At 11:05 pm Sunday night on the Pacific Coast, we enter the watery realm of Pisces. This lunar cycle concludes another trip through the Zodiac, winding down one cycle and approaching the threshold of the next, a rebirth at the March Equinox.
The symbol for Pisces is two fish swimming in circles and representing the dual nature of manifested life and the human experience. We get a clue to the meaning of this sign through its rulers: Jupiter and Neptune, gods of sky and water which speak to us of Spirit. Manifested life precipitates out of the Void through the Quantum Field and dissolves back into this field at the end of its cycle. Dissolving is the essence of Pisces.
Pisces words include letting go, intuition, psychic sensitivity, suffering, empathy, unconditional love, compassion, spirituality and Oneness. It is in the healing waters of Pisces that separation begins to mend and we are united once again with Source. Pisces activates our spiritual longing for connectedness but it also asks us to let go of our need to control our lives, and surrender to the evolutionary flow which is the action of Spirit.
Pisces stimulates our faith, our dreams and our imagination, but we can go astray. Letting go and surrender bring up images of loss, being out of control, becoming a victim, lacking autonomy. When fear takes over, we become distrustful, resistant, paranoid, confused, sometimes delusional. When our dreams clash with our reality, we can seek escape through addictions. We can cling to illusions which always let us down in the end, leaving us disillusioned or depressed.
We are only two weeks away from two activating events that will trigger our natal USA Chart. On March 6th transiting Mars will make its return to our natal Mars in Gemini. The Full Moon is the very next day when Saturn moves into Pisces. Seeds we plant now in our consciousness will come into bloom at this time. I suspect that one of the benefits of Saturn’s passage through Pisces will be a renewed commitment to truth and facing facts. We have no power to create change when we are lost in illusion. So let’s look at the wisdom of the New Moon chart and see how best to navigate this cycle.
New Moon in Pisces
To set the stage for this New Moon it is important to know that America is literally at a crossroads. The transiting Nodes at 6 Taurus and Scorpio are exactly square our natal nodes at 6 Leo and Aquarius forming a perfect Fixed Square. Our current path of destiny comes into alignment with our original intent. It is no coincidence that this happens at the conjunction of Sun and Moon in Pisces, symbol of our commitment to form a more perfect union. As a nation we stepped onto the Path of the Courageous Heart – North Node in Leo in the 8th House of mysticism. Our South Node is in Aquarius, in the 2nd House of values, conjunct Pholus, which brings in ancestral karma. Our experiment in democracy was the cutting edge of social evolution at the time. Now we are facing the next evolutionary step. We need to get clear about our values, which is what the past few years have been all about since Saturn caught up to Pluto in January of 2020. What has happened to our values? They have been kidnapped by capitalism, justified by religion and concretized by outworn science with its warped paradigm of competition, scarcity and survival of the strongest.
Think of the big dreams of our founders. They never imagined our current reality. At the same time they were oblivious to the karma they were creating through genocide and slavery. They certainly couldn’t imagine a world of poisoned air, water and soil accompanied by the rise of totalitarian factions seeking to undo our democratic way of life. Healing is possible and now is the time to commit to it. How can we expand the original intention and shift our timeline from self-destruction to resurrection?
In the New Moon chart there are two Grand Trines, harmonious flows of energy between heavenly bodies. One is in Air involving Mars in Gemini, Mercury in Aquarius and Saturn in Libra. The other is in Water comprised of the Sun and Moon in Pisces, trine Haumea in Scorpio and our natal Venus in Cancer. These trines perfectly express the masculine and feminine qualities of life. We need both, but at the moment they are dangerously out of balance.
Mars in Gemini and Grand Air Trine
Mars is returning to its natal position on March 6th. We’re going to have a Mars return. Mars takes about two years to complete its revolution around the Sun. Looking back, the past two years have been plagued by an insurrection, countless mass shootings, an aggressive war instigated by Putin’s madness, disasters that have displaced millions, domestic conflict and political cold war in a climate of growing fear, distrust and disrespect.
