Get ready because you are about to receive a dou­ble dose of Spir­i­tu­al Instruction…it is a “dou­ble-play” or bet­ter yet maybe it is a “squeeze play”…It is for you, as always, a time of chal­lenge and of oppor­tu­ni­ty. Today you face Mars to Plu­to, tomor­row it will be Mars to Uranus…together they have much to ask of you, and you have much to gain too…if, if you choose wise­ly. For you should always remem­ber, that you and all the beings on this world we call Earth are part of a larg­er sto­ry that is held with­in and cir­cum­scribed by the Sacred Space of our Star’s fam­i­ly, our Solar System…we here on Earth, and our Star­ry com­pan­ions are one fam­i­ly and we have much to learn from one another!

Mars is mov­ing through Libra now, spurring you to bring about a bet­ter bal­ance between your­self and any oth­er, to cor­rect the wrongs in what lies between you, to make your “we” a space to meet and be ful­filled together…Mars push­es you now to forge ahead and make your rela­tion­ships right, fair and true.

Plu­to in Capri­corn is dri­ving the deep­er sto­ry of your jour­ney, bring­ing about fun­da­men­tal changes to insti­tu­tions, economies and culture…and bring­ing to each indi­vid­ual con­scious enti­ty who jour­neys upon the earth a quick­en­ing. Plu­to demands noth­ing less than the re-birth of Respon­si­bil­i­ty in each and every dur­ing his time in Capri­corn. This is an era, and your time of oppor­tu­ni­ty, when an old order will be pass­ing and a new one will rise, (just as it was before, in the 1500’s and again in the 1700’s). Much will be asked of you, and great will be the reward, for you and every oth­er who help to forge this new world, a bet­ter world for you and those to come. But always, there must be a reck­on­ing, there will be decon­struc­tion (and preser­va­tion) before the re-build­ing, there must be a let­ting go of much and a hold­ing on to what should be passed down…The times ahead will be chal­leng­ing and a won­der to behold…and you will make it happen…

There will be many steps and stages you will pass through…for this re-birth will take a long time…you will fal­ter or fall back at times…of course you will for this is how you have always learned to choose to do “the Good”. There is only one true way to make it through, one path that has always been “The Way”…You must lift up your­self with a Free Mind, Uncon­di­tion­al Love and a Cen­tered Will.

Plu­to’s lessons are all about that third principle…The Will, (tomor­row it will Uranus’ turn, so the focus will be on that first prin­ci­ple of a “Free Mind”). Plu­to through the Will estab­lish­es all the sacred spaces that each and every con­scious­ness resides with­in and devel­ops through. You must cre­ate, pro­tect and expand your sacred space of self-realization…while at the same time respect­ing and hold­ing sacred each and every space around you too…

The les­son of Mars in Libra and Plu­to in Capri­corn is here to help you con­scious­ly face the need to bal­ance and inte­grate your Desire for Jus­tice with your Will for a rebirth of Respon­si­bil­i­ty. If you feel that some oth­er, or many oth­ers, are impos­ing their will upon you, vio­lat­ing or tres­pass­ing upon your sacred space whether by intim­i­da­tion, threats or manipulation…then you must act to restore the bal­ance of right relat­ing and your sacred space. If you are, even for the best of inten­tions, attempt­ing to impose upon anoth­er, maybe try­ing to “change” them, fix them or whatever…you must stop and return to your bound­ed space and respect them in theirs.

Astrol­o­gy often describes this aspect as one that con­tains a tremen­dous poten­tial for destruc­tion, for bring­ing about harm inflict­ed or deliv­ered. But real­ly that is because we do not yet under­stand, we are still learn­ing to use our won­drous pow­ers “rightly”…So this align­ment should be seen as a most beau­ti­ful reminder of how much pow­er you do have with­in you. And, that in the course of your spir­i­tu­al awak­en­ing you will be remind­ed, again and again, that there is only one con­trol that you may obtain and is per­mit­ted under Karmic Law…the only con­trol you need or can have tru­ly is the one of Self-Mastery…of Self-Control…

Turn and face the Lords of Desire and Will…

For their pow­er is your pow­er too…

Turn that pow­er back upon yourself…

So that you might bet­ter direct your Desires upon that high­er path…

To rebuild you Sacred Spaces, to ful­fill your Responsibilities…

Each and every align­ment is an oppor­tu­ni­ty to grow and unfold your potential…

And you are real­ly shin­ing now!

