Some Thoughts on the New Moon, Mercury Retrograde & Life after the T-square

[Rhonda]

Here is the September Astrology Newsletter by my friend Virginia Bell.
Thought you'd enjoy it.

See you soon - Evolutionary Astrology class starts on Sept 30th at
6:30pm. If you haven't signed up yet, send me an email:
rhondas...@gmail.com
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September Astrology News

One Door Closes and Another One Opens –
But it’s Hell in the Hallway!

Some Thoughts on the New Moon, Mercury Retrograde &
Life after the T-square
By Virginia Bell

Personally, I’ve always found it holy in the hallway. The “hallway” is
an in-between time; when we’re between jobs, seasons, relationships or
when we’ve experienced a loss and everything feels suspended, on hold,
or in transition. Jungians have a name for it; they call it
liminality, from the Latin threshold, and it refers to the space
between here and there. It is an actual place; in ancient times it
represented a crossroads, a sacred location protected and guarded by
Hermes and Hekate. It is also a psychological state, when one is not
who one once was yet not who one is about to become. Right now many
of us are in the hallway and as far as I’m concerned it’s not a bad
place to be.

I think we’re all a little shell shocked from this past summer with
its heavy duty cardinal t-square, natural disasters, and extreme
weather. We’ve either experienced a serious crisis (or three) or know
people who have. Now that the summer is almost over and we’ve had the
last Saturn/Pluto square it feels as if we’re soldiers returning from
war and although the shooting has stopped we still smell gun powder
and wake up with night sweats. We’ve all been under a great deal of
stress (just reading the paper or watching the news is painful) and we
need to recover and heal which is why the hallway is so valuable.

You see, the hallway transcends normal time and boundaries and
therefore has a magical quality. Things happen during these periods
that don’t necessarily occur when we’re on the fast track, super
focused, and over scheduled. These times are filled with
synchronicity, and whimsy; we meet people who have important messages
for us; we have great insights and powerful intuition. And perhaps
because we are desperate, exhausted, and our defenses are down we are
more willing to reach out for help and more open to receive new
information and even, maybe, possibly, change.

In mythology, Demeter’s loss of her daughter Persephone caused her to
abandon Mount Olympus and roam the mortal world in rags. She came to
the town of Eleusis and because there was nothing she could do (to
bring her daughter back), she chose to remain there and simply wait.
This period of waiting is what helped to bring about her ultimate
transformation; for it was there that she created the Eleusisian
Mysteries. For 2,000 years these mysteries were the most sacred and
revered ritual celebrated in Greece. Incidentally, it is during this
month (from September 2-10) that the Eleusisian Mysteries are
honored.

Carl Jung had his own hallway experience; after he broke with Freud he
went into a deep depression. He probably would have gone into therapy
except that he had fought with Freud and he was Jung. Instead, he cut
back on his patients and spent afternoons in his garden exploring his
childhood and getting back to those things that brought him alive.
This period gave birth to his greatest work; the discovery of the
archetypes. He wrote: “It all began then; the later details are only
supplements and clarifications of the material that burst forth from
the unconscious, and first swamped me. It was the prima material for a
lifetime’s work.”

In her best selling book, Eat, Pray, Love, Liz Gilbert wrote about her
year in the hallway while traveling through Italy, India, and Bali. On
the surface she was eating pizza, sight seeing, and meditating but she
was doing so much more; she was allowing herself the time and space to
release an old life while on a deeper level she was creating a new
one, one more aligned with who she really was. Which is why we need
down-time, soul-time during this period. “You can’t see yourself in
moving water, only still water.” –Liz Gilbert

Don’t dismiss this hallway period for although on an outer level it
doesn’t look like much is happening (Jung hung out in his garden, Liz
Gilbert in ashrams and pizzerias), there is a great deal of creative
activity going on beneath the surface; we are marinating, percolating,
preparing, and most importantly - healing. That’s why it’s so
essential not to rush into the next project or relationship. It is
less about doing and more about being. We need time to restore; not
restore back to where we were (before the summer or the crisis) but
restore our essence and bring our soul back to the surface. The best
thing to do is to slow down, unplug from the world, and have patience.
More than anything else; love yourself where you are right now; love
yourself unconditionally, and trust this period, this process; it is a
mysterious place of gestation, transformation and eventually new life.
Consider this affirmation: “I am exactly where I need to be; I am
doing exactly what I need to do; I have all the time, money, and
energy in the world.”

