove just how powerful your intent can be. Intent originates with the mind, which (among other things) versatile Mercury represents. Intent is part of the ‘conceive’ that must precede the ‘achieve’.

Mercury will join Pluto and Venus in Capricorn, and will precede the grand entrance of the Sun and Moon on Dec. 21 for the astounding and unlikely simultaneity of a New Moon and solstice — which appears for all the world to be the initiation of a manifestation.

That’s because Capricorn is a cardinal sign (along with Aries, Cancer and Libra). Cardinal signs are where seasons initiate upon ingress of the Sun, setting a template for other ingresses.

Capricorn is also an earth sign (along with Taurus and Virgo), where the nature of things are made tangible. What is made real in Capricorn is also likely to endure because of how Capricorn is ruled by Saturn’s proficiency for leaving form, order and structure in its wake.

When Pluto entered Capricorn in 2008, the indications were clear. Implied at the beginning of a decade and a half of Pluto’s tour of Capricorn is that form, order and structures in place for more than two centuries were up for transformation. The only question was what the nature of the transformation would be.

Then, for nearly two seasons from late last year to early this year, Venus spent more time in Capricorn (due to retrograde) than it had for more than two centuries, to implicitly make us receptive to the change that has to come.

Now Venus is back in Capricorn (since Dec. 10) reminding us to be receptive, and Mercury is about to follow. That’s how Mercury entering Capricorn this year is your cue to participate (or not) in answering the question of just what the form, order and structure of an inevitable and lasting change will be.

Your participation begins with setting an intent for what you want the rest of your life to be like. After that, what you want the lives of today’s children to be like. After that, the children and grandchildren of today’s children.

Because Mercury is and will be in swift and direct motion for all the time it will be in Capricorn (it leaves Capricorn Jan. 5 or Jan. 6, depending on your time zone), it is emblematically powerful. Hence your intent is implied to be powerful at this time.

So step up and stand in your power. Set a clear intent for the initiation of a new season in your life, and the life of the world. It will make a difference. Especially when the Sun and Moon conjoin for a New Moon solstice, and do so as the rulers (or co-rulers) of fully half the signs of the zodiac gather in Capricorn. The planets are inviting you to participate in determining the nature of the change that’s gonna come.

Offered In Service

Len is available for astrology readings. You can contact him at lenwallick [at] gmail [dot] com.

I have a confession to make right now, before we journey any farther together. I need to reveal something that makes me somewhat uncomfortable.

I am of the Pluto in Libra generation.

Photo by graywacke/A Landing a Day

Not that that’s a bad thing, really. But I’ve come to realize that my Libran shadows are so deep, and those karmic patterns so entrenched that anything Libra tends to make me squirm.

When I get a glimpse of the not-so-shiny Libra shadow (placation, for example) I cringe. So I’ll say it — my name is Amanda and I have Pluto in Libra (in the 3rd house) and the South Node in the 7th house in Aquarius (that’s a Libra house).

I practice Evolutionary Astrology, so Pluto and the nodes of the Moon are super-important. Using this form of astrology, I’ve been able to understand that within my karmic past lie some tendencies towards getting tripped up by decisions I have made or that others have made for me. Usually involving betrayal, abandonment and other Scorpionic themes. The path of individuation has been thwarted, and this time around I’ve chosen to work on that.

Relationships, by virtue of my karma, my choices, and the path I’ve chosen or been led to, are part of my spiritual path. It’s the path of all of those in my generation, if you ask me. The healthy formation of human relationship is vital to the healing of our world, and that’s what we Pluto in Libras are trying to figure out.

Getting to know my chart as it is expressed in my life has helped me to identify that authenticity and celebration of myself as an individual are crucial to my growth. I’ve also come to understand that part of my process of healing involves relationships that support me as an individual. Furthermore, there is a need to revisit the karmic past, to revisit old ways of engaging relationship and then do something differently in order to heal. Paradoxes abound.

In summary: I’ve never had conventional relationships. Several years back I encountered the book The Ethical Slut, and immediately rejoiced that there were other people engaging sexuality and relationship differently from the norm. Then in the summer of 2011 I came across this random podcast — Planet Waves FM — and the host (our dear friend Eric) was interviewing someone at a “Poly conference” or something like that. My jaw hit the floor.

After hearing that podcast, I delved into the world of non-monogamy, first intellectually, and then practically. I floundered, I flailed, and I re-wrote my entire personal myth of soul mate and relationship while trying to figure out how in the hell to stand up for myself in relationship. I discovered that I can make entire mental constructs around an idea, and that I have to make sure those constructs resonate with my experience rather than just serving as rationalizations for enduring or continuing bad behavior.

Changing conditioning around relationships, and the cultural construct that monogamy and commitment are synonymous, can be really fucking grueling work. In my experience, no matter how liberated or progressive-thinking the individual, the thought of non-monogamous relationships is oftentimes too much for a person to grasp. The monogamy myth is perhaps one of the most insidious I’ve encountered.

I’m not comfortable building my identity around a relationship orientation. But I am clear that maintaining myself as the center of everything I do is important — as important as finding people to be in relationship with who can support that endeavor. Some would consider that to be a primary relationship with my Self. But that 7th house urge to surrender everything I am to the needs of the other is gigantic, compulsive and largely instinctive.

I love the idea of non-hierarchical relationships — relationships that exist without a “primary partnership” structure. I also love the idea of having one person who prioritizes me. I think there is room for both of these styles of relating, and more.

I am passionate about greeting relationships and exploring them and seeing where they go without a predetermined idea about the ‘shoulds’, with an emphasis on personal growth. I also think it’s important to recognize needs (something I struggle with) and be able to work towards a goal. But how can a relationship be authentic and nurture the authentic identities of those involved, when it has a predetermined construct of where it’s going?

The other day I realized — even though I’ve managed to grasp these ideals and am ready to embody the paradoxes and work honestly with them within relationship — how in the hell am I going to find partners who are also ready to engage at this level? And if I find those partners, how can I ‘know’ that any of their partners are able to honestly engage as well? I love non-monogamy. But in so many ways, it can be a clusterfuck.

And then I spent time with my love, my sweetie, one of my soulmates. He stepped in to dance with me in on the anniversary of my brother’s suicide and we kind of re-wrote the anniversary script. We realized that night: we’re doing it.

We’re doing the non-monogamy thing really honestly and well and it is expansive and mind-blowingly sweet and passionate and complicated and hard. But I feel so good about it and so grateful for this man’s presence in my life and the ways in which we are able to go deep and swim around in ambiguity and respect for each of our paths — and so lucky to have the freedom to find others who can do the work at this level.