Two New Moons in Cancer and Eclipse Season, All Wrapped Up in a Plutonic Bow

Photo: Willow

So we've got some spicy Plutonic action going down with the New Moon in Cancer opposite Pluto, kicking off two lunar eclipses and one total solar eclipse over the next month and a half.

New Moon in Cancer (1 degree) - Monday, June 22 at 1:35 p.m. MDT
Full Moon in Capricorn (15 degrees) *lunar eclipse* - Tuesday, July 7 at 3:21 a.m. MDT
New Moon in Cancer (29 degrees) *total solar eclipse* - Tuesday, July 21 at 8:35 p.m. MDT
Full Moon in Aquarius (13 degrees) *lunar eclipse* - Wednesday, August 5 at 6:55 p.m. MDT

A New Moon happens once every 28(ish) days when the Sun and Moon come together at the same degree of the zodiac. At this time, the Moon is located between the Sun and the Earth (Earth-Moon-Sun), and the illuminated half of the Moon is positioned toward the Sun, away from the Earth. From our vantage point on Earth, the Moon appears to go dark in the sky. The period just before a New Moon, as the Moon's reflected light is disappearing, is called the Dark of the Moon or Balsamic phase. So the point of Sun-Moon conjunction in the zodiac marks the end of the previous lunar cycle and the beginning of a new one - the New Moon.

A Full Moon also happens once every 28(ish) days but occurs when the Sun and Moon are in opposition to each other in the zodiac. This is the time when the Moon appears at its brightest as a full, round circle. The Moon is on the opposite side of the Earth now, away from the Sun. So the line-up is Moon-Earth-Sun.

Eclipses happen when there is an extra precise alignment of the Sun, Moon and Earth. "The stars align!" We don't have eclipses all the time because the Moon's orbit around the Earth is a bit off in alignment with the Earth's orbit around the Sun. So only when those bodies line up very precisely do we have eclipses - every five or six months.

Solar eclipses always happen at a New Moon when the Moon (between the Sun and Earth) blocks or partially blocks the light of the Sun. Lunar eclipses always happen at a Full Moon (Sun-Earth-Moon) when the Earth casts a shadow on the Moon. Most eclipses are partial. Total eclipses are more rare.

Every once in a while, we also have two successive New (or Full) Moons in the same sign, and this is what is happening now.

We start with the New Moon at 1 degree Cancer tomorrow, June 22. We have a second New Moon July 21 at 29 degrees Cancer - the final degree, called the anaretic degree. This second New Moon at 29 degrees is also a total solar eclipse. Powerful stuff. The total eclipse of the Sun will be visible in southeast Asia and the western Pacific for up to six minutes, 39 seconds. This is the longest total solar eclipse that will occur in the twenty-first century and will not be surpassed in duration until June 13, 2132!

Book-end New Moons in Cancer at the first and last degrees with a total solar eclipse on the anaretic degree.

There is a deep need for new energy and new expression with this sign. The sign of mothering, nurturing, family, home, emotion, past, roots, soul. A new integration of the emotional, soulful, feminine aspects of life and release from the past misuses and abuses of those things. New emotional territory. Especially in light of what we now know about the lack of integrity within our structures (especially economic/business/government), as they continue to break down and crumble around us. A new emotional reality is necessary.

And in light of the backdrop of the Aquarius triple conjunction, I think this indicates new soul families coming together, brought together through necessity, beginning to form new, like-minded communities. Connected not by blood but by soul-purpose. These indicators have been coming up for a while now. It's been a long process of weeding through false karasses to get to the real, vital connections...

Sandwiched between these two New Moons in Cancer, we have a Full Moon lunar eclipse on July 7 at 15 degrees Capricorn conjunct Black Moon Lilith at 19 degrees.

With Pluto in Capricorn involved so strongly in kicking off this eclipse period, you can see how much work there is to do along that Cancer-Capricorn polarity. The penetration and breaking down of old, outdated structures and the emotional ties that bind us to them and, therefore, to certain soul death. The transformation into something more sustaining continues its slow crawl...

Collectively, we have a lot to do.

