By Rob Moore

I can still recall the excitement in my chest while I sat waiting in that coffee house all those years ago. When at last Travis walked through the door, he also walked right into my heart and staked a claim on every part of my being. God, I adored that guy. There was so much I got about him.

Calming the Storm by Rob Moore.

I knew, for instance, how his gruff exterior was merely covering a deeply sensitive fellow traveller underneath. After all, it was my story, too.

Nearly inseparable for two weeks, one night we entered into a rather deep and revealing conversation about our personal pasts. Travis began to relate stories from his upbringing that clearly indicated physical abuse.

Caring so deeply for him, I asked if he understood the misguided nature of those harsh actions taken out on him. He said he didn’t see it that way. He seemed puzzled by the suggestion and started getting a bit defensive.

Let me just say that — largely because of what happened next — today if I were in the same situation I would give the topic a rest for the time being. Perhaps set the intention to discuss this further once our relationship had established solid roots. But back then, all I could see were the facts of abuse pitted against misplaced trust. I so adored this sweetheart of a guy, I felt it was my duty to make the reality clear to him.

So I pushed my points. And persisted. He asked me to stop. I didn’t. He said he didn’t want to talk about this. I did anyway. I was certain he had to know. Everything in me said he simply had to understand. I pushed and prodded and persisted some more. In a matter of minutes, he snatched up his stuff and bolted out the door, never to return again.

My story involves several similarities to the current astrology, not the least of which involves planets in retrograde or about to be. Had I worked with astrology consciously, the outcome would have been exceedingly more favorable. Nevertheless, this direct experience is how I learned. Mistakes and missteps such as these were the exact moments when the light bulbs clicked on. That’s why I so frequently relate such things to you.

Right out of the gate in the latest Planet Waves FM, Eric considers current retrograde transits from a purely scientific point of view, pointing out that all astrology is really about what Earth is doing. I found this to be a remarkably simple yet remarkably clear explanation of how this system works with us and for us.

The more I have applied astrology, the more I have come to see it consistently maps out the most fortuitous general directions currently wide open to us. What we do from there is entirely up to us, and any solutions are as varied as we are as individuals.

Oh, if only in those Travis days I had understood the impeccable direction and timing that astrology affords us. I was just beginning to seriously explore it back then. I can tell you, though, that Mercury was retrograde. As my jury was still out on the validity of astrology, I ignored indications that meanings could easily be misconstrued during this phase. I instead clutched those misunderstandings ever tighter and just plowed them right on through.

I assure you things would be very different today. Very different. Retrograde planets or not, more than trying to pinpoint facts, I would instead set out to demonstrate care, affection and respect during the course of our connection.

Incidentally, in addition to the present Mars retrograde, Mercury is currently in shadow phase before heading into apparent reverse motion April 28. So if there were ever times to tread on the easier end of the spectrum with points of view and finalizing decisions, we are among them.

Are there such situations looming large for you now? Particularly where significant others are involved — and anywhere it appears some big, sweeping move needs to be made — there is a way to ease the undue pressure. Or at least to feel at peace with how you choose to respond. It’s something that is common knowledge to so many of us, yet so incredibly easy to slip out of our mental consideration just when we need it most.

Among the areas I touched on in last week’s post was shame following sexual interaction. It occurred to me afterward that it might do to explain exactly how it is that I am ‘baffled’ by what is such a common human condition. In my twenties, following an AA crash-course on no longer being a people-pleaser, I set out to find connection with what I consider a reliable ‘source’ of wisdom and direction in my life. That concept has had many incarnations for me over the years, the most recent being the very highest aspect of my own self — my own energetic presence.

Yet when it comes to feeling completely satisfied with our decisions and actions — be it sex or what we said to the server at Starbucks this morning — the solution is exactly the same regardless of our concept of ‘God’ or ‘source’. Even the old-man-on-a-cloud idea will do just fine as long as we understand to our core that he, she or it is pro-joy about life and therefore pro-joy about you and me.

Okay, at last… the big reveal. The way to feel at total peace with what transpires: stopping and offering the situation over to our personal source for the wisest and most fortuitous way to become clear. In all likelihood, not a ground-shaking revelation for you. Thing is, though, I have learned the hard way just how invaluable this practice is for even the minutest of things. Like how we respond to a text or something.

