Mercury Stations Direct, Grand Sextile, Sun in Leo: 7/22/13 through 8/22/13

The great summer sea voyage of 2013 continues with another watery month.  True, we have some islands popping up in our midst, enabling us to rest & replenish now & again in the warming sun as it creeps out from behind the drifting & shifting Cancerian clouds into its full & fiery Leonine blaze.  Now, more than ever, your heart is your compass, & synchronicity is your guiding star.  With Venus entering Virgo shortly before & the full moon exact only a couple hours after the entry of the Sun into Leo, the month promises to be full-throttle, with a need to push outwards & upwards, & all the while, managing both the details & the big picture.  Ready?  Set?  Here we go.

But first, a public service announcement: Come see my last art show in Seattle, up at the Columbia City Bakery through 7/27.  It’s a magical retrospective of my favorite works from the past decade.  I’m moving to California, so some prices just might be negotiable...

The mind grinds to a halt in the last few days of the Cancer solar month as Uranus (insight) stations retrograde on 7/17 & then Mercury (perception) stations direct on 7/20.  In addition, we have no major planets in air signs for a while, so we must rely on our emotions (half of the major planets are in water signs) to guide us.  Although we’re in the bright days of summer, we are feeling our way through the darkness of our subconscious.  As for Uranus’ retrograde (7/17 - 12/17), whatever your big push for freedom is, allow it to change form as needed, perhaps in sudden & even shocking ways in the coming months.  With Mercury’s shift into direct motion, you can expect things that have felt hung up to get rolling by the end of July.  The best question to answer as Mercury finishes his thrice-long swim in Cancer is:

In what ways are my perceptions based on my past experiences, rather than what is actually happening here & now?

The grandest version of 2013’s Grand Water Trine is exact during the week of the 15th, further activated by Mars towards the end of that week, just before it morphs into a Grand Sextile at the end of the month.  This is a use it or lose it opportunity.  Maybe you’re trusting that everything will take care of itself, or day-dreaming a lot, or feeling swept up in shifting emotional tides.  That’s all well & good, but there are profound opportunities showing up during this time that do require action.  The general rules of thumb to follow are:

1, Think bigger.  Dream bigger.  Explore with & expand from your heart.

2, Put effort into manifesting what has deepest meaning to you, but be patient as this may require more time than you had anticipated, & you’ll need to stay open to surprising turns & detours.

3, Leave space & time for dreams & meditation.  Notice & welcome synchronicity, & above all, allow life to surprise you.

It’s a tricky balance of trust, effort & all the while leaving space for magic to come in to play.

7/27 through 7/31 are massively potent days with Mars activating a T-square with Pluto & Uranus, & the extremely rare occurrence of a Grand Sextile.  These two configurations offer a nice blend of the kind of discomfort that forces growth with the kind of ideal conditions that allow for growth.  Once again, I remind you to seize opportunities that come your way, & give them your all.

The Grand Sextile is a double grand trine, forming a six-pointed star.  Consider that astrology is based on how the planets appear from the perspective of the earth.  Hence, on Monday, 7/29, the earth will be surrounded by a six-pointed star - a potent mandala for those of you who enjoy meditating on images & yantras.  One triangle is the grand water (emotions) trine, made up of slow & fairly slow moving planets  (giving the configuration more potency because it lasts longer).  The other triangle, facing in the opposite direction, is a grand earth (manifestation) trine, lasting only that day.  The most basic interpretation of this energy is we are granted the ability to manifest our dreams.  Sounds good, eh?  As always, however, there is a potential dark side.  You must first make sure you are dreaming the dreams that are right for you:

Have I been ignoring my needs or the needs of my family in my strivings for personal freedom & attainment of major goals?

How can I advocate for myself & make sure I’m being nourished, even as I strive for freedom & for the attainment of major goals?

What are my Big Life Dreams, & what will it take to actually manifest them?

Are my dreams my own, or have I taken on the dreams of my family, of society, or otherwise obscured my true desires?

What is my body actually capable of doing from this point on, in regards to these aims?

Do my dreams, & my plans to manifest my dreams feel deeply nourishing to me?

Am I dreaming as big as I can, while remaining within the realm of what is actually possible to manifest?

Am I walking my talk?  How can I better walk my talk?

Is there anything (dream that doesn’t fit, a used-up relationship, work that no longer nourishes, etc) I need to sacrifice in order to attain those dreams that are truest & most important to me?

