July 2020 Full Moon Lunar Eclipse
Active Healing, Practical Planning & Collective Care
5Th July Full Moon Annular Lunar Eclipse 13° Capricorn @4:44UT
“It’s not the Mountain we conquer, but ourselves” ~ Edmund Hillary ~ 1st climber to reach the top of Mount Everest with Tenzin Sherpa.
The ‘Great Anthropocene Pause’, a.k.a. giving nature a break, hiding from covid and, for those comfortable enough (financially or psychologically), making the most of a chance to get off the treadmill means a (now) long-term Capricorn confinement continues for many, all the while waistline’s thicken as boredom sets in and wanting to get back to work is high on the career agenda. The 10th sign of the zodiac, Capricorn, sits at the position of mid-heaven and, although often slow to shine, is born mature and determined to give form to ambitions. The Sea-Goat is the symbol of authority, boundaries and discipline. With a readiness to accept responsibility, the strong-minded mountain-climbing Capricorn can list impressive accomplishments, not least reaching various peaks with a sense of achievement, as well as personal insight. The challenge over this Full Capricorn Moon is therefore to be objective and empirical in our striving, confident in our stature. The key to climbing Capricorn heights is to recognise footholds when we see them, and to remain in the present moment, always in the process of being in one’s flow.
To make the most of this Full Capricorn Moon, be realistic: know your facts, talents and worth. Active and dynamic Mars recently arrived in home sign of assertive Aries, which will help shift any added weight gain 😉; but we may also need to control passions to get an advantageous practical working life in order that will contribute to a greater whole – eventually. While others buzz about, not quite like nothing has happened because recent global events also triggered issues of planetary awareness and human rights. Equality and freedom, friendship and community, climate change and covid control, all are now under personal and collective scrutiny and focus.
MOON NOW joins THE TRIPLE CONJUNCTION
At the same time, 2020’s rare triple planetary Capricorn conjunction sees karmic Saturn with powerful and secretive Pluto, together with expansive Jupiter; now joined by the Full Capricorn Moon during an Annular Lunar Eclipse. Within the confines of this ambitiously driven stellium of planets in pragmatic, corporate Capricorn, it is good to note how there isn’t another triple conjunction of this calibre for the emotional Moon to connect with until the next century!
The all-pervading influence of the Moon within this rare alignment indicates how expressively involved we personally are in our generations’ moment to transform. Seriously, this is it: we had dramatic warnings that we ignore at our peril that a change to the consumer life-style is necessary from 2010, beginning with our use of fuel and resources, as well as now confronting (economic) fears and doubt, pomp and paranoia. Yet when being yourself sunny self (always in spectacular development by Sun’s sign and house), be sensible as well as sensitive: employ truth, insight, and practicality when working with others towards a society that safeguards a healthy future without losing personal human freedoms that sustain well-being and the positive contacts we social human beings thrive on.
Take note: these three goal-orientated and power-loving planets are also retrograde throughout the current season (i.e. Summer in the North, Winter in the South): and those with a takeover in mind are now having to go back to rethink and rework; with an unreserved Jupiter first to go direct as the seasons begin to change, just before an Equinox New Moon, 12th September. Currently bringing intelligence and sagacity to this power-house trio is an influential asteroid, Pallas Athena. Pallas is also retrograde and closest to the Capricorn Moon in a wide conjunction – but still within the orb used for ‘The Lights’, Sun & Moon. So, a quick recap (pun intended) that’s four retrograde planets AND the Full Moon, also with the karmically connected South Node (Ketu is generally always in apparent backward motion!), all in Capricorn.
As strategic astral advisor, Pallas Athena with the sensitive Moon provides warrior woman sisterhood a smart kind of back-up to suggest feminine wisdom can advise a way forward. This is helpful for Luna, as the Moon is not at ease faced with the sometimes ruthless and austere Capricorn; and the Moon is in astrological ‘detriment’ when with the Sea-Goat. This placement often makes it difficult for anyone to access or show deep feelings. Emotions then harden and get concealed or suppressed; deflected by what the English would call ‘a stiff upper lip’ – meaning we maintain a respectable front in a materially motivated world, even in the face of what might seem like overwhelming sentiment. Be aware this kind of restraint is not necessarily emotional intelligence, rather the REaction of the emotional dinosaur. Not that we should let it all hang out either but look smart and find a middle way to keep cool when confronted by harsh reality.
