Now the Cosmic story wants us to re-align ourselves to a different vibratory pattern, one that opens us to greater consciousness and understanding. Are you seeing how your beliefs and thoughts are creating your reality? If things aren't working out the way you want them to, perhaps it's time to let go of old expectations. Are you running into obstacles? Perhaps you need to reconsider what you think you desire.

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Sagittarius Full Moon Lunar Eclipse, June 15, 2011

"No man is brave that has never walked a hundred miles.   If you want to know the truth of who you are, walk until not a person knows your name.   Travel is the great leveler, the great teacher, bitter as medicine, crueler than mirror-glass.   A long stretch of road will teach you more about yourself than a hundred years of quiet introspection."                  Patrick Rothfuss, The Wise Man's Fear

While we no longer have to walk to go that hundred miles, it is still true that we really learn about ourselves when we face what is foreign to us.   This full Moon eclipse in the sign of Sagittarius asks us to face the unknown, the foreign, the Other, and see what emotions come up.   And then we have to release those old emotions, clean out old misguided beliefs, and let ourselves see with new eyes.

First, though, have you freed your Mind yet?   The June 1st Gemini Solar Eclipse offered us the opportunity to release old mental programs, enabling us to open our minds to new categories, new information, and a new orientation.   We all have our routines, our schedules and our beliefs about life and our perceptions about what is real.   These mental structures have brought us this far.  

Now the Cosmic story wants us to re-align ourselves to a different vibratory pattern, one that opens us to greater consciousness and understanding.   Are you seeing how your beliefs and thoughts are creating your reality?   If things aren't working out the way you want them to, perhaps it's time to let go of old expectations.   Are you running into obstacles?   Perhaps you need to reconsider what you think you desire.   This full Moon lunar eclipse can help you do it.

It's time to use more of our brainpower.   It's time to use both right and left sides of the brain equally.   Equal doesn't mean the same though, it means equal but different.   Complementary.   Both brains offer us necessary ways of seeing and experiencing the world.   The left brain operates through rational thought and factual sensory input; the right brain through holistic imaging and emotional intelligence.   The union of opposites of an awakened Mind is the goal of Gemini's lessons about information, categories of experience, teaching, communication, the Mind.   How we use our Mind, how we communicate our Mind, how we understand the world through the categories we project from the Mind.   How we use the information that is flooding our minds via modern technology.    When you own your own Mind, you have choices.

So, have you freed your Mind from the old patterns that shaped you and helped you understand the world?   We now have to develop Beginner's Mind, the childlike ability to see ourselves, each other and the world without old psychological and moral overlays.   We have to learn to let Life surprise us again, as it did when we were children and not totally acclimated to our society.     The June 1st solar eclipse fertilized our souls with new information about how the brain naturally wants to operate holistically.

Mercury, the ruler of Gemini, is the Messenger God, the archetypal Mind which can travel through the three realms: the Unconscious, our ego consciousness and the Super-conscious realm of Spirit.   It is the Mind as our operating system, allowing us to see and understand whatever it's been programed with.   Mercury is a trickster god like Coyote, and can trick you into foolishness just as easily as he can show you the way through a problem.   It all depends: is your Mind using you or are you using your Mind? Is your Mind a Mac (right-brained) or a PC (left-brained)?   Or is it something so beyond them that you are creating a new Mind?   That's our job right now.   We have to create a new Mind that is capable of using all its rational and intuitive abilities working in harmony.   A Mind capable of using the Creative Imagination with integrity and wisdom.

