The Cosmic Story: Beltane and the Taurus/Scorpio Lunar Eclipse 2023

 

The Wheel of the Year: Beltane

The Spring winds are still blowing swift and cool, but the Sun is warming the air, rain is falling, coaxing the forsythia, daffodils, tulips and azaleas to blossom. The trees are already unfurling their green leaves or opening up their blossoms.

The Wheel of the Year has moved six-weeks further into the New Year, grounding in the season of Spring. The Spring Equinox winds have given way to Beltane’s beauty.

Beltane arrives in the middle of Taurus, officially on May1^st but astrologically when the Sun hits 15* Taurus, which is on May 5^th this year. May 5^th is also the Scorpio Full Moon lunar eclipse, which occurs a few minutes before the Sun hits 15*. So like the first Aries New Moon which occurred the day after Spring Equinox, we have a major alignment of the new season with the lunar cycle, and an eclipsed lunar cycle at that.

This all points to major shifts and changes during this flowering Beltane season. Since Beltane ushers in a season of growing warmth, color, light, fragrance, beauty and sensual energy, don’t fight it! Let your body feel the energies rising, and listen to what it tells you about life. That’s what Beltane’s gift to us is. To experience the pure beauty of life, whether in a flower or a child, in a beloved animal companion or a friend or lover.

It’s time to experience the enchantment of life as Nature comes awake again, because this is the energy that will fuel us through the rest of the year. Aphrodite, who is the goddess to call on this Beltane season (May 5 – June 21), is the enchantment that radiates from things and beings and enraptures the senses with its smile. This is the way to experience the beauty and charm of this season of Beltane: a time of flowering and extraordinary growth as Nature slowly unfurls herself, trailing beauty wherever she goes.

 

 

Beltane is a magical time, when the veils between the worlds are thin (as they are at the opposite gateway of Samhain), and the powers of life return to us (for more on Beltane). The more open you are, in your body, your mind, your heart and your imagination, the more you will gain from this bountiful season. When we align ourselves to Earth’s biosphere, we align with her energy and her purpose. Right now, as Spring is grounded in, her energies of life and growth and passion are strong and growing. And they are available to us – if we attune to them.

Beltane occurs while the Sun rises through the signs of Taurus and Gemini. Fixed sign Taurus is the time of embodiment. Mother Earth takes the fiery life energy of Aries’ Sun and uses it to create Nature’s bounty. In a slow, sensuous dance, Sun in Taurus adorns Mother Earth in beauty, warmth and fragrance, grounding in life. When the light grows as the Sun rises even higher North in the sign of Gemini, the rhythm of life quickens and life spreads out and thickens. Vines grow longer, fruits start to emerge, flowers blossom in profusion. People and animals go out into the light and mingle. The light urges us to connect and communicate, to explore and to be curious.

Gemini is a mutable sign, a liminal time of transition between the season of Spring Equinox and the season of Summer Solstice. By the end of this Beltane season, we will have come halfway around the Wheel of the Year, from the birth of the Light at Winter Solstice, to the full Moon fullness of that Light at Summer Solstice.

While our world seems to be in crisis, (out of chaos a new form arises) the best thing each of us can do is learn to take care of ourselves, so we can help others in the future. A good way to do this is to learn to ‘know yourself’ (journaling, therapy, astrology, meditating) and then to attune to Mother Earth and her seasons. When we ground into the cycles of nature, we learn to understand how to live in balance with nature and ourselves.

So stay true to the season (although down in the southern hemisphere, you’re celebrating the Dark and Samhain), and celebrate life. Life returning in beauty and freshness.

Aphrodite, Goddess of Beltane

Aphrodite the earth-born Kore is also sea born, as becomes an island Queen, but more than any other goddess she becomes Ourania, the Heavenly One. . . She is the only goddess who in passing to the upper air yet kept life and reality. . . .As man advanced in knowledge and in control over nature, the mystery and the godhead of things natural faded into science. Only the mystery of life, and love that begets life, remained, intimately realized and utterly unexplained; hence Aphrodite keeps her godhead to the end.

I’ve been working on my book on Aphrodite, the Solar Feminine goddess who initiates our souls to help us discover what we love and are here to create. So I’m excited to share some of what I’ve learned about this ancient and powerful Goddess. And why Aphrodite is the Goddess to call on to guide us through this beautiful season of embodiment and growth.

