There’s a whole lot going on with this Full Moon! The chart of this Full Moon, which is a SuperMoon (i.e. the closest it gets to the Earth, increasing its size and intensity) occurs only about 4 hours after the exact Equinox. The Vernal Equinox in the Northern hemisphere is the most geomagnetically active month of the year. The Earth in its orbital path is exactly perpendicular to the Sun, there is equal day and night worldwide. During this time, the Earth’s magnetic field begins to open in ways that researchers call getting “cracks” or openings in the magnetic field, which usually protects us from solar winds. These winds create energizing disturbances in the Earth’s magnetic field, which also creates amazing Northern Lights. Energetically, those who are sensitive also feel more solar energy pouring into the Earth, causing a sense of disturbance or unrest or high activation at times. And also, in addition….

Mercury is still retrograde in Pisces, symbolizing mental confusion in the very Neptunian astrological climate nowadays (see New Moon in Pisces) as it inches in its retro motion toward a conjunction of Neptune on March 24th. This adds to the power of our dreaming now, but also can interfere with linear, rational thinking, causing slips of mind, lost items, and computer mishaps. (Please make sure your computer is backed up!)

As the Sun moves into Aries on the Equinox, it forms a conjunction with Chiron also. Chiron has a way of pointing out to us the wounded aspect of any planet it touches, as well as the potential for the healing of it. With the Sun in a Mars-ruled sign opposed the Moon in a Venus-ruled sign (Libra) we have a classic standoff between archetypal masculine and feminine energies. And to further point up this opposition, Mars in Taurus squares (forms a challenging 90˚ angle) Venus in Aquarius at the Full Moon!  With Mars square Venus we have tension that affects all of us, both male and female and can tend to polarize (or agonize) these elements of our psyche, both individually and collectively.

In many cultures, this equinox is their New Year’s Day, and the chart of this moment marks the character of the year. This will be a year in which the balance and distribution of power makes huge changes, leaps forward and backward. How fitting that we are in such a state globally, with our world leaders emulating the archetypal masculine in such a “broken” fashion, i.e. out of touch with its counterbalancing and grounding energy. Doing more, making more, rising higher into the skies, ignoring the Earth beneath its feet (and the changes in its climate), these are all examples of masculine energy gone awry. Our governments are like Icarus, flying helter-skelter toward the Sun with wings held together by wax, unaware of the fate that must befall them. But Aries is about new beginnings, and this may be a chart in which we become aware of the need within ourselves for the balance of masculine and feminine, uniting to form a new awareness of how to take action, move forward, given that the world is in a state of crisis now.

This Full Moon in Libra asks us to remember we are in relationship to All That Is, to each other, that we cannot continue to exist without a respectful relationship to the Earth which gives and gives to us. And we cannot continue to exist without each other, without the relationships that nurture us and bring us once again into communion with a greater reality than ourselves.  The Moon forms a Grand Trine with Mars and Pluto, the two planets dealing with personal and collective power, showing us that Venus-ruled Libra knows how to allow, trust, receive, be vulnerable. And that also it can take advantage of good boundaries, that the feminine energies are by no means weak or fragile. They are the balancing keys to right use of power.

There is strength to be had, but only if we are conscientious and do our own personal work of becoming aware of our habitual responses to the world around us. The horrible atrocities seem to be increasing  each day; Trump continues to serve as an example, giving permission for those with racist beliefs to enact them violently. Chiron in Aries can expose to us where we indulge in feeling defeated by the system, by the collective fear and mania.

This is the time to look within and do our homework, even though the Sun has moved into action-oriented Aries, still Mercury’s retro and coming closer to Neptune, puts a strange spell upon our minds: We’re able to connect with the infinite, but not so capable of bringing back coherent reports of what we’ve experienced. Not to worry. We need to chill until the New Moon in Aries on April 5th happens. Until then, learn what we can learn from the enveloping Neptunian fog around us, and speak with friends, journal, write down insights in order to concretize them, so they can serve as touchstones for our growing awareness.

Chiron’s important placement at this juncture is an invocation to use the errors of the past to instruct us, to heal that which seems to be indelibly imprinted upon our soul, that which seems to be destined to fail. Chiron’s orbit serves as a symbolic reminder: its orbit is between Saturn, the planet of limitation and time, the elements of physical reality, and Uranus, the planet which symbolizes miracles, insights that come like bolts of lightning that allow us to step outside of our limitations, that awaken us to new possibilities. This is a new beginning for us all. We can begin each day, each moment, by remembering what is sacred, what inspires us, what reminds us of the beauty and magnificence of Creation.

[ Photo taken by Markus Varik on March 16, 2019 @ Tromsø, Norway]