The Cosmic Story: Spring Equinox: Emergence and Rebirth & Pluto Goes into Aquarius

 

The Cosmic Story: Spring Equinox 2023

Emergence and Rebirth 

 

 

Spring Equinox: Autumn Equinox

While I’ll be talking about the northern hemisphere and the Spring Equinox, I want to acknowledge those of you in the southern hemisphere as you begin to let go of the light and slide into the fall.

The Equinox impacts both the North and South in the same way – there is a balance of day and night, light and dark. That moment of balance happens twice each year, as the sunlight waxes and wanes.

Onward we go round the Spiral

Touching darkness, touching light.

Twice each year we rest in balance,

Make choices on this night.

Make choices on this night.

In the South, you’re gathering in the harvest. Up North, we’re beginning to see flowers emerging. The crocuses have come out, heralding the return of life. If you haven’t already, it’s time to ground yourself in Mother Earth’s life and death cycle. We belong in the natural cycle: many of our cultural problems come from being cut off from it.

The choices we make for this new year will have ramifications for the next few years. With Saturn’s entry into Pisces, we have the chance to completely regenerate the roots of our sense of security and grounding. While it might seem scary to root ourselves in the waters of the Collective Unconscious, what we’re really being called upon to do is to root ourselves in our spiritual beliefs. Which means, establishing a strong spiritual practice so we stay centered while our collective culture undergoes a much needed transformation. To be in the world (society) but not of it.

 

 

At Spring Equinox, we emerge from our Winter hibernation and prepare ourselves for another year of growth. Each year we learn something new about ourselves and each year when we integrate that new part of ourselves, we create a new story. This year’s new story is about Freedom. The freedom from patriarchal rules and perspectives and beliefs. That doesn’t mean we throw out the baby with the bathwater. It means freely choosing what you value and how you live those values, without the guild, shame and fear that patriarchy thrives on. Clean out your psychic ‘gut micro-biome’ of unhealthy self-talk, negative emotions and most importantly, fear.

Open yourself to your community and to the causes that you’re passionate about. That’s what Spring is all about. Coming Out. Emerging.

March’s Astrological Shifts in Energy

Spring Equinox is the beginning of the new astrological year. This Spring Equinox comes in the midst of important collective energetic shifts. 

 

 

The first was Saturn going into Pisces on March 7^th. For the past, tumultuous five years 2018-23), Saturn has been in the two signs it rules: Capricorn and Aquarius (along with Uranus). Our physical and mental lives have been shaken up, our illusions about our collective life shattered. As Saturn’s archetypal energy of structure and security begins to dissolve in Pisces’ oceanic womb of our collective psyche, our sense of reality is going to shift. Just look at the hot movie of the year: Everything, Everywhere All At Once. It’s about parallel worlds and alternative realities. And most important, it’s a story about the power of Love.

The Aries New Moon, March 21^st, occurs one day after the Equinox, naturally aligning with the shift in season. (This is often not the case with Aries New Moons.) There will be a second Aries New Moon at 29*50’ on April 20^th, switching the lunar cycle from New Moon/Full Moon in complementary signs to Full Moon/New Moon. The last time it flipped with two New Moon was in July 2020 and it flipped back in August 2021 with two Full Moons in Aquarius (a Blue Moon).

On March 23^rd, Pluto, the planet of evolution/death&rebirth/power, dips its toe into Aquarius for a little over two months before moving back into Capricorn, giving us a preview of changes and challenges we’ll be facing as a society when it finally stays in Aquarius from 2025 – 2043. 

 

 

When Pluto moves into a sign, it usually picks up on what’s really not working right away. In 2008, when Pluto moved into the sign of Capricorn – the sign ruling financial systems, government, collective institutions – we had one of the worst financial crises we’ve faced. Instead of taking the bull by the horns and addressing the real issues of wealth inequality and power, the government gave banks the money they needed and left people to swing in the breeze. Instead, they could have allotted each of us a certain amount of money that could only be used to pay off debts, thereby laundering the money for the banks through us, keeping all of us economically healthy.

But they didn’t. Perhaps because Pluto was just beginning to show us what was rotten in the system. Now as Pluto ends its stay in Capricorn, we’re seeing another bank failure out in Silicon Valley. A nice tidy bookend to these past 15 + years. What will be our response now? How did this happen again?

If we take this as a metaphor for our inner lives, what have we been ‘banking’ on? And have we put our energy into a solid structure?

When Pluto moves into Aquarius, we’ll be dealing with new ideas about our society, about what is fair, about technology companies and how we use and abuse social media. (I love to imagine us getting rid of social media during these years. It reminds me of an old Star Trek: Next Generation TV show where they pick up some people from our time who were in frozen stasis floating in space until cures could be discovered. When they asked about TV - social media wasn’t around at the filming - they were told ‘we got rid of that along time ago’!)

The last time Pluto was in Aquarius our constitution was written. Pluto in Aquarius is invested in our personal power and our freedom. It’s interesting, and a bit disturbing to once again see them using astrology for their own purposes, that right-wing conservative money is funding a push in red states for a new constitutional convention to re-write our constitution – perhaps to institute a more Christian-based society. This is another aspect of Pluto in Aquarius – manipulating public opinion through mass media.

Pluto will be squaring the Nodal Axis in Taurus/Scorpio most of the year. This new vision of life must include the Earth and all of Nature. It will also bring about major transformations in our political life. Last time Pluto was in Aquarius, the French Revolution brought down the monarchy and shifted power to the people.

Aquarius as a fixed air sign: there are certain cosmic laws that shape our society and certain ideals which shape how we see our purpose in life. How we live those ideals is up to us. Air signs always speak to the need to improve our communications and personal networks. But Aquarius, especially, asks us to look at our experience as individuals in the context of society. What is our social responsibility? What part do we play as an individual member of our local community, the national community, the global community? We have the next 20 years to figure that out. But it starts with us, now. If we want to create a better world, we all have a part in making it happen.

So let’s watch and see what Pluto’s first ingress into Aquarius (March 23 – June 11) brings up for ourselves and for the world.

Mercury went into Pisces on March 2^nd and conjuncts Neptune and then the Sun at 27* Pisces on March 17^th. Then Mercury goes into Aries on March 19^th, right before Spring Equinox. So watch for Mercury conjunct the Aries New Moon and how it affects what you want to plant for this year.

 

Venus started March off in Aries connecting with Jupiter on March 2^nd. Luck and beauty. Truth and Compassion. Venus moves into her own sign of Taurus on March 16^th, right after she squares Pluto in the last degree of Capricorn. Venus rules money, so let’s see what happens with the bank crisis. Venus conjuncts the Taurus North Node on Spring Equinox and conjuncts Uranus in Taurus on March 30^th. 

 

 

Mars ends its long retrograde, 7 month journey in Gemini on March 25^th, finally arriving in Cancer to see how home, family and emotional security are feeling. Gemini offers a wide range of ways to think about life and the world. With Mars there for so long, have you settled on a new world view, a new paradigm that helps you understand the world? Mars in Cancer probably just wants to be home for awhile. So slow down that mind of yours and sink into your feelings. What do you desire most? When Mars moves into Cancer, it squares the Spring Equinox point of 0* Aries. What challenge will be offered us when Spring Equinox Aries Sun’s ruling planet moves into the soulful waters of Cancer?

 

 

Spring Equinox, March 20, 2023

The Spring/Autumn Equinox occurs on March 20 – 21, 2023 at 1:24pm AKDT, 2:24pm PDT/ 5:24pm EDT/ 9:24pm UTC/GMT.

 

 

When the Sun gets to the equator and enters the tropical sign of Aries, the fire of Spirit once again descends on us. The spark of life gets ignited. That’s Aries quest: Who Am I? What am I? Wherever you have Aries in your chart is where this spirit awakens in you. It has called to you from your birth, and it gets re-ignited each year on the Spring Equinox. 

 

 

The Aries Sun, so soon after its conjunction with Mercury, will continue that Mars/Mercury vibe we’ve been under while Mars retrograded in Gemini. Mars and Mercury’s blended energy indicates an energized Mind, and with the Sun conjunct Mercury for this Equinox chart (which influences the year), we’ll be having to make some clear decisions about what we want to accomplish this year.

The Equinox Sun semi-square Uranus in Taurus pushes us to include Mother Nature’s evolutionary genius in our plans. It’s time to adapt to a new world. Uranus awakens us to higher Mind – it connects us to cosmic consciousness. But as in the myth of Saturn cutting off Uranus’ phallus to stop him from coupling with Gaia, this cosmic consciousness has to be mediated by Love. We’ll see this cosmic message come up when we look at Venus.

Ceres, the dwarf planet, concerns how we nurture ourselves. Ceres in Libra is exactly opposite this Aries Equinox, reminding us to include others’ needs in our decisions.

The Pisces Moon, however, is a balsamic Moon – the last phase before New Moon. Under the balsamic Moon phase, we have to finish up old business. I call it graduating from graduate school – we know what we need to do and now is the time to do it. It’s an energy of completion, of sensing your destiny, of feeling secure in what you know.

This feeling of endings and new beginnings is echoed by Pluto in the last degree of Capricorn and Mars in the last degrees of Gemini. Something is coming to an end. Something new wants to be born. First, lay to rest the old story so you can put all your energy into the new one. 

 

 

Conjunct Neptune, this Pisces Moon gives our Equinox emergence a sense of destiny, a sense of spiritual initiation, and a great connection to our dreamworld. With Saturn sinking into this same collective womb, what we imagine for ourselves will connect with the imaginings of all of us. The more we focus our 3^rd Eye/ Imaginal Eye/ Moon on that better world, the more opportunities we’ll have to meet others who have those same passions. This is the time to let go of the old, Aries’ ‘I am alone in this’ belief for the Aquarian ‘I can be myself with others who I resonate with’.

With Mars squaring Neptune on March 14, the best use of this square energy in the Equinox chart is to stay open to your spiritual insights, using Mars to expand on what you intuit by looking up what symbols are appearing in your dreams and external life. And then learning to integrate them when Mars moves into Cancer. A great example of Mars square Neptune in Pisces is the character of Waymond in Everything, Everywhere All at Once. He’s compassionate, kind, willing to cooperate – he just wants people to stop fighting and to be kind. A spiritual warrior and redeemer.

There is big Aries’ energy in this Equinox chart, with the Sun, Mercury, Jupiter, Chiron and Vesta in Aries. This is good warrior energy, energy to give us courage to look at this ‘emergence’ as a real new beginning for ourselves and the world. This is the virginal energy of the goddess Artemis, which can stand on a frontier and take the risk of crossing over into new terrain.

I always think of Aries as the scouts of the zodiac. They go out alone and find what the tribe needs for food or safety. They recognize the signs before others do. So look for the signs of what you need and follow after until you find what you need. Since Mars is out-of-bounds, meaning it’s outside the normal north-south range of latitude for the Sun, there’s a maverick quality (thank you for this Pam Gregory) to how we might want to approach things. A bit of a rebel, a bit of just following your own path.

Venus is conjunct the Taurus North Node this Equinox, once again telling us, “All you need is Love” to see the truth of our world’s imbalance. Time to let go of our American identity of being ‘consumers’ and begin to take up our work as citizens and stewards of Mother Earth.

The Sabian symbol for the Sun at 1* Aries is: A woman just risen from the sea. A seal is embracing her. This is an image of a new impulse, a new feeling tone arising from the Collective Unconscious. This will be echoed during the Beltane part of the season when Aphrodite becomes our goddess guide. The seal is important in Celtic mythology and comes as the Selkie, or seal woman. This symbolizes our imaginative and creative abilities. When a new feeling life arises, it is accompanied by these qualities.

The Sabian symbol for the Moon at 19* Pisces is: A master instructing his disciple. This speaks to ancient spiritual wisdom being passed down. This is an image of initiation into the mysteries. Coupled with the Sun’s symbol, we are invited to use our intuitive abilities as well our ancient wisdom to guide us through the next year.

The Sabian symbol for Venus and the North Node at 5* Taurus is: A widow at an open grave. This is a great symbol for letting go of the past. And also to recognize that we are part of a natural cycle of birth-growth-flowering-harvest-release-death-rebirth.

The tenor of the chart is a strong energy that wants to push for action. All that Aries energy needs an outlet. The outlet is to Uranus, 45* away from the Equinox Sun. The best way to utilize this Uranian energy is to go out and listen to what the Earth is saying. Listen to your imagination. There is a mystical aspect to this chart with the Moon, Saturn and Neptune anchoring in Pisces, the Moon connecting the Lord of Time and the Lord of Eternity/Timelessness. Focus on what needs to be finished up and how that connects to your new ideas and hopes for this year.

Spring Equinox: The Season of Emergence

The Wheel of the Year keeps spinning. As we leave behind the Winter Solstice/Imbolc season of visioning and head into the Spring Equinox/Beltane season of flowering and new growth, we’ll see what our visions can produce.

 

Persephone ~ Susan Seddon Boulet

 

There are many goddesses we can call on for this season. In many ways, the most important one is Persephone, who returns each Spring from her stay in the Underworld where she is Queen of the Dead. This is emphasized by Ceres, the Roman Demeter and Persephone’s mother, opposite the Equinox Sun. In the Greek myth, at first she is called Kore, the Maiden. While she is out in the fields picking flowers, she is ravished away into the Underworld by Hades, the Greek Pluto, and becomes his bride. She has no name before she is ravished. When she returns in the Spring, she has a name and is a Queen, a woman of power and purpose. We have all gone through the darkness of the past few years, gone into our own private underworlds and hopefully dealt with our Shadows, so when we emerge this Spring, call on Persephone – Spring Maiden and Woman of Power – to help you step into this next part of your story with grace and beauty.

While Persephone epitomizes the returning energy of Spring, she is part of a deeper mystery along with her mother Demeter. You can read about Persephone’s return at my Wisdom Chronicle blog.

The Spring Equinox season includes Beltane, the cross-quarter fire festival that occurs when the Sun reaches 15* Taurus, between May 1 – 6. We’ll call on the great goddess Aphrodite for Beltane, but for these next six weeks, here are a few more Spring goddesses who exemplify the first flowering of the season.

Ostara

Pagans celebrate Spring Equinox as Ostara, the festival of Spring and new beginnings. We get the name Easter from this Anglo-Saxon goddess, Eostre, since so many of our Christian holidays are based on ancient pagan celebrations.

Ostara is the goddess of increasing light and warmth and the balance between light and darkness. Ostara was associated with rabbits, who symbolize fertility. This is Her legend.

 

 

Ostara is the goddess of spring. She is the divine maiden that brings forth the first light of day and springtime. Ostara is responsible for resurrecting the world after winter’s frozen grip has been withdrawn.

She blows the warm winds of springtime over the lands. Fields and trees become green again, and flowers blossom. However, one year, Ostara came a bit too late.

Already feeling a little bit guilty for arriving late, the Goddess Ostara was appalled when the first thing she encountered was a little bird who lay dying on the forest floor, his wings frozen by the snow.

Filled with compassion, Ostara took him as a pet or, as some versions of the tale have it, her lover. Feeling sorry that the poor wingless bird could no longer take flight, she turned him into a snow hare and gave him the ability to run rapidly so he could evade all hunters. Honoring his earlier life as a bird, she also gave him the ability to lay eggs in all the colors of the rainbow.

Eventually, the decision backfired when the goddess became enraged with his numerous affairs. In a fit of anger, she threw him into the skies, where he, unfortunately, landed under the feet of the constellation Orion (the Hunter). He remains there to this day and is known to us as the constellation Lepus (The Hare).

Softening her attitude a bit, Ostara allowed the hare to return to earth once each year to give away his colored eggs to the children attending the Ostara festivals that were held each spring. (https://goddessgift.com/goddesses/ostara/)

This is a goddess who feels compassion, love, jealousy and forgiveness. She is a goddess of fertility and her totem animal is the Rabbit. (Where do you think the Easter Bunny comes from?) In medieval times in Europe, the March hare was seen as a fertility symbol, and a sign of spring. This species of rabbit is nocturnal most of the year, but March is its mating season, and so during March, hares are seen all day long.

Maia

Maia is an ancient Roman Goddess of springtime, warmth, and increase. She causes the plants to grow through Her gentle heat, and the month of May is probably named for her. Her name means "She Who is Great". Through the increasing warmth of Maia's spring season, flowers and plants sprouted and grew.

Flora

 

 

Flora is an ancient Goddess of blossoming plants, especially those that bare fruit. Without Flora, there would be no fruit, no harvest, no honey. In her myth, Flora was a nymph of happy fields. One Spring day while she was roaming meadows of new grass and wildflowers, Zephyr the god of Breezes saw her and fell in love. For her wedding gift he gave her the gift of perpetual Spring. Zephyr filled her garden with every kind of blooming flowers and called her Queen of the Flowers. She was the goddess who scattered seeds of narcissus, hyacinth, violets and more – she scattered the seeds for grains and fruits as well. Honey from her flowers were her gifts.

In Rome, her festival, the Floralia, took place from April 27 to May 3 and was marked with dancing, drinking, and flowers. Her priests released hares and goats, animals of great fertility. Women wore brightly colored clothes to symbolize the variety flowers and garlands in their hair.

Blodewedd

 

 

Blodewedd is a Celtic Spring goddess who was created by the Welsh Bran and the wizard Gwydion with magic from nine spring flowers to be the wife of Llew Llaw. This got around the curse Gwydion’s sister Arianhod had placed upon her son, preventing him from taking a human wife.

Artemis

 

 

Artemis is the Greek goddess of the Moon, sister to Apollo, god of the Sun. She was the divine huntress and the nurturer of young girls before they matured into women. She lived in the wilds and the girls before puberty came to her sanctuaries and were her ‘bear cubs’. They learned to be free and in their bodies, before they were condemned to be married and shut away without any rights. Artemis is the Virgin, the goddess who belongs to herself.

Just as Spring gives birth to so many beautiful and diverse plants and flowers, so too we have many goddesses to choose from. But what they all share in common is the idea of blossoming. The goddesses of emergence help us to get out of our shells and explore the world in new ways.

So have a blessed Equinox, both North and South, and may you blossom so that your harvest is full!

Blessed Be!

Cathy

The Cosmic Story: The Wheel of the Year: Imbolc The Season of Light Returning

 

The Cosmic Story: The Wheel of the Year

Imbolc: The Season of Light Returning

The Seasons of the Earth

Now that Astrology is once again a hot topic, since its popularity does comes and goes through the centuries, most people identify themselves with an astrological sign and its characteristics – I’m a Taurus, you’re an Aquarian, he’s overemotional because he’s a Cancer, she scatters her energy like all Gemini’s.

And so they should. Signs tell us a lot about the character of a person: is he a fire sign like Aries, Leo or Sagittarius? There’s a lot of passion and creativity and energy there. And we all know about the empathic gifts of water signs, the practicality of earth signs and the social skills of air signs.

But most of us don’t think of ourselves in terms of the season of the year we were born into. While the astrological signs are part of the season, they are the heavenly part of the story. The actual Earth seasons, described by the Wheel of the Year, tell us about what’s going on down on Mother Earth – at least in the northern hemisphere – while the Sun moves through those tropical zodiac signs. The season tells us what our earthly energies will be like this lifetime. The Innocence of Spring, the Fertility of Summer, the Knowledge of Autumn, the Secret Wisdom of Winter.

 

Winter Solstice, the season of the rebirth of the Light, holds sway until Spring Equinox, the emergence of the Light. Along with Summer Solstice and Autumn Equinox, these are the major turning points of the seasons. In-between these annual changes of seasons are the cross-quarter holidays of Imbolc (February 2), Beltane (May 1), Lammas (August 1) and Samhain (November 1). They are all fire festivals and they illuminate the end game of the season.

Imbolc is the cross-quarter holiday of the Winter Solstice season. It is celebrated on February 2^nd in the U.S. as Groundhog’s Day or St. Brigid’s Day in Ireland. Astrologically, because of precession, the date is now closer to February 4^th, when the Sun hits the 15* Aquarius power gate. Each cross-quarter holiday occurs at the 15* of a fixed sign, because it is on those days that the shift in the seasons begin to occur.

The Sabian symbol for 15* Aquarius is: Two lovebirds sitting on a fence and singing happily. This power gate calls us to let our soul unite two complementary spiritual (birds) energies to achieve real happiness or bliss. One way to understand this is to let our imagination (right brain) show us our path and to use our rationality (left brain) to help us walk it. 

 

 

The inner light of the unconscious unites with the heavenly light of consciousness to bless our lives. Love is what unites them.

Imbolc is the feast of the returning light. In Ireland, it occurs when the sheep are birthing their lambs and lactating, a sure sign of Spring. You’ll notice that the daylight begins to grow longer quickly now. The Sun has reached a point on its journey back North where it stays visible longer in the sky. And we begin to know that Spring will indeed come again.