In earlier Athenian myths, Aphrodite was called Aphrodite Urania, the eldest of the Fates. This is the heavenly Aphrodite, the one who speaks to us about the Cosmos, daughter of Uranus, the god of Cosmic Laws. In most ancient cultures, there is a trinity of goddesses who control our individual fate – the Spinner, the Alloter and the Unturnable/Death. Our modern culture tries to forget that we all have a Fate, but we’re beginning to remember that we all have something unique to add to life, perhaps laid out in our natal birth charts.

 

 

If Aphrodite is an older version of this archetype of Fate, then love must be an intrical part of working out our fates here on Earth. For Aphrodite is the Goddess of Love, of Connection and of our body’s Wisdom. These are the tools of Fate - that we find ourselves through love, through our connections to people and animals, and most especially through our inner Wisdom. If Free Will also asks us to accept our Fate – to meet what comes to us in the best possible way, rather than rejecting what comes-- then honoring Aphrodite and her gifts might make that acceptance sweeter and easier to deal with. Love and beauty, truth and great sex can do that!

Aphrodite of the Greeks, Venus of the Romans, is one of the most vibrant archetypal images of the Goddess that has come down to us from antiquity; the aspect of the ancient Goddess that was never totally forgotten, the form of the Goddess written about and romanticized down through the ages until She truly embodied 'the mystery of life, and love that ‘begets life'.

Aphrodite is the Goddess who combines the spiritual and natural worlds, spirit and body. She does this through Her essence. She embodies the energy of connection, for She brings everything into relationship, from electrons to people. As Goddess of Beauty, she connects us to Truth, which is the ultimate reality because Beauty is the true reality of a person or thing. She is the Goddess of Love, love that is rooted in the body and which is playful, sensual, and erotic. As Goddess of Sexuality, she engenders all physically passionate love: non-marital and marital, heterosexual and homosexual. As Goddess of Wholeness, she drives our individuation and awakens Psyche within us.

She is Aphrodite Ourania, Queen of Heaven, who was in the Beginning and who created all the worlds. She is that spiritual Love we call compassion, the love which unites us in our humanity and makes us all One. She is the Wisdom that teaches us greater consciousness, in her role as Soul/Psyche’s initiator. Her energies fill us with longing to connect with ourselves, with others, and to create Life!

What makes Aphrodite fascinating is that she is liminal. Liminal means pertaining to a threshold, a boundary. What this means is that Aphrodite bridges physical reality and metaphysical belief. She opens us to our imaginations and our inner visions and then generates the passion to manifest our intentions.

Aphrodite is also the flower maiden, for her sacred space is a garden, where we work with nature to create beauty, pleasure and peace. Aphrodite brings together the wild and the tame to open us to the wonders of life, just as she unites people and animals in the pleasures of sexual union.

Starhawk wrote that Beltane is a time when ‘sweet desire weds wild delight’. This is Aphrodite’s gift to us as Spring deepens and blossoms. While Spring is a time of youth and innocence, each year we can become young again if we let ourselves merge with these energies. We just have to take Aphrodite’s bath and renew our virginity, our wholeness and our bliss. So let Aphrodite guide you for the next six weeks. Take delight in the sights, sounds and smells of Mother Earth renewing life and let your own body be renewed.

Friday is Aphrodite/Venus’ day. Take time to delight in life each week!

Natalie Merchant has just written a song about Aphrodite where she calls on her for help.  This is another aspect of Aphrodite -- she helps those of us who ask!

The Astrology of Beltane’s Season: May-June 2023

Taurus is the fixed Earth sign of the zodiac. It roots in the new energies of the year. It is the sign of embodiment and when the Sun moves through Taurus (here in the northern hemisphere) our senses wake up after a long winter’s sleep. This is the time to give form to, nurture and develop the vision that has been percolating within us since Imbolc (February 2).

As our senses awaken, we look at the pleasures that life affords us. Massages, delicious foods, fragrances, beautiful fabrics and art fill us with possibilities of enjoyment. Think of the Tarot card of The Empress – she who fills the land with abundance and beauty. This is the power of Taurus – to build, to shape, to make the Garden. This leads to Taurus also ruling over material resources, wealth, security and contentment. 

