New Moon in Virgo Sets a Preparatory Tone For the Upcoming Mars Retrograde

We unfold into the New Moon in Virgo today and specific new work/service assignments begin to be defined ahead of the Mars retrograde in Virgo. You know the kind. This is "my purpose and role on the planet at this time" type stuff, with work (hopefully) acting as a vehicle for that. 

These newly defined assignments coming into play could be completely new gigs or they could be the refining and clarification of roles within old work arenas. In light of the current circumstances on Planet Earth, Mars, the planet of personal will, goals, direction, and physical energy, will be re-directing us down only the most crisply effective channels during its almost eight-month transit of the sign of virginal purity. 

And in light of the monstrous levels of unemployment and underemployment that have been purposefully and systemically created, this retrograde is about the fight (Mars) to remain engaged in one's life's work or any work at all (Virgo) at a time when people (at least the people who are not on the top rungs of the socio-economic pyramid scheme) are being treated as if redundant. 

We're not redundant. We're the most potent, influential, rock-and-roll force there is. And this retrograde asks us to stand up and prove it by being the most effective, the most useful, the most thorough, the most practical, the most down-to-earth, the most organized we can be. 

The splashy, fiery, everyone's-an-artisan Mars in Leo overlay, kicked off almost two years ago during the Mars in Leo retrograde in winter of 2010, quiets and draws to a close. 

In order to achieve our goals now, we have to practically and effectively apply the creative fire we've spent two years blazing in ways that hit just the right spots to fix, straighten out, heal, clean, clear whatever fucked up mess we find before us. It's hardcore, warrior holism, and at this time on Planet Earth, we have lots to work with. 

This is the fight (Mars) to heal (Virgo) and to stay healthy, to maintain health as Fukushima spews, as our environments are poisoned physically, emotionally, psychically, electromagnetically all around us, as we are manipulated by those who profit from us being unintegrated, toxic, unbalanced, disconnected, dysfunctional. 

During this Mars transit of Virgo, we address all that, right down to the teeny tiniest detail. 

Mars will transit Virgo for almost eight months - from November 10, 2011 until July 3, 2012. It will be retrograde from January 24 to April 14, 2012 - prime re-direction processing time. 

Just before, as Mars transits Leo (September 18 to November 10), the creative fire in our hearts becomes concentrated. The big, blazing, dancing flames die down, and we start to work with the distilled, with the quietly glowing embers that, despite appearance, are the smoking hottest, the most alchemical, the most transforming. The most pure. This is what Virgo can work with. The pure. And if it's not, it'll carve it down until it is pure. 

This is what Mars in Virgo is after: right action. Only the right action. Just the right touch, the right word, the right angle, the right analysis, the right effort, the right medicine. Smooth, flowing functionality. Work that is a natural extension of self. Work that is self. Nothing more, nothing less. 

There's a re-direction and a restraint in application of our physical energy with this retrograde that stills the over-the-top showiness, the grandiosity, the tendencies to self-promotion of Mars in Leo. 

You know what, Mars in Virgo asks? Who gives a shit? Who gives a shit about your fashion statements or who your influences are or how much of an ego-pampered pretty, pretty peacock you are? 

Virgo is the sign that gets things done utilitarian-style, no frills, no hoopla, no ego stroking. It separates the coddled artistes from the people who can really play ball. And when war planet Mars comes to town amidst initiations of World War III, it doesn't give a shit about your artist's statement or how many magazine interviews you've done or who you had dinner with last night or your greatest fucking hits. 

If you can't break out of the self-flagellating ego bubble and hit the most pertinent marks just because 1) they're there and need to be hit and 2) you just might have the means to do so, you're excess, and Virgo has very little tolerance for excess. 

Be of use in the most practical, immediately necessary ways and flow with that shit like it's a second skin or you're really not hitting the heights you think you are. 

Pretty hardcore, that Mars in Virgo. Demanding standards. But there's the gauntlet as it is about to be thrown... 

Mars in Virgo touches this New Moon point at 5 degrees Virgo November 20-22, and we officially begin. 

Mars enters its retrograde shadow November 18 at 3 degrees, and we start to get an understanding of what will be sanded down, honed, sharpened for efficacy in our lives and selves during the retrograde process. 