We can make a difference here. The collective Mars is made up of around 340 million parts. We can take responsibility for our one part, correcting the imbalance in our own lives. Mars has been in Gemini for 7 months – unheard of. And right now it’s Out of Bounds, meaning that it has moved beyond 23 degrees away from the ecliptic. It has escaped our human realm and is consulting in the ethers. It is speaking with Mercury in Aquarius, discussing how we’re going to get people to wake up and realize that we are all one, that the harm we do to others, we do to ourselves. This squabbling and blaming and violence constitute self-abuse. We’re so obsessed with our own beliefs, so dead sure we know what’s right and wrong, that we have solidified a mindset and brought our egos to guard the boundaries. No new information allowed in here. No books with new ideas. No gender confusion. Just bury our heads in the sand, outlaw deviation and don’t say “Gay.” Problems solved!
And that brings us to the third component in the Grand Trine – Saturn. We know how Saturn loves his boundaries. In our current paradigm Saturn represents control, institutions, discipline and hardship. But Saturn is so much more. Saturn brings us the manifestations of our own consciousness in the form of challenges to our growth. He is a great teacher providing just the lesson we need to learn next. Our experience is immediate bio-feedback. If life is a struggle, we need to shift something within our own psyche to bring more ease. Maybe it’s a belief or an attitude. Maybe it’s old conditioning. Maybe it’s a delusion we hold about ourselves or others. When we are out of touch with reality, Saturn throws up a brick wall, blocking our path and demanding attention.
Mars has been activating our curiosity, Mercury is responding with gigabytes of information. Our job is to sift through it all, with an open mind. The challenge, of course, is opening the mind. Pisces should help dissolve some of our resistance to anything that contradicts our opinions. Mars is asking us to think, to look beyond our mental constructs, to perceive the consequences of a paradigm based on male dominance and entitlement.
Venus and the Grand Water Trine
While 7th House Mars has been activating our minds and asking us to think hard about ourselves and our relationships, Venus, the relationship expert, is completing her tour of Pisces, having created a loving context for incoming visitors. The Moon passes through this sign in 2 days, the Sun in 30 days, but Saturn, as usual, takes his time laying new foundations.
Interesting item in the news last week. The Anglican church is considering more fluidity in gender specific words when speaking of God. Even thinking about the possibility that the Divine may also be feminine is a huge breakthrough. We may see shifts within our religious institutions over the next 2-1/2 years, along with an expanding concept of our spiritual origins.
Venus enters Aries less than an hour after the New Moon. But she is only 5 degrees away from Neptune. Venus has become a symbol of romantic and sexual love, and rightly so. She has other qualities as well, like beauty, aesthetic appreciation, harmony, peace, justice and balance. Neptune is the higher octave of Venus, encompassing compassion and agape or unconditional and universal love.
The USA natal Venus is conjunct Jupiter in Cancer. Our collective Venus is expansive, protective, nurturing, bountiful and generous. The New Moon trines natal Venus from Pisces as well as transiting Haumea at 1 degree of Scorpio. While the Air trine is activating our minds, the Water trine is renewing and opening our hearts. What a great opportunity to bring these polarities into balance! Transiting Venus will catch up with Jupiter on March 1st, within one degree of Chiron. Mark your calendars for this extraordinary opportunity to open our hearts, expand our faith and heal past heartbreak.
Let’s Not Forget Healing
In the USA chart, Saturn is conjunct the planet Juno, wife of Jupiter, Queen of Heaven. In Libra in the 10th House, they suggest a commitment to world peace. During this lunar cycle we will get some lessons around commitment. Remember Saturn and Juno are part of the Mars Air trine. They provide the content of our expanding consciousness. Rather than focus on conflict, we can dedicate that Mars energy to learning about ourselves and questioning our values. We don’t want to take worn out misconceptions with us for another go around the Sun.
Transiting Juno is at 19 degrees of Eris. Our natal Chiron is at 20 degrees. There is wounding and confusion around commitment. What commitments have we made – to ourselves, to our Souls? How about other people or organizations, sports teams and political parties? When is it time to relinquish commitments that no longer serve us or others?
