Julie Simmons 9/22/22 Julie Simmons 9/22/22

Insights for Libra

September 22
Sun enters Libra: 09:03 PM EDT

Libra reminds us of the rules of engagement: How we write contracts, how we go to war: What is acceptable when you are trying to kill or steal. it's absolutely as ludicrous as it sounds. Yet Libra asks us to be civilized, to use our ability to reason, a faculty of air. Consider the oxymoron of the notion of a “Civil War”. And we are all too familiar with how love can turn to hate when there are disagreements over shared resources.
Libra is represented by the scales, a human-made object, unlike all the other signs of the zodiac. It will never give up this notion of civil society. What it needs to give up is the notion that it is reasonable to fight for peace as well as the cloak of passive aggression which it often dons to protect itself. As the world grapples with rather massive issues of inequity we are reminded at this Equinox (when day and night are perfectly balanced) that balance happens. It is possible. We might consider our own contributions and struggles regarding civil society. Libra loves harmony and has a strong affinity for the arts. If the struggles seem too enormous you might consult with the Great Artist; the creator of this place we live and consider for a moment how natural beauty inspires art, restoring balance to the soul and inspiring us to live together in more harmonious ways.

As the Sun journeys through Libra it will oppose Jupiter, trine Saturn and Mars, square Pluto as well as conjunct Venus. Today and tomorrow, it conjuncts Mercury at the midpoint of its retrograde journey. A good time to listen (for the still, small voice), if you have ears to hear.

September 23

Mercury retrograde, conjunct the Sun

If we navigate by the stars we understand that some days might be better for some things than others. Today we might listen for the heartbeat of the new season as we contemplate the harvest of the one that has ended. It's like finding that space between inhaling and exhaling; vast and spacious as eternity yet lasting only an instant, ever-present, fleeting, ephemeral, your whole life long.

September 24
Venus opposite Neptune

Maybe, instead of “dreaming big” as the cheerleaders of the day suggest, we should just dream and listen to the guidance they so generously provide.

September 25
New Moon: 02 degrees Libra: 01:55 PM EDT

This New Moon opposes Jupiter for a day or two suggesting a time to confront, challenge or perhaps collide with, all assumptions; yours as well as other folks. This may take a couple of days. Once you're done wrangling, make an intention to carry with you throughout the lunar month.

September 26

Venus trine Pluto, conjunct Mercury (still retrograde)

Sun opposite Jupiter

Everything you cannot control is not the enemy. It may require surrender which is often nothing more than accepting reality. This is not the same as capitulation. There is no white flag to wave at the moment. We have come far and away from nature which includes our own nature. Time for a reset which might take until October 6th. Then again it may take forever. Aligning ourselves with this notion empowers us. Resistance is futile and scary.

September 27

Mercury trine Pluto

There is a drum beat in the mind this week, a persistence of what some call “earworms”. It may be intermittent yet repetitive and unwelcome. Perhaps is a call to some kind of prayer or awareness. Maybe like a drum these persistent rhythms carry messages. Possibly they arise spontaneously from the dark matter of the body itself; that mysterious, vulnerable, soft animal that accompanies us everywhere and all the time and reminds us without ceasing that we are one and the same as nature. What we do to Nature, we do to ourselves. This seems to be Mercury's message as it stations direct during the next week. We can all benefit from paying it some mind.

September 28

Mars trine Saturn

Be resolute, not defensive or belligerent as you stand by your ideals. Respect is a powerful agent of change.

September 29
Venus enters Libra

Unlike the Sun in Libra, Venus is at home here. I like to think of what art and justice have in common when considering Venus in Libra. Maybe justice seems blind to us because it has come so far from the notion of beauty which of course is not good for the soul. To truly understand this we have two separate beauty from glamor. Deprived of beauty, we become criminals.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9498.Beauty

October 1
Venus opposite Jupiter

Co-operation, co-llaboration, co-mpetition, co-nsideration. It's all interactive. Nobody is here alone. Co-nnection requires negotiation.

October 2
Mercury stationery direct

The dragonfly with its gossamer wings alights on your book, on your thigh, only to take off once it has solved the riddle of what you are or are not. If you learned anything about the nature of embodied existence while Mercury was retrograde: How close, how vulnerable, how immanent, how utterly real it is, then you are ready to put it into practice. Walk the talk; even in this crazy mixed-up world. Especially since September 27th when Mercury trined Pluto and as it does again as it stations direct.

October 6
Mercury trine Pluto

This is the last trine for a while. You could say that this completes the lessons (for now) regarding the ever-present manifestation of the soul of Nature in everything, always. Class dismissed. Time to go out into the world with all you have learned. (If you're not sure what you learned while Mercury was retrograde, take stock of what hurt, what you had to clean, fix heal or organize. Nature manifests through every living thing, every lived experience and the most mundane events. If only we could understand this. Every living thing is a teacher, including you and me.)

October 7

Sun opposite Chiron

Where does your greatest wisdom come from? is it from the screaming screen, streaming information or might it be from the loves and losses of your lived experience?

October 8

Pluto stationery direct

There is a gathering of energies happening, a winding up for the pitch. Hopefully your aim is true. Hope is a tricky thing; most useful when we stand on the solid ground of what we might call reality. This IS actually, IT! For me I feel this most intensely when I accept the rabbit hole that I happen to be down at any given moment. What we think of as reality can change shape in an instant.

October 9
Full Moon: 16 degrees Aries: 04:56 PM EDT

These people with whom you are sharing your current space/time continuum are a perfect reflection of something you can't see about yourself except through the relationship with another. Maybe it's not even someone you know.

October 10

Venus opposite Chiron

Mercury enters Libra

What if all relationships are about love? Even the contentious ones: Even the ones we meet in court. What if before we signed on the dotted line love was the glue that would make it stick?

October 11

Sun trine Saturn

Step up to all agreements, with love, yes, but also with a sense of what is and is not possible. someone needs to be the grown up around here.

October 12

Mercury opposite Pluto

How's it going in the agreements/disagreements department? Now is not the time to be afraid of pointing out injustice or inequity.

October 14
Venus trine Saturn

When you love someone or something there is no question that your energy, time and money are worthwhile investments. Today is a good time to evaluate if your attachments deserve your love and possibly, just how much is enough?

October 18

Venus trine Mars

Which of your good ideas are socially cohesive? Who shares your perspective? We build our world through these connections.

October 19

Sun trine Pluto

Mercury opposite Chiron

If, like Groucho, you would not want to be a member of a club that would have you as a member it’s time to look around and notice if the people who share your ideas are actually people you like to associate with. If the two things don’t jive it might be time for a new perspective. Even if they do it seems a good time to let go of that which no longer serves your purpose.

October 20

Venus Square Pluto

Yesterday's themes persist: Time to let go or change some fundamental assumption.

October 22

if “hell is other people”https://1000wordphilosophy.com/2021/02/08/hell-is-other-people/#:~:text=%E2%80%9CHell%20is%20other%20people%E2%80%9D%20is,are%20essentially%20fraught%20with%20conflict.

then “what's a heaven for”?

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43745/andrea-del-sarto

A day to consider how we might live together on this planet. Start with the ones closest at hand.

Julie Simmons 8/22/22 Julie Simmons 8/22/22

Insights for Virgo

As the World Turns

These insights, are meant as contemplations. Astrology invites the muse. I offer them in the hope that you will reshape and fashion them into something of your own. Follow the links, where you find them for further musings on the planetary aspects.

Mercury will be retrograde on September 9th. To learn more about aligning with this energies join us here.

August 22nd
Sun enters Virgo: 11:37 PM EDT
Mercury trine Pluto
Don't even try to get it right. It’s not your fault that the wind rises and throws you off course just as you were almost there in your little boat. Or maybe that the Sun leaves you in the dark just as you thought you saw something. Maybe time itself is the issue. Things look so different in your twenties than in your 40s or 60s or 80s. And then there are those pesky planets, never in the same place twice, writing messages you can't quite decipher in the sky like dreams, always subject to interpretation, changing all the time. Mercury tells us to dig deep, not to worry about getting there but to put more energy into being there. Living is a process. Mostly it requires us to participate, to show up. All we can bring is what we have.
These are things to remember this month as the Sun squares Mars at the New Moon and trines Uranus at the Full Moon. It will oppose Neptune and trine Pluto toward the end of its journey through Virgo.

August 24th
Venus trine Chiron
Activate your noble heart. See if there's something good you can do for someone in distress (even if it’s you). Trauma and drama are good friends. Generosity eases the way.

August 25th
Mercury enters Libra
Here is a suggestion to be reasonable, to listen to the other person, to debate and if we must, to argue. Mercury will go retrograde in Libra reminding us all to measure twice and cut once.

August 27th
Venus Square Uranus
Sun Square Mars
New Moon: 4° Virgo at 4:17 AM EDT
None of the keys fit the locks today. We either ‘break and enter’ which isn't really that great or we consider other options. Not 'either/or', not even 'both/and' but something radically different. If you're wanting to make an intention keep in mind that, most likely, whatever it is, it isn't.

August 28th
Venus opposite Saturn
Once again and not for the last time, we are reminded of the rock and the hard place theme of ’21 and ‘22. The frustration of not getting nearly as far as we thought we could or should or would is alive and well. Have a serious talk with yourself or someone you love and trust. Debate the pros and cons of progress.

September 1st
Mars sextile Jupiter
A good day for warriors of all sorts to take on the enemy within. Imagine you are abundantly wise, at least as wise as Yoda or Marcus Aurelius who said,

“Dwell on the beauty of life. Watch the stars, and see yourself running with them.” And “The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts.”

September 2nd
Mercury opposite Jupiter
If everything is possible then there is bound to be conflict regarding which possibility is best. The sooner we abandon the ‘my way or the highway’ world the better.

September 5th
Venus enter Virgo
We don't wake up from the dream we wake up in the dream and we’re awake because we know we’re awake not because the dream disappears.

September 9th
Mercury stationary retrograde
Such a fuss we make when Mercury goes retrograde. As if we can only expect that we will cross wires, misunderstand each other and lose things. The gods, whatever they are, don't control us. Mercury retrograde is an invitation to listen, to pay attention, to let go in the sense that you don't have to be in control although you might have to accomplish things. This Mercury is retrograde in Libra. Opposing Jupiter 9 days later. What I find most interesting is that when it goes direct in October it will be essentially squaring the Mars station later in the month. Put it all together and it says something about thinking before we act; considering options; allowing for differences of perspective. What kind of power does information and the distracted wings it travels on have over you?

September 10th
Full Moon: 17° Pisces: 5:59 AM EDT
Once again we might consider that the challenge is not to wake up FROM the dream but to wake up IN the dream: The dream of life, yours and mine.

September 11th
Sun trine Uranus
The Full Moon continues to shed light. Look for every opportunity to awaken, to see something from a different point of view, to understand that you can't understand everything and you don't.

September 16th
Venus Square Mars
Sun opposite Neptune
Attachment, aversion and craving are on the loose in the worst way. Unless of course we remain still and listen to the swirl of desire and the longings of the soul. Then there's no telling what can happen.

September 17th
Mars sextile Chiron
Having managed to sail through the whirlpool and not hit the rocks (assuming that you didn't hit the rocks) now would be a good time to think about what you learned. And even if you did smash up against the rocks it still would be a good time for that.

September 18th
Mercury opposite Jupiter
Sun trine Pluto.
If you have something to say to someone in particular make sure that you're on solid ground before you speak.

September 20th
Venus trine Uranus
The last day of summer. What kind of arbitrary measurement do you use to measure time? Do you see time as pages on a calendar, tearing off one at a time or maybe a giant Ferris wheel circling around; always the same always different. Maybe like the poet says,

The stars and planets are my abacus

and the moon and sun are my zero and one

but both fluid and interchanging

Rearranging constantly.

Julie Simmons 7/22/22 Julie Simmons 7/22/22

Insights for Leo

July 22
Sun enters Leo: 04:06 PM EDT

Who can say? Maybe God really was a Leo. Maybe the world was created in the Age of Leo. Maybe history really began when humans discovered the golden light of the Sun buried deep within the earth. Fanciful speculations: As useful as angels on the head of a pin.
Leo reminds us of the power of heat and light, the unique gift of fire which humans may have indeed stolen from the gods and used for our own ends. Fire cooks and burns. Warms and destroys. Leo reminds us, at best, of courage, confidence and the great gold of a loving heart. We believe that ‘love’s the only engine of survival’ .
Leo is also the will. That part of us that wants ‘absolute control over every living soul’. This love that we believe in doesn’t keep bombs from falling or children from starving. It hasn’t kept the climatic thermostat from rising. It hasn’t protected the trees. There are an infinite number of possible futures, they say. Yet we feel the closing of options. It’s impossible to sort. We could keep it simple and explore more graspable Leo things such as creativity, self-expression and the way the Sun radiates light and heat no matter what we get up to down below. We might even offer gratitude to the beauty of Sun rises and sets. We could do something to help the children.
As the Sun journeys through Leo it will square Uranus and oppose Saturn (10th – 14th of August), reminding us of the ‘rock and the hard place’ theme of 2021- 2022. Standing in our frustrations we might also consider the wisdom that ‘this too shall pass’ as the Sun trines Jupiter and Chiron (July 30 – August 8) promising change and the possibility of the kind of joy that comes from wisdom. (see specific dates below)

July 23
Mercury trine Jupiter
Have a little fun. Be creative. Play your favorite sport. Take a risk. Fall in love. Seize the day! Live forever if only for a moment.

July 25
Venus square Jupiter
If there can be too much of a good thing it would be today. Exceeding good fortune can easily slip through your fingers. Enough is as good as a feast.

July 26
Mercury square Mars
That which refuses to move or change is best regarded with curiosity. Never attempt to teach a pig to sing; it wastes your time and only annoys the pig.

July 27
Mercury trine Chiron
The wisdom of the benefits of not biting the hook is obvious today.

July 28
New Moon: 05 degrees Leo: 01:55 PM EDT
Jupiter stationery retrograde
Mercury square Uranus
Today’s we could practice getting out of our own way by accepting our glorious uniqueness without making ourselves out to be more precious than another living thing. It’s an idea whose time has come and it’s a lot easier to agree with it than it is to actually live it. To make this our point of origin for all intentions this month helps us live with true self-esteem and confidence.

July 31
Mercury opposite Saturn
Venus square Chiron
Sun trine Jupiter
What happened to time? Some days it seems to be consumed by an unfriendly and invisible force. We all have our theories, no doubt. Meet this challenge with an open heart with confidence in your intuition. The practice of radical self-acceptance makes it possible even when it isn’t easy!

August 1
Mars conjunct Uranus
Explosive tensions can be chaotic but the possibility of real change is up close and personal as well.

August 2
Venus sextile Mars and Uranus
The opportunity that knocks may be a one-time offer. You can tell if it’s good if it’s grounded and sustains (your) life.

August 4
Mercury enters Virgo
Time to put newly aquired skills into practice. If the markets are full of food consider how you might preserve some for winter. You might dry or freeze things. If you’re more adventuresome you could learn how to preserve things in jars. If you’ve never done this before, all the better. You have so much to learn! Mercury isn’t always a trickster. In Virgo it loves us to be clever in ways that keep us healthy.

August 7
Venus trine Neptune
Mars square Saturn
Dreams take us to a world of possibility: A beautiful and just world which we believe, deep inside, is possible. Reality offers circumstances which require that we work hard for what we want. It presents us with a shovel and demands that we dig. Dreams uplift, reality grounds. Grace and gravity are a perfect pair just like above and below. Some see them as contrasting others as complementing, which is to say they perfect each other. Your choice.

August 8
Sun trine Chiron
In your exact situation, what would a wise person do? The greatest wisdom generally comes from direct experience. We don’t forget these lessons. Life is the teacher, we are the students. One person’s wisdom can be another person’s frustration. Stay in your own lane, on your own path for this one.

August 9
Venus opposite Pluto
The painful clash between what we want and the consequences of having it are clear. The ‘us and them-ness’ of trying to work this out is all too familiar and needs to transform. It falls to those of us, alive and aware, to do the work of this necessary shift in perspective. If we refuse the ‘us and them’ position how can we manage our challenges? Start where you are. Remind yourself of all that you value. Listen to the body. Accept what you hear. Respect the power of Life in all its diverse forms. The Great Mother loves all her children equally. The Crown of Creation belongs to Her, not us.

August 10-11
Full Moon: 19 degrees Aquarius 09:35 PM EDT
Sun square Uranus
Venus enters Leo
Mars sextile Neptune
The frustration of a willing heart in a time of overwhelming change is felt by many. We are living in a time when ‘things seem to slide in all directions’ and the center isn’t quite holding. The wisdom of our poet who said, “Love’s the only engine of survival” makes more, not less sense. Doing what love requires can’t be wrong.

August 14
Sun opposite Saturn
Mars trine Pluto
If we’ve learned one thing in these years of the rock and the hard places as well as ‘real things’, it might be this: If it’s in the way, it is the way. Saturn likes that. Circumstance is the most powerful teacher especially if the student is willing. That’s us. To be empowered by this kind of wisdom equips us for the situations we encounter. These are our times.

August 16
Mercury trine Uranus
There are times that call for innovation which is not the same as the relentless pressure of progress. We won’t get where we are going by simply leaning in and pushing through. A wiser approach might be to use our tool making abilities and repurpose as much as we can in an effort to inhabit the world in an embodied way. We are physical beings.

August 18
Venus trine Jupiter
Inspiration, creativity: Head first. Every creative risk is a birth.

August 20
Mars enters Gemini
Later this year Mars will journey through its retrograde phases. This will take place in the sign of Gemini. Mars is the warrior as well as the terrorist. Mars is vitality as well as belligerence. Living as we do in the Great Round of Being, inhabiting the cycles of seasons and planets, we will be reminded again and again that actions speak louder than words even as we know that the pen (or the font) is mightier than the sword. Gemini loves a paradox. We might start looking for indications of this even now.

August 21
Mercury opposite Neptune
If you are confused by a sense that there is more to your embodied, mundane existence; if you are longing to find meaning in beauty, in nature, in time, you are resonating with today’s aspect. Be still, right where you are, close your eyes and listen to the hum of everyday existence: The beat of your heart, the songs of birds, the clatter and clang of the city surrounding you. Open your eyes and see the flutter of wings, the to and fro of squirrels, maybe the wind in the trees. It’s alive. Just like you. Life itself is full of meaning, of beauty, of everything and nothing.

Julie Simmons 6/21/22 Julie Simmons 6/21/22

Insights for Cancer

These insights, are meant as contemplations of a sort: Each one fashioned using the astrological aspects of the moment. Astrology can be thought of as a kind of sky writing which invites the muse. No two perceptions are exactly the same but any of us can find insight through the images if we look. These are mine, happily offered for you to reshape and fashion into something of your own. Follow the links, where you find them for further musings on the planetary aspects.

