Venus in Cancer squares the True Nodes today. A moment to pause and assess your values. To linger in honesty with your open heart (note in the image, it's meant to be heart 🤣) and check in with how your values are pulsing and flowing through you right now.
We've been on journeys throughout 2024 and most likely ebbs & flows of selfhood that are still underway are shifting our wants & needs in this life. This is a process of course and yet today linger a while in reflection, in honest communion with yourself. Journal about your deepest values- about what feels truly nurturing to you and where you are in your life right now.
And then check in with the Nodes! Libra & Aries. The axis of our own primal drives & how we emerge in 1-1 relationships. Does anything need to shift in either realm in order for those heart-centred values to be met a little more fully? Do you need to shift? Even if relationships need to shift, it's often us that need to do the boundary work. Yet Venus here speaks with so much love- love for the other & love for ourselves. Any boundaries that need to move a little, we can do that with love.
Blessings on the Journey.
This coming weekend, Saturn, our archetype of boundaries and limits that shifts the tidelines of known reality, stations retrograde.
Wherever you have 19-12 degrees of Pisces in your chart, opportunity abounds for redirection, refocusing and most importantly with this particular transit: release.
This is a spiritual purge most likely manifesting in all different realms of your emotional, relational & physical life.
A cleaning out. A letting go.
It is part of a much bigger cycle involving Saturn & Neptune preparing to begin new journeys through the zodiac with us in 2025-6.
So: Let. It. Go.
Even more than you've already done.
This Saturn will be revisiting themes that may have emerged in March, April & May of this year. Was there a cleaning up process underway in some aspect/s of your life then? It's time to release even more.
Because NEW awareness and structures are coming and for that to happen, we have to let go of old stuff we simply cannot carry forward. This could run deep. It doesn't get much deeper than Pisces. And yet, Saturn says, "It's ok. You're ready for this. It is time." So let it be time.
And..move slowly. Saturn in retrograde (along with all the other planets we'll have in retrograde during this period!) does not need to move quickly. Take care. Rest. Check-in with your body & psyche & heart. If grief arises with the releasing process, honour it. It is real. And it will release.
Remember, Saturn is ultimately about boundaries and in Pisces- we're talking boundaries shifting so that we can create new structures for our spiritual lives manifesting in the house where you have Pisces. This is deep soul work.
Blessings on the Journey.
Remember our conversations with Ceres, talking & supporting out Aries growth those weeks ago? She’s still here but on her retrograde journey in Capricorn. Today she is opposite Mercury in Cancer. Venus & the Sun will follow Mercury.
Ceres Rx can speak of deep nourishment to the Cancerian vibes we’re moving with right now. Slow down on thoughts and plans of productivity for productivity’s sake. She wants us to tune into the body’s needs & rhythms and today those rhythms want to merge with a Cancer Mercury.
Tension could certainly arise if we resist or ignore the body’s wisdom, a wisdom that roots us into Mother Earth. Avoid resisting! Listen into the body’s messages and to how your intuition speaks with them through your own watery ebbing & flowing. Go off book! Off plan! See where the earth mother guides you.
Blessings on the Journey.
The Moon will complete its journey through Capricorn today and as that happens it will conjunct Pluto Retrograde at the first degree of Aquarius. Their conjunction is building all day and it is exact around 11pm Pacific Time this evening.
You could feel this one building.
Especially as that Moon hits the 29th degree, where we'll have our second Capricorn Full Moon in July...oh there is so much in that final degree of Capricorn right now as Pluto is on its way for its final Capricorn song, most likely a requiem of sorts, in September of this year.
If you're feeling the depths in your bones, let it move slowly through you. See if the energy can transmute through creative and/or meditative practices. Or get into nature. We are still coming through Capricorn insights from the Full Moon and there could certainly be some push & pull within and without today. The Moon in Capricorn does not want to shut down emotions (especially when the Sun is in Cancer!) for the sake of 'productivity.' It wants to use those emotions to find the wisdom in them and let that wisdom be the path forward.
Slow movements with the body could support that wisdom coming up to the surface. And perhaps as that Moon moves closer & closer the final degree of Capricorn throughout the day, deeply transformative insights will emerge.