It is just so second nature when it comes to seemingly minor undertakings to think, “I got this,” and plow on ahead. Besides, it’s no big deal, right? But I’ve noticed whenever I feel the slightest doubt about what direction I’ll be happiest with, if I lay out my intentions before my guidance, nine times out of ten something will dawn on me that I overlooked. Something that makes my effort really worth it to me now. Something that I would’ve been kicking myself ten minutes later for not thinking about.

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As mentioned, though, so often when we could really benefit from taking this brief pause, it doesn’t even enter our mind.

The good news is that offering whatever has already happened for correction — to either the situation or our perception or both — works wonders, too. Honestly, just look for the shift that occurs or the opportunity to make one yourself.

Nevertheless, it’s so much more efficient to get our brains and our actions and the highest knowing available to us all on board from the get-go. Besides, I’ve noticed the brain alone has a chamber of guilt-trips it has no problem pulling from if given the upper hand.

And so it was with my brain in regards to my pushing, prodding and not even considering the prevailing vibe of the room, the sofa, the relationship or the moment with Travis. I bashed myself with regret for years for crushing something so delicate right into the dirt. For mirroring, albeit in a different way, the exact kind of disrespect I was warning Travis about.

These days, I would have offered the entire evening over to my guidance beforehand. At minimum, halfway through the first push, I would have remembered my earlier appeal for higher wisdom and then scanned inside for inklings of a more enlightened way forward.

Particularly where relationships feature during the stop-and-go nature of our current astrological environment, I highly recommend accessing the peace of mind this little practice offers. Wherever opportunities for deepening our connections are on offer — be it through sexual interaction, heartfelt conversation or whatever — knowing that a higher level of wisdom and foresight are actively involved in how things play out really eases the pressure and transforms the experience. So, if the most I’ve done today is remind you what a good idea this actually is, just wait till you remember how good it feels.

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By Judith Gayle | Political Waves

So New York happened. Bernie closed the 40 point divide Hillary held to come within a dozen or so, but it wasn’t enough to impact Gotham, where capitalism makes its decisions behind closed boardroom doors. I doubt if any of us are surprised.

The Talking Heads, who undervalued Sanders’ chances early on, are now sure he has no path to the nomination, telling us that he’d have to take 60 percent of the remaining delegates, in even less friendly states like Pennsylvania and Maryland. The last hope, so it’s said, of the Sanders campaign comes down to convincing super-delegates that he’s the more electable — and on paper, he surely is.

According to Real Clear Politics, Sanders does best in projected general-election match-ups. Mother Jones, describing Bernie as a “scourge to machine politics,” cites polls that have Sanders leading Trump by 15 points, Clinton by 9. Against Ted Cruz, Sanders wins by 11 points, Clinton by 2 (this last seems somewhat ominous).

Like so much else in today’s politics, these numbers are hypothetical. Bernie’s unconventional style, proposals, and religious convictions haven’t yet faced a well-funded onslaught of Pub negativity, which would surely move that needle should he become the nominee, but I doubt he’d earn the same level of distaste (even disgust) of those who refuse Hillary’s candidacy. After all, to the faithful on the right, Bernie’s just a Commie, not the Bride of Satan.

Still, although Sanders remains the most trustworthy of those in the running, what started as a movement may end up just that: a burgeoning political movement that inches the needle left, a bit at a time — hopefully not with the kind of minimal increment Mrs. Clinton prefers — but that in itself is a monumental achievement considering the kind of money interests orchestrating this calamitous exercise. Those who think this populism (seeking reform on the left, replacement on the right) will go away quietly should think again.

There were a good many so-called “third rails” before Bernie Sanders began to mainstream his call to populism — topics that were simply not brought up except in disposable talking points, like ‘banks too big to fail.’ We were stuck in corporate rhetoric, vulture-like media, and status quo political leadership, with no end in sight. Thanks to Bernie, we will find most of those topics in the news today.

B.B. (Before Bernie), banks too big to fail were ignored no matter how much Elizabeth Warren railed at egregious Wall Street practices, which continue despite having been solidly condemned. The One Percent meme of #Occupy had all but died out until Bernie took it up, in parrot fashion, to link it to the greed and purchasing power of ‘the billionaire class.’ Suddenly it wasn’t just something we had to live with during the financial meltdown of the last decade; it’s something we’re living with now, and today everybody knows who the Koch Brothers are.

B.B., Social Security was touted as limping and broken — certainly not easily fixed by a moderate increase in the tax on earnings, and absolutely not solvent enough to consider a necessary increase in benefits. Suggesting that the rich should be responsible for their fair share is no longer anathema.

