It’s going to be quite a weekend! The Moon will be full in Aries VERY early on Sunday at 12:23 am Eastern. The way we communicate and think is challenging the way we take action on our will and our deepest desires. Our ability to assert ourselves is punching our ability to regenerate and transform, or conversely,the pull to degenerate or be dangerous. The Full Moon, who always triggers high emotions, will connect with the energy of sudden unexpected changes and events – so be ready for anything! There’s a revolutionary feel to what’s happening, and we can experience these energies as empowerment or as rebellion, both personally, and obviously, in our world. If you’ve been following the presidential campaign at all, you know exactly what I mean.

The planetary motions I’ve listed above represent what’s happening now via the Moon, Mercury and Mars. They are the quick moving cosmic entities who trigger the longer term trends provided by the slow moving planets.

The long term trend that has been the backdrop of our lives since late 2014 is the Saturn/Neptune square (and this is actually the final contact between these two in their 36-year cycle that began in 1989 with the Berlin Wall coming down – a perfect example of a separative boundary crumbling). The final EXACT contact between these two life changing forces occurred on Sept.10, 2016, and now we are in what I call “the fallout” period of any major planetary aspect – that period of time when we’re trying to integrate all that we’ve experienced and learned during the time the two planets were contacting each other. In my work with clients over the years I’ve seen that this period of time can be quite challenging, as this is when we decide whether or not to “learn the lesson.” This fallout will be in effect at least until the end of the year… let’s ponder that for few minutes.

Saturn, as a pure energy, represents our structure, the foundation that we have built for our lives, our traditions, the status quo. He symbolizes our urge toward success and integrity, as well as our fear of failure. Saturn asks that we work hard toward a goal and that we accomplish what we set out to do on one hand – yet he also symbolizes where we feel “less than” and unable to perform due to perceived boundaries and obstacles on the other. Saturn is the great task-master and time-keeper, and lives solely in the plane of reality, for good or for ill.

Neptune, like the sea, is forever moving, shifting, ebbing and flowing. He
represents transcendence, compassion, the dissolving of boundaries and our urge to become one with all that exists – he is our urge toward God. Yet, Neptune also symbolizes illusion, delusion, deceit, addictions – all things that escape or cover reality and the truth. Neptune, at its lowest vibration, is the crux of co-dependence and victim-savior complexes. Neptune energy can have us believing a lie, while masquerading as a truth that is sublime.

It is these two energies combined that have created the sense that our structure, our very foundation (Saturn), is shifting – undulating back and forth (Neptune), no longer providing the security we crave, and challenging our sense of what is real. (We can witness this both in the political arena and in the weather.)

When Saturn and Neptune shake us, we are caught in moment in time when we must differentiate between what is real and what is fantasy, and be willing to let go – to surrender – on some levels, while taking up the challenge and being willing to build anew on other levels. We strive to bring our dreams into reality and over time are successful as the best case scenario – or we are so caught up in our self-defenses and co-dependencies and victimization that we feel completely unable to move forward as the worst case scenario. We feel our reality dissolving around us. And of course, there are all the complexities in-between.

The best possible way to work with both Saturn and Neptune simultaneously is to honor both… working with Saturn means to create and apply yourself to a goal, even if it’s hard to do. Make a plan and take the necessary steps to fulfill it – and then reap the rewards of your hard work via success and that golden sense of accomplishment. Working with Neptune means to open your heart, to let down your defenses and allow your compassionate nature full throttle. It means going toward your own divinity – working your spiritual practice. As a matter of fact – working (Saturn) your spiritual practice (Neptune) honors both the Gods. And that’s a happy combination.

Regardless of whether we are working the Saturn/Neptune square at the higher or lower vibration personally, our world is reflecting this challenge all around us. It is a zeitgeist that we must not turn away from. We may feel that we would prefer to escape into our internal world which feels safe and comfortable, not facing the new way… but instead, we must work toward something tangible, something with integrity, something real. We must be present in this moment in time and fully engage our divinely inspired creativity to make the most of where we are.

It is my hope that we are all able to unite with our own newpersonal truth and with others in a more compassionate way, and that we can build something for ourselves and our society that is a gentler, more inclusive, less boundaried reality than the one we have been witness to lately.