the weather inside me

mercury direct= unspooling your brain

Mercury is direct today and finally moving away from Pluto. Finally. I mean, those two were too tight for nearly a week there. (Someone cue, The Weight...)

Does this mean all your plans on hold are now ready to go? Not exactly.

The first week of February Mercury finally makes it back to the point where it went retrograde on Boxing Day. Until then let your brain gently unspool from this retrograde. We've just passed through a mighty tight astro period, so don't go at "what it all means" with too heavy an agenda. What it all means will sort itself and show itself over the next few weeks. At least you should have a few ideas by mid-February when Mercury has passed the North Node (future ideas), and then finally connects with Aquarius (the sign of people you do yer stuff with).

Need to mend fences with someone?

You might make some progress after Jupiter arrives in Pisces on the 17/18th. Jupiter in Pisces is a lovely grace note, but Mars is still retrograde in Leo, so don't be surprised (or offended) if your peace offering is only half-accepted. If you're dealing with a self-aware or "conscious" person, you'll probably get somewhere with your negotiations, even if it's an indefinite conclusion. But if you're dealing with your average "unconscious" and defensive character, be prepared for some degree of ego blowback. Real dialogue requires two people willing to engage openly about their legitimate needs --emotional and physical. Mars in retrograde seems to play into defensive behavior, so don't ask for a fight if you're not looking for one. Stay away from hassels. Mid-March may loosen up your negotiating potential, so if you can let sleeping egos lie until then, do.

You've got better things to do: stick with refurbishing your own brain and looking for new opportunities. There's something in that gestalt pattern you created these past three weeks. Go play with the possibilities.

a special january eclipse week note to Capricorns/Capricorn Rising

If you're a Capricorn or Cap rising --be kind to yourself right now. Really.

You so easily dog yourself about what you have/have not done on the road to success (whatever that road is to you), but this week don't indulge that stuff. Instead this is a good week to think hard about liking yourself for the right reasons, and deciding what sort of leadership you truly want to give to the world.

You like being seen doing the "right thing," whether that's promptly sending thank you cards or knowing the company vision statement by heart. You don't see yourself as a complete suck-up to the job because like all cardinal signs, you've got an independent, self-starting streak within you. You prefer to think you decided what the right thing is. It just so happens that your version of "right" has an air of long tradition hanging around it, which might sound to some folks an awful like like "status quo". But is it?

Just because something is time-honored doesn't make it bad, you think. You have no problem with time. I am here to ask you about "honor" though. Specifically, I want to ask you "what's worth honoring?"

Now is the time to rethink what the "right thing" is in your life. If you are more honest with yourself, you'll admit you're too often driven by an authority or voice of authority outside yourself. What is this authority you revere --or fear? Your boss, your friends, your perceived reputation, your family faith? Pick one --or two or three. 

You want an accumulation of worth and you definitely want the esteem of others, but someone else seems to be defining that worth. What are you working towards? 10 million frequent flier points on your credit card? Another company recognition plaque on the office wall? An "appropriate" partner for that next marriage/project/committee? What is it? There's some delectable fruit you're after; I know because every Capricorn is always working toward something.

Working towards something implies we're also working away from something. For many of you that something is a fear that keeps you in constant motion toward your goals. Maybe you had a hard childhood; maybe you once knew poverty; maybe you lost a parent at an early age; maybe you grew up in an emotionally hostile/cold/or enmeshed family. Whatever it is, it's the fear that that monstrous memory coming back to you that pushes you out, away and up into some kind of carefully controlled (and I mean controlled) need for civility and accomplishment combined. No more chaos and crazy people, you vow. (Nope, those folks are getting side-lined quicker these days.) Like Scarlett O'Hara, herself, you vow you'll never go hungry again.

And no more fear of rejection. Ah, the fear of rejection: your very painful achilles ouchy spot. You know exactly what I mean.

