PLANETARY ENERGIES

SUMMER OF LOVE

“The heart has its reasons, of which reason is unaware.”

Blaise Pascal

 

Happy Solstice!

The Summer Solstice

is exact this year in the Northern Hemisphere

on June 20 in the US at 7:59 pm Eastern

4:59 pm Pacific and on June 21 in the UK at 0:59 am

and in Western Europe at 1:59 am.

 

In this issue:

Summer Solstice Traditions

Summer and Love

The Planets June 21 — August 2 (mostly for subscribers only)

Notes on the World

 

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Summer Solstice Traditions

 

The Longest Day

In the Northern Hemisphere, the Summer Solstice is the longest day of the year. Solstice means standstill, and this period is so-named because the sun appears to rise in the same place for three days running.

Midsummer

The period around the solstice is known as Midsummer and was believed to be a time for fairies and magic. In ancient pagan Solstice celebrations huge fires were lit on the hilltops. Livestock were driven through the fires to be purified, while the people danced around and leaped over the fires for the same reason.

Traditionally, June 24 is Midsummer  Day, and either Midsummer Day or Midsummer Eve (the evening of June 23) was celebrated in most European countries, and in some areas is still a time of festivity.

St. John

The pagan celebration of June 24 was adopted as the birthday of St John’s by the Christian Church. This practice seems to have developed gradually throughout Europe. We know that certainly in the seventh century Saint Eligius encouraged the celebration of St John’s birthday and warned against the customary pagan rites.

I’ve often been in Southwest France for the Summer Solstice, where there is an unbroken tradition of celebrating the longest day with a huge community bonfire, a party with live music, and as always, lots of food. The festival is called the Fete de St. Jean, the Feast Day of Saint John the Baptist.

St. John is the polar opposite of the male archetype associated with Jesus, whose birthday was of course assigned to the Winter Solstice, exactly six months away. St. John was the wild, fiery counterpart to the calm, sacrificial Jesus of the winter. In his gospel, Luke notes that John was born six months before Christ, which was the reason the Catholic Church gave for John’s birthday occurring on June 24.

Matriarchal/Patriarchal Archetypes

The Summer Solstice begins when the Sun moves into Cancer, ruled by the Moon, significator of the matriarchal archetype. The Winter Solstice occurs when the Sun moves into the sign of Capricorn, ruled by Saturn, signifying the patriarchal archetype.

Over the past millennia, the shifting of celebratory emphasis in the year from Midsummer to the Winter Solstice reflects the accompanying dominance of the patriarchal model of social organization.

In most countries in the Northern Hemisphere, Christmas/Winter Solstice is the dominant collective holiday, but in areas where the winter is particularly long and hard Midsummer is almost its equal, and is a national holiday in Sweden, Finland, and Latvia.

 

Summer and Love

Traditionally the Summer Solstice is the time of marriage, occurring at the juncture between the signs of Gemini (soul mates, twin souls, partnership) and Cancer (family, nurturing).

The solstice was also a time to wish for love: young men who succeeded in jumping over the Solstice bonfires were said to be going to find their true love in the coming year. This tradition continues today in parts of Europe including rural France.

The Marriage of the Sun and the Moon

The Summer Solstice occurs at 0 degrees of Cancer, the moment of the Sun’s entry into the sign that, since ancient times, people have considered “belongs” to the Moon. This means that at the peak of the Sun’s influence on the Earth, it is in the part of the sky ruled by the Moon. In archetypal terms, this means that masculine Sun power at its peak is filtered through the prism of feminine Moon energy, making for a symbolic marriage.

The Summer Solstice is energetically like a magnified Full Moon. The Moon is Full when the Sun and Moon oppose each other in the sky i.e. they are in opposite signs of the zodiac.

The Full Moon at any time of the year is also traditionally considered to be a good time for marriage, as well as for making love potions and invoking the help of the unseen in finding true love.

The Summer Solstice is the traditional time within the annual cycle for marriage, for the union of male and female. Each Full Moon evokes a similar version of this union, and is the best time within the monthly lunar cycle for marriage.

This year the Solstice occurs just two days after the Full Moon, making it an extra strong time for experiencing relationships. For each of us, psychologically, this double whammy of Full Moon and Summer Solstice facilitates the union of the opposites within our own beings, bringing us into deeper self-love and the genuine capacity to love others..

 

The Planets June 21–August 2

Overview

This period begins with intensity, with the Solstice occurring just a few hours after the exact opposition of the Sun and Pluto, and with the Sun still close to Venus. The Moon is in late Capricorn, just past its monthly conjunction with Jupiter and void of course (i.e. it won’t make any more Ptolemaic aspects before leaving the sign). Mars is about to oppose Neptune and this opposition takes place close to the nodes of the Moon. Uranus is almost stationary at 22 Pisces, and will turn retrograde on June 26. 

