A Spunky and Not Fully Grounded Full Moon

Friday night’s late evening Full Moon in Taurus, early Saturday for the East Coast and Europe, brings both a Neptunian and a Uranian factor to the grounded presence of the Taurean energy of the Moon itself. That is because Venus, ruler of the sign of the Moon, is also precisely opposite the Trickster energy of Uranus, in the same degree of Aries as Venus occupies in Libra, therefore exactly across the circle of the Zodiac, and differing by only one minute of a degree. This is an unusual and unexpectedly intense configuration under which just about anything can (and will) happen.

Along with the calmness and earth-oriented energy of Taurus, this Uranian emphasis brings a note of chaos in. Meanwhile, the Sun and Moon also closely aspect Neptune in Pisces. Noting as well that Uranus was also greatly emphasized in the recent Libra New Moon from the last twelve days of October, we are in for another wild ride for the remainder of November, especially perhaps over the next two weeks, leading up to the Scorpio New Moon of November 18th. The virtue of all these intense outer planet energies, including Uranus and Neptune, both now greatly emphasized, is to allow us to see over the edge of our normative three-dimensional nuts-and-bolts reality into the magical realm of the transpersonal and the other-dimensional. Our life is more than what we may make of it by referencing only our physical circumstances. Getting and spending, as Wordsworth put it, even though it dominates our current Western focus, occupies only a small part of our available attention.

When we welcome in the intuitional, and indeed, spiritual, perspective that Uranus and Neptune bring, we recognize what is in actuality the greater part of ourselves, although these components might be almost unconscious – or barely conscious – as we go about the schedules of our days and weeks. These energies have a disruptive capability as far as normative consensus thinking is concerned, although on the other hand, they open us up to something that is vital to our continued well being. When we face sudden shock, therefore, the province of Uranus, it pays for us to take a good look at the potential benefits. We all know the story of the experience that morphs over time and reflection. We hear someone say – I lost my job; this is the worst day of my life… only to admit years later that it was, “the best day of my life, everything opened up from there.”

The planetary archetype of Neptune can also feel like an ill fit to our normal daily patterns, which turns on its head in a figure-and-ground reversal when we can see its otherworldly messages from a different point of view. This society, with its unfortunate over-emphasis on the material and the hard-and-fast logical conclusion of black and white, right or wrong, rush to judgment, has little patience with an approach that views all that lives as holy. Pluto as well, and the new planet, Eris, while disruptive, also have their positive side, leading to rebirth, transformation, and living out soul intention. As we come into contact with these numinous messengers, “ambassadors of the galaxy” as seminal Humanistic Astrologer Dane Rudhyar chose to term them, we do well to look upon the events that they symbolize as hidden blessings.

The Sabian Symbols for this Full Moon are, as usual, instructive. For the Moon, in the twelfth degree of Taurus (11 +) we have, “Window Shoppers.” This reminds us that as humans we stand apart from the material plane, even as we participate in its multiplicity. Marc Edmund Jones has this to say: “Human imagination [is] the real corrective for [one’s] experience, enabling each individual to know whether the choices he or she makes are in line with his or her desires… the keyword is Visualization.” For the Sun, in the same degree of Scorpio, we find, “An embassy ball.” Jones references, “the social dramatizations which enable each person to know whether his or her overall loyalties are bringing the self-fulfillment to which he or she aspires.” Indeed, as we ask this question we must, each of us, strive to connect with the greater realities of our existence, no matter how subtle the message or how difficult to truly recognize. And we must equally turn away from surface superficialities in order to look within ourselves for the answer.