signs

Venus rules Taurus and Libra

Our current transits today include sun in Taurus and moon in Libra. Feels like a good day to discuss how both are ruled by Venus, the energy of love, beauty and values. Big difference:

Taurus is an earth sign. Libra is an air sign.

Taurus is more about what’s tangible, about endurance, about sensual pleasures.

Libra is more about harmonic connection, aesthetics, relationships with people.

A Libra type artist is more likely to have an idea and then express it artistically. The idea often precedes the picture, song, etc.

A Taurus type artist is more likely to immerse themselves in the media, e.g., pottery clay, paints, etc., and then have the material inspire them to create.

Do you see how the more you understand the planetary rulers and elements, the signs become clearer?

Moon Phases

October 2021 Full Moon

This full moon is exact on Wednesday, October 20th at 10:57am ET. The moon is in Aries opposite the Libra sun, both at 27 degrees.

The cosmic mirror of this full moon is reflecting back to us our part in our lessons. It’s about being willing to acknowledge our karmic patterns that play out in relationships, or that we attribute to relationships, so that we can heal them.

It’s tempting to look at our pain or struggles and focus on something outside of ourselves. This is especially true with relationships. She lied. He cheated. They wouldn’t recognize my value, etc.

Yes! People are 100% responsible for their actions. This isn’t about excusing anyone or blaming victims.

I’m talking about owning your part in every encounter and relationship. That includes your choices, your fears, your insecurities, your needs, your gifts … everything you bring to relationships, including your expectations, fantasies, hopes, dreams, and agendas.

This full moon is an invitation to look at relationships in your life and instead of focusing on what they did or didn’t do, look at you. Look at what feelings, fears, and beliefs come up in you.

Instead of thinking about how you wish they would change, be open to owning what scares you, what hurts you, what beliefs keep you from seeing how lovable you are.

Seeing your own patterns is a huge first step in changing them. If you’re not ready to change, that’s okay. It’s okay to recognize something and not be ready to take action. The recognition is important. Too often we ignore facing truth because we aren’t ready to then take action. Be gentle with yourself and know that just being willing to see things differently is brave and valuable.

If you are ready to make a shift, the wind is at your back. You’ve got this.

Have a beautiful full moon.

Moon Phases, uncategorized

October 2021 New Moon

This new moon is exact on October 6th at 7:05am ET. It’s in Libra and is conjunct the sun and Mars all at 13 Libra and this trio is quincunx Uranus at 13 degrees.

So the energy of thirteen really colors this new moon. Thirteen is such a cool number.

As you most likely already know, thirteen is a very witchy number. It’s the one of self using the 3 of mind body spirit, to create a 4 of traditional nurturing and control. It isn’t aggressive, but it sets the table to get a desired result.

This new moon feels like an excellent time to emotionally connect in a deep way to what you want, especially when it comes to parts of yourself that you have kind of suppressed, ignored, or held back in some way because you didn’t feel like you had the freedom to really embrace and accept this part of yourself.

It’s also a time to look at how partnerships can support your desires and ambitions and how they can also limit your freedom. Being connected to others includes making agreements with them, and those agreements often have to get renegotiated over time. The circumstances of our lives change, we grow, evolve and change, and so relationships have to shift and change.

When you make any change within yourself, the people around you are required to make some sort of adjustment. The same is true for you. It can be tempting to want to keep people just as they are, for better or worse, because if they stay the same it gives us the option of staying the same.

So this new moon is also an invitation to not only support your desires and ambitions, but also to be open to allowing your partners and people you are close with to grow and expand and trust that you can adjust to who they need to be.

I’m going into to this new moon with the intention of increased clarity of both what I most want in life now and how I can stay true to going after what I want while supporting those closest to me as they go after what they want.

Have a beautiful new moon.

Moon Phases

March 2021 Full Moon

When the moon is full, it looks fully illuminated. We look up at it and see it reflecting the brilliance of the sun and the moonlight it sends us is a softly filtered glow of light from the sun.

What I’m inviting you to do today under this Libra full moon is to shine a light on your feelings and own them. Honor them.

There may be some you want to hold on to and others you wish you didn’t have. Whatever the case, this is a good time to go to the source.

Consciously nurture the source of the good feelings, because its easy to take our health, our relationships, our abundance for granted and have that goodness slip away. Be kind to yourself and to those that come into your bubble. Feed the goodness.

There may also be some feelings you want to release, like sadness, jealousy, resentment. Take a few minutes today and be willing to own the source of those feelings as well and ask yourself what you can do to heal the part of you that’s hurting.

If you feel ready and are willing to see things differently, open your mind and heart to something you can do to address a wound at the base of feelings you don’t want.

It could include some form of forgiveness (of yourself or someone else).