B.B., Big Pharma had to make and keep all those outrageous earnings in order to spend time on research and development — much of which is now understood to rearrange molecules in existing medications so new patents apply and guarantee outrageous profit, continued insurance scams, and victimization of patients who must scramble to survive the cost.

B.B., we knew media might not always tell the truth, but it was assumed most of the news would be reported. The Sanders campaign not only got left behind, it got completely ignored in favor of the ratings Trump enjoyed. Most of the electorate noticed that it wasn’t just FOX News that suffered from a deficit of ‘fair and balanced’ reporting. Media itself proved to be the (self-admitted) ‘ratings whore’ we always thought it was.

Perhaps most dramatically, B.B., Israel could do no wrong — a tiny and beloved outpost of democracy in a sea of hostile terrorists. Before Bernie, whose Jewish heritage makes him THE person to speak to the issue, the plight of Palestinians in the West Bank — sometimes likened to slow genocide — would still be under media black-out and NOT open for discussion.

The Republicans will have no truck with these issues, of course; they’re all part of the progressive agenda and therefore easily ignored. But Bernie has pushed them out into the mainstream, just as he’s pushed the frontrunner into taking positions well to the left of those she would have preferred.

Ultimately, though, with Hillary and Cruz the likely candidates, the question isn’t which party captures the flag. The question is, will we let corporatocracy and oligarchy have its way with us for yet another presidential administration, or will we finally begin to question the neo-liberal policies that have brought us to a standstill.

The outliers, despite their warts or virtues, have brought the heart of our chaotic national agenda into focus: ethical, balanced economic policy that stabilizes a floundering nation. They alone have the spunk and courage to properly address what those politicos in the middle don’t dare mention, so let’s not miss the remarkable advantage they provide to wake up a cowed society.

Opportunity to change course and shake off the programming of a by-gone era doesn’t come every day, and it’s a challenge to catch the attention of an overwhelmed public. Only when the citizenry is adequately clothed, housed, fed can it attend to matters of ethical importance. Only when it’s given enough accurate information and education to consider its situation can it attend to the duties of citizenship. Only when the working class is let off the hamster wheel long enough to regain equilibrium can it make a choice for political will. For all those reasons, the economy lies at the center of our concerns.

Regardless of the belligerent rhetoric, racism, and xenophobia displayed in the Donald’s campaign, it’s his anti-establishment economic populism that has captured the imagination on the right. While the America they want to make great again is no doubt very white, it’s also prosperous. The younger folk who support Bernie are focused on correcting the financial inequality they see as the impediment to a decent future, while the older folk are invested in a return to the sociopolitical support and economic opportunity they knew in the past.

More of us have begun to agree that fuzzy-headed acquiescence to the economic status quo as only needing a tune-up here and there is the ‘happy place’ of the well-off, if not the hubristic wet dream of the elite. That leaves the rest of us out in the cold in what  Elizabeth Warren has correctly labeled a rigged system, and few of us — right or left — argue the point. You can see where the various candidates fall in that spectrum on this revealing scale.

You might think, reading this, that I’m giving up on Bernie. I’m not, nor has he given up the fight. If anything has been proven during this campaign season, it is that nothing is as it appears and anything can happen, but we must agree that the wealthy will do whatever they can to stop Trump on the right and Sanders on the left. Neither of them play by establishment rules, and it’s taken the plutocracy close to forty years to get it just the way they want it.

Even then, it remains to be seen how the conventions play out, and certainly the electoral system is as faulty as the economic. If Trump or Sanders, either one, had gone into this race as Independents, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. Neither would have gotten time at the podium or attention in the press, no matter how outrageous, or spectacular, their ideas. But our two-party system — the same one that founders Washington and Adams warned against as dangerous to liberty — is a lock.

Third parties have never been successful in the United States, but that doesn’t mean they can’t be. The Greens, the Working Family party, the Independents, even Libertarians in some camps, have separated themselves into schisms that might make a big noise once united, but alone have as much chance of surviving a campaign as a guppy in a shark tank.

With a Gallup poll indicating that 60 percent of the population would prefer a Third Party candidate to either Pubs or Dems, it might be time for such a national experiment. The populist movement sweeping the nation, no matter who wins the election, is like a flood which must flow somewhere, a force of nature — or perhaps better said, of the human heart. It’s best that somewhere be productive. Surely our new era is asking for a people-centered template on which to build a better way.