Mars stations retrograde at 23 degrees Virgo January 23, and it stations direct at 3 degrees Virgo April 13, 2012. 

It leaves the retrograde shadow at 23 degrees Virgo on June 19, 2012 and enters Libra July 3, finally conjuncting Saturn in Libra August 14/15, 2012.

Mars-Saturn Square: Survival Guide For the Breaking Point

Mars in Cancer square Saturn in Libra – final aspect of the Summer 2011 Cardinal Grand Cross August 24/25

This is a tough aspect to deal with at the best of times: two planets considered malefics interacting in a tense, clashing, frictional square. Add the facts that 1) Mars is debilitated in Cancer and prone to over-the-top emotional reactions and 2) we’re at the tail-end of the final wave of a highly challenging Cardinal Grand Cross configuration we’ve been dealing with all summer – we all have Cardinal Grand Cross fatigue - and this aspect coming at the end of it can feel like more than we can bear.

This aspect is especially rough on men. Mothering, nurturing, in-touch-with-the-inner-self Cancer is not traditionally their scene. Mars in Cancer includes themes of men grappling with and trying to express these feminine/yin aspects while maintaining their masculinity. Square to Saturn in Libra, the acute challenge is in finding the right balance in a world that benefits (especially financially) from men who set their emotions, consciences and soul urges aside to keep getting the job done. They are encouraged, subtly pressured to do so, and anyone unwilling or unable to keep up the extreme split and the extreme pace becomes less valuable, a disappointment, weak, unable to cut the mustard. In order to keep bringing home the paycheques, they subvert emotional cues and soulful guidance to the point of detriment.

News hit a few days ago of the suicide of National Hockey League hockey player Rick Rypien. Rypien had just been traded from the Vancouver Canucks to the city where I’m currently stationed, a city where he had played as a junior. Instead of showing up for work, he was found dead at his home in Alberta August 15. Rick was at the fateful age of 27, soon to be entering his Saturn return. He had endured years of depression, speaking publicly about it and taking time off twice from his hockey career to have it treated. The death of his girlfriend in a car accident when he was a junior player and captain of the Regina Pats was more than likely a contributing factor to his ongoing depression, and the stress of a move and a brand new hockey club under the Cardinal Grand Cross – facing down that Mars-Saturn square - were more than likely contributing factors in his decision to end his life.

It’s interesting to note that Rypien was what was considered an enforcer – his basic role was to fight opponent players on the ice. Night after night, he fought and bashed other guys, amped up on adrenaline, and that would definitely take its toll on the chemical balance of an individual. Rypien’s death follows the accidental death in May of another NHL enforcer, 28-year-old New York Rangers player Derek Boogaard – also on the cusp of his Saturn return. Boogaard died of an accidental overdose of the painkiller oxycodone and alcohol.

This is the difficulty of big, tough, hockey playing men (Mars) dealing with the emotional, physical and psychic aftermath of being professional fighting machines - a theme that can be applied almost across the board these days. The hyper masculine culture (professional sport being one leg) has not traditionally done well dealing in the feminine realms of emotion and soul. Human beings are not machines. The extreme imbalance between masculine and feminine is bound to create destruction and dysfunction, and Ryan and Dennis are just the tips of the iceberg.

Mars square Saturn is an indicator that we’re challenged to do things we don’t really want to do right now, things we don’t feel we have the strength to do at this point, and it’s kicking up anxiety and dread.

For me, part of this involves returning to unsettled circumstances in the city, just as this aspect is exact, when my heart is and probably always will be in the country. I know the trail forward in my life has always gone squarely through urban areas and that it’s required that I re-enter the concrete jungle, but it doesn’t make it any easier to actually do it as I’m enjoying a clear view of a sunset that I know I will not see again for months with the wind in the cottonwoods the only sound.

My astrologer and psychic friend freeforall is also moving on with mixed feelings out of the Cardinal Grand Cross summer. She and I both ended up in this city at around the same time, moving from Alberta last year. Her work contract here ended unexpectedly, and she now finds herself with an exciting new contract in the city from which she came – a city that also involves a lot of heartbreak and bad memories for her.

At the same time, we in Canada are feeling this aspect as the end of the much-too-short summer season. Long, cold, dark winter (Saturn) is not too far off, and it’s always difficult to look forward to months on end of ice, snow, flaky skin, Vitamin D deprivation and freezing appendages.

