New Moon in Taurus and Solar Eclipse: Nourishing Earth

Gaia!

New Moon in Taurus
Solar Eclipse
May 9, 2013

The New Moon is on her way, bringing energy to transform our relationship to this world. Many parts of the northern hemisphere are (finally) experiencing Spring.

We're entranced by warm breezes, the scent of lilacs, the intoxication of forest paths lined with wildflowers, and birdsong. The idea of relating to this world seems wonderful, natural, and easy ... of course we want to!

Do we really? Maybe, maybe not. Let's look:

Taurus is the sign that celebrates Earth, the natural world, and the body. As in, our body, the one we live in. Taurus loves the ordinary things of life––food, drink, good company, and also dishes, laundry, and fixing the sink. The blooms on the lilac, also digging in compost.

This New Moon arrives in the middle of this year's eclipse season, bringing us a solar eclipse––which means the Nodes of the Moon are lined up with the New Moon herself. This is another powerhouse grouping, too, with Mars, Mercury and Pallas Athena also in Taurus.

The alignment of the Nodes means the North Node, the place we're meant to be heading toward, is opposite the New Moon in shadowy Scorpio. Which means this New Moon isn't limited to celebrating the natural world. We're also asked to look at the shadow side of that relationship.

At this New Moon, we're invited to set intentions and make wishes in areas like self-nurturing, abundance, sensuality, and healthy growth. These are lovely wishes to have:

• I wish to bring abundance into my life.
• I intend to find ways to care for myself in healthy ways.
• I wish to appreciate the beauties of the world, and bring colors, textures, sounds and tastes into my life that I love and that nourish me.

Bluebells in Spring

These are all good, wonderful, strong Taurus New Moon wishes.

And ... our journey with this New Moon will tell us something about whether we really mean it, and where we get hung up. Because, you know, that Scorpio North Node is part of the story too.

So, we all know we need to be grounded. What does that mean, though? We need to have our feet on the ground, not spend too much time in our heads, and find our center.

Yet when we're grounded, we can't fly. When we're rooted, we're rooted to the spot, frozen, unable to move. We have a long legacy of not liking earth very much, from the world's major religions through some Enlightenment thinking, and New Age ideas that focus on what is higher, lighter and transcendent. Descartes said, "I think, therefore I am" ... not "I have a body, therefore I am."

Today's media-mediated society delivers constant messages about not liking our bodies. Women get more, but men get it too: The need to look right, smell right, eat right, because if we don't, well, then we won't have love, money or health.

This Taurus New Moon says, let's calm waaaaaay down and just be. That Scorpio North Node eclipse point adds, let's notice what's really going on with all that messaging.

How can we really feel "grounded" if our goal is to transcend? How can we connect in healthy ways with the Earth who is the literal ground of our being, if we're constantly feeling not enough-ness?

That saying "We're not bodies that have a soul, we're souls that have a body" misses, I feel, an important point: We are embodied.

Our souls, our spirits, our minds, our emotions are all expressed in and through and with our bodies. Whatever happens before or after or elsewhere, while we're here in this life, it all happens with this body.

New research on mind-body relations makes it ever harder to tell the difference. Our minds are clearly not limited to our brains. Our minds exist throughout––some would say, in every cell of––our bodies. We are integral and whole. It would be really cool if we could embrace and love all of us.

At this New Moon, I'm proposing a change in language. Let's not get grounded, let's experience the nourishing qualities of Earth. This is a wonderful time to deeply feel the way the Earth feeds us, caresses us, supports us, energizes us. It's a great time to experience how our bodies are part and parcel of that feeding, caressing, supporting and energizing. Just the way we are.

Today is the Balsamic Moon, moving us into the last days of release and preparation. The strong Taurus presence is already in the sky, helping us find our way home. For the next few days, we're invited to let go of whatever gets in the way of our experience of this one precious life, on Earth, in a body.

Then, with the New Moon, we can say "ahhhhhhhhh ... I love this life!"