A Last Quarter Moon to Dream On

Monday's Last Quarter Moon comes at a crucial time, as we prepare to leave the transformational storms of November for the even more intense configurations of December and the upcoming year. This phase in any case corresponds to taking a second look at everything that has been happening over the course of the pre-existing lunar cycle, with the idea of bringing the knowledge that we have accumulated into the next. As we mull over the previous three weeks, in keeping with these times of prominent Uranus-Pluto, we are likely to come to certain epiphanies regarding where we are headed with our lives, in a deeper fashion than the ways of the world nominally dictate.

This Last Quarter Moon configuration is quite interesting symbolically. For one thing, the Sun and Moon tellingly activate the spaciness and cosmic numinousity of Neptune; the Moon is in close opposition and the Sun is in square, each within about a degree of Zodiacal longitude, forming a T-square. With strong Neptune, we have the reminder that deep inside ourselves lies an otherworldly emphasis on insubstantiality over solid matter and for spiritual rather than material gains. We might be able to lament along with Wordsworth that "the world is too much with us," but it is rare that we have the spare cycles to be able to do anything about it. In a phrase that is even more meaningful today, two hundred years later, he went on to say "getting and spending we lay waste our powers/ Little we see in nature that is ours." This last part of the month of November might however be geared to some form of retreat from business as usual.

The emphasis on Neptune brings all three outer planets into prominence, since the Sun and Moon also aspect Pluto and Uranus, in their extremely close 90-degree collision, re-emphasized in the chart of the Winter Solstice and due for another exact hit in the spring of 2014. Thus, once we pause to reflect, we can see that there is a transformational thrust to everything that happens to us now, together with an action-orientation since Mars is aspected by this quarter moon also. A note of optimism comes into this pattern as well, since Venus is opposite to Jupiter, while alternatively, the Saturn-Mercury conjunction that briefly forms for this occasion brings sharpness of mind and even a touch of cynicism to the fore.

With the personal planets so activated, we are in the soup, no way around it; stirred by events and inner fantasies, in whichever direction these might take us. We do well to plan, in whatever way we can, to allow the time and space to get more centered in ourselves. Once we do, and contemplate our lives from that true vantage point, we begin to see what we might have been missing — the message of our Higher Self. You can refer to this numinous influence, well symbolized in astrology by the outer planets, as the Universe, the Cosmos, God or Goddess, and it is the same. Within this perspective we are all One. This is so because the deepest level of the psyche directly corresponds to this higher dimensional awareness in which we all share.

Astrology provides a synchronistic chime with this vital perspective, one that we are all tuning into, as we can, and at whatever level we can plug in. The Sabian Symbol for the Sun in this quarter moon configuration gives us a beautiful message that relates to this process of ever-growing awareness. It is, for the 4th degree of Sagittarius: "A little child learning to walk." For this symbol, Marc Edmund Jones give the keyword INDIVIDUALITY and states that it represents "exceptional facility for entering experience on its own terms while yet preserving the full genius of self-hood."

For each of us, may it be so.