Outside my front window, on the eastern horizon, a glorious Moon has risen. Looking very full, this Moon won’t land astrologically until tomorrow morning. Yet the Full Moon feeling is here tonight.
Welcome the Aries Full Moon, the Hunter’s Moon. This Moon finds Mars still close to the Sun in Libra, adding extra fiery spice.
Or perhaps it’s the other way around? Mars in Libra is quieter, more socially conscious, than in Aries. Maybe we’ll see some of that?
Probably not.
The patterns around this Full Moon point to intensity and a need for careful balancing. This is a passionate Moon. The key will be finding good ways to experience the passion without burning anything up, or down.
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The Moon sits in the third decan of Aries which Austin Coppock names The Burning Rose. Here we see the fire of Aries flowing in creative ways. This decan, ruled by Venus or Jupiter, depending on the system you consult, wants beautiful passion, a fire that brings us together rather than separating us.
Sun and Mars sit in the third decan of Libra, the Gyroscope. Here we need all the balance Libra can offer to maintain our position in the face of extremes of desire and emotion. Balance is possible, but not if we veer off in search of one or another of the desires that might arise. This decan calls for a deliberate, chosen balance.
Does it sound as if the decan names and descriptions are switched? It does to me: The Burning Rose more of Libra, and the spinning, carefully engineered Gyroscope a work of Aries. Perhaps this is another point of both balance and exchange at this Full Moon: Each sign calls out its opposite.
The intensity increases when we realize Pluto squares this Full Moon. In late Capricorn, this alchemist of transformation tests the deepest foundations we have. The third decan of Capricorn is named The Throne, pointing to the culmination of achievement and power that comes from steady, careful work.
The only way to hold on to a throne is to wield power that reaches to the very roots of the kingdom. This is where Pluto will be testing, challenging, looking for weak spots. His aim is not to destroy but to find and fix broken places. Sometimes though his testing process can feel destructive.
So he’s looking at the balance of this Full Moon. Aries and Libra hold self and other, passionate Fire and cool Air, action and thought, risk and carefulness, harmony and discord, joining together and coming apart.
As the themes of these decans suggest, we need both. Each of these qualities is meaningless without its opposite. So often in life, though, it seems we have too much of one and not nearly enough of the other.
The Aries Full Moon will illuminate places in each of our lives where we feel balanced and where we do not. The spotlight could be internal, highlighting our inner states. It could be external. Relationships, never easy, have been stressed in the last two years, whether in our families, our work, or our wider social networks.
Jupiter, at 22 Aquarius, trines the Sun and Mars and sextiles the Moon. Here we feel a beneficent, optimistic energy. Jupiter is direct now and beginning to move. In the third decan of Aquarius, he’s are dissatisfied with the status quo. We’re ready for change.
This is another way to think about balance: Not as finding a single, permanent point of stasis, but instead the dynamic balance of systems, where adjustments throughout can create a better situation for all.
When we think of passion, we think of emotions. Yet this Full Moon chart has almost no water, and what there is, is not accessible.
Neptune is retrograde in Pisces and angular, but unaspected. We may feel emotions without being able to connect them clearly to what’s going on. Or perhaps we might retreat into Neptunian mists to avoid whatever’s happening around us.
This chart is Fire and Air. We can play with these elements, creating beautiful, passionate words and music and movement. We can fight with these elements, in argument, invective, and accusation.
Sometimes we need to fight. Some conflict cannot be avoided. Pluto will likely point out where those places are. At the Full Moon, we can hope to see a challenge clearly and still avoid getting carried away by the intensity of the time.
We can play. Again, with the intensity of Pluto. Fire and Air are inspiring, inflaming us with creative vision. If this is the illumination the Full Moon brings, then capture the moment, the idea, the essence. Visits from the Muses are wonderful. It will take time and calm to create something finished.
The many needs in our world have not disappeared. The asteroid Eris, the chaos goddess who seems to champion our Earth as a biosphere, and our people in all their needs, sits with the Moon. In fact, Eris opposes Mars more closely than the Moon does.
Eris calls us to remember wider communities. The “me” vs “us” we think of for Aries and Libra really extends outward. Sometimes the Aries “me” is my family, my group, those who think and feel as I do. The “us” then becomes a “them,” those others, who are different, not like us, against us, trying to ruin our lives.
Here, Pluto challenges each of us as members of the Earth, of the cosmos. How big can we dream? How inclusive are our categories? And what are the dangers of staying too small?
This can be a Full Moon that tests us. Mercury at 10 Libra opposes Chiron at 9 Aries. This is the conundrum of the mind. To perceive at all, we must make distinctions. We literally cannot see without being able to perceive difference. So we need that Aries capacity to say this and not that, here and not there.
Where we get ourselves into trouble is investing value in some distinctions and not others. We think we know. We think we are right. We think our view is reality. Can we find a healthier way to make distinctions? Can we balance and harmonize different views of reality?
If this all sounds too theoretical, remember that a key difference between Venus and Mars, Libra and Aries, can often come down to whether we see someone as a friend or an enemy.
At this Full Moon many things might be illuminated for us. Notice where you are drawing lines, and why, and what the benefits and costs of those lines are.
I am not advocating just smooshing everything together in one big love fest. What I’m saying is, notice. See where you join and where you separate. Notice especially where you are sure you’re right. And then see if maybe there’s another way.
We’re all looking for balance in a precarious time.
Title image adapted from David Hofmann
https://unsplash.com/photos/POd35V_uE4k
Fighter by Thao Le Hoang
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Couple by Renate Vanaga
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