March 2017: Two Steps Forward, One Look Back (Or More)

You’re in for a workout in March. We all are. The wind’s at our back, pushing us onward and hurrying the pace. Then other forces join in,  some jerking our heads backward, another sinking us deeper into our bodies.

How to respond? Scurry ahead? Turn around? Flee to the past? Throw a tantrum? Stuff your face?

Yep. To all.

March’s complex celestial clockwork splays our attention across multiple overlapping timelines. Some are identifiable and pop up for everyone. Others are customized for you, only you. All are infused into the equinox chart, which means time-hopping is an ongoing factor for all of spring.

The Role of Dec. 2013
Watch for echos all month long from late December 2013 (or its immediate aftermath).  Fundamental, tectonic shifts erupted then that reshaped your psyche, and likely relationships and family structure. Whatever grew out of those shifts is up for dramatic expansion now, as Jupiter forms an excruciatingly slow-building t-square with cosmic change agents Uranus and Pluto.

The first stage, peaking March 2, pits mushrooming relationship and fairness concerns against an explosive impulse for personal freedom. By March 30, relationship issues push for deep, lasting and powerful systemic changes — none of which would be possible without the world tilts of late 2013.

The process provides a good, long look at tensions in specific situations and agreements, then births their next big phase.  Be on the lookout for this playing out in political news. New horizons in power grabs — or crackdowns —  are possible by the end of this dance.

Curious to learn more? Read why December is relevant now. http://www.astrologyhub.com/evolutions-echoes-how-astrology-illuminates-cycles-of-change/

Old Flames & Financial Matters
While developments from late 2013 are blossoming and expanding, our attention is also being lured backwards. And sometimes yanked. The instigator is Venus, ruler of love, money, beauty, creativity — basically, everything we mortals value. Her domain is coming up for revisiting during her retrograde from March 4 to April 15.

Some of what’s surfacing involves current involvements and agreements, which you may review,  reconsider and possibly reignite.  Some of it is downright ghostly. Don’t be surprised if old loves and friends show up in dreams, social media or conversation — or in direct contact.

Old financial matters also have a way of returning during a Venus retrograde. Shelved creative projects or outlets could easily come back to life now as well.

Because Venus is in huntress mode, aka Aries, revisitings and visitations alike come impulsively and with high energy, if not passion.  Or tempers. They invite spontaneity, risk-taking and hair trigger reactions.  You could throw caution to the wind and do Lord knows what. You could just as likely put out smoldering fires and extinguish whatever tiny sparks might have remained.

Every bit of the past you encounter is an opportunity to resolve unfinished business (even if you thought it was done already) and to learn about yourself and what your heart values now, as opposed to then. Whether you take up with an old love or indulge in nothing more than memories, the lasting importance is what you learn about your own heart. Likely you’ll retrieve a part of yourself, or realize you’ve grown so much you would never get involved now with a person or situation like that.

You can instigate a lot of this journey yourself. Hunt down lingering business that affects your heart and finances and actively deal with it. Check in on people you used to be involved with. See where your heart lies uneasily in current involvements and address the discomfort.

Be bold. Speak up. Take chances. Declare your emotions (love, even) and see what follows. And have fun.

One caution:  don’t jump into any new relationship, job or deal that presents itself now, or splurge on a high-dollar item. New investments during a Venus retrograde have a way of turning out to not be worth what you thought. (Do. Not. Marry. Do. Not.) As the saying goes, all that glitters is not gold.

The fieriness surges when Mercury enters Aries on the 13th. The vagueness, confusion and unwitting telepathy of February dries up, and communication turns self-starting, spontaneous, impulsive, combustive, assertive, even reckless.

As hurried and impetuous as the second half of the month is, treat Venus’ backpedaling as part of  an ongoing investigation. Mercury will be heading to his own retrograde next month as Venus wraps hers up. Know that some of the investigation will extend into Mercury’s retreat, which will take him from Venus’ Taurus home back into Aries.

Meanwhile, Back in the Here and Now
As timelines begin to pile up on you, grounding cords conveniently lock into place. Developments that have been percolating stabilize and take form around March 5, when the ruler of our drive, Mars, completes an easy, open current with Saturn, lord of structure, order and commitment. If you’ve been itching for a situation to firm up, it may well then.

After that, how we go after what we want downshifts into the slow, practical and concrete. Mars, the ruler of our drive, leaves the fire of Aries on March 9 for the raw earthiness of Taurus, which he visits through April 20. His presence there not only keeps us in our bodies, but also encourages using and enjoying them. Food, drink and other sensual experiences have a marked gravitational pull, for you alone and à deux.