June 21
Sun enters Cancer: 05:13 AM EDT Summer Solstice
Venus trine Pluto

Cancer is about housing. And therefore homelessness. Such themes inspire a bit of ranting…
I used to wonder why those born in the sign of Cancer didn’t have more children, bigger families. In a world where women were waking up to the fact that they were fully human, a world in which children could be considered ‘illegitimate’ (I wondered this in the 1970s…) there was less and less incentive to be fruitful and multiply. Along with the tendency in western culture to blame mothers for all the ills and perceived inadequacies of their children not to mention the systemic mistreatment of children in institutions and as a demographic. Our social fabric which has become rather tattered and weak is more concerned with selling products and interactions to children. It ravages their minds with screens and the images that jump out from them. Access to nature is greatly diminished for many children and having children requires money: Not just enough but more than enough. Cancer is a sign that wants security, not just for themselves but for their hive, for the ones they are connected to. How we treat the children tells us everything about how we treat our planet.
On this first day of summer in the northern hemisphere we enter the season of fire and rain not simply the season of vacations. A day to remind ourselves that how we treat each and every child of the ancient, eternal, generative Mother of Us All matters. And that’s not just humans…
As the Sun journeys through Cancer it will square Jupiter and Chiron, sextile Uranus, conjunct Mercury, trine Neptune and oppose Pluto; reminding us to be cautious not rash, compassionate not ruthless and to take every opportunity to listen for new ways to nourish the land, the children their parents. We are a planetary hive.

June 24-25
Triggers to Saturn semi-sextile Neptune
The interesting thing about a semi-sextile which is not really an aspect (planets in neighboring signs) is that while one planet makes a difficult aspect often (not always) the other one is ameliorating that stress. Also true is that if a planet (or in today’s case) an asteroid is square to one of them it can be trine to the other. Maybe it’s a ‘good cop, bad cop’ kind of thing.
Saturn says, “You must”. Neptune says, “You can, but only if it calls to your soul. Only if it feels right”. Saturn requires effort, Neptune wants flow. Pallas-Athena (the asteroid pulling them together at the moment is squaring Saturn and sextiling Neptune. Pallas reminds us to stand up for our truth, to protest injustice most importantly on behalf of the disempowered. Whatever it is that requires you to take a stand it may appear like an impossible task. Call on your guides, your dreams and the expression of your soul through art or music.

June 27
Mercury sextile Chiron
Mars sextile Saturn

Everywhere you look there are opportunities to learn or teach in ways that heal or build something. This world breaks apart even as it comes together.

June 28
Neptune stationery retrograde
Sun square Jupiter
Venus sextile Jupiter
New Moon: 07 degrees Cancer: 10:52 PM EDT

For ages we have believed in some kind of divine law which is superior to the laws of the natural world. But divine law must draw from the natural world or it is not divine. We struggle to accept such simple and profound wisdom.
If you need an intention or affirmation for the New Moon let the starting place be that this planet is our home, our temple, our hive, our one and only. It belongs to all living things. Whatever we do or create, may it be in harmony with nature’s organic urge toward sustaining and lasting life.

July 1
Mars square Pluto

A day of fireworks here in Canada, a celebration of the nation, underscored by explosive and colorful materials banging, popping and bursting over our heads, just for the fun of it. What are we celebrating when we explode fireworks? Perhaps we are celebrating no danger, no war. At least not here, not now. Mars and Pluto love a good explosion. On a personal level, stand back from the ignition, slow down. It’s too easy to trip over untied laces or misplaced marbles. Thoughtful actions, the kind that respects consequences for generations to come, are best today.

July 2
Mercury trine Saturn
Mercury square Neptune

Here’s that semi-sextile again… It’s probably a waste of time to try and reason with chaos. Negotiating while in a state of high anxiety or with those of evil intent is a bit delusional. The alternative might take us along a path of steadying and focusing our own mind, finding center and drawing sense from internal awareness rather than attempting to change external circumstance. Circumstance has a tendency to coalesce in synch with our inner awareness.

July 5
Mars enters Taurus
Mercury enters Cancer
Mercury sextile Mars

A shift in perspective dawns: from breakthrough to building and from curiosity and distraction to concern. These two things together remind us to create a world worth inhabiting. Here. Now.

July 6
Venus sextile Chiron

Words that carry wisdom on their expression are preferable to the bon mot, charming and irresistible as it may be.

July 8
Sun square Chiron

If indeed the pen is mightier than the sword or the bomb for that matter, then words can harm as well as help. They can twist our understanding and cause us, in our confusion to do harm. Like HHDL said, “Be kind whenever possible. It is always possible.”

July 9
Mercury square Jupiter

Just because it’s clear to you that someone did something they shouldn’t have it is also painfully and paradoxically possible to despise the action even though we continue to love the person. Better to grapple with the paradox than to turn your back on love.

July 10
Sun sextile Uranus

Whatever you care about matters. If it matters it’s worth thinking about in a new way for a new world. Time to seize every opportunity to consider the problem from a new perspective. How else will we ever shift from the old age to the new?

July 13
Full Moon: 21 degrees Capricorn 02:37 PM EDT
Mercury sextile Uranus

We know the drill: How important it is to approach old problems with new perspectives. Although we know that this should empower us as familiar systems collapse around us, it’s not easy. In fact, it takes a village. We can’t really do it alone.

July 14
Venus square Neptune

Honor the impossible longing, the unrequited loves. Watch out for the cure, the lie, that suggests we can feed and thereby satisfy our cravings. For they simply cannot be satisfied. To be human is to stir the pot of longing at least from time to time if not all the time. We are not called to wake up, once and for all from the dream of reality. Rather we keep waking up, over and over again, all the livelong day (and especially in the night if you happen to be awake at that time.)
To awaken from the dream of life is an oxymoron, a paradox, a glorious impossibility, a rainbow…

July 16
Mercury conjunct the Sun

Six times a year, in the geometric pattern of an almost perfect Star of David, Mercury listens, is blessed and renewed in the fire of the Sun’s heart. It’s not literal, none of astrology is. Astrology is a mighty metaphor. Only you and your lived life makes it real or useful. Today is for listening, for allowing sound to land on the shore of awareness just as it is: Buzz and chirp, clang and screech, melody and harmony, cacophony or symphony. Just listening is enough. Hearing and understanding are also possible.

July 17
Mercury trine Neptune
Sun trine Neptune
Venus enters Cancer

A day to celebrate water in all its manifestations: for drinking, for washing, for growing and for all the ways it connects us. Life needs water. Cherish it.

July 18
Mercury opposite Pluto

Think back to June 3 when Mercury went direct. It was a call to determination. What was yours? What did you set your mind to accomplish? How is it challenged today? What can you do about it? Why do you want to?

July 19
Mercury enters Leo
Chiron stationery retrograde
Sun opposite Pluto

Given that we are only here for now as we close in on the very end of Cancer we might consider the difference between a human and a Terran. Whose planet is it? Why are we (humans) having such a hard time reconciling ourselves to the simple truth that we have come to the end of the time when greed is acceptable as a motivation for action? What kinds of alternatives might drive the change we know, we sense, is happening within and without us?

Julie Simmons 5/20/22 Julie Simmons 5/20/22

Insights for Gemini

May 20
Sun enters Gemini: 09:22 PM EDT

Blame it on Gemini. All if it. The sorcerer’s apprentice is at it again. Alone and unsupervised in the house of magic: Curious, brilliant and unaware of consequences: Too young, too immature to believe that some doors are better left unopened until you have more skills.
Of course this apprentice is the mind, the human mind at work. Consider the relentless human dexterity in making new and better weapons, in our ability to manipulate the human psyche and make it believe something, buy something, fight for something; not because it is necessary but because it seems as though it is. It seems we have arrived at the point where it has become increasingly difficult to tell truth from a lie, fact from fabrication, virtual from real.
Gemini is the guy with the 3 shells and the pea. You’ll never guess which one unless they want you to but you’ll keep trying. Yet we need Gemini the way we need little flying creatures, pollinators, to make the crops grow. It is definitely has its part in the Big Twelve of the zodiac.
The thing is that the human mind was never meant to be severed from the heart. If we imagine that the year unfolds around 12 major tasks, this month would be the task of mastering or at least focusing the mind. If the mind is the apprentice, the ever curious student, let the heart be the sorcerer, the teacher, the guide. To do this you must unplug, at least for some time each day. Move, breathe. Allow the chatter to subside. Listen to your heart.
As the Sun journeys through Gemini it will sextile Jupiter once again, square Neptune and conjunct Mercury, underscoring Gemini themes for the month.

May 21
Sun conjunct Mercury retrograde

I tend to think of this as the hidden-in-plain-sight, secretly most powerful day of the retrograde period. A day when Mercury, the mind, sits in the heart (the Sun) and is renewed for another round. Hidden because it only shows itself to those with ears to hear and eyes to see. (The mystical part of this is that when the mind sits in the heart all polarities and paradoxes resolve. If only for a moment.)
Navigating as best we can, the free-fall of change that seems to move so fast we can only think of it as chaos, we come to a moment of stillness. We allow the moment to be just as it is. We could listen for a message at this pinpoint of awareness which may allow a glimpse of coherence amidst wildly fluctuating energies. Like a stone falling in still water, concentric ripples will follow.

May 22
Mercury retrogrades back to Taurus
Mars sextile Pluto

Stay close to nature the natural world as well as your own nature as part of that world. We are human animals, gifted or perhaps cursed with abilities uniquely our own. Our purpose, whatever the circumstances has something to do with awareness which requires presence. This gives us the ability to inhabit the world as it is even as we imagine what it might become. This is both mystical and practical. To be present to things as they are opens doors to rooms where sustainable change can happen. We can only get ‘there’ from ‘here’.

May 23
Sun sextile Jupiter
Mars sextile Mercury Rx

“Been there, done that,” signals the end of learning but it could be the beginning of application. Open yourself to possibilities for dealing with your circumstances, remembering that you weren’t born yesterday. You have a wealth of experience that has taught you, for better and worse, about the world in which you live. The more you are aware of this the better the application to the conditions you meet.

May 24
Venus sextile Saturn
Mars enters Aries

The justifiable anger and indignation of Venus these days benefits from Saturn’s steady hand. Look for opportunities to plan your campaign, whatever it is. Mars in its home sign wants to ride wild horses or cause massive breakthroughs. As Mars catches up to Jupiter shortly before the New Moon we can expect escalations of all kinds. We know where that thought leads. But there are other uses. We can use reason to navigate our vision. We don’t have to use force. Harnessing this ability we could, at least in our own lives, escalate the breakthroughs that we know need to happen. ‘Escalate’ and ‘war’ do not need to go together.

May 25
Mercury retrograde trine Pluto

This aspect is with us till June 12th. Think ‘empowerment”. The effects may be more obvious after June 3 when Mercury goes direct but we are approaching. It’s a slow trine, an unfolding, a time to be honest about your outrage in a season of terrible events and impending disasters. Harm comes if this outrage takes shape as the familiar mantra of ‘coulda, shoulda, woulda, but if only’. It is what it is.
Uncontained rage is said to be like picking up a hot coal to throw at someone. We all have those kinds of scars. To contain this force and direct it toward your best hope could work wonders. Outrage can become a diamond laser cutting through difficulties and pulling the world, broken as it seems, into a sustainable shape. If not now, when?

May 27
Venus square Pluto

The women have had it. They are convinced in spite of thousands of years aimed at a lie that we, and all of our children are human. In all of our manifestations. We are all feminists when we recognize the equality and full humanity of all genders. To do less is to destroy the web of connection that allows for human existence.

May 28
Venus enters Taurus

What does it mean to be at home in your body: To take in the actual sense perceptions of the environment? We need to slow down, to allow the spell of the sensuous at least until the New Moon on the 30th. This, in spite of Mars who has a different agenda (tomorrow). Even if you can only do this for a moment, a breath, there is much to be gained by anchoring the mind in the body, by slowing down and sniffing your world. Maybe it’s time for some flowers or a deep appreciation of the scent of your doggie darling’s fur.

May 29
Mars conjunct Jupiter

Here is the possibility of a hot coal landing in our lap and the sense that something must be done right NOW. But the New Moon isn’t until tomorrow and it’s always better to wait till after this to actualize our impulses. Give it one more day if you can before you do the thing you can’t undo.

May 30
New Moon: 09 degrees Gemini: 07:30 AM EDT

Today’s New Moon, like all New Moons is a time to plant a seed of intention, or even a real seed in the dirt. What we plant at the beginning of this particular cycle will take until mid-January to come to fullness. By then we may have lost track of this moment. But the connection is strong and specific. (This in reference to a Mars retrograde period from October 30 – January 12 when it goes direct at this exact same degree. Given the Mars Jupiter conjunction yesterday this seems quite worth making note of.) The seeds of today will be energized beyond our imaginings at the beginning of 2023.

June 3
Mercury stationery direct

Whatever supports the shape and structure of your real life, matters more than ever now. It’s not a time to acquire more things or experience. It’s about making the world around you livable, sustainable for as many living beings as possible. The last 3 weeks were time for consideration, exploration of ideas. What did you learn? Now you get to be the change or at least start the ball rolling. It beats simply waiting for the apocalypse.

June 4
Saturn stationery retrograde

Pressure turns coal into diamonds. It’s a natural fact. We love diamonds for their glitter, for the sharp beauty that fractures light into rainbows. Now would be a good time for a bit of awe at the earth’s ability to create such wonders. We humans are a bit like diamonds: All that pressure turning us into gems of earned wisdom.

June 6
Sun sextile Chiron

Think of all the clever ways that life has taught you to be just you: Ways you never expected, lessons learned on line at the supermarket, on mountain trails, messages in dreams and books (rarely bottles). How might you pay it forward? We are all teachers as well as the taught.

June 10
Mercury trine Pluto

A continued reminder since May 22nd that we are making the world even as it unravels. In mythic terms we might imagine we are guided by the three fates; Clotho who spins the thread of our fate by clothing us in conditions, Lachesis who dispenses it by twirling us into the dance of living and Atropos who cuts this thread at the end, dispelling the enchantment of existence. From a more mundane perspective we might just appreciate the hard work of shoring up the reality that sustains us.

June 11
Venus conjunct Uranus

Be amazed by beauty. Even if only for a moment or maybe an hour. Look for it in the natural world which is closer to Creation: A flower or a tree, maybe up in the sky or inside your own heart. Is creation the same as love? Does it always start with a bang?

June 13
Mercury enters Gemini

At home in the realm of the 10,000 things we marvel at butterflies, birds, thoughts and feeling flying in the air. To do this we must steady the breath. Otherwise a marvel becomes a nightmare of 10,000,000 things which swarm rather than fly. Which overwhelm rather than delight. As the wise man said, ‘I breathe in, I breathe out.’

June 14
Full Moon: 23 degrees Sagittarius 07:51 AM EDT

What stories do you tell yourself? What stories do others tell you? Bred in the bone of our being, humans are made of stories. Our stories are changing, collapsing, transforming and new stories are arising. Take the journey, risk opening your mind. Live and learn some new stories, some of which will take us through this time of Great Transition to the birth of a New Age. It’s unnerving, creative, exciting, stressful, chaotic, exhilarating, devastating and even dangerous. There’s a list for you. Story that.

June 15
Mars conjunct Chiron

Humans make love and they make war. They are tender and they are cruel. They are healers and they are killers. They are US. All of us. Life is the teacher. The mere act of being born alive is the teaching. Paradox and mystery in everything.

June 16
Sun trine Saturn
Sun square Neptune

There is no point in building a house on shifting sands or flood plains. How are your plans unfolding in these times of uncertainty, when the way can so easily seem lost? It’s a question that doesn’t have an answer, although it needs to be asked over and over again: by all of us together not one at a time. Consensus takes time which we have somehow broken so that it appears to be linear rather than cyclical. Cycles give us more time, lines are finite and seem to limit time. Time is a real mystery and our perception of it can mess with our plans.

June 18
Venus square Saturn

Today’s gift reminds us we can bend not break if we hold our ground, not with resistance but with conviction, a deeply rooted sense that it matters. Hold back the punch in favor of asking questions about why things are done in a particular way. Paradigms shift because we shift them.

June 19
Venus sextile Neptune

Having stood firm for that which matters, today is for beauty, in unexpected places and for no reason. Maybe because beauty is love and hallelujah anyway seems like the right idea.

June 20
Sun trine Pluto
Mercury sextile Jupiter

Choose your adventure. Like the Fool with one foot on the rainbow bridge we walk the path not really knowing where it leads. It teaches us everything: The getting of wisdom, the only game in town.

You can support my online offerings for a minimal amount at Patreon.com (see button below), helping me keep costs of my other services as they are.

Julie Simmons 4/19/22 Julie Simmons 4/19/22

Insights for Taurus

As the world Turns

It’s a Mercury retrograde month. For deeper insight you can see below or read here. You can also join the online alignment with Carolyn Winter and me for a unique way to grapple with the Trickster as they dance backwards!

April 19
Sun enters Taurus: 10:24 PM EDT
Maybe reality is debatable: the nature of it, the meaning and whether pigs have wings. Debatable or not we have been blessed with our senses; the doors of perception. And despite the pull of the Metaverse it is painfully obvious that thoughts are nowhere near as real as, let’s say, our sense of smell or the sounds we hear. Sirens jar us, bird song cheers us, we turn up our noses at the smell of garbage but we love the scent of bread baking. Maybe we have only five senses, most likely we have many more. The denial or neglect of this possibility means that many people don’t believe in our ‘extra-sensory’ abilities. If you’re reading this you are probably the kind of person that is open to the idea that we have more than five senses with which to experience the world. This month is an especially good time to use those “extra” senses and open to a wider reality than the obvious. As Uranus has moved through Taurus it has crashed into our realities revealing the cracks, the weak points, the glaring gaps which require change. The world we thought we were familiar with is changing rapidly, not necessarily for the better. Some days change seems too ragged, jagged. Use your senses to navigate. They will show you the moment in stark reality and help ground you. If this seems confusing start with noticing the fire, earth, air and water and how everything is made of these primary elements.
As the Sun journeys here it will conjunct Uranus, sextile Mars, square Saturn, sextile Neptune trine Pluto and participate in a solar and lunar eclipse, (see below for specifics) reminding us that all systems change. Things die and other things get born. Opportunities are all around us and we must do the work even if we haven’t a clue where it will take us.

April 22
Earth Day

Earth day, birth day.
Love your Mother, there is no other (planet).
Praise and respect her too.
She gives us everything, this All Mother.
The sky is nothing without Her.

April 24
Mercury square Saturn
Mercury sextile Neptune
Don’t just kick the can out of the way. Pick it up. At least recycle it if you can’t reuse it.
The same applies to all obstacles. If you meet them on the road, deal with them; for love and in service to life, yours, mine, theirs. Life: The Precious Gift.

April 27
Mercury sextile Jupiter
Venus conjunct Neptune
It seems there is no end to suffering but there is also the rising sun, the new day, the gathering light, the promise of a rainbow, a flower opening, somewhere. The mere possibility of grace is a kind of blessing.

April 28
Mercury trine Pluto
Mercury has been busy this week. Reminding us to think globally and act locally, to be practical in dealing with our immediate surroundings, to wash windows for love, to appreciate flowers because the soul is real and needs beauty the way the body needs food. The smallest inclination in these directions helps transform reality and creates a more beautiful world.

April 29
Pluto stationery retrograde
Everything astrological is from the perspective of humans (those who can look up and see the heavenly clock turning). How then to make sense of the first planet to be retrograde since Mercury went direct in early February and all hell broke loose? Pluto is the keeper of the underbelly, things which are despised and denied. It’s amazing really that things about which we say, ‘never again’ have a way of popping up when Pluto is in town. Clearly Pluto has been hard at work. We could say since 2008 when it first entered Capricorn, picking up a real head of steam in 2020 when it met up with Saturn, Jupiter and Mars, and now on its own as it readies to complete its journey through Capricorn. As it changes direction we could take it as a reminder to be honest about our feelings, if only to ourselves. The power of bearing witness to truth, however harsh, is transformative. This is true collectively as well as personally, albeit more difficult to manage. If enough strong individuals do this in their own lives it ripples out into the world and turns what seems like chaos toward transformative change. It may take until later in July when the Sun opposes Pluto to actually have a sense of where this process is taking us. Next month Mercury will go retrograde. And then then Saturn and Neptune the month after, Jupiter in July, Uranus in August. Even Mars will join the retrograde dance at the end of October. Each of these turnings at a time of such Great Turning are invitations to reflect for weeks and months at a time, when you remember. There are no good old days to return to but there is a mountain of unfinished business.
Today is also the last day of a waning Moon: A time to notice the vast spacious realm within. We feel this more easly in nature, perhaps because we are part of the natural world. Think of it as an invitation to a beginningless, endless place of constant change. The dance in utter stillness. And then there is this other realm, the one of circumstance, the one we constantly attempt to manage. The one that in fact is so much less real yet pulls us time after time day in and day out away from the spaciousness of a greater reality.
Today is the last day of the Moon’s month and a waning energy permeates the world, asking nothing of us. Nothing at all. It’s the moment when the wave pulls back into the sea and before it breaks toward the shore. Tomorrow is a New Moon. A breaking wave.

April 30
Venus conjunct Jupiter
New Moon: 10 degrees Taurus: 04:28 PM EDT Eclipse
The prevailing culture of the 20th century was a sort of mission to ‘live for today’. Here in the 21st century we are coming to understand (along with those who never forgot) the necessity of considering the inheritors of the earth, the children of our children’s children. New Moons are always about intention. Eclipses intensify the energies. They seem to open portals which invite more than we know to join in. New Moons call us to plant seeds for the future but of course we are here, stuck in the present, painfully aware that we create the future with every action, every intention. Even if it feels chaotic here, in the ‘now’, our choices will create The Change and carry seeds for future generations. It’s a time machine.
There is a simple, accessible, profound truth in our ability to bear witness, not only to pain and sorrow but also to beauty, to allow our soul to be stirred. Venus has been reminding us of this since the conjunction with Neptune on the 27th.
Given that Venus and Jupiter are in the later degrees of Pisces we might consider these words from Martin Shaw in his book, Courting the Wild Twin: “Beauty is created not just by desire but by diligence. By circling again and again like a hawk round the well to what truly sends you both dizzy with admiration but also utterly focused in service.”

May 1
Venus sextile Pluto
We are overwhelmed yet awed by life if we allow ourselves to even try to fully absorb the events of the day. It’s inconvenient and messy. Even so, now would be a good time to remove ourselves from all the mind noise: the desperate distractions of clicking, liking and commenting and to let it be or maybe to let it bleed. Who is to say?

May 2
Venus enters Aries
Possibly only an ‘uppity woman’ can appreciate such a quality in someone else. Venus in Aries doesn’t want us to be comfortable with the way things are. It’s a symbol of pushing limits, breaking through assumptions and questioning the status quo. Jupiter goes into Aries on the 10th and Mars on the 24th, all fingers pointing to the Moon you might say of doing something new even against the odds.

May 3
Jupiter sextile Pluto
Wisdom can come from above and below. It can lift us up or remind us that, after all we are not more or less than one amongst all living beings. No matter what well you draw your wisdom from at the moment it offers deep teachings regarding personal conditions for transformation, which is to say, change; as it applies to you specifically. Guaranteed these are not the conditions you imagined. Sit by the well of wisdom, fill your cup and drink. Even the smallest sip could change you forever.

May 4
Mars sextile Uranus
Sometimes when you least expect it an opportunity comes knocking. If you open the door you will find that the gift of the moment requires change and there is no telling where it’s taking you. The river knows where it’s going. It always finds its way.

May 5
Sun conjunct Uranus
Radical shift continues. Our species is inherently opportunistic. We love to turn a profit from any and all circumstances. Truly this has created some evil conditions on our planet. Denise Levertov said, “Man’s capacity for evil, then, is less a positive capacity, for all its horrendous activity, than a failure to develop man’s most human function, the imagination, to its fullness, and consequently a failure to develop compassion.”
No one controls the movements of the planets. They are like a Great Mirror, simply and profoundly reflecting what is happening down below. What do you imagine change will bring?

May 6
Venus sextile Mercury
We make priorities based on what we decide matters most. Every choice is an opportunity. When you open the front door today breathe in the world and choose nothing (for a change). Better to notice the squirrels, the birds going about their very important business, the clouds rolling by and even the breezes and the bugs. The world is happening, not just in your head but every possible ‘where’ there is. The joy as the saying goes, is in the ride.

May 07
Sun sextile Mars
Freedom means so many different things to so many people. For some it’s permission to do what I want (come what may). Others find freedom in restraint from harmful impulses (such as eating animals or using fossil fuels). There is freedom to protest and demand rights and freedoms on behalf of others. there is freedom to breathe, to drink, to touch the earth. There are people fighting for their right to live in a free world. Those who are choosing to ‘live free or die’. We measure freedom against conditions. This is the challenge, the call.

May 10
Mercury stationery retrograde
Jupiter enters Aries
Actions speak louder than words. (Even little ones.) The world witnessed this as we heard words of non-aggression just before the bombs fell. Even so, words matter. Mercury reminds us to pause, to listen to the world with our senses not just the thoughts inside our heads. If we are fortunate to be in pleasant surroundings that is easy enough, but the suggestion is there for all as Mercury appears to move from Gemini back to Taurus. Here is an invitation to unplug where possible, to think with more than your mind. Leave the pundits and the know-it-alls to their own devices. They haven’t a clue about the immediacy of your particular life; the ache in your joints or the pleasure of a juicy fruit.
Of course, Jupiter could care less about such things! It wants action. Just do it! In Aires there is the possibility of recklessness based on arrogance. Seize the day or bust.
It’s a push-me-pull you kind of moment, On one hand the inclination from Mercury to pause and consider, on the other, from Jupiter, to energetically follow the impulse.
Jupiter will be in Aries till the end of October. Mercury will be retrograde until June 3rd. To be alive is to sail the seas of paradox, to hold impossible contradictions in one hand even as we release the birds of hope and possibility from the other. An excellent time to memorize this poem from Auguries of Innocence, in all or part:

To see a World in a Grain of Sand
And a Heaven in a Wild Flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hour

Or this part:

A Truth thats told with bad intent
Beats all the Lies you can invent
It is right it should be so
Man was made for Joy & Woe
And when this we rightly know
Thro the World we safely go
Joy & Woe are woven fine
A Clothing for the soul divine
Under every grief & pine
Runs a joy with silken twine

May 15
Venus conjunct Chiron
Sun square Saturn
Sun sextile Neptune
To be alive is to be subject to all manner of suffering and joy. This is true for all living things. Venus reminds us to bless this notion. The Sun, like a determined juggler, calls us to the task of participating in life’s fullness: To work hard and deal with circumstance even as we remember “the still point of the turning world” that was so important at the New Moon two weeks ago.

May 16
Full Moon: Eclipse, 25 degrees Scorpio 00:13 AM EDT
As the Moon in its fullness carries the theme of participation in two worlds at once – the inner spacious one as well as the demanding circumstantial outer one - it might be useful to consider how things felt and what you thought you wanted back at the New Moon on April 30th. Perhaps you planted a seed in this unstable world. As you survey your life at this moment consider how accessing both worlds, inner and outer, shapes your particular dance. Live between the worlds, no escaping in either direction. Be witness to change, to the cycles of destruction and creation. Then do what you must because while you’re here on Planet Earth, you can.

May 18
Mars conjunct Neptune
Which opportunities that called to you on or around May 7th are ready to expand and grow. How do your dreams match up with your abilities? Here is a good time to remember you are only human and to fulfill that gift you cannot be too pure or perfect. Our best is always good enough.

May 19
Sun trine Pluto
Mercury (still rx) sextile Jupiter
The power to transform, to change, to become someone we didn’t think we could be, lives inside each one of us. Be literal about this. Seeds that turn into green shoots are nothing short of a miracle of transformation.
Today there is a whisper on the wind, a message waiting to be heard. There are things we can do, ways we can align with and move into change. It’s a process. It takes time.

Julie Simmons 3/20/22 Julie Simmons 3/20/22

Insights for Aries

Here is some food for Aries thought, from a patriarchal voice (8 centuries old) yet nonetheless wise:

How is it
they live in
such harmony
- the billions of stars -
when most men can barely
go a minute without declaring
war in their minds about
someone they know.

….St. Thomas Aquinas

March 18
Sun enters Aries: 11:33 AM EDT

As if we need reminding that it is time for a new beginning, today is the first day of spring here in the northern hemisphere, the equinox, a new season. One of only two days when, for one perfect moment light and dark are balanced: akin to the moment after exhaling and before inhaling, or maybe the other way around: A moment when uncounted angels perch on pin heads, defying reason, reminding us that it’s all an illusion based on perspective, an endless reality of becoming. Creation is always happening here and now, calling us into being again and again and again. Possibly we hit the ground, running for eternity, always the same, always different. If we see the other as equally alive and deserving of life, in that instant we are an equinox.
Aries and Libra are the signs of war. Our predecessors throughout the dominator age saw the relationship of light and dark as a battle. This is the very notion we must change. Of course there are some, many in fact, who think this perspective is bred in the bone of what it means to be human, who believe that this is how it has and always will be. Consider for a moment the parable of the two suitors.
This year as the Sun journeys through Aries it will encounter Mercury, Saturn and Pluto as well as Chiron. Saturn and Chiron remind us that we have work to do. We are all first responders when Aries is the theme. The trauma or wounding in each of us creates a planet of unease at best, a tinder keg waiting to be ignited, already burning, in fact. We too easily confuse vengeance with justice. When we acknowledge the hurts of the past yet stay present we open to real wisdom. From this wisdom, change. Pluto warns us, yet again, that there is danger, there is evil, there is power. How we use it and react to it matters.

March 21
Mercury conjunct Jupiter
Mars sextile Chiron

Awash in our beliefs we are careful not to make assumptions regarding the beliefs of others. One way to do this is through artistic or creative expression. Sharing our stories through song, dance, image and word is an endless opportunity for healing. It is possible, even in these times, to open our heart/mind in utter devotion to whatever we believe without trying to make someone else believe it too. This is especially good for the children.

March 22
Mars square Uranus

As we continue to keep on rockin’ in the hard places, it’s necessary to believe that the kind of change we need will ultimately come. Nature will reset the ecological rhythms, even if humans are at war with her. Perhaps the human challenge is to bring reason but not rigidity to the process. How can consensus work in a polarized world? Can we reason with people who have already decided on their agenda? Can we be reasonable if we have already set our own? It’s a folk tale. We must find the key that can open the door to the dungeon. It is time to free the princess from her bewitchment. We are the princess, the dungeon, the key and the seeker. All of it. Each of us. Perhaps the seekers need to listen but not just to one another. That’s too much like listening to ourselves. We need to listen to the trees, the flowers, the waters, the weather, the rains, even the floods and the fires. There is where we find the key.

March 23
Mercury conjunct Neptune

Myth, dreams, poetry, song, story. They carry us on our journey through life. They allow us to talk to one another even when separated by time and distance. It’s a love story: A ladder to the sky: A descent into the deep reaches of existence: A longing that opens the door to real magic.

March 26
Mercury sextile Pluto

Dig, right where you stand. There is treasure. Not a tunnel to the other side of the world but more like a dark and twisting path, full of shadows that hook onto the projections of your own mind. Fascinating. Fertile. Awareness beyond ‘me’, including all living things. Whatever it is that grips your inner eye or mind, don’t push it away. Turn and offer your best attention. Profound consideration wins this day.

March 27
Mercury enters Aries

Typical of the fleet-footed god, the messenger, Mercury flies off to Aries just as we were getting comfy with the depths. Such is the nature of mind, yours and mine. Neither or perhaps both, here and there. ‘There is nothing but that thinking makes it so’ said the Bard. Which isn’t to say we can magically turn bombs into flowers but that we can choose to deal with them one way or another, depending…

March 28
Venus conjunct Saturn

If it matters, it’s worth planning for, especially if it involves a group. If you love the idea or if you can imagine the ideal outcome of something that matters, make a plan. Infuse your planning with love, not excessive caution or fear.

April 1
New Moon: 11 degrees Aries: 02:42 AM EDT
Sun conjunct Chiron

The April Fool is on the loose. There are fools and there are Fools. It can be difficult to distinguish the difference between innocence and ignorance when the F/fool shows up. This particular New Moon calls us to beginnings, to the planting of intentions like seeds. We want these seeds to grow even if we might not be around to see them flourish. We are a bit like Jonnie Appleseed, trailing seeds as we travel through life. “Who Am I?” might be the question. The answer changes even as we think we have one.

April 2
Mercury conjunct Chiron
Mercury conjunct the Sun

Wear the wisdom of experience, not like a badge, more like a secret that only you know: the secret that makes you the unique being you are. Feed the fire of life that both inspires and consumes us at the same time. Spring fever is nothing more or less than sap rising, awakening our biology as well as that most ephemeral quality we call soul. We are alive. Life is the gift, precious and fleeting. Not more, not less.

April 4
Mars conjunct Saturn

How does the shoulder fit the wheel? Efficiency is good. Kindness is better. May our efforts be a wise mix of both these qualities.

April 7
Mercury sextile Saturn

Hone your thoughts. Just because you want something to be true, doesn’t mean it is. Struggle if you must to maintain your sovereign right to think and focus on what is real and present, not what you have been led to believe, not to a virtual rendition of ‘real’ and ‘present’. You want freedom? Then find the part of you that can focus and direct it toward something real, present and meaningful: the cat, your dinner, a tree, a crying child, a wilted plant, a neighbor. Despite the bombardment of useless, dysregulating misinformation we have endless opportunity to dig into our immediate circumstance and find what’s real enough. Seeing isn’t enough to inspire believing anymore. Saturn has been trying to tell us for a while now that the ability to reason is a gift worth strengthening.

April 8
Mercury sextile Mars

The faculty of reason continues to require mercy. Do not become a casualty in the assault upon the mind which has been happening for a long time. Defend your right to think, to understand, to use your intelligence. Every conversation, each thing you read is an opportunity for this. We can temper the sometimes, negative Pisces energies of blind faith through the application of reason. This just might be the mandate if we want to enter the Age of Aquarius with our shirt on.

April 10
Mercury square Pluto
Mercury enters Taurus.

Ponder rather than perseverate. Live in the layers not on the litter.

April 12
Jupiter conjunct Neptune
Sun sextile Saturn

Big astrological news! This conjunction has been heading toward us like a wave waiting to break, or perhaps a tsunami heading toward land. It has been brewing for a while. We could say since February 24th but it’s older than that. We are awash in Pisces which is to say, feelings, connections, a sense of oneness with all life. We feel the suffering of others in ways we didn’t use to. Many more of us have come to understand that this suffering belongs to all of us. We are also at the mercy of madmen threatening destruction of OUR planet. Do we need a common enemy to feel these things? Is that the only way? For the many this may be true but for the individual it is not. We are, all of us, each of us, one individual and many at the same time. As we fling ourselves at the door of the Aquarian age it seems we have work to do on remaking our notion of a hero.

April 14
Mars enters Pisces

Here comes the warrior planet joining up you might say with Jupiter and Neptune in Pisces. What can we expect given that one person’s warrior is another person’s terrorist? Among other things, Pisces tells the story of our deep need for sacrifice which is ‘to make the mundane holy’.
Great compassion is often elicited in reaction to great cruelty. This, too is the story Pisces often tells. Everything in the manifest world is made of light and shadow – even signs and symbols.

April 16
Full Moon: 26 degrees Libra 02:55 PM EDT
(close to a square with Pluto)

We could say this is a warrior’s Moon. Aries and Libra are signs that go to war (this Full Moon is made of the Sun in Aries opposite the Moon in Libra). The ancients venerated war and so the Sun was exalted in Aries. We fight to survive. We even fight for peace. We fight. We resist. We make demands and offer challenges. Perhaps the best of Aries and Libra is when they concern themselves with justice and equitable living for all. The Full Moon (consider it the day before, the day of and the day after) encourages us to evaluate these things on micro as well as macro levels. Is there another story we could tell regarding Aries (and Libra)?

April 17
Mercury sextile Venus

In these last days of Aries, it seems we have stepped over a threshold, participated in an initiation we didn’t ask for and weren’t expecting. There was no ceremony for this initiation, no shaman or wise elder to encourage us to make the journey. At a time like this we need to consult with our inner shaman, the wise one within. They undoubtedly have a poem or a story, a song or maybe a suggestion to look at the moon or watch the sun set.

April 18
Mercury conjunct Uranus
Venus sextile Uranus
Sun square Pluto

You might say we have reason to worry about the future. Yours, mine and all the living beings on our planet. We do. But worry is generally alleviated when we take some kind of action, even prayer. We live in a time of Big Change. We can’t go back and the way forward seems fraught with confusion and danger as well as a promise of beauty and peace. We feel it all. Possibly we think too much and listen too little to the voice of our planet. No matter what we think, we are truly Nature’s children. Listen to your mother.

Julie Simmons 2/18/22 Julie Simmons 2/18/22

Insights for Pisces

As the World Turns (and turns again…)

Here are some insights for the month, which could become contemplations: Each one fashioned using the astrological aspects of the moment. Astrology can be thought of as a kind of sky writing which invites the muse. No two perceptions are exactly the same but any of us can find insight through the images if we look. These are mine, happily offered for you to reshape and fashion into something of your own. Follow the links, where you find them for further musings on the planetary aspects.

February 18
Sun enters Pisces: 11:42 AM EST

We all have longings. What if they aren’t meant to be satisfied? What if they were given to humans for the soul purpose of simply feeling them? To be carried on waves of longing, not to some kind of material fulfillment but to bliss itself, a sense of letting go and becoming nothing and everything at the same time? Our addictions, great and small might then let go their hold on us. Fixations would melt into practices that would enable our capacity for oneness and the Great Connection.
Of course here’s the rub: Pisces is opposite Virgo. Virgo likes practice. Pisces doesn’t. Maybe this is how Pisces gets its reputation for wishy-washy, vagueness and confusion. Like all stereotypes, this one isn’t true, except perhaps on the surface. If you are willing to dive in, there are realms and depths with Pisces, quite literally beyond imagining.
This year the Sun will travel through Pisces along with Jupiter Neptune and even Mercury. We are used to having Neptune in Pisces since 2012 and sure enough it has made us all too aware that we are all connected to each other as well as the natural world. Oneness is Us. Like it or not. Jupiter’s nature is to expand what it touches. Maybe we have two choices: to be confused and deluded or to dive into the mystery, to get ‘right and wrong’ and meet each other. Or at least to try.

February 23
Mars sextile Neptune

As if reminding us that our longings do indeed need to be managed and guided by practice we have today. It is helpful, even wise to contain longing in some kind of structure which allows us to feel what we feel in safety. Prayer, meditation, movement or even therapy can help. Today we might get started or strengthen what we already have in place. If this is troublesome consider consequences. Mars in Capricorn likes consequences.

February 24
Mercury sextile Chiron
Venus sextile Neptune
Mercury square Uranus

Whatever chaos you meet today, coping lies in helping someone near you, any way you can. Even the smallest acts of compassion can make a difference.

March 2
New Moon: 12 degrees Pisces: 12:34 PM EST
Sun sextile Uranus
Mercury conjunct Saturn

A gentle reminder that life goes on and we are the ones here, living it. We might as well go on too. A good time to plant seeds of hope. Over the next two weeks or so you may get to see these seeds putting down some roots and even sprouting a few tiny leaves.

March 3
Mars conjunct Pluto
Venus conjunct Pluto

The shadows of desire are in charge for the next few days at least. On the bright side we know what we want and what we don’t. We are more or less familiar by now with the benefits of gratitude. Everything that shines needs a bit of shadow to be visible. If Venus is ‘yes’ then Mars is ‘no’. The shadows of desire are about the cost of having what we want and the damage it might create for ourselves or other living things. Only by looking honestly at these shadows can we truly use our desire in sustainable ways. Otherwise we are at the mercy of the manipulators, the aggressors.
Don’t be afraid of apparent contradictions, of paradox. Looking into the heart of desire at micro (me) and macro (us) levels we shift away from rapacious destruction and toward a world where everyone, gets to eat, learn, work and live. Pluto’s job is always to take us deeper into that which has been denied, repressed, suppressed.

March 5
Sun conjunct Jupiter

At the heart of the Sun (conjunct) a planet ends and begins its journey for the year. Invisible to our eyes, Jupiter is revitalizing its capacity for wisdom and propensity toward faith or belief. We could all take a moment apart from the chaotic swirls of passionate goings-on in this world to acknowledge the ‘soul’. What is it? What does it need? How is it getting on? Is it indeed becoming wiser? And, of course, does it even exist?

March 6
Mars enters Aquarius
Venus enters Aquarius
Venus conjunct Mars

Astrology can be viewed as a long story, a story of culture arising, collapsing, cooking in the petri dish of our collective human journey. The passionate conjunction (Venus and Mars) happens at the same degree as the Great Conjunction of December 21, 2020 when Jupiter and Saturn stood together at zero Aquarius. Zero is the beginning: the Alpha: the sign on the map reminding us that ‘we are here’ (not someplace else).
Aquarius is the sign of the coming New Age, the one we are kicking and screaming our way toward. (No more slouching toward Bethlehem). It is also the sign of hopes and plans for the future, the sign of possibilities. On account of its tendency to see possible futures it is also the sign of technology, algorithms and all manner of theories about how to control the masses. Systemic control. Aquarius is about politics, politicians and social constructs.
Today we are reminded of whose desires are at the helm, making our decisions and most importantly what motivates them. On a personal level we might take stock of our inner elected official, the mayor of the city you call your life. What motivates your desires for your future? Be honest, no censoring of what you find. Everything is grist for the mill, rather than the defining moment. Planets transit, they move, they dance across the sky. Today they show us a blueprint, not a finished structure.

March 9
Mercury enters Pisces

Mercury joins the Sun, Jupiter and Neptune in Pisces. We might consider these planets as a symbolic rendition of the frothing of the waters of our planet, manifesting as things such as floods and tsunamis as well as accenting issues of longing, compassion and addiction. Pisces can be extreme in its reach, from the most abject interaction between victim and victimizer to the most expanded and lofty compassion. It can indicate an atmospheric wave of destruction yet leave a river of kindness, compassion and connection in its wake.
We all know how good it feels to help someone in need but we balk at the times when we are the needy one. How would this change if we understood that our neediness, even our abject suffering is the very thing that allows others to rise to their best self? it might help us to see that there is no separation between the one who suffers and the one who soothes that suffering.

March 13
Sun conjunct Neptune
Daylight Savings Time begins, where it begins

Just as with Jupiter (March 5th), Neptune gets its moment at the heart of the Sun. This makes me think about when the Little Mermaid is ‘elevated’ and becomes a ‘daughter of air’, considered by the author to be a step up on the ladder of evolution toward becoming human; clearly the best thing to be. I object. Surely the best thing for the Little Mermaid – a sea person with the ability to sing and love with a full mer-heart - would be to be restored to her true nature. One of the big things the Age of Pisces twisted out of shape was the understanding that our best self is our true nature. We are born blessed, not cursed. The most effective way to the wholeness which Pisces longs for is to stand in the fleeting glory of this self, with compassion for ourselves and all selves on this planet of paradox.

March 17
Mercury sextile Uranus

If you’re looking for the third alternative, neither this nor that, the aha! which transcends the stuck place, or even just looking for your keys, be open to surprises. Finding solutions where you least expected them is a source of delight if you can think outside that awful box.

March 18
Full Moon: 27 degrees Virgo 03:19 AM EDT
Sun sextile Pluto (Moon trine Pluto)
Venus sextile Chiron

How, you might ask, can a full Moon shed light when it entangles with Pluto, planet of shadow, depth and darkness? A silly question really if you remind yourself how the greatest awakenings generally come to us on account of the dark nights which the soul, all souls navigate at one time or another. It’s the very nature of things human that this is the case. This Full Moon is full of the paradoxical wisdom that weds dark to light. Be as open and willing as you can. Even if it means helping someone help you.

March 19
Venus square Uranus

Since we can’t really expect the unexpected how about we accept that we don’t know everything and see what there is to learn? Practice is always preferable to perfect.

Julie Simmons 1/19/22 Julie Simmons 1/19/22

Insights for Aquarius

As the World Turns… and Keeps on Turning.

Here are my insights for the month, which could become contemplations: Each one fashioned using the astrological aspects of the moment. Astrology invites the muse. No two perceptions are exactly the same but we find insight through the images if we look. These are mine, happily offered for you to reshape and fashion into something of your own. Follow the links, where you find them for further musings.

January 19

Sun enters Aquarius: 09:39 PM EST

When you hear the words: ‘Age of Aquarius’ what comes to mind? Utopia? Dystopia? Both and neither are possible.
Imagine: No more crimes against humanity but rather a flowering of kindness and inclusion which we know is possible. A time of truly coming to our senses as we awaken the powers of our fully integrated collective brain/mind.
Or: A world run by algorithms created by greedy people at the top of a pyramid. Directives that determine how and what we think about and what we buy while creating the illusion that we are making choices.
Clearly, both worlds exist here and now. Perhaps the Age of Aquarius requires us to stop conjuring either/or scenarios and to look at both/and ones. Just as a house divided against itself cannot stand, neither can a brain or a personality divided against itself function properly. Maybe Aquarius, the Age as well as the month, urges us to heal the divided self, to integrate reason with feeling.
As the Sun moves through this sign, this year, it will remind us that Saturn squared Uranus last year and it’s not quite done. Which is to say our collective efforts to stem the tide of chaos which seems better some days than others is still in play. Our need to tell another story from the overarching one of the hero/savior which is also the story of the sovereignty of the individual over nature is giving way to its next chapter, the one where we recognize the equality of all living beings not just me. Chaotic but necessary.

January 23
Mercury (retrograde) conjunct Sun

There comes a time at the exact midpoint of every Mercury retrograde when it rests, but not for long, in the heart of the Sun. It’s a time for poets and mystics: A time for the inner ear to listen, to consult the muse, to breath in and breathe out, knowing that the only truly predictable thing is change.

January 24
Mars enters Capricorn

It is said that Mars likes ito be in Capricorn. It gets to be boss, to be in charge. You might think of it as a general or a C.E.O. If those images don’t work for you, imagine the Great Meister of your chosen endeavors. The question is this: What is your expectation? Dominance or excellence? There is a world of difference between them and yet each is a manifestation of Mars in Capricorn.

January 25
Mercury (retrograde) enters Capricorn

No longer at the heart of the Sun, Mercury is tasked with returning once again to the situation room to figure out what went wrong and what could go right. The magic ingredient seems to be the willingness to learn from our mistakes.

January 28
Mercury retrograde conjunct Pluto

Think long, hard and deeply about all the things that are changing that you believed were rock solid. And while you are doing this, relax, drop your shoulders, inhale and exhale fully. Remind yourself that you aren’t in control but you can participate fully, willingly. Where else could you be?

January 29
Venus stationery direct

Somewhere on this planet, Venus has been visible as the morning star for some days now. As she goes direct, releasing the Sun’s hold on her, she shines bright, strong and determined in the eastern sky before the Sun rises; announcing the day, reminding us that there are things to do, even if Mercury is retrograde! Where does your determination lie? How are you called to participate in the only dance there is? Might as well, since you’re already here.

January 30
Sun square Uranus

Determined as we are to progress, to maintain reason and to understand the world around us, shift happens. Nature speaks. Reason is a gift bestowed upon humans but we are also Nature’s children. It’s as though we are collectively waking up to the fact that we are indeed part of the natural world. At this moment change is real and out of reach of reason or human understanding. Beginner’s mind works best at such a time. Don’t kid yourself.

February 1
New Moon: 12 degrees Aquarius: 12:46 AM EST

Dividing the world into students and teachers is misleading. We are fools, stepping out on our journey; innocent and ignorant of what lies ahead. There is so much to know and to learn. Sharing what we know is the best of classrooms.

February 4
Mars sextile Jupiter
Sun conjunct Saturn

The swiftly tilting landscape of change offers a myriad of possibilities for all. It is the task of the young to learn and of the old to mentor, to point out those possibilities. For those in the middle, the adults, the job is to maintain order to build structure to anchor the world with an eye to letting it flourish in its time and according to its nature. We cannot put the world in a box or on an assembly line and expect it to live. And that’s no fun anyway.

February 6
Mars square Chiron

If you were looking for something to do, look instead for someone to help. Someone who might benefit from a bit of structure or good management. Maybe the one who needs your help most, is you!

February 8
Mars trine Uranus

Everything is possible but only some things are really worth the doing. Not because they please you (or not) but for the benefit of your little corner of the Universe. This is common sense. These particular times seem to be encouraging us to think globally but to act locally.

February 11
Mercury conjunct Pluto

Focus. Remind yourself what you learned when Mercury was Retrograde (January 14 – February 3). Maybe you are only beginning to see what that was. If you’re having a hard time imagining a way forward, consider your ancestors. What did they have to do, how did they live in such a way that you came into being? Whether they were kind and careful or greedy and mean-spirited they are the dirt beneath your feet, the soil out of which you flower. The deeper you dig at this time the more you can make sense of how to achieve your goals.

February 14
Mercury enters Aquarius

Some say that Aquarius is the sign of the highest kind of love, the kind that allows the beloved to be free. The kind that includes everyone. Hallmark saw it as an opportunity for cards and chocolate. Who doesn’t love cards and chocolate? Especially in times of plenty. These days we need to read the label and make sure it’s not endangering the planet. Surely love is an unlimited resource and there is enough for everyone. Better than chocolate?

February 16
Full Moon: 28 degrees Leo 06:48 PM EST
Mars conjunct Venus

Here is a real, spontaneous day made to celebrate love and passion: A kind of belated Valentine’s Day. Passion is high and love demands to be celebrated however that is for you. Winter is more than half over. The days are most definitely getting longer in the north. Make love. Make art. Play with the children. Today’s passionate pair (Mars and Venus) are intent on carrying us toward our desired goals. In combination with the Full Moon we might say that it’s important to celebrate love in embodied ways. Which is to say, through our senses. The more we engage the so called, real world, the immediate world, the more our self-expression and love can achieve goals worth reaching. There is no point to all these lofty astrological considerations if we don’t express them through our lived lives. Precisely in the way we are able.

February 17
Jupiter sextile Uranus

A shiny penny of a day. Pick it up, have an adventure, trust in the goodness of life, just not blindly. There are indeed infinite possibilities but reality is a co-creation. Choose your co-creators wisely. Blind justice is one thing, blind faith quite another. The human instinct for devotion is quite real, quite strong. Devotion to ‘what’ or ‘whom’ is well worth reflection.

Julie Simmons 12/21/21 Julie Simmons 12/21/21

Insights for Capricorn

Here are some insights for the month, which could become contemplations: Each one fashioned using the astrological aspects of the moment. Astrology is a kind of sky writing which invites the muse. No two perceptions are exactly the same but any of us can find insight through the images if we look. These are mine, happily offered for you to reshape and fashion into something of your own. Follow the links, where you find them for further musings on the subjects.

Mercury will station, retrograde on January 14, 2022: If it makes you edgy and you would like some alignment you might find it here. Alignment is always preferable to anxiety!

December 21
Winter Solstice: Sun enters Capricorn: 10:59 AM EST

One year dies, another begins – or begins to begin. It’s a process that takes us to January 1st when the calendar year turns. Life is a series of cycles and thresholds. Time moves through us even as we perceive ourselves moving through time.

Today is and has long been a profound and universal marker for our world. The fact that it is a clearly northern hemisphere centric perspective could be said to be short sighted or exclusive to half the planet (the northern half) yet there is no mistaking that what we might call north centric consciousness rules the world . As we grapple with climate change the unpredictability of winter, as with all seasons, becomes more and more dramatic. Yet, up in the sky we see the same thing we have always seen. The days get short and shorter. Then a time comes when the Sun appears to stand still for three days (yesterday, today and tomorrow) and, miracle of miracles, the days slowly, steadily, unwaveringly begin to grow longer. Silent night. Holy Night. Down here in under the sky we have choices: we can be amazed, wondrous, and awed by this predictable magic, or not. We can ‘quake at the sight’ like the shepherds in the song. We can celebrate with hushed reverence, give thanks for what we have as well as what we have to share. We can look around and see the needs of others as if they matter.

December 24
Saturn square Uranus

You may have noticed an unfamiliar feeling to this holiday season. Here in Canada, for example, there is a shortage of Christmas trees. The sense that we can’t do things the way we always have but we aren’t quite sure how to do them differently persists on many levels. Although this is the last exact square of these planets they continue to challenge or block each other through 2022. The kids know what has to happen. Perhaps a ‘child should lead us’.

December 25
Venus conjunct Pluto
Mars trine Chiron

Turning off the news doesn’t, alas, turn off what is happening in the world. Even so, we instinctively know that there must be a way to rejoice in the return of the light, to believe in something sacred, holy and beneficial to all that lives. It’s true that to live is to consume, for all living things. The thing is that nature built us to recycle our waste not to simply dump it where we can’t see it. It may be Christmas for some but/and even so, Venus continues to remind us to look back, to reflect on where we have come since, perhaps, Christmas of 2019. Who owns the land? Who controls the resources? Why, when there is enough for everyone do we live in such scarcity? What might help us heal the tragedy of the commons?

December 26
Mercury sextile Neptune

Whatever rose up and grabbed at you yesterday from the recent or distant past, you might imagine as a fish you caught or maybe one that just landed in your boat. You know that little boat of your life that travels the Great Sea of Living? Like many folk tale fish inside this one is a magic ring, a wishing ring. Knowing what you know of the past, what might you wish for the future? And what small thing might bring it closer to real?

December 28
Jupiter enters Pisces

Maybe Jupiter loves Pisces like meat loves salt or like tofu loves tamari. Jupiter is at home here. Its most noble manifestation in this sign is compassion, particularly for the ignorance of humans and their (our) inability to see the beautiful world in which they (we) live. Its most ignoble manifestation is blind faith and gross assumption that they (we) have found the one true thing, the truth of truths. This world is made of paradox. It thrives on ambiguity. Truth is a process, a journey, an endless discovery and a constant revelation. Every day. Jupiter will be in Pisces, reminding us of these things, until May 10th and again from October 28, 2022 until December 20th. Word on the street is that this should be a good time for Pisces people.

December 29
Mercury conjunct Venus (retrograde)
Sun square Chiron
Mars sextile Saturn

As 2021 becomes 2022 we might wonder at a year of not enough of the right kind of change, a year of chaotic weather eruptions, strange protests, and growing apprehension. Why not look for a poem or a song, a kind of theme or thread to carry us across to 2022? This New Year seems to have room for cautious aspiration for a better world; better because humans are capable of so much. Whatever your age or stage of life at this time, the possibility to learn from our losses, to let go of what isn’t coming back and to take aim at a sustainable world is there in everything we do. If you see it you can believe it.

December 30
Mercury conjunct Pluto

Ponder deeply. Think about underlying structures. “Dig where you’re standing.” Mercury has entered the shadow of its next retrograde period (January 14 – February 3). We are digging out from 2021, finding our way to 2022. Capricorn at its best, considers the Good of All not just the one or even the some.

Happy New Year!

January 1
Sun trine Uranus

Imagine we are coiled but not quite sprung just yet into a New Month (New Moon tomorrow) and a New Year (2022). Today we might marvel that anything can and will happen. We might simply be with how it is. It’s like the moment after inhaling – before exhaling. Suspended. Full of potential. Celebrate the Great Gap between what has been and what will be. Direction unknown. At least for now.

January 2
New Moon: 12 degrees Capricorn: 01:33 PM EST
Mercury enters Aquarius
We are not here to simply keep on keeping on, to merely put one foot in front of the other. As it says in Chapter 97 of Ministry of the Future, “Whether life means anything or not, joy is real. Life lives, life is living.” We are stepping into a time which is the same but different than before. Take a walk outside. Consult with the natural world. You, too are made of fire, earth, air and water. Made, not to last but to sustain and express, for the time you are here, life itself.

January 5
Venus sextile Neptune

Each day of any week or month is like a bead on a string: A necklace which, when strung together, makes a life. To be human is to be overwhelmed. Much of the time it is a trick of the light which has us seeing things as awful or awesome.

January 8
Venus (retrograde) conjunct the Sun

There comes a time at the midpoint of every Mercury or Venus retrograde period when they conjunct the Sun. It’s a call to the mysterious if you’re so inclined, a powerful metaphor of transformation. In the story of Inanna this is when she is hung on the meat hook; suspended between realities. The Sun is the heart of the solar system. The heart of the Sun is the heart of the heart itself. Venus is consumed, inflamed by a kind of love that incinerates that which is over and done as a necessary part of renewal for tackling what lies ahead. Love in flames. Being that we are talking archetypes here – goddesses and gods – we understand this to be a flame of transformation. She dies as the evening star but will be reborn on the other side as the morning star. Here is a heavenly reminder that even after great loss, life goes on, determined to live.

January 9
Mercury sextile Chiron

Take hold of your innate ability to direct your mind. Don’t let the algorithm tell you where to focus.

January 10
Sun sextile Neptune

The way to the door of your inner being is through body and breath. Your body, standing firmly between heaven and earth. Feet on the ground, head in the stars. Inhaling and exhaling.

January 11
Mars square Neptune

Some of us are busy being born, some dying, or so it seems. In truth all of us, all the time are busy doing both. It seems to us that the paradoxical qualities of life, the way it can be fierce, joyous, fragile and tragic all at the same time, is known only to humans. Possibly this existential confusion is at the root of our craziness. Be that as it may, today is not a time to figure this out. Today we want to stay out of harm’s way. Damp down our righteous indignation and remain silent as we pause before deciding if we will take action. Time, space and patience reveals all.

January 14
Mercury stationery retrograde

This Mercury retrograde grabs onto the coattails of Venus’ retrograde journey, even as she moves toward the end of her time of transformation. If ever there was a message from the planets to reflect on where we have been, what we have lost and what we have (or haven’t) learned, it’s now. Each of these planets is retracing our journey since January of 2020, which is to say, the movements of Pluto, Saturn and Jupiter, as well as the retrograde period of Mars in 2020. It’s a lot harder to say where we are going if we can’t admit or if we remain ignorant of where we have been. There is benefit in taking this inventory for your own small life – if not for the entire planet.

The so called dwarf planet, Ceres is also stationary today. Ceres is associated with all manner of cereal as you might imagine, given her name. In ancient Greece she was known as Demeter. She represents an aspect of the nourishing mother. If you’re into considering the smaller planets you might also factor into today’s astrological comings and goings the notion of food, nourishment and security in light of where we have been over the last couple of years. Our journey is most likely more about climate change than Covid. Possibly they arise from the same root.