This polarity loves tradition and convention. The North American Dream. Big single-family home. Husband and wife. Two SUVs in the driveway. A boat. A camper. Dirtbikes. A four-wheeler. Two or three kids. A dog. A cat. Dad works in an office Monday to Friday. Brings work home on the weekends. Maybe Mum does, too.

But with Pluto involved, we see that the conventional standards that have been set are starting to crack around the edges. They have become more image than reality in many cases. People mortgaged and debted up to their eyeballs to keep the image afloat. Dragging themselves through soul-crushing work to support it. Stuffing down their feelings and soul-urges to maintain "the way things are." Setting their lives up in the ways they think they should, in the standard ways, and still finding themselves unhappy, unfulfilled, unsatisfied. The feeling that something is off. Many things.

People can putty the cracks, paint them, hang a picture over them. But with Pluto underway in its 16-year transit of Capricorn, sooner or later, anything that is not right within these structural set-ups will have to be dealt with. No more putty. No more smiling into the camera as the house falls down around us. No more faking it. Pluto knows the areas that lack integrity. And here it is working on some sacred cows - our homes and our businesses. Our families and our careers. Our feelings and our public images. Our definitions of success. Image versus reality. How we believe we are "supposed" to live. According to which standards. To whose benefit.

Pluto demands that we prioritize integrity and gut-level honesty over image, no matter how deep the changes we have to make to get there.

The "standard lives" we have set up for people have become detrimental to the future of humanity on this planet. Life in the bubble. A series of single-serving consumptions. Nothing else exists. Nothing else matters but that we can enjoy living the North American Dream. It supports a tyranny.

What of the people who don't fit into that North American Dream? What of the people left outside those nice, neat, boxed structures and roles? What of the backs that North American Dream is being lived on?

The Aquarian winds are blowing, and those safe, secure boxes people are living in (physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually) have to morph. At the very least, to allow space for those who don't fit into those boxes. To let go of the strangle-hold there.

The family structure, the business structure, the structures of government - being run in too many cases like corporations, the standard structured roles leaving emotional and soul needs unmet, leaving soul-driven purposes for being on this planet unfulfilled...

The structures we have set up for people to live within have become a version of hell in a lot of cases. They result in hell in a lot of cases. Things have to change.

Black Moon Lilith is also involved here. She is conjunct the Moon in Capricorn at the Full Moon lunar eclipse. And here it is imperative that we start to listen to the deep feminine wisdom - all of it, not just the soft and cuddly parts. Not just the glamourous and sexy parts. The dark, dirty, ugly, denied parts are pounding on the door. Some Kill Bill shit. And this time, we can't leave BML and all those who live her consciousness out in the cold. It's just not going to work this time. The paradigm has to shift. We're past due for this integration. We have to start addressing this stuff. The dark feminine will not remain a hostage, along for the ride in this immature, imbalanced shitshow any longer.

There are different astrological interpretations of eclipses. I'm not an expert on them by any means. But I do think they amp up the energies and themes of the New or Full Moons. They make the emotional processes involved there a bit stronger and deeper. More all-encompassing. Eclipses also seem to me to signal a dropping away of one backdrop and the overlay of a new one. A sort of mini paradigm shift. One layer discharged and another put in place. It could be subtle or it could be obvious.

I remember watching the total lunar eclipse in Virgo in February of 2008 from a park near my apartment. It was a very emotional day. I drank too much red wine. I was crying. I kept saying, I can't do this anymore related to Virgoan work/service and how impossible it was becoming to continue with the level of dysfunction there was in my work situation. But not only about work. It was about how I just couldn't do ANY of it anymore. The underlying psychic and emotional pain related to "how things were" was too much to wade through anymore. Too many people getting away with too much bad behaviour. So things very much came to an emotional head around the Virgo themes for me. The eclipse was beautiful, though. I had a perfect view. The sky was completely clear and it was just stunning. It made me feel better out there in that park, crying to the moon.

So expect some emotional times with these eclipses.

I read that solar eclipses usually relate to external events while lunar eclipses relate to more subtle, unseen aspects. Makes sense.