Perhaps this is an expression of Capricorn's fishy side: the symbol of the climber is also has a tail of a fish. The fish within you vibes more like Pisces: it's the trembling, sensitive, secretive and (potentially) spiritual side of you. Do you remember the last time you stunned a friend who discovered your secret passion for crop circles? That stash of weed --or your tarot collection? "I had no idea you were into this stuff! I mean, I thought you were so straight." Uh, yeah... Your fishy secret self is also the side of you prone to (self) deceptive illusions. Exhibit A: Tiger Woods, the Capricorn of the hour and control freak extraordinaire. If you want to be an illusionist, take care. All Caps have some weird side, and so do you. Pluto, however, has a way of outing your weirdness. Digging in the basement, so to speak. Some honesty may be necessary if you haven't found some peace between your goat (climber) and fish (dreamer) halves.

With Mercury still in retrograde in your sign of Capricorn, take some time right now to think about who --or what- exactly is driving your ambition. And your fears of ambition. What is your ouchy spot, anyway? Are you self-medicating that spot with shopping and power grabs? Or maybe hitting the hooch a little too hard? Or have you buried your brain between the pages of Harlequin Romances?

This week as we prepare for a solar eclipse in your sign, the Sun, Venus and the North Node are clustered together in Capricorn, too. All are pressing you forward toward a more authentic expression of your leadership potential. Which means, you've got a really good opportunity this week --and I mean a really, really good opportunity-- to tune into what's attracting you to your future. With all these signs in your sign (or rising sign) the attraction signals should be coming from you.

Tune into yourself and listen deeply to your own heart. What is the most noble and life-affirming leadership you can offer? --First, to yourself, and then to others. You've got stuff in there that bears no resemblance to the rat-race, corporate/parental authority kow-towing you've known for most of your life.

Capricorn is the sign of revolutionaries. That's an amazing thought because most everyone has written you off as pretty uptight in these tell-all, happy-clappy Facebooking times. But you know, stuff doesn't change without someone with backbone in charge. Real change requires people who commit to long-term visions. That, Cappy, you've got in spades --long term vision.

So be the one with backbone. Be the one with vision for the long-haul. Just make sure the revolution you're starting is your own heart's fire; don't settle for anything less.

january 2010 solar eclipse week, pt. 1

This is an interesting week, for sure.

• We have a solar eclipse at 25+ degrees Capricorn on the 15th.
• Mercury is stationing most of the week at 5+ Capricorn.
• Mercury will go direct on the 15th.
• Jupiter will ingress Pisces on the 17th.

Okay, so this feels like a lot like a Rip Van Winkle tale --time distortion, old man involved, and someone re-emerging on the other side of the distortion with an altered identity and an adamant belief in something that could only be a fairy tale.

Is that right? Only a fairy tale?

I suppose astrology is mostly fairy tale to the modern mind. We might have serious students of Klingon language and folks who prefer to live on Endor, but they're tolerated as dreamers and romantics of a sort. Astrology fits in that category, too. Except when it's practitioners insist that something happens to all of us when Jupiter ingresses Pisces.

Astrology happens to us pretty much like weather happens to us, and our part in the matter is to decide how to respond. Yes, I'm a dreamer and a romantic of a sort, but Capricorn that I am, I get a little (a lot) nervous if I don't work with the tangible "real" world, too. So if I'm going to talk about this week, I want to talk about anchoring the events of the week into something you'll really use.

So here's today's useful eclipse week advice:

We are still in a dark moon phase, right now in Sagittarius, which is swell. Dark moons are typically draggy and murky, emotionally, but today I'm feeling pretty sanguine. And well, what d'ya know? The moon's in Sagittarius --until tomorrow night, when it ingresses Capricorn and triggers that Aries Point that's so active these days.