So I ask you a third time: Have you freed your Mind?   If so, then this Sagittarian lunar eclipse can offer your new Mind the wisdom of the Cosmic Laws that underlie not only how the Mind works, but how Life works.   In ancient Egypt these Cosmic Laws were called the Neters, imaged as gods and goddesses incarnating "the divine impulses that reveal themselves in the natural world and in the body. . . .These neters revealed their divinity through nature, and divine nature was present in all things, animals, plants, moving water, the heavens, the earth.' (Jean Houston: The Passion of Isis and Osiris)  

If we are going to create a new vision of the future we better base that vision on the cosmic archetypal principles of Life.   Otherwise, we'll just be re-creating the world as it is now -- left-brain, materialistic, finite and out of balance.   With Jupiter in the sign of Taurus for the next year, the ruler of this eclipse anchors us firmly in the realm of the Earth.   That's where our information will come from.   If your personal story needs transformation, you will need to align yourself with an archetypal principle which is a source of infinite power, a bigger story than the one you're living in now, which only has finite energy   and which is collapsing along with our capitalist culture.   You can't change your life if you don't change the story.   "All the truth of the world is held in stories, you know." (P. Rothfuss)    

So, first find your true, archetypal identity -- that's the job of Uranus in Aries.    Are you a healer, a painter, a priestess or a mom?   Is your gift one of fathering, of leadership, of service?   These big archetypal categories and their stories can lead us to greater self-knowledge, self-worth and understanding.      C. G. Jung proposed that the archetype had a dual nature: it exists both in the psyche and in the world at large. He called this non-psychic aspect of the archetype the "psychoid" archetype.   He believed we live in the psychoid energy field of the archetypes.   Another way to say that is that the archetypes have their own reality, and we exist in them. We live in the matrix of natural law.   So if we clean our small minds of the unbalanced training of the patriarchy and learn to honor the dual aspects of the feminine and masculine energies of life, giving them their proper due, we can achieve the greater Mind that is our heritage.  

What do you make of the fact that we don't use most of our brainpower?   Why would we consciously cripple ourselves when we can work to open up the parts of ourselves that are shut down?   This series of eclipses in Sagittarius/Gemini are re-aligning our collective Mind with the cosmic principles of Life.   We need an opened Mind to incarnate them.  

Sagittarius is ruled by Jupiter, the archetypal energy of curiosity, of expansion, of storytelling and of luck and abundance.   Jupiter pushes us to go beyond what we know. With this full Moon eclipse, we might look to a story that stars both Jupiter and Mercury.   There is a Greek myth, starring Zeus (the Greek Jupiter) and Hermes (the Greek Mercury), which describes what they find when they walk that hundred miles from home.   Even gods can discover new things about themselves.   This is the story of Baucis and Philemon.  

Sometimes Zeus, the King of the Olympian gods, would leave his splendid palace to journey down to earth. Disguising himself as a mortal Zeus would go off seeking adventure. Often on these trips he would be accompanied by Hermes, the clever and entertaining Messenger god.

Zeus wanted to see how hospitable the people of Phrygia were, so he and Hermes disguised themselves as poor travelers and flew to earth, knocking on the door of any dwelling they encountered, be it rich or poor, large or small .   And at all the doors, they were turned away, without so much as a drink of water or a piece of bread.   All doors, that is, except one, which was the poorest and smallest one they had yet encountered.   And yet, as soon as they knocked, they were greeted with courtesy and brought inside with all the respect and hospitality that generous hearts can offer.   The old, loving couple, Baucis and Philemon, gave their guests the last of their food and treated them as if they were gods.   And because these mysterious travelers were gods, the old couple was rewarded with a new life and a new purpose.  

The people who had rejected the disguised gods were punished for their greed, their arrogance, their ignorance and their inhospitality.   They didn't recognize the opportunity that knocked at their doors, because it came in a shape they didn't expect, and so they rejected a great gift that would have brought change to their lives.   But what did the gods learn about themselves?   Perhaps that they had kept too much to themselves in far-off Olympus, enjoying their power and play without regard to what was happening on earth.   Perhaps they discovered that unless Heaven's laws are written in the hearts of mortals, there can be no justice, truth and compassion in the world.   Perhaps they learned that Heaven and Earth need to come close -- just as Love had brought the old couple close -- so mortals could re-create heaven on earth.  