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Heavy rains don’t last forever. Neither do high winds, nor seasons. That’s the way of life on Earth. There is ebb and flow. There are cycles. Furthermore, it is not unusual for your experience of cyclical phenomena to differ from that of others at least as often as you find yourself sharing the same experience with others.

It doesn’t really matter whether your experience of life’s ebbs and flows converge with or diverge from that of others at any given time. Over time, the breaks tend to even out. What does matter is whether or not you choose to have any experience in its fullness from beginning to end.

It is thus important to remember that the current lunar cycle is only halfway towards completion now that the Scorpio Full Moon of 2016 is just a few hours behind us. Even though a lot has transpired since the Aries New Moon of April 7, it would almost certainly be a good idea to stay tuned as the Moon wanes towards newness again.

Probably the best way to stay tuned in to the monthly cycle (often called a “lunation”) that proceeds from one New Moon to the next is by watching it. Astrology correlates the Moon with the many things that you privately experience ‘in person’. That’s the reason it’s so important to look up and see the Moon with your own eyes as often as you can. Actually seeing the Moon (and consciously noting your feelings while doing so) is the most straightforward way to understand how its motions and phases correspond to your own.

In the first two weeks of a lunation (as the Moon waxes towards fullness) it’s pretty easy to see the Moon because it is already up in the sky by nightfall. Full Moons are also fairly available because they rise in the East as the Sun is going down and remain in the sky all night, only setting in the West at dawn. Because the Moon continues to rise a bit later every night, however, viewing the Moon during the second half of its cycle (as it wanes towards newness again) is problematic because it means you you must stay up later and later to catch your glimpse.

It’s easy to lose visual contact with the Moon in the second two weeks of a lunation. Fortunately, you still have contact with your own body. While the experience is often subjective and not easily amenable to empirical proof, it’s reasonable to hypothesize that your body is at least synchronized with lunar cycles. After all, the actual stuff you are made of has been recycled through many bodies before yours. Additionally, among all the experiences of previous lives coded into your DNA, there is almost certainly included some extensive familiarity with the Moon.

Therefore, especially if you have to observe a regular bedtime, pay attention to your body over the next two weeks. Feel consciously. Be particularly attentive to any physical developments or visceral sensations that seem to represent a complementary ‘other’ side to how you have experienced the two weeks just past.

As an example, if you were somehow ill between April 7 and today and are starting to feel better, pay attention to all the experiences that correlate with recovery. See if any parallels come up for you. Don’t think too much about it. Just be present to your feelings and let correspondences come as they may. Then as the next New Moon on May 6 approaches, start looking for correlations with other people and over longer periods.

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One way of filling out your personal experiences with this current lunar cycle is to get some useful information from an experienced astrologer. Fortunately, Planet Waves has some resources for you.

As we approach a New Moon that will also represent the middle of our current season, you can build on your work of integrating the current lunar cycle through your body by consulting Eric’s 2016 Spring Reading. Think of it as the extra mile you would not be able to run without a little guidance.

Then, as you get the hang of working with future lunations so as to give yourself the full experience, give some serious thought to how you might use your work as a springboard to a wider understanding of the world as a whole, as well as broader service to it. Should you aspire to such service, a membership in the Planet Waves Core Community will go a long way towards helping you reach your aspirations, by giving you a way to connect with others whose work parallels your own.

No matter how personal the experience of living in a physical body may be, none of us are in this earthly boat alone. No matter where you are in your own process, and no matter who you are in relation to others, life and its cycles are constantly turning towards making us one. Your part in making that happen is to see each and all of your own experiences through to fullness and completion as best you can.

Offered In Service      

By Amanda Painter

Sometimes the news just hands you an illustration of the astrology on a silver platter — which is what just happened to me yesterday. We’re coming up on the Scorpio Full Moon early Friday, which I’ll describe in a moment. But there’s another aspect happening at roughly the same time, and that’s the one that grabbed my attention via the news.

Section of chart for the Scorpio Full Moon. Shown, L-R: Nessus, Neptune, lunar South Node and Chiron in Pisces; Ceres, Venus, Uranus and Eris in Aries; Sun, Vesta and Mercury in Taurus. The Moon, not shown, is in Scorpio exactly opposite the Sun.

I’ll start with that story: Yesterday the U.S. Treasury announced that Harriet Tubman, African-American heroine of the Underground Railroad, would be replacing former president (and slave owner) Andrew Jackson on the $20 bill.