• Maybe finally make another draft of those New Year's Resolutions, with a hard look at the beliefs behind those resolutions. (Remember Mars in Leo, retrograde, is giving us time in the "backstage" of our ego structures to sort a few things out.) Certainly after that lunar eclipse over the New Year, you've gotten a clue or two about false feelings or out-dated beliefs/habits.
• Take out the recycling and the old clothes. Don't freak over this and suddenly think you've got to go on campaign; just give yourself 15 minutes to cull and then stop. Then actually shove the stuff into your vehicle and get it off to the Goodwill shop.
• Unless you've got a religious reason for it, pack up any left-over Christmas decorations and be done with them this week.
• Don't make any big decisions or permanent judgments until next week, at the very least. All the facts are NOT in.

Pretty simple, eh?

mercury into capricorn

Mercury moves into Capricorn today, squaring the Aries Point, and will pair up with Pluto on the same degree (2+ Capricorn) December 7th. Thus beginneth the Capricorn season.

We'll have about ten weeks of Capricorn thinking this year: Mercury goes retrograde the day after Christmas (aka Boxing Day) and then resumes its forward path January 15th where it will remain in Capricorn until February 10th. Ten weeks. Whew.

Soon each of the personal planets (Mercury, Venus, the Sun and the Moon) will pass by Sir Pluto, pushing all our dear Cappy friends into new realms of selfhood. We Cappys are such Nervous Nellies and Pluto sitting in our sign for the next fourteen years will no doubt make us or break us, so be kind to our neuroses this holiday season. 

On the other hand, if you get rebuffed by a Cap, don't take it too hard. If they feel anything like me, they are so not into your games these days. Whatever games they are. Doesn't matter. Was having a laugh at myself after I realized Mercury had already moved into Capricorn because today I've noticed the shift in my approach to others right now: if you've got a serious offer or a legitimate/thoughtful plan, we'll talk; otherwise, I've got better things to do --and one of 'em is not you.

I know, hard core.

Still, there's that fishy/mystic interior life that Caps work so hard to hide. But with Mars still in Leo and Mercury now in your own house, any opportunity for self-expression won't go unnoticed these days. In fact, if you're a creative Cappy, I imagine these would be pretty fertile times for you.

So welcome, Mercury.

Sculpture: Max Ernst, "Capricorn" (1964).

Mercury Retrograde October 2009: The Epilogue

Mid-October will definitely bring new opportunity for acting on your recent insights. This is because in the second week Mercury will square off against Pluto and oppose the Aries Point.

The Aries Point = where what's personal meets the public --or vise versa.

If the AP is new to you, here's a basic introduction. What happens on an Aries Point event is usually something "out there" that comes home to you.  Usually this meeting isn't a collision, but there's always a possibility of hard adjustments. No, usually the Aries Point works more like a ripple effect in play. Something out there rolls it's way back into your personal life, or back into your head. Think Micheal Jackson's death this summer --an Aries Point event, sure as sure. Or legislation passing that will affect your personal life (health care, fer'insance). On a far great scale of impact and importance (at least in political and social terms) was the September 11th Aries Point events.

Does an Aries Point event always point to death and destruction? No, no, no. However, we can never forget that AP events always carry the seed of wider influence. In other words, whatever you choose to think or do does not stay in Vegas. This could be the birth of an idea that positively transforms your company's whole culture, or it could be the revelation of your shoddy bookkeeping that brings down the whole company. Positive or negative, AP events always connect us by merging the public with the private.

So here's my thematic take on the upcoming AP aspect in Mid-October: What is the power within your mind?

• How do you want your ideas to utterly transform your world?
• How are messages you tell yourself creating the environment you find yourself in?
• Or the people you want to be with?

You will be thinking about your relationship to the people around you. You will be thinking (or reacting) to the power or authority you perceive in the people around you. (This is the Pluto part.)

• What ideas (assumptions) do you bring to these people?
• And where are these assumptions leading you?
• Got any ideas about how you'd like to lay a better foundation for yourself in these relationships?

If you've been doing your homework during the Mercury Retrograde (and shadow) phase, I bet you'll have clearer answers to this questions. Just a head's up.

Photo: Precog chamber from Minority Report.

mercury direct! (yes, you must still think before you speak.)