This lunar eclipse in Sagittarius can offer us an opportunity to discover who we are through what we believe.   Is it time to walk that 100 miles so you can discover something new about yourself? Or if you stay home, do you know how you would greet these two gods if they showed up at your door?  

The Sagittarius Full Moon Lunar Eclipse

The Sagittarius full Moon lunar eclipse occurs on June 15, 2011 at 1:14pm PDT/ 4:14pm EDT/ 8:14pm GMT.   It will be the longest and darkest lunar eclipse since the July 2000 eclipse, lasting 100 minutes.   During the totality of the eclipse, the moon will pass in front of the center of the earth's shadow. The best location to view the eclipse will be in the northernmost region of central Asia, as well as Eastern Europe and northeastern Africa.   Many people in South America, Western Africa and Europe will view the eclipse at moonrise, while Eastern Asia and Australia will view the eclipse at moonset.

The Saros series of this eclipse is 130, and it started back in June 1416 and will continue until August 2696, occurring every 18 years and 11 days.   Yes, eclipses come in series but each is different.   The first eclipse in this series had Pluto conjunct the Sun in Gemini trine Uranus and Jupiter in Aquarius, with the Sagittarius full Moon sextiling the Aquarian planets.   Its message seems to be that the information we gather (Gemini Sun) must be transformative (Pluto) if we want to have a liberating collective mindset (Uranus/Jupiter in Aquarius) and a strong belief system (Sagittarius Moon).   The last lunar eclipse in this series was in June, 1992.   What changes were you going through back then?   Have you accomplished what you set out to do?   If not, now's the time to do it.

So how are you using the information that comes your way?   Is it transformative or just an overwhelm?   Maybe it's time to filter the information and start to actually think about what is important to know.

This full Moon eclipse occurs near the Galactic Center, which transmits strong electromagnetic waves, so be prepared to open yourself to Cosmic consciousness.   During a lunar eclipse, the Earth moves between the Sun and Moon, bringing up old emotional patterns that need to be released.   With the eclipse in Sagittarius, this is a great lunar eclipse to dump old religious beliefs that keep us from joy, from fulfillment, and from blessings.   It's time to let go of the guilt, pain and insecurities that our religions have fostered on us for millennia.   If you succeeded in opening to a new Mind, then this eclipse intensifies the need to let go of old, limiting beliefs about ourselves and the world and instead, fill our minds, hearts and souls with the cosmic laws that our western culture has tried to make us forget.   We are part of the Earth's ecosystem, and it's time to remember our place in it.   Memory is such an important tool to develop not only for our minds, but for our hearts and spirit as well.       

It's time to make conscious choices about our future.   Without getting negative, we do have to realize that the environmental damage is overwhelming.   What are we going to do about it?   Sagittarius is concerned with seeking Truth and with expanding our mental, emotional, imaginal and spiritual horizons.   We are called to look at the lies that our governments, our corporations and our religions keep telling us and then go out and tell the truth.   We no longer have the luxury to stand back and let the "powers that be' continue to manipulate the cultural story.   We have to tell a new story that is the Truth.    

Sagittarius asks us to expand our philosophy of life to see the big picture.    Mercury is conjunct the Gemini Sun and so opposite the Moon and the North Node.   We have to find meaning in what we learn.   We have to dig deeper to find not only understanding, but if we're lucky, Wisdom.     Then we can confront the untruths of our world.

The lunar nodes determine where the eclipses occur.   With the north node in Sagittarius and the south node in Gemini, our collective destiny calls us to leave behind useless information and seek the deeper meaning and ramifications of what is going on.   The asteroid Ceres, the ancient grain goddess of the earth, is in Pisces, squaring the nodes from 27*Pisces: The harvest Moon illumines a clear autumnal sky.   This is a karmic degree of blessings on work well done.     It indicates the need to incorporate Feminine values into our vision -- the heart-centered, right-brain values of emotional intelligence, intuition and creative imagination, as well as compassion, inclusivity and patience.

