Monday’s full moon and partial eclipse in Aquarius sits between two Leo new moons which will mark the first and last degrees of the sign. These new moons, particularly August 21st which will bring a full solar eclipse with it, are heavy hitters. The full moon in between is here to help us balance, prepare and generally become more aware about what we’re dealing with.

Aquarius is Leo’s opposite. While Leo is ruled by the star at the center of our solar system, Aquarius is ruled by Saturn and Uranus, the planets who know the edge of reality and beyond. While Leo expresses creativity in the moment, Aquarius envisions the big picture. While Leo warms our hearts and ignites our inspiration, Aquarius integrates our entire systems and engineers our effectiveness.

This full moon brings a partial eclipse with it. Lunar eclipses are considered to be chapters in your karmic story that’s unfolding. They are a time to let emotional patterns go and get reset. They can bring sudden revelation as much as they can bring the final nudge to act on what you’ve been feeling all this time. Since the south node is in Aquarius, this means that whatever you’re letting go is a big picture. It is far beyond what is only personal, but working personally can have prismic effects upon all of your relations.

Eclipse energy usually integrates and unfolds in the months following them, but take extra precaution please in these next few weeks. These times bring intensity and extra karmic baggage to our actions and reactions. You should consider that any harm you cause will be magnified tenfold as well as any healing.

The sun is in Leo, the sign that rules your heart and spine. The moon is in Aquarius, the sign that rules your nervous system and connective tissue. If you want to create profoundly positive effects for yourself and others, then keep your attention and intention aligned with your heart. Practice being a tenderhearted person in the world. This means let yourself feel: the joy, the sadness, the confusion and the emptiness. Feel without taking any of it personally. Don’t guard yourself against your humanity or anyone else’s. This is a full moon whose energy will be best worked with by being as real as possible and absolutely unattached to anyone’s drama, including your own.

I talked for an extra long time for this full moon’s astrology podcast and looked into many of the most dynamic aspects (there are a lot) that figure into the energy we’re working with. To help you work most positively with the eclipsing lunar energy I recommend you practice strengthening your auric field and building your lightbody. What does that mean? Use this guided meditation to create energetic containers that help you hold onto your healing and discern whose energy is right to help you.

Last week I released part one of a special series I’m doing on US politics and the eclipse. Listen to this episode where I discuss the United State’s natal chart and how the eclipses will act on it (and us.) Stay tuned next week for part two where I’ll look specifically at Donald Trump’s chart and how the eclipses will affect him (they will.)

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ARIES
A question most artists need to ask themselves repeatedly is, “who is this for?” The question isn’t just important because you need to know what your audience wants. The question is important because you need to know what your own ethical considerations are, and why you think that whatever it is you have might be useful for anyone else.

Creative processes often originate from an artist’s personal desire for exploration, but at some point will have to answer to a wider world. That said, creativity for the sole purpose of self-expression and satisfaction is valid, as long as it’s conscious. What I mean to say is that what each of us finds helpful, beautiful and compelling is different. If you want your work to have any kind of impact, it won’t do you good to assume that everyone else is as interested in what you find fascinating.

It seems that you’re in a moment where you’re ready to offer something to a larger community. Your learning in some area is reaching a point of conclusion and it’s natural for you to now turn it into a form of some kind that stands on its own. How you do this while still maintaining open-minded enthusiasm and playfulness is the question.

There’s always a balance between consideration of self and consideration of others. In order to give anything useful to anyone else it needs to be a joyful experience for you. If you get locked into acting or producing from a place that feels obligatory and stagnant, then what you put out into the world will cease to be inspiring, for you and for us.

It would serve you well to build a feedback device of some kind into your process of creation, and build a self-reflection device of some kind into your process of presentation. You want to set yourself up for balance in ways that will continue to honor your needs for creative experimentation while also providing enough structure and form for others to engage with it in the ways that serve them best. Your full moon motto is, “Creativity is a relational practice.”

TAURUS
Some places are better than others to do certain work. Some industries thrive by the ocean, some in the desert. You are a human creature who grows in response to the sunlight and landscape. You’ll prefer certain cultures over others and will find that some regional dialects spur your motivation while others bore you to sleep.

Home, family, a sense of belonging and sensations of rooting are a big theme in the next few years. The choices you’re making and will consider making in this time will obviously impact who you are and what you do when you step outside of your front door. For you, now more than ever, home has to be where your heart is. You need to feel seen and appreciated, you need to feel playful and pleasurable, you need to feel that you can take up space and express yourself.

The work you want to do is relational. Considering inventive strategies for getting along together means that you need to feel comfortable enough in your own skin to ask questions that might sometimes be uncomfortable to ask. To put yourself out and give all that you can, you have to be able to come back and get replenished regularly.