It could include focusing on the good in your life, what you have versus what you feel you lack. Gratitude is a powerful change agent.

Maybe it’s owning up to doing something you’ve been wanting or needing to do. Take action to move your life forward and when you do you’ll feel more excited for others that you see moving ahead.

It’s tempting to focus on other people as the source for how we feel, yet the true source is us. It’s our mind, our desires, our fears that create our reactions so getting clarity about how we really feel guides us to multiply the joy inside us and release that which doesn’t really serve us.

Moonlight is beautiful, though it’s true source is sunlight. The moon doesn’t create its own light. Your feelings reflect who you are and what you believe. You are the source for them. Take a minute to focus on where they come from within you and it becomes easier to filter out the ones that don’t serve your best self, your highest good and to amplify, to make radiant within you the ones that do.

Have a beautiful full moon today.

signs

The Twelve Signs

In previous blogs I have discussed the four elements and three qualities. I explained that each of the cardinal signs seek to assert themselves. In some way they are all driven and ambitious. The fixed signs are all focused and tenacious and have a definitive quality about them. The mutable signs are versatile, restless and seek change. Let’s take a look at the moon in the elements and see how these elements combine with the three qualities to give us the twelve signs.

 

Fire Moons

Fire is active and initiating energy. It seeks to create experience and take action. All of the fire moons feel nurtured through experience and action. Aries (Fire & Cardinal) seeks to experience life first hand and learn by doing. Aries energy needs to feel directly involved with the experience. Leo (Fire & Fixed) is more focused and wants the experience to have meaning. These moons need to be feel valued and feel admired and to serve the greater good. Sagittarius (Fire & Mutable) is restless and desires change. These moons feel nurtured through change that leads to growth and expansion. Sagittarian moons are progressive and seek spiritual fulfillment.

 

Earth Moons

Earth is stabilizing concrete energy, and naturally tends to create form and solidify human experience. Taurus (Earth & Fixed) is focused and tenacious so these moons need physical pleasure and do best when they are comfortable. Virgo (Earth & Mutable) combines the versatility of the mutable signs with the earth element, resulting in a moon that needs to feel a sense of service. There’s a need to keep changing the physical, so just when everything is settled, these moons want to move again and disrupt the order in life somehow. Capricorn (Earth & Cardinal) really needs structure and flourishes when their home base is solid. They are driven to create something that has lasting value.

 

Air Moons

Air is changeable kinetic energy, and expands to create discovery and innovation. Gemini (Air & Mutable) moons need variety and so they are in perpetual motion. They are emotional chameleons seeking changing circumstances. Libra (Air & Cardinal) combines the intellectual quality of air and the assertiveness of cardinal to create a thoughtful desire for life to be fair. Libra seeks balance. Aquarius (Air & Fixed) is intensified innovative energy resulting in a need for the unexpected, and an ability to relate to those in all walks of life.

 

Water Moons

Water is steadily flowing energy that moves to shape and deepen any experience. Cancer (Water & Cardinal) is strong, assertive emotion. Cancer needs emotional security and likes to be in control. Scorpio (Water & Fixed) is intense emotion and almost thrives on crisis. Scorpio moons have much to learn and teach regarding choice. Pisces (Water & Mutable) is fluid emotion. They are are gentle dreamers with great capacity for empathy and compassion. They tend to blur the lines between illusion and reality and kind find themselves often in the role of rescuer or feeling that they are in need of rescue.

I hope this gives you a better understanding of how the elements and qualities create the twelve astrological signs.

Copyright © 2009, Lisa Wagner

signs

The Elements

In the past two blog entries, I’ve taken a brief look at the Moon and the Ascendant, and considered how each of these two pieces are colored by the twelve signs. Today I’m going to begin an explanation of how the meaning of the Astrological signs are derived, by discussing the elements.

The signs are derived from four elements and three modalities. The four elements are fire, earth, air and water. The three modalities are cardinal, fixed and mutable. Identifying all the possible combinations of these elements and modalities results in the twelve signs of the Zodiac. For example, there is a fire sign that is cardinal, a fire sign that is fixed, and a fire sign that is mutable. The same is true for each of the remaining three elements, thus providing a total of twelve different ways these elements and modalities may be paired.

To begin our illustration, we’ll first look at the four elements. Fire is active and initiating energy. It seeks to create experience and take action. The fire signs are Aries, Leo and Sagittarius. Earth is stabilizing concrete energy, and naturally tends to create form and solidify human experience. Taurus, Virgo and Capricorn are the three earth signs. Air is changeable kinetic energy, and expands to create discovery and innovation. Gemini, Libra and Aquarius make up the Air trio. Water is steadily flowing energy that moves to shape and deepen any experience. Water is the element of Cancer, Scorpio and Pisces.

