If Mercury and Venus are any indication, your head and heart will encounter some of the same issues on separate paths tomorrow. Mercury appears to be slowing down in Libra on its way to pass between Earth and the Sun. Venus appears to be speeding up in Virgo on its way to the Sun’s far side.

Mercury, among other things, correlates with your head — specifically how you think. Venus, among other things, corresponds to your heart — specifically how you feel.

Mercury appears to be decelerating on approach to station retrograde for the third time this year on Oct. 4, at 2+ Scorpio. Venus appears to be accelerating at it approaches the halfway point between its much less frequent retrograde periods.

Mercury entered the echo (or “shadow”) phase of its next retrograde two days ago as it moved past 16+ Libra, where it will resume direct motion again on Oct. 25. Venus is now entering the dawn’s glare to temporarily disappear from view before resuming visibility in the western sky after sundown later this year.

One would be hard-pressed to find two planets on more different paths than Mercury and Venus are now. The same may very well be true of what you are thinking and how you are feeling.

Yet, in both astrology and in your life, separate paths sometimes lead to something of the same circumstances — at least for a short while. In astrology’s case, at least, such will be the state of affairs for Mercury and Venus tomorrow.

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By Amanda Moreno

In general, my dreams and I are fighting these days. I’ve had more nightmares in the past few weeks than I’ve probably had in my entire life combined. They’re not really the kinds that lead to me waking up screaming or anything, but they have been disturbing and chaotic.

It’s probably not helpful at all that I’ve been reading about “evil” and “psychic self defense” before bed, but I digress.

A few weeks ago I gave you a glimpse into my New Moon ritual process. As I sit here reflecting on my intention — When I make time to still my mind, to listen and perceive, I act on the inspiration that comes with dedication and ease — I’m laughing at the “still my mind” part.

My mind has been anything but still. But I’m realizing that I have been making the effort to listen and perceive. And my dreams have been the direct means of getting inspiration for writing and living and loving.

The fact of the matter is that I’ve been picking up little communications from dreams and then acting on them. I do, however, find dream work to be somewhat exhausting and tedious sometimes. It requires time and effort. And although the pay off can be huge — seeing as dream work provides a means for getting to know the images of our own unconscious minds — I tend to be inconsistent in my efforts.

So what is dream work, anyway? To my mind, dream work is yet another tool for healing and understanding because it connects us to the language of the psyche. I see it as different from dream interpretation. Dream interpretation, for me, is more about “what does the dream Mean,” whereas dream work is more alive and fluid. It’s about unpacking images and emotions. Dream work includes interpretation to a degree, but moves beyond it to see the dream as a constantly changing dynamic.

The gist of dream work is that dreams are alive, that they are multidimensional and multi-layered, and that they are communicating with us through images that are full of meaning. The images that appear in a dream are specific to the particular dream. Therefore there can be no universal meaning for “water,” because the context of the water (is it still? clear? warm? salty? menacing?) describes the image further.

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By Sarah Taylor

“Completion,” “Happiness,” and “The Star.”

A threshold has been crossed permanently and honoured as such. Now you have an opportunity to focus on the new experience that you have crossed into, which may feel so different as to be at first unrecognisable.

Like all the Fours, the Four of Wands stands as a marker on a particular part of your journey. The Fours are pauses. Last week, there was the Four of Swords, which refers to time out that is prescribed, with the admonition that if it’s not taken now, it might be enforced more strongly later. Here, the Four of Wands is also a pause before another threshold — a stepping into an agreement that has a sense of finality to it.

Often, the Four of Wands will indicate marriage or some kind of commitment ceremony. Here is the agreement; from here, life moves forward, but somehow differently. If there is no marriage, it is the acknowledgement that one phase has passed, and you are contemplating the next step into a new paradigm. The position in this week’s reading refers to what has just happened, and which has a strong bearing on the present: the Nine of Cups.

I love the Nine of Cups, and yet it also has the tendency to frustrate me a little: it is light and wondrous, and whimsical. How, then, to put that whimsy to practical use in a world that can often be anything but light and wondrous? Perhaps it is to take to heart (Cups being associated with our emotions) that you are operating in an environment that you have come to view in a particular way — stolid, intractable, heavy — yet maybe it is you who has become somewhat stolid, intractable and heavy in a world that is waiting for you to lighten up a little. Or to lighten up a lot!

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By Judith Gayle | Political Waves

I suspect that most of you reading this today are exhausted by daily news and disgusted by the politics that drive it. We’ve long since lost the edge of hysteria used to manipulate us post-9/11, and if we’ve grown at all during the ensuing years, come to recognize any hint of war drums in the thread of white-noise behind government announcements. The 34th President of the United States warned us about the growing influence of the military-industrial complex in 1961, so we’ve had over fifty years to chew on that information, along with four major wars and countless skirmishes and military actions to illustrate our growing reliance on violence to both define and enrich ourselves.

