My week started off with clogged sinuses. Which led to plugged up ears. I’ve indicated in previous installments that my body is undeniably used as a message center for deeper issues that need attention. And if those aren’t addressed, the messages then extend out beyond me to my surroundings.

“Overtaken” by Rob Moore.

Oh, yeah… the toilet clogged up, too. And would not budge. And the landlord wouldn’t respond to my messages. And since all my calls went to voicemail on the first ring, I know he got them.

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist, a doctor or plumber to pinpoint the problem: something isn’t moving.

But since I wasn’t exactly paying attention or listening, more things stopped moving. It soon became apparent that what was stuck were feelings. And this external piling-on only exacerbated them.

Mercury having just turned direct as the week got underway, I could well have been experiencing that storm phase. If you have had a similar experience this past week, take heart that Mercury is now gaining some decent momentum.

So great have been the feelings going on for me, however, that I actually cannot pinpoint the last time it was this way. Nevertheless, I’ve been here before…spending a third of my day working through feelings in order to be something akin to productive. I actually started writing a completely different piece but because of so much heavy feeling unrelated to anything I was writing about, I’ve chosen instead to tell it like it is. Or, more accurately, like it has been.

I started to deduce that this may have had less to do with the Mercury storm phase and more about retrograde Mars’ reentry into Scorpio. There are some of us who tend to experience transits on the early side of things. Psychosomatic, perhaps? Could be worth looking into in another installment. This much I can say for sure: Mars officially exited Sagittarius on Friday. Whenever it’s felt, such ingresses by inner planets can be rather palpable for any of us. Eric has the full overview of current astrology including Mars’ reentry into Scorpio in this week’s Planet Waves FM.

I suppose having Mars in Sagittarius for the last few months, even if it is appearing to go backwards, has been a productive thing for me. Not only have projects been clicking, but my emotions and my spirits have been almost effortless to maintain. Well, it would appear all that is grinding to a complete halt. Without taking the time to work through a barrage of overwhelming feelings, the projects, personalities and petty issues are feeling like tortures to endure right now.

There’s an old one-liner about the world being a wonderful place except for the people. Indeed, people most often seem to be the source, the cause or the catalyst for my feelings. Actions… inaction… communicating one thing… doing another. Crazy-making.

Since this entire Mars retrograde transit has been underway, a number of notable individuals have entered my scene, each with a unique part to play. However, with all the retrograding of planets that has colored recent times, it hasn’t always been easy to get clear on who’s here for what reason. This can lead to feelings of doubt and instability. And that can lead to all sorts of other feelings.

Retrograde planets often bring back into the spotlight mistakes that have been repeated throughout our lives. It’s either a chance to once and for all not make the mistake anymore or to see just how far we’ve come since the last big mistake. One of my ongoing mistakes throughout my life has been prematurely granting my trust.

When such gifts are not appreciated or there is no response to a heartfelt gesture, this is where the feelings come rushing in for me. This is where clarity is lost. This is where things begin to look dingy and grey and disappointing. Scenarios begin to form in the brain. In turn, the brain takes those scenarios and runs with them, building ever more elaborate scenarios ad infinitum.

During the day while I’m working on my iMac, I generally keep a window open to a particular hook-up site. Virtually nothing has developed from that population for a ridiculous amount of time. Lots of lookie loos; lots of messages from guys who get scared and logoff before I can even respond. Yet, to my surprise, someone I had managed to have a couple of actual conversations with a while back recently indicated the desire to connect. As fate would have it, we actually did connect. I had a great time. He said he couldn’t remember the last time he was so completely immersed in the action.

With a desire to increase the quality of my connections, one of my emerging Mars retrograde objectives is to be able to repeat rewarding encounters with others while retaining our individuality. Liking what happened here, I extended the invitation. He accepted. Matter of fact, later this very week looked like the best bet for a while. We’d firm things up the first of the week.

First of the week came. Nothing. Before midweek, I took the initiative and texted. Nothing.