I don’t know anyone who is not looking to this fall and winter without a bit of trepidation or at least resignation. This observation is not to be a downer – it’s to point out that no one is alone in feeling this way. These feelings are completely normal considering circumstances on this planet.

The new directions spurred by the Cardinal Grand Cross are interesting and at times exciting, but they are being initiated under circumstances both globally and personally that are not exactly best case scenario.

In light of the difficulty of this particular aspect, here are some emotional survival tips for Mars in Cancer square Saturn in Libra, in effect until the end of this month:

- Comfort yourself in healthy ways however you can. Baby yourself through the challenging parts, and don’t feel weird or guilty about it at all. Emotional comfort is what Cancer does best.

- Understand that this is an aspect, a span of time, and that the arduousness of it will let up. Saturn makes things feel as if they’ll be this way forever: ie. bad. They won’t. Applying aspects almost always feel worse than succeeding, so the roughest time emotionally is this upcoming week.

- Work through the feelings coming up. Expect some possible anxiety, fear, dread, anger – but try not to dwell on it. Move through difficult feelings and onto something else as quickly as possible. Distract yourself. Focus on what’s coming into your life that interests or excites you and close the tap as far as the inexhaustible supply of anxious Cancerian what-ifs. Tell your over-protective, overly stressed inner mother to go pamper herself at the spa for a while.

- Be around people regularly. There is a tendency to isolate under the emotional weight of difficult aspects like this one, but maintaining contact, even when it’s challenging, is a necessary touchstone.

- Make sure everyone in your posse is doing OK. Check in with the people in your life and also extend yourself to people you wouldn’t usually converse with. We all need to take responsibility for maintaining (Saturn) the social spheres (Libra) now. We’re going to need them.

Another tip I would add for the entire Uranus in Aries square series to Pluto in Capricorn through March 2015 is: Don’t be too surprised or shocked as things/people start to come unglued. (I’m sure most people who read this blog won’t be.) At this point, the weight, complexity and demands of the structures of many people’s lives, especially within the mainstream, are becoming too much to bear. The structures and pacing all around us have reached a point of no return as far as insanity, inhumanity, toxicity and corruption, and keeping up the game from here on becomes increasingly taxing to the point of impossible. There is only so long that people can keep up with the demands of an increasingly unnatural pace and lifestyle for the sake of dead and done concepts of prestige, success, progress and power. We’re reaching the point where many just won’t be able to do it anymore. (I think I was born at that point.)

For the next seven years, as Uranus transits Aries, there is a focus on radical, ingenius (Uranus) survival (Aries). Radical breaks from the toxic structures as they exist (Uranus in Aries square Pluto in Capricorn) are to be expected, even from people considered highly successful by mainstream (and most often less soulful) standards. People will be at the point where they shed their entire old lives - because they have to. It really is a matter of life and death – at least, soul life. And what’s the point of hauling these carcasses around if there’s no soul left to guide us by?

Mars in Cancer Square Saturn in Libra and Responsibly Avoiding Emotional Triggers

We can all learn a little something from the sideways-stepping crab right now: healthy, self-preserving avoidance of angry trigger points.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not talking avoidance as in denial and wilful ignorance of reality. With Pluto in a long-term transit of Capricorn opposing and working its transformational magic on Cancer, the at times pathological level of look-the-other-way-itis and cozy hypocrisy often prevalent with less mature expressions of this sign are deadly problematic and need to be exposed at every turn. (I’m from Canada, a Cancer Sun nation rife with those deadly Cancerian problems, and then there is that Cancer Sun nation south of the 49th parallel, which is even more rife with it…)

I’m talking about a ‘Pluto is my homeboy,’ eyes-wide-open, fully cognizant avoidance of emotional trigger points that serve no purpose other than to drag us into old territory (Cancer), piss us off and waste our energy (Mars).

Mars doesn’t like being forced to go over and over old territory – it wants to forge ahead onto new ground. So the healthy avoidance comes in taking a proactive new track, especially as it relates to challenging relationships (Saturn in Libra). Forging this proactive new track is tricky, though, as Mars in Cancer without a doubt involves sentimental trips down memory lane. History books. Heritage. Stories about the old times and the old timers. Old loves. Family albums. Roots.