Additionally, five women will grace the back of the $10 bill. (Treasury secretary Jacob Lew had promised to put a woman on the face of the $10 bill also, but walked that commitment back, apparently due to the popularity of the Broadway musical Hamilton.)

The only other U.S. currency to feature women in the last 100 years have been the Susan B. Anthony dollar coin, and the Sacagawea dollar coin — neither of which have been popular in everyday use. The only woman on a piece of paper currency was Martha Washington on $1 silver certificates for three separate years in the late 1800s.

I wrote more about the context of this decision yesterday on Planet Waves, but the point I want to make here is that this is a historic change to what is essentially a symbol of national identity: our currency. Granted, changes to currency are made often, and many men have been featured on U.S. bills — but you can count the women honored that way so far on one hand.

So what’s the astrology involved? For starters, The Sun entered Taurus, sign of material wealth and resources from the earth, on Tuesday (the day before the Treasury’s announcement). Taurus is ruled by Venus, who not only stands for the feminine principle, love and receptivity in astrology, but also MONEY.

Now, here’s where things get really fun: Venus is within tickling distance of conjunctions to Uranus (exact Friday at 5:00 pm EDT / 21:00 UTC) and Eris (exact Sunday at 5:55 am EDT / 9:55 UTC) in Aries. Eric Francis has been describing the Uranus-Eris conjunction in Aries as a cultural and personal spark to the process of identity unification and individuation, in the midst of modern identity chaos (which is being exacerbated to new levels by the Internet).

Uranus is inventive, revolutionary and often surprising. Eris can act as a subversive or chaotic agent; yet it can also indicate in a person’s chart an unusual level of cohesion in their sense of self, when working positively. So this announcement from the U.S. Treasury makes for a perfect illustration of some cultural identity integration, moved forward by a positive expression of feminism (an online campaign spearheaded by two women) and enacted through a surprising re-imagination of our money.

Granted, it’s only the beginning of a process that still has far to go, in terms of valuing and giving voice to women and minorities — both historically speaking and in current day-to-day life. But in a culture as obsessed with material gain, status symbols and cash as the U.S. is, having women on our paper currency is a level of visibility and indication of worth that has significance.

Now, as mentioned, Venus is cruising through the Uranus-Eris conjunction in Aries nearly in tandem with the Scorpio Full Moon. That is the Sun in early Taurus opposed by the Moon in early Scorpio.

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Scorpio Full Moons are known to evoke passion — especially of the sexual and emotionally compelling kind. Yet Taurus and Scorpio are both ‘fixed’ signs, indicating the potential for a situation or relationship in your life (represented by the Sun and Moon) to feel a little ‘stuck’ or polarized. At least temporarily, until after the Full Moon peaks, which is just before 1:24 am EDT Friday morning (5:24 UTC).

Yet despite the reputations of Scorpio and Taurus to get entrenched at times, these are also two signs that are highly tuned in to the nexus where emotions and physical senses meet. Translation: passion is paramount during a Scorpio Full Moon.

So if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em in bed; or in a fragrant flower garden; or in eating a great meal; or in listening to emotional, texturally rich music; or in walking barefoot in the grass; or in touching silky, velvety fabrics; or in watching the stars under cover of darkness. Let your passion guide you around perceived blocks when possible, rather than inflaming conflict, if possible.

Sometimes waiting out a confrontation creatively is wiser than engaging in a full-frontal assault or defensiveness. And sometimes engaging your passion can lead to things like getting women on U.S. currency — or feeling more whole.

By Amanda Moreno

I often run across people — friends, acquaintances and others — who have a policy of complete intolerance when it comes to anything Christian. I find this to be somewhat frustrating, although I can also understand it. Christianity has been at the helm of tremendous amounts of pain and suffering. At the same time, Jesus seems cool, be he real or mythological.

Photo by graywacke/A Landing a Day

Also, I love working with Mary. And when I tap into what I see as the heart of the religion, it is just that — a lot of heart. Love. Compassion. Forgiveness. That the shadows of those concepts seem to have taken hold is an unfortunate byproduct.

My earliest exposure to religion was through my father’s Catholicism. I was quite the devout, bible-school lovin’, Catholic Kindergarten attending little Catholic girl until my dad died when I was six. This left my religious education to my mom, who was your typical run-of-the-mill non-practicing Methodist. Although, to give credit where credit is due, she was in fact the one who oversaw my baptism in a friend’s kitchen sink. Practical and effective.

