Eclipses in July/August
There are no fewer than 3 eclipses occurring in July and early August – a Total Solar eclipse bracketed by two Lunar eclipses. The size of this eclipse and therefore its power, could make it the most important solar eclipse in the 21st Century, according to some astronomers. Certainly it is the longest in duration occurring between 1991 and 2032.
There are other more technical reasons why this eclipse is noteworthy described by the Moon’s perigee and syzygy – but quite frankly, if you want to know more about that, then take a look at Guy Ottewell’s “Astronomical Calendar 2009”.
As you should know by now, my interests lie a little closer to home – to you and me, to our families and to national events. However, I do think a little information could be useful for deepening your understanding of this wonderful phenomenon called an eclipse.
Basically a Solar Eclipse is a very special New Moon. A New Moon is when the Sun and Moon are together in the same zodiac sign – this happens regularly every month – what makes an eclipse is when the body of the Moon sits between the Earth and the Sun, and effectively disrupts the flow of sunlight coming to us for a brief period of time. As the earth turns, the shadow thus created shows up as a slick of darkness moving across the planet. Each eclipse creates a shadow on a different part of the earth – across different nations – and focuses the cosmic energy patterns there.
On the International level
The shadow of the upcoming eclipse of 22nd July, 2009 (GMT date) swings across India and China, which would indicate that those nations will be where the cosmic energy is at its strongest and most intense. However, last August, the eclipse that heralded the Olympic Games also fell across China, as will the next eclipse of January, 2010, which will begin in West Africa (where China has interests) and swing across India and up past Beijing, pulling in Korea and Japan.
This is a lot of attention being paid to the Far East by the Cosmos, when most of our human attention is focusing on the Middle East instead.
I am not a political astrologer, however, I would suggest that China and India are in the process of emerging as the world’s newest, most powerful nations, thus diminishing the powers of the Western world as we know it. From West to East – it is already in the process of moving – and so it will continue.
Countries associated with the Zodiac sign Cancer will be affected as well – they are USA, Holland, Canada, Scotland, Iraq and the Philippines.
Please, please, remember, that the Universe is never out to get us. Any angst we feel is as a direct result of our resistance to the changes – those energy shifts – that we are being asked to make or accommodate in our lives.
On the personal level (or what this means to you and me)
These predictions are made from your Sun sign only and although often effective, it is your actual time of birth that gives the most accurate results.
The Solar and two Lunar eclipses fall across Cancer and Leo, with the Solar eclipse just scraping into Cancer by a squeak at 29 degrees 27 minutes. This indicates that the patterns of the eclipses is shifting from Leo/Aquarius to Cancer/Capricorn for the next 18 months or so.
I would suggest that both Cancer and Leo are in the frame for being churned up by this energy pattern, so I will interpret them this month for Cancer only – and look at Leo next month. I will also interpret them as an axis rather than the 12 individual signs, because while the Solar Eclipse falls in Cancer, the Lunar Eclipse falls in the opposite sign across the Zodiac. Otherwise we’ll all get bogged down ……
Please note that the effects of a Solar Eclipse can last for at least 6 months and in some cases for a whole lifetime.
Aries/Libra – This indicates that major changes will occur both in your family and career. I have often noticed for my clients that a child can be born at these times – either in their own or their extended family, changing the domestic climate forever.
It could be that you have a job offer that really moves you light years ahead of where you wanted to be or conversely, you could lose your job. If this happens, it is useful to ask how you attracted this and what the opportunity is that you are being offered instead – did you really like your work or would you rather change careers altogether?
A good question to ask yourself at this time is – what is really important to me in terms of my inner (home) life and my outer (career) life? The Eclipses will certainly enable you to get clear about these issues.
Your family of origin will undergo changes – weddings, funerals and births are all likely events – although not necessarily all at once, thank goodness. You may decide to move home or even country. If you do stay in your existing home, then you will likely make changes in it that will radically alter the way it looks and what it offers you in terms of accommodation. Otherwise if it doesn’t give you what you need, then you could find it elsewhere.
The trigger point may be in your career, necessitating changes in your domestic circumstances – such as being offered a job too far away to commute and thus needing to relocate. Or it’s the opposite – events at home will push you into redefining yourself and your needs which could see you looking for a job that will enable you to support your new lifestyle. For both signs, this is a time of taking your responsibilities and duties seriously – to both your nearest and dearest, and also to yourself.
Taurus/Scorpio – The Eclipse axis falls across your Solar 3rd and 9th houses. These houses are traditionally associated with our ability to communicate, to teach, to write and to learn, combined with the desire to travel, to explore and to broadcast our ideas to a wide world. The 3rd house also indicates those nearest to us, such as siblings, cousins and neighbours – and the 9th is also about foreign affairs and surprisingly, grandchildren and in-laws. A huge package of significances indeed – and any number of them can work out for you!
So, how can we pick our way through that lot? I think the underlying key to it all is that in the 3rd house we have the place where we learn about ourselves and the 9th is where we take those ideas out into a larger context and test their veracity in the greater world. So, with an eclipse here, you may find that what you believed about yourself up to now may not be your own Truth, any longer, so you begin to question who you really are; you read books that can liberate you and re-educate yourself about yourself; you actually stop taking everything you were taught as gospel. In the 9th house you begin to look for a wider viewpoint – you meet people who will challenge your small ideas and help you broaden your mind and personal viewpoint.
This can be the most exciting period of your life up to now – as you venture out into the world of new possibilities, new friends and philosophies. It will probably mean that you will leave the familiar behind – not easy for fixed types like Taurus and Scorpio, but I guess you have no choice really, other than go for it this time around.