The trick comes in maintaining a healthy and responsible balance (Saturn in Libra) and knowing when to just beat a track the hell out of there. As sweet and comforting as it is, the past can be both suffocating and debilitating, keeping us from being effective in the present, and these are strong Mars in Cancer themes, in effect until Mars ingresses Leo September 18.

Mars, currently debilitated in the sign of Cancer, is grinding out the last tense aspect of the Cardinal Grand Cross summer of 2011 – a square to Saturn in Libra at its culmination point August 24/25. We’re coming into very close contact with the frictional challenges of relationship, including emotional habits that draw us into a weak relational position.

Saturn in Libra abhors being in a weak relational position.

Here, trusting the cautious, indirect, emotionally-triggered movement of Mars in Cancer to responsibly guide our actions in relation to other people as we navigate this square can help us avoid the pitfalls, sidestepping the game altogether.

Keep a wary eye on the people around you as well as on yourself under this square: Mars in Cancer square Saturn in Libra as the final Cardinal Grand Cross of 2011 aspect is a reality check as far as the development of and commitment to rock-solid standards for the people with whom we are in partnerships, both business and personal.

Don’t kid yourself. We’re still limited under these configurations. If we move too far, too fast, we feel the unbreakable, unshakeable limitations holding us in place.

The potentially frustrating constriction and restriction and confrontations with fear of this Mars-Saturn square have the ability to force character weaknesses acutely to the surface between now and the end of this month. With the Cancer-Libra square these include: unresolved emotional baggage, emotional immaturity, unreliability, inability to commit, making emotionally-based excuses for shirking responsibility, falsity and dishonesty to maintain social popularity/playing to your crowd, over-committing and under-performing, avoiding the responsibility of emotional honesty in relationship, living in past relationships to the detriment of present and future ones, using relationships (and people) to fill emotional voids, making decisions and taking actions based only in the attempt to alleviate personal anxiety, keeping people in your life out of habit or emotional neediness.

If people are caving under the pressure of this square and under the pressure of the Saturn transit of Libra, in general, take heed. Things are about to get infinitely more complicated as Saturn heads into Scorpio October 2012 within mutual reception to Pluto in Capricorn. It’s time to get very serious about who we have in our lives.

From previous posts:

“We're in the midst of a five-year gutting, restructuring and energetic re-balancing process in relationship that will not reach ultimate completion until the end of a period of mutual reception between Saturn in Scorpio and Pluto in Capricorn when Saturn leaves Scorpio September 2015...

The planetary conditions will be getting pretty dicey on multiple fronts over the next three or four years, and love and partnership take on a whole new requirement for commitment.

Legal enmeshments become increasingly sticky, and the decisions we make now have the ability to drag us into hell then. It's very easy to be adversely affected by other people refusing their Saturnine responsibilities. If you don't want to end up with double duty (theirs and yours), make firm and responsible decisions now as far as the people you have in your life. No compromising.”

There are a lot of people feeling the pressure to be in relationship under Saturn in Libra. There are a lot of fears (Saturn) coming up related to being single forever and dying alone and miserable in a cold, empty, desolate shanty reflecting a cold, empty, desolate heart. This is especially true for the Pluto in Libra generation - many of whom have done a massive amount of heavy lifting as far as shifting relationship dynamics and structures and have good reason for being late coming into relationship - they don't want to repeat the mistakes and massive fuck-ups of the past.

What this means is that people are very conscious of the passing of time and of the passing of their best case scenario love/marriage/babies timelines and are more prone to fudging it a bit, to compromising their standards and their fulfillment levels for the sake of being in a relationship, any relationship.

You could do that.

But I really wouldn’t advise it.

Mars, Juno and Black Moon Lilith Arrive Fashionably Late to the Cardinal Grand Cross Party

And things are really hopping... 

Mars in Cancer, Juno in Libra and true Black Moon Lilith in Aries are now officially hitting the Cardinal Grand Cross scene, and right on schedule, stock markets have entered a tail spin. 

This hasn’t come out of the blue by any stretch, but the involvement of Mars square Uranus (August 9) is making it seem so for those who have not had their Plutonic noses to the ground. A lightning-fast shock to the system with further melt-down (or possibly temporary containment/kicking the can yet further down the road) coming as Mars squares Pluto August 11. 

