An Aquarian Full Moon Interlude Amidst the Continued Dance of the Cosmos

The Full Moon begins to emerge in the sky, a radiant being whose glow casts a brilliant light over the land below, illuminating the mountains’ peaks, the valleys’ hollows, and the aura of late summer that spreads out over the land.

Energies of the Leo-Aquarius axis will reign supreme for this Full Moon on August 19th, the Sun shining in the sign of the Lion conjunct Mercury retrograde (through August 28th); the Moon dazzling in that of the Water-Bearer; and both square to Uranus in Taurus, the sign of the Bull, representative of Mother Earth herself. The Sun, Moon, and Uranus are all at 27° of their respective signs, so those with planets and angles around these degrees in their natal charts will most certainly be dancing with the Cosmos under the light of this Full Moon! And, lest I forget, all of this will be taking place at the same time as the Jupiter-Saturn square in the signs of Gemini and Pisces, respectively, who are both in the middle of the signs they’re traveling through, 17.5° on the day of the Full Moon.

From an Evolutionary Astrological perspective, Aquarius the Exile needs complete authenticity in order to live the freedom that it is here to embody. No mainstream ideologies or constricting vantage points for this Revolutionary, please. Instead, it reminds us that only by following the rhythm of our own inner drum are we able to be the human we came here to be, letting our own true heart and innermost knowing lead the way. And though we did all come here amidst a cultural paradigm that has sought to claim us as its own, the Aquarian signature is a clear one; eschewing labels, it chooses to do things its own way, often counter to what it has been modelled, if only to find itself in a left field that it initially may not recognize. But it is in the journey of reaching this left field that it begins to understand who it is and who it is certainly not, having been able to define itself at first against the crowds that it initially needed escape from, and later, in letting its “freak flag fly” in only the ways that it can, regardless of what the peanut gallery has to say about it. Eventually, others come to recognize the importance of walking their own true paths, inspired by the ingenuity and weirdness of the Rebel, and they, too, begin to march to a rhythm all their own. In an optimal scenario, those walking this path claim it as their own from a deep place within, without the need for others to join or follow, content to be who they are in a world that often seems to demand conformity. And eventually, those with similar enough ideals and aspirations find one another, banding together to support each other’s causes, dancing with the Cosmos similarly enough to find likeness and community in each other in inspiring and healthy ways.

But what if one mistakes another’s rhythm for their own, missing the whole point of this exercise? What if someone has become so disconnected from what is true for themselves that they take on what another is doing to the T, sealing away their own authenticity further, all the while thinking they’re doing what IS authentic? What if people misunderstand their own truth for a fad, letting one social trend or another lead them along until they don’t recognize who they’ve become? What if someone finds a crowd who seems to represent them, where they feel a sense of belonging they’ve never felt before and end up giving their power away to this group, only to realize that they never felt belonging within themselves first, and therefore projected onto the group the sense of belonging they were yearning for in the first place? In all of these cases, the shadow of Aquarius ensues, creating a dissociation from one’s own sense of center, intelligence, and emotional process, resulting in an energetic coldness and distance that keeps someone disconnected from reality and all it encompasses, including healthy relationships with self and other. In the same vein, a mob mentality can easily ensue, as can a situation of group think or a herd mentality, one in which those involved have given up their own truth, their own voice, their own deep knowing, in lieu of a collective voice that seems to hold more power but is inherently disconnected from the deep truths of those it represents.

The Full Moon in Aquarius holds many possibilities, as all the signs do, with both sides of the spectrum mentioned above demonstrative of some of them. But the choice is always ours, for Free Will is continually at play, and is, in fact, what we’re meant to exercise when dancing with these energies. The true Water-Bearer asks us to lean into our own inner truth, attuning ourselves to it not so that we can constantly rebel against society and all those who disagree with us, but so that we can free up this deepest knowing from within, finding creative and innovative ways to bring it forth in our own lives — ways that are deeply inspiring to ourselves and perhaps others, and ones that are integrative rather than divisive.