Some good tests for your decisions might be based on whether you feel supported enough in your big picture dreams to attend to the details. If your generative energy is getting spent taking care of tedium you might need a change of pace. Another question is a pond size issue. Are you the only one doing what you’re doing? This might mean too much responsibility or not enough critical feedback. You need environments that support your learning and can also accommodate your growth and expansion. Your full moon affirmation is, “I have the space and support I need to grow in the ways I want to.”

GEMINI
There are plenty of theorists and theories, philosophies and philosophers, religions and religious. But the ones who walk their talk are few and far between. You know when you meet them because they talk less and walk more. They are not so impressed with the ways they’ll explain their ideas to you, they are in fact, too busy putting their ideas into action.

This is the moment for you to reflect on your theories, philosophies and beliefs. Which ones are mostly hot air, and which ones are actually lighting a fire underneath you?

The thing about all theories, philosophies and religions is that they are incomplete. Though their emissaries might try and tell you to take their word for it, “truly this is the only way!” The only truth in life other than that we all die, is that no one can see their own ass. That is to say that every bright idea casts a shadow, and no matter how strong the theory might be there is always the need to be critical thinkers.

This is the moment for you to double and triple check what’s coming out of your mouth. Don’t make promises you can’t keep. Don’t build it up bigger than it actually is. Absolutely don’t gossip or share information about anyone without their consent.

You can be creative with your interpretations, in fact, it’s best to be so. You don’t want to be a carbon copy of your teachers, you want to synthesize the info you’ve gotten from everyone into your own dang thing. You can be innovative with your leadership by staying responsible in your relationships. Treat everyone else as if they were worthy of all your respect.

This is the moment to recognize that your big ideas are nothing without a public to test them with. Your successes nothing if friends aren’t made and kept for the long haul. Your momentary satisfactions are a drain if they don’t make some kind of deposits in the bank of accountability. Your full moon affirmation is, “My mind is expansive and inclusive. Everyone I meet has a thing or two they can teach me.”

CANCER
This full moon phase is a good time to get objective about what’s usually the most emotional. Sex and money. Your mind is in the kind of space that can see the patterns and pick out the pieces which get in the way of your freedom and flow. You’re blessed right now with abundance and goodwill to rock the boat a little. Take a chance. Say what you need to say.

When I say sex I don’t just mean the act of it. I mean the whole package that usually goes along with sex – like attachment, vulnerability, self-worth, and N.E.E.D.S.

When I say money I don’t just mean cash. I mean the whole concept of energy exchange, give and take, emotional labor too, and of course, I.O.U’s.

These two items are some of the trickiest terrain we can get into with our people. They’re bound to bring up insecurities and power dynamics. They’re equally bound to bring up avoidance, defense mechanisms and a whole lot of baggage that honestly probably has very little to do with you. So be prepared.

Prepare yourself by getting uncharged in your own nervous system and untethered from the outcome. Prepare yourself with deep breathing and momentary reminders that you are lovable, worthy and going to be just fine. Prepare yourself by meditating on those you’re in dialogue with so that you see them as a whole picture of human complexity worthy of your honest communication and great sense of humor. Your full moon affirmation is, “I easily and enjoyably initiate courageous conversations.”

LEO
You are, of course, at your best when you’re being seen. But, of course, it takes a lot to let yourself be seen. First of all it takes the willingness to stop performing, to dissolve your mask and put down your pretenses. It takes a decision to stop playing to the crowd and start paying attention to the one(s) right in front of you. Don’t get confused by the ways you objectify yourself. Don’t play to what you think others want to see, hear, feel. Don’t play to the hall of mirrors your insecurities make.

Don’t imagine the effect you will have, let yourself feel the effect you actually have. Are the words you speak resonating honestly with your vibe? Are the invitations you make relevant to the company you keep? Are you interacting with the ones you love, or are you only acting?

Now is the time to be beautiful in the backstage. To stop worrying about how to present yourself and just trust that the groundwork you’ve laid will support your dance. Now is the time to reflect on your audience and recognize the gratitude you have to have for their attention, participation and patience.

When you can drop the act, stop playing pretend, get over your insecurity about whether or not you’ll be any good, and finally trust that those who showed up did so of their own free will… Well then, you’re ready for your close up.

Your relationships have everything to teach you right now about the ways you work in the world. But in order to learn from them you have to listen first. For you this means primarily getting out of your own head and ego. Ego might be bravado just as much as it might be insecurity. Please stop listening to the stories you tell yourself about yourself and start listening to the ones who have been here loving you all along. Your full moon affirmation is, “I am tender hearted and receptive.”