But with a solar eclipse in Cancer and a lunar eclipse in Capricorn, you can see the combination, the interplay of this polarity. External shifts triggered by internal, emotional changes. Changes in the family structure, especially in the role of the mother/feminine/nurturing energy, resulting from changes in the business structures. And vice versa.

With Pluto so involved in kicking off this eclipse season, I think these eclipses do relate to deep, structural and emotional shifts. Sloughing off the layers of past-related emotion that cling and constrict, collected through generation after generation who struggled to live their lives according to the pre-set standards...or who were considered failures if they could not do so.

Coming to terms with the loss of innocence in some ways related to those North American Dream structural set-ups. Processing feelings of guilt and disappointed expectations.

Oh, the disappointment of mothers! It's a huge one. Pluto has its work cut out for it. But it's really the sadness and disappointment of all family members when the structural set-ups don't meet their needs. When the trip to Disneyland doesn't bring the family any closer together - instead, making everyone even more aware of how far apart they are. I remember taking weekend trips with my family. Staying in a hotel! With a pool! Eating fast food! Ice cream! Whatever we wanted! But still having an empty, lonely feeling in the pit of my stomach. Something very fundamental was not right with the whole set-up. There were unseen, unspoken pressures keeping us apart.

Think of every mother who ever stood at a sink full of dirty dishes with a sadness in her heart about her life with her family. Every sigh. Every disappointment. Every moment of loneliness she had to bear alone.

There's not much that can make a heart heavier than the weight of the disappointments of a family, is there?

With Pluto involved, there is also the processing of rage of people who have been speaking about the damaging effects of these rigid constructs all along. We felt how wrong "the way things are" were all along, and the ability to say "I told you so" now is just not cutting it. The waste. The damage. The pain caused. It's sometimes overwhelming.

And that's why we have to do better, instead of going on pretending the current set-ups meet our needs. We need the soul back as a guiding priority.

But then, at the same time, Pluto has only just scratched the surface, hasn't it? Most people continue living in these same standard set-ups. Most don't see much change at all. They hear about economic problems on the news and read about the numbers of unemployed, but it doesn't affect them personally, beyond a little belt-tightening. They see more police in the streets, hear the police helicopter circling. Doesn't mean much to them.

But the pressure is building...

Thinking about all those people going about their lives, continuing with their version of the North American Dream, I sometimes think I must be seeing things! haha That everything is going on and will go on just as it has...

But no. I think not. Because I know that Pluto is retrograding back to zero and will begin it's unearthing full force again September 11. Pluto peels away our layers of denial bit by bit, unrelenting. It forces awareness on us if we do not take it willingly. Pluto in Capricorn has a long-term goal here.

I think these New Moons in Cancer (with Pluto/Capricorn involved) also have to do with releasing the family structures (and expectations) of the Pluto in Cancer generation. You can see that that generation had to deal with some messed up Plutonic shit related to family and clan. Things got busted up there and transformed into some sort of hybrid of past and present. There are some very messed up dynamics going on between that gen and their children, the Pluto in Leos/Baby Boomers, that need to be dealt with.

Possibly, these eclipses will force a deeper examination and collective understanding of the obsessive security fears (including expansion of the police state), patriotism, killing for the North American Dream stuff. They could stir events which bring on increased awareness of these control mechanisms and of the power structures being held in place.

Events could happen which pseudo-justify further crackdowns on the people or other countries leading to more people putting on the Plutonic X-Ray glasses and seeing through it. Seeing the roots of it, which go, in a large part, to the Pluto in Cancers and their successor children.

This mentality has leaked into Canada, also, unfortunately, with our army fighting U.S. wars for oil and power with talk of the horrific North American Union and "Security and Prosperity Partnership."

Both Canada and the United States have Suns in Cancer, incidentally, so both countries should be profoundly affected by these New Moons, especially the 29 Cancer New Moon/total solar eclipse on July 21. Their very expressions on the world stage as "protectors" are on the transformational offering stand. The dirty aspects of these countries' agendas are coming more fully into the collective consciousness...as is their collusion. More and more, Canada is acting as an arm of the United States government, no longer an autonomous country. I think the Canadian public is past due for a wake up call on this front.

Oh, so much work to do, and Pluto has only just begun!

I'm tired already. I think I was born tired already. :)