'Staying the Course' with the Taurus Solar Eclipse

4.25.14


The most common question about these disruptive cardinal-grand-cross energies I've seen posted by online readers is some form of: 'When will this end?'

Implied in such a question, of course, is the assumption that whatever's been most recently stirred up in our lives will, at some point ('sooner rather than later', the questioner hopes), return back to normal.

That, however, reads as a false assumption in my book, for I honestly don't believe there will be a returning-back-to-normal following the momentous astrology of our current flashpoint. Sure, this exaggerated feeling of strong evolutionary pressure mixed with a high-vibration whir of dynamism (and a couple sprinkles of serendipitous surprise thrown in for good measure) won't continue at this fevered pulse forever. In fact, by the time you read this, the peak of this grand-cross will have already come and gone, and the Moon continues to wane toward its darkest point… which also happens to be a solar eclipse in Taurus (Mon Apr 28), an indicator that this high-drama moment has yet to completely pass us by.

When I say I don't believe we can 'go back', that's not meant to suggest everything existent in our lives prior to, say, a month or two ago has wondrously dissolved into thin air… though such a 'wonder' would probably thrill some of us as much as it would devastate others. On the literal level, we obviously can seek reprieve or comforting retreat by relying on people, structures, and/or situations that have long served our sense of security. In most cases, they will still exist. Yet, like one who visits one's long-departed hometown with a yearnful tangle of nostalgia around their heart, only to discover upon arrival that cherished sites were torn down and new freeways built atop the orchards and that unmistakable scent in the air has given way to a disconcerting flatness, the attempted homecoming is not at all like slipping back into a still-perfectly-fitting pair of worn-in jeans… but instead a bittersweet epiphany, spawned by the contrast of colliding incarnations. The 'eureka!' is less about confronting what's changed back there, and more about acknowledging how we have grown in a different direction. The old jeans no longer fit, it seems, though we probably could cram ourselves back into them if we tried.

Those of us who are rather pleased with (if not simultaneously terrified by) what's lately gone down may be perfectly content with leaving the past behind. And still, this newfangled reality hasn't yet settled into being. (Far from it, in fact.) The soaring highs of triumphant reinvention continue to be accompanied by the expected stumblings, momentary second-guessings, and necessary uncertainties associated with any new experience. While we can casually discuss our forever-altered circumstances as some 'new normal', we don't legitimately feel it as such. Until we've been around this unexplored block enough times to adaptively identify with a few orienting landmarks—until a reliable footing has once again been re-attained—there's nothing 'normal' about it. The unfamiliarity (and the nervousness it naturally brings) can only be neutralized over time, through repeated exposure and our development of updated habits which better align with this altered landscape.

Those who are less pleased with the latest changes and/or find themselves suddenly freaked out by 'impulsive' actions recently taken and wishing to go back in time to undo their deeds, meanwhile, could have a harder time continuing to move forward… though it's really the only fruitful route to tread. Wistful denial of these evolutionary currents will not make them go away, as if some terrible nightmare we could awaken from, but merely increases the span of suffering one endures in the futile attempt to fight fate. Dissatisfactions which loomed in our hearts prior to this period will only worsen in magnitude, if we've met this ideal (though no less scary) chance to actually address our dissatisfying circumstances with self-imposed paralysis and instead chosen to stay frozen in the fear. Inside, we know we're letting an opportunity slip away… though, I promise, it's never too late to act on one's own behalf. The pain associated with any losses this period has wrought (maybe, at times, near-excruciating), too, cannot be wished away. The path forward, in such cases, demands a courageous engagement with the pain—an everyday honoring of the grief, the process which most greatly honors what-or-whoever we're leaving behind until, slowly but surely, its intensity starts to gradually wane. Pain will lessen as long as we willingly allow it to speak its truth through our whole being; silencing it, on the other hand, forces it to hang around us in a dull haze until we respectfully pay it its dues.

A solar eclipse is perhaps the single best astrological occasion for ritualizing our intentions for a fresh start… this new moon with an extra karmic kick inviting us to begin again from scratch, to plant a seed in the lunar darkness that'll develop not only over the coming moon-cycle but throughout the months ahead. With the Taurus influence and a south-node signature, this particular eclipse asks us to recommit to staying the course with whatever destabilizing changes have recently been kicked off in our lives—or otherwise face a very real threat that the powerful undertow from yesterday's habits or patterns will suck us back in, qualifying this recent rocky ruckus not as the transformative game-changer promised by that chorus of astrological commentators, but merely as an odd discontinuous exception to the same crusty rules governing an endless expanse of more of the same.

It is an uncanny paradox of human nature that we so often side with The Devil We Know, a voluntary servitude to living 'safely' within whatever pen-walls demarcate that limited slate of possibilities nearