A First Quarter of Imagination and Courage

Monday evening's First Quarter Moon is an interesting and slightly odd configuration. We have all been feeling the triple crunch of the Mercury Retrograde period, in alignment with Uranus and Pluto remaining in close square all throughout this cycle, and with a dose of the limitation represented by Saturn an important part of the scene as well. Now, at the moment of heightened tension when the cycle initiated by the New Moon reaches the testing time of the First Quarter phase, Neptune steps further into the picture. The planet of dissolution and imagination is closely aspected by both Sun and Moon as they come into square alignment, and is still somewhat conjoined by Mars, being closely conjunct as well to the Venus/Mars midpoint. This puts layers of other-dimensionality and illusion over the churning pudding of other influences that remain, perhaps unpleasantly, in the foreground of our consciousness. Underlying all our present angst and uncertainty is the fear of change, as symbolized by a prominent Chiron, the Wounded Healer, also in Pisces.

We are indeed in this climactic new year of 2015 faced with quite a bundle of unresolved promise for radical change, that which we know that we need to do for the sake of our continued growth as human beings, and still have yet to find the courage to totally act on. Does it actually help to be taking this situation, an ultimately practical one, out to the higher-level perspective that Neptune provides? I suppose that you could make an argument either way. What we need now is clarity of purpose, and Neptune is all about cloudy imprecision and vague fantasy, either rosy or else more dire than is even warranted. And yet, with both Jupiter and Neptune emphasized, we do have a spiritual foundation available to us that can actually aid us in finding our way forward in spite of anything. Either way we have come to a crux of activity, one keyword for this lunar phase that Dane Rudhyar called a 'crisis of action.' It might be beneficial to recall the advice of the television hero of the 1950s, based on the character of pioneer Davy Crockett, who said "Be sure you're right, then go ahead."

This is of course easier said than done. At the timing of this configuration, Mercury, in full-on backward motion, aspects Uranus, Pluto and Chiron, all within about a degree or less, triggering these important cosmic factors of revolutionary change and of inner wounding. We must come at the world from where we begin, in our very depths, with all the insecurity of our earliest imaginings, and seek to make the most positive long-term choices for ourselves, independent of what our conditioning might offer, or social appearances dictate, or our fears attempt to side-track us from actualizing. And as we do so we must somehow decide between mere uneasiness and genuine well-motivated caution, and still have the courage to proceed as though we knew what we were doing. The famous Goethe line has an extra meaning for us now, that we must be willing to take risks for the sake of our future, because boldness has "genius, power and magic in it."

The Sabian Symbols for this Quarter Moon add a touch of otherworldly emphasis as well, in a nice chime with the cosmic currents swirling around us now. For the Moon, in the seventh degree of Taurus, we have: "A woman of Samaria." This is meant to invoke the biblical story of Jesus at the well, meeting a Samaritan woman of uncertain morals, who at least chooses to live her life unafraid. Marc Edmund Jones refers to "Self-giving, in the hope of honest self-realization," and to one who "plumbs all experience to the depths" in search of what they truly need. This emblem does remind us also of the striving for women's rights in a world that at times seeks to deny them, which can stand for anyone, male or female, that dares to completely follow his or her own inner guidance. For the Sun we find: "A child born of an eggshell," and this mystical symbol reminds us of rebirth into a more spiritual dimension of higher reality, seeing bird as the image of flight and ultimate separation from an earth-bound existence. Jones echoes this sentiment, calling our attention to the "illimitable potentialities to be found in each moment," and "a highly individual and completely unlimited resourcefulness." Indeed this is what we vitally need, as we navigate these times of decision and of standing up tall for what we, each one of us, deeply believes.