One of my recent topics here on Planet Waves was about a lifelong pattern of Mercury retrograde connections. Having experienced a few lasting triumphs after legions of failures, I was now feeling like those few triumphs were enigmas I never should’ve given any weight. I was now feeling like I had fallen for wishful thinking one more idiotic time.

Sinuses killing me, projects piling up, toilet clogged, messages not returned… it became clear that to find some kind of peace I’d have to take drastic measures. I would have to formally meditate. And bring every synapse into the very instant. And take the steps necessary to transform paralyzing feelings into something else. I honestly didn’t know what that was because all I could do was feel feelings. So into the moment I went.

I met my feelings one by one and felt them fully. Foremost was anger. I was angry at so much going on it wasn’t even necessary to contemplate any of that. I just felt the anger.

Sitting there just fully feeling, the anger transformed amazingly quickly into a kind of blissful thrill. Ahhh… yes… now I remember how this works. It’s almost like the feeling of coming over the big rise on a roller coaster. Scary, scary, scary… whoooo-we! Exhilarating!

Oh, but wait. Here comes the fear. Okay… feel it, feel it, feel it… aahhhhh, mmmmm, mmmm. Peace. Oh, yeah… that’s the stuff.

Once the fear and angst have given way to peaceful, blissful feelings, I ask this more-attuned aspect of myself for the truths I need to know. I ask what presently ‘is’ with any number of situations. I ask what is presently needed to restore peace and effectiveness to each physical-world situation. Having done this for many years, I will frequently perceive visual answers or otherwise gain a new perspective on a situation. When applying such techniques, the way each of us is inspired or brought to a different way of considering things will be different. It may even happen two days later.

In this particular instance, I got the impression there was more information available if I opened to audible perception, an aspect of meditative connecting that was a major breakthrough for me 10 years ago. Here’s some of what came through this week:

“You need be just you and be no other. There is no need to justify or clarify or nullify your endeavors or promises in the mist. Foremost you must see and know and have the light that rains in and be that which you are. Have this you do now be the guide.”

I just want to point out that I began seeking to yield my goings-on to whatever wisdom exists beyond my thinking brain in my 20s. By 26, I had experienced the indescribable transcendence that results from meditative contact. Twenty-five years later, I still to this day fall into the idea that I completely have this all handled and figured out. Even while everything is collapsing around me. Never ceases to amaze and scare me just a little.

Nevertheless, my cell memory (or something) clicked in and reminded me how to get to a better way of seeing things. And now the other part of all this that never ceases to amaze me:

As I brought myself back fully to the room following meditation, I realized my ears had unplugged. A bit later — after having already plunged the frick out of that clogged toilet for an hour to no avail — the clog gave way, sending gurgles echoing down the pipeline. Shortly thereafter the landlord came to the door with his plumbing equipment, followed by a text from my Internet ‘connection’ with possible times to meet.

Having such developments take place wasn’t the reason I at last came into the moment. Feeling good again was. Everything falling into place was icing on the cake, albeit a very delectable icing.

I’m telling you, more and more I find that the ultimate solutions to my problems aren’t so much about a phone call or a text or a particular action. It’s about how all things are really connected. And from what I can put together, that is in the moment. Hey, I don’t claim to fully understand it. I just know it works — and sometimes all of a sudden.

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By Judith Gayle | Political Waves

How’s the political pulse, you ask? It’s racing. The usual suspects have fallen by the wayside, the outliers have cap​tured our imagination, and the situation remains fluid, no matter what established wisdom insists is true. ​All that and it’s not even summer ’til we smell the smoke from the barbecue (grab yer weenies, we’re almost there!).​

There are still three candidates in the race, although the attempt to marginalize Sanders has — from the very beginning — been substantial. While Donald Trump may prove the most dangerous candidate world wide, Bernie remains the most threatening to the political machine that feeds at the trough of big money and fiscal skullduggery.

