Happy Birthday, WWA blog!

Today, my blog is eight years old. One full Venus cycle is behind us. And when I think of all the amazingly brilliant, interesting, and kick-butt people I've come to know because of this blog, I'm a little mind-boggled.

I always had a feeling there were others inhabiting the far reaches. I had a feeling there were others working and living from their own outskirt outposts. And now I know it's true.

I couldn't have imagined, growing up as a square peg in a rural, conservative round hole, that I would one day be able to communicate with other people who saw what I saw and understood what I understood. The internet age is almost like a dream, something truly fantastical. But it's real. I'm real. This blog is real. And you are real.

What a bizarre and fabulous time to be alive.

Happiest of Birthdays, WWA blog! You have provided love, sustenance, information, and guidance through some very treacherous times. Please keep on keeping on.

Mars Retrograde 2016: a Re-Direction of Passions

Mars is referred to as the action planet, relating to physical energy, personal direction, goals, will, anger, aggression, sex drive, sexuality, the way we move, and the way we do things, in general.

One of the primary astrological events for 2016 is a Mars retrograde period from April 17 to June 29 when Mars will appear to re-trace its steps in backward motion through the zodiac. 

Mars retrogrades occur once every two years. With the upcoming retrograde period from 8 degrees Sagittarius to 23 degrees Scorpio, the path we are actively carving through life will be changing - or at the very least, deepening - in 2016, becoming more fully aligned with our personal belief systems, faith, and truth.

Both Sagittarius and Scorpio are known as quite passionate signs, and this Mars retrograde period indicates a time of “passions directed and re-directed.” 

In Sagittarius, Mars is actively seeking meaningful experiences that boost inspiration, exhilaration, joy, and faith, as well as deepening our knowledge of the truth.  

In Scorpio, Mars desires to know stone, cold reality, right down to its deep, dark (and sometimes ugly) core. Mars in Scorpio leaves no stone left unturned.

This is an excerpt from the patron article, "Mars Retrograde 2016: a Re-Direction of Passions." It is available in its entirety to Willow's Web Astrology patrons, or it can be purchased for $9.50 via PayPal or email money transfer.

A New Moon in Aquarius Delivers Us From the Plutonic Grips

We experience a New Moon at 19 degrees Aquarius on February 8 (8:39 a.m. CST) that propels us beyond the Plutonic muck we've been wading through since the year began.

Celebrate good times, friends.

Even the Sabian Symbol for this New Moon has a bit of a relieving message: "A Large White Dove Bearing a Message."

Part of that message is: we're moving out of the gut-churning grips of Pluto in Capricorn! At least a little.

Having our nose rubbed in the dank and disturbing side of things has been fun and all, but honestly, let's bust loose from the muck and mire and set our sights on what's up ahead for a while.

The objective, detached, and future-oriented characteristics of Aquarius will be a very nice change as we deepen into Aquarius season with this New Moon. Mercury moves into Aquarius February 13, and Venus follows into the sign of the water-bearer February 16.

The Aquarius New Moon February 8 officially closes out the lunar cycle that began with the Capricorn New Moon, tightly conjunct Pluto, on January 9.

That entire 28-day lunar cycle was Pluto-infused, making the first month of the year a little heavier and more depressing than usual. (And yeah, January is generally pretty depressing!) Like perpetual Monday morning under the fluorescent lights of a soul-sucking office job...

The lunar month that is now coming to a close included Mercury (communication, intelligence, what's on our mind) retrograding back to a conjunction to Pluto and then stationing direct there on January 25. This kept us struggling with some of the paranoia, obsessiveness, and icy-grip fear related to Pluto for an extended period of time.

Coming out of the holidays, financial and job-security worries were preying on people's minds and emotions in some fairly intense ways, and this theme continues with a Venus (money) in Capricorn conjunction to Pluto on February 5.

Here in Bakken oilfield territory, the rock-bottom price of oil has thrown many people out of work, and those who managed to keep their jobs have often had to take substantial pay cuts. You can certainly see the price of oil reflected in the patronage at the honky tonk dive bar where I work a couple nights a week. Once filled with rowdy, oil field-employed drinkers every single night of the week, we are now closing at 10 and 11 o'clock at night due to lack of customers.