January 16
Sun conjunct Pluto

What do we really know about Dark Matter? Is it dark or invisible? Does it represent the flip side of reality? It’s certainly fascinating to consider, except when it comes charging at us via other people’s projections. Then it’s downright terrifying.

January 17
Full Moon: 27 degrees Cancer 06:48 PM EST
(opposite Pluto – lest we forget)

This Full Moon could reminds us that Venus is beginning her reign as morning star, bringer of light also called poetically by the ancients, Lucifer and Phosphorous. As the Full Moon sets in the west Venus will be rising in the east. The bees are stirring. Perhaps they feel, not only the turning of the wheel of seasons at the solstice but also the fullness of the Moon in their sign of Cancer. They sense it’s time to look around and see what needs organizing. You can’t have a productive hive if you aren’t organized. This Full Moon is in close opposition to Pluto, asking and not for the first or last time, what we have learned from what we have lost, or are in the process of losing.

January 18
Mercury (retrograde) sextile Chiron
Uranus stationery direct

Climate change is real. At least we have come that far. So is the real trauma that comes with it for those who can’t go home again. Imagine the children who lose their small universes, children who will grow up conditioned by these losses, conditioned not to feel at home anywhere. Imagine a planet of refugees. How can a person not have a place to belong on their own planet? Uranus is the WTF! planet. It is way more than one person can cope with. Time to reach out as best you can as we all travel the highway to the Age of Aquarius.

Julie Simmons 11/23/21 Julie Simmons 11/23/21

Sagittarius

November 21
Sun enters Sagittarius: 09:33 PM EST

Sagittarius is the travelling sign. This year it arrives in conjunction with the south node. The past is calling to us in so many ways at this time. Tavel (a Sagittarian signature) has been curtailed over the last two years, more for some than others, but generally speaking. What did you do instead? As you look back over the last two years consider the issue of lies, more lies and misinformation: Silos of truth and the human inclination to believe what we choose. Who shares your beliefs? The issues of the pandemic have made some strange bedfellows. Soon the nodes will leave Gemini and Sagittarius and enter Taurus and Scorpio, signs of resource and scarcity. Time to be less theoretical and more substantial about how we actually live, on the ground, the Earth. If you’re convinced at this moment that you are ‘right’. That others are idiots consider this: Although the Sun rises and sets each and every day it is really the earth that is turning. It is the Earth which bows to the Sun but it looks as though the Sun encircles Earth. We are no longer privileged tourists, looking for experience. We have become pilgrims, like it or not. As we learn about things such as the Mother Trees, we may feel ourselves to be strangers in a very strange (possibly wonderful) land about which we know a lot less than we thought. It is as important to welcome the stranger as it is to be the stranger who is welcomed.

November 24
Mercury enters Sagittarius

Another visitor to the early degrees of Sagittarius which continues to focus our attention on outright misinformation, the bugaboo of the world for the last (at least) five years. There have always been snake oil sellers but the internet, our external brain/mind has made it much, much worse. Look back with as much honesty and as little self-judgment as you can muster and ask how the whirling, swirling winds of misinformation and outright lies has affected you. What is the difference between opinion and fact? Why is it suddenly so difficult to distinguish between them?

November 26
Saturn sextile Chiron

It’s not just a biblical truism to say that if we don’t care for the least of us we don’t really care at all. It’s common sense at this point. We, who consume the most have a mandate to make reparation to the least. Every degree of global warming displaces more than we can imagine. Somewhere in all this is an opportunity.

November 28
Mercury conjunct the Sun

In the deep heart of your own mind, in the silent stillness, what is it you call truth?

November 29
Mars trine Neptune
Mercury trine Chiron

We would be happy to see this astrological line up in a baby who was born on or near today. This child would be a wise soul who might know instinctively or have the good fortune to be taught that when we welcome all our feelings, even the ones we don’t like, amazing things happen. Which isn’t to say we should act them out, although we might turn them into songs and stories; sit with them and see what they want. This is where we find the roots of healing and true transformation. It’s a mystery. Perhaps it’s The Mystery.

November 30
Mercury sextile Saturn
Sun sextile Saturn

Today would be a good day to count our blessings, to appreciate the kindnesses and connections that enable our lives. If this inspires you to pay some forward, all the better! Windows of opportunity are everywhere.

December 1
Neptune stationery direct

When Neptune stations direct we are offered an image of a wave rolling onto shore and delivering treasure. On a good day. On a not-so-good day it might seem more like a tsunami about to engulf the world, your world at least. It’s not simply a trick of individual perspective. Neptune represents the collective dream we are having. It has been gathering energy for at least a few weeks and will release it for the new few months as it interacts with other planets as well as the Sun and Moon and eventually goes retrograde once more. Time to entertain the paradox of our longing for oneness and how overwhelming it all is.

December 4
New Moon: 12 degrees of Sagittarius: 02:43 AM EST

We are approaching the end and the beginning of a new year as well as an eclipse season attached to the north and south nodes in Gemini and Sagittarius. These are signs that ask us to consider truth and lies, communications of all sorts. Human being have been awash in the toxic soup of misinformation and polarizations, systemic bias and downright lies for some time, Maybe forever but this period, since the nodes entered these signs (May of 2020) brought us to awareness like never before. Apparently it’s not just some bad apples. Rather it’s a challenge for the whole human race to get our brain/mind working correctly. This might well be a prerequisite to entering the Age of Aquarius. Perhaps our intention for this New Moon should be ‘delusion prevention’: Less bias, more openness to the well-meaning exchange of ideas.

December 6
Mars sextiles Pluto

Truth to power. Wonderful words. An invitation to transformation. An opportunity to share the validity of your feelings in such a way that it can open doors rather than slam them shut with you on one side and someone you care about on the other.

December 7
Mercury square Neptune

Lies and more lies littering the airwaves, confusing us all, just when it felt like some honest progress was being made. Today does not erase what was learned or experienced yesterday. In fact, staying connected to our feelings allows us to find a storyline that orients and allows us to follow cultivate some kind of generosity. Something as basic as donating warm clothes to new comers in your land would be a start.

December 08
Mars square Jupiter

Planets at the late degrees of a sign remind us that we stand at choice points and we will soon need to go one way or another. Beware of over-enthusiasm – to be filled with too much God. When enthusiasm crosses the line to self-righteous, dogmatic fanaticism someone always gets hurt. Surely there is another way.

December 11
Venus conjunct Pluto
Mercury sextile Jupiter

Temper enthusiasm with awareness of consequence. Such is the way of things. Sooner or later reality corrects itself. As Venus conjuncts Pluto for the first time of three we might attend to the issue of how we will manage what matters as Venus journeys on her retrograde path (December 19th – January 29th). Time, energy, love and money are the most obvious resources we have. Reasonable enthusiasms are modestly rewarded which supports the good of all. As Mary Poppins reminded us, back in the day, ‘enough is as good as a feast’.

December 12
Sun square Neptune

You might say, ‘Madly off in all directions’. You might simply dive, head first, into a sea of confusion, a melee, a storm of chaotic circumstances. You might not. You might, like a sage of old, sense the threshold, the shift, the change. And simply wait till tomorrow, taking your place at the center of the whirling wheel. Shift happens.

December 13
Mars enters Sagittarius
Mercury enters Capricorn

Two planets in one day changing sign, promising changes in perspective. Moving into a time when actions speak louder than words. We do best when we put our money where our mouth is. To be avoided is the delusion that we can rise above nature. There is no planet “B”, no other world, even for the very wealthy.

December 18
Full Moon: 27 degrees Gemini 11:35 PM EST
Mercury square Chiron

Our obsession with information, with virtual reality must needs shift toward an obsession with the so-called ‘real’ world, the world in which we live, eat, build shelter and exist in embodied form. Full Moon’s shine the light on something we didn’t quite see before. This is an awesome one for a big idea, a lightbulb of understanding, especially if it includes the wellbeing of others.

December 19

X-TRA! X-TRA! READ ALL ABOUT IT:

Venus stationery retrograde in Capricorn
Chiron stationery direct
Sun sextile Jupiter

The insights we may have had at the Full Moon will be tested over the next 6 weeks by how practical they are. Capricorn is a sign of the tangible, as in real world. Venus, the most beautiful, the most treasured, prepares for descent. As she is pulled closer and closer to the Sun (watch it in the western sky over the next weeks) she will grow fainter and fainter until she disappears sometime around the first week of January. Ancient people saw this as a roadmap for the journey of loss, grief and return. She is called to the underworld to witness these things. And so are we. Here, in the last days of a frustrating year (following a chaotic one), is a good time to evaluate all we have experienced since January of 2020: How it has changed our minds, our circumstances: What we have learned and what we have lost. Those who cling to the notion that we can go back to the way it was are like Orpheus trying to bring Eurydice back to life. Doomed to lose even more. The indisputable truth of how things are is the best measure of how to go forward. Which isn’t the same as curling up in a ball and waiting for the end. Not at all. The process of descent and letting go is a necessary part of clearing the way before going forward. A perfect end-of-the-year reflection. Watch a few sunsets, pay attention to the natural world both near and far, the beauty as well as the damage. This allows us to soften the ‘us-and-them’ mentality of these times and to acknowledge the pandemic of misused resources.

Christmas derives from Solstice, the universal celebration of the return of the light. As we birth the baby we might call 2022 be assured that awareness lessens fear and eases change.

December 20
Mercury trine Uranus

There is no doubt we are living inside borders. Some of us are determined to break out, to break open, others are exploring a sense of new limits which make some kind of sense for a small planet. In the best way possible we can use the terrain of our local world be it desert or mountain, windswept shore or densely populated city. We can make what we have as livable as possible. Tomorrow the year is born again, fragile, like all newborns, like a candle flame that will grow strong and hot in the months to come.

Julie Simmons 10/23/21 Julie Simmons 10/23/21

Insights for Scorpio

As the World Turns and Keeps Right On Turning

Here are some insights which, through time, might become contemplations: Each one fashioned using the astrological aspects of the moment. Astrology is the most ancient kind of sky writing. It invites the muse. No two perceptions are exactly the same but any of us can find insight through the images if we look. These are mine, happily offered for you to reshape and fashion into something of your own.

October 23

Sun enters Scorpio: 12:51 AM EDT

It’s easy to blame Scorpio for just about anything. I mean we all know “what Scorpios are like”. Or do we? Maybe Scorpio doesn’t even know itself at least half the time. Scorpio can be mysterious and deep. It invites us to look beneath the surface. It can also be deceptive, manipulative and remorseless. Possibly the connecting factor is the inevitability of loss which Scorpio feels so intensely. We cannot know the true motivations of another but there is a way to cultivate awareness of who can and can’t be trusted. Which is, of course, to know how it is you really feel about another person. To do that requires a kind of honesty that can be uncomfortable. We often don’t want to know what we feel. Maybe the true Scorpio questions these days are things like, ‘How is it we have come so far from knowing our own truth?’ ‘How is it we cannot bear our own feelings?’ When did watching other people feel in made-up situations become preferable to the more real feelings of others: Our partner, our parents, the bus driver, the patient, a child, not to mention ourselves. In a week the Sun will square Saturn and Mars will enter Scorpio. Perhaps it’s time to work on Scorpio themes for a while. If you’re experiencing this year as the ‘rock and the hard place’ this could be a key for moving the energy: To explore the murky and mysterious realm of feelings.

October 26

Venus square Neptune

Sometimes we see potential and possibility in people or situations that will never come to be. If this bugs us and makes us critical or judgy we are perfectionists. But we might just allow for the fact that it is enough to see and appreciate possibilities even if they don’t come to pass. Our reach can and often does exceed our grasp.

October 28

Venus sextile Jupiter

Perfectionist or not today is a time for love and freedom to join together. If there is a game, a quest, a challenge that has something to do with the human capacity for loving kindness, carpe diem!

Love is greatest when it is freely given. Freedom is most precious when it allows us to love fully.

October 30

Sun square Saturn
Mars enters Scorpio

Maybe it’s innately human to want to understand what can only be felt. It can be compelling and lead some to deep investigation while it leaves others frustrated, angry and alienated. Consider that surrender is not the same as capitulation. To accept reality as it is does not mean that we do nothing to make it kinder, safer, wiser than it seems to be. Perhaps we need to dive deep into what seems unresolvable and see what might be learned. There is no definitive truth when it comes to feelings. Feelings are always true for the person who feels them.

November 1 & 2

Mercury trine Jupiter and square Pluto

This kind of sums up the most recent Mercury retrograde period (September 27 – October 18). Remember? You might reflect upon journal entries you made or your date book. You could go back over the news of those weeks. What did you learn or witness that left an impression? How has it changed your perspective? What do you think is possible that you didn’t back then? What do you despair of in a world so heavy with seemingly intractable problems? Jupiter is UP, Pluto is DOWN. Mercury, in the middle reminds us that we need not get attached in either direction. It’s a constantly shape-shifting landscape.

November 4

New Moon: 12 degrees of Scorpio: 05:14 PM EDT
Sun opposite Uranus

Some say, ‘She changes everything She touches’. Others say, ‘This too shall pass’. And of course there are those that speak of impermanence and the great web of interdependence which is always being created and which connects us all. Each of these wisdoms may open to a different (religious) path yet there is no mistaking that these great wisdoms are grounded in the same notion. No point railing against it. You are better off making an intention for this New Moon that embraces the notion of change as the only constant: No despair, no expectations.

November 5 & 6

Venus enters Capricorn
Mercury enters Scorpio
Mercury sextiles Venus

We have a kind of long and agonizing way to go, collectively, till our overarching values are genuinely sustainable. Human impulses toward greed and domination, violence and revenge are difficult to reign in. Might as well start where we are, with ourselves: to observe these impulses from within. Consider how to subdue them by using them in other ways:

Greed becomes the ability to manage resources.
Domination morphs into the notion ‘for the good of all’.
Vengeance turns into truth and reconciliation.
Violence becomes assertive action.

This may not be easy but it’s quite possible, especially on an individual basis.

November 7

Daylight Savings Time ends. We are restored to a time which is more in synch with celestial time.

November 10

Mercury conjunct Mars, square Saturn
Mars square Saturn

Here is a reminder of the rock and the hard place year we are in. You could say that during this time (last week, next week) Mercury and Mars are asking or showing us where that place between rock and hard exactly is: which is to say, the frustrations we have at the chaos (change) we see and don’t see happening.

November 12

Sun trine Neptune

If you’re on this ride: using astrology as a navigational tool, let today be a time of deep diving for pearls of psychological or mystical wisdoms. Pull the plug on the usual hyper-mental pursuits. Think less, feel more.

November 13

Mercury opposite Uranus

Shocks of awareness, thunderbolts of truth are sparking till the Full Moon on the 19th. Revelations can be sharp and disruptive as well as anchoring us to deeper levels of truth; the kind that isn’t exactly supported by facts but that doesn’t lead to violence. The shock of the obvious, an invitation to see the moment as it is. Stillness would help as it feeds our sense of presence.

November 15

Venus square Chiron
Sun square Jupiter

Real but not true. True but not real. We are easily unbalanced by assumptions, judgments, blaming. It’s best to assume that everyone is suffering in some way. This helps us slow our reactions, quiet our fears and act out of kindness rather than projection.

November 16

Sun sextile Pluto

Enjoy the sensation of mastery, yours or someone whose mastery over powerful feelings makes you happy. Somewhere between suppression and acting out is real power. What the world needs now…

November 17

Mars opposite Uranus

The greatest barriers are the ones we build to keep out fear. Those of us living in the world where we take privilege for granted have what seems like a lot to lose. But only if we think of it as a limited resource. Actually these privileges we take for granted, things like health care and education, free elections and housing don’t belong to us. They are human rights that belongs to all. Privilege hoarded is fearful, shared it becomes something else: The better world we all long for.
Perhaps the challenge of Mars opposing Uranus is how it can be that this is not obvious to all.

November 18

Mercury trine Neptune

Let your dreams of a better world carry you toward the Full Moon. This dream of shared resources, of connection to all that lives is more poignant as the season here in the north reminds us that every living thing will, someday, die.

November 19

Full Moon: 27 degrees Taurus 03:57 AM EST Eclipse
Venus trine Uranus

Sharing is a two way street. We give something and we receive something for the giving. Otherwise it’s patronizing. Charity is hierarchal and by now we know that it is also a way for Winners to Take All. Donations to wildlife funds while your product is responsible for burning down forests or polluting the waters doesn’t help the planet or her sentient children. It matters what we give and also how we live.

November 20

Mercury square Jupiter

The basic rule is simple: If judgment devoid of kindness is useless, saying more about the judger then the judged. To judge wisely we must also seek to understand the other person which naturally generates kindness as it requires patience and a calming of the instinct to point and blame. Slowing down the reaction time twixt thought and thunderbolt can only make for a better interaction even if it causes some discomfort in the moment.

November 21

Last day of Scorpio, first day of Sagittarius
Mercury sextile Pluto

At the cusp of the transition from one sign to another, we are reminded of the indisputable truth that change is, that it is more powerful than you and therefore requires alignment (not resistance). Scorpio leaves us with this awareness: Before we look ahead, which Sadge loves to do, might we consider where we have been, what we have learned, and what meaning we might make or take from the somewhat precarious journey from there to here.

Julie Simmons 9/22/21 Julie Simmons 9/22/21

Insights for Libra

Think of these insights as contemplations on the astrological aspects of the moment. Astrology can be thought of as a kind of sky writing which invites the muse. No two perceptions are exactly the same but any of us can find insight through the images if we look.

A Mercury retrograde month: Alignment is preferable to anxiety.

September 22
Sun enters Libra: 03:21 PM EDT
Mercury Square Pluto
There is a kind of magic in the equinox. A day when the seesaw of light and dark is perfectly balanced. A moment in time when angels pause on the heads of their pins in perfect balance. A reminder of grace. But Libra has more than this under its hood of meanings.
Remember the feeling of being on the lighter end of the seesaw? At the mercy of a bigger kid, you might have trusted not to upend you. Maybe that never occurred to you or maybe you didn’t trust them at all. We live in a world where we have taken inequities for granted more or less. Many of us don’t get that we have been the bigger kid, in control of the see saw. It is a wonder and a marvel of our civilization that so many have not felt the brutality of systemic injustice. There is no doubt that the growing awareness of the sufferings of others as their land burns or they are deluged by storms, war, famine and homelessness as well as the undoing of civil rights is a good thing; an awakening. It’s always better when the guy on the heavy end of the see saw understands that the person on the other end is as real as they are, that their curcumstances matter.
Libra is the sign of civilization, culture and the elegant notion of justice for all. At its worst it is about war. But at its best it encourages human potential to live in balance with others.
As the Sun travels through Libra this year it is joined by Mars (conjunct the Sun, October 8). It will square Pluto (October 17) and oppose Chiron (October 3).
Mercury will turn retrograde in Libra on the 27th and on account of this it will spend more time in this sign than usual. For Canada ithis suggests a post-election reflection is in order. To go forward we need to look at how we got here.

September 23
Venus opposite Uranus
Loss is part of life. Anyone can tell you that. But when it comes out of seemingly nowhere, when we thought we were minding our own business, it’s really not ok. Given the inevitability of this it is possible to marvel at how just being alive changes us forever. But what, exactly changes if change is guaranteed?

September 25
Mars trine Saturn
Cooperative competence. What a concept: a sense that we understand, that we can do this together and that it might even benefit others. That’s the way to get things done.