The particulars of the race are, frankly, fascinating once you get past your personal desire, disgust, and despair. The Donald has rallied the right to gleefully anticipate and approve  his every small-minded and self-serving comment, sure it’s the utterance of the man who will save them from decades of decline foisted upon them by small-minded and self-serving liberals. The majority of his voters — those plagued with night terrors regarding  their own ‘small hands‘, apparently — are not swayed by facts, but the right has been comfortable with that scenario since inception.

The Clintonistas are pushing their boulder uphill, fighting against Donald’s smear campaign featuring the Billary years, his casual ability to ‘rename’ his opponents — Crooked Hillary —  and the unfortunate stream of ​revelations regarding the Clinton Foundation and Hil’s private e-mail server. With Clinton attempting to pivot towards the general and take on Trump, she’s still facing a very real populist movement that is threatening her super-delegate lead — especially worrisome as the polls show her in a dead heat against Donald, while Bernie beats them all with ease.

The Sanders campaign, meanwhile, continues to shake the bushes for new voters, despite the scathing accusations of establishment politicians that it threatens a Dem presidential win by remaining a loud and active counterpoint to same-old neo-liberal politics. Comes as no surprise, since the majority of Sanders supporters consider themselves Independents. That’s not a political party but a description of political independence, one that has become more anti-establishment with every revelation of corruption and example of plutocratic collusion over these last several decades.

I will admit my personal bias here, in that I have considered myself an Independent for more than thirty years, and — as you’ve noticed — that’s not been to move toward the middle in support of Pub policy, but to blast past the constipation that has brought full-throated democratic principle to a halt in the District of Columbia. Coming to this place and time has been a long, frustrating journey for us all.

Over the years we’ve continued to wander down ideological side roads, strolled down alternative political paths, unable, or perhaps unwilling, to open the larger can of worms that has to do with the machinery behind the governmental machine. But the worms are out and crawling now, and some of us are trying to deal with this worm-riddled system, while others are trying to stuff them back in the can.

So the left finds itself — declared Democrats or not — with dueling philosophies in Sanders and Clinton, who are not peas in a political pod: they are apples and oranges. The notion that Bernie could easily fold himself into a Clinton presidency ignores the essential, dramatic difference in their political visions for the nation. His is as close to a third party contest as possible without that declaration, and since it’s still a primary election and not the general, it continues to have the capacity to inform national politics without harming them.

Taking a calming breath is good advice. But gotta say, I’ve never seen anything quite like this, even as it echoes the passion of ’60s politics. It isn’t a traditional party split, as happens regularly among national voters. It isn’t even the right-left divide that was widened during the years of Bush the Lesser. This is more the birth pangs of a reality-based political spin off, although — like most creative acts — it may take longer than we’d like to take shape.

Outcome remains uncertain. Republicans are traditionally emotional creatures, nursing grudges and licking wounds. They vote for personalities, and Lord knows Donald Trump has a level of narcissim and inflated self-opinion for the fraidy cats to embrace, enough hot air to keep their worst fears warmed while protecting against harsher demographic truths.

Lefties care less about personality than they do about legislation. They are the larger umbrella that seeks the public good, or at least retains the capacity, having spent thirty or more years courting the moneyed class rather than dancing with those what brung ’em. They’re policy people, and Hillary is a policy wonk. She tells us what she would do for us as a formidable, and stern, candidate.

Bernie is a policy wonk as well, more general than Hil, less specific in legislative details. He tells us — as he did to a chanting crowd in California — “It’s not Bernie, Bernie, Bernie. It’s You, You, You!” Bernie employs the all-inclusive ‘we’ in most all that he promotes. The grass roots has an authentic champion. The old paradigm meets the new, the divide widens, and, as Eric Levitz writes in Daily Intelligencer, “Politics ain’t beanbag. Neither, presumably, are political revolutions.”

Curious about what the epic Uranus-Eris conjunction means for you? Intrigued by the dance of Neptune and Chiron in Pisces? In our exciting new class with Eric Francis, The Astrology of Now, your questions will receive thoughtful and insightful answers — and you’ll have lots of fun in the process. Sign up here.