VIRGO
There is a lot of confusion about what meditation is, who can do it, and what it’s good for. You might not be someone who’s confused. But then again, this is a moment to remind us all about some basics:

Meditation is not bliss. It is not achieving a state of Nirvana or having a transcendent experience. It is not a rapturous connection with the divine or a state of rapid insight. Usually it is none of those things. Sometimes it is some of those things. But then just as quickly again it’s not. Mostly, meditation is discipline practice for your mind. It’s training to keep coming back to the present moment when you’re tripping out on the past, future and all the unknowns and to-do’s.

Anyone can meditate. People who meditate aren’t any better than people who don’t. Though plenty of people will tell you that meditation helped them feel happier and less stressed. You can also meditate anywhere. All it takes is the decision to stop thinking or being all emo, and then just breathe some deep breaths that you actually feel. It could be for five seconds or five hours. Up to you.

Meditation is good for your mental health because it helps you get grounded in the here and now and stop ruminating or running wild on all that’s not here and now. It’s good for your emotional health because when your mind is at peace generally your moods are too. It’s good for your physical health because your body bears the burden of your emotional and mental experiences.

Meditation is also good for your relationships with everyone. All of your relationships will get better as you get clearer, calmer and more connected. Meditation is good for the environment, it helps you discern what you actually need from what you actually don’t and in general makes you a more conscientious person. Meditation is good for our political situation, the more sane, stable folks are on board right now, the more hope we have.

Your full moon affirmation is to simply breathe, in and out. Feel your breath. Bring your attention to right here, right now.

LIBRA
You will receive the support you want for your creative and heartfelt efforts when you let people access you from a heartfelt place. If there are any ways you’ve been operating behind a façade it’s time to let them go.

If your Libra instinct is a strong one, this might be quite a challenge. Particularly if you find yourself needing to keep the peace between different factions of your life. Particularly if you’re feeling that you need to uphold any kind of hierarchy in your identity. Particularly if you’re navigating your role and boundaries as any kind of teacher, leader or boss.

It won’t do you any good to pretend your pain isn’t what it is. Your emotional, physical, mental and psychological pain is no more wretched or profound than anyone else’s. It won’t do you any good to shorten your own process in order to present what you think others need to see or experience.

Your work now is about humbling yourself to the partner, teacher, leader and boss that is the God/Goddess of your understanding. Let them help you let go of any personal habits or daily rhythm that keeps you from connecting with them.

The kind of love, art, inspiration that you can move through your body, face and voice is profound. You know it is. It’s time to totally release your mental ideas of what it should look like  though. It’s time to get as transparent and as present with your present moment as you can be. Your full moon mantra is, “I include myself in the communities I serve. We are all each other’s teachers, students, parents and children.”

SCORPIO
It seems that you’re preparing for some kind of major debut, significant transition in your career or shift in how you want to pursue your grown-up-ness. Whatever that may be could still be in a planning or dreaming-up phase, or even possibly still be unknown to you, but by winter will be fully formed and ready to articulate and act on.

What needs to happen between now and then is some kind of release, mental shift or conceptual twist that will allow you some more freedom in your home and with your family. Beginning now, with Monday’s full moon and lunar eclipse, this shift will become increasingly apparent as an actual change in your nervous system and attachment styles.

My suggestion for you now, and for the next few weeks and months, is to strongly resist dualistic, binary thinking. Just because you think X, does not mean Y must be the conclusion. There is infinite creativity in the universe and friend, none of our brains, including yours, can even begin to comprehend how many successful solutions there really could be.

Your thought processes are still forming. You’re still working through some dark materials that get in the way of your more compassionate intentions. The necessary spiritual process that require you to cultivate faith when you feel like you don’t have a clue will not be rushed.

For now, your full moon mantra is, “I am free from all forms of external control.”

SAGITTARIUS
Letting your identity evolve is hard work. Especially as an adult. When we’re kids it’s easy to play with all the ideas of what to be when we grow up, but the necessary thing about growing up is that ideas have to turn into action, and action becomes solidity and structure. Making significant changes means that we have to notify all the loved ones, change the credit cards, recycle the old items and attend to the other five million details that all depend upon our consistency.

Right now you are getting pushed (anywhere from gently to aggressively) onto your path. You’re understanding that your long-term vision for how things could be can’t be based on fears of scarcity or objectified ideas of success. Rather, you’re understanding that if anything is going to be sustainable it will have to be something you’re doing with your whole heart, and not just your head.

