Dec. 7th-13th:
The Keystone Effect
The Moon wanes over a week full of irritations, insights and heavy thoughts and communications. On Monday, a newly ingressed Mercury in Capricorn aspects both Saturn and Pluto, bringing weighty considerations to the forefront. Meanwhile, the Sun progresses toward a trine with Mars in Leo this Thursday, throwing plenty of light on the source of the agitations. This aspect to Mars will ignite some situations and help to clarify others. Or, quite possibly, both. The situation with both Mercury and Mars resonates throughout the season to come. Understanding where these energies are unfolding in your life earlier rather than later is key for riding out an unstable holiday season.
Mercury, The Maze and the Keystone
Mercury moved into Capricorn over the weekend, and it is in the realm of the Goat that Mercury will stay for the next 2 months. Mercury will go retrograde at 21′47″ Capricorn on December 26th and resume forward motion again on January 15th at 5′34″ Capricorn. Mercury will stay within the confines of the Goat’s sign until February 10th.
In Capricorn, the spry god of trickery takes a serious turn. The mind becomes focused on the parameters of one’s concrete situation. The sacred caduceus of Mercury becomes an architect’s drafting pen. This practical viewpoint paints a realistic landscape. However, in depicting the structure of the present, it is sometimes bereft of hope, where things will be as they have been, with no escape from the pattern of the past-in-the-present. Here, Mercury’s chatter can easily trap the mind in a map of limitations and can-nots. This is where the retrograde comes in. When Mercury reverses motion at the end of the month, we’ll find ourselves walking through the looming architectural ruins of our situation, searching beneath the devil’s feet for the forgotten keystone.
The Messenger must first pass the lurkers at the threshold of Capricorn. As Mercury rolls through the early degrees of Capricorn, he comes into conjunction with Pluto in Capricorn and makes a square to Saturn in Libra. This is a rough entrance, fraught with heavy thoughts and for many- serious decisions. The pressure will be on early in the week. Turn panic into problem solving.
Mercury’s journey through Capricorn won’t be strictly nightmarish, though. Mercury is the first planet to move into Capricorn since Capricorn’s planetary ruler, Saturn, moved into Libra, where it is exalted. The oldeDevil’s palace will reveal itself to be quite different than its been in the past. For more on the changes Saturn in Libra forebodes, read “Mirror and Scythe.” Mercury’s movement into Capricorn, once it is relieved of the dire pressure that Saturn and Pluto will simultaneously put on it, will reveal a number of new and more fundamentally balanced arrangements that accommodate the radical changes in perspective initiated under the series of Saturn-Uranus oppositions.
Light And Shadow
This week the Sun applies to a Trine with Mars in Leo. Extra agitation and irritation are likely to be prevailing winds, but as the Sun perfects its aspect to Mars on Thursday, The Moon is in relatively mellow Libra, mitigating the influence a bit, making some of the ego-mechanics of the combustible configuration a little bit more transparent. This aspect is one of the clearest angles we’ll have on Mars until before he goes retrograde on the 19th. Take some time to examine the current relationship between your identity and sense of personal power. If you can find the internal division creating the friction inside you, you’re on the right track. For more on the ego dynamics of the Mars in Leo cycle, check out Mars in Leo: Shadow Play.
Horoscopes:
December 7th-12th
Note on Horoscopes: 12 Fold horoscopes are a way to assess the general condition of the splayed rays of the zodiac. Although not without value, they are a blunt tool, and can only describe the archetypal activity in each power-zone. In order to sharpen the accuracy of the horoscopes, read your Sun Sign if you were born in the day-time, and read your Moon Sign if you were born at night. Reading the Sign in which the Ascendant is placed is also advised.
For information on where the Ascendant and Moon are in your natal chart, check out the accurate, free, chart calculation programs at astro.com and khaldea.com.
Aries: The Ram
Mercury’s conjunction with Pluto and square with Saturn this Monday sets off critical decisions and communications in your professional sphere. Important relationships play a critical role in this. This kicks off the next two months of Mercury’s retrograde cycle in Capricorn, whose larger theme will be reconfiguring your professional relationships. Meanwhile, the Sun’s pending trine with Mars can help clarify your increasingly troubled sense of personal power. Or it can trigger a tantrum. Your choice.
Taurus: The Bull
Mercury’s conjunction with Pluto and square with Saturn this Monday touches off important thoughts and communications surrounding your long term plans. Plans for travel may also play into the mental mix. These plans for the long term and/or long distance travel hinge on the state of your fiscal and physical health. Bring balance to your habits. Meanwhile, the Sun’s pending trine with Mars heats up a configuration surrounding your living situation and shared money, time and energy. Try not to take developments here too personally.