With California coming up quickly, and the last of the primaries, we will know the outcome soon enough (although probably NOT soon enough for the Clinton campaign). Those Clinton loyalists who are concerned about the Bernie or Bust movement need to think back to Obama versus Clinton and the PUMA movement (party unity, my ass!) which was even louder and more angry than that of the Bernie Bro’s.  That worked out all right in the end, with everyone uniting against the possibility of McCain keeling over and leaving us with Sarah Palin at the helm. Of course Obama and Clinton were on the same page politically, giving voters less agita about coming together than today’s candidates.

Meanwhile, those who are afraid Bernie’s giving Trump an edge have decided that Elizabeth Warren’s twitter-war with Donald is the poison pill keeping him from pivoting toward hard core presidential politics (like appointing Newt Gingrich as his running mate, and I’m serious!). And now that Donald has dropped “goofy” as nickname for Warren to replace it with “Pocahontas” (because of a college application that included her Cherokee heritage,) Elizabeth seems to be taking a good bit of pleasure in becoming the interpreter of Trumpisms that illuminate Donald’s true elitist motives and ideals.

Donald would be a disastrous president, Hillary an efficiently calculating one, and Bernie? Who knows. He’s not as crusty as he appears, but he’s no ‘no-drama-Obama,’ either. Of the three, Sanders is the one I trust not to cover up, power-grab, or distort, which doesn’t mean I will go down with the ship on the Bernie or Bust summer cruise.

Robert Reich, a dedicated public servant, has been taking a bruising from those who refuse to consider what comes after the presumptive is chosen. It should be said that he echoes the people I trust — Moyers, Chomsky — who know that politics is compromise OF THE MOMENT in order to protect against worse (like ANY SCOTUS nominee from the Donald’s list of coathanger candidates, for instance, or total decline of American leadership in the free world), ​until a better opportunity comes along.​

Although we still have a way to go — and we haven’t even gotten to the presidential campaign, fer gawd’s sake — the real loser in this event is establishment politics. Republican leadership is farther along in this than their opposition. They’ve swallowed the bile that comes with losing control of their party. They don’t like it, but they understand Trump’s coat-tails are the only ones left to ride at this point, even if into oblivion.

On the left, I’m amazed and dismayed at how tone deaf the Dems are in getting honest with themselves over a system that’s been neutered in its ability to provide for the average citizen, while making the wealthy wealthier. This read from Politico on the possibility that Clinton could win the necessary delegates while getting whipped in California is full of quotes that make me shake my head at how clueless the political establishment has become to the pain of the people left behind.

But as long time activist, Jim Hightower, tells us, populism isn’t going away any time soon. That cat’s out of the bag, and we’ll see where it wanders, as cats are known to do. With the ‘free market’ a sham as result of corrupt trade agreements — capitalism gone the way of all vampiric creatures, glutted on life-force not its own — and the foot soldiers of the elite doing all they can to snuff out the sparks of anger that will light, God/dess willing, torches to go with the pitchforks held by disenchanted citizens, there IS no solution to this socio-political problem without a revolutionary shakeup to free the natives from their illusions and prompt a demand to re-draw the public contract.

This Memorial Day, let’s visualize the eventuality of a day when our veterans service to their country can be celebrated without a headstone — and the appreciation of the nation is for those who serve in ethics and honesty, rather than in blood.

By Amanda Painter

Do you know your instincts when you feel them? Sure, we’re talking about things like the urge to procreate; but there are also creative instincts — like being in a play rehearsal and moving a certain way without rationalizing the choice beforehand. Or sensing that what you’ve just painted needs a splash of blue, even though you had not intended to use that color initially.

A very confused Christmas cactus with a dozen blooms in mid-May. Photo by Amanda Painter.

Instinct is related to our biology; animals operate on the level of instinct when they mate and migrate and search for certain foods. It can get a little complicated to discuss instinct when it comes to humans.

Intuition (a level of knowing that can be stimulated, intensified and enriched) is generally not described as quite the same thing as instinct, yet people often use the words interchangeably. On top of that, humans often override instinctive and intuitive functions by using conscious, rational thinking or through cultural conditioning — whether it actually works better or not.