What will investors do? Oh, gee. I’m on the edge of my seat. 

This is a triggering culmination point after decades of financial excess and over-extension, especially militarily, as well as critical mass as far as the absolute, unchecked corruption at all levels of global money structures which has left them rotted to the point that there is little resembling sanity or legitimacy. 

Using the very shortest timeline, this stems from the orchestrated economic collapse (most prominently involving grand-scale mortgage, insurance and banking fraud in the United States) of 2008 when Pluto entered Capricorn. Deep, Plutonic changes to the way things were set up were put off following that collapse as the U.S. banking industry looted the public purse of its Federal Reserve Notes. The orchestrated crashing of world economies and resulting chaos and desperation puts the people right where global powers want them. It also sets the stage for more war – always useful to the monied warlords who refer to themselves as our leaders. Except that most of us have caught on. 

The current tail-spin was triggered, right on astrological schedule, by the announcement of the U.S. debt ceiling extension, which came just as Mercury was stationing retrograde at 1 degree Virgo August 2. The lowering of the United States’ credit score followed. 

Now, Mercury goes back over the weeks leading up to the announcement as it re-enters Leo. 

There is a surreal quality for those who were/are still invested in the legitimacy and soundness of illegitimate and unsound structures and people, and there is still a massive amount of wishful thinking as the illusion that this is just a blip continues to permeate (Mercury Rx in Leo opposite Neptune Rx in Aquarius). The insanity of corrupt, stock market-directed economic and financial sectors continues to be apparent as financial analysts insist things are still in good shape. After all, corporations are posting healthy profits! There is no mention of the millions of jobs shed to maintain those profits. There is no mention of the people currently losing their homes, no longer able to put enough food on the table. But as long as the corporate world posts a profit, these guys are certain all is right with the world. 

The full effect of the announcement and the lowering of the U.S. credit score will not be known until Mercury crosses out of its retrograde shadow, entering 2 degrees Virgo September 10 – just in time for the 10-year anniversary of 9/11. 

What a puppet show. 

The true placement of Black Moon Lilith is zipping around in Aries, conjunct Uranus and triggering the CGC from the fringes August 9-11. 

Juno in Libra, having recently completed a nine-month+ transit through Virgo, has also entered Cardinal Grand Cross Zone, opposing Uranus in Aries August 10 and squaring Pluto in Capricorn August 13, just in time for the Full Moon at 20 degrees Aquarius. Juno is heading to a conjunction to Saturn at 17 degrees Libra (in the early Via Combusta) September 18. 

Expect interesting and somewhat spicy developments along strategic partnership lines around that time – both personally and on the world stage. When Juno is involved, it’s not always easy emotional territory, but the partnerships that come together or strengthen at that time are related to the long-term success of our souls, which is what most of us are here for. Juno enters the Via Combusta (burning path) at 15 degrees Libra September 12 and exits at 15 Scorpio December 8. Juno traces the path that Saturn will follow through the Via Combusta from August 29, 2011 through November 20, 2013. 

 The people, relationships and partnership themes – especially as they relate to reaching our highest potentials in career – highlighted during this fall’s transit by Juno of the Via Combusta set the foundation for the longer term alchemical progress represented by Saturn’s transit of the Via Combusta until November 2013.

Astrology is Not New Age...Part Two

Mercury in veil-lifting Virgo has just stationed retrograde opposite Neptune Rx and Chiron Rx conjunct in veil-dropping Pisces, and I'm digging up a little 'deconstructing the New Age' review on this blog.

In light of a few misinformed comments and e-mails I've received in the last little while, I'd like to make this crystal clear: Astrology is not New Age, and I find the co-opting of astrology by the New Age movement and its adherents problematic.

I've written a post on this exact subject in the past, and I've reiterated it on the blog repeatedly. This is the tricky part about writing a blog. A lot of people who comment or e-mail me are not really acquainted with my writing or perspective. A lot of times, they're reading a single post and commenting on that.