 

We just had a solar eclipse on April 20^th at 29* Aries, a critical degree of completion, linked to the Taurus North Node. This second Aries New Moon shifted the lunar cycle so that for the next 18 months or so, the Full Moon in a sign will come before the New Moon. This shift gives us a different perspective on our lives, crossing from one sign to the next within a cycle.

That solar eclipse was squared by Pluto at 1* Aquarius, pushing us to evolve our relationship to Earth and each other. Here in the US, if corporations can be protected under the law as ‘individuals’, Mother Earth should also get that right as She already has in other countries.

We’ll be feeling this solar eclipse energy for the next year as Pluto moves back and forth between Capricorn and Aquarius, hitting 29* Capricorn squaring the 29* Aries Solar Eclipse. What new energies do you want to cultivate since Aries is the sign of new beginnings. If you have planets at the end of a cardinal sign or the beginning of a fixed sign, you’ll be dealing with power – either your own or others.

Speaking of Pluto. Pluto turns retrograde on May 1^st our official Beltane, and will back up into Capricorn again on June 11^th to continue to deconstruct the old framework of our world’s governing structures since Pluto entered Capricorn in 2008. We now have a bookend for its time in Capricorn – another bank failure. Let’s see if it’s dealt with differently. Hopefully, things are changing. Look at old patterns that you take for granted and know that by 2024, things will probably look different. Change is evolution, and that’s what Pluto brings us.

2023-2024 are transition years as Pluto returns to Aquarius on January 24, 2024 until September 2, 2024, when it will return for its last look at Capricorn (during the U.S. presidential election) before heading into Aquarius for good on November 20, 2024 until January 20, 2044. Hopefully, Pluto in Aquarius will unite us as we deal with the most important issues our world faces – climate change, freedom and equality and peace.

Taurus-Scorpio Lunar Eclipse, May 5, 2023

 

 

This Lunar Eclipse in Scorpio/Taurus is a South Node Eclipse, so watch for things in your life to come to a completion. All Full Moons are about a culmination, but with the South Node in Scorpio, this is about shedding old skins, letting go of a past cycle and moving on from past traumas. Understand what the trauma was about, and work to heal it now. Look for old secrets, deep wounds, compulsive patterns. What habits and patterns do you need to move away from? 

 

 

This Lunar Eclipse is especially potent as it occurs on the power gate of 15* Taurus, Solar Beltane, with the Sun conjunct Uranus, the planet of change and awakening. When we let go of something, we need to fill that empty space with something new or else the old patterns creep back in. To help you fill in the blanks, go out into Nature and feel your body. Work to release any toxins your body is dealing with. Clean out and give your body a break. Awaken to your senses and connect to Mother Earth’s energies. Uranus in Taurus opens us to revelations about our embodiment, so let this energy help create new patterns and behaviors. Also, expect the unexpected, especially if this Lunar Eclipse aspects any of your natal planets. It’s hitting my Sun/Venus conjunction in Taurus, and I’m paying attention!

This is also the Buddha Full Moon, Vesak, when the Buddha was born, achieved enlightenment under the Bodhi tree and later died. The fact that this Full Moon engages the energies of both groundedness and transformation tells us a lot about how we can be spiritual beings having a human experience. What the Buddha taught us is that our culture and all its trappings are just that. Traps that do not nourish our soul’s essence. Once we can step away from all those made-up desires that our culture offers us, we can find our own wholeness. 

 

Mercury went retrograde on April 21 at this same 15* Taurus and will conjunct the Sun on May 1^st, so our mind knows that it’s time to listen to our body as well as listen to the Earth. Taurus is the sign of our foundation, our grounding. As the old world collapses, it’s a great time to take back our authority. At the Lunar Eclipse, Mercury conjuncts the asteroid Vesta, our inner priestess who guards our fire, our energy and our creativity. Taurus rules money and resources, so think about money and finances and how these issues might change for you. Put some cash aside. Find new ways to deal with the details of life before we head into the summer. This Mercury retrograde has been all about the details. Mercury turns direct on May 14^th at 6* Taurus.