Blessings on the Journey.
How are you today? The Solstice-Full Moon has come and gone. The Moon remains in Capricorn today. The Sea Goat's wisdom and yearning and strength are still with us, but it has moved on from it's square to Neptune and the Sun more slowly also moves on. We are almost released from the intensity of those Pisces squares that have carried us through the past few weeks. I for one am relieved for the shift!
And today Vesta in Leo sits opposite Pluto Retrograde. Mmm. Vesta in Leo is such a luscious Vesta. Velveteen joy. Playful fire. Creative & healing dances with the goddess. And today she's opposite Pluto, the great transformer.
A window to become aware of what holds you back from entering your own velveteen joy.
A moment to bring awareness to embodied self-doubt & self-restriction, perhaps that comes from fear of standing out or being seen and/or by others our ourselves.
Pluto retrograde in Aquarius is breaking down some of the mental restrictions that keep us from claiming our authentic selves, and this is just our first taste of that breakdown. There will be more over the years!
But for now. For this Plutonic dance with Vesta. Have the courage- a Leo trait- to lean into a joyful & playful dance for yourself. Vesta in Leo is not about other people at all. It's about us and the goddess. Us and our healing journey. Let the mighty transformer show you some restrictions you need not carry forth. Let them dissolve. And given that Pluto is also still in a quincunx with our Cancer Sun, let that dissolving be deeply nurturing.
Blessings on the Journey.
Fresh through the Solstice threshold we emerge in our Capricorn Full Moon, exact at 6:07pm Pacific time today. The wisdom of the Sea Goat seeps through our bones illuminating our path right now. In this moment.
We just came out of a somewhat wild Gemini season. How are you? Did the rollercoaster of air energy send you into any moments of overload? Did your mind nearly burst at moments? Mine sure did! And here we are in Cancer season- time to rest and bring a nurturing inner gaze to the ideas that Gemini season birthed and choose what we want to journey forth with. The rest- let them go. If they are meant to manifest, they'll surge up later on, transformed & alchemized from their time in the rest zone.
Let Capricorn's strength of will & bone deep wisdom carve out the boundaries today for you to use that wisdom to see where your path wants to lead. Remember- we already know it's leading into Cancer season! Whatever project or plan of an idea we want to carry forth, it's going to be one that ebbs and flows through our body-mind-life and there are no 'goals' right now other than to be with what is here. So what is here?
Neptune squares this Full Moon. A Neptune preparing to station retrograde. And Saturn, ruler of Capricorn, also in Pisces with Neptune, prepares to station retrograde. This shi*t ain't supposed to be all figured out right now! But it is supposed to be honoured and
looked at
with a truly mystical heart
open to possibilities
that today
in one moment
you could
cast a spell or say a prayer
the brings ancient elder wisdom
stirring in the marrow of your bones
up to the surface of psyche
why not after all? Capricorn is a goat born of sea that journeys onto land. Magic is real. Believe. Because it's in your bones.
Blessings on the Journey.
Solstice Blessings to All!!
Whether you find yourself in the longest day of light in the year or the shortest, may the Sun offer blessings that steep you in ancient rites of belonging and change as the Sun enters Cancer and we leave Gemini season behind.
Cancer craves belonging & safety. Love & nurture. Sometimes Cancer's long journey lesson is to learn to find that belonging & safety within the self, in its own embodied home and not to look toward others to direct its nurturing impulse toward rather than itself. To pause in the journey of feeling what is present right now, from one moment to the next and simply be at home in that feeling, regardless of how we might categorize it as good, bad, happy, sad. Cancer is meant to move between emotional states and it is happiest when it can flow and experience without shame or critique.
Neptune speaks strongly during this Solstice. Neptune has been speaking strongly at the final degree of Pisces and will continue that cosmic song into 2026. However as Neptune prepares to station retrograde on July 2, lean into those higher realms for this Solstice day and tomorrow's Capricorn Full Moon. Let go of control & fear of the unknown. In the Northern hemisphere, this letting go is accompanied by an incredible amount of light to carry us forward, blossoming into summer. In the Southern hemisphere, this letting go wants some inner reflection & quietude as the shift to winter comes.