From a previous post:

"Unfortunately, astrology has come to be understood as synonymous with New Age ideology in the minds of many people, which includes the 2012 furor. A lot of people are actually embarrassed to admit they are interested in astrology due to the associations with New Age.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Astrology is not New Age. Astrology is not a belief system. It's a symbolic language describing cycles and themes that we can use as a navigational tool. That's not all it is, but that's it in a nutshell. If it works for you, use it. If it doesn't, don't. I really don't mind. But please know that astrology is alive and well outside the confines of the New Age."

A common criticism I receive here is: How can you be opposed to New Age? Astrology is inherently New Age.

No, actually, it isn't. The roots of astrology are ancient. They go back at least 4,000 years. The roots of the New Age movement go back less than 200 years. The New Age movement has co-opted astrology and many other ancient traditions, but none of these traditions is New Age.

Here's a previous post on that subject: Astrology is Not New Age from April 9, 2009.

Another criticism I've received is that the foundational idea of the "New Age" itself (related to the Aquarian Age) comes from the precession of the equinoxes and this proves astrology is New Age. Actually, no. This proves only that astrology has been adopted by New Age adherents to promote New Age ideology, including what they believe the Aquarian Age/"New Age" means. The precession of the equinoxes is not New Age. It's a physical shift of the position of the Sun at the time of March equinox from the physical constellation Pisces to the physical constellation Aquarius.

Here's a previous post on that: The Precession of the Equinoxes, Shifting Astrological Eras and '2012' from March 9, 2011.

Yet another common criticism I receive, generally from people of the soft New Age persuasion (ie. those who would not necessarily wear their New Age status on their sleeves or who downplay their adherence to its ideology), is that I can't possibly be so black and white in my rejection of New Age.

I can and am, actually. I find the energy and ideology of the New Age poisonous, manipulative, insidious, fatally flawed, and deeply insulting. There are no shades of gray.

Feel free to create your own reality, manifest your abundance, and achieve blissful enlightenment under the tutelage of your favourite guru or Ascended Master. Just do it over there, away from me.

Astrology requires no specific belief system to practise or utilize. Astrology can be a belief system, but it isn't for me. As astrologer Antero Alli says, "I don't believe in astrology. I use it because it works." I practise astrology as a navigational tool - something that provides valuable insight to help me and others get through the territory.

Here's a previous post on that: Astrology: No Specific Belief System Required! from April 18, 2009.

This is a phenomenon I don't completely understand, but it happens with this blog a lot, and I see the dynamic as a combination of Pisces/Neptune and Scorpio/Pluto.

1. People of a New Age persuasion are attracted to this blog for whatever reason - probably because they have never seen New Age ideology refuted or deconstructed before and are intrigued.
2. They read only what they agree with or what seems to support their own views and unvoiced critiques of the New Age movement.
3. They discard or overlook the rest, including my pointed critiques of the entire ideology/paradigm.
4. They continue reading the blog, assuming I am aligned with their belief system and seeing only what supports this view.
5. Eventually I write something that lets them know in no uncertain terms that no, in fact, I am not aligned with New Age beliefs in any way. (ie. I'm really not kidding about this.)
6. They get angry and leave comments or send e-mails that try to critique my point-of-view (with arguments that don't actually get the job done).

It's Neptunian projection related to what I'm about (ie. that we're on the same page), which I know the internet is rife with, and then Pluto rips that projection a new one, puncturing the Neptunian illusion and resulting in disillusionment and anger.

One recent example of this phenomenon was my article on the summer solstice Cardinal Grand Cross and triple eclipse season being plagiarized by the newsletter of a New Age ascension-promoting channeller. The people involved were mystified as to why I, a New Age critic, would object to my words and work being folded into their New Age newsletter. Trying to get New Age adherents who believe that everything comes from the non-physical to be passed around hippie "free intellectual love" style to understand the concepts of plagiarism and copyrighted intellectual property was a fun, fun exercise, let me tell you.

Posts on that here and here.

It's actually fairly mind-boggling how often this happens, and each time it's like stepping into the Twilight Zone.

The arguments and critcisms always go down in the same way, all New Age 101 Handbook stuff. They follow the pattern, and I've heard it a hundred times before. The problem is that I don't want to direct my energy to refuting this stuff on constant replay. If I've gone over something already on the blog, I generally won't devote my time and energy to repeating myself. I'm making an exception here because this has happened so often in the past little while, and I'm hoping I can just direct people to this post for all their educational needs from now on.