Imbolc was called Candlemas by the Catholic Church, a time to bless the candles that the church would use during the coming year. In Ireland, they celebrate St. Brigid’s Day, as she is the Patron Saint of Ireland along with St. Patrick. But in reality, Brigid was a goddess before she was a saint. One of the most important Irish goddesses, such that the Church had to adopt her as their own, since the people would not give her up. We’ll talk more about her below, as she is the Goddess we look to in this later part of the Winter Solstice season.

All the Imbolc festivals are fire festivals. The fires are lit as sympathetic magic to help bring the sunlight back. And with the Light comes vision. So Imbolc is also a visioning timed: doesn’t the groundhog look for his shadow to forecast the return of Spring? Just as we look to see more light at Imbolc, it is also a time to envision the new life that will emerge in the Spring. 

 

So if you are born into the Imbolc season of the year, your purpose is tied in with vision – envisioning the future, nurturing new life, finding your creative talents. These are the gifts of the season to you.

 

 

 

To honor the energy of Imbolc, light some candles and be present to the light. Gaze into the flames, and let images arise within you. Ask for a vision of what your inner child of light wants to do this year. How is the baby of Light growing? What does it need from you to grow strong enough to emerge in the Spring and root into the deep soil of your life?

If you need help, ask the Mother Goddess who helps us grow in this second part of the Winter Solstice season: Brigid, the Gaelic Mary and the foster-mother of Christ. (The Celts placed great value on fostering their children and one’s foster – mother was just as beloved and important as one’s birth mother.)

Brigid, Goddess of Imbolc: How do we work with the Light?

 

 

Since the Winter Solstice is about the re-birth of the Light, the purpose of that season is to nurture and grow that light until it is strong enough to stand on its own. The Goddess energy that works in the Winter Solstice season is the Divine Mother – the birthgiver, the nurturer, the bestower of gifts and talents.

At Winter Solstice, Mother Mary embodies the archetype of the Divine Mother who keeps her child nourished and safe and secure from death. At Imbolc, the Goddess form changes to one of Teacher, Healer and Inspirer. We look now to Brigid, whom the Irish call Muire na nGael or Mary of the Irish. She is called the foster Mother of Christ.

If we acknowledge that the Christ is the part of us that is the Eternal Spirit of the Creator, then Brigid is the Divine Feminine Mother who now takes that spirit and helps shape it into life-giving purpose.

  Brigid (you can read about her here) is the Celtic goddess of the fires of the forge and the hearth, of poetry, healing and childbirth. The name Brigit itself means either ‘Fiery Arrow’, ‘Bright One’, or ‘High One’ in the ancient Celtic language, referring to her solar aspect, as she is a goddess of Light and Flame. She is an ancient image of the solar feminine – from a time before the masculine deities took over the rulership of the Sun and its gift of self-consciousness.

Brigid, Brigit or Brighid (pronounced Breed) is an important Celtic Triple goddess, changing form from Maiden to Mother to Crone. At Imbolc, she comes to us in her Crone aspect and leads us to the inner depths where the Cauldron of Inspiration waits for our gaze to seek a vision. When we emerge, Brigid comes with us as the Maiden, renewed once again. She is the Mother of our spiritual birth, when we recognize our soul’s gifts and potentials and purpose.

 

 

Brigid is the patroness of poetry, healing and smith craft, all different ways humans use the creative fires of life with practical and inspired wisdom. As a solar deity Her attributes are light, inspiration and all skills associated with the creative fire, especially the fiery power of inner healing and vital energy.

What area of life calls to you? Looking at the astrological houses and their meanings are a template, is it a year to concentrate on yourself, on your talents, on your family, on your work? Or perhaps it’s about friendships or partnerships, about deep intimacy or a time of silent reflection.

Let Brigid’s fire light your way through the remaining dark.

Astrological Happenings in Imbolc’s Season

Imbolc Chart

I heard a song the other day – it sang “the future ain't what we thought it was no more.” After a quiet laugh, I stopped and thought how true it is. Our future isn’t going to be what we thought it would be.

We all sense that our world is at a turning point in our history. Our technology has made us ONE World. Our next lesson, coming in the next two years as Saturn travels through Pisces, is to learn to be ONE heart that cares for all of us – people, animals and Mother Nature. The crisis and change of heart will most probably come through climate change, since it will be Mother Earth who has to set things back in balance. But She needs human beings to do our part in stopping the continued destruction of our environment, as well as helping Her heal. What can you offer to help heal? 

