July 28 1:55 PM EST
This is a powerhouse new moon that could see some surprises in store! The new moon takes place at 5 degrees of the fixed fire sign of Leo, and is trine to expansive Jupiter at 8 degrees of Aries. This is a “bigger! more!” combination- with Leo enjoying doing things on a grand scale, and Jupiter, as always, expanding and fanning the flames. Leo wants to shine and love and play, and Aries wants to pioneer forwards in a blaze of passion and inspiration. But before we get carried away in the excitement, which we very well may want to do with this high wire enthusiasm in the air, there are some more catalytic and intense aspects at play here too.
The new moon is in a loose out-of-sign opposition to intense and transformative Pluto at 27 degrees of Capricorn. It’s almost like the new moon and Jupiter are rushing, full of excitement, to the new- but Pluto is saying “hey, wait- not so fast.. Aren’t you forgetting something?” Pluto sees into the deep dark depths. It’s realm is the recesses of our lives and the collective. We cannot, ultimately, soar away on a golden chariot of Leo light, UNTIL we have fully cleaned the cobwebs and released the past. If we attempt to do this, the sticky strings of past entanglement or unfinished business will tug at us even as we try to ignore it. We will have to ‘double back’ and do what we neglected (perhaps very subconsciously or perhaps very deliberately) up to this point. Doubling-back can feel at best annoying, or at worst catastrophic as we get dragged into the messes we had pretended did not exist and forced to confront them.
It’s not that Pluto is ‘punishing’ us. Not at all. The truth is that Pluto is on our side, has always been on our side. It’s work in the collective, especially as seen through the lens of the Pluto Saturn conjunction (which kicked off the energetic of the past few years), Pluto has been tirelessly working to dismantle the old, to dig up the dirty secrets and corruption, so it can be cleaned out so that we can have newer, lighter, stronger relationships and structures and institutions in our lives that are in true integrity. You would not want to build a new house on old, faulty foundations would you? Of course not. Pluto is the one who does the excavation work so that the new IS possible. But of course cleaning up the old messes can be unpleasant.
And this new moon is about our PERSONAL issues that Pluto needs to ‘work on’. Leo is all about me, my creativity, my originality, my self-expression, my leadership, my star power, my authenticity, my courage, me as the center of my world. So we would be wise now not to view any drama that comes up as thwarting our sense of self-autonomy and forward movement, but rather as a gift that is exposing the barriers to our full self-embodiment that we need to clear up pronto so that we can get on with that and thrive. The less FEAR we have about going through this process the easier it will be. If we can even turn to Pluto and say ‘thank you!’ for showing me this and helping me get to the other side of it, we will have aligned to a powerful ally in our healing and transformation process.
Pluto sometimes works in subtle ways, giving us a mysterious knowing of what is ‘really going on’ under the surface with something so that we can address it. That is especially true with Pluto now having been in a long-term sextile with psychic and intuitive Neptune, currently at 25 degrees of Pisces. But sometimes Pluto just pulls the rug out, lets the chips fall where they may and leaves us to sort it all out. In this sense it is rather like Uranus, the ‘great awakener’ whose symbol is the lightning bolt. No warning, no preamble- just a shot of electricity that changes everything.
“The Tower” tarot card comes to mind here, having strong Plutonian and Uranian connotations. The Tower itself is being struck by lightning (in the Smith Rider Waite imagery) and is completely destroyed, its inhabitants flung from the old and familiar, which is no longer safe or available to them. Some of us may find ourselves in Tower situations this month. Especially because an extremely rare Mars/Uranus/North Node triple conjunction is also happening during this new moon.
The north node symbolizes “the path forward”. It is our personal and collective ‘north star’ at any given time, showing us where the greatest learning is to be found, especially if we are committed to following our highest path and purpose. The signs where the north and south node are are where the eclipses occur. The north node has been in Taurus since January 2022. All issues related to Taurus have been extremely highlighted since that time (food availability, environmental concerns, finances, stock market, cryptocurrencies, assets, values, resources, nature), climaxing in some ways around the time of the Taurus solar eclipse in April. This triple conjunction of the Uranus, the North Node, and Mars brings these issues firmly back to center stage. To put the rarity of this into perspective: the north node only conjuncts Uranus once every 18 years. To have this happen at the EXACT same time as Mars is on this degree is perhaps a once-in-a-lifetime event, certainly in the sign of Taurus it is. The conjunction of the (True) north node and Uranus is on July 31st followed by the Mars Uranus conjunction on August 1st. But for all intents and purposes this is happening virtually simultaneously and will be very active throughout the entire 28 day lunar cycle of this new moon.
Mars, similar to Jupiter in this way, is throwing fuel on the fire. Mars is a catalyzer of action. And Uranus again shocks, stuns, electrifies – for the purposes of speeding up our awareness, our consciousness, our electrical circuitry. And the north node encourages our future progress. So what might this mean? Again the realm of Taurus is the likely backdrop : financial shocks, natural disasters or the dramatic ripple effects of news related to agriculture, resources or investments. Taurus also has to do with our five senses, so we could all be seeing, feeling, hearing, smelling, KNOWING the significance of what is happening now in a very profound and personal way.
This triple conjunction takes place at 18 degrees of Taurus so those with planets or angles at this degree may have the most personal experience of it. The conjunction is also square to both Saturn at 25 degrees of Aquarius and Mercury at 18 degrees of Leo. Perceiving the changes in our lives or in the collective that may be popping up now, once again from a position of ‘necessary housecleaning’ will help us be less susceptible to panic or any other narrative of fear that may arise as a result of what is happening. And resisting the urge to say things (Mercury) that we might later regret (Saturn), and avoid scapegoating (Saturn/Mercury) others will also keep us in highest integrity now. Leo, at its highest, is also about deep authentic personal power and responsibility.
Venus at 12 degrees of Cancer is another interesting side note. I rarely talk about the asteroids or fixed stars in these readings (so much material!)- but 13 degrees of Cancer is the location of Sirius, the brightest star the sky and one of the most highly significant stars to our ancestors. Venus, as always worshipped as the Goddess of beauty, wealth and relationships- would have been considered by them to be highly auspicious conjunct Sirius. This is a bit like a ‘north node aspect’ in that it ultimately points our way towards the highest possible future. Our relationships and finances CAN ultimately thrive, if we see and hear and understand and heed the messages that are coming our way now.
And some of this has to do with Lilith. Dark moon Lilith (another point, like the nodes, formed by the intersecting rotations of the moon/earth and sun)- is also present here with Sirius and Venus, at 11 degrees of Cancer. Lilith represents primordial female power, sexuality and autonomy (you know- the kind that has been more or less deliberately repressed for the past few thousand years). This gives us a hint again that the messages we get now and the healing and rebalancing that is necessary, involves reclaiming parts of our divine sacred Feminine wisdom (whether we are male of female or other). Ultimately the new CANNOT be born of an intrinsically energetically lopsided and fragmented foundation. Our INNER sacred marriage (hieros gamos) between our divine Masculine and divine Feminine is necessary to build and create the life we want to live. And is also necessary collectively to ‘re-build’ our world in the highest integrity.
Over-emphasizing the Masculine at the expense of the Feminine has NOT worked. It may have ‘worked’ in a short-sighted capitalistic kind of way to consolidate power and wealth at the expense of others, but like any faulty foundation this must now crumble and be re-claimed. Lilith does not shy away from this task. And nor should we. Ultimately that is what creates the container and the capacity to embody our Leo selves, to truly shine in all of our unique splendor and glory and provide a true light and inspiration for others on the path.
*art by @indig0
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