Artemis Rising: Lunar Eclipse in Libra

Open post. The Earth throws a little shade at the Moon. Link to March monthly horoscope included at the bottom.

Artemis Emerging from the Quarry by Gaia, in Kingston, NY, on the back of an old theater most recently called BSP. This was painted as part of the 2018 O+ Festival here.

Good morning. No proofreaders have seen this! There will be typos. Link to March monthly horoscope included at the bottom of the post.— efc

Dear Friend and Reader:

Overnight Sunday to Monday we will experience the Libra Full Moon, which is also a penumbral lunar eclipse. As it reaches full phase, the Moon will pass through the fuzzy edge of the Earth’s shadow, called the penumbra.

This is part of the eclipse pair completed with the April 8 total solar eclipse in Aries.

The Moon enters Libra today at 4:37 pm EDT (on Sunday, March 24). From what I am reading, the visible part of the eclipse will begin at about 12:53 am on Monday, March 25, and last until 5:32 am EDT. The peak will be at about 3 am. Note that this is a subtle event, and to people who don’t usually look at the Moon, who have never seen it, or who think it does not exist, the Moon will probably seem nondescript.

However, if you can find a dark spot, you will be treated to an interesting and beautiful change in perspective. Lunar eclipses are visible wherever you have a view of the Moon (unlike a solar eclipse, which has a narrow band of visibility).

Happening close to the minor planet Logos, I would sum up the message of this eclipse in three words: try using logic. It’s also saying: try not projecting onto others.

Ordinary Full Moon is Influential

Even an ordinary Moon-Sun opposition, the Full Moon, is an influential event. People who don’t believe in or work with astrology tend to notice: many emergency workers from cops to ER staff, or anyone who contacts the public, describe different behavior when the Moon is full. This would only be surprising if we pretend that nature does not exist or that people are not part of it.

Both eclipses in this pair are along the Aries/Libra axis, which is jostling matters of relationship to awaken. Yet the underlying influence is personal, inner, inward — some matter of self-recognition or actualization. If there is stress on relationships, consider that it may not be about relating so much as the state of those doing the relating.

Conventionally-trained ideas of relationships tend to not leave much room for people to grow, change, and evolve. They often involve a concept of the participants that is trapped in amber, and assumes that they will stay more or less who they are. Yet we have never had more environmental influences shaping us, which tend to conceal direct experiences of both self and of growth.

Lunar eclipse, cast for Kingston.

Dimming Moon De-Emphasizes Relating

Think of the dimming of the Moon as taking the emphasis off of relationships — about which most people obsess — and places the emphasis on you. This is uncomfortable territory for many, who are accustomed to subverting their needs for the sake of relationships, or concealing their personal development because it might ‘threaten’ a relationship.

This eclipse takes place in Libra, which is ruled by Venus. Saturn also has an affiliation with Libra, as the planet exalted there. For this eclipse, Venus and Saturn are forming a conjunction in Pisces (which is not visible as it’s too close to the Sun). But this conjunction was exact last week. So it may represent an event that took place in the past.

Venus is approaching a conjunction to centaur planet Nessus (the third in Chiron’s group of exotic little orbit-crossers), which emphasizes consequences or results of choices made in relationships. That is a long story, though the first thing to consider is the influence on various forms of sexual legacy on your current situation.

There exists the question: does your partner know everything about you? By which I mean everything that influences how you relate to one another.

The Nessus Myth: It’s Complicated.

Matters of Hazy Consent

Nessus also raises the matter of any form of hazy consent. Those cloudy issues extend to sex offered in exchange for anything (or whether it was freely given, which I realize is counted as impossible today), whether it was given with some hesitancy, whether a mood-altering substance influenced the choice, or whether it was taken from you.

By “hazy consent,” I mean not knowing which of those it was.

While the last of the possibilities is potentially real, and has actually happened to some people, usually, one of the others usually solves the riddle of how something happened. In Pisces, with Saturn so close by, the question shifts to personal accountability — a topic that is verboten by the Almighty God of Woke. Say the words and suddenly you’re allegedly a racist, sexist, transphobic felon-hugger.

Unlike the zeitgeist 50 years ago under similar astrological conditions, today there is very little ethos of “I will get help with my issues.” We get a lot of feelgood advice, and plenty of examples of image-building, and concepts of “empowerment” that seem to extol victimization and make-believe “existential threats.”

None of those will be helpful now.

One key to solving this problem in the long run is developing a clear yes and a clear no. You cannot have one without the other; they are only meaningful in context. Anyone can do this with practice. Others might find it annoying. Of course, the potential downside of that is once you have that tool available, you’re responsible for your choices. You might also find you make better ones.

James Wanless.

Emphasis is Really in Aries

Aries is currently home to the Sun, the North Node, Chiron, and slow and powerful (nearly retrograde) Mercury conjunct Eris (which it will be for weeks). This is saying pay attention to who you are, what you want, and what you want to exchange with others. Pay attention to who you are becoming.

This is the solution to egotism, not the problem. Most true narcissists are hopeless cases: they don’t know anyone else exists. The rest of us are just conditioned to be a certain kind of self-centered that it would be pretty easy to lose and replace with another outlook, if anyone noticed the benefits.

The main one of those is, you get to be you, and facilitate the people around you being themselves. This is a cooperative rather than competitive state of being. It is relational rather than alienating; respectful rather than dismissive. It requires truly confronting the problem of jealousy.

Think of it this way: you have your healing needs, and so does everyone else. Are you aware of what you must do, to grow through anything you’re done with? Have you taken note of the things that happen over and over?

Are you able to calmly speak the truth of who you are, without caring much how others might judge you or react?

There are no easy answers here — though there are moments of clarity. And you may just be in one of those right now. There are moments when you figure out what you want, and what you’ve denied yourself, and you offer yourself that very thing. Who knows, you might be right here.

With love,