Here's Mystic Medusa's take, which has some wise and fun advice:

Merry Mercury Direct & now, well, things go faster and there should be heaps less of that mixed-messaging style confusion but as I say, Mercury Retrograde purists don’t count it as DONE until Mercury gets back to six degrees of Libra, the point at where it went Retro in the first place. How I Think This Works: The contracts signing being a bad idea, shit breaking down, crazy Freudian slippage and all that stuff is done once Mercury is Direct. But dialogue from as far back as mid-August still has a while to play out. There will be further developments on any important dialogue in that time. Or reversals. Weirdings. Revelations. Secrets. You get the idea. Particularly when Mercury Squares Pluto again for the third time in a row on October 11.

Mercury's turn direct is next door to Saturn, both planets still in the sign of Virgo. So steady on, folks. Saturn doesn't reward fluffery, and Mercury is still working out the details. So still a good time to lay down solid tracks for your next project/venture/personal development scheme. In fact, not much else will work these days.

moon in capricorn: get real

Sweet Earth Flying (mp3)

The Moon entered Capricorn today. As I write this, it's just crossed Pluto, so if you're wondering why the obssessions and fixations today, wonder no longer. With Pluto at 0+ degrees Capricorn and the Moon crossing it's path, it's natural to feel like someone pulled your large intestine into your mouth. It's that deep.

Compounding this gut-twisting scene is the Sun in Libra at a sharp angle to both Pluto and the Moon. I've been writing a lot about Libra lately (and will continue to do so as Saturn heads into this sign), so you probably already know Libra's penchant for balancing ideas through balanced relationships. But Libra's dynamic is hardly as tidy as that sentence suggests.

As Micheal Lutin puts its, Libra's dilemma is the eternal "who's on top and who's on bottom?" question. In other words, Libra's dilemma is about power. In our culture, it's usually expressed this way: who you're gonna screw, or who's gonna screw you? Libra runs the gamut from one end to the other, trying strategy after strategy, skipping from glittering ideal solution to glittering ideal solution, attempting to work this out in his head, and thus missing the whole point.

And that point is? Find the fulcrum of that mental see-saw. Find the meeting place. Find the cooperative vision, the consensus that balances. Libra searches always for the ideal, hoping that with just a little tweak here or there, they'll find it. But it's not to be found in some outward bound adventure; it's always to be found in the mundane meeting of common ground.

Enter a Capricorn Moon alongside Pluto, hauling Reality in on a caravan of 18-wheel Peterbuilts. You want relationship? You want compromise? You want to find that balance that helps us all cooperating and get on with the work of recovering this crazy financial mess? You got it.

Just take a look at today's news. Talk about finally accepting reality: the G8 finally acknowledges a decade old truth and becomes the G20, bringing China, India and other huge developing economies on board; and Iran's bad-faith relationship with the rest of world worsened with the revelation of an underground nuclear development facility. Get real. (I would talk about the UN, but the closest thing to real going on there are the Survivaballs protests. Check out Planet Waves for this truly sharp and funny protest.)

On the other hand, Libra and Capricorn can pull out some really elegant moments together. There's nothing untoward or ugly about these two; they vibe with the need for elegant and functional design in all that they do.

Capricorn Moon is also not just about getting in the office for a weekend work jag. Cap Moons have a soulfulness that's not usually acknowledged: they remind us to work out our "salvation" brick by brick. Salvation has little to do with someone plucking your burning butt from the fires of your own bad decisions, and a lot to do with acknowledging why you built those fires in the first place. The rest is learning to love yourself. Pluto, wherever it is, gives us profound transformative power to do that. The engine is there, folks. And the will is available, too, if you want to grab it.

Consider this weekend a reminder it can be done. If Survivaballs can float down the Hudson River and get a chuckle from CNN; if the G8 can consent to letting some dark skinned folk into their club, then it can be done... It can be done.