Ten presidents later, we’re still chewing on the same old stuff; we know it when we taste it, don’t we? Tastes like war and rumors of war, and, although many of us are disappointed by Obama’s declaration of … whatever that was, this week … against ISIS and anyone who threatens American interests, reinvigorating the War on Terror, I’d be really surprised if you hadn’t seen it coming. Me? I’m surprised it took so long.

This is America we’re talking about, “the land of the free and the home of the brave” (with neither of those attributes carefully scrutinized nor fully comprehended), and the political party that’s been screaming about the lack of American leadership and the decline of American influence in the world has been relentless in its criticism of our president’s international lack of aggression. The first ISIS beheading was enough for them to implode, the second was a bridge too far. (Yet, if you will pardon the candor, is a quick beheading any less barbaric — any less brutal and unforgivable — than years spent in solitary confinement, one’s mind slowly slipping sideways?)

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Mars enters Sagittarius Saturday at 5:57 pm EDT, after about a month and a half in Scorpio. Sagittarius is a fire sign — and Mars is a fiery energy. If Mars in Scorpio was the slow burn, or the sense of dropping deep into the erotic magma at your core, Mars in Sagittarius is about fanning that heat out into the world.

It’s about letting something ignite within you that can translate your more idealistic desires and sense of soul-purpose into some tangible adventure. You’re being invited to go beyond your known borders in a bold and adventurous way — whatever that boils down to for you.

But the realization of a sense of purpose in life can feel terrifying. Because once you own that, you begin to run out of excuses for not getting down to business living it. What if the sky’s message is that the current adventure ahead of you has a clear purpose and as much assurance of success as is possible? Will you choose your direction, go forward, and keep going forward? Do you trust what you want?

Note that as soon as Mars enters Sagittarius it will be closing in on a square to Neptune in Pisces.

Mars square Neptune is partly a caution to be honest with yourself and wary of self-delusion in your motives — that is, to be wary of ‘wants’ that are really just distractions. It’s also a reminder to keep careful tabs on your alcohol and drug use. On a more metaphysical level, Mars-Neptune is a good reason to keep your energetic/psychic boundaries strong and to stay in clear psychic integrity.

But Mars square Neptune has incredible creative potential, too. And in a sense, creativity is delusional. That’s the whole idea. It’s not supposed to make perfect sense or be practical. Any relationship into which you channel your creative fire, regardless of its label (work, love, play, etc.), is about to get a real lift.

As it does, you may very well find your voice in a way that is close to your heart. Not in the pages of your journal or the confines of your imagination, but out there — in your community.

With Eric Francis

Indulge neither fantasy nor fear as Venus moves through Virgo to oppose Neptune in Pisces at 6:51 am EDT (10:51 UT) tomorrow, and you’ll be positioned to handle what relationship has brought you since Friday. Venus entered Virgo on Friday, probably followed soon thereafter by some relationship situation entering (or re-entering) your life.

The nature of the relationship situation that precipitated soon after Venus made ingress to Virgo at 1:07 pm EDT (17:07 UT) necessarily varies from one person to the next, yet with one probable common thread.

The common thread would have been yesterday’s Pisces Full Moon at 9:38 pm EDT (or 1:38 am UT this morning), possibly accompanied by a sense of exasperation.

Exasperation, perhaps, for what remains unresolved for you in relationship, either since Friday or since even further back in time. Fortunately, tomorrow’s opposition from Venus to Neptune is taking place along the same sign axis (Virgo to Pisces) as yesterday’s Full Moon.

Fortunate, but not because the Venus-Neptune opposition will necessarily bring the resolution you crave. Because instead, one way or another (but probably also through relationship), a deeper understanding of your emergent (or re-emerged) relationship situation will be accompanied by a broader range of options for you to address when Venus and Neptune follow the Full Moon’s act.

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By Carlos Cedillo

I am taking a bit of a shortcut to writing my blog this week to share what I wrote back in February of 2011, with the intention of encouraging you to interact more fully with this new cycle of Mayan astrology. Please feel free to comment on what you would like to see manifesting this new tzolkin round and beyond into the new Baktun.

How many of these things have already happened for you, or maybe you have seen on the news since 2011-2012?

Now of course would be a great time for a Maya calendar analysis or a Mayan tarot reading, to get some new perspective. More than ever it is time for a universal calendar perspective because the cosmos is not what it used to be.

Think back if you can just to the 1990s. Talking about the New Age was still considered to be ‘woo-woo’ or just a crazy pipedream, but now here we are on the other side of that veil. Most humans are aware now that the Maya and many other ancient cultures had some prophetic visions about this new era, but few folks take the spiritual leap into the void and out of their old dogmas.

As we move further away from that 2012 barrier, which really was the Venus Transit Portal from June 2004 to June 2012, we see and feel that things are somehow not the same at all. Climate change — or more accurately, “Global Warming” — is only one of the most severe physical manifestations of the New Baktun.

It is a razor cutting us completely away from old energy sources and small ego attitudes. We are all on one boat called Earth, and there are no life rafts (yet). If we don’t all shift away from burning carbon-based fuels, then we will choke ourselves, rich and poor alike, all while trying to make a dime exploiting our Mother Earth.

Leadership must come from the people — ALL the People!

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