September 27
Mercury stationery retrograde
Mercury retrograde periods always invite reflection, consideration, observation and active listening. If and when things get messed up it is usually because we didn’t do those things. This retrograde period specifically points toward the depths of loss and change that Planet Earth is experiencing. (Square Pluto). Don’t kid yourself. But there is also a grand trine (with Jupiter and the Moon) which suggests a thoughtful look ahead to what is possible through collaboration.
One of the great accomplishments of civilization is to live more or less peacefully among strangers. We follow the rules. We wait in line. We care that those around us have what they need as well as ourselves. These things that we have taken for granted seem threatened. Shadows hang over some of our most basic social realities: health care and education for example. The idea isn’t to scare yourself but to observe and learn. What story line arises in your mind when you become aware of shadows?

September 29
Venus trines Neptune
Sun trines Saturn
There is a lot of really good advice going around these days. How much of it resonates with what you know inside yourself? That’s the only advice you will take. Today’s trines encourage us to trust ourselves, not because we mistrust the world but because we do best what we are convinced is worth doing.

October 1
Mars opposite Chiron
Mercury Rx square Pluto
Imagine the fallen hero, the humbled warrior, (Mars in Libra) approaching the wise, wounded healer/teacher (Chiron). What irrefutable wisdom that comes from your difficulties wants your attention? Is it even possible for human animals to turn our aggression into non-hostile, assertive action? Is there such a thing as healthy competition? Think before you act. There will be consequences, possibly unto the 7th generation.

October 2
Venus sextile Pluto
Often our most difficult moments teach us what we could never learn otherwise. When you’re helping those you love, remember this: for them and for you too.

October 3
Sun opposite Chiron
Mercury (rx) trine Jupiter
What has been lost opens doors to what might be found. To know this is to relax enough to see possibilities. So close to a New Moon with Mercury retrograde, is a time for reflection, not action. Not yet.

October 6
New Moon: 13 degrees of Libra: 07:05 AM EDT
Pluto stationery direct
No matter what seesaw you are on there is always a third way, a third alternative. Even in the world beneath this one, the world of deep and complex feelings such as grief and despair, even there or maybe especially there, we find rich and fertile and soil in which to plant seeds for new growth.

October 7
Venus enters Sagittarius
If you’ve been struggling with projections, yours or someone else’s, if it has been hard to tell if it was you or them making things worse, look for a shift. Sagittarius is meant for some kind of liberation: A new vision. As long as it doesn’t point and blame, as long as it frees everyone involved, it could be a time to find a better, freer way to make love grow or even art. Remember when people used to say, ‘Love isn’t love till you give it away’?

October 08
Sun conjunct Mars
When planets conjunct the Sun they were said by astrologers of old to have been invited into the heart of the king. They have grown weak (close to the Sun they cannot be seen) and need to be revitalized. And so it is for Mars these days. Mars can be a bully, a bad actor, but Mars holds the key to our vitality, our energy and how we assert ourselves. We live in scary times and it’s hard to simply do what we have always done. Imagine you find yourself in a deep, dark wood. Are you lost? Or are you being asked to learn something? Is it the end of everything or the middle of an initiation that requires you to look for a new way to engage with others?

October 09
Mercury conjunct the Sun and Mars
Yesterday’s message continues with gusto. Understand that wherever you are pinned at the moment, like some unfortunate butterfly, is where you need to learn. Maybe what you need to learn is how it feels to be at the center of transformation; that moment when you’re too far in to turn back but not far enough along to see the light at the end. All manner of creative possibilities arise from such moments.
If it’s time to seal some kind of deal think twice, really listen to the other guy, calm your reactivity and use all your negotiating skills. How you approach may determine the outcome. It’s not time to force anything.

October 10
Saturn stationery direct
We are not finished with this rock-and-the-hard-place year. There are more shocks and frustrations to come no doubt. Today could be a bit of a turning point, a glimmer of ways to shift toward plans that might actually work. Test runs are a good idea even as we know that we can’t anticipate all eventualities.

October 13
Venus sextile Saturn
If the plan is seaworthy or maybe earthquake proof, look for those who might fund and support it. People enjoy supporting things they believe in.

October 15
Sun trine Jupiter
When we dare to imagine together, to include as many people as possible, there is no telling what could happen. Since we seem to have figured that ‘God doesn’t play dice with the Universe’ it would be good if our possibilities were grounded in rational, reasonable concepts.

October 16
Venus trine Chiron, sextile Mercury retrograde
The greatest wisdom comes from experience. Experience can be difficult. Vision is always rooted in the depths. In the midst of a deep, dark wood if we suddenly know which path to follow we are found, even before we leave the woods. What if we always trusted that we are on the path, our path?

October 17
Sun square Pluto
Somehow modern religions have made a hell out of the notion of the underworld or Hades. Even astrologers, who should know better, fear Pluto. What might be more useful is respect. Resisting the power of the inevitable makes as little sense as trying to control it. In the honoring of endings we welcome beginnings. Happy and sad are not opposites.

October 18
Jupiter stationery direct
Mercury stationery direct
Mars trine Jupiter
Something about all these astrological events on the same day suggests either a bat out of hell or a great awakening. At the least it seems to be a ‘ready, set, go’ kind of picture, pulling us toward the Full Moon on the 20th. Look up! Take some kind of action, large or small, that confirms your goals. The more living beings that can benefit from your aspirations, the better. If you follow the Moon you might take the temperature with intentions made at the new Moon, two weeks ago.

October 20
Full Moon: 27 degrees Aries 10:55 AM EDT
Questions and challenges that appear to block your goals are meant to help you focus on the best ways forward. Life is a quest even if we don’t always know it. Perhaps we all have an inner questing beast.

October 22
Mars square Pluto
Let me contradict myself: All that looking up and taking on challenges may mean that we, you, me have stumbled over something unseen, unexpected on the path. There are moments when we struggle against odds to wrest what we refuse to let go from the jaws of loss. There’s no telling if this is a right or wrong thing. It’s powered by instinct and will only be understood or evaluated with hindsight.

A perfect invitation to the month of Scorpio!

Julie Simmons 8/22/21 Julie Simmons 8/22/21

Insights for Virgo

These insights are offered as contemplations on the astrological aspects of the moment. As we consider and contemplate what we might call sky writing we invite the muse. No two perceptions are exactly the same but each and all may be awakened by the same images.

August 22
Full Moon: 29 degree Aquarius 08:01 AM EDT
Sun enters Virgo: 05:34 PM EDT:

The Full Moon at the very last degree of Aquarius reminds us that our planet, our living, breathing planet which sustains all life equally, is on a precipice, a ledge, an edge, a point of radical shift. Some of us know this directly through our experience of the moment, others not so up close. We all feel it. Full Moons offer the possibility of seeing in the dark. What do you see from your particular vantage point? Are you willing to be an agent of change? And if not, then what? The will is a funny thing. It cannot stop the change, it can only align with or resist it.

Later, this same day , the Sun enters Virgo. Astrology is a story, constantly, incessantly telling itself. Virgo is a mighty sign, much diminished in a world of hierarchy and dominance. Virgo is also a sign of high anxiety and timidity. Ten thousand years of suppression can do that to an archetype. It can twist it out of shape but it cannot eliminate it. As hierarchal systems continue to crumble Virgo will find its strength once again. The distress and the strength of this archetypal signature can be seen in how we have treated the people who serve, from the wait staff in a restaurant to the nurses and the people who stock the shelves, tend the gardens, process the food and heal the sick. Essentially the ones who keep the show on the road.
What is it about dominance mentality that insists on treating these folks as worth less than those they serve? And now, as we wend our way through various disasters is this changing? Because change it must. When Virgo can get down to the work it is meant to do without the humiliations everything changes.
The Sun as it travels through Virgo will trine Uranus, conjunct Mars, trine Pluto and oppose Neptune. You can follow along below.
Meanwhile consider this bit of Virgo wisdom by Rachel Naomi Remen:
“Helping fixing and serving represent three different ways of seeing life. When you help, you see life as weak. When you fix, you see life as broken. When you serve, you see life as whole. Fixing and helping may be the work of the ego, and service the work of the soul.”

August 23
Venus trine Saturn

We weigh and measure things to see if they have substance, to see if structures will hold. ‘Measure twice, cut once’ as the saying goes. Now is as good a time as any to do this, maybe better than good.

August 24
Mercury opposite Neptune

To putter around in service to your dreams: To let go of how important it is or you are and how you must achieve goals: To notice where you actually are, how you actually feel: To find the flow and trust it. Somehow these things make more sense than futilely attempting to beat dreams into submission.

August 26
Venus square Chiron
Mercury trine Pluto

The inconvenience of other people’s problems is not to be ignored. Even so, we show up and help out when necessary. Human beings are inherently paradoxical. When we show up with awareness of this kind of complexity we won’t undermine the good we offer. There is no shame in paradox, in fact it fascinates and compels us to learn and be more - more fully human and therefore more fully alive.

August 30
Mercury enters Libra

Does Mercury mind leaving their power place (Virgo) for one less suited to their nature? It’s hard to say what planets feel or think, so we imagine. We might imagine, in this case, that we have brilliantly figured something out while Mercury was in Virgo. Now, as Mercury changes perspective, it’s time to dialogue and debate as we weigh the myriad of options before us.

September 2
Mars opposite Neptune

Back-to-school didn’t used to include quite so much angst regarding contagion and fear of the future. We cannot hold back the tide – even for the ones we love the most. Neptune can feel like a wave about to break. Mars can shake a fist at such a wave, and make not a bit of difference or… We can turn Mars in Virgo away from anxiety and rage born of fear and toward the vital energy of adaptation. We can use the terrain upon which we stand to anchor ourselves as best we can, not because we accept some kind of ‘new normal’ but because in this particular time and place energy flows in one direction and makes things worse in another. Your barometer is your body. Listen to its messages as it is wise in the way of adaptation.

September 4
Mercury trine Saturn

What do I know? What do any of us really know? Whatever it is, there is no doubt that it’s a mere fragment of all that can be known. And yet, should we trust the machine, the algorithm to guide our knowing? Can we even tell the difference any more between our own thoughts and those we are being directed toward? Now would be an excellent time to cultivate the beginner’s mind; to open to the multi-dimensional world surrounding us that has much to teach. We all need to learn to fish.

September 5
Venus square Pluto

Here is a hint of winter at the end of summer. In December Venus will appear to turn retrograde as it conjuncts Pluto. This last square before the conjunction is a precursor activating themes which will intensify during the retrograde period. Much has been lost since January of 2020 and much has been revealed. Shedding the skin of old ways of evaluating and valuing our lives is not done lightly. As we look around we see that we are not the only one. Acknowledgment and discussion about loss offers some ease in times of such intense change.

September 6
New Moon: 14 degrees of Virgo: 12:53 AM EDT
Mars trine Pluto
Venus trine Jupiter
Sun trine Uranus

If you are making an intention for this New Moon, inhale deeply, exhale fully and consider that the world is not broken and doesn’t need fixing. A better image is that this world of ours is in the throes of giving birth to a new age and what is needed are midwives: People who can witness and serve at a crucial moment in the process. Whatever our personal brand of privilege is has little to do with deserving it and lots to do with offering it to these times of Great Change. Maybe it’s always been chaotic for some of us all of the time but now it seems chaotic for all living things all of the time. “Change or bust” might be our bumper sticker.

September 8
Mercury opposite Chiron

Justice is best when it bows to wisdom. Wisdom is hard to define. The greatest wisdom seems to come from experience combined with reflection which leads to awareness. Our sufferings have a gift (which we don’t want, generally speaking, at least in the moment). The bridge that stretches between suffering and wisdom opens the way for compassionate justice. Otherwise its just vengence.

September 10
Venus enters Scorpio

Is Venus really in a detrimental position in this sign or is she just too much for a patriarchal world? Detriment implies that she is unable to function properly, that she is wounded. We all know the history of what happens to women who don’t behave as prescribed – from witch burnings and systemic abuses of all kinds to glass ceilings. Maybe in Scorpio she’s just far from her home in Taurus where things are pleasurable. Maybe in Scorpio she understands the value of loss and difficulty and how these things make us fully human, how there is no avoiding it and that this is just true, not bad or good.

September 14
Sun opposite Neptune
Mars enters Libra

It is said that somewhere someone knows every grain of sand, every strand of hair and even every little sparrow. Whoever that is, it’s probably not you. If you’re annoyed by every little thing try a bit of reverence, even awe, for each and every tiny widget that holds the world together. As you go about your business, know that you’re a widget too.
As Mars slips into it’s astrological detriment in Libra we find Mars and Venus in mutual reception for a while. Which is to say they can, if prompted, receive each other in their home places. This only happens if we allow it. In the face of passive aggression (Mars), or intensity of attachment (Venus) you could step back into prescribed social behaviours (Venus in Libra) outwardly even as you deepen your willingness for radical self-awareness (Mars in Scorpio) on an inner level. It’s a dance and requires balance and strength. What does it take and is it worth the effort to choose to act competitively or co-opereratively? Without application which the mutual reception offers be prepared for desire to be more trouble than it’s worth when Mars or Venus activate in the coming weeks.

September 16
Sun trine Pluto

As you contemplate the ever changing sky that astrology shows us, you might marvel at the endless combinations of influences that we can interpret. As the saying goes, ‘If you don’t like the weather, just wait five minutes’. One day, confusion, the next solid ground. It is more like the turning of a kaleidoscope than a straight line from some imagined start to finish. Today’s turn of the wheel encourages us to stand our ground. Seasons change and so do we. It’s always good advice to Be! Here! Now!

September 17
Venus square Saturn

There isn’t simply a right way and a wrong way. There is always a third alternative. The best held theories are subject to disruptions once they hit the forces of reality. The frustrations and messiness of the real world are worth accepting if we are to accomplish anything today.

September 20
Full Moon: 28 degrees Pisces 07:54 PM EDT
Mercury trine Jupiter

We have come to the last full day of summer here in the northern hemisphere. Seasons changing teaches us that everything changes. We cannot hold onto yesterday or even something that happened an hour ago. But we can celebrate the simple powerful truth that we are here, in this life at this moment with one another and that we know how to laugh. We are and we do!

Julie Simmons 7/22/21 Julie Simmons 7/22/21

Insights for Leo

As our world turns, and turns again…

July 22

Sun enters Leo: 10:26 AM EDT
Venus opposite Jupiter

Before the Sun officially enters Leo, Venus in the earliest degree of Virgo wants us to consider what really matters to you and for the seven generations we give lip service to. Trauma is not a buzzword, it is the ground of our being. It is the soil out of which we can grow a more compassionate inclusive way of living. To imagine such a thing starts the process of bringing it into being.
And then there is Leo: We seem to be living in a time of wounded kings; rulers who refuse to admit that they, as well as the systems which hold them in place are, in fact, wounded. This denial is the strongest indicator of how very wounded they are. As the damage becomes clearer we all wish for a hero to set it right. Leo is not heroic although it is courageous. It’s about love which emanates from the heart. The Sun is the beating, pulsing heart of our solar system. Each of us is a little solar system of our own, powered by a beating, pulsing heart. Hearts are courageous in that they risk loving. They are innately generous because there is no running out of love. This may sound trite but imagine a world in which wounded kings truly loved the people they serve, rather than the ones who pay for their favors. Leo will continue to be put to the test this month as it follows in the footsteps of Mars in this fiery sign; symbolizing the heat and the fires which have burned and continue to burn. The Sun will oppose Saturn and square Uranus before it catches up to the conjunction with Mars and an opposition to Jupiter.

July 23
Full Moon: 01 degree Aquarius 10:36 PM EDT
We often feel the effects of Full Moons earlier than their official time of exactitude. And these effects last longer. It’s a celebration and it starts as soon as you notice the big shiny ball in the night sky. All creatures under the Moon (and Sun) are welcome!
As this Full Moon lights the night and we approach the mid-point of summer (quite close to the New Moon in two weeks), look around. The pandemic has estranged us from one another in time and real space. And yet it is also true that we have come in contact with many people from far and away. How it is our heart makes room for others? Who do you favor, whose favor falls on you? How do we take joy in each other?

July 24 & 25
Mercury trine Neptune, opposite Pluto
As Mercury prepares to leave Cancer we might give thought to the painful and grievous revelations that occurred when Mars was there not so long ago. So much happens and our thoughts are carried away from one unspeakable tragedy to the next. The cruel violation of families and communities of this land is true. These things actually happened. The unmarked graves of so many children remind us that the mistreatment of children is a weapon of war.
Our inner children know this even if our adult selves turn toward other issues of the day. Allowing ourselves to grieve even if they weren’t ‘our’ children is a protection for future generations. As we step into the unknown future which is filled to the brim with innocent, trusting, vulnerable children, we do well to re-member the losses, to listen to their stories which are our stories. This helps move forward.

July 27 & 28
Mercury enters Leo
Jupiter rx enters Aquarius
Radical shift. One planet enters at the beginning of the sign (Mercury) , the other, retrograde (Jupiter) backs into the sign it is re-entering. A shift in perspective is called for. Time to shift perspectives. Both these planets are leaving the realm of water which connects us all for those of fire and air which encourage passion and ideals. Jupiter reminds us that we can make plans, we can envision where we want to go. Mercury will follow the Sun and Mars. It suggests we think creatively and take risks, at least in our minds.

July 29
Mars opposite Jupiter
Mars enters Virgo
With a burst of courage and will Mars challenges Jupiter just before leaving Leo. It’s a bit of an adventure story. If you’re out and about having adventures pay attention to thresholds, moments or locations where one thing changes into another. It is true that flying sparks can start fires and little bugs can be so much more than annoying. It is also true that we can turn a corner and be struck with the full force of Nature’s power and beauty. Mars in Leo loves a good adventure, Virgo is attention and fascination with detail.

August 1 & 2
Mercury conjunct the Sun and opposite Saturn
Sun opposite Saturn
We humans can be creative to a fault when our will to express ourselves is unchecked by actual skill and discipline. We learn best from masters, who have experience. In an age driven by likes (and dis-likes) we need, more than ever, to discern true expertise from persuasion and charisma. The heart has innate wisdom in these matters if we are courageous enough to listen. Circumstantial obstacles and resistance to self-expression are teachers of merit. And of course there is no point in arguing with a boulder blocking your path.

August 3
Venus trine Uranus
Mercury square Uranus
From now until the 8th doors open and shut with alarming frequency. The doors themselves might be interesting. We want so much to be on the other side of change we can miss the invitation itself, which means we miss the power of making choices. Thresholds are not incidental. There is a gap in our understanding of how to get to ‘there’ from ‘here’. The solution might be hidden in the nature of the call rather than the imagined end result.

August 4
Sun trine Chiron
Who is the guardian at your gate? Why does the gate need guarding? What is the teaching? Even as you stand before your own gate, it may also be true that you are the guardian at someone else’s.

August 6
Sun square Uranus
In the thick of change even the noblest of hearts must bend or bow to what they cannot control. Love itself is the strength that enables us to do this.

August 8
New Moon: 16 degrees of Leo: 09:51 AM EDT
Yesterday was the exact midpoint between solstice and equinox. Today is close enough, and a New Moon too. We are invited to affirm and intend something, starting right where we are. Is this magic? Science? Geometry? Power? Imagination? Is there a story to tell in the subtle waning of the light as the year bends toward winter? There is if you tell it. What reminds you of the dark in the midst of so much light? What intention do you have as you stand in the heat and light, sensing the fading of the light? What difference does it make? The New Moon is always a beginning.

August 09
Venus opposite Neptune
Devotion is most effective when it has practical application. This does not preclude beauty or dreaming. Our lives play out on many planes of existence.

August 10
Mercury opposite Jupiter
Think creatively as you reach beyond simple self-expression for the good of all.