In fact, it would seem that the more engaged with and embedded in our digital technology we get, the more confusing the distinctions become. When you’re filtering all your social interactions and communication through texting, emailing and social media posts, you lose the body language and vocal cues that might normally inform you on those semi-conscious, instinctive, biologically primal levels. When you can’t smell the other person or smell and hear your shared environment (wind shifting the scent of food cooking; birds going silent), a level of understanding gets lost.

Those environmental and physical cues constitute a level of input that can help you interpret where you are in relationship to people, situations and your own desires. Without it, you depend more on the mental level of processing; you also have access to your emotional responses — though they may be more subject to projection onto others without the multi-layered input from in-person interaction.

If you’re a very ‘tuned in’ sort of person, your intuition can also help to guide you. But that biological, instinctual level may be harder to access and integrate with technological disconnect. How many times have you ignored the need to eat because you’ve been conditioned to put work ahead of physical instincts?

In turn, that’s layered on top of however many decades of cultural and religious indoctrination you’ve lived through, especially when it comes to instincts like sex. I’ll bet you can think of more reasons why you shouldn’t fuck compared to why you should.

It’s this juxtaposition that the current astrology seems to be highlighting. On one level, there’s an emphasis on the intellectual, the superficial and a devotion to the kind of rapidly shifting external expression we’ve become used to in the Internet age. This comes through the Sun, asteroid Vesta and Venus clustered together in early Gemini — an air sign often associated with quickly shifting thoughts and communication.

Yet we also have retrograde Mars finally making its way backward from Sagittarius into Scorpio on Friday, just before 11:00 am EDT (13:51 UTC). This brings Mars out of the realm of beliefs and plunges it into a space of something potentially steamier: your most fundamental desires and biological urges.

It’s an intense and inwardly focused space, plugged into ‘how you really feel’ and ‘what you really want’. Eric Francis has written a good deal at Planet Waves about the ways that guilt might surface when Mars gets into Scorpio. Any guilt shows you the points of tension you’re holding between ‘what you’re supposed to want’ (or not want) and what your instincts are actually compelling you toward.

How open are you to feeling your way through that? How willing are you to step away from the screen — no matter how tiny and convenient it is — so you can stop chattering away into empty, virtual space and instead step into the moments of stillness that will allow you to see, feel, smell taste and hear the stimuli that really get you going?

Yes, this will likely bring up some emotions for you. And you have a choice as to whether or not to feel them, how you process them, and how you let them influence your self-awareness and self-expression. A pair of minor planets in Pisces (Nessus and Pallas) are squaring the Gemini cluster. Can you use what you learn proactively, or will you let emotional reactions use you in the same unproductive patterns they often have?

Your opportunity here is to exercise your spiritual and creative muscles through your innate humanness. To do that, you have to reclaim your power beyond the dictates of social media. That is, you have to be willing to hear your biological instincts and emotional desires, and be willing to want what you want.

Three planets in ‘Gemini mode’ are calling your attention to the intellectual level, making you aware of the other side of every story. But Mercury, which rules Gemini, is still in Taurus: body-knowledge is still accessible, and it plays very well indeed with Mars in Scorpio. Feel it, and see where it takes your mind.

Visit the garden of delights that is the Planet Waves Boutique, and find the top-quality reading, class or membership that you need, or that special gift for a loved one.

By Amanda Moreno

So it would appear to be mutable grand cross season — although I’m not entirely certain about that. It’s all kind of foggy. The increased mutability underscores a feeling that I’m constantly trudging through, or on the verge of, an identity crisis of some kind.

Photo by graywacke/A Landing a Day

Part of that might also have something to do with me learning all about Libra through Uranus and Eris opposing my natal Pluto in Libra as well as a whole cohort of Librans I appear to have called in to my life right now. Libra shadows, both the dark and the golden, abound.