Jupiter at 25* Aries just conjuncted Eris on April 23^rd, the dwarf planet who is the warrior of the heart. It’s time to fight injustice and not be afraid to follow your heart. Jupiter will be finishing up its time in Aries and will go into Taurus on May 16 for a year – going retrograde at this same 15* Taurus of solar Beltane and the Scorpio Lunar Eclipse on September 4^th. So Taurus will be highlighted for the year, and since Jupiter expands whatever it touches, we’ll be dealing with issues of beauty, nature, money and resources.

Jupiter in Aries squares Mars in Cancer at this lunar eclipse. Mars is the ruling planet of this Scorpio Lunar Eclipse (along with Pluto) as well as Aries, so where have you neglected to take care of your body, your family, your sources of nourishment for body, mind and Spirit? Jupiter expands things, so watch out for Mars anger, especially around family and self-care issues. Cancer is the sign of our soul, what makes us uniquely ourselves. Don’t be afraid to stand up for yourself now.

Venus, the ruler of Taurus, is in the last few degrees of Gemini, opposite the Galactic Center. It also squares Neptune in Pisces, opening us to other dimensions of reality. What do you need to communicate and to whom? What are you listening to? What is your truth? What do you really love? Venus, like her sister Aphrodite, rules beauty, love, money, the Arts and our inner Wisdom. In Gemini, she likes to talk and explore and satisfy her curiosity. See who and what you link up with in the next week.

Venus leaves Gemini for Cancer on May 7^th, where she’ll stay until June 5^th, when she enters Leo. She is an Evening Star now, but once she enters Leo, she will quickly descend in the evening sky and disappear for 15-23 days in the glare of the Sun before she re-emerges as a Morning Star. Venus goes retrograde on July 22, 2023 at 28* Leo and will turn direct at 13* Leo on September 3^rd and will finally leave Leo on October 8^th. As you can see, Venus retrograde lets Venus linger in Leo for four months, where she’ll spark your creativity and sense of play.

Venus in Leo is warmhearted, generous and playful and just wants to express herself in many ways. Girls just want to have fun! She is the Queen and enjoys her pleasures and her power. This is the time to honor our solar Feminine nature. More on this in my Summer Solstice newsletter.

There’s a Taurus New Moon on May 19^th at 28*25’ just a few days before the Sun enters Gemini on May 21^st. Gemini is a mutable sign, a transitional time between late Spring and early Summer. Gemini is ruled by Mercury, which will move out of Taurus and into Gemini on June 11^th, just an hour after Pluto moves back into Capricorn, forming a trine with the planet of evolution. Can you see a pattern here? It’s time to change how we think about our lives and our world. As the early feminists found out, the personal is political. If we want a better world, we have to step up, speak out and do something about it. Once you know what is important to you, you will want to make sure that those governing us don’t take away our rights.

Saturn turns retrograde at 8* Pisces on June 17^th until November 4^th. It’s a great time to ground in your spiritual practices this summer.

This is a time to relax and enjoy life. Even in the midst of chaos. Ground into yourself with breath-work, meditation, some form of qi gong or yoga. Relax and enjoy the Garden!

Blessed Be!

Cathy

In beauty I walk
With beauty before me I walk
With beauty behind me I walk
With beauty above me I walk
With beauty around me I walk
It has become beauty again

Navajo Blessing Way

The Cosmic Story: May & the Divine Feminine Taurus Lunar Eclipse & Mercury Retrograde

 The Cosmic Story For May 2022

The Romans worshiped the Goddess Flora, the flower maiden, in May. For them, May was the time to blossom, just as the Earth was blossoming. Flora was a nymph who became the bride of Zephyr, the god of breezes. As a wedding gift, he gave her the gift of Spring and the Garden. (As usual with patriarchal re-tellings, it is the god’s gift to Flora, instead of recognizing that Flora, blossoming, is the growth aspect of Mother Earth, who also sends the gentle breezes of Spring to awaken that blossoming. In reality, they work together. Equal partners in creating the awakening of new life. Sort of like pregnancy being caused by a penis.)