August 11
Mercury enters Virgo
Venus trines Pluto
Problems have solutions. It’s the nature of things. Time often reveals these things, time and a deep appreciation for the cycles of life.

August 16
Venus enters Libra
Art and culture. What’s it mean to you?

August 18
Mercury conjunct Mars
Energetic speech, precise and sharp in its ability to describe helpful innovations. It’s a tall order but preferable to supreme irritability and snide comments.

August 19
Sun opposite Jupiter
Uranus stationery retrograde
The easiest thing is to point, to blame, to judge. Righteous indignation protects us from our feelings about tragic and systemic injustice. In this way we shirk responsibility for the restoration of dignity to those who have suffered. Revolution is one of the 10,000 words we have for change. It beats the notion of evolution which is a rather hierarchical concept, suggesting a fundamental need for improvement and a relentless faith in progress. Perhaps we need to extract the notion that we revolve. We live in cycles. Turning and turning, ever returning to the same place with new eyes, new understandings. We have all been here before.

August 20
Mercury trine Uranus
Fix what you can. New worlds are always made from the materials left from old ones. If it’s really broken consider mosaics.

August 22
Full Moon: 29 degrees Aquarius 08:01 AM EDT
Before the Sun enters Virgo today there is a Full Moon in the very last degree of Aquarius. Full Moons are high energy. Some astrologers say 29 degrees is about living two lives in one. We are endlessly dancing on the head of a pin, waiting for the world to begin (again?) Imagine your precipice, a meeting (and parting) place of heart and mind.

Julie Simmons 6/20/21 Julie Simmons 6/20/21

Insights for Cancer

These insights are offered as contemplations on the astrological aspects of the moment. As we consider and contemplate what we might call writing in the sky, we invite the muse. No two astrologers see the same thing but each and all are awakened by the same images. That’s why astrology is art…

June 20

Sun enters Cancer (Summer Solstice in Northern Hemisphere): 11:32 PM EDT
Jupiter stationery retrograde

Astrology is about time. When we are aware of our relationship to the sky and its intersection with earth we are able to predict things, things we can count on, such as the rising of the Sun each morning, the phases of the Moon each month and the turning of the wheel of the seasons throughout the year. Knowing such things helps us to figure out other things such as when to plant and even when to travel or even how to get where we are going (using the stars to guide us). It is a natural progression for humans to think that the ability to predict fluctuations at one level extends to other levels: When to buy a house or sell a business, when to marry and even who to marry. Astrology also gives us insight into the ‘how’ of things such as how to navigate the waters of our emotions or health concerns, even our relationships. To some this seems ridiculous, to others it makes a kind of instinctive sense.

And so we come to the longest (or shortest, depending which hemisphere you live in) day of the year. A time of culmination or nadir of light. Our ancestors approached this day with reverence for the reliability of the rays of the Sun hitting the stone exactly where predicted. We might do the same.

Cancer is a time to gather people and resources together. To build a hive of activity that will produce nourishment for a later time, which is also predictable. There will be a later time. Winter will come bringing scarcity of light if nothing else. Cancer is a time of flow but ebb will certainly follow.

This year the Sun in Cancer will square Chiron, Sextile Uranus, trine Jupiter and Neptune, oppose Pluto as well as conjunct and oppose the Moon (which it always does of course). Overall we might consider how it is this abundant planet has so much scarcity for so many people. Even if you think ‘It has always been thus’ times are changing. We could do it differently. The soul of nature is an ever-present reality in all things including the self. Start right where you are. See below as each of these aspects occurs.

Jupiter can point and blame. It can even demand that we question our right to live. It can also bless and bonify. Today would be a good one for counting blessings, making amends if you’ve hurt someone and for a bit of mirth and reverence in celebration of the turning of the wheel as we stand on the threshold of the new season.

June 21
Venus trine Neptune
What is your deepest, most intimate longing? You can tell yourself. Go ahead. Is there actually someone who could fulfill this for you? It is said we can’t really engage with life outside our perception or concepts about it. We must feel within ourselves that which we would have without. Love what matters most to you, with all your senses. Offer this love which is also longing, to the Universe. Then see what happens.

June 22
Mercury stationery direct
What happens now? Does Mercury Direct really make it easier to think freely, to be understood? Do we have some kind of celestial permission to sign the contract, to close the deal? Give a quick review to the last month. How clever were you? What did you learn? How do thoughts create reality? How does that work collectively as well as on and in an individual life? Mercury loves a good question.

June 23
Sun trine Jupiter
Venus opposite Pluto
Blessings everywhere, littering the streets, scattering like rainbows all over town. Each one attached to a warning, a consequence. Why should it be otherwise? How is it we could possibly be born and not expect there would be consequences? Are we, perhaps, simply, profoundly a consequence of other people’s actions?

June 24

Full Moon: 03 degrees Capricorn 02:39 PM EDT
Saturn sextile Chiron
Everything astrologers see and interpret in the sky looks a bit different depending where you stand on earth (our circumstances). This is why no two astrologers interpret exactly the same way. And why twins are the same, yet different. There really is no ‘last word’.
Full Moons suggest it’s time for seeing in the dark. This is quite different for city dwellers surrounded by light all night, every night and those who live where night is truly dark. Meaning can be found within ourselves as well as through an actual experience of seeing moonlight through the trees or on the water. Either way the heavenly prompt for this Full Moon suggests we think about winter, the inevitable turn of the wheel six months from now. What do you think can can’t and must be done to help us get through the winter? Practically speaking.

June 25
Neptune stationery retrograde
Possibly the collective soul that we share with all living things is holding its breath; waiting for the drop of a shoe. If this was true for you what is it that you are waiting for at the pause between inhale and exhale? (Planetary stations can be felt at least a week before and after.)

June 27
Venus enters Leo
Whatever the word ‘creative’ means to you, it matters.

July 1
Mars opposite Saturn
You could say we have two choices: to act with selfish pride or courageous love. We make choices about our actions even if we can’t control circumstance. Kindness and courage live on unto the 7th generation more productively than selfish pride. Seems obvious. The best of a Leo/Aquarius opposition is seen when kindness and courage motivate behavior.

July 2
Mars trine Chiron
This particular emphases on love, courage, pride, kindness and consequence culminates on the 13th with a Venus Mars conjunction. We have time to awaken the courageous heart beating inside our chest, time and situations to practice doing what we do on behalf of the heart’s wisdom. Sometimes, of course, doing nothing is the right action.

July 3
Mars square Uranus
It’s only human to want control, to try and live an ordered existence. Wisdom teaches us that change is the only constant. Change looks, feels and smells a lot like chaos when we aren’t in control of it. Be steadfast at the center even as you know the world will turn as it does. Chaos is change in manic mode. Or perhaps as Tom Waits suggested, “there ain't no devil, there's just God when he's drunk”

July 4
Sun square Chiron
What to do with all the suffering of individuals that you can’t touch. There is no way to hold it, even just in your mind, without feeling it. Our feelings connect us to everything else that feels, all that lives. How we feel makes a difference. Every breath is an offering.

July 05
Sun sextile Uranus
Change is good and offers opportunity. Allow the sparks of potential to ignite your fondest dreams. It’s an up-and-down world, not just a down one.

July 06
Mercury square Neptune
Venus opposite Saturn
Doubt, disappointment and despair are most definitely forces to contend with. There is no point in astrological whitewashing. Making so-called lemonade isn’t necessarily an option for everyone. But where astrology is concerned, things are always open to what we call interpretation. We could look at these same aspects and say that making every effort to stay grounded and to accept reality as it presents itself without telling yourself an ‘always’ or ‘never’ story is a worthwhile endeavor on a day just like today.

July 07
Venus trine Chiron
Everybody matters. Every. Body.

July 08
Venus square Uranus
Reactive indignation springs eternal from the human ego. Call it pride (not the good kind, not self-esteem) ‘I’ matters but ‘I’ is also the matter, the problem. Watch out for pride as it collides with unalterable circumstance. It goeth before a fall when it’s an inflation of the ego, it engages the noble heart when it arises from self-esteem.

July 09
New Moon: 18 degrees of Cancer: 09:16 PM EDT
Six months from now (January 2022) there will be a full moon in Cancer. Cycles unfold within cycles. We plant seeds at the New Moon, we harvest them at the Full. A mighty seed for this NM might be the aspiration to feed everyone: To beat our swords into ploughshares. It’s not like we haven’t been aware that it’s the right thing to do for a really long time, at least since around 720 BCE.

July 11
Mercury enters Cancer
Time to think about feelings. How real are they? How do we create reality with them? What do we project from them?

July 12
Mercury trine Jupiter
Here is love. Transcendent and pure. In search of expression. A good time to ‘wear your love like heaven’ or at least make art.

July 13
Venus conjunct Mars
Passion: Pure and simple. (Is it ever really simple?) Only we can decide if it consumes us like a fire or glows with radiant light.

July 15
Chiron stationery retrograde
Sun trine Neptune
Reach not grasp. Flow, not flood. Feelings not emotions. There are great wisdoms to be had in these distinctions.

July 17
Sun opposite Pluto
It can be scary to take the measure of our own needs against the backdrop of a world so full of others who have needs that are even greater. It is also liberating to allow ourselves to fully acknowledge such a thing and then to see what shifts. Because, shift it will.

July 19 & 20
Mercury square Chiron and sextile Uranus
It takes compassion for ourselves as well as others to get any perspective on the difficulties we are faced with on Planet Earth. It takes curiosity and an open mind to learn from it. Some seem to delight in making things much worse than they have to be. At the same time, even on the same day, there are seemingly endless opportunities to offer help and support to those whose need comes into your awareness.

July 21
Venus enters Virgo (soon to oppose Jupiter)
The Science of Mind tells us that we construct the world by how we think and feel about it. Not the other way around. Cutting through delusion requires practice and more practice. I think of Venus in Virgo as an invitation to fierce compassion which might look like tough love. What matters is keeping the heart open even as we demand truth and reconciliation. It’s a long and arduous process possibly the pinnacle of human achievement.

Julie Simmons 5/20/21 Julie Simmons 5/20/21

Insights for Gemini

Mercury is retrograde May 29 – June 22.
Alignment is preferable to anxiety about such a thing. Find us here.

May 20
Sun enters Gemini 3:37 PM EDT:
As the Sun slips across the invisible border from Taurus to Gemini and Mercury prepares for its retrograde journey nine days later, we might acknowledge the stress and anxiety that has been generated over the last few years regarding information, misinformation and how we, the people, have been manipulated and robbed in many ways of our attention. We are told that the biggest game in town is won by those who can control our attention. We feel the difficulty of a world whose children too easily fall into the pit of attention deficit disorders. Have we created a monster with our collective external brain (the internet)? Are the synapses of our brains over connecting? Are we doomed to become extinct because we can’t focus our intention on things that matter such as climate change, equity, health care and the common good? Gemini doesn’t answer questions. It only asks. When you think of this sign, think of birds and butterflies, the flying things, the pollinators. Breathe. Gemini is the breath: The twins of inhalation and exhalation, equal and necessary in the most fundamental of ways. We inhale our first breath at birth, we exhale our last at the end. In between we don’t spend too much time on either. This is the gift. This is the biggest game in town: To focus now and again on the breath: To marvel at the blessing of such a strong and gentle thread that connects us to life itself. If you want to own your own attention, breathe and know that you are breathing. The more interesting you find this (even more interesting than the latest episode of your favorite TV drama) the more you own your attention.

May 21
Sun square Jupiter
It’s all well and good to extol the virtues of the breath/mind connection but how do we deal with the thought arrows which pierce us from within? Some ancient wisdoms might help.

May 22
Mercury square Neptune
Arrows of inattention, distraction and too much of a good thing, or maybe too much of everything, keep coming. All the good advice coming along with them begins to sound like just one more distraction, one more attempt to own your attention. So let the Great Wheel spin. Marvel at winged creatures, how they take flight and land in seemingly whimsical patterns. Mercury loves whimsy.

May 23
Saturn stationery, retrograde
Saturn’s job is to ground us. You might say they’ve been at it for a few weeks already, reminding us to focus on knowledge rather than random information. If there was an archive or library that held the greatest knowledge you could imagine where would it be? What would it look like? Most importantly, what would be inside it? As we grow toward the Full Moon in a few days a little active imagination might be a good thing. When it comes to Aquarius (Saturn is in Aquarius) it’s good to have a blueprint in the mind. It’s how we build the world.

May 26
Full Moon: 05 degrees Sagittarius 07:13 EDT Eclipse
Total lunar eclipses are also sometimes called Blood Moons because of the reddish-orange glow the moon takes on during the eclipse. On the day of the eclipse the Moon will be closest to the earth, so it may look larger in the sky making it a Super Moon eclipse. This eclipse will be the first total lunar eclipse since January 2019. It will be totally visible in all of Australia and partially in other parts of the world.
Astrologers pay attention to where the totality of an eclipse falls as it would have the greatest impact in that part of the world.
Themes of this particular eclipse seem to underscore issues of breath, mind, information, distraction and attention. You might say that the Moon as it shines down from the night sky is revealing an enormous tangle of lies, gossip, truth and all the shape-shifting wisdom you could want. Imagine yourself at the center of a spinning wheel. Let it spin, you can’t stop it. It’s a hologram. You are always at the center.

May 27
Venus square Neptune
Particular cautions are advisable regarding the game of love and seduction. Consider the wisdom of the fable of the fox and the crow. Flattery might get someone everywhere but how will it feel in the morning?

May 29
Venus conjunct Mercury
Mercury stationery retrograde (6:34 PM EDT)
What if instead of running for cover when Mercury goes retrograde we chose to honor the Trickster, the Magician for their clever magic which opens us, time and again, to seeing things from a different perspective which doesn’t have to be fear based? What if we allowed ourselves to be guided by the ‘signal in the heavens’ ?What if we took Mercury’s retrograde period as a suggestion to turn inward, to be more contemplative, to review and consider, most importantly to practice the art of listening? There is music in everything if we have the ears to hear, even in the noise of traffic and the cries of the world, certainly in our dreams and from our poets. We can listen and be privy to the magic of hearing. We have three weeks to practice.

May 31
Mars trine Neptune
A bit of ease for those who are not afraid to feel the tender places, not just your own.

June 2
Sun sextile Chiron
Venus enters Cancer
The practice of allowing feelings without wallowing in them could develop and strengthen us in aid of encouraging greater wisdom. There is a saying that goes something like this: To gain knowledge, learn something new every day. To attain wisdom let go or remove something every day. We might imagine that the Sun in Gemini, aspecting Chiron encourages us to become knowledgeable regarding the nature of wounding and trauma. But Venus (and Mars) in Cancer pull us toward wisdom, asking us to forgive if not exactly to forget. There is room for both, of course. It benefits us as humans to live in a ‘both/and’ world rather than ‘an either/or’ one.

June 3
Sun trine Saturn
Venus trine Jupiter
The getting of wisdom is a gently held aspiration. You can’t grab it or fake it (although many try). Generally the greatest wisdom, the longest held and most useful kind is that which we learn from experience.

June 5
Mercury (retrograde) square Neptune
Mars opposite Pluto
Sooner or later all journeys turn down a road or around a corner and the journeyer must face fear or/and confusion. We cannot and should not avoid these turns. Life is the teacher. What kind of student are you? Which is to say, how are you meeting the fears and confusions of the moment?
Mercury reminds us we don’t know enough (it’s not possible) and Mars suggests that the greatest enemy comes from the projections of our own mind.

June 10
Sun conjunct Mercury retrograde
New Moon: 19 degrees of Gemini: 06:52 AM EDT Eclipse
That which was a seed, a thought seed, wants to take root in your mind, in the mind of humans everywhere. Some of us cannot accept or imagine a better way to live than the way we have been living in the dominator paradigm. They want to get back to what seems ‘normal’. For them this seed has fallen on unfertile ground and may fail to take root. For others however, there is great curiosity in imagining how we might live together with all living things, what it might mean to learn from nature, to learn a new, old way. Today this thought is a whisper on the wind, if you have ears to hear.

June 11
Mars enters Leo
There won’t be much for Mars to do, all alone in a fire sign, save to remind us when the time comes (when it opposes Saturn and squares Uranus next month) that bold action has its place. Mars in Leo is constantly tasked with differentiating genuine courage from foolish acting out.

June 13
Venus sextile Uranus
Sun square Neptune
We are not really done with the seas, the tides, the floods of misinformation washing up on the beaches of our lives. Take every opportunity to use your common senses, to think horses not zebras, to honor thy mother Gaea, the Earth, even as you think outside the construct of colonizer mentality (no matter which side you’re on).

June 14
Uranus square Saturn
Saturn, moving slowly near its station (May 23) is squared by Uranus. Usually Saturn moves faster than Uranus and we would see it as the planet creating the square. We are half way through this aspect which frames 2021. This has indeed been a year of being caught between rocks and hard places. Given that Uranus is the acting planet this might be a moment of explosive realization that there is no turning back to the good (for some) bad (for many) old days of systemic dysfunction and relative stability for those who tell the story. No going back because, like they say, you can never step into the same river twice. Change is indeed the only constant. The real struggle within each of us is in how we meet the change. Awakening equanimity is the practice.

June 20
Jupiter stationery retrograde
Today is the last day of Gemini and the first day of Cancer. It is the longest day of the year in the northern hemisphere. Before the Sun enters Cancer Jupiter makes a station. Here is a call to check in, if we will, to our best wisdom. What are the beliefs that guide you to live as wisely as you can? Who are your teachers? Humans are driven by belief, the felt sense of meaning. From these knowings we go to war or make peace. We cultivate compassion or point and blame. What will you do with all that light?

Julie Simmons 4/19/21 Julie Simmons 4/19/21

Taurus 2021

April 19

Sun enters Taurus 4:33 PM EDT
Mercury enters Taurus

It’s no accident that Earth Day is a Taurus event. Taurus is the fixed, earth sign. Fixed means that it holds or stores the essence of the season (as do Scorpio, Leo and Aquarius) and earth is exactly as it says: all things of matter, all things that matter. Even so, Taurus is not inherently materialistic. Matter is substance, the stuff of the world which we behold and perceive through our common senses you might say. Our senses, these doors of perception, are gifts that allow us to discern wholesome from unwholesome. We are not simply meant to seek pleasure and avoid the unpleasant and the bitter. Bitter can indeed indicate poison but, for example, we need some bitter herbs in spring as tonic for the liver. Most importantly for Taurus is that we need beauty. The healthiest gardens are diversely planted and please the eye. A garden of only one thing is not nearly as beautiful. The earth is alive with all manner of creatures from the smallest microorganisms to animals as large as bison. Taurus welcomes them all with an instinctive acceptance of the equality and necessity of all living things to make a wholesome, healthy, robust world. Mercury moving ahead of the Sun at a faster pace heralds this Taurus message, reminding us that the Earth is our Mother and all living things, her children.

April 22

Venus conjunct Uranus

It takes a big mind to comprehend chaos. Possibly no mind can truly grasp such a thing because by definition it lives beyond understanding. So why not make art, foster beauty, inhabit the present so fully that you stand at the center of the spinning wheel and let it turn?

Happy Earth Day to All!

April 23
Mars enters Cancer

Caution seems like the right choice as Mars travels through Cancer, caution on behalf of the needs of others, to err if we must, on the side of caring for the least of us. Possibly a planet in its fall (as is Mars in Cancer) requires more care regarding its expression, a tender and necessary consideration as our planet Earth seems to be experiencing its own ‘fall’ at this time.

