A Full Moon of Power and Clarifying Priorities

The Full Moon in Aries on October 17th at 4:26 am PT brings a mounting sense of tension, with a configuration that invokes a potent call for major growth and each of us stepping more fully into our truth, our power, and our priorities. The Full Moon is perched at 24º 35' Aries – just minutes from a conjunction with the new KBO planet Eris. This conjunction alone creates a potent and confronting energy, but it’s also just one point of a wildly intense Cardinal Cross, involving the Sun, Mars, Pluto, and more!

It’s also important to note that this Full Moon is the culmination of what began during the Solar Eclipse New Moon on October 2nd, meaning that the karmic shifts and intense changes coloring the onset of this lunation cycle are now coming to a head. You can expect emotions to run high, power struggles to surface, and opportunities to gain clarity around your priorities, willpower, inner truth, and what you truly stand for.


Breaking Down the Cardinal Cross

The Cardinal Cross involved in this Full Moon features the Moon very closely conjunct Eris in Aries, and also conjunct nearby Chiron, as the Sun opposes, itself in partile (or same-degree) conjunction with major asteroid Juno. Squaring this opposition is Pluto in Capricorn and Mars in Cancer.
 
This significant Full Moon thus stokes inner fire and passion, stirring as well our courage and boldness to take quick, decisive action. This lunation configuration, lasting until the end of the October month, can also provoke frustration, impatience, and existential restlessness. With Eris so tightly aligned, her archetypal nature adds further intensity. Mythologically, Eris is a fierce feminine warrior—the sister of Ares, the god of war — astrologically known for being willing to fight for her beliefs and to be unyielding in so doing. As our founder Henry Seltzer has discovered through his research, prominent Eris placements can represent disrupting the status quo, trailblazing one’s own inner path, therefore standing firmly for what you uniquely believe. This Full Moon partakes of this potent archetype and might be a signal to dig down deep in order to find your own individual bottom line.

Chiron, sitting just a few degrees away from Eris and the Aries Full Moon, brings in a layer of emotional process that can lead to healing, perhaps surfacing old wounds that are more than ready to be tended, rehabilitated and integrated.

Additionally, opposite all this Aries intensity, the Libra Sun is conjunct a very different feminine archetype as represented by the asteroid Juno, implying commitment and devotion in a partnership orientation. Juno reflects what you may be most deeply devoted to — those relationships to which you feel a profound sense of sacred duty. With both Eris and Juno activated, we are called to recognize what matters for us at a core level. In Aries and Libra, the themes of self, individuality, and ego stand in contrast to — or in a spectrum with — connection, partnership, and togetherness. Your relationships likely hold key lessons, calling for your love, attention, communication, and care.


The Pluto-Mars Opposition

Now let’s look at the planets squaring the Sun-Juno Moon- Eris opposition. Pluto is at the anaretic (final) degree of Capricorn, having recently stationed direct, and is in the very last moments of its 16-year journey through this sign before moving into Aquarius on November 19th. This amplifies Pluto’s influence, marking the end of an era. Pluto’s time in Capricorn has brought massive changes to societal structures and traditional institutions — and depending on where Capricorn falls in your chart, this transit has tended to reshape your life and sense of power in that area. Pluto is also in close square to another of these new KBO planets that Henry has been researching, namely Haumea, which seems to be related to love of Nature and to a sense of treating others around us with a sense of equality and fairness. The plus and the minus side of that can be brought out by the Pluto square, active since early 2023 and also through to the end of this current, and rather intense, year.

Mars in Cancer, meanwhile, has entered the pre-shadow phase of his upcoming retrograde. Opposing Pluto and squaring both the Sun and Moon in this Full Moon configuration, he completes the Cardinal Cross. Mars can struggle to express his fiery nature in the emotional waters of Cancer, leading to reactivity, passive-aggression, or inflamed emotions, especially within family dynamics.

No planetary influence, however, is all bad news. This placement can reveal where you’ve been harboring resentment that’s ready to be acknowledged and cleared. It can also show where your anger points to the need for tending boundaries — or how far you’re willing to go to protect what you love and cherish most deeply.


A Soothing Balm from Jupiter

This configuration is no easy pill to swallow. And yet… there is one aspect that softens the intensity and helps the proverbial medicine go down. Jupiter in Gemini forms a flowing trine to the Sun and Juno in Libra, creating an opportunity for open communication, journaling, or self-inquiry. This trine encourages a focus on expansion, possibilities, and positive potentials, offering support in clarifying your deepest commitments and priorities.

I encourage you to set aside time to explore practices that connect you with love, divinity, or a higher power — whatever that means to you. These practices can serve as a balm to soothe frayed nerves and tender hearts during these intense times.

Amidst all this passionate energy, this Full Moon invites us to lean into clarity, courage, and commitment. Mid-October is therefore a powerful time to identify and remember what matters most, to clear emotional debris, and align with your deepest truth. Though challenges may arise, they carry the potential as well for profound transformation. With a bit of reflection and care, you can allow this energy to fuel meaningful growth and renewal. May each one of us know with utter clarity our own empowered stance and receive the blessings of the universe with its balm of love and grace so that we may heal and blossom forth into our most coherently aligned potentials.