Full Moon/Total Lunar Eclipse in Leo: Reclaiming Power

Art by Donia Lilly

Full Moon/Total Lunar Eclipse in Leo: Reclaiming Power

Moon opposite Sun @ 11:15pm CST on 1-20-19

Eclipse lasts from 8:36pm CST on 1-20 till 1:48am CST on 1-21

Full Eclipse between 10:41pm - 11:43pm CST

Maximum Eclipse @ 11:12pm CST

'Blood' in red for dramatic effect

Welcome to the Full Cold Moon (or Super Blood Wolf Moon as it’s being hyped...whatever combination of sensational words most draws the attention of readers, right?). While there are many names for the full moons of the year, I go by the ones that make the most sense for me in the middle of the US...and the Full Moon in a midwest January almost always brings with it some freezing temperatures. From my observations, this is when most people in Omaha are really bemoaning the cold, after the holiday season (another fitting old name for this moon is ‘Moon After Yule’). And yes, it’s close enough to perigee to look a tiny bit larger (when the Moon gets a ‘supermoon’ status)...but it’s actually a bit closer at the Quickening Moon next month (which might not be as hyped because there’s no lunar eclipse then to also turn it ‘blood red’). 

Whatever fascinating words or events might have put this particular moon in focus for you...it’s actually the Moon herself who is pulling you in (even before you see her in shadowed fullness, if you are in an area of good visibility). She’s got a powerful message for us this weekend...one that will continue to resonate at least until the next eclipse season this summer. Pieces of this message may even come up after another 18 years, as eclipse cycles do. 

Moon messages communicate intuitively...sometimes through feelings, musings, visions, dreams, or symbols. Often times, you’ll see or hear something that connects you to an unmistakable knowing (do your best not to doubt it). This is the way I write these astrological blogposts...following the feelings that emerge from the connected symbols and sharing my musings. Here is how the Music of the Spheres speaks to me, and how I translate the messages within the music.

All Planets Direct (APD) from January 6^th to March 5^th

First page of a picture book called 'Slow Down, World' by Tai Snaith...
It says, 'Are you galloping along?  Faster and faster until...'

A day after the opening eclipse of this season, Uranus stationed direct and ushered in another time of APD quickening that will be especially potent throughout February. In March, Mercury gives us his first pause and shift of perspective of the year for our Collective Mind. At that point, we’ll be working through any of the inconsistencies or disregarded necessities of this APD time period. 

That this APD time period began within this eclipse portal is important...there may be a lot more ignorance of the shadow we’re carrying, especially collectively. In worldly affairs, we’ll see a lot of rushing about within the matrix of our human constructs...trying to get things done that may not be integral to the larger plan before the Universe can call us out on any failures. 

Here in the US, the Trump administration has forced a government shutdown to further continue an ultimately useless agenda. Trump was inaugurated during APD too...so it’s good to be somewhat skeptical of any APD hype that this is a time of wish-fulfillment with only good manifestations. Move forward, yes...but make sure you’re doing no harm or karma will eventually bite back (remember, it’s Eclipse Season). 

From the perspective of a woman with 6 natal retrogrades, don’t speed up so fast that you ignore the important things along the way. It’s not like you’ll be able to ‘take it slow’ while the world speeds up around you, but try your best to keep things in check. Also, this Full Moon and Total Lunar Eclipse carries a warning of using our power wisely as we call out the shadows.

Total Lunar Eclipse (Saros Series- 135): The Shadow of Sovereignty

Saros 135 began in 1550 with an imperceptible penumbral lunar eclipse. And thus began what is referred to as the First Wave of European Colonization and the First Atlantic System of Slave Trade. The shifting concept of Sovereignty emerged anew in France and spread, but it failed to recognize its Goddess roots in the land and Her integral role in granting sovereignty to human rulers. What was ignored is that Sovereignty does not represent ownership of land and people, but stewardship. And so a whole new treacherous wave of hierarchical ownership displaced the importance of a network of nurturing relationships. The misunderstanding of the value and worth of the land, Her anima loci, and Her indigenous lives, has had lasting consequences. Sovereignty was then used to colonize, dispossess, enslave, and threaten the ‘New World’...and continued to evolve over centuries through this 16^th century shadow.

ANWR Porcupine Caribou

The last time this series of eclipses was total was on January 9^th, 2001. A day later, the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge was denied national monument status by the White House...shattering hopes that such status would prevent oil drilling. I bring this up because, fast forward to recent news and we see that the Trump administration is currently rushing to open up the ANWR, one of America’s last untouched pieces of wilderness, to oil companies. May the odds of APD endeavors be ever in Earth’s favor.