Take relationships. Do we stay committed even if we are abused? Or the love has worn off and we’re frozen in an empty pact? What is our spiritual commitment? Why did we incarnate at this time? Everyone has a role to play in this evolutionary drama. What’s yours?
When Juno comes to visit Chiron, they will talk about old wounds, outworn misconceptions, healing, forgiving, blessing and letting go. Every old wound we heal, every resentment we release, lightens our load, liberates our spirit.
Our nation has been in the throes of an internal war. Transiting Chiron is at 13+ Aries, only 7 degrees away from a Chiron return. For those of us over 50, we know what a Chiron return brings – an opportunity to claim freedom and sovereignty, along with a big dose of healing and new insight. Our Chiron return begins on April 20, 2024 and completes on February 18th, 2025. Throughout this year the seeds of healing will begin to germinate.
Centaurs in General
This seems an appropriate time to bring up Nessus. All the centaurs are mythologically related to poisons. Chiron was pierced by an arrow tipped with the fatal blood of the Hydra. He was immortal, however, and couldn’t die, so he suffered throughout his life from this wound. Pholus died but not before he realized his own mistake. Nessus was a pretty nasty fellow who was murdered by Hercules for raping his wife. He too died, but got his revenge. He gave a phial of Hydra poison to the jealous wife telling her to put it on her husband to keep him faithful. She poured the Hydra blood onto the inside of his cape. He died an agonizing death.
Greeks are pretty dramatic. But there is a lesson about the toxicity of lies. Nessus promised Hercules to protect his wife, then raped her. Nessus lied about the poisoned blood.
Recently the whole theme of toxins and poisons has stolen headlines. A train wreck in Ohio created a deadly leak of vinyl chloride, a cancer-causing, explosive chemical. They set it on fire to stop the leak causing a plume of noxious gas, killing pets, plants and poisoning the bodies of all nearby. Then this morning I read that another crash caused a toxic spill near Tuscon, closing the Interstate and evacuating residents.
What’s the message? We’re a toxic society right now. In fact we are infecting the planet. Our methods of terrorism are spreading everywhere. I read the other day that an Israeli drove his car into a crowd. Who does that? A few years ago we never saw that. Globally we lead the pack comprising 70% of mass shootings around the world. Russia is second, then Germany, France and Canada. The rest of the world has 2 to none.
I bring up the story of Nessus because on the Full Moon he is riding the back of our natal Sedna, the new outer limit of our solar system, discovered in the Oort Cloud beyond the Kuiper Belt. Her discovery expanded our neighborhood in quantum leaps. We are slowly coming to understand some of the themes of this new dwarf planet, but one of them is our relationship with the Earth and its shifting climate. It’s time to remember our original mission, to tend this Earthly garden, protect all life and live in harmony with nature, the embodiment of the Great Mother Goddess.
I heard a channeled comment today that made me stop and think. The speaker said that the Earth has her own evolutionary path and she wants to get back on course. She too is evolving and her desire to restore herself is building. Just like us, when we’re sick, we want to get well. We do everything we can to heal. And when the time comes for us to change, to seek a new direction, to leave behind the known and set out into the adventure of the unknown, the will toward greater freedom becomes irrepressible.
I’m participating in a two-week meditation retreat beginning on the New Moon and going all the way to the very powerful Full Moon in Virgo. Now is the time to let go, to say goodbye to self-imposed limitations, old stories that no longer define who we are now, relationships that diminish rather than nourish us. We can thank the past for all it has taught us, bless it and release the emotions that bind us to our pain. Pisces supports compassionate endings.
Between now and next time, focus on self-healing, self-loving, self-care. Appreciate all you went through to get here, now. It’s been a hero’s journey, but that tale is coming to an end. A new adventure lies ahead. Can you feel the energy – quivering at the edge of reality?
And here’s a gift. I discovered this mind-boggling video a few days ago and want to share the wonder. It’s brief, and beautiful, and will completely reframe your understanding of our universe.
Leave a Reply