Professionalism is always called for when the Moon is in Capricorn, which is also happy working hard from home, even if it means stipulating, organising and rearranging family timetables (to make the most of the current Mercury retrograde with the Sun, also in Cancer). But with so much earthy Capricorn accented in the sky, judgemental policing abounds. All-the-while everyone naturally senses the need to create personal barriers – mask wearing withstanding respect for our fellow humans.
This mound of earthy Capricorn opposite the watery Cancerian Sun/Mercury also provides a means of protecting our innate but often subtle human sensitivity, just as a mother would her child as a matter of survival. While we do our best to boost immune systems and maintain health and happiness, caution and protection are still the watchwords for this Annular Full Moon Lunar Eclipse, if only to keep an eye on trickster Mercury, the heaven’s media messenger. Be aware: how we proceed now influences the renewal of environmental health and natural assets to be witnessed in decades to come. Or not. This is the planet of choice, after all.
This Lunar Eclipse marks the end of a triple Eclipse Season
This Lunar Eclipse, just as the Lunar Eclipse, only a month ago, which preceded our recent total Solstice Solar Eclipse, is ‘annular’. Annular means we probably won’t even notice slightly dimmed moonbeams. This Annular Lunar Eclipse is also the last of an intense triple eclipse season. Like riding dragons, Eclipses take skill to navigate, as they always generate some sort of shift in the geophysical (earthquakes, tsunamis, cyclones and fire), as well as political and personal shake-ups and whirlwinds. This interaction of Sun-Moon-Earth also magically opens portals for those who have the courage to release the past and go through often painful events to discover and give thanks for what we deeply appreciate in life. And right now that gratitude is directed towards having the freedom to speak one’s truth, as well as seeing family and work as personal modes of active healing.
Reflecting the light of the creative, family-orientated Cancerian Sun, the Moon’s magic is such that developing and working with our spiritual nature now reveals a certain brilliance – with powerful insights into the nature of the heartmind. This is mainly intimated by the Sun, our life-giving source. Not only is Sun adept at keeping the sacred home-fire burning whilst in partile to the Asteroid Goddess Vesta, but Sol is also now beaming with the night sky’s brightest magnitude 1 Fixed Star: Sirius, once revered as the Egyptian star of the Goddess. In the days of Pharaohs and thick eyeliner, the Sun with Sirius marked the flooding of the River Nile to water crops to provide food and sustenance for the coming year. Sirius shows how the ordinary can be turned into the Divine, just by altering our perception and taking time to nurture our souls. Encompassed in the sign Cancer, the sign that rules the Moon and tides, Sirius also illuminates our physical foundation, as well as the profound emotions we experience coming from the cosmic womb of creation.
Interestingly, Sirius is also the very same star upon which the planetary trickster-healer, Mercury, went retrograde during the Solstice Eclipse. Make no mistake: words, ideas and thoughts may now dazzle in wondrousness, but they will also need to be reviewed and corrected to be based in historical truth, written and spoken with care and consideration to be truly bright and amazing. Come the end of July, around the 27th (and a first quarter Moon), Mercury will again join Sirius; at the same time the remnants of the recent Venus retrograde shadow period comes to an end. This is when Venus will again make a third and final tight square to Neptune, the same square which spawned so much illusion and confusion about the viral and unseen in recent months. Before anyone goes into hysterical debate about what is real and what is not; even though we cannot see it the virus is real and contagious – but so is fear, as is LOVE. But while the celestial courier, Mercury, is retrograde in Cancer until the 12th July (with a lingering shadow period) – and still with Hygiea, Asteroid Goddess of Healing: once again it’s important to recognise how information is a power which can be used to either heal, make deals, or perpetuate the fear. What you feed your mind with is crucial to wellbeing and health.
The Moon also rules the sign of the Crab, which is remarkably symbolic of mass awareness, as well as existing mass manipulation and historical mass movements (albeit the move sometimes sideways). Mercury in Cancer also denotes a love of the past. Sentimentality aside, dour Capricorn is also strong: try not to get too maudlin as reminiscing brings up memories of what can happen when good people say helpful things and do good deeds. But use the influence of loving contacts to spur you on into the future.