 

Flora

Like the cross-quarter holiday of Beltane (May 1-5), May is a time of wild delight, innocent wonder and open sensuality. Our senses come alive as the fragrant blossoms open to the Sun. In May, we are bathed in beauty – our sight is filled with vibrant rainbow colors, our smell is intoxicated by the heady fragrance of lilac, hyacinth and rose, our touch by the feel of the Sun’s warmth and soft breezes on our skins, and our hearing by the sounds of birds, insects and leaves filling our heads with the music of life. My heart is always blown open by the sheer beauty all around me in May here in Rhode Island. But then again, I’m a Taurus. A May baby. I incarnated to embody that season’s beauty.

 

 

The Romans honored Maia and the Bona Dea/ Earth Mother in the beginning of May. This time of blossoming was also allotted to girls who were just coming into their sexuality and womanhood, the new beginning which promised them growth and change. But I know all women feel this awakening to life, no matter what our ages. It is the Goddess’ call to us to continually create and grow. As the goddess of flowers, Flora invites us to make flower garlands and crowns to adorn ourselves with the scents and beauty of the Goddess herself.

May and the sign of Taurus exemplify the light-filled side of the Divine Feminine (her dark side manifests in the opposite sign of Scorpio, for She is all things, all possibilities, all mystery) – its beauty, its sensuality and its ability to manifest life. Out of the divine spark of Aries’ fire, Taurus takes that energy and manifests it into something tangible, beautiful and life-giving.

In its truest form, Taurus is The Garden – the earthly paradise that our planet once was. And still could be.

 

 

For the most part, humanity experiences the Earth as a Mother Goddess – the One who carries us as we grow, the One who nurtures us, the One who clothes us in our human body. And the One who takes us to our final rest. Most surely, She is the One who embodies Home.

Just so is the quantum field – for it is the most subtle form of Mother Earth – the place where manifestation begins. And so we see the energy we call ‘the Divine Feminine’ as the foundation of the universe. We see it in the Tarot card The World, as the Woman dancing in the snake of time.

The Divine Feminine is not just our physical world. She is the Source of mystery and life, love and wisdom, our soul and its power to manifest. She is the ground of our being. The foundation and cosmic laws of Life.

She has been called many names, for she is Maia, the Magic/Illusion of the world that keeps us from seeing the Cosmic Unity. In fact, She is Life in all its many forms. She is the Goddess with 10,000 names because She is Matter that knows she is also Spirit. She is the mirror of our self-reflection, helping us see who we are. She becomes illusion when we don’t listen to our souls but rather to collective, rigid beliefs.

In Hinduism, Maya is illusion, a veiling of the true, unitary Self—the Cosmic Spirit also known as Brahman. The illusion these religions warn us about are the societal rules and perspective we each live in. Maya is what entices us into life so we get the experience we incarnated for. It’s how we respond to the experiences that make them an illusion, which are meant to trap us. When we see past the illusion, we get past the societal traps, and see ourselves clearly. Then Maya comes alive with the beauty of deeper experiences and lessons. The Buddha had to remember all his past lives before he became an Enlightened One under the Bodhi Tree at the Scorpio Full Moon of May.

In the I Ching, the second hexagram (although some feel this used to be the First) is the sacred Yin energy of life The Receptive. The feminine is open and allowing. It is also the source of Yang energy, since masculine doing is the externalization of feminine being. This is the energy of the Quantum field, the place where creation begins.

It’s interesting, and practical, that the Romans also got cautious by mid-May and knew that ‘lemures’ and other night stalkers could hurt the newly blossoming growth. Birth is always a dangerous time and new growth must be cultivated tenderly.

These ‘lemures’ are our shadows, our old unconscious behaviors that kill off new life and growth. We’ll see this at the Scorpio Lunar Eclipse – a perfect time to look deeply at who we are – our shadows, our fears, our gifts and our desires. Watch that you don’t cut off the new feelings and visions that want to live this year by shutting down that new life.

Mercury retrograde: May 10 – June 3, 2022

Shedding superficiality for self-assurance,

and mediocrity for authenticity.

Our dear traveling companion, Mercury/The Mind, is once again turning retrograde on May 10^th. With so much going on in the world, I’m sure most of our minds are spinning. So why not take a break? Instead of looking outside for ‘the news’ why not turn your attention inside yourself and see what you really think about the past few years. To really blossom this May, look at what happened from a deeper perspective, hold on to the lessons learned and then let it go.