I’m not sure what choices you’re trying to make, but here are some tips I hope are helpful:
- You will make money and have what you need when you’re not afraid of your own authority. This means that you’re not following anyone else’s script about how to make money, or what you need.
- You will receive support from others (including financial) when you let yourself be touched by them, and truly care for their welfare and wellbeing.
- Your family and your home are your current spiritual teachers. How you let yourself feel safe and believe that you belong is up to you.
- Your role in the world is to be a healer, but how you do that depends upon the details that are most fascinating for you, and bring you closest to experiences of divinity.

Your full moon mantra is, “What kind of idea am I?”

CAPRICORN
The moment of the story you’re currently in is the one where the hero(ine) loses whatever they thought was the most valuable and then realizes that it was only through a process of loss that they could find the thing that was most valuable.

The next few weeks is a good time to take stock of your valuables. This means your wallet and bank account. This means your assets. This means the ideas you hold most tightly. And ultimately this means whatever makes life worth living. As you consider each item or idea, ask yourself again and again, “Is this still valuable to me?”

Don’t be attached to the answers. Do observe the mental content of confusion that arises from feelings of rejection, habits of co-dependency and misplaced need. If you’re not sure what the answer is, your clue is whether or not it feels like part of your healing. Your job is to be brutally honest with yourself about what kind of healing you want. Do you want healing that you have some say in how it happens, or do you want healing that’s forced on you as a result of ignoring your needs for too long.

For nearly a decade now you’ve had to confront the impacts of your unconsciousness. Whatever you hid from or pushed away throughout your life has come out of hiding, and with some considerable fury. My hope is that you are no longer under any illusion about who you are or what you are capable of. In other words, I hope you are no longer convinced that your life situation is anyone else’s responsibility but your own. Your full moon mantra is, “I possess what I need. I accumulate what is in my heart.”

AQUARIUS
What is true about your most important relationships and partners? Are they aligned to your life philosophies in ways that help you further understand your purpose? Do they teach you about your blind spots in ways that you can integrate and grow from? Do they help you manifest yourself in wider social networks because they are your teachers of diplomacy, tact and equity?

If you answer yes to the questions above, then these are the right ones for you. These are the humans that you can count on to continue to guide you along a path of evolution. Of course they’ll have bad days, throw tantrums and be annoying and unconscious sometimes. So will you. But if in general you feel that your close friends and partners help you learn more about (and practice) your highest potential then those are the ones to keep.

However, if these folks bring out your diva more than 30% of the time. If they constantly stir the drama pot, take up all the space, act like toddlers most of the time or somehow support you to act like one… If they are bullies or if you find yourself moving towards abusive behavior with them. If narcissism is a word that been coming up a lot lately… then it’s time to reconsider your engagements.

Your relationships should be ones that bring you closer to your spiritual path by pushing you to remember yourself as a spiritual being. Not in the messiah complex kind of way either. I mean, remember you’re a spiritual being because the people you love make you want to be your best self and grow the f*** up for them. Your relationships should inspire you to attend to your life with care and attention, not clinginess and addiction. These experiences should be tangible, useful and healing, not control trips or fantasies rooted in insecurity.

That may sound like a tall order considering the kinds of relational models the media gives us constantly. It may seem impossible in a world that’s full of folks who are checked out, numbed out and freaked out. Here’s the thing, if you decide what matters most to you and then commit to behaving from your integrity, your relations will follow suit. Your full moon affirmation is, “I attract partners that mirror my intent.”

PISCES
This full moon wants to assist your focus. It’s here to help you flush out any recent confusion surrounding your work in the world and the ways you present yourself publically. It’s ready to show you what you weren’t ready to see before. It wants to reveal some pieces of information that you surely won’t want to miss.

The best way to listen to its advice though is not with a pen and paper, not a strategy session or planning board. The best way to listen is to let yourself go. Get out into the dreamy spaces, get lost in nature, absorb yourself in art, relax your brain and untether it from all the things you think you should do.

This is a moon to be in your beauty with the ones you love most. To surround yourself with the human friends and 4-legged companions that get you closest to your true nature. The part of you that laughs easily at your own process and doesn’t need to uphold any austerity or performance. The part of you that isn’t afraid to be seen.

You’re ready to shift into somewhat of a different set of rules regarding your life path, values (financial or otherwise) and daily rhythm. You’re ready to be living from your heart and creativity every day, not just on the weekends. You’re wanting to arrive in the spaces that feel most authentic and where you are the most appreciated.

You may be well on your way. You might feel like you have a ways to go. Either way you can help your own process by giving yourself space to abide in those sensations regularly. It’s not only enjoyable, it’s useful and practical to take time away, to remember how much you don’t know, and to rest in the open field of awareness that you enter when you’re not trying to do anything at all. Your full moon mantra is, “I release all efforts and let my path unfold before me.”