Happy New Year!
Welcome to 2009, a 2-year that will see us cooperating more and looking to find partners to collaborate with and bring more love into our lives.
We also welcome in the first of 5 SuperMoons on January 10-11, with the Cancer Full Moon. SuperMoons occur when the Moon is closest to the Earth as well as when the Sun, Earth and Moon align. Look for intense gravitational forces that pull in stronger tides, wilder weather and deeper psychic intuitions.
Full moons occur when the Sun and Moon are in opposite signs and this month those signs are Capricorn and Cancer, the 'parental' signs of the zodiac. Cancer/the Moon represents the Mother while Capricorn/Saturn represents the Father. At this full Moon, the Moon sextiles Saturn, so these two ruling planets are working well together like loving parents, provoking new insights into what needs to grow and change, both in our lives and in our society. Growth needs Love. Change takes Will and Discipline.
Cancer is ruled by the Moon, and we can see the full power of the Moon's ebb and flow. The sign that rules the feminine luminary of our heavens speaks to us of constant change that comes through the need for nurturing and the need to release. It is the living power of the cycle of birth, growth, decay and death, followed by rebirth. The moon rules our emotional, intellectual and spiritual responses to the circumstances of our lives.
Depending on what sign your Moon is in, it represents the unique needs that ground you in the world and make you feel secure. Cancer moon is a cardinal water sign, and you'll find it urging you to relax and take a bath, or it will have you cooking soup for your depressed friend. Cancer actively supports creativity – yours, mine or ours. She's the best mom in the world! Which means she sets up rules so you grow right.
With Pluto's entrance into Capricorn, we can finally be certain that the old King ... the rule of the 'fathers' ... the old corporate structures ... the deadening social corruption ... is dying. Will this old king hang onto his privileges as our world turns into a wasteland, or will he sacrifice himself (as is his duty) on the Summer Tree for his people and the land? Or will others come along willing to offer themselves for the renewal of the land, and in doing so, become a channel for spiritual evolution? The next 16 years will show us how we intend to evolve our vision of society and our responsibility to it. Will we create a more peaceful, just and loving world or will we continue to create war and death for the benefit of the few? This is Capricorn's spiritual purpose. Pluto wants to renew it.
The deep power of the Cancer Moon is needed this full Moon. The Moon in Cancer reaches out to Capricorn as a loving mother and says, do not be afraid! Death is nothing to fear. True freedom comes with change. That's the way life here on Earth is meant to be lived. The Seasons mark the basic rhythms and patterns of life. The Star Patterns tell us about the spiritual vision we are here to manifest through those life patterns. The Sun gives us the will, courage and strength to manifest our spiritual destiny. And the Moon gives us the ability to reflect on our lives and make choices based on our instincts, our intuitions and our feelings.
The Moon's values are just as important to life as are the Sun's. Perhaps more important, since we've been living in a culture that elevates solar consciousness – intellect, reason, facts – above lunar consciousness – feelings, intuitions and instincts. We need to balance this masculine consciousness with feminine wisdom if we're to solve our collective problems. Devaluing the Moon's consciousness has led us to the dead-end belief that death is the end of everything. And we're making it happen before our eyes.
So this Full Moon in Cancer is the Mother Moon, and it wants to love and nurture and feed our Capricorn structures. But here's the catch. Only if those structures are viable and vibrant. Our Capricorn culture needs new life, and the Cancer Moon Mother knows which children/new possibilities/ new ideas to nurture and which to gather back into her womb to be reborn at another time in another way. Life is never wasted in Nature. Only humans have invented a way to end life's cycles. We fear death so much that we create it all around us – our governments continue to go to war, our corporations kill the earth to get to resources, and our business practices poison our food, our water and our air.
The Capricorn New Moon on December 27th was conjunct (joined with) Pluto and Mars, stating very clearly that death and rebirth is on the agenda for this new year. Death is the demon we have to face and transform. We have become so cut off from our instinctual nature that we think of death as a negative, as something to fear. And we've created whole industries to foster that fear as we get older. But Death itself is just a release, an instinctual need to let go of what is no longer viable. Once we let die what is already dead, we have room in us for new life. (Like cleaning out your closets of 20-year-old clothes that you really will never wear again.)
Transforming this old collective attitude about Death takes on a deeper dimension when we see it played out in our social structures, because it is our fear of Death that keeps our society from moving forward into a different vision of life. Our government and corporate structures operate on the premise that they are 'immortal' – they might have to make accommodations for changing times, but they have no intention of really changing their policies or giving up their power.
Only an educated and enlightened citizenry can force the change. Educate yourself about the Feminine spirit of life, which calls us to come back to a basic understanding of life before we succeed in killing ourselves off.
This Cancer Full Moon lights us up so we can give our attention, our love and our energy to the dharma we are here for. Each of us has something that we can do to contribute to our world. This full Moon is the time to really find out what it is. And start to nurture it.
There's an interesting configuration in the sky this full Moon called a mystic rectangle: there are two oppositions - the Sun and the Moon, and Saturn and Uranus - whose ends form sextiles and trines to each other. It forms a rectangle in the sky with the two oppositions potentially bringing us awareness and illumination so we can combine our intelligence and creativity to resolve the problems facing us. Dane Rudhyar calls it 'practical mysticism'.
Saturn, the Sun and the Moon work together to make you aware of what you really want and what you need to do to get it. This is a very good aspect for getting in shape – body, mind and spirit. Or for figuring out how to make your business grow in these confusing times.