 

 

According to The Gene Keys by Richard Rudd (a system that unites your astrology chart with the I Ching), Mercury goes retrograde at the 20^th Gene Key – The Sacred Om. This retrograde is a call to re-align ourselves with the sacred sound of the Universe. This entails a change of frequency. While we have measured Earth frequency and reproduced it, it’s always best to just go stand/sit/lay on Mother Earth and let yourself get tuned.

The shadow quality of this hexagram is superficiality – an apt description of so much of our cultural conversations and the media. But all too often also a description of our society. One of the lessons we’re being asked to learn this Mercury retrograde is to recognize our shadow behaviors that keep us living superficially, so we can step into the light of our own decisions, our own visions, our own purpose. It’s time to own who we are. And rejoice in it.

The war playing out in Ukraine is happening all over the world. How lucky we are that most of us don’t have to physically fight in a war for our liberty. The old dominator/patriarchal/corporate culture is trying to stop a new world from being born: a world focused on freedom, on diversity, on community, on creativity, on peace. A world in balance, where both Yin & Yang, Feminine & Masculine Spirit are valued equally. Isn’t it time to stand up for what we value? It is the season of Taurus, after all. Taurus asks us to find out what is of value to us and work at it and refine it.

In America and the West, perhaps liberty comes from not engaging in what is expected of us. Freedom comes from putting time into the things and experiences we value (a Taurus trait) rather than shopping (a patriarchal twisting of value and self-worth). One need we all share is our need to value Mother Earth, not only because our lives depend on Her, which they do, but because we are part of Her and of each other. This is our home. Why are we killing ourselves?

What creative options can we come up with to live differently, to enjoy life more, to engage in community? First we have to change our minds – change our perspectives so that we can see ourselves clearly – see what’s important to us. We need to look from the inside out – from the inner feminine knowing of heart and gut that knows what we long for.

The conjunctions between Neptune, Jupiter, Venus and Mars in Pisces this past month opened us to our collective unconscious needs and desires. Those waters are still stirring. While you wait to see what life brings you this year, ask yourself important questions. What is important to me? What do women desire most? What are men willing to do to preserve life rather than kill it? What can I do to make this beautiful world a better place to live in? How can I take up my stewardship of Mother Earth?

If we can hear the Sacred Om in everything (Maya – May), we can change the Story.

So what is it that Mercury is going back to reclaim? Mercury travels from 5* Gemini back to 27* Taurus. This is Gene Kay #8: The Diamond of the Self. This is the point where we either choose mediocrity or our own unique wildness and freedom. If we embrace who we are without fear, if we choose life’s adventure instead of a fake security (see how the money keeps disappearing), we can bring this back to Mercury’s original purpose – to know the truth, to speak the truth, to vibrate to the sacred OM.

Mercury retrograde occurs on May 10, 2002 at 4:48am PDT/ 7:48am EDT/ 12:48pm GMT. 

 

 

This chart is interesting because the only planet Mercury aspects (just before it turns retrograde) is the Virgo Moon. This shows us a mind at odds with the plans of the heart. It makes sense, since this retrograde is all about deciding what is important to us.

The other interesting thing going on is that Aries Venus is inconjunct the Virgo Moon. They can’t see each other’s point of view. Venus in Aries wants to fight NOW. Moon in Virgo wants to make a plan. Venus might be too impatient to wait for Virgo’s plans to take shape. But to make wise choices, we’ll need to be patient (Mercury is retrograde!) and make sure our hearts are clear.

Pluto, which just turned retrograde April 29^th, is in an easy aspect with Neptune, Jupiter and Mars in Pisces. As it retrogrades back to the second hit of the US Pluto return, can we take the concerns of the world’s suffering seriously? Can we leave behind the old divisive wars (so many of which use religion as an excuse), and see that we’re all in this together? Time will tell.

The Pisces trio is also in an easy flow with Uranus, Sun and North Node in Taurus, feeding our soul’s hopes and dreams into the new world we’re building for ourselves and hopefully for the world. While at the same time, Saturn in Aquarius is squaring the nodes, once again questioning us about our desires. Are we fearfully clinging to the Old or will we take the risk to embrace the New?