I’m using the term “identity crisis” lightly and somewhat whimsically at the moment. I apply that same whimsicality to the sentiment I’ve been uttering a lot lately, which is that sometimes Libra just feels like a lie to me. It’s an energy that seems so externally motivated, and while I’m all for making and keeping the peace, diplomacy and harmony, the stronger Scorpio parts of me just want to shriek, “But what’s REALLY going on?! Underneath the surface?! Who are you really? Who am I really?”

As for those last two questions, I wonder if we can ever really know. There is so much mystery to this dance we’re partaking in on the Earth. Being able to be present with our lives as the mystery unfolds seems worthy work. Letting the pieces fall into place and giving ourselves a break from trying to figure it all out sometimes. At the same time, it seems as if combining the seeker’s need to know with worthy work and service in the world is utterly vital to our wellbeing as a collective. The combination helps to put the emphasis on the process rather than the outcome, which is rarely ever pre-defined.

Last weekend I attended a Town Hall gathering with Michael Meade in support of his newest book, The Genius Myth. From the website:

The Genius Myth proposes that each person born participates in the genius of life and the world at this time is in great need of an awakening of the genius qualities hidden in each of us. In a rapidly changing world faced with seemingly impossible problems, it becomes important to understand that each person has something to contribute to the solutions.

I was introduced to Mr. Meade’s brand of storytelling and his perspective on the world while I was in graduate school, learning about apocalyptic cycles and quite immersed in what it is to be living during a major paradigm shift, as we are now. Seeing him again felt like a homecoming and a very timely reminder, re-igniting my own genius and reminding me who I am at my core. I appreciate those anchors during times of identity flux.

Something I read very early on in my experiences at Planet Waves spoke to the importance of each person becoming an expert in just one or two things, rather than all of us learning superficially about so many. This was an idea that has stuck with me, and that has helped me in times of feeling overwhelmed or like I should be doing more or learning more. I believe this idea that each of us has an inherent spark of genius that shows us what we’re here to do is similar to that. Both ideas also seem to allow for some fluidity of identity. In fact, Mr. Meade points to the inevitability of identity change as being the mark of a healthy human.

The inspiration I felt at the lecture was very much a double-edged sword. It definitely brought me closer to my own gratitude for being so deeply immersed in the works of such wise, grounded and realistic humans as Mr. Meade for so many years now; and brought me closer to my gratitude for having found my ‘calling’, as well as the ability to strike off on a path that is absolutely meaningful for me.

At the same time, that heartening, inspiring immersion means I’m also diving in once again to the world stage, to the realities of climate change, nuclear proliferation, one refugee crisis after another, ‘climate change fatigue’, the fact that our current president is officially the longest war-time president, and the absolutely surreal shit-show that is our political system.

The resulting emotions can be pretty acutely bittersweet. The joy and exhilaration of being alive at this time is often equal to the heartbreak. Sometimes that tension is incapacitating. But often…it’s the most potent form of fuel.

So much of what’s been stuck mentally and emotionally for the past few months seems to be moving again — all at once. I suppose it was obvious that a Mercury retrograde in already stubborn Taurus could lead to some stuckness, but as always the felt reality of the idea was still somehow shocking. Now the deluge of mutability is definitely making me think a lot more about drugs, alcohol and altered states — alongside a longing to be in one. Even if waking sobriety feels like an altered state as it is. It’s good to be aware of these things, and to monitor how often I’m giving in.

So I’ve decided, amidst my sometimes over-dramatic and sometimes entirely authentic proclamations of identity crisis, to try and channel the sudden fluidity of emotional energy into poetry, which is for me a form of cathartic release, and one I have not visited in some time. I want to write love songs to my body and listen to its responses — to what it has to say, and to what it’s still holding onto — as an ode to incorporating the lessons of these earthy Mercury retrogrades.

I think it could also help to uncover more of what’s going to be arising as Mars re-enters Scorpio this weekend. That re-examination of desires in terms of whether they’re in alignment with what the spark in my soul — my genius — is striving towards seems like good identity crisis medicine.