Each sign belongs to one of these elements, and each sign is connected to the other signs of the same element. To demonstrate this point, we’ll now look at Mercury in the elements. Mercury symbolizes the rational mind and how we communicate via language. It’s what we believe “makes sense.” Mercury in our chart shows how we think and how we learn. People that have Mercury in the fire signs are people that need first hand experience to learn. They can’t just read about it or hear a lecture. A fire Mercury also needs to connect thought with action in some way. Kids with Mercury in a fire sign usually do better when their learning environment gives them the opportunity to experience the lesson rather than simply to be taught the lesson.

People with Mercury in earth signs seek a practical application for what they are taught. If information isn’t useful, then it rarely makes sense to these types. An earth Mercury needs to connect thought with some type of form. Kids with Mercury in an earth sign usually do better when they are taught how they can use what they are learning to create something new or improve something already established, rather than learning for the sake of learning.

Mercury in the air signs gives us people that crave knowledge and information, and love to learn for the sake of learning. An air Mercury can read a book or engage in conversation on a subject that s/he will never actively pursue, just for the excitement of discovery and for the satisfaction that comes from sharing and exchanging ideas. Kids with Mercury in an air sign usually do better when they have access to books and discussions that allow them to share ideas.

A water Mercury needs to feel emotionally connected to learn. This connection can be to a teacher or to some internal desire that drives the person to want to learn. Mercury in water often feels a need to derive some sense of control and/or to feel that the knowledge is empowering. Kids with Mercury in water usually do better when they have a positive relationship with their teachers and learning environment, and feel as though what they are learning is personally enriching.

Next time, I’ll use Mercury to take a look at the three modalities, and explore how these combine with the elements to differentiate the twelve signs.

Copyright © 2009, Lisa Wagner

ascendant

The Rising Sign

The Ascendant, also called the Rising Sign, (both terms mean exactly the same thing) is the sign that appears on the eastern horizon, relative to where you were born, at the moment you were born. It is referred to as the lens through which you see the world, because it is your initial view of life, as well as the mask or surface personality that you develop in childhood for dealing with the world. The Ascendant also describes the kind of family pattern you were born in to, and the kind of child your parents wanted. As with every piece in a chart, you look at the sign, the degrees, and aspects etc., but even just looking at the sign can provide insight into the meaning of the Ascendant in your chart.

Those with Aries Rising often end up in families where they continue to be treated like a child, making the transition to adulthood difficult. Aries Ascendants usually take life at face value, and come in to learn to take risks, be spontaneous, and develop a clear sense of individuality. Taurus Rising is generally told to have specific goals and to be aware of when it is worthwhile to make an effort. Taurus Ascendants usually develop a strong appreciation for the sensual, physical side of life, and come in to learn how to conserve resources, pace oneself, and feel at ease.

Those with Gemini Rising are generally told to not be a burden, and to learn to tell people what they want to hear. Gemini Ascendants generally have strong verbal skills and are very adaptable, and come in to this life to learn to develop a lighter touch in life. Cancer Rising is often raised to be a parent and nurture others. Cancer Ascendants generally know how to stay in control, and often must learn how to ask for and receive help from others.

Leo Rising is usually told that it is important to look good and dress right to succeed in life. Leo Ascendants are often drawn to serving the greater good, and have a keen eye for improving themselves and others. Their lessons often involve learning to be happy. Virgo Rising is usually told to work hard and to pay attention to detail. Virgo Ascendants often have a talent with math, music or healing and come in to learn how to derive fulfillment through work and service.

Libra Rising usually grows up being told to be fair, play nice, and to be aware of what other people need. Libra Ascendants know how to accommodate others, and are here to learn balance in life and in one on one relationships. Scorpio Rising often indicates a family that kept secrets and had trouble setting consistent priorities. Scorpio Ascendants understand vulnerability, and often have come in to this life to learn to be decisive and become comfortable with choice.

Sagittarius Rising is usually told to be self reliant and to focus only on the good in any situation. Sagittarius Ascendants often project a lot of confidence and faith, though they are usually here to learn how to trust. Capricorn Rising is usually told to grow up immediately and often doesn’t have time to be a kid. Capricorn Ascendants usually appear to be very grounded even though their lessons often include learning how to achieve stability in life.

Aquarius Rising is told to be observant and to be a team player. Aquarius Ascendants generally hear a call to social consciousness and come in to learn how to develop connections with others that include intimacy. Pisces Rising is told to blend in and to have compassion. Pisces Ascendants usually have a chameleon like quality and their lessons often include learning that they cannot save anyone accept themselves.

What is your Rising Sign? Check it out for clues about your family patterns, and the kinds of masks you wear in the world.

Copyright © 2009, Lisa Wagner