Scorpio-Taurus total Lunar Eclipse, May 15-16, 2022

The Scorpio Full Moon total lunar eclipse occurs on Sunday and Monday, May 15-16, at 9:14pm PDT/ 12:14am EDT/ 5:14am GMT.

 

 

This is a total Lunar Eclipse because the Sun and Moon are quite close to the Nodes. The eclipse is expected to last about 85 minutes. This total eclipse is central, meaning the moon passes centrally through the axis of Earth's dark (umbral) shadow. This is also a super moon, meaning the Moon is orbiting close to the Earth. The eclipse lasts from around 9:30pm to 1:55am EDT, with totality occurring from 11:30 pm EDT to 12:30am EDT, with maximum totality at 12:14am EDT.

The Taurus/Scorpio axis of the zodiac energizes our search for values, for what is worthy of our attention, for what is needed for growth. Both feminine signs, Taurus adds the earth element while Scorpio adds the water. These two signs are concerned with growth – both our physical and emotional growth, which depends on us living up to our values and knowing our worth.

While the Taurus Sun has been dancing on a daring edge with Uranus, Scorpio’s deep waters have been stirred up by the tumultuous energies moving through Pisces. Perhaps if we truly see how it is our culture that creates the traumas we’ve all been through, maybe we can share our grief over those emotional wounds and forgive ourselves for incurring them. And let it all go! While Taurus wants to grow our lives and experiences, Scorpio wants to release emotional pain what no longer serves life so we can grow.

The Full Moon of May/Taurus is also called the Buddha Moon, because it was under the Scorpio Full Moon that Siddhartha achieved enlightenment and became The Awakened One. (I had to bitch for a moment – our superficial culture has even taken this most important aspect of spiritual growth – to awaken to our divinity – and turned it into ‘being woke’.)

 

This Full Moon deepens our need to polish the Diamond of the Self. If we can do it properly, we will be clear about our goals and desires. The eclipsed Moon will need to work with the idea of compromise – how we continually compromise our beliefs and values by not standing up for them. By working at jobs that don’t nourish our souls. By living without a sense of personal freedom. By being too afraid to really love another. By never developing our imaginations or seeing our own uniqueness.

This is our opportunity to look at those shadow qualities that keep us in our ruts, that stop our growth and leave us dissatisfied with life. We’ve allowed a killing society to shape how we live our lives. This is a good time to break free and rediscover how you want to live your life.

At its best, this lunar eclipse calls us to become a driving force for humanity, to bring something new and vital into the world. When we do, it has the power to attract others, who can help us with the birth. It is time to create something in our lives that can help us blossom.

Saturn in Aquarius squares this Full Moon as well as the Nodes, so we get another challenge to choose between the Old vs the New. What possibilities will help us create a new reality? Saturn is probably part of your shadow. Look to your natal Saturn to see what might be holding you back from freedom.

Mars is about to conjunct Neptune in Pisces, both in a helpful relationship to this Lunar Eclipse, so be prepared to start acting on what Spirit has been telling you. Jupiter leaves Pisces on May 10^th after Mercury goes retrograde, adding some passion for action to our self-reflection. And giving us many new opportunities to search for our new identity.

Venus has just danced with Chiron in Aries, so I know she’s feeling healed and self-confident to meet the demands of this eclipse, since she is the guardian planet of Taurus. She’s in charge, and it feels like Chiron was mentoring her on her self-worth, especially after hearing how the conservative judges on the US Supreme Court are about to take away women’s right to an abortion. And yet these people allow their children to be trained in the military as killers, so we know this is not about murder and death. This is about control. Our Aries Venus is not going to stand for it. But she has to remember to have a plan.

It’s always easier to make changes when you connect with the cosmic energies operating at the time. These times are enlivened by many big changing energies. It’s time to fasten your seatbelts – the ride is going to be rocky for the rest of the year.

(There’s a Taurus/Scorpio total Lunar Eclipse on the U.S. Election Day – it should be interesting!)

Blessings of the Season

Cathy 

 

Matins II (excerpt)

I arise today

Blessed by all things,
Wings of breath,
Delight of eyes,
Wonder of whisper,
Intimacy of touch,
Eternity of soul,
Urgency of thought,
Miracle of health,
Embrace of God.

May I live this day.

~ John O"Donohue ~

(Eternal Echoes)