Moon into Aries: The Personal Is Political

Monday morning through Wednesday evening

Adbuster's poster

The Moon is reborn into vibrant Aries Monday morning at 8:57am EDT, where she joins Uranus in Aries, forms an inconjunct with Venus in Scorpio, and squares Pluto in Capricorn. Let's hope this newborn Aries Moon is a Hercules, because this babe is in dangerous company.

Aries, ruled by Mars, cardinal Fire, is the first sign of the zodiac, pure energy surging into the world to become manifest. Aries is criticized as self-seeking, heedless, angry, and impetuous––and valued as single-minded, pioneering, with the fearless heart of a warrior. This is the sign of Tuesday's Full Moon, the Hunter's Moon, the Blood Moon. This Aries Full Moon is a hero's Moon, reminding us of the need to be of good heart as we pursue our goals.

But first, back to our Hercules Moon standing tensely with Uranus, Venus and Pluto.

"The personal is political" is the title of Carol Hanisch's 1969 feminist essay in which she argues that women (and other oppressed and disadvantaged groups) are criticized individually for struggling to improve their situations, when the real issues are collective and need to be addressed collectively. Political is used in the sense of collective, social, big, not elections and party politics.

It's so easy to turn that Aries tag against anyone wanting more––She's so egotistical. He's so self-centered. Doesn't she have enough already? Shouldn't he be more humble? Don't they know their place? Well, Aries "never knows her place" except in knowing her place is over the next horizon, reaching for the biggest, juiciest apple on the highest limb of the tallest tree.

Joining with Uranus, champion of both individual freedom and collective struggle, this Aries Moon knows when we become who we uniquely are, and express that freely, liberation ripples out to touch the world. Inconjunct Scorpionic Venus, this Aries Moon asserts she will not be submerged in someone else's idea of what is right, just or meaningful. Squaring transformative Pluto, this Aries Moon learns that in surrendering the small self, we find more power than we ever imagined.

Turning the blazing anger of Aries or the colder, more subtle blades of Scorpio against each other only weakens our ability to fight against the bigger forces that really hold us down. From the political side, this is Megyn Kelly wondering on Fox News whether the girls screaming as they're pepper-sprayed are hamming it up for the camera. From the personal side, this is the gossip, back-biting, and ostracism that leads to shame, which Brené Brown writes about so well.

Occupy Wall Street

This Aries Moon, standing her ground with powerful outer planet energies, helps us connect with our authentic selves, our courageous hearts, and stand up for ourselves and each other.

Tuesday, the Aries Moon steps fully into her power with a flowing trine to Mars in Leo, one of the aspects making up Tuesday night's Full Moon. The Full Moon arrives at 10:06pm EDT, and is followed by the exact opposition to Saturn, also part of this Full Moon's oomph.

Wednesday, the Moon shines forth, sharing and communing. In the morning, Mercury in Libra trines Neptune in Aquarius––our minds in touch with cosmic messengers. In the afternoon, the Moon sextiles Neptune, wanting messages of her own. The Moon's last classical aspect in Aries is her opposition with Mercury at 8:08pm EDT, beginning a brief void-of-course period until she steps into calm Taurus at 9:35pm.
    

Waxing Moon in Scorpio

Today's incisive and insightful Scorpio Moon asks us to consider where we are on our life path. We each have skills and dispositions we are good at, ways we act, feel and think that are comfortable. Those familiar skills are often valuable, to us and to our communities, but may not bring about the personal growth that makes life meaningful.

Other areas of life draw our attention, intriguing and challenging us, bringing us in to experiment with new ways of being we might pull away from when they feel too different from who we are. Today is a good day to look at where we are balanced between the familiar and the challenging, what we know and what will help us grow.

This path is marked in our birth charts by the Nodes of the Moon, those points where the path of the Sun (our yang, solar self) and the path of the Moon (our yin, lunar self) intersected in the sky. The South Node, where we've been, is the tail of the dragon. The North Node, where we're going, is the dragon's head. The sign and house placement of your Nodes of the Moon (always exactly opposite each other) show the characteristics of each. Stepping away from the safe familiarity of the South Node often creates discomfort, yet if we take a deep breath and step toward the challenge embodied in the North Node, deeply meaningful experiences unfold.

Today, the Nodes of the Moon are being challenged by squares from Venus and Mars, together in Libra, the sign of balance. The searchlight of the Scorpio Moon is turned on this T-square as the Moon flows energy in semisextile to Venus (exact at 11:15am EDT), and then to Mars (2:26 pm), and flows energy to the Nodes with a trine to the South and sextile to the North (exact at 1:05pm).

Remember that old song about friendship? Make new friends, but keep the old; one is silver and the other is gold. Our Nodal axis is like that, a place where we find the balance between appreciating who we already are and what we offer the world using skills we've mastered, and who we are becoming and what the world will discover through us as we break new ground.

The bicycle path in Hungary, taken by Lhgergo, and the painting Picking up Silver and Gold by Alexander Mann are available through WikiMedia Commons.