Just after midnight last night PDT, the Moon moved into Capricorn, and at 4:56pm PDT, the Full Moon in Capricorn is exact. The Sun is in Cancer, the sign of mommy. Daddy is the Capricorn goat who connects with movement, purpose, and the masculine principle as it is expressed here on Earth. The opposing energy of Cancer is where the feminine dwells, and the nurturing and sustaining capacity of being warmed and fed at home is where we can come to rest and restore when we are tired from all that climbing.
Cancer rules the Moon. In First Nations traditions (and in my practice), the Moon is Grandmother. Grandmothers are an expression of higher consciousness. There are only two species on Earth that have them: whales and humans. Grandmothers, both practically and archetypally, reflect the embodied power of procreation, the greatest power there is. When the ability to birth subsides, that power is still in the body. But without the demand to attend to their own birthing any longer, they contribute to the success of community, and ultimately civilization itself. If this is true here on Earth, it may be a direct reflection of Grandmother Moon, whom many scientists believe is unusually close compared to other planetary bodies.
In the community of the zodiac, Cancer is where we know home and hearth. As an archetype, this cardinal water sign reflects all aspects of care, restoration, and retreat, like that safe home you can always return to if life falls apart. Not your literal home and family if it wasn’t a safe place, but all the ways you have learned to put yourself first so you can better care for what is outside of you. This sign is the memory of the zodiac, including ancestral connections, as the birthing associated with Cancer directly reflects the matriarchal principle that rose up in consciousness long before the Capricorn demands for accomplishment.
This is why early humans lived in such close intimacy with the land. Matriarchal consciousness will allow us once again to live in a restorative way, so the world can function in a masculine way that is integrated back into wholeness. We’ll get there, but understand this is a Full Moon of toppling the old order so the divine feminine can return more fully. Keep this in mind as you receive this powerful Full Moon, and throw some energy toward the collective in support of the continued death of the old ways.
This lunar cycle is all about the mind, perception, communication, and connecting to others through the sharing of like-minded ideas. Though the Sun is in Cancer now, the New Moon that kicked us off was in Gemini. Uranus, now in Gemini for good, is still holding that disruptive T-Square with the Nodes of the Moon. That pattern is quite literally about sudden and potentially unexpected changes, with new things dropping out of nowhere that alter the direction you are moving in. But in equal measure, there may be sudden loss as well, and we are now in that monthly moment of release. Some of you will experience endings that are unexpected. Trust that either way, it’s all for our benefit.
This already unstable T-Square is being directly activated by Mars, who just came into Gemini yesterday afternoon. In and of itself, Mars is fun in this mutable air sign. We accomplish more through collaboration and are, in fact, drawn to connect with others more easily with the planet of action in Gemini. For the first week or so, beginning with today’s lunation, Mars is adding to the chaos and the potential for circumstances to suddenly pivot or end just as abruptly as they begin. In fact, the shadow of Mars in Gemini is being scattered and distracted, and that quality is going to show itself to us all this week and over the US holiday weekend.
A helpful thread has just been initiated by Chiron moving into Taurus. The process of healing softens a bit because we are no longer burning the wounds off with Chiron in Aries. We’ll visit it again due to retrograde motion, but this placement is active in this release opportunity. Personal healing and Chiron’s ultimate goal of helping us master life’s mysterious ways are now more connected to the Great Mother Gaia and Grandmother Moon. With an Easy Opposition to the Nodes, the past is gently left behind (Trine) as we put our effort (Sextile) toward our continued growth into the future.
Now more than ever, we need Earth’s great capacity to heal us, her children. We drop resistance to a more spiritual (or energetically aligned) path, so we can let the North Node in Pisces remind us that compassion, empathy, and dignity are the future we are creating as a collective. In July, the North Node will move into Aquarius, and the time for breaking out of old boxes arrives. Capricorn represents such boxes, limits, and compartmentalization, and we can easily let some, or all, of those old restrictions go.
A dear friend reflected, “I think I could be more generous with others if I could be more generous with myself.” True story, that. There’s help from the sidelines, though, as Leo invented generosity and Venus in Leo allows us to center ourselves with more ease. A Trine to Saturn and Black Moon Lilith says all that shadow work is paying off. We have emotional stability with Saturn, and thanks to BML we have a willingness to go to the depths of where the lack of self-care is still attached. Jupiter is at the mastery degree of Cancer, where he is the most generous he can be with us. And with Mercury right nearby and retrograde, our minds are being downloaded with this consciousness now, and over the rest of the summer.
This placement of the personal planets makes our individual marching orders in this lunation pretty clear, and it’s outlined for you in the previous paragraph. What is it that you have to let go of that may even be something you’ve been working on for a very long time? Capricorn keeps us focused on the goal and cannot offer the discernment of whether that goal is still what feels important to you. If you are too focused on making things happen and not enough on caring for yourself, this too is under review.
Feels means Cancer. What the system is modeling for us is the true way the masculine and feminine are designed to interrelate. The masculine can want to do whatever it wants to do, and Capricorn provides the steady focus needed to build. But it must not begin anything without asking permission of the feminine first. Find the part of you that is set opposed to your impulses to act, find purpose, and build your life. If I arrested you for being in balance with how this integration might be operating in you right now, would I be able to convict you? If not, drop into the consciousness of Cancer to learn how to reverse the trajectory of how you embody your life. And don’t make a move until you ask your body if this is what it wants first. Have at it.