Let’s take an energetic look at the concept of sacrifice, which is a strong element in this grand water trine, & further potentized by that edgy T-square.  Sacrifice entails a massive release of energy - giving up something big, but also giving up the energy it took to hold onto & maintain that big thing - for the purpose of honoring something even bigger than that which was released.  There is, in this act, the opportunity to break a curse, to break free of bondage, & to open to a reality that may actually surpass the bounty & beauty of our dreams.  One final set of questions, then, to ask yourself throughout the remainder of July is:

What am I holding onto that is holding me back?

How do I feel bound, or perhaps even cursed?

What might happen if I gave up something/someone I never thought I’d give up?

What is the newness that is aching to emerge?  What nourishes that newness, & what squelches it?

What do I love that loves me back?  What stands in the way of that exchange?

In regards to this issue, you can keep that old saying in mind: If you love something, let it go.  If it comes back to you, it’s yours.  If it doesn’t return to you, it never actually was yours.  Sounds like another version on the theme of trust, eh?

The first half of August gives us an opportunity to assimilate the shifts instigated in the latter half of June & all of July.  How do you assimilate?  Rest!  Be present, & above all, BE.  There will be plenty to do in late August.  Take some time out in solitude at the New Leo Moon on 8/6 to connect very intentionally with your heart, perhaps through some creative outlet.  Express yourself to yourself, & see how you’ve changed.  Notice:

What brings you joy now that you are who you are in this particular time & place?

Well, friends, thanks for reading.  Next month’s posting will go into the nitty-gritty of another round of T-square activity, & more.  Until then, please wish me luck in my move to California, & drop me a line if you know of a nice cottage for rent in Oakland or Berkeley!

For more personalized insight, you may go here to schedule a private astrological consult, or an Alithesis healing session in Seattle (July 18th is my last available day).  In August, I’ll be available for phone consultations & for Alithesis house calls in the Bay Area.  By September, I’ll be practicing in Oakland, CA.  Until next month’s posting, carpe diem!  Please forward this posting on & repost it as you see fit.  Thanks for reading,

Rae Diamond

rae13diamond {at} gmail.com

Summer Solstice, Mercury Retrograde in Cancer, Sun in Cancer: 6/20/13 - 7/22/13, Mercury Retrograde: 6/26/13 - 7/20/13

“Shall we go for a swim?”  If a friend asks you that question, you could say, “No,” if you weren’t in the mood for a swim, or if you didn’t know how to swim, or if you happened to be by some icy or shark-infested water.  But when the bulk of the Solar System asks you that question, you will be getting in the water, like it or not, seemingly safe or not.  We will all be going for a swim this summer, & we’ll be learning some new strokes & techniques for better swimming this month.

The metaphor breakdown:

All things watery symbolize the emotions.  We will be learning about what makes us tick emotionally this month.  Then we’ll have plenty of opportunities (i.e. there will be some nice, gritty salt rubbing into some raw & nasty old wounds) to learn how to work with our emotions better throughout the summer.

From another perspective, water is profoundly cleansing, clarifying & reflective.  Many things dissolve in water, so that they can combine in new ways, or be carried away.  Hence, profound transformation & letting go is possible in the coming months.  The reflective capabilities of water allow for new insight & perspective - the ability to see what is right in front of your face (often those things that everyone other than you can see).  The clarifying aspects of water can simplify heretofore complex or murky issues.  All of this is possible this summer, so long as you (insert descending cello notes here for dramatic effect) take responsibility for your emotions, exercise compassion for yourself & others, & dig down to the heart of matters to reach the Truth.  How’s that for some summer fun?  Whoopee!

The Sun enters Cancer, & ushers in Summer on the evening of 6/20 (10:04, PDT) & the morning of 6/21 (1:04 EDT).  A chart cast for this day affects not only the Cancer solar month, but also the entirety of summer.  It is the Summer Solstice, the longest day of the year - classically, a good time to honor the apex of light, fire, & esoterically, masculine qualities.  However, the strongest element with the most momentum in the Solstice chart is water.  Put those two elements together, & you’ve got Hot Water, so you can expect to get cooked - this is a good opportunity to bring things to fruition if you harness this energy consciously.

Operative in this solstice chart is the Big Astrological Event of the summer that all of us astrologers are clucking about - the Grand Water Trine.  Grand trines have an unstoppable momentum.  The element of water will give this summer a sense of really getting swept up.  Emotions can run wild with this configuration, so the Mercury retrograde that begins on 6/26 will help you in deciphering the seemingly secret code that is your emotional/mental patterning.  More on that below.

