The Magic Is Us
By
Sarah Varcas
The moon is full at 12:30 pm UT on 15th August 2019
This Full Moon in Aquarius is poised to blow some old beliefs out of the water. With its ruler, Uranus, having turned retrograde on 11th August and now squaring Mercury, it illuminates how our mind works and the power it holds. This moon reminds us we don’t have to believe a single thought or subscribe to any belief unless we choose to. And we must choose with great care, for what
occupies our mind also shapes our life. If we can simply sit in silent witness of all our mental meanderings at this moon, we can create the space around our thoughts which allows us to just be: watching them without believing them. Assessing their value before committing to them.
It’s often said that ‘where attention goes, energy flows’. This moon refines that statement. It’s not the fact of placing attention that holds the power, but the quality of the attention applied. If we attend to painful feelings with a mind that feeds off the drama and identifies with the pain then yes, our attention is problematic. If, however, we bring to difficult issues a softened heart, a compassionate perspective, patience, insight and a desire to know our true nature, we don’t have to look away from what challenges us. Instead we can observe it, feel it, surround it with compassionate awareness and, ultimately, change our relationship with it by doing so.
Creating this space in our own mind – which is simply a tiny cell in the vast collective consciousness – is akin to introducing fresh air into a closed room or sunlight into a darkened space. We all too easily believe our mind’s every movement, allowing it to dictate our life not in the interest of truth but of those energies on which it feeds: fear, separation, anxiety, power, superiority. Mind is the ego’s domain and if we want to balance ego with spirit, we must get to know it intimately, not simply surrender to its might.
If we’ve been wondering why we can’t get it together and make some long overdue change, this moon reveals how we keep ourselves in chains, blinkered to truths on the edge of awareness and mired in self-sabotage. It may be a rude awakening, especially if the stark lunar light reveals not external circumstances but our very selves as the obstacle at hand. Whilst such insights are a bitter pill to swallow, this is just the first stage: a nudge from the universe to recognise our role, not beat ourselves up over it. Self-blame gets us nowhere, so whatever comes to light at this moon, meet it with a gentle and loving heart, not a hardened, self-critical one.
We may, however, be too distracted to take ourselves in hand. An accumulation of stress and anxiety, despair or depression – even the tedious boredom of a life lived in black and white – can prevent us recognising the power of the present moment and the alchemical force unleashed when we live it fully, without guile. If we’ve invested too much energy in anticipation of an ideal future where everything magically falls into place, we need to realise the magic is us, living on purpose, with clear intent and for the greater good right now.
Opposing Venus in Leo, this moon may trigger loneliness or a sense of being misunderstood. If we can resist taking things too personally it will go a long way to not letting these feelings rule the day and create mountains out of molehills! There’s a fair bit of tension around, so cutting each other (and ourselves) some serious slack is good advice. If possible, avoid heated topics of debate and focus on things that unite rather than divide, otherwise it may be all too easy to slip into overzealous championing of our own perspective with no consideration of someone else’s view.
If we find ourselves resistant now, wrestling with external pressures that threaten to change our course, discernment is key. We cannot and do not live apart from the world and must attend always to the constant feedback loop which occurs between us and our environment. Sometimes we must stand firm in the face of external pressures. At other times those very pressures are the touch of the divine reminding us we may be losing our way, drifting off track or blind to something we can’t afford to ignore. If resistance energises and clarifies intent, it’s probably keeping us on track. If it drains us and destroys our peace, distracting from positive action which could blow cobwebs away, we may well be resisting the very thing that will set us free.
Beware, also, the seduction of certainty in the face of current confusion. It can only ever be a thin veneer atop an infinitely complex existence beyond anyone’s power to fully understand. Knowing it’s okay not to know, being at peace with paradox, embracing with an open heart all insights gleaned (even that we’ve been wrong all along!)…. these are important elements of this time. Avoid the tendency to act out rather than turn within. It may be easier to take our stress out on the people around us, but every time we soften around the tension, turn toward another not away from them, seek common ground not battleground, we plant the seeds of a quieter mind that can clear the wheat from the chaff and know instinctively what’s needed in times of challenge to come.
Uranus, the Great Awakener and ruler of Aquarius, uses sudden twists of fate to rouse us from the deceptive slumbers of assuming we know who we are. But what we call ‘fate’ is often our own nature reflected back to us, and what we find ‘out there’ has its deeper roots within. Now retrograde, it’s rearranging our inner world to illuminate those roots – stories we tell ourselves; beliefs that shape our perceptions; dogma absorbed from others; mental constructs perceived as truth. These beliefs, thoughts, feelings, behaviour patterns and perspectives are traps we unwittingly set on our own path of awakening.
In the coming five months Uranus retrograde will reveal the inner roots of our ‘fated’ lives, in which we’re mysteriously confronted by the very circumstances that force us to draw upon ever deeper levels of the Self. While this Full Moon reminds us that overcoming external limitations is one thing, but only by removing inner barriers are we truly free.
Sarah Varcas