Photo by mandj98 at http://flickr.com/photos/mandj98/; creative commons license.
The Hunter Moon, the full moon after the Harvest Moon, occurs in Aries on October 14, 2008 at 3:04 PM Central time here in the Florida Panhandle. Aries, as the first sign of the Zodiac, has its own themes of exuberance and fresh starts–think of a four-year-old boy who has no fear and jumps right out there into hard play! (I highly recommend Gail Wood’s The Wild God (http://spilledcandybookstore.com/The_Wild_God.html) for a better understanding of personalities of the zodiac and how to use astrological connotations in your rituals and meditations.) So consider this a time of fresh starts, even if you–like most of us–are a bit edgy over the shaky economy as you watch your life savings and retirement accounts go “poof!” like really cruel magick.
For those of you who routinely read my suggestions for meditations, you know how this works. I share this unraveling of images I have just before a New Moon, Full Moon, and/or Eclipse and you’re welcome to use what makes sense to you. For most of 2008, I’ve been following this “story” of a river of emotions connected with Moon phases–everything from bridges over rivers to the structure that holds the river in its banks, to surfing the river, to becoming the river, to rising above the river in a parasail…all taking me “around the riverbend” to a beautiful new vista that is lush and green.
And for those of you who have been following my personal life over the past few months, yes, I know you get a few giggles out of seeing me sail around that riverbend into an incredible new romance with an utterly surprising someone who is everything I have ever wanted in a partner and have never had before in my entire life. Not that there aren’t obstacles–boulders in the river–that hinder a bright future before us.
Which brings us to this Full Moon’s meditation.
You might think that, since Aries is a fire sign, that the meditation I’m seeing is related to fire but it’s really more about earth this time. About exploring how solidity can both help and harm us in this time of new starts and leaps of faith. This meditation started simmering for me a while back, and solidified a few days ago when my sweet Double Scorpio spent the day unexpectedly diving in underwater springs. I sent him a text message, asking him to bring me back a small stone from the springs, but I was thinking he’d just pick up a rock near his truck and pocket it. Instead, he made several dangerous 30-foot dives to pick up a stone for me, a stone I’ll be using in my own Full Moon ritual.
In this meditation, I see myself no longer sailing blithely overly the river but rather, walking on the bottom of it, under the crushing weight of the emotional flow. That is, after all, how it feels when worry over money shows up or worry over the future with the person you love, isn’t it? I am finding huge boulders that the current of my uncertain emotions bash me against. Some are under the water and unseen, both by myself and by others, but certainly felt when just beneath the surface, I slam into them. The jagged edges that jut out above the surface can often be seen and navigated, but some cannot. We can’t force the river to change course, but we can look ahead, squinting into the future, and see much of what’s coming and prepare for it. Or we can spend our energy in fear, letting the current carry us directly into the obstacles when we could be figuring out how to swim around them, leap over them, or grab something explosive and blow them to bits before we reach them.
In this meditation, I see stones under the current of the river. Depending on the angle of where I stand, some stones look smaller and others look much bigger. It’s the uncertain emotional current that distorts their actual size, and once I emerge from the river’s bottom, they are often only pebbles in my hand.
These stones, this river bottom, these obstacles of boulders–these are all solidity for us to explore in uncertain times. They may be obstacles to hinder our progress, batter us, or make us change course. They can also be a firm footing, even at the bottom of the river. We are pushed along, flailing, our feet searching for ground. As I’ve learned from my Double Scorpio and his tales of free diving, once your feet touch the bottom, you finally have something to push off of so that you can surface.
Tags: Aries, Astrology, eclipse, economy, full moon, harvest moon, Hunter Moon, meditations, new moon, October 2008, Prosperity, Relationships, retirement accounts, Rituals, Romance, zodiac
wow, this was so beautifully and spiritually written. an absolute pleasure to read. thank you for writing and sharing your gift. take care.