April 24
Mercury conjunct Uranus

Following right behind Venus, soon to catch up to her, Mercury may not understand the workings of chaos either. We might encourage our human propensity for curiosity regarding things we don’t understand. Together Mercury and Uranus intuit that things fall apart because they are meant to come together in a new way. We are in Wonderland and things get curiouser and curiouser as Alice said.

April 25

Venus square Saturn
Mercury square Saturn
Mercury conjunct Venus

Wouldn’t you know? Mercury finally catches up to Venus. It’s a love story. Together at last they are ready to make love, art or maybe just dinner: better yet, dessert. And there in the doorway is Saturn, arms crossed and scowling as if she knows better, reminding them that there will be consequences. There will always be consequences.

April 26

Full Moon: 07 degrees Scorpio: 23:31 EDT

Full Moons remind us that we can see in the dark. For many of us there is no real dark at night unless we put blackout curtains on our windows or cover our eyes. Even so, there is more dark matter in the universe than light. And each of us carries a large percentage of night substance in our psyche. So take a look at the big moon hanging over your street. Acknowledge that it isn’t just another, higher up street lamp. Then take a Scorpio look inside and reflect on the losses of the last year (since the last Full Moon in Scorpio). The Taurus part of this Full Moon (where the Sun is) asks us to look at what remains. That’s the thing about change. The shock of it undermines our trust in our ability to control things.

April 29

Mercury sextile Neptune

We all have a soul. Don’t we? Nature has a soul. Doesn’t it? But what is it? Why does it matter so much? And what part does beauty play in matters of the soul? Beauty that is, not glamour.

April 30

Sun conjunct Uranus

Think back to Earth Day. Think ahead if you can to what you see for this, our Earth. More importantly, how do you feel about it?

May 2

Mercury trine Pluto
Venus sextile Neptune

If life is a journey, today would be a good time to gather strength. To read something that matters, to reach out to someone who loves and nourishes your soul. It’s a time, as the poet said to “peel your own image from the mirror. Sit. Feast on your life.”

May 3

Mercury square Jupiter
Sun square Saturn

It’s not that life is hard, although it is for some of the people all of the time. It’s that it’s always changing, and nothing changes that. Given the immutable truth of this it’s ironic how we grab onto our little corners of reality and attach to them as if they are the One True Thing. We hammer and build these constructs of reality and fixate on others doing the same. Only to come to a time, a turn, a moment that changes everything. This is the Great Lesson, the one to teach the children. S/he changes everything S/he touches, everything S/he touches, changes.

May 6

Venus trine Pluto

Solid ground arises – right where you stand. Drink it in; the color, the texture, the smell. To be relaxed and present is to be awake and ready for anything.

May 08

Venus square Jupiter
Venus enters Gemini

There is a constant sense of push-me-pull-you between the ways which we live as a society and what we really think we want as individuals. It’s as though humans have come to some land which is far away from nature, particularly our own inherent nature as well as Nature Herself. Which is, of course, impossible. Possibly this is the issue of the moment. The solution if there is to be one is most likely not found in greater consumption - even of nature itself: rather to discover it right where you are, to dig where you stand, so to say.

May 10

Mercury sextile Chiron

Pause. Breathe in the vast waves of dysregulation breaking around you. As you breathe out send love, healing or whatever you have to sooth and calm such a world. The New Moon tomorrow might call us to action but today was made for reflection.

May 11

New Moon: 21 degrees of Taurus: 02:59 PM EDT
Mars square Chiron, sextile Uranus

The best, sweetest and most honest thing is to start this new lunar month right where you are. Do what you do as best as you can. Do what you must in alignment with the simple knowledge that it must be done. This is Taurus at its best: The present tense. Maybe we should think of it as the Presence Tense.
Meanwhile doors will open for those that have the courage to feel what they feel without collapsing into puddles of infantile need that render those around them unable to help. Unless and until we understand that we are not islands of suffering, that we can and must bear the suffering of the world as one, it will be hard to bring the world into a workable shape.

May 12

Mercury trine Saturn

An excellent day for the intellect: A day to truly understand, learn and articulate the subject of your choice. No need to defend or react to the opinions of others. When information combines with knowledge humans become wiser, saner and maybe even happier.

May 17

Sun trine Pluto

The heart of nature beats strong and steady this day. This drumbeat keeps time for us if we let it. Flowers bloom, plants grow, the cycles of heaven wax and wane. These things are our teachers and can teach us all we need to know.

May 18

Venus sextile Chiron

If you were the one who opened Pandora’s Box, how would you feel? Would you recognize your kinship with Eve who ate the apple? Would you shake your fist at the singular god and say something like, ‘Your days are numbered, old man. Just like the hairs on your head’. Or would you cower in shame and guilt, believing that all suffering is your fault? Take every opportunity to rise up. It’s quite likely you are not The Problem.

May 19

Venus trine Saturn

Creation may indeed start with a big bang, perhaps a wild, orgasmic collision. Out of this creation proceeds to make worlds, one stitch, one cell, at a time. It’s art, this making of a universe. And it’s always changing, never finished. Just like you and me.

Julie Simmons 3/20/21 Julie Simmons 3/20/21

Aries 2021

As the World Turns

March 20 Spring Equinox
Sun enters Aries 5:37 AM EDT

Aries is the sign of the hero, the individual. If this last year has taught us anything it might be that the best results are achievable through collaboration and collective action. There are many examples, of course, of the great feats of individuals but it is somehow clearer to us now that all of their successes were possible because of their interconnectedness with others. The good they accomplished is measured against the benefits to others. Most important might be that the so-called, “strong man”, the dictator-in-the-making was defeated (for now). Gun slingers are actually out of favor save in their own minds. We are not just slouching toward Bethlehem waiting for the rough beasts to be born, we are working hard to see the world with new eyes. To tell ourselves a different story.

“Embedded in the stories are the values and priorities we live by, and what we believe about women and men, power and war, sex and love”.

For eons it seems, humans have subscribed to the story of the hero’s journey, the assumption that we are born and die alone and that it’s up to us as individuals to take the journey, to make it work. Recently we have seen the effects of dying alone and abandoned in nursing homes. When we die alone we die sadder and sooner. As we awaken from this dream of singularity and witness the lonely deaths of our elders we have come to understand that to die alone is a travesty: unnatural, unkind and horrific. Perhaps the one truly singular and powerful action of a life occurs at the boldness of birth. Truly we are each and every one of us unique beings, not simply data points but this does not mean that we are ‘only’. It is true that we will always need fire fighters and first responders, that each of us is tasked with having to make choices for ourselves alone. We live as individuals, a lot like and yet completely different from one another. We have come to the leg of our journey which requires us to stop the relentless, exhausting striving for ‘best’, ‘first’ and ‘most’ and find a different game than King of the Mountain. Instead we might welcome each other, with our unique gifts, to the dance. Aries can do that.

March 21

Venus enters Aries
Mercury sextile Uranus
Mars trine Saturn

There is a lot (too much) to learn about all the changes coming at us. One thing for certain however is that no matter what stage of life we are at; be it eldering, mid-life, childhood or infancy, even and possibly especially adolescence, this period of our development will be forever marked by a collective sense of social restriction and personal responsibility as well as social chaos and, of course, the threat of disease. Even so, we can only live one day at a time. Let today be: A day of action based on understanding (Mars trine Saturn); A day of fluidity and adaptability in communication as we listen attentively so as to actually hear (Mercury sextile Uranus) and a commitment to evaluate what matters most over the next 3 weeks while Venus travels through Aries, especially where it goes against the grain.

March 23
Mercury square Mars

Good listening goes for naught if we over-react and drown out the exchange of ideas. Be still and touch into your feelings before releasing them. Hesitate before hitting ‘send’ until you know what you’re sending.

March 26
Mars conjunct the North Node (on its way to square Neptune!)
Venus conjunct Sun

Conjunctions are fusions of energies. Conjunctions with the Sun are sort of nuclear in nature although not necessarily portents of events so much as a sense of internal pressure regarding the fundamental principle which the planet represents. It is literally a turning point when a planet, in this case Venus, shifts from morning to evening star. You might say it isn’t really done until the day you see Her in the evening sky after sunset. And that day will vary depending on where you live and what your horizon is like as well as how observant you are of the sky above. Today it’s an inner thing. We are pressured to consider the questions bubbling in the cauldron of our hearts; something like, ‘How have your values changed since Venus was retrograde in May-June of 2020?’ The big event at that time was the murder of George Floyd. How has that changed what you value? Mars seems to be piping up reminding us that we are all part of the so-called arrow of history. Actions aren’t exactly louder than words, these days. It seems the two have become one. Words are actions.

March 28
Full Moon: 08 degrees Libra: 02:48 PM EST
Venus conjunct Chiron

The theme is trauma. It’s a bit of a buzz word these days, for good reason. To be human is, sooner or later, one way or another, to be wounded. And we are coming to understand that we can’t just ‘suck it up’ and that it takes a village to heal. Of course the story of our healing is as unique and specific to each individual as the trauma was to begin with. Truly the wisdom that comes with our healing is a great gift of grace and a powerful aspect of life’s mysteries. Today’s accomplishments arise when we acknowledge this equally for ourselves as well as for others.

March 29
Sun conjunct Chiron
Mercury conjunct Neptune

Tell yourself and anyone who might be listening, a big story, one that comes from a big dream of a constantly healing world. A world of wisdom and beauty and above all, compassion.

March 30
Venus sextile Saturn

Make room for the strong women and girls, the challenging ones, the edgy ones too. “Once again, the world was on the brink of disaster, and only a woman could save the world.”

March 31
Sun sextile Saturn

Offering resistance to monolithic industries that would turn us into data, we make a difference individually as well as collectively. Take all opportunities to shop locally, to actualize your part as an individual engaged in a collective endeavor.

April 2
Mercury sextile Pluto

Memory cannot be extracted from time. Our memories apparently morph along with us as we change through the ages and stages of our lives from infancy to and through old age. Memory is more like art than science, real to the feelings but not always precisely factual; profoundly creative. Today’s opportunity is to dig deep into memory and offer it with wisdom and compassion to the world. No need to infuse it with regret.

April 3
Mercury enters Aries

Sharpen your wits. Wake up from the dream of the past. The future awaits. The future we long for starts here and now. If this isn’t metaphysical, what is?

April 6
Venus sextile Mars

The desire for a new world, one that works for all living beings, not just the fortunate few, is stirring. Like a demiurge it demands our attention and creates dissention in that we don’t necessarily agree with one another regarding what that new world should be. If a door to this room opens for you step over the threshold and see what’s there.

April 09
Mercury conjunct Chiron
Mars square Neptune

Awash in information, misinformation and false as well as true facts we might marvel at how the human mind is like a playful, tricky monkey, jumping from one thing to the next so fast we cannot sort through the noise. Some try to capitalize on chaos, others avoid it and still others take a stand, defending their information of choice. Pundits share perspectives adding to the collective mind salad, shoring up our opinions. This fray can wound the mind when it fosters anxiety and attacks (like a virus) a sense of healthy self-esteem especially in the young. The best approach for today is to practice the wisdom of W.A.I.T. Ask yourself, ‘Why Am I Talking?’

April 10
Venus sextile Jupiter
Mercury sextile Saturn

Learning requires unlearning and the questioning of assumptions. We manufacture our ignorance to protect our identity. As we lean into the possibility of returning to a freer life it might be time to re-define the notion of freedom. What does it means to be free if my freedom is as important as some other guy’s? How does ‘liberty and justice for all’ actually work around here? There is no going back.

April 11
New Moon: 22 degrees of Aries: 10:30 PM EDT
Venus square Pluto

New Moons incline us toward a kind of anticipatory stillness: Anticipatory in that we do well to make intentions and so we think about the world to come. Stillness because our intentions are empowered when we align them with the Universe, the Great Spirit or the Soul of Nature (however you see it). For that alignment to happen we must be still.
Much has been lost. No doubt about it. Grief and outrage also show up today. Letting go is easier said than done and cannot be accomplished by will alone.

April 13
Sun sextile Mars

There are way more possibilities than we can anticipate, scattered like drops of dew, tucked inside the folds of flowers as they open to the morning sun.

April 14
Venus enters Taurus

Unlike Venus in Aries, Venus is at home in Taurus. In her own sign she shows us beauty through our senses. She supports the arts and reminds us to be real. Of course it’s up to us to channel and use this energy especially when she engages with another planet.

April 15
Sun sextile Jupiter

More possibilities today. More to heaven and earth if we listen and learn from the world within and around us. It’s not just humans living on this planet, not simply the ‘family of man’.

April 16
Sun square Pluto

Stop! Just stop right where you are. Look. Listen. What rumbles beneath your feet? How present can you be to what’s real in this moment (even if that is washing the dishes or cleaning the bathroom) without fear of losing agency or missing out? When do we stop seeing life as a pyramid with everyone scrabbling to the top and start seeing it as a garden rich in diversity and nourished by fire, water, air and earth?

April 17
Mars trine Jupiter
Mercury sextile Jupiter and Mars
Mercury square Pluto

Today is a wrap for everything that has happened since the New Moon on the 11th. Six short days and a world of possible futures have paraded past against the backdrop of our best intentions. As we grow toward fullness at the Full Moon consider what remains to be done and how to do it with a sense of possibility that can strengthen our aspirations for the greatest good? All is never lost.

April 18
Mercury conjunct the Sun

It seems sort of natural to see Venus as ‘she’ and Mars as ‘he’ even though there is actually no way to ‘sex’ a planet. The Moon is most definitely Mom, a ‘she’ because only she can give birth. Mercury is the exception. A true ‘they’, the one and only and has been since astrology began. If seen at all it is always close to the horizon flickering in and out of sight. It tricks us into seeing things one way and then another. On the distinct six days a year when it conjuncts the Sun (three times when direct and three when retrograde) we can, only if we choose, tune into this quality, this they-ness that exists in each and every one of us. Today is a ‘they’ day. Not one thing or another. A day for magicians, story tellers and shapeshifters of all sorts, to reflect on the ever-changing dance of energy we call life. One and many; no difference.

Julie Simmons 1/29/21 Julie Simmons 1/29/21

Pisces 2021

As the World Turns

February 18
Sun enters Pisces 5:43 AM EST:
If ever it meant anything to be ‘spiritual’ now, as we leave the Age of Pisces, would be a good time to investigate the meaning of this much bandied about word. We seem to agree that spiritual is not religious. Although most religions have a place for their most spiritual practitioners, call them saints or mystics. Spiritual may be more aligned with the notion of mystical, another word fraught with all sorts of nuance. Once we journey in this direction we find poets and visionaries. We might stumble upon the notion of faith, both blind and otherwise. This puts us in the realm of fanatics who seem able to believe almost anything with a kind of devotion that can lead to bad behavior. Devotion is definitely a word that belongs in the Pisces box of keywords. Humans long for someone or something to which we can devote ourselves. If nature could speak and She can and does, we might find a useful, yet profoundly spiritual way to use these Pisces inclinations as we journey toward the Age of Aquarius. And it harm none.

February 19
Venus square Mars
Maybe you worry about the earth, changes to our climate as well as the relentless appetite we have for consuming and misusing our precious resources. Fear can stop us in our tracks. Lack of knowledge is also a danger. Here is something we all need to know.

February 20
Mercury stationery direct
Maybe you have been waiting for this day, to sign the contract, make the deal and move forward at last. Or maybe you spent the days since January 30th listening and learning rather than simply waiting. Now you might have a greater sense of what you heard. Given the airy, Aquarian flavor of this transit, hopefully we have been listening, not just waiting. In any case it is indeed a better time to sign the contract, make the deal and get on with things.

February 24
Mars trine Pluto
Having educated yourself in spite or because of your fears, now would be a good time to take a step, make a stand, commit yourself to the task at hand. Starting where you are or, as activists and poets say, digging where you’re standing can have awesome outcomes.

February 25
Venus enters Pisces
Sun sextile Uranus
Beauty and truth really are one in the same. How does that matter to you? It’s not enough to be spiritual on your own any more. Where we offer our spirituality to the radical shifting of these times, however small, creates ripples of opportunity even if we don’t see it just yet.

February 26
Jupiter trine the North Node (sextile the South Node)
Reach for a good idea. Don’t grasp. Better to open it slowly or watch it open on as you might watch a flower open on an early spring morning.

February 27
Full Moon: 08 degrees Virgo: 03:17 AM EST
This Full Moon trines Uranus reminding us to look for even a glimpse of how those seemingly small applications of spirituality in service to radical change, which we considered on the 25th make a difference, ease our sense of meaningless chaos and anxiety and offer real help along the way.

March 2
Mercury trine North Node (sextile South Node)
The Nodes of the Moon are points in space: portals. The North node call us toward our growing edge. The South indicates our most deeply ingrained habits. A planet aspecting the NN also aspects the SN. In 2020 Neptune squared these points. The exact finish of that was January 26th. A perfect symbolic rendition of the confusion, deceptions and supremely misguided realities of the world. Some people really do their best and even that hasn’t been good enough to dispel the distress and confusion of the times. Here we are in a New Year when everything and nothing seems possible. Between February 26 when Jupiter got involved and March 10 when the Sun conjuncts Neptune would be a good time for some deep reflection on where all this confusion has delivered us. Was anything learned? Most important might be to take the temperature of our longings, our sense of devotion and our addictions. The challenging relationship between our habitual behaviors and our longing to awaken might be as old as time itself.

March 3
Venus sextile Uranus
Mars enter Gemini
These times are more easily navigated when we see the world as if it is as alive and in a process of becoming, the way we would see a lover, a mystery. Over the next six weeks while Mars sojourns in Gemini we will need sharp eyes, wit and the nimble steps of a juggler not to get caught by the unreliable tricksters who will, no doubt, show up.

March 4
Mercury conjunct Jupiter
Good ideas are seeds. They do best when they fall on fertile ground. Some cultivation helps. At the moment they are falling and flying like pollen. Which ones will you nourish?

March 10
Sun conjunct Neptune
Today could be considered a kind of birthday for Neptune, if planets have such things. Here’s hoping it is the end of much too much confusion and the beginning of clarity. We might acknowledge our longings, all of them, in honor of Neptune, knowing that each and every one is a longing for oneness and therefore only human. For some, longing is the road to bliss which opens us to a fully lived life. The Full Catastrophe as it has been referred to. For others, longing can be an unbearable feeling which takes us down the road of addiction, craving and despair: A long and winding road that one day, in this life or another will connect to that other road, enabling us to understand simple and profound truths such as that nowhere in this world is there someone more or less deserving of love and compassion than you, or me for that matter.

March 11
New Moon: 23 degrees of Pisces: 5:21 AM EST
Venus conjunct Neptune
Every New Moon is a new beginning, a promise for a reset, a possibility for the kind of forgiveness that bows to the difficulties of simply being human and moves on. And so we make intention to do our best with what we’ve got. This one in Pisces calls for stillness and contemplation.

March 15
Mercury enters Pisces
The more we pause and ask ourselves what we just heard and how it makes us feel, the smarter we become. To allow our mind to connect with our feelings is like breathing under water.

March 16 - 18
Sun sextile Pluto
Venus sextile Pluto
As Venus catches up to the Sun they become one for a while. This lasts till the end of the month. The Sun catches planets in its fiery brilliance and they cannot be seen by those of us here in the realm of the ‘below’. By this process Venus is energized but not quite able to act on her own. She is fused or infused with the Sun’s agenda. As they aspect Pluto we might ask ourselves if we are ready, already to take responsibility for the radical transformation of values we are experiencing as reality tilts. Which isn’t to suggest that you wear the hair shirt.

See you Next Month!