Blog — Newsletters

by Steven Forrest

Venus turned retrograde on December 21st, right on the Winter Solstice. Those two pregnant moments coinciding is a rare event and it tells me that we should pay a lot of attention to the strong Venusian signature on the coming year.

On January 11, that retrograde Venus conjuncts the Sun at 21°12' of Capricorn. It remains retrograde for the usual forty-day period, finally turning direct on the last day of January at 13°33' Capricorn.

The Sun-Venus alignment on the 11th is called an “inferior conjunction.” Despite the term, there’s nothing wrong with it! “Inferior” here only means that Venus is directly between the Earth and the Sun. On the other side of its orbit, Venus again aligns with the Sun, but this time with the Sun between us and Venus. 

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We can usually count on nice weather in Portland in September. It's often like a much-needed extension of summer – a sweet memory to tuck away for the rainy months to come. But no such luck this year. In fact, it's been raining cats and dogs. And it usually only rains butterflies and hummingbirds here, if you know what I mean (light sprinkles and mini drops).

So after about 5 days in a row this week without seeing the sun, I started getting grumbly. But now as I prepare October’s newsletter, it's all perfect fodder for this month's subject: The Grace in Debility! Because if we're evolving well in life, we learn to appreciate the benefits in "taking our medicine," whether that means eating our greens for health, or accepting the first frost, which might signal the start of winter, but also lays the stage for the coming rebirth of Spring.

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September opens straightforwardly with Venus in Libra and Mercury in Virgo. Each planet is in the sign it naturally rules, in other words. And that symmetry can be a bit bland, like a beige rug in a beige room.  But then things get a lot more interesting. On the 9th, Mercury crosses into Libra where it resides for the bulk of the month, until finally entering Scorpio on the 29th. Two days after Mercury slips into Libra, Venus leaves it, crossing the border into the classic sign of its “detriment,” Scorpio, where it remains until the end of the first week of October.

It is this period from September 11th onward, with Venus in Scorpio and Mercury in Libra, that I'm interested in.  Harnessed in an evolutionary way, this planetary combination can trigger conscious deepening, support both truth-telling and truth-hearing, and foster the resolution of tough, longstanding intimate conflicts. Experienced unconsciously, it can read like the script of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf.  People can tear each other apart in the name of love, in other words.

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Well, we’re still smack in the middle of the Uranus-Pluto square, as evidenced by any handful of news headlines you can find on a daily basis. As I write this, judge Col. Denise Lind just issued a verdict on the Bradley Manning case. The Manning case is likely to be remembered historically as one of the hallmarks of this transit, and the verdict could have a profound impact on our culture. Whether you believe Manning’s actions were right or wrong, the case calls into questions our current legal system, and glaring issues around accountability for wrongdoing within our armed forces and systems of government.

As a true representative of the Uranian archetype, whistleblower group Wikileaks is seen as a threat by the status quo. They are criticized for “going too far.” Their actions are seen as “offensive and operating outside the law.” And maybe that’s true. But in the eyes of those blowing the whistles, the means taken to reveal truth are necessary to shed light on wrongdoing. These are extreme archetypes at play, so whatever stories unfold on the world stage right now, they’re sure to be dramatic.

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As I write these words, temperatures are nearing record highs all across the US. So it seems fitting that Steven's newsletter this month takes the sun as its subject. Have you ever heard of Solar Maximum? If not, you're not alone. It just so happens that right now we're in the middle of the peak of the solar cycle - called solar maximum. Below, Steven shares some thoughts on this. And to bring you up to speed, we're also including his chapter on sunspot cycles from The Night Speaks. We'll be re-releasing this beloved little book in ebook format soon. Meanwhile, enjoy the teaser.

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Contemplating the astrological weather for the month of June, three “warm fronts” capture my attention. They all promise rain, at least in the symbolic sense. First, Neptune makes its station in Pisces on June 6th. Planets making stations are always at their strongest. Second, Jupiter enters Cancer toward the end of the month — on the 26th.  Third, Mercury and Venus pave the way for Jupiter’s Cancer ingress, with Mercury arriving in that sign on May 31 and Venus following on June 3rd. So we will have a lot of Cancer steam in the air for the entire month, and it will be getting an assist from Neptune.

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by Tony Howard

I’m writing you from the always beautiful Pacific NW, which is in the peak of Spring, abundant with green, awash in flowers, the air scented with lilacs. And lots of sun! Almost paradise… But kind of like the neighborhood I live in, it’s complicated to take in the beauty and be fully present to it with all of the simultaneous complexity going on in the world. The Uranus+Pluto square is still in full swing, and we’ll continue to get reminders of that until the orb between these two intense planetary bodies starts to widen.

I’d like to share a blog-style entry with you this time, rather than a cohesive work of writing, as a way to facilitate the beginning of a healing process. Take these words as food for further thought. Follow the trails that interest you. And let the rest go.

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When I was a kid getting interested in astrology, I quickly learned that the Ascendant was a big piece of the puzzle. But what did it mean? The more I read, the more I heard astrologers rolling the drums and blowing the trumpets for it . . .  but I still didn’t get it. The Ascendant is “your identity.” It is “your ego.” It is superficial; it is more important than your Sun Sign. The more I read, the more confused I became.

I decided I needed to figure it out for myself. I began by thinking about it physically. The Ascendant is the sign that was rising in the east when you were born. It was “dawning,” just like the Sun dawns in the morning. And it then came to me in a flash: the Ascendant represents how you “dawn on people.” It is your style, your affect, the way you present yourself to the social world.

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As I write this, we've already been fully initiated into the current Mercury retrograde cycle, which began on February 23, 2013. And something tells me you've noticed this one, even if you weren't forewarned.

That's because this Mercury retrograde cycle has an especially discombobulated quality since it's taking place in the sign of dreamy, subjective Pisces. When adrift in the sea of Pisces, Mercury isn't transmitting from its clearest channel. This isn't to say that Mercury in Pisces is "bad." Every planet/sign combination has a divine reason and place. But some combinations are certainly less complicated than others.

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by Steven Forrest

Saturn is the planet that helps us grow up. Failing that, it just helps us get old. Neptune is our guide when it comes to the most bedrock issue of all—what we take with us out of this world, and that boils down to consciousness itself. “Wisdom” might be a good word for it, although that has nothing to do with passing any posthumous  “multiple choice tests.” Neptune is that depth you see in some people’s eyes. Saturn is the quality of maturity. Both of them are constantly moving around everyone’s chart, stepping into the spotlight and back out of it. We grow with them in pulses.

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