 

A quick look at the chart for Imbolc (when the Sun gets to 15* Aquarius) tells us that this is going to be a busy six weeks, with all the angles in cardinal, initiating signs. With a Libra ascendant, it’s all about relationships and balance. Our society needs to learn courtesy again. Cancer on the mid-heaven tells us that our homes, our families, our soulful needs have to be foremost in our sights. With Aries on the descendant, we have to learn to be ourselves with others, to know our boundaries without shutting down to others.

The Aquarius Sun exactly squaring Uranus in Taurus is certainly another wake up call to us concerning the state of Mother Earth and our civilization. Why can’t we bring our collective awareness concerning Mother Earth to the forefront of our political awareness, instead of unjustified moral outrage at what … people being free to be who they are? Aquarius is the rebel, the freedom-fighter. Uranus is Prometheus, bringing fire from heaven to humans.

The Moon in Cancer is opposite Pluto in the last degrees of Capricorn before it enters Aquarius for the first time on March 23^rd. Our emotional needs must be met – we have to stop the politics and get back to common sense and take care of our world and each other. Saturn in Aquarius is hidden from the Cancer Moon, so we have to make an effort to put those emotional needs in terms the collective can understand and accept.

Venus in Pisces squares Mars as he moves ahead again in Gemini. Since Venus is exalted in Pisces, she’s sure to charm Mars into slowing down and thinking about what she really wants him to do now. Jupiter is back in Aries, and is once again beginning his twelve years journey around the zodiac. Change is on the menu this year – or at least the beginnings of change – with both Saturn and Pluto moving into new signs this Spring.

 

There are astrological signs of real change coming over the course of the next few years. While we’ll be dealing with the dying rattles of patriarchy for a few more years as Pluto finishes up his business in Capricorn, we’ll also be honing our vision for the future: Pluto enters Aquarius for the first time since 1778-1798 CE on March 23, 2023 and will travel back and forth over the Capricorn/ Aquarius cusp from 2023-2024.

As an archetypal energy of the power of evolution, Pluto finally settles into the sign of Aquarius in 2025, hopefully signaling a renewed vision of the Age of Aquarius, rather than the End Times story of patriarchal religions (Capricorn) that is unconsciously feeding the crisis of our times. (See my book, Wisdom’s Daughters, for a summary of these End Times beliefs.)

 

 

Saturn is moving out of Aquarius and into Pisces on March 7, 2023, shifting our reality to the deep needs of the Collective Unconscious – the deep needs of Life. We have been exploring the deep divide over beliefs and mindsets on Planet Earth for the past five years during Saturn’s journey through both his homes in Capricorn and Aquarius. Saturn conjuncting Pluto in Capricorn in early 2020 set the stage for the massive change (or social experiment of Covid) the world went through in these past few years.

Saturn has been in Aquarius since December 2020 when it teamed up with Jupiter in early Aquarius. Aquarius is a fixed AIR sign, an energy which gathers together collective thoughts and beliefs, and as we have seen with Saturn there, makes everyone stubborn about seeing the other side of the story. Aquarius’ shadow is judgment, which is different from having a well thought-out opinion. So look to see if you’re judging or just expressing your opinion.

When Saturn moves into Pisces on March 7^th, he will be staying in Jupiter/Neptune’s home waters until mid-February 2026. No longer in his own comfort zones (Saturn rules both Capricorn and Aquarius), Saturn, the reality principle and ruler of our Root Chakra, will have to ground us into those watery depths.

But what does it mean to us if our root chakra/reality is grounded in the watery depths of Pisces? It can be a time of inner turmoil and delusions, or it can be a time of great spiritual awakenings. It’s a question I’ll explore in my next newsletter on this big planetary move in the next month.

Pisces/ the Collective Unconscious/ the World Soul is a vast realm, a place that isn’t material like the Earth plane, but more like the Celtic Otherworld, a different dimension that holds the imaginal/emotional/spiritual energies of the Earth. This is where we all share in life. It’s where we are ONE.

 

 

Carl G. Jung call the Collective Unconscious a second psychic system within each of us, deeper than our personal unconscious which contains our personal (this lifetime’s) memories, experiences, complexes and trauma. The collective unconscious has a collective, universal and impersonal nature which all of us inherit. This is the realm of the archetypes, our psychic DNA, the pre-existent forms which make us human.