It’s an irresistibly sexy time. No point in fighting it. Not likely you’ll want to. Sheer physicality will stabilize you and momentarily slow time as developments mushroom and ghosts swirl around.

That gravitational pull toward physicality may be particularly strong at the Virgo Full Moon of the 12th. That Moon may also, however, encourage us to analyze and exercise discernment. Tension results….what to do with it, what to do…

The Equinox Chart
All of this has a life span that outlasts the month of March. The spring equinox, on March 20, when the Sun makes its annual entry into Aries, takes place in the midst of this head-rattling, escalating, impulsive, desire-driven, take-it-to-the-bank, life-changing blend of energies.  Because they are in place at the equinox, they will resonate to some degree throughout the entire spring —  with one twist.

The equinox chart imposes a measure of order on that unruly blend, through the stabilizing, limiting and constraining influence of the Moon tightly conjunct Saturn in Sagittarius. (It’s an uneasy peace, however, since that pair is in direct contact with rabble-rouser Uranus.) We may crave and seek structure; it may be slipped onto us. Integrity, ethics, beliefs or politics may play a role. If you’re looking for footing, the sure place is in your perspective on life.

And We’re Off
Stabilizing doesn’t mean slowing down, though. Aries gets two more blasts as the month winds down. Desire hits the gotta-have-it point when the Sun meets Venus on March 25. The gumption to go for it follows at the Aries New Moon on March 28. Raw life force is breaking out everywhere you look, and in you as well. If you’ve been lacking in nerve, you’ll find plenty coursing through you.

The month ends with communication settling into a practical, calmer, step-by-step mode, as Mercury enters Taurus on March 31. Running around takes on a slower pace as well.

Energies remain high, but we’re more likely to chew on an impulse before leaping on it. Besides, relationships are undergoing monumental systemic changes, building on the expansive tensions that started the month. There’s a lot to take in, process and communicate. You’ve got the time. Trust it.

Join my FB Live Astrochats about the Scorpio Full Moon on Friday, March 10 and the Aries New Moon on Friday, March 24, both at noon EST at the OMTimes Magazine FB page.

Keep Astro-Insight going. Please contribute a cup of coffee, or maybe something stronger? Make a donation via PayPal to kbiehlATempowermentunlimited.net (and replace “AT” with @). Thank you!

© Kathy Biehl 2016. All Rights Reserved. You may forward this article as long as the copyright notice is intact. No part may be used or reprinted without my prior written permission. Karma, ya know.

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Forecast for February 27 – March 5, 2017

Life, the universe & everything are over the place – forward, backward, zooming, idling engines. So what saunters into the chaos but ghosts of loves and desire past. Explore; rediscover; learn. Commitment and stability are in the air, but beware any new shiny object presenting itself. All that glitters is not … you know. These days, especially if it’s new.

Learn more in the Astro-Insight podcast for February 27 – March 5, 2017  (7:20 minutes).

Keep Astro-Insight going. Please contribute a cup of coffee, or maybe a replacement mop head? Make a donation via PayPal to kbiehlATempowermentunlimited.net (and replace “AT” with @). Thank you!

© Kathy Biehl 2016. All Rights Reserved. You may forward this article as long as the copyright notice is intact. No part may be used or reprinted without my prior written permission. Karma, ya know.

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Forecast for the 2017 Pisces New Moon Solar Eclipse

February 26, 2017
6:58 AM PST / 9:58 AM EST / 2:48 PM GMT
8 Pisces 12

Time for another growth spurt! This one’s been building for a couple of years, but it might still take you by surprise.

How are you at surfing? Or riding a wave? Not that you have much choice. And not that effort is required. A surge is coming, no matter what you do, with the force to carry you into the next 19 years.

The excitement is coming off the Pisces New Moon, which combines the cosmic whammy of a solar eclipse with an undercurrent of fire power. Even if it’s not hitting a point in your chart, it’s bound to be a watershed moment, pun fully intended.

The eclipse is finishing a cycle that’s been with us for two years, on the Virgo/Pisces axis. This cycle has had us revisiting, reevaluating and rebooting issues of boundaries vs. interconnectedness, logic vs. faith,  rationalization vs. compassion, and service vs. martyrdom.