Changes may occur in your immediate family, siblings may make their own changes that challenge you to make yours. Someone from afar may come into your life and turn your ideas upside down. You may even decide to go into further education to broaden your intellectual life. And belief in a higher power may also be an option for you.
Gemini/Sagittarius – The Eclipse pattern falls across your 2nd/8th Solar Houses. These are the houses where you experience challenges to your value systems and personal security through your relationships with others, who are similarly being challenged. It’s a two-way process – what you go through, so does your significant other!
As you can imagine, this is a strong challenge for you. These are two mutable signs that prefer to do anything but look at the issue if it means getting close up and dirty. Gemini may talk about it incessantly and do nothing that has any real effect; and Sagittarius could be on the next plane heading out at the sniff of anything involving in-depth confrontation.
However, it doesn’t have to be like that – this is the eclipse pattern that will help you deepen your experiences and enable you to uncover your own gifts, talents and creative life. What you must do, though, is communicate, not just talk, but really get under the skin of your partner and help them to uncover their own real needs and gifts. The flash point for both of you can be money – your own and the shared pot. If one of you isn’t contributing then things must change, and change quickly.
Money is always a symbol for something deeper – it’s about values and expectations. Actually, in reality, it’s simply energy – energy you exchange to get your desires met. If your partner isn’t coming up with the goods in another area of your life, then that will show up as a financial issue. Similarly, if you’re not coming up with the goods for them, well, now is the time to sort it through.
You could both emerge from this with a more realistic idea of your finances, emotional needs and your inner values – so that you can put your relationship on a firm footing for the future.
Cancer/Capricorn – This is your very own personal eclipse pattern. The axis falls across your shared 1st/ 7th Solar Houses, which are about you and the closest emotional ties that you have. Both these signs can clam up like no other, so the key here is to stay open and run the risk that someone may really be there for you, rather than imagining that you have to do everything alone without help or input from anyone else. If these eclipses teach you nothing else, then they’ve done their job!
However, you know how life can be – you have to go through a whole lot of “stuff’ first before you get there. This will be played out in your relationships – marriage, emotional and business partners and will impact on both of you.
The key with the 1st House is that this is where you have to ask yourself what it is that you truly want from life, what you want to be doing, who you want to share it with, and what really makes your heart sing. And this is the time to examine how much or how little of those things are really happening for you and your partner. For example, you might want to take time out to explore your self-expression and your partner may have the same desire – how do you reconcile both needs? Well, that’s what the eclipse is asking of you to sort out, so that you are both growing and developing within your partnership.
And for some, the relationship may end or go through such changes that it is no longer recognisable to either of you. This could be no bad thing if one of you is feeling so trapped and unfulfilled that something has to happen.
And it doesn’t have to be like that – this is the time for honesty, for laying your cards on the table and risking that your partner may actually tell you to go for whatever it is you want. It could also be that one of you simply wants to move house or change jobs – and if it aids mutual understanding and brings you closer, how good is that?
This can also be the time when you meet the person you want to spend the rest of your life with and find that they feel exactly the same way so you jointly make the decision to do just that.
Leo/Aquarius – The eclipses fall across your 6th/12th Solar Houses. The 6th house is associated with health and healing, routines, everyday work, service and efficiency and your relationship with coworkers and your employees; and the 12th house is associated with endings of cycles, institutions, solitude, poetry, mysticism and music. A very strange combination indeed. Vedic (Hindu) astrologer also see it as the house of relocation to a far away land, where you must learn new routines and habits.
So, experiencing two eclipses across this axis is going to be interesting, to say the least. This can certainly be a period of health matters being worked through – and maybe teaching you that there are many different methods to examine before making your decision as how to deal with things. It could even have you wondering whether to study some of those systems and retrain to work with them. In other words to offer a new service to those around you.
Both these signs are idealistic, social and creative, Leo in terms of self-expression and Aquarius in a compassionate, humanitarian way. This is where you explore new skills on a practical level, taking whatever you learn into your memory hard drive, and thus ensure that you become expert in your chosen pursuit.
These are changeable houses, so as soon as you have learnt whatever it is you need, then you can become creative and above all, useful with your new skills.
If you work with others, there could be a crisis for someone that requires you to step up and take over just at the most inconvenient time for yourself. However, by so doing, you move your work profile ahead quite a pace – and you will not go unnoticed by the powers that be.
You could go through a period of heightened sensitivity to music, poetry, and mysticism – which for both you and your partner could have long lasting effects.
Virgo/Pisces – The axis of the eclipses falls in your 5th/11th Solar Houses. This is the social axis, that brings new friends in, with all their attendant baggage of ideas, beliefs, attitudes and funny little ways, that will demand great flexibility on your part. Some old friends will leave your immediate circle by relocating or setting off on their world tours. However it works through, this is the time when friendship at the deepest levels is teaching you a great deal about yourself and other people.
This is also about creativity and doing that which makes your heart sing – and if friends and their needs get in the way of you doing that, then choices will have to be made. You will have to decide which is the most important to you – your heart singing or you being the life and soul of the party.
At some point you may realise that you have not been enjoying life very much recently and are wondering how you can do that. There is within you a hunger for something more than just keeping the wolf from the door. If an offer comes to take time out, play a little, or even fall in love, then go for it! However, just bear in mind that an eclipse can demand something deeper from you than just surface fun and games.
The needs of your children and step-children are also indicated – your parenting skills will be put to the test as one (or all) of your offspring makes the biggest decision of their lives just at the moment when you thought everything was quietening down enough for you to get on with your own life.
You will be using this period to clarify your ideals and objectives for your future, for yourself, by yourself. You may find that you are having to rethink a great many of your long held and most cherished ideals, but this is no bad thing, because eclipses always help clear the decks for new life to begin.