Time to make your choice…whether to hold on or to let go, to turn left or right…it is time, time to choose!

Three months ago you came to a reck­on­ing, three months ago the Sun and Sat­urn faced one anoth­er and you took the mea­sure between your infi­nite poten­tial and your lim­it­ed reality.

Today you come to the next turn­ing in the year­ly Sun/Saturn cycle. Where­as the oppo­si­tion brought a rev­e­la­tion, the square presents you with a choice. You have reached a cross­ing point in your ever-unfold­ing jour­ney of self-real­iza­tion, of bring­ing your infi­nite poten­tial into real­i­ty. For as much as what you have poured into def­i­nite forms made your dreams come true, those very forms you moved into often become the very lim­it to the fur­ther real­iza­tion of your yet to be unfold­ed dreams.

So, you must choose…which dream is truer, which form is best…you must face squarely…which dream is done and which form must pass away…you must turn and face your fears and hopes…for you always have the choice…to choose between dark­ness and the light.

At each turn­ing, at each wax­ing or wan­ing square, you make a choice. At the wax­ing square you need to take action, you must com­mit to a bet­ter form to make real your dream…but at the wan­ing square, which you face now, you need to let go of some­thing in order to con­tin­ue on your ever-unfold­ing jour­ney of growth.

The rhythms of life sing to you now, they call for your choice…and you must let go. It may be a form that must pass away…it may be the idea that gave mean­ing to the form…but some­thing must go so that you may grow…

For from the very heart of you this is the one true shin­ing ray that runs through one and all…You Must Grow!

For you are not what you will be…

You are ever…forever and ever…

You, the self-unfold­ing, the becom­ing that wills to be…

And this is your time to choose!

Her­mes spins around to go back and review his last 3 weeks in Leo. And, of course as is usu­al for him, he will be mov­ing in reverse for the next 3 weeks (so be pre­pared!), at which point he will turn around and con­tin­ue in Leo until the end of August…All in all, that is quite a cir­cling spi­ral dance for your mind, swirling round in those resplen­dent shin­ing rays of Leo.

But, of course, what inquir­ing minds seek to know…what does this mean for you? Mer­cury ret­ro­grade is always an oppor­tu­ni­ty for you to turn your think­ing back upon itself, to engage and devel­op your mar­velous fac­ul­ty of self-reflec­tion and self-correction!

Your men­tal path­ways can become fixed and nar­rowed, part­ly from habit and/or the seem­ing secu­ri­ty of rely­ing upon your assump­tions, and you end up con­scious­ly or uncon­scious­ly not being able to con­sid­er con­trar­i­an points of view or per­spec­tives. As a result and over time, your aware­ness and per­cep­tion of the shifts in the world(s) around you begins to drift fur­ther and fur­ther away from “real­i­ty”. What was your orig­i­nal yet lim­it­ed under­stand­ing becomes ever more dis­con­nect­ed from the unfold­ing pat­terns of your life journey.

Mer­cury ret­ro­grade is like a men­tal “re-boot”, a won­der­ful oppor­tu­ni­ty to refresh the mind by means of per­cep­tu­al re-set. The next 3 weeks is a gift…and you can move with this ener­getic shift to an Archimedean-like point out­side of your­self. It is this per­cep­tu­al shift that cre­ates a self-reflec­tive space, and from that freer space you can ques­tion your assump­tions and facts. It is from this re-align­ment or re-posi­tion­ing of your own men­tal­i­ty that will elic­it the growth so that you can cor­rect and improve your com­mu­ni­ca­tions with your fel­low companions.

Mer­cury ret­ro­grade is a time for men­tal self-cor­rec­tion and this ret­ro­grade loop­ing back is what can help you to first move towards your own greater self-aware­ness. This release into your expand­ed aware­ness will then allow you to devel­op your greater under­stand­ing for the oth­er too.

The first step, espe­cial­ly in Leo, is to acknowl­edge your imper­fec­tions as you let go of your ego-dri­ven pride, which pre­clud­ed your clair­voy­ance (clear-see­ing) and adopt a more accept­ing, lov­ing approach to the thoughts of your beloved. It is pre­cise­ly dur­ing the Mer­cury ret­ro­grade time that you can go back and cor­rect those mis­un­der­stand­ings, doubts and fears that may have come between your­self and another.