Jung also said that the Aquarian Age would be an age where the waters of the Unconscious will be poured out and renewed, a time when we make the archetypal energies of life conscious. 

 

 

The Collective Unconscious could also be called the Anima Mundi, the World Soul of Mother Earth. It contains all human archetypes and experiences, most especially all those things which the collective society rejects and denies. It holds the fear and terror of war, rape, abuse, cruelty and domination, and it also holds their opposites – peace, love, concern, kindness and communal well being. So it holds humanity’s hope for a better world – a world in which we no longer go to war to settle arguments, where we care for our elders and children, for our mothers and fathers. Where all genders, races and beliefs are accepted and respected. Where human beings are allowed to BE themselves and do what they incarnated here to do – pursuing life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

We will probably experience the watery, mysterious powers of the unconscious in some form – psychic hits, telepathic communications, dreams, visions – as well as being imprisoned on our own worst paranoid delusions. We can get lost in the watery realm of the Collective Unconscious, so it is important to learn to understand what you are seeing and experiencing instead of putting a label on it right away. Carl Jung spent years trying to map this vast realm, and his theory of archetypes came from those explorations.

Neptune will be moving through the last degrees of Pisces while Saturn travels through it for the next two years. That will add some magic and mystery to the process, since Neptune is the ruler of Pisces, and the energy of the wild, erratic, powerful forces of the Deep. Neptune will leave Pisces for good (2012 - 2026) in early 2026, after moving back and forth over 0* Aries, the Alpha point of the Zodiac, through 2024-2025. (As you can see, these next few years will be unsettled in many ways.) 

 

 

Neptune will settle into Aries and meet up with Saturn at 1* Aries in mid-February 2026, right after a total solar eclipse at 29* Aquarius. (Did our collective consciousness get the message?) These two very different energies will bring the dreams of the lost values and hopes of our collective unconscious into the beginning of manifestation.

While we wait, this is the time to ‘cry for a vision’. So hone your imagination (Neptune) and get disciplined (Saturn) concerning your work. The world of 2026 awaits us all! 

 

 Cause the future ain’t going to be what we thought no more!

Carl Jung says in the prologue of Memories, Dreams and Reflections, “My life is a story of the self-realization of the unconscious.” Each of us has that same ability to learn the symbolic language of the unconscious, which is the voice of the imagination. It’s time to listen to what wisdom it has to offer us. This is how we re-connect with Mother Earth’s inner-net. This is how to get through the hard times ahead for our world. Our rational minds have got us into this mess. We need our imaginal minds to give us the information that will heal us and heal Mother Earth.

What part of the collective dream are each of us called to bring forth? It’s not going to be tied to our patriarchal values of money, work and success. The new dream will be something else entirely.

This year as a great time to relate to the archetype of the Fool from Tarot. The Fool sets off on his life adventure with an innocent heart and a fearless attitude. He packs his tools (values, attitudes, beliefs) in his sack, brings his dog companion along for company and instincts, and is prepared to step off a cliff to find that new dream. But he’s so much more than that. He is our ability with dance with life, to see and experience what’s before him. 

 

 

One of my favorite authors is Charles Williams, a friend of C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien. He wrote stories about supernatural powers breaking in on everyday life for good or evil. His book, The Greater Trumps, is about the original Tarot pack and a magical table with all the tarot figures moving with each other on invisible lines of energy. The mystery of the table is that the Fool is the only figure that doesn’t move. That is, until someone with spiritual vision sees the Fool dancing with all the figures. The Fool is immovable yet moving, the unseen cause of all the rest of life’s energies.

The Fool’s fluid state is probably the best one to emulate as we move through these next few transitional years. Keep an open mind, an innocent heart and a clear vision of how much better life can be when we change our collective values from individualism, consumerism and competition to community, creativity and happiness.

Buckle up, because the future ain’t gonna be what we thought it was no more.

Happy Imbolc. Life’s energies are rising again. May Brigid’s bright blessing shine to light your way.

Cathy

 

 

Prayer to Brigid on Imbolc

Sacred light in the darkest night

Our beacon in the cold of winter

Our guide to the dawning of spring

We hold vigil on this sacred day

Welcoming the Goddess Brigid

Welcoming the return of the sun

Asking for protection and abundance

To our hearth, our homes, our fields, and family

On this night and every night thereafter

Bless us Brigid, the keeper of the flame