The New Moon Partial Solar Eclipse at 9° Aries is exact in the wee hours PDT, at 3:58am PDT. This is the last eclipse of the season, but because it is a New Moon, this entire lunar cycle ahead will be marked by the intensity and amplified energy that eclipses generate. April will be slightly less extreme than March has been, but we enter it like being shot out of a cannon. This New Moon has some powerful forward thrust, and twenty-four hours after it is exact, Neptune will enter Aries for the first time in over a century and a half, and life on planet Earth will never be the same.
The New Moon in Aries is the startup moment of every astrological year, which commences at the Equinox with the Sun moving into Aries. It is this New Moon where we truly set our intentions for the year ahead, as Aries is cardinal fire – the most powerful initiatory energy that the zodiac has to offer. But this year, it hits different. For one thing, it’s an eclipse, which means the moment is fated and transformational. Additionally, we are in unprecedented times of tremendous change as all three of the outer planets change signs. Pluto has already done this, Neptune will do this tomorrow, and Uranus will follow suit this summer.
When outer planets change signs, enormous new consciousness is ushered in. This summer and all of next year, these three will form a Grand Sextile in fire and air signs; very combustible. This is the perfect geometry to reflect radical changes in just about every aspect of life on Earth. We want to meet those changes with the most grace that we can, by knowing who we are, and how we serve. While the outer planets hold our collective experience in their wake, it is the personal planets that allow for shifts at the personal level. The first three months of the year have been preparing us for deep movement, so we might meet the transpersonal changes that have already begun.
The personal planets have been extremely active in an uncommon experience of all three of them in retrograde cycles at the same time. Mercury moves so fast, when Venus or Mars go retrograde, a Mercury Rx will almost always overlap. But all three at the same time is rare indeed. How they are dialing into this eclipse is also wildly fortuitous, because as I’ve been trumpeting for many months now, we are all being prepared at the personal level to meet the demands that the world will be putting on us in the year ahead. Mercury and Venus are playing an important role which I will get to, but it’s Mars that really has my attention.
Mars oversees this eclipse as Aries is the ruling sign of the planet of action. Mars is moving between Cancer and Leo in this cycle, where he is helping us turn toward what we need for restoration, self-care, and preparation (Cancer) so that we might step more powerfully into our personal sense of leadership (Leo). Right now, he is direct at 22° Cancer, so loosely Trining everyone from Saturn through the Sun and Moon. This puts the consciousness of this eclipse directly into our bodies, helping us turn new awareness and the intentions we set into behavior so that we might walk a more powerful walk.
Just twelve hours after the eclipse, Mercury will drop back into Pisces, joining Venus in this mutable water sign where we directly connected to the collective. Intentions we set today will be brought back into the territory which is responsible for everything that we create before we create it. Pisces contains the potential for all possibilities, and Aries is where we choose what we will start up anew. When Venus and Mercury both cross over this sensitive point for the third and final time in the second half of April, we will all be able to bring more of the Piscean compassion into our mind and heart when they move into Aries once again. The setup is complex af, but there is a true elegance in the way it is all unfolding for our benefit.
But make no mistake about it. Change is happening at a breakneck pace, and this Eclipse signals a moment where that is about to get amplified. Uranus is playing a direct role in this eclipse by touching into the Nodes of the Moon, the anchor points of every eclipse. Uranus is the consciousness of fast and revolutionary change, and the Age of Aqurius is under his rulership. Uranus is Trining the South Node, so moving away from the past will be easy; partly because the world we used to know is already gone. But the Sextile with the North Node is where the work is, as Sextiles are potential only. We will continue to have to effort to make the transformations necessary to face our collective future, but support is there for such change.
While all this wild energy is disruptive, Uranus and Saturn are also beginning to form a Sextile that will last all year long thanks to a second hit of this in August. Uranus generates instability, but we create stability with Saturn. We may not feel very grounded right now, but it’s in there. The North Node in Pisces demands that in order to move forward, we must put our spiritual connection first. Saturn in Pisces is also teaching us this as a primary lesson, and the Teacher will help us bring some of that spiritual underpinning with him when he moves into Aries later in the spring.
The house in your natal chart ruled by Aries is lit up right now, and that will offer some distinction of how this New Moon eclipse is impacting you directly. Consider what you have been learning about how you are walking through your life since October of last year when Mars started up his cycle. Ask yourself what do you want to focus on and start up in the year ahead? You do you, of course, but make sure you understand the principles of service when you land on a course of action. One of my favorite quotes ever is from Indian Saint Rabindranath Tagore. He said, “I slept and dreamed that life was joy. I woke and found that life is service. I served and found that service is joy.” We must all find our version of this so that the collective can join to create a new Earth, worthy of the Age of Aquarius, where all human beings are cared for and we have Peace for Humanity at last. Have at it.