The Sabian symbol for the Sun at 25*Gemini is: A gardener trimming large palm trees.   This symbolizes the need to prune back some of the old categories of perception and understanding that are dead or dying.   These old categories tried to contain the imagination, which needs room to grow.   So we have to get rid of the old to make way for the new.  

The Sabian symbol for the Moon at 25* Sagittarius is:   A chubby boy on a hobby-horse.   Here is a picture of the new -- a childlike imagination that uses play to bring about growth.   This symbol foreshadows the new abilities that are waiting for us once we clear our old Mind of its misconceptions about reality and open ourselves to the Truth of Cosmic Law.   The horse is an ancient symbol of power and movement.   The image is almost that of a shaman riding his "spirit' horse into other realms of consciousness and reality.   The symbol is a call for us to learn to fly!

Other Astrological Happenings:

June 12 -- Saturn turns direct at 11*Libra: A professor peering over his glasses at his students. We are more than the knowledge of our cultural heritage.   Knowledge without experience will not help us now.   Saturn went retrograde on January 25, the day of the Egyptian uprising in the beginning of the Arab spring. As it turns direct, we can begin to grow that revolution in all parts of the world, including America.   Saturn, old Father Time, will be moving forward again in Libra, demanding a real "fair and balanced' world.

June 12 -- Sun conjuncts Mercury at 22*Gemini: Dancing couples in a harvest festival.   The union of opposites, celebrating and dancing to the rhythms of life.

June 15 -- Sagittarius full Moon lunar eclipse.

June 16 - 17 -- Mercury goes into Cancer.   Mercury trine Neptune & sextile Jupiter.     It's time to explore the imagination and allow your empathy and inspiration to find practical outlets in your life.

June 17 -- Venus trine Saturn.   Venus is the first planet to connect to Saturn now that it's in direction motion, and we are asked to be responsible for what we love.

June 18-19:   Mercury in Cancer moves into a square with Uranus in Aries and Pluto in Capricorn, helping build that new Mind with originality and depth.

June 20 -- Mars goes into Gemini.   The Mind becomes more dynamic and flexible.   

June 21, 2011 -- Sun moves into Cancer -   Summer Solstice: With the Summer Solstice upon us, we want new stories and new leadership to take us into the future.   Summer Solstice is the union of Heaven and Earth, the warmth of summer bringing light and life to the land and the people.   The Cancer Sun at Summer Solstice grounds in the energies of the Cardinal grand cross: Uranus in Aries, Pluto in Capricorn and Saturn in Libra.   Its message: search for what nurtures you, for we need a new society; to create a new society, discover a new identity that is inclusive of others and their welfare.   So what nurtures you on a deep soul level will probably nurture everyone else.

As we head into summer, we need to tend our garden and help our projects grow.

Bright Blessings on all your endeavors!

Cathy

Authors Website: http://www.cathypagano.com

Authors Bio:

Cathy Pagano is a spiritual advisor and Jungian psychotherapist, storyteller, author and teacher.

She is the author of a book on the return of the Goddess, "Wisdom's Daughters: How Women Can Change the World".

Cathy trained at the C. G. Jung Institut-Zurich in dream interpretation, has an M.A. in Counseling Psychology in Feminine Spirituality, and is a certified Life Coach.

As an astrologer and storyteller, she weaves the Cosmic Stories written in the stars. From The Bard's Grove, she writes about emerging archetypal themes in movies and books.

Cathy works with the tools of the imagination - dreams, alchemy, myths, astrology, symbolic language, storytelling, ritual - to awaken the Soul's wisdom.



I believe that Americans are called to a higher consciousness at this point in our history. We are called on to live up to our ideals and create the country our forefathers imagined. Inner consciousness needs to be acted upon for social justice.



Cathy believes that our writers and artists must take up our responsibility to create art that inspires, teaches and heals our humanity.



Cathy writes about political, psychological/spiritual, and cultural issues.