May we all move forward, nurtured & held.
Blessings on the Journey.
Tomorrow brings our Cancer Solstice and today- the Sun's last full day in Gemini. What a whirlwind it's been. From abundance of ideas to mental exhaustion to everything in between.
Today the Sun squares Neptune which carries it through the Solstice threshold tomorrow, 1:50 Pacific Time. It's a day to feel into where you are- right now. Regardless of how this Gemini season treated you, where are you right now? Today. What's pulsing life in your veins? What visions are floating into your daydreams?
With Vesta trining Neptune as she moves into heart-centred Leo today, those daydreams may very well be healing medicine. Let yourself fall into them a bit. Let yourself welcome creative healing fires within. Vesta's fires are sacred. They connect us to the Goddess and she is nurturing and loving us within today. Drop into that sacred feminine energy and from that place,
thank the Gemini Sun. Whatever mental gymnastics it brought your way, however graceful or clumsy they may have felt, they were somehow necessary for this unraveling mystery of precious life. Tomorrow we enter Cancer season. Very different energy. Very different direction. Very different gifts.
Blessings on the Journey.
Perhaps a sigh of relieve can emerge! Mercury & Venus entered Cancer together, breaking up some of the very intense Gemini energy we've been moving through these past few weeks. Their entrance comes through a square with Neptune which still holds, but Cancer can defuse the high Neptune vibes through watery feelings and emotions that ebb & flow whereas Gemini can get overwhelmed by all that other realmness.
And the Sun sits opposite the galactic centres as it too prepares to square Neptune and then make its Solstice threshold crossing into Cancer on June 20th. Remember the galactic centre is a black hole. A void to our mind's categories of time & space and yet its power offers incredible insights and breakthroughs of inspired understanding so long as those insights are allowed to stream through by their own accord.
And Vesta, goddess of the sacred hearth, she who stokes the sacred fires of our creative & healing sexuality, sits at the final degree of Cancer and trines Neptune as well. She offers healing from other realms to nurture us so fully. What a day to dance with Vesta, should the impulse come to you.
As we begin to move into more Cancer energy, especially if the past few weeks have been a lot for your mind, take time to rest & nurture. Nest into safety & comfort & slowness. Especially as Venus, Mercury & the Sun move into Cancer and come through the Neptune square, an extra slow shift allows the mind to defuse all that it's been processing through the emotional body. And the physical body needs time to let all that energy ebb & flow. Gentle yin movements. And remember- Mercury in Cancer does not necessarily have explicit words for what it's feeling. Lean into poetry and speaking with and through the body.
Blessings on the Journey.
It's not supposed to make sense. It's not supposed to align to what should be or even what could be. It's supposed to be other realms streaming through with a somewhat dizzying pulse of the life that a version of you once believed in before they told you that was child's play. A past life version of you definitely knew it was real and she or he or they are also here saying:
Let go.
Let go of every neat line and structured plan
Let go of the directions you told yourself were the path to success
Let go and jump head first into the dizzying spin that is literally the mind & body & heart realigning itself with the final degree of all that is. The final exhale of the cosmic mother before the first life of breath in a new dimension begins. There is no going back from Neptune at the final degree shimmering into Venus, Mercury & the Sun. There is not going back because reality is altogether altered.
Some will pretend it didn't happen. Pretend it was 'just a dream' and numb their hearts to the reality that opened to them.
But you will surely not do that.
You will surely let go
and walk out into that glistening new season
changed
by what the cosmic Mother
exhaled into you &
all that is.
May the next five days that carry us into the June Solstice
release what needs to be released
so that a wise child's dreams
the child you once were
may finally come true.
Blessings on the Journey.
A channel that explores spirituality, astrology, healing & living in synch with nature's cycles with Iris J., PhD- an evolutionary astrologer, writer, educator & cultural theorist. This work is all about the deep dives of slow burn astrology, discovering beauty & fostering community along the way.
*A note on Comments.
I welcome comments. I love reading about how the energies are settling/working with folks. When commenting, please remember that we all come from diverse backgrounds & experiences. Please use respectful language.
Disclaimer: Archetypal Astrology is never intended to replace advice of medical professionals, doctors or psychotherapists.