The grand water trine involves Neptune & Chiron in Pisces (rather than releasing your wounds themselves, you can release their grip on you or your reactions/resistance to them), Saturn in Scorpio (take responsibility for what matters most), & a stream of various planets in Cancer (various lessons in nourishment & the cyclical nature of life), most potent of which will be Jupiter in mid-July.  At the Solstice, we have the Sun & a Lilith in this spot, suggesting both extreme light & extreme shadow.  Further potentizing this configuration is the slow movement of the three main planets involved.  This gives our water wheel a slow pace, but a great force.  Expect things to change radically, but exercise patience.  A good rule of thumb: You will never be the same again after this summer.  Sure, that’s always true - we’re always changing, but thinking in those terms will help you seize this energy more effectively.

Grand Water Trine deep sea probes:

If you were to be “never the same again,” what would you want that change to be? (Hint: think of an evolution of your current state)

What emotions & emotional patterns of response are you hanging on to that are holding you back from evolving?

What nourishes you?  What places are nourishing to you?  Which relationships are nourishing to you?

Do you acknowledge & nourish your sources?  (Hint: support that/those which support/s you)

What do you have to be grateful for?  What does gratitude FEEL like in your body & mind?

Are you owning your emotions as created by you, or are you blaming other people, society, or institutions for how you feel?

How are your emotions affecting your body?

The full moon in Capricorn is just a few days later, on the morning of 6/23.  Most of the configurations from the Solstice are still in effect.  The great tool here is the Moon, powerful through the Sun’s presence in her home sign, & placed in grounding, steady-as-she-goes, eye-on-the-prize Capricorn.  Anyone who’s ever swam at the seashore knows that you need to pause every so often to see where you are in relation to the land, lest you get swept out to sea.  This full moon in Capricorn reminds us to check back in with objective reality, rather than getting lost in the sea of our personal perceptions:

What are the actual facts & train of events in the situations & relationships you’re in?

How do things look different if you take away your interpretations of those facts?

Jupiter enters Cancer on 6/25, where he’ll be swimming about until next summer.  On the low end of the Jupiter in Cancer spectrum, we may experience emotional overwhelm that leads to excess, especially with food & sugar (sugar cane grows in the tropic of Cancer).  Also watch out for instances of cancer affecting either you or those you love.  The disease of cancer is ruled by the sign of Cancer.  Jupiter makes everything it touches Bigger, so that’s a potentially troublesome combination.  On the high end of this spectrum, we are strongly encouraged & enabled to follow our heart in expansive ways, & to reap major rewards through doing so.  Also, Cancer is an incredibly resilient & cyclical sign.  One of Jupiter’s keynotes is Faith.  If things are looking down in the coming year, trust that they will come back around in some way or another.  The golden rule with Jupiter is trust in an ultimately positive outcome, & focus on the positive potentials in the meantime.  The trick is you need to be flexible & unattached with your definition of what positive is & could be.

The very next day (6/26), Mercury stations retrograde in Cancer until 7/20.  But the past week has already been quite wonky with all of this planetary shifting, & Mercury appearing to just barely move at all.  These directional shifts are like the moment before a ball tossed straight up in the air shifts from upwards to downwards motion.  For a magical moment, the ball is still, weightless - neither acted on by the force of the throw, nor the force of gravity.  It’s free.

On 6/26, Mercury is free, & you better believe he likes it that way, that sneaky trickster.  He has no obligation to us, either externally (normal motion & smooth functioning of communication & transportation) or internally (retrograde motion, & rethinking of communication & transportation).  This is the time to really let go.  Let go of how you think things should be or develop, of how you think you should feel, & especially of how you think others should feel.  Do that, & this retrograde will go a lot smoother for you.  I hope you heeded last month’s advice, & have already backed up your computers & phones, & tuned up your bicycles & cars.  Speaking of cars, anybody want to buy a 2004 Chevy Cavalier?  I’m selling one... Really.

Evolutionary questions for Mercury’s retrograde in Cancer:

What happens if you simply witness my emotions when they occur, rather than suppressing them or acting on them?

What is your diet like?  Do you need to rethink WHAT, HOW & WHEN you feed yourself?

Who nourishes you?  Whom do you nourish?  Are those healthy relationships?