We’re wrapping up and moving on from this process just as the next one is beginning, courtesy of the Leo/Aquarius eclipses, which began with the Leo Full Moon of February 10. The gear shift moves us from learning to remain intact while soaking in the sea of humanity, to the next challenge of shining brightly in the midst of a group.

The shift comes with shocks, jolts and goodbyes. A solar eclipse always closes something out and leaves something behind. This one stands to wash away situations, patterns and likely specific people.

Some departures could go unnoticed, or come with camouflage, unclear motive or subterfuge that takes months to be fully detected or appreciated. (Be on the lookout for sacrificial lambs.)

A sense of unreality is probable. (No! Not these days!) This could be gentle and lovely, as if the divine is at work, or maybe raw magic. It could also be disorienting, to the point of putting someone’s sanity in question.

Thank the New Moon’s host, Neptune, ruler of illusion, escapism, and transcendence. He’s not only in the thick of this party, but he’s also the first planet the Sun and the Moon will meet after they separate (the Moon six hours later, the Sun three days later, on March 1).

His close involvement amplifies the otherworldly, unhinged-from-normal-reality character of a Pisces eclipse. Surface appearances may have nothing to do with what is really happening.

Take heart, though. Since the event is a graduation exercise, we don’t have to fall prey to lower, delusional potentials. We’ve been dealing with and working on this area of life, and we can apply what we’ve learned to this final burst.

That means:  Know where the borders are between you and others. Safeguard your boundaries.(No codependency! Got that?) Use a connection to a higher force — faith, divine guidance, love — as the navigational tool for the waters, and for the likely fog (more likely, steam) that blankets them.

Trust is essential. There’s not much time to think. Likely you’re not going to see the biggest developments coming. Even if you do catch a glimpse, good luck doing anything about it.

We’re about to be transported by a massive energy surge (or several). Every solar eclipse brings an effect like hitting a power up in the old Nintendo Mario Cart game. In this instance, though, it’s more like you’re on a jet ski or powerboat. You’ll be traveling along and blam! The pace will quicken like crazy, and it’ll be all you can do to hang on for the ride.

You may feel as if a huge force is rising up within or under you and sweeping you along. This eclipse is turbo-charged with urgency, unpredictability, volatility, aggression, and passionate, nonrational impulses. With Neptune in the mix, you may not appreciate the power of those waters (or what’s in them with you) until you’re well underway.

That’s because this eclipse is powered by an intense and dynamic evolutionary surge (that word again!): a loose cardinal t-square linking the god of war and the cosmic rebel (Mars and Uranus), the lord of death and the underworld (Pluto) and the most expansive influence in the sky (Jupiter). This configuration plays out from February 22-27, as Mars squares Pluto, teams with Uranus, and then opposes Jupiter.

The configuration is raucous and energizing to the max. The combination promises to affect and reshape issues of home, family, tradition, nurturing and security, as the pressure rushes to find expression in the sign opposite Pluto, Cancer. (Political alert: Think immigration and borders have been hot issues? Just wait.)

The intensity peaks on the day of the New Moon, when Mars and Uranus meet. They’re unleashing the energetic equivalent of dynamite detonating, or a geyser erupting — sudden, explosive, violent, and propulsive; shattering and destroying as they shoot events forward and color the next six months as the eclipse plays out.

Resistance is futile. Situations will be changing in an instant, and time may feel like it’s speeding up like crazy. There’s no point in hanging on to any person or situation that slips away. Clutching may lead to something blowing up in your hand.

All you can do is ride with it — whether that means acting on motivation that’s igniting within you, or climbing on your surfboard and hollering, “Cowabunga!”

You’re up to this. You’ve been in training for the past two years, as the Virgo/Pisces eclipses have pushed you to simplify and reset your life, habits, and personal boundaries.  You are as prepared as is humanly possible.

There will be moments that take you by surprise. That take your breath away, that make your heart race, that make your head spin. That stun and probably sting. You may cry. You may swear angels are at work.

And you may feel exhilarated, lighter and freer than ever, and jubilantly, utterly alive.

You can do this.

When you land on stable ground a few months from now, look to see who’s made it to the same destination. And celebrate what you’ve done.

 

 

Keep Astro-Insight going. Please contribute a cup of coffee, or maybe something stronger? Make a donation via PayPal to kbiehlATempowermentunlimited.net (and replace “AT” with @). Thank you!

© Kathy Biehl 2017. All Rights Reserved. You may forward this article as long as the copyright notice is intact. No part may be used or reprinted without my prior written permission. Karma, ya know.