Yet the past is gone, and the future is still to exist. And all that really matters is NOW. So it’s also worth bearing in mind that people power is presently very effective, because this Full Moon shows a ‘Cardinal Water’ horoscope with the Moon representing feelings as well as the populace, in a leading a ‘bowl shape’ scope. As for those currently seeking world power by manipulating the masses through fear and division and making a play for corporate domination and wealth, everything relies upon the amount of 000’s that sit on a computer in an offshore tropical island. This kind of ‘power’ with digital rows of zeros is essentially nebulous. In the ultimate understanding of reality none of it is ‘real’. Dark and sinister power grabs visibly taking place by the selfish, mean and greedy, while ordinary people are taking care of themselves and loved ones, need not work nor have longevity. Remember: Light always shines through and LOVE conquers all.
But while the Capricorn Moon is widely conjunct the ‘South Node’ and ‘Dragon’s Tail’ past (life) energies are being released in recognition of deflecting attacks that weaken. In order to go forward we need to show the way for successful healing within communities that thrive and have a say in creating wellbeing in education, in the markeplace, and within the mind.
Still, the Capricorn Moon is emotionally concerned with ‘the establishment’, laden with tradition, responsibility and an innate gift to be the heavy weight. All the while taskmaster Saturn who recently returned home to join an authoritarian Capricorn Pluto, whose extremism and scope of influence seemingly grows with Jupiter’s natural expansiveness, it also suggests ambitious bubbles can and do pop. So that any accountability for knowingly misleading can be addressed and put into place.
Note how this now infamous triple Capricorn union of Jupiter, Pluto and Saturn, is only half way through its transformational process, ending in November 2020; and will mark this year’s powerful events that reveal questions of trust and betrayal, , judgement and obeyance. Take heart, even as these planets mark toxic situations such as pollution and corruption, the awakening to transformation IS happening. And while this next December Solstice indicates freedom from (the mind’s) tyranny, this strangely secretive and lingering sense of confinement could last into 2021.
Last but not least, Sun and Moon are in a challenging T-Square with active Mars, now in accenting individual identity in Aries for an astounding seven months, until January 2021. Martial Mars is at home in the sign of the Ram, doubling up assertion, courage and daring, as well as fast-moving clumsiness. So, be aware.
As one of my late teachers would often say ‘Speed is Aggression’; and as the Scarlet planet is at home in fiery Aries, this saying is something we would all do well to recall, especially when driving or working with heat (hot ideas, people or things), in the kitchen and on the road, as well as physically working out. An Aries Mars influence is naturally quick on any uptake, but when challenged by both ‘Lights’, Sun and Moon, patience works wonders.
From an astrological point of view, this Full Moon sees Mars connected via a T-Square to the Sun and Moon for the third time. First Mars was in Aquarius with Taurus-Scorpio axis; secondly in Pisces and the Gemini-Sagittarius axis; and now in Aries. Anger and impatience stirring from humanity’s inequality (Aqua) turned into confusion (Pisces) and now action with Mars in Aries. Sun, Moon and Mars are all very nicely connected here, which could smooth any edginess. So although Sun, Moon and Mars are in what is normally considered a stressful T-Square, they are also in a sweetly teased but supportively tangled relationship. This is because muscly Mars is now at home in the sign of Sun’s exaltation; while the Sun is in the rulership of the home-loving Moon; and the Moon is in Mars’ sign of exaltation. Here you can see it’s as though everyone in the celestial clubhouse is having a cordial and rather well-behaved gathering (though could just as easily get out of hand, overstep marks and be generally bumptious). The potential is also there to recognise utilise each other’s significant strengths: thus the ability to act, be self-sufficient and take personal responsibility for healthy boundaries, at the same time acknowledging we are all One under the auspices of the bountiful Sun. So, while covid control circulates we must not forget events such as this pandemic only happens when human activity is out of alignment with Earth and the Elements, the universe’s building block. And it’s time to redress that situation. Now.
With one last word about this Full Moon, and that is how in the East this Full Moon is known as the ‘Guru’s Moon’, the ‘Teacher’s Moon’, I would like to thank to all our beloved teachers.
Also giving thanks as this Moon cycle closes with a New Moon 20th July, it brings an end to eclipse season until the end of November!
With love & Light from Astro Dakini Dharma Stars 🙏🌈🌕🌍☀️
Aka Laura Boomer-Trent©
#87
Many thanks for the blessings of Buddha images to:
https://www.gnosticmuse.com/ : http://www.roerich.org/ : and unknown artists for seated Kwan Yin & Buddha with Moonshine & Earth.