This open­ing of your own mind and build­ing of a bet­ter bridge between minds will be most secured through one sim­ple approach that comes from the core of, springs from the very heart of Leo. That heart doc­trine is based upon the fact that all in our uni­verse spring from the One, that in the end we are all ones of this One, and are bound to one anoth­er by and through our Love for one another…For with­out this there would nev­er be, could nev­er be real under­stand­ing whatsoever.

So as Mer­cury turns, you will turn too…

Turn and acknowledge…

You love yourself.

Then, turn and tell your beloved…

You love them too.

Heal your mind…mend our hearts.

For you are all ones of the One…

Who holds one and all in an ever­last­ing Love.

The ruler of your High­er Mind, the Spir­i­tu­al Dri­ver, the Divine Impe­tus to your greater Indi­vid­u­a­tion and Freer Self-Expres­sion, the Lord Uranus turns ret­ro­grade for five months. From now until Decem­ber 13, you should turn with Uranus and move with those Mind-born ener­gies, tak­ing them inward, deep­er so you may root out those lim­its you made for your­self, those self-cast shad­ows which have hereto­fore held you in thrall to your less­er, more doubt­ing and fear­ful self.

Uranus rules your capac­i­ty to move beyond the con­di­tioned self, to reveal the inner glo­ry of your high­er con­scious­ness, car­ried by your high­er self. It is always there, your “Genius” with­in, but your low­er mind’s bound­ed­ness, its pre-occu­pa­tions and prej­u­dices block that inner voice of wis­dom from lift­ing you up into those clear­er path­ways, so that you might walk those ancient aisles in your tem­ple of truth.

Where­as Uranus mov­ing for­ward helps to estab­lish those clear­er path­ways for you and oth­ers to find your self-real­iza­tions with one anoth­er out­ward­ly, by and through your mutu­al growth through one anoth­er as you cre­ate freer spaces for self-realization.…Uranus ret­ro­grade is for you!

Uranus ret­ro­grade is your time to jour­ney with­in, so that you may cre­ate those clear­er path­ways with­in yourself…and espe­cial­ly to estab­lish, strength­en and extend that numi­nous bridge between your freer, High­er Mind and your low­er consciousness.

Uranus, the Awak­en­er is turn­ing for you!

Uranus, the First of the Three Emissaries…Turning now to bring you inward…

Uranus bestows upon you, the won­drous gift, the Quick­en­ing of your Mind…

He shines his super­nal light upon the path­way to your Self…

Now lit by his bril­liant dia­mond rays.…

You move clos­er to the cross­ing point…

Between your dark­ness and the Light…

You move into the Greater Understanding…

To Know Thy­self, to become the Becoming…

You embrace and are always embraced…

You were, are and will always be…

Free!

Your year divides, into four quarters…four cor­ners to square this cir­cle of life. At each cor­ner there stands a sign of begin­ning, for each sea­son a start­ing line. At Spring and Fall you find a bal­ance, you poised upon that equinox­al line…where the bright­ness of day meets the dark­ness of night as equals…

But at Win­ter and Sum­mer you find the extreme, you can­not go any further…and you must turn and move towards the oth­er, for there is no oth­er way…You find your­self at a turn­ing and you must acknowl­edge, the cur­rent has turned, the tide will ebb and you must turn too…

Now at this Can­cer moment, at this Burn­ing Bright, this Sum­mer moment that is root­ed in your devo­tion to the per­son­al, to the home, to the fam­i­ly, it is all for your per­son­al pri­vate life. It is pre­cise­ly now that you must turn and acknowl­edge that you are part of some­thing greater too…that you have a duty and respon­si­bil­i­ty to some­thing beyond yourself…because you are part of some­thing greater than just this that is so very close and dear.

So you watch this ris­ing Moon with won­der, you con­sid­er what lies beyond the near at hand, the com­fort­able and familiar…You feel the pull of that larg­er life, the greater sto­ry yet to be told…You must pre­pare your­self, make secure these foun­da­tions upon which you stand…for you will have need of them upon the path ahead…

The Full Moon of Capri­corn reminds you now…

That you must bow your head and bend your knee,

To pre­pare for what is call­ing you now…

For you have your part in a greater work too…

And Win­ter is coming!