There’s something fated and fateful about this chart, a set-up for the unfolding of a story over the next three months (the Solstice chart sets a tone, an atmosphere, for the quarter of the year that follows) that may take a while to become clear. At the collective level it doesn’t look so much like a time for immediate breakthroughs and solutions as a time for trudging through sludgy issues that will ultimately lead us to deep transformation. At the same time, some upheaval appears likely.

I have noticed with the quarterly ingress charts that their effect is variable in how literal it is, so this upheaval and sludginess doesn’t necessarily means yet more natural disasters (although it does sound like a recipe for flooding!). It does however fit well with the ongoing theme of financial uncertainty and rapidly shifting sands in our collective material reality. We do also have the Beijing Olympics during this period, and this is unlikely to pass without some kind of drama and controversy.

At the personal level, some breakthroughs are possible: with the Sun opposite Pluto, Mars opposite Neptune, and Uranus about to station before turning retrograde, all in the first week of this period, interpersonal relationships are under pressure and this can lead to a bursting of the banks of polite behavior, and a freeing up of old patterns of dominance and submission. If you tend to let people walk over you, you may find the strength during the Solstice window to tell them to stop, and to mean it, and if you tend to be bossy, be prepared to be put in your place. For many of us, both occur at different times depending on context, so be aware of power struggles in general and work to maintain your well-being and inner stability, and to stay connected to your truth.

In terms of our relationships with ourselves, this is a great time to cut through old patterns and move clearly into the here-and-now. As with all the ancient sacred time windows, the Solstice is a great time for inner work and meditation as well as for gathering together to celebrate the moment and the cycle of the seasons.

The elemental emphasis during this six week phase (until Lammas on August 2) is predominately earth/water. We begin with three planets in water and three in earth, two in air and two, Mars and Pluto, in fire.

Mars moves into Virgo on July 2, and this strengthens the earthy work we have been doing this year, trying to collectively figure out how to best manage resources and get our financial houses in order. Mars opposes Neptune and then conjuncts Saturn this month, highlighting Martian energy and how we use it. This is a good time for working on aggression and anger, and finding ways to speak your truth clearly and cleanly, without rancor. The opposition to Neptune on June 21 heightens our awareness of where we are sloppy with boundaries and unclear in our relating, and the conjunction with Saturn on July 10 helps us clarify this territory. Substance abuse issues are highlighted by this pair of aspects, and this time period offers a great opportunity, especially as the Mars Saturn conjunction occurs in Virgo, to heal the issues behind the use of substances as substitute for feeling real feelings and meeting real needs.

Mercury is now moving forward in Gemini (as of June 19) and we are in the catch-up phase of moving forward with everything that went onto pause during the retrograde period. Mercury moves into Cancer on July 11, and will in a few days sextile Mars and Saturn allowing for mental acuity and practical organization. Before that though, we have a brief window of the Sun, Mercury and Venus all being in Cancer before Venus moves into Leo on July 13, offering an opportunity for creating and experiencing domestic harmony and family cohesion.

 

Planetary Details

for subscribers only

The Outer Planets

 for subscribers only

 

Notes on the World

All over the world inflation is up, and energy prices are rocketing. Today China announced a rise in diesel of 18% and gasoline of 16%. Yesterday in the UK notice was given that the price of domestic gas will double by next winter, while gasoline is currently running at over $11 a gallon. Meanwhile, my bank in their wisdom have switched to an air miles system and without asking, I now get air miles for using my credit card along with lots of flashy literature showing seductive pictures of far flung pleasure trips. They’re just ten years too late with that little wheeze. For sure, we still have to catch planes, but the era of desirable cheap long distance travel is on the way out, for reasons of both cost and ecology.

These examples show how clearly we are teetering between two worlds at the moment – still partly in the world of excess symbolized by Pluto in Sagittarius, and yet partly in the new world of limitation symbolized by Pluto in Capricorn. It’s going to feel just a little schizoid for a while.

 

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I’m sorry I don’t have time to write more about the world this month. Barack Obama’s birth time has just become available, and I was hoping to find time to write about this but have been too crazily busy. Next time……Meanwhile if you want to read some good analysis of Obama’s chart, I recommend Dharmaruci’s blog, Astrotabletalk, http://www.astrotabletalk.blogspot.com. He’s also just included some posts from other astrologers as well.

I’ve been so busy because my new book, Love Begins at 40: A Guide to Starting Over, has just been published by Hay House, and I’ve been doing tv and radio appearances and newspaper interviews here in the UK. If you would like to find out more, do visit the book’s dedicated web site, http://lovebegins40.com, and if you would like to buy a copy, go to http://www.amazon.co.uk, or click here http://tinyurl.com/692yfb

If you’re in the London area, (or anywhere I guess, as it’s all available digitally now through the internet), I’ll be appearing live on the Vanessa Feltz show tomorrow morning (Saturday June 21) on BBC Radio London, 94.9 FM, between 11 and 11:30 am, talking about the book and related topics!

Have a great time over the Solstice.

With love, 

Lara

June 20 2008