This is just one of the collective Pluto in Capricorn stories as corrupt and unsustainable structures are manipulated and milked to the point of collapse.

Some re-structuring - mental, emotional, and physical - was necessary as we moved through the first month of 2016.

But as we move through the upcoming Aquarius New Moon, Mercury in Capricorn has moved beyond its conjunction to Pluto and has re-gained full speed direct, while Venus in Capricorn has cleared the exact conjunction to Pluto, moving into a nice, productive trine aspect to Jupiter and the North Node in Virgo, exact February 10.

We've received the Plutonic reality check loud and clear. Changes have been made or forced. Endings have been experienced. The dust has (somewhat) settled. And now, as we enter this Aquarian-infused lunar cycle, we're ready to look forward.

We can't simply step away from the things we've come to know, however.

This Aquarius New Moon falls in tight square aspect to Mars in Scorpio, indicating a tension-filled necessity to hold the emotional/psychological bottom line as we make our future plans. Holding the energy of that bottom-line reality - even when it's on the uncomfortable or unpleasant side - ensures that our future plans have the right grounding and less chance of falling apart at the seams.

Aquarius' detachment and icy objectivity have a way of hurting Scorpio's feelings.

And you know Mars in Scorpio will just fuck shit up if its concerns are not taken fully into consideration, right?

We can't simply sever our emotional state or intuition in favour of the future vision. It won't work.

We're balancing what we know and feel in our guts (Scorpio) with what our brains are telling us about the way forward (Aquarius), and this tension continues throughout the 28-day lunar cycle.

Stay at Emotional/Intuitive Ground Zero, but look ahead with interest and excitement, at the same time.

We can't pretend things are less messed up on Planet Earth than they really are. Taking the full shitshow into consideration ensures that we're moving on from here in a grounded, effective, and reality-respecting way. We aren't amputating our feelings or any aspects of our experience in an ill-advised attempt to lighten the load.

Juno is also in Scorpio at the moment, conjunct Mars and square the Aquarius New Moon, so our soul mates are those who also know the score - and live by it - on the emotional and energetic level. Our soul mates are those who've dealt with more than their fair share of shit sandwiches in their day, just as we have.

As we move into this more strongly Aquarian-flavoured time period, Uranus in Aries becomes a much stronger influence over us, indicating a drive to make changes and even radical breaks from the standard way of doing things. These changes may be taken on willingly, or they may be forced by increasingly unsustainable circumstances within our structures, particularly business/finance.

The influence of Mars in Scorpio at the time of the Aquarius New Moon indicates a fairly charged and unpredictable month of events in store for us.

There may be some anger as we run into clashing future visions or people who are looking out for their own interests to the detriment of others. We may have to fight our way through some dense emotional or psychological territory as we make strides toward a future we'd like to live through.

We may also have inflammatory issues popping up with the body (Mars) or physical energy. This is a good time to remind ourselves of transiting Jupiter conjunct the North Node in Virgo and the wisdom of being pristine with diet and health.

Look to the house where 19 degrees Aquarius falls in your birth chart to find the breath of Aquarian/Uranian fresh air coursing through your life and world. There are unconventional and unexpected solutions coming in this area of life as we open out of the New Moon February 8.

The Moon will move through Capricorn, the sign of its detriment, February 4 - 6. As we close out this uber Plutonic lunar cycle, the Balsamic Capricorn Moon will be very busy tying up loose ends. It will form conjunctions to Pluto, Venus, and Mercury in Capricorn as well as a vibe-shifting square to Uranus in Aries, all on February 6.

The electric zing! of Uranus/Aquarius is on its way for the lunar month up ahead, replacing the dense and concentrated energy of Pluto that we've been navigating intensely since 2016 began.

The Aquarian-flavoured lunar cycle that opens February 8 continues until the New Moon total solar eclipse at 18 degrees Pisces (conjunct Chiron) on March 8.