That pursuit might or might not be one I’ll share here. But I will leave you with a poem I came across on the interwebs the other day. It speaks quite deftly to whatever it is I’m trying to articulate and experience in my own life these days, and hopefully in some of yours as well:

the hard season
will
split you through.
do not worry.
you will bleed water.
do not worry.
this is grief.
your face will fall out and down your skin
and
there will be scorching.
but do not worry.
keep speaking the years from their hiding places.
keep coughing up smoke from all the deaths you
have died.
keep the rage tender.
because the soft season will come.
it will come.
loud.
ready.
gulping.
both hands in your chest.
up all night.
up all of the nights.
to drink all damage into love.

∼ by nayyirah waheed

Visit the garden of delights that is the Planet Waves Boutique, and find the top-quality reading, class or membership that you need, or that special gift for a loved one.

Astrology suggests that the next two weeks or so would be a good time for you take a bearing. The purpose would be to work with time (and timeframes) to evaluate where you are in your life. The process might be described as similar to finding your position in physical space with a map and compass.

Without getting too technical, orienting yourself with a map and compass often begins with locating two or more landmarks (such as mountain peaks) with your eyes. Than you find them on your map, and deduce your position relative to the known positions represented by the landmarks.

Of course, spotting landmarks requires you to be in a good position to do so, usually high ground. With Venus having entered Gemini shortly before 6 am EDT (09:44:28 UTC) this morning, you are about to get one of astrology’s temporal versions of spatial high ground.

That’s because Venus (now in the very first degree of Gemini) will oppose retrograde Mars (in the very first degree of Sagittarius) shortly before 11 pm EDT tonight (02:38:08 UTC tomorrow). That opposition on the zodiac (corresponding to an actual opposition of Venus and Mars in the sky) will represent a landmark in time. That’s because of how astrology interprets oppositions.

The phenomenon known as a Full Moon (the Sun and Moon opposing each other on the zodiac and in the sky) serves as the template for interpreting all other oppositions. Most fundamentally, the occasion of an opposition represents a halfway point between conjunctions. A conjunction is when two objects occupying the same degree of the same sign.

Hence, the Sagittarius Full Moon (opposing the Gemini Sun), which just took place on Saturday, represented the halfway point between the Taurus New Moon back on May 6 and the next New Moon. That next New Moon will see the Sun and Moon converge again in Gemini on June 4 (or June 5, depending on what time zone you are in).

That’s how any Full Moon gives you sufficient metaphorical high ground to get perspective on at least an entire month. Since Venus and Mars oppose roughly every other year, basically alternating years with their conjunctions, the perspective you are about to get with them is potentially much broader. Most fundamentally, the opposition that Venus and Mars will move through overnight will represent a culmination — very much like a Full Moon.

For astrologers, culminations are not endings; rather, they are peaks in time. They function like mountain peaks in physical space: as known positions from which you can deduce your position. As regards to this particular opposition of Venus and Mars, you may now deduce that whatever started for you when Venus and Mars conjoined three times last year (on Feb. 22, Sept. 1 and Nov. 2, 2015) is now somehow coming to a peak of its own. That would be especially true regarding subject matter that corresponds to what Venus and Mars together symbolize, which would certainly include personal relationships.

As an added bonus, with both Venus and the Sun now in Gemini, both are about to give you some orientation regarding a prominent feature on astrology’s map for this entire year: the mutable T-square that Eric has referred to so often lately (most recently in his Planet Waves TV telecast on Sunday).

This year’s mutable T-square is anchored by Neptune, which has been in the mutable water sign Pisces for five years or so. The configuration then formed up when Jupiter entered the mutable earth sign Virgo in August of last year, followed by Saturn returning to the mutable fire of Sagittarius for the long run about five weeks later.

Now, the Sun and Venus are beginning their mutual tour of Gemini’s mutable air. Your consciousness (as represented by the Sun) and your sense of values (correlating with Venus) will finally be attaining sufficiently high ground to help you orient yourself with regards to some of the slower-moving planets (Jupiter, Saturn and Neptune) and the very long periods of time they correspond to. Indeed, it is very possible that you might even locate your place in history, as well as where you are in your life, over the next few weeks.

