That Was Then — Aries Full Moon and Lunar Eclipse

Tomorrow, the luminaries (Sun and Moon) return to precisely the same relationship they had on Oct. 8, 1995. For the rest of the solar system and you, however, that was then, and this is now. Remember that, and you will have a leg up on the rest of this month and maybe longer.

Yes, 19 years ago tomorrow the Libra Sun and Aries Moon opposed each other from the middle of their respective signs for a Full Moon. Each luminary was in turn sufficiently proximate to one of the perpetually opposing lunar nodes to precipitate a lunar eclipse.

Now, it’s happening again. Precise to the day, and (for the Sun and Moon only) precise to the degree. Yet, October of 1995 could not possibly be duplicated now. Too much proverbial water has passed under a metaphorical bridge.

Nonetheless, you can make both a realistic assumption and practical presumption about the Aries Full Moon and lunar eclipse tomorrow. You can assume how something that started for you 19 years ago is somehow coming full circle now.

Furthermore, you can also safely presume that a new cycle of your life is in some way opening, giving you a chance to make the most of differences between then and now.

To get a handle on how the situation works for you (without having to remember 1995 precisely), consider the basic elements of tomorrow’s lunar eclipse separately, and put them back together again.

Full Moons take place once every month or so, because it takes the Moon about that long to make a complete circuit of the zodiac. A Full Moon in any given sign will usually take place once a year because it takes the Sun that long to cycle through all the signs, (opposing the Moon once a month in the process) before starting over again. By convention, the zodiac starts over again with Aries.

Fiery cardinal Aries, ruled by Mars, says ‘I am’, which is where a lot of things start. Airy cardinal Libra, ruled by Venus, says ‘We are’, which is where a lot of things meet.

In their opposition on the zodiac, the combination of Aries and Libra speaks to how it’s impossible to live without relationships, while also addressing unavoidable challenges every being encounters living within relationship.

The Sun, for its part, correlates with how consciousness, as it is normally understood (being awake and interactive, with your personality shining out for others to know you by), is a necessary component of relationships with others.

The Moon, on the other hand, corresponds with a myriad of very private, and sometimes (but not always) unconscious components of relationship with self.

That’s how any phase of the Moon in Aries is always so powerful, and potentially so problematic. An Aries Moon combines assertion of self with a level of self awareness that (if unbalanced) can go over the line into the sort of self-involvement that undermines the reciprocation necessary to sustain relationship.

Likewise, the Sun in Libra often triggers a profound consciousness of interconnectedness that (without balance), can go over the line to undermine the sort of individualized motivation required to conduct a functional relationship from a solid foundational sense of self.

At best then, an Aries Full Moon represents attainment of the balance the opposing luminaries symbolically seek through each other. At worst, the dilemmas inherent in the necessity of relating will prevail to unbalance matters. At the scale you’re about to encounter, enter eclipses.

Eclipses take place whenever the Sun is in the vicinity of one of the perpetually opposing (and relatively slow moving) lunar nodes, which is to say every six months or so. Lunar eclipses happen when the Sun, so conjoined with one of the lunar nodes, is opposed by a Full Moon, which by definition must then be in the vicinity of conjoining the other node, which the Sun is more-or-less simultaneously opposed to.

Solar eclipses happen either two weeks before or two weeks after a lunar eclipse when the Sun and Moon conjoin for a New Moon while the Sun is still “close enough for government work” to one of the lunar nodes.

The lunar nodes themselves are simply points where the paths of the Sun and Moon intersect. Not so simply, those points of intersection move themselves.

With a net retrograde motion, the nodes return to approximately the same place on the zodiac every 19 years or so, but (and this is a big “but”) the Sun is not always in the neighborhood to meet up with one of the nodes upon return, especially with the relative precision that will be evinced tomorrow.

Hence, discarding all the irrational stuff, what eclipses really do is take the personally accessible time scales of luminary alignments and extend those cycles more or less exponentially through the auspices of the lunar nodes. That’s how the nodes got associated with long-term concepts of cycle like karma and dharma.

That’s how you should not be afraid of or intimidated by either tomorrow’s lunar eclipse, or the subsequent Scorpio New Moon and solar eclipse on Oct. 23 (which will also closely replicate the sign, degree and timing of a similar luminary conjunction in 1995).

Instead you should be excited. You should be excited because you are part of the same solar system as the luminaries, but on your own schedule. Just like the planets, you will be in a different place, doing different things compared to 19 years ago when the Sun and Moon come back to the same place to do the same thing.

Nevertheless, the motions of the Sun and Moon can’t help but find some correlation with all of us, often all of us at once. Witness the seasons, or the calendar you use to schedule and organize your life — all based closely enough on the periodicity of luminary cycles to work with.

So it is that 19 years ago or so, you probably confronted a situation having to do with both your consciousness and relationship. It’s likely you made some choices (possibly in an attempt to achieve balance in your life) that set some long cycles in motion.

It’s also distinctly possible that some of those cycles are now coming to a close, giving you a rematch of sorts, but not a predestined outcome.

Because astrology is not destiny. Because astrology does not simply happen to you. Because that was then, and this is now.

Offered In Service

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