Gemini: The Twins
Mercury’s conjunction with Pluto and square with Saturn this Monday sets both sides of your brain to task on a serious set of questions. Questions and arrangements surrounding shared money, time and energy abound. These questions will linger for the next few months, and will likely lead to an analysis of what you’re doing with your creative energy. Meanwhile, the Sun’s pending trine with Mars shines a light on changing surroundings, and how that affects your identity and sense of personal power. Encounters with important Others is the trigger for these realizations.
Cancer: The Crab
Mercury’s conjunction with Pluto and square with Saturn this Monday triggers a series of communications with those important to you, likely about living situations. Meanwhile, the Sun’s pending trine with Mars illuminates changes and challenges to your monetary situation.
Leo: The Lion
Mercury’s conjunction with Pluto and square with Saturn this Monday starts off a series of communications and thoughts about your fiscal and physical health. You’ve likely got some habits that are due for rethinking over the next few months. Meanwhile, the Sun’s pending trine with Mars in Leo shines a clear light on the changing state of your personal power, and that power’s root in who you think you are.
Virgo: The Virgin
Mercury’s conjunction with Pluto and square with Saturn this Monday begins a restructuring of the way you marshal your creative energy. You’ll be reprogramming your voodoo-tronic circuits for the next few months. Meanwhile, the Sun’s pending trine with Mars highlights that piece of your personal power still wiggling its way out of the shadows of your unconscious. Take a look, take a look. It looks just like you.
Libra: The Balances
Mercury’s conjunction with Pluto and square with Saturn this Monday kicks off a serious set of communications surrounding your living space. The changes to your living situation are coming from a mutating sense of self. Those mutations proceed directly from an attempt to accommodate Saturn’s entrance into your sign, and an attempt to incorporate the energy into your ego construct. Meanwhile, the Sun’s pending trine with Mars shines a little light on the role friends, allies and contacts are playing in your changing sense of personal power, and what it implies about who you thought you were.
Scorpio: The Scorpio
Mercury’s conjunction with Pluto and square with Saturn this Monday, triggering a series of serious thoughts about your surrounding environs. This mental map leads back into the autistic recesses of your cerebral corridors. You’ll be considering how the layout of your environment and your mindscape interact extensively over the next few months. Meanwhile, the Sun’s pending trine with Mars shines a light on your changin perceptions of your professional self. A mutating sense of personal power anchored in a worn out self concept is at the heart of this.
Sagittarius: The Archer
Mercury’s conjunction with Pluto and square with Saturn this Monday triggers a series of communications and thoughts surrounding your finances. This opening riff leads into the theme for Mercury’s stay in Capricorn over the next 2 months- a reconfiguration of the structure of your finances in relationship to your mutating social sphere. Meanwhile, the Sun’s pending trine with Mars illuminates your changing world view and long term plans. There is a hunger to assert yourself in this shifting landscape. Try to understand it before acting on it.
Capricorn: The Goat
Mercury’s conjunction with Pluto and square with Saturn this Monday begins a series of important communications and decisions surrounding your strange personal destiny and the status of your career path. The coming Mercury retrograde will see the decisions and arrangements made early in the week echo throughout the next two months. Meanwhile, the Sun’s pending trine with Mars spotlights your changing relationship to other people’s resources. How does one borrow power, and how does one repay it?
Aquarius: The Water Bearer
Mercury’s conjunction with Pluto and square with Saturn this Monday highlights your entrance into the labyrinth of your collected notions of how the world works. You’ll find that the territory has changed since that old map was made. Expect to wander for awhile before the discrepencies become clear. Meanwhile, the Sun’s pending trine with Mars highlights emerging power struggles within your relationships.
Pisces: The Fishes
Mercury’s conjunction with Pluto and square with Saturn this Monday brings conversations with friends and contacts to a serious and decisive place. This begins a series of communications through which your webwork of connections will become significantly reconfigured. Meanwhile, the Sun’s pending trine with Mars shines a light on the mutating state of your habits. Inaccurate parts of your self image are currently being reflected in negative behaviors. Take the time this week to fire a clear eye at that.
Consultation Services: If you’d like a personal consultation with the monkey behind the mask, you can get ahold of the Baron’s mortal vehicle at xroadsconsultations@gmail.com. You can find a list of prices and services here.
COPYRIGHT DARK SUN ASTROLOGY 2009
Sol in Sagittarius, Luna in Leo