To get your bearings accurately at this time, however, you must first do all you can to place yourself on high ground. At least in regards to personal relationships, that would mean taking taking what responsibilities are fairly yours to own instead of simply looking to blame other people for your problems with them. In addition, assuming the high ground would necessarily entail actually being how you would want others to see and remember you when both the long and short astrological cycles we are now in the midst of finally come to a close.

The ultimate potential of this period in your life (and history) is thus for you become something of a mountain peak yourself — somebody who other people will someday refer and aspire to as they orient themselves in lives yet to come. Obviously the first step in attaining such lofty aspirations is to at least behave as though you are already there.

Offered In Service

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Earlier today, The New York Times and other news outlets reported that Pres. Obama has rescinded a decades-old embargo on Vietnam. Dissolving any lingering vestiges of the Vietnam War and the Cold War would seem a good thing until you realize one detail: it was a lethal weapons embargo.

Is something ‘off’ about this ‘normalized’ relationship? Barack Obama at a press conference with Vietnam’s President Tran Dai Quang at the Presidential Palace in Hanoi May 23, 2016. Photo by Reuters

Fabulous. As if U.S. arms manufacturers were lacking anybody to sell to, right? As if any country in the world is lacking ways to kill people.

One reason for lifting the embargo is that apparently Vietnam needs a little more muscle in the face of China’s buildup in the South China Sea. China and Vietnam have long been trading partners and ideological pals, but Beijing’s claims of waters off Vietnam’s coast in the South China Sea have been raising tensions.

The Times notes that one remaining barrier to lifting the arms embargo had been Vietnam’s lagging human rights record — “an area where we still have differences,” according to Obama.

He is perhaps referring to factors such as a lack of independent media; or that, “Legally and formally, human rights organizations and unions cannot exist independently of the Communist Party of Vietnam,” according to John Coughlan, a researcher at Amnesty International for Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam, in an interview on Slate.com. Amnesty International’s ”conservative” estimate is that there are 83 prisoners of conscience detained in Vietnam at this time.

John Sifton, the Asia policy director of Human Rights Watch, said, “President Obama just gave Vietnam a reward that they don’t deserve.”

So did the U.S. just lose influence over Vietnam’s approach to human rights? Does the Obama administration think that it’s bribing Vietnamese president, Tran Dai Quang into behaving better? Or do Obama and his advisors just not care as much as they claim to?

Even though “only” about $1 billion is earmarked for weapons procurement out of Vietnam’s $4.6 billion defense budget, spending on new equipment is expected to reach $1.6 billion a year by 2015 according to the Teal Group, a Virginia-based consultancy.

Obama is playing Santa Claus on this visit to Asia, essentially telling Vietnamese officials they’ve been good enough this year. Meanwhile, American military contractors’ Christmas stockings look to be further stuffed should the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a trade deal among 12 nations, pass.

Obama has suggested that the TPP would benefit Vietnam greatly, and will eventually become law — though it has little chance of passing Congress before November’s elections. Plus, Bernie Sanders, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump all oppose it (at least for now — you never know when Trump will change his tune on something).

With or without the TPP, the U.S. government seems to be on its way to “normalizing” its relationship with Vietnam.

“The decision to lift the ban was not based on China or any other considerations,” said Obama in a press conference with Pres. Quang at his side. “It was based on our desire to complete what has been a lengthy process of moving toward normalization with Vietnam.”

Given the blind eye turned toward human rights abuses and the clear benefit to arms makers, it’s clear that “normal” relationships between the U.S. and other countries are just as screwed up, co-dependent and potentially abusive as any personal relationship in the U.S. these days.

When you get rewarded for not changing your destructive ways, where’s the impetus to change? I’d suggest couples’ therapy for the U.S. and Vietnam, but from what I can tell, they’d be better off working on themselves individually for a while. Can anyone recommend a good meditation retreat or something for an entire government?

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