And with Uranus, the god of lightning, squaring the Full Moon from the steady sign of Taurus, we’re given a few moments of revelation in this arena. Uranus is known to bring what we may least expect, yet contained within this is also his very nature: the possibility for a freedom so expansive and vast that we don’t even recognize it until it’s there, and maybe not even then! Uranian energy has the capacity to shake things up with such dynamism that the freedom we’ve been yearning for, standing for, perhaps even living, comes so close that we must embody it in ways we could not have done even a year ago, for this messenger of the unexpected wants us to claim a freedom that is always available to us, though right now he’s giving us quite a strong opportunity to do so. And the earth will shake under our feet; what we once felt to bring stability will feel constraining and confining; what in the past gave us a sense of security will necessarily be shifted, only to give way to the freedom that is our innate nature, so that it may shine like the radiant source that it is. That is, if we align ourselves with the inherent intelligence of this potent time, letting it move us in the ways it must for our inner guidance within to lead the way.

All the while Mercury teams up with the Sun for this Full Moon, its retrograde period giving us the chance to review what’s been unfolding over the past few weeks (since mid-July), inviting us to look into the ways we seek and find joy; the ways we play, delight, and shine like children; the ways we roar our creative voices and spirits into the world, letting them land where they might, all the while opening to receive the praise we are due. And with the Sun in the most brilliant of signs, it has invited us to claim the rightful space of the inner Queen or King, able to place our sovereign energies in the domains that our most innate selves see fit, empowered to be the radiant beings we truly are, if only we remember this birthright. More on this can be read in the last piece, Late Summer, the Leo New Moon, & Lughnasadh.

Lastly, Saturn, the Hermit of the zodiac, is in Pisces the Mystic, Dreamer, & Yogi, and has been since the Spring of 2023. With Jupiter, aka Zeus, squaring Father Time from the sign of the Witness, the Teacher, & the Storyteller, we must learn to say “no” to those things that no longer serve us and that we have outgrown, in order to say “yes” to the things that we are ready to expand into, those we didn’t think we were capable of until, perhaps, now. This square on August 19th is the first that will take place between these two planets, with the next one coming on December 24th of this year. While traditionally Saturn is seen as “malefic,” or bad, he’s honestly THE planet that gives us the chutzpah to pull up our boot straps, get things done, and to put our time, energy, and attention into what is most important to us. He asks us to get real about the things we’re still doing that we know we shouldn’t be, especially when it comes to all the ways we escape our present reality. He wants us to put healthy boundaries in place when it comes to putting priority on spirituality, practices that connect us with the bigger reality, and activities that remind us of how magical the Universe is, including ourselves within it! And he asks us to cap it on the habitual, unhealthy ways in which we run from ourselves and our lives so that we may remember our own magic.

Jupiter in Gemini wants us to expand our horizons when it comes to communication, both receiving messages from the infinite universe, and sharing what we feel we must, letting our voices be heard and our words be shared with the world in only the ways we can. Yet we’re called to practice discernment with this combination, for Jupiter makes everything big within the arena he inhabits. If there is too much information that is causing overwhelm, leading to a feeling of being engulfed in a flood of data, facts, and stories, it’s time to put some Saturnian wisdom into practice, cooling it on the social media, apps, and taking in too much news in whatever forms we do. Instead, he asks us to quiet the mind, reconnect with the heart and divine flow of life, and open to the inherent intelligence of life instead of what is constantly bombarding our homes, lives, and privacy, at any hour we choose to let it. Placing healthy limits on what we’re letting into our precious minds, hearts, and energy fields is the role that Saturn plays here, and if we allow him to be the ally that he can be, we’ll contract into the deep knowing within, drawing into the core of who we are, only so that we can expand our most innate voices and selves into the world again, our words offering value and meaning, truth and love, in a world that so desperately needs it.

Wishing you a beautiful Aquarian Full Moon! For this ongoing Cosmic dance, may you go with the divine flow of life and the Cosmos; may you claim the freedom that is your innate nature; may you know the true Self at your core so that you may live this with sovereignty in the world, uplifting us all, for when we liberate the one, we liberate the collective.