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Forecast for the 2017 Leo Full Moon Lunar Eclipse

2017 Leo Full Moon Lunar Eclipse
February 10 – 11, 2017
4:32 PM PST / 7:32 PM EST / 12:32 AM GMT
22 Leo 28 / 22 Aquarius 28

This year’s Leo Full Moon has the subtlety of a powder keg igniting. It’s a pile-up of combustible influences that stoke the year’s theme of self-actualization. And like a powder keg’s igniting, it’s blowing some situations to smithereens — and blasting us further into this wild new phase.

Like any full moon, it’s bringing emotional outpourings to a head. They’re especially larger than life now, for multiple reasons.

One is the moon’s sign, Leo, which has a bent for drama and grabbing the spotlight. Feeling sufficiently seen, acknowledged and validated is a hot topic now. Some people are going to attack any perceived shortfall with attention-grabbing antics. Others, channeling the proud and regal possibilities of Leo, will respond by walking away from devaluing situations, with head held high.

Another reason for the larger than life emotions is this full moon’s nature as lunar eclipse, which escalates the looney factor exponentially. Lunar eclipse emotions aren’t merely aggrandized; they’re forceful, overwhelming and enormously informative (and so are the revelations that accompany them). What is seen cannot be unseen. Life will never be quite the same again.

This month’s full moon launches a two-year cycle of eclipses on the Leo/Aquarius axis, which has us revisiting and resetting the challenge of shining as individuals while coexisting within a group. A defining question is:  Who is your tribe? Here’s another: Where is your stage?

Watch for related themes, situations and even people to come back (perhaps only in your thoughts) from the summers of 1998 through 2000, the last time we underwent this eclipse cycle.
We are profoundly different now, though, so our responses to this cycle’s issues and triggers will be markedly different than they were some 19 years ago. Since then we’ve refocused our priorities, gained acute self-awareness and shed most inclination to contort ourselves to make a relationship “work.”

The first returns are coming this week, and continue as the eclipse unrolls over the next six months. Who sees your light? Who fuels it? Who doesn’t? There’s no point in running after anyone who leaves, or who fails to see you. Nor in continuing if you’re dancing your heart out in front of people who aren’t aware you’re in the room. Realizations are flipping internal switches in an instant, and permanently.

But wait!  There’s still more reason for the extraordinary uproar:  The Sun and the Moon are locking into the controlled firepower of the Saturn/Uranus trine, which ignited in December and fuels us for most of this year. Even if that trine did not activate anything in your chart (and in your heart), this Full Moon makes the potential immediate and personal.

Impulses are erupting from within, maybe from anger, maybe from passion, maybe from a raw life force that you can’t entirely define. You have got to have freedom to express yourself. Whether you’re seeing yet where you’re going, you are seeing what you’re leaving.

You have every incentive to get a move on. Action hero Mars, ruler of our drive and ambition, is ultimately in charge of this eclipse. (Here’s how:  the Moon in Leo answers to the Sun, which is in Aquarius and answers to Uranus, which is in Aries and therefore answers to Mars, which is in his home base of Aries.)

Mars doesn’t wait for permission, or for premeditated thought. A hot head and a risk taker, he simply acts. And that’s what we’re all doing.

The leaps and lunges, comings and goings, switches flipping and all the rest of the commotion stand to benefit us greatly. Bountiful Jupiter, bestower of optimism and expansiveness, is making helpful links to both the Sun and the Moon. Those contacts could further balloon some of this eclipse’s dramas to cartoonish proportions, but they could just as easily cushion the impact, or help us see why they’re ultimately good for us.

Many of them are. Revelations, partings of the way and split-second emotional decisions all carry profound healing potential. The Moon and Jupiter are making a yod, or Finger of God, that points directly to Chiron in Pisces, embodiment of our abiding, collective wound.  We are being called to address, even immerse ourselves into, interconnectedness.

The concept is seemingly incompatible with this moon mission. Tap into the elevated perspective of the Aquarius Sun and think of it this way:  On a micro level, it’s time to separate from the herd and venture forth in mutually appreciative networks. On a macro level, though, we’re in this together, various herds and all.

 

Keep Astro-Insight going. Please contribute a cup of coffee, or maybe something stronger? Make a donation via PayPal to kbiehlATempowermentunlimited.net (and replace “AT” with @). Thank you!

© Kathy Biehl 2017. All Rights Reserved. You may forward this article as long as the copyright notice is intact. No part may be used or reprinted without my prior written permission. Karma, ya know.

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