The Virgo New Moon – September 8

A New Moon is new beginning; it’s a time to set a goal or plant a
seed. Yet Mercury is still retrograde in its own sign of Virgo making
it especially strong. Plus, it is Rosh Hashanah (the Jewish New Year)
a period devoted to withdrawing in order to pray, fast, and forgive.
This New Moon, too, feels like a hallway; nothing is solid, everything
is in transition – which makes anything possible. It’s as if we need
to recover something from the past before we can move forward. Look
where you have Virgo in your chart; that house contains a key to both
the past and the future.

“Our angels value enthusiasm over perfection.”

Virgo is not so much about perfection, but about the process of
perfecting; we are not a finished product; we are a work in progress.
The high Virgo is about taking care of the daily chores and details
that allow us to grow and improve; it’s about refining our life. The
shadow part of Virgo is beating ourselves up for not getting there
sooner. There is a temptation with Mercury in picky Virgo to focus on
what’s not working, rather than improve and build on what we have.
Fortunately, Mercury makes a helpful trine to transformational Pluto
(in Capricorn) at the New Moon allowing us to recognize old patterns
and giving us the courage to break them.

There was an article on yahoo recently about dieting; it suggested
that instead of extreme food plans and fasts, we would do better by
simply taking small steps; not eating late at night, or using low-fat
milk instead of cream in our coffee - that kind of thing. It reminded
me of the sign Virgo. Real change (whether physical, emotional, or
spiritual) is subtle; it happen slowly, over time. It doesn’t always
arrive in the form of dramatic epiphanies while meditating in India or
Bali, or going on a three week fast; it’s not necessarily that flashy
or high profile. It’s replacing old habits with healthy ones, being
consistent, showing up, and doing the work, one day at a time, day in
and day out. We don’t have to change everything at once. As they say
in AA; “Just do the next right thing.” That’s the spirit of the New
Moon and Retrograde Mercury in Virgo! “Hope begins in the dark, the
stubborn hope that if you just show up and try and do the right thing,
the dawn will come. You wait and watch and work. You don’t give up.” –
Anne Lamott

Mercury turns direct on September 12 at 5 degrees of Virgo. It went
retrograde on August 20 at 19 degrees of Virgo. It won’t come out of
its “shadow” until September 26 (when it again reaches 19 degrees
Virgo). Mercury enters Libra on October 3, which gives us another
three weeks in the hallway, to release, refine and integrate all the
changes in our lives.

Pluto turns direct on September 13 after being retrograde for five
months. Whatever has been brewing for five months can begin to move
forward over the next few weeks, albeit slowly and carefully.

Jupiter slips back into watery Pisces on September 8-9. It will remain
there until January 22, 2011. On September 18 expansive Jupiter will
rendezvous with brilliant Uranus in late Pisces. The great American
psychologist Abraham Maslow (the founder of Humanistic psychology)
coined the phrase, “peak experience” in 1964. He described it as an
experience of insight and inspiration that was ego transcending and
had the potential to release creative energies and leave someone
changed for the better. When Jupiter and Uranus hook up on September
18 it is possible to have such a breakthrough. It may not be dramatic
or earth shattering but it could bring something (or someone) new into
your life. Look at your chart to see where this conjunction falls;
that’s an area where it can occur. September 18 is also Yom Kippur,
the Jewish Day of Atonement (at one ment). Wouldn’t it be wonderful if
the Jupiter/ Uranus conjunction brought some peace to the world?
Breakthroughs of all kinds (artistic, medical, political, technical,
etc.) often take place in the culture at a Jupiter/Uranus aspect.
These two planets will join again on January 4, 2011. In the mean time
they will be traveling within a few degrees of each other.

“It’s not over till it’s over!”

The Full Moon on September 23 occurs at 00 degrees Aries/Libra. Not
only is this a critical degree (it’s on the world axis) it echoes back
the powerful t-square that took place this summer. Plus, this Full
Moon makes a square to the eclipse we had on June 26. What happened
three months ago? What’s pulling you back into the drama now? The
Jupiter/Uranus conjunction, so close to the Aries Moon, can be a
beacon of light that helps to guide us through these waters.

“Be patient towards all that is unsolved in your heart and try and
love the questions themselves like locked rooms and like books that
are written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers,
which cannot be given you because you would not be able to lie them.
And the point is, to live everything. Love the questions now. Perhaps
you will then gradually without noticing it, live along some distant
day into the answer.”
–Rainer Maria Rilke

Viriginia's website is: www.virginiabellastrology.com