My mom never really had much of an interest in going to church, save for a few times she took my brother and me to one. My mom is actually the source of one of the most influential nuggets of advice anyone ever gave me in regards to religion when I was young. I was hiking with her and my brother, and she told me to be good to people and to myself; to act with kindness; and to learn as much as I could about all kinds of different religions, and then figure out what made sense to me based on my experience.

My best friend from fourth to seventh grades, however, was Vineyard Christian, a fundamentalist branch of the church that I absolutely adored. I realize in retrospect that what I really loved about going to church could be whittled down to two things: love of community and love of singing. Those Vineyard Christians incorporated song into everything — and not the stoic, formal hymns of the Catholic Church. Rather it was folky and reminded me of rock music and took place with the full congregation — including the kids. Which I thought was awesome.

So here I am, a late-thirties lady with fairly eclectic spiritual beliefs. I went through my days of absolute hate and disregard for the Christian church. I can still dredge quite a bit of that up when discussing the Catholic Church in particular, as I have very little tolerance for institutionalized child rape. But every once in a while it all comes back to those early days, and I’m able to recognize the early seeding of my current path as someone who anchors love here.

While riding the train yesterday I was compelled to do something that made me vaguely uncomfortable. But the more the thought stuck around, the more I realized I needed to just give into the compulsion. So I did it: I purchased and downloaded Amy Grant’s The Collection — a 1986 compilation of some of her ‘greatest hits’ along with a few new tracks that marked her exit from strict Christian music and into the pop world. Love songs that seemed fairly typical for the time, but yet could be said to be love songs to god. A really hip, 80s pop culture god.

To be clear, this album is Christian pop music. Amy Grant is apparently known as the “Queen of Christian Pop.” At least, she was prior to her crossover to regular pop music — and prior to allegations of an affair and a divorce that caused some Christian stations to stop playing her music. She also garnered criticism from the Christian community that she was too worldly and sexy. Reading that just now on her Wiki page made me like her even more.

So I found myself walking around Seattle’s hippest, most eclectic, alternative-culture wonderland neighborhood, listening to Amy sing her praises to the lord and smiling involuntarily and brightly because of it. It was cracking me up, and it was also filling me with all kinds of nostalgic joy.

Several things clicked into place as the music filled me up with a sense of totally unexpected euphoric happiness. Part of that was remembering how much I loved singing at church as a child, a habit that evolved into years spent in all kinds of choirs and performing in musicals. I also realized as I listened that my sister bought this particular Amy Grant album (or maybe I should call it what it really was: a cassette tape) for me shortly before my dad died.

And there it was — the thirtieth anniversary of my dad’s death is in a few weeks, and we are therefore in the Saturn return of the event. As I realized this, tears came to my eyes as I recognized what a healing salve this music must be for my inner six-year-old who was such a little love bug, who was devout and full of faith, and who was plunged smack-dab into the middle of the totally shocking and unexpected loss of her favorite person in the world.
My emotions — the good and the bad — shut down that day thirty years ago as I went into a state of complete overwhelm, as I sponged the emotions of my mom and brother and probably a bunch of other people too.

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That emotional side didn’t dare to resurface until I was 16, when something triggered the realization that I had never really cried over my dad’s death. Up until that point, what moved the emotions within me was cheesy pop music, and then as puberty set in, the more angsty music of Tori Amos and Nirvana as well as musicals like Les Miserables and Phantom of the Opera.

Christian rock, at least what I was exposed to three decades ago, is pretty straightforward. The lyrics claim that “love will find a way,” and talk about guardian angels and hope and joy. Really, they are themes that are still pretty relevant to my way of seeing and being in the world.

In my most centered state I tend to want to just pour heaping doses of love into the planet. It reminds me of a recent experience I had doing one of my favorite things — getting to know a new lover’s body through massage — and the feeling of just wanting to let the love flow through to my hands and into the other person’s body. I consider that feeling of euphoric love to be one of the best forms of erotic energy.

Perhaps that erotic energy is a bit far removed from the six-year-old part of me. But considering the upcoming anniversary, I thought the urge to listen to music I’ve rarely heard in thirty years seemed a fascinating synchronicity. And as I ponder themes of truth and judgment as they’re related to Saturn in Sagittarius, as well as revisit and rethink my desires and their motives as Mars starts its retrograde, I think I’ll pay some attention to what was forming for me thirty years ago.