Just for fun, here are the dates when Pluto was last at 0 degrees Capricorn. If you've been paying attention, you may see them as milemarkers along the route of your current personal evolution:

• May 2008
• November 2008
• August/September 2009 (turned direct September 12th)

Pluto will square off against some Libran themes for the rest of '09 and into '10, but it won't pass by this exact degree again until 2254. Thus, this is the end of the preliminary push into your new life. What are you slowly letting go of these days? What are you inviting (or thinking of inviting) into your life?

But..we've got less than a week left of Mercury in retrograde (plus another week or so of a lingering shadow phase), so you're still free to rethink your new self and play around with what you'd like that self to be.

Just remember, getting "real" is the key. No giving out blue ribbons to every runner just because it makes us all feel better about ourselves. If you really work for your good vibes, Pluto is totally on your side now.

moon in cancer this weekend: coffee and quiet confidences

The Moon will oppose Pluto all weekend, so take time to note the deep insights that can float to the surface of your thoughts and emotions this weekend.

I say "can" because this is totally possible, but not usually pleasurable. With Pluto in the mix we're likely to feel something discomforting about our insights.

Discomfort is something we tend to ignore or treat away, like a headache. But like a headache is usually the body's first signal that something is out of order, emotional discomfort is usually a signal that something within us needs an adjustment, too. It's not that our emotions are "wrong," but that they may point to a deeper discomfort hidden beneath the clutter of our daily to-dos and amusements/distractions. As a culture we are trained (and sometimes even rewarded) for ignoring this pain. Instead we pop the emo-aspirin and turn on Iron Chef or the Steelers game and fogettadboutit.

Word of warning: if you're ignoring your darker or more painful emotional side, you may just encounter that issue through another person this weekend. So heads up if you think someone else isn't handling their "business" well this weekend. It might be a clue about the way you handle your own emotions.

The Moon is also squaring Mercury retrograde in Libra and Uranus in Pisces. If you're a daring soul this is a dynamic set-up for revelation and compassionate/spiritual breakthrough about personal power in relationships.

I, for one, am having an abundance of thoughts on the subject of ambition. There's plenty of dark power in that topic. Lots about who's on top and who's on the bottom, and who has to give what to whom --for what? It's absolutely uncomfortable, but I'm rethinking many of my assumptions about ambition. And the first stage was simply acknowledging I even HAD assumptions.

If you feel a little like taking a retreat from the world for this deep thought Moon, by all means, do. Really. This is a feeling opportunity, and it's so difficult to sort our own feelings when we're entangled in the emotions of (even well-meaning) friends and family. Remember Pluto's in the mix, and the planet just turned direct. Pluto does have a habit of pulling up buried stuff. So if your psyche hands you that lump of coal in your heart, remember that lump that has all the potential of becoming a diamond of great beauty. That's also the power of Pluto in its current sign, Capricorn.

And if you happen to ponder all this alongside a slice of double dark chocolate cake and a cup of good coffee, do not feel ashamed. After all, this is a Cancer Moon. Enjoy.

Photo: millianda.com

moon in gemini: time for your inner twin!

Gemini, the sign of the twins, is known as a bit of a trickster. He likes games of wit and loves to tease, and well, if there's two sides to be found on any point, he'll advocate them both. It's not that he's incapable of discrimination it's just that he's constitutionally incapable of leaving any detail out of his toy box of ideas. And they key word here is toys. Ideas are playthings!

Occasionally he forgets the details and assigns them instead to his invisible friend --The Inner Twin. Watch now as the Gemini Inner Twin asks the corespondents at The Daily Show about the Trickster's favorite gimmick --lying.

From September 10-12 the moon will be in Gemini, which could keep your communications life lively while we motor through this Mercury Retrograde period. Inner Twins on the loose everywhere.

You want my advice? Double and triple read instructions; check your Target receipts twice for over-rings (always a good idea); don't believe the first thing someone tells you --fact check it; and don't assume all the details are in or all the facts are on the table. Have a talk with your own Inner Twin on the truthiness of your own motives. Play mind games extra responsibly.

If you're an ethical play pal now, Momma will let you have an extra big slice of chocolate cake when the Moon slips into Cancer Saturday afternoon. Promise.