What are the cyclical patterns in your life?

At what stage are you at in those various patterns (building, apex, decline, death, rebirth)?

Other events of note:

Venus enters Leo on 6/27 until 7/23, highlighting the arts, creativity, & joyous times with friends.  Throw a party, & attend some art events, such as my last art show in Seattle before I relocate to California, up at the Columbia City Bakery 7/1 - 7/27, with the Columbia City arts walk on 7/18.  Do buy my art, & in so doing be a keeper of some particular magic (that is why you read this blog - to feel connected to the flowing & mystical side of life in this regimented & binary world).

The Sun will activate the Pluto/Uranus square in the first few days of July, so try to keep your cool as emotions will run extra high, anger will be easily ignited, & patience will be tested.  What’s good about this tense configuration is it adds some imperative to change & grow.  A grand trine can move freely without obstruction, but it can also create unchecked growth, with an attendant complacency towards any other potentials.  This square offers some much needed perspective, incendiary insight, & reality check to this summer’s emotional wash.

Saturn stations direct on 7/7 (7/8 for eastern folk), which means some things that have felt stuck, or have been in the behind-the-scenes planning phase since February will get moving in the coming months.  Hopefully, you’ve worked on increasing your sense of personal power (& the limits thereof) in that time so you can set appropriate boundaries & act from your true strengths.  Hint: Be clear about what is your responsibility, & what is someone else’s responsibility, & act accordingly.

The new Cancer Moon is on 7/8, with a massive stellium in Cancer.  The message here is: Emotions are a source of information.  Allow your feelings to inform you rather than direct you.  Cancer is largely about digestion.  Take your emotions in, process them, & see how they transform.  Then you can turn what’s useful into new energy, & eliminate the waste.

Mars enters Cancer on 7/13 until 8/29, activating another T-square in the ongoing Pluto/Uranus configuration in late July.  Let’s just say anger & frustration will be coming up, which you may experience in yourself or in those around you.  Feeling depressed?  You’ve probably got some suppressed anger, so this just might be your opportunity to clarify exactly how you feel thwarted from getting what you want, or how you may be holding yourself back from getting what you want by holding onto old angers.  Hint: anger is a secondary emotion.  First comes fear.  What are you afraid of?

Well that should tide you over (pun unintended but duly noted) until next month’s posting, in which I’ll discuss the most exciting & rare Grand Sextile.  Due to Mercury’s retrograde & my impending move to Oakland, CA at the end of July, there is a possibility that next month’s posting may not occur, or may occur late or early or inside out or upside down or backwards.

For more personalized insight, you may go here to schedule a private astrological consult, or an Alithesis healing session in Seattle until late July.  In August, I’ll be available for phone consultations & Alithesis house calls in the Bay Area.  By September, I’ll be practicing in Oakland, CA.  Until next month’s posting, enjoy reconnecting with your heart.  Please forward this posting on as you see fit.  Thanks for reading,

Rae Diamond

rae13diamond {at} gmail.com

Sagittarius Lunar Eclipse (5/24/13), Sun in Gemini: 5/20/13 through 6/20/13

Let’s say you’re a weaver.  A year and a half ago, you were commissioned to produce a tapestry, due this week.  Your client, whom you’ve been avoiding, is starting to send you angry messages.  Size-wise, you’re almost finished with the piece, but you have a zillion colors of thread dangling from your loom and a veritable horde of themes and patterns, all needing to be tied together in just a couple inches of warp.  Meanwhile, you’ve been working on other commissions and pet projects that are way more interesting to you at this point.

You don’t really want to think about this tapestry anymore.  However, you could sure use the payment you’ll receive once it’s complete, & it just doesn’t seem to magically finish itself while you happily deal with other things.  In fact, it’s getting difficult to deal with those more interesting projects because this nearly-finished tapestry is constantly rumbling around in the back of your mind, distracting your focus, your creativity, & ultimately depleting your energy.

Metaphor Breakdown:

    What issues have you been working on & dealing with for the past one & a half years?

    What have you been learning in that time?

    Do any of these issues & lessons echo back to what was happening in your life in 1993-94?

    What feels like a loose end in your life?

    How can you either weave it into completion, or simply cut it out?

    Which feels like the truer response?

That, my friends, is the experience of the final eclipse in this round of the Sagittarius/Gemini axis, which occurs as a full moon & lunar eclipse in Sagittarius on Saturday, May 25th.  A chapter is closing, & you won’t be rereading it for another 19 years.  An example of how this played out in my own life is this: In 1993, I planned to move to the Pacific Northwest.  I moved to Olympia in 1994, didn’t care for it, tried San Francisco out, & then “settled” (a relative term in my personal history) in Seattle for most of the past 19 years.  Well, in two months, I’ll be moving to Oakland, California, just east of San Francisco.  If you’re in the Seattle area, & want to see me for an in-person astrology consult or Alithesis session, you have until mid or late July to schedule such an event.  If you’re in the Bay Area, my practice will be up & running by September.  I’ll be available for phone consultations throughout August.

This is also the final eclipse until October, when we’ll open the chapter of Aries/Libra eclipses that will be in full swing in 2014.

There are a few other intriguing & Big Events that occur in the 2013 Gemini solar month, which begins on 5/20 with half of the major celestial bodies in air signs, & another exact square between Uranus (fresh & rebellious in Aries) & Pluto (stodgy & grim in Capricorn), & ends with Jupiter at the tail end of Gemini, ready to dive into sensitive Cancer for a full year.  The rule of thumb for this month is clean up your mental act before your emotions take center stage this summer.  Those emotions will be a lot easier to deal with if you do, & we all like ease, right?

Also, Mercury & Venus form an exact conjunction at both the beginning & the end of this solar month, bringing the following questions into the fore:

    How do my own values differ from the various people I’m in relationship with?

    How can I both honor my own values & respect their values?  Hint: You’re different rather than “right.”

    How can I gracefully communicate what’s important to me, but also understand & accept that it might be

    different than what’s important to the other person?

    What would happen if I saw things through the other person’s eyes, looking through the lens of what’s

    important to them?  How might that change me, or change what I see as important?

Mercury enters the shadow of his retrograde (6/26 - 7/20) on Monday, June 10th.  On the practical level, back up your computers, set your travel plans, & tune up your vehicles of transportation.  On an emotional & mental level, take note of what is stirring up for you 6/10 - 6/26 because it’ll be up for review through July.  Given the planetary positions, it’s likely that your views on your relationships, your diet, & how you both give & receive nurturing will be going through some changes.  More on that in my next report.  For now, I suggest you be loving to yourself & others, & remember that we’re all - like it or not - sensitive.

The Pluto/Uranus square offers longterm growth potential (that’s woo-woo-speak for anything challenging) on both the collective & individual level.  That influence is covered fairly thoroughly in the link above, but what’s exciting about this exact pass is that it occurs shortly before Mercury & Venus form a Cardinal T-Square with this ongoing square configuration.  What that means for us humans is a burst of insight into how this pattern is playing out in our lives, & a sense of what really matters to us in this situation.  It’s likely you’ll find that your family (loosely defined) mean a lot more to you than you realized.  At the very least, they’ll take some attention away from your personal revolution & metaphorical mountain-climbing, & in so doing offer some key perspectives on those processes.

Also, we’re given another sneak peak into the summer’s Grand Water Trine as Mercury & then Venus step briefly into a sweeping & sloppy waltz with Neptune about to turn retrograde in Pisces & Saturn about to turn direct in Scorpio.  I know I said it’s time to take a look at your mind, but it’s also time to take a look at your feelings (eek!) -

    What have you been learning about power since October?

    Have you been working towards mastering your own (rather than others’) transformation?

    Who needs forgiving?  You?  Your parents?  Those you’ve had conflict with?  Those you’re closest with?

    How compassionate are you with yourself & others?

    Are you taking proper care of yourself?

    Are you caring enough for those who mean the most to you?

    Are you getting enough care from those you mean the most to?  If not, how can you effectively ask for more?

Next month’s report will cover Mercury’s retrograde in Cancer, Jupiter’s entry into Cancer, & the summer’s Grand Water Trine & Cardinal T-Square.  A final hint for this month is to review what you’ve been taking leaps of faith on since June 2012.  It’s time to wrap that stuff up, & get ready for the next big leap... or dive...

For more personalized insight, you may go here to schedule a private astrological consult, or an Alithesis healing session.  I’ll be practicing in Seattle until late July.  By September, I’ll be practicing in Oakland, CA.  In August, I’ll be available for phone consultations only.  Until next month’s posting, happy mental flossing, & get ready to reconnect with your heart.  Thanks for reading,

Rae Diamond