This is only one of the myriad of eclipse shadow manifestations in our modern times...but it distinctly brings up this Saros 135 theme of the misrule of ownership over the sacredness of the land, and disregard for the life that dwells upon it. What we must remember, as we peer into this eclipse shadow and watch the full light re-emerge as it passes, is that what we are here to do is in sacred stewardship to our Mother Earth and we must nurture this web of relationship that connects all life on this planet. It is the reclaiming of personal sovereignty that encourages healthy, heart-centered leadership to emerge by our example.

Moon in Leo 1

The Sabian Symbol for this degree is ‘blood rushes to a man’s head as his vital energies are mobilized under the spur of ambition’. In this first degree of Leo, the symbol refers to the individual experience of energy rising from the heart to the head. Essentially, in a creative sense, our heart’s desire comes to mind and seeks conscious manifestation. Or, in a destructive sense, the wrath that arises from a wounded heart starts a wildfire within…and the heat rises to the mind, creating a chain reaction of destructive thoughts. The original wording of this symbol gives more clues into the destructive shadow aspect of this energy: “a case of apoplexy”. Apoplexy is unconsciousness or incapacity resulting from cerebral hemorrhage or stroke. But apoplexy also has a more informal definition as an incapacity or speechlessness caused by extreme anger. In either definition, the result is incapacity in some form if we’re not careful with this energy. The different descriptions of this symbol present a choice. Will we intentionally focus this trailblazing force of bio-psychic energy into ambitious creative pursuits, or will we leave it unattended…resulting in a conflagration of disastrous effects?

The way this Full Moon/Total Lunar Eclipse energy manifests in our individual lives will largely depend on what energy we are currently holding in our hearts before it rushes to our heads. Are we holding space for love and gratitude in our heart center? Or are we holding onto damaging feelings of fear, lack, jealousy, rage, revenge, or hatred? Let the healing fire within purify your heart center during this closing of the Eclipse Portal...and then allow for grounded release. No matter how broken you may feel, that sacred flame is eternal. Whatever you hold in your heart right now (be it radiant love or a towering inferno)…it is bound to spread…first to the mind, then out into the world around us. As within, so without.

Sun in Aquarius 1

San Diego Alcala Mission

The Sabian Symbol here is ‘an old adobe mission in California’. In general, this symbol refers to enduring structures of group effort that outlive those who founded and built them. But, during an eclipse, it is often the shadow of the symbols that is most revealing. In the early colonization endeavors of the Spanish along the Pacific Coast in North America, a mission system was constructed to both defend against Russian fur traders and to convert the natives to Catholicism. What is often taught today, that the Franciscan friars and the natives lived together in these missions harmoniously, is a completely glossed over version of the darker truth. 

It often began with the youth of the tribe, being curious and more gullible to the false promise of a better life through conversion...but once in, they were never allowed to leave and were forced into slavery. Mothers would come next, searching for their children...followed by fathers in search of their whole family. The conditions were little more than concentration camps, and the baptized lives of these natives were considered worthless...except for their contribution to the workforce and their deaths meaning that more souls would go to heaven, in the twisted minds of those who controlled them. 

What this symbol brings to light is that Aquarian innovation often brings together group efforts from like-minded individuals...networking ideas and contributing talents for the greater good (such as the current Women’s Marches across our country, largely speaking to a shared message of gender equality). However, the shadow side of spiritual bypass comes in when our humanity is disregarded in ‘us and them’ distinctions. Consider, especially for those of us in the states, that this longest-ever government shutdown is because Trump wants funding to build his hyped-up border wall (a physical structure, like the mission system, which would do more harm than good).

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Let’s pull it back now to our individual lives. We’re at the figurative flowering phase of this current lunar cycle that was seeded at the New Moon/Partial Solar Eclipse on Jan. 5^th. The intentions set forth then are now in full bloom. What grew from there might look different than you envisioned a couple weeks ago, as what is grown in the eclipse portal can often surprise us (especially this one, which has had a very Uranian influence throughout). Beyond this cycle, there is a larger lunar gestation cycle...and this one began with the New Moon in this same degree of Leo on 7-23-17. So something that began then in your life is now culminating. And beyond this, the Saros cycles of eclipses come back around roughly every 18 years...so things may be resurfacing in a graduated light that happened in your life in 2001.

As we close out this Eclipse Season, our cauldron is full of the many ingredients we’ve been stirring into this Strange Brew. As the moon starts to wane, we’ll be going through a distillation process where we extract the essential meaning from these eclipses and use it as a potent elixir for the integration of these lessons.

Love and Gratitude,

Felina Lune Kavi