I guess when your prevailing belief system (New Age) focuses on everyone thinking the same way ("oneness") and dulls the discernment skills that would make those differentiations, it can come as quite a shock to realize that we don't.

Mars Triggers the Final Wave of the Summer 2011 Cardinal Grand Cross and a Look Ahead to Future Formations

Early this morning, Mars entered Cancer, the sign of its fall. The masculine, balls-to-the-wall, do now/think later action planet doesn’t get the job done so well from the soft-underbellied, sideways-stepping, strategic avoidance-prone crab zone. This month has frustration written all over it, actually. 

Still, Mars is going to have to do its best to take care of business from this sign as it enters full-on Cardinal Grand Cross territory August 9 with a square to Uranus in (the sign it really likes) Aries followed almost immediately by an opposition to Pluto in Capricorn just after midnight on August 11. 

The first two weeks of August are not a good time frame to add any unnecessary extra pressure to the people and situations around you. Understand that many people are at their breaking points under the tension of this Grand Cross. Move gently but firmly, and allow as much leeway as you comfortably can without compromising your own position. 

 Saturn in Libra has started to get some space from the proceedings, moving into the second decan of the sign of the scales. Mars in Cancer will not square Saturn in Libra until August 24/25 at 14 degrees. 

Mars, the final personal planet to transit Cancer, and Saturn continue to gain speed direct as Uranus and Pluto retrograde, and the Cardinal Grand Cross formation of the Summer of 2011 is loosening its grip. Uranus in Aries and Pluto in Capricorn remain within the longer-term series of seven squares, exact at various points between June 2012 and March 2015, which does not let up completely until Uranus enters Taurus for good in March 2019.  

Future Cardinal Grand Crosses involving Uranus and Pluto: August to December 2013 and April 2014 

We won’t experience another full-on Cardinal Grand Cross until late August 2013. At that time, Saturn will no longer be in Libra, but Jupiter will be in cardinal Cancer. 

The personal planets in Libra will move into place within the Cardinal Grand Cross – which is four squares or two oppositions involving planets in all four cardinal signs - triggering this grand-scale initiatory formation in waves, just as we experienced this summer. 

August 23-27, 2013 - Venus in Libra will move into place, forming the fourth leg of the Cardinal Grand Cross. 

September 14-20, 2013 - Mercury in Libra will pass through this territory using a nine-degree orb for aspects. 

October 1-13, 2013 - The Sun in Libra will trigger the Cardinal Grand Cross using a 10-degree orb for aspects. 

December 23, 2013 – January 1, 2014 - Mars in Libra moves into Cardinal Grand Cross formation to close out 2013. Mars then moves out of orb in Libra but retrogrades back in.  

Extreme Potency: Exact Cardinal Grand Cross at Lucky 13 April 2014 

April 21-24, 2014 – This is the big one. Mars Rx in Libra makes an exact Cardinal Grand Cross configuration with Jupiter in Cancer, Uranus in Aries, and Pluto Rx in Capricorn all at Lucky 13 degrees of the cardinal signs. Whew. 

This exact Cardinal Grand Cross formation will strongly colour the Mars retrograde through Libra (February 28 to May 19, 2014) indicating a very tenuous and strained balance with a sometimes immense degree of personal exertion to maintain it while moving rapidly toward our goals. 

Aren’t you glad Saturn in Libra is drilling us on our maturity and responsibility with Libra themes right now? Weak points related to this sign’s energy would (and will) wreak major havoc within these future Cardinal Grand Crosses. Going out of balance within the pressurized circumstances of this formation would require an immense amount of effort to put right. Under this type of tension, if one spring goes, they all go. 

This formation, especially the exact one April 21-24, 2014, will have a hugely polarizing effect socially with a tendency to move to extreme ends of the spectrum in relation to other people or groups. Mars is in detriment in Libra and indicates struggle to maintain any semblance of social diplomacy and good relations. It will take great effort (Mars) to maintain peace (Libra), especially in light of the groups gunning for another world war. Thirteen is a potent and highly symbolic number, and we can expect this formation to be used to trigger further symbolic events on the world stage. 

Learn your Libra lessons well between now and October 2012, and the foundation will be set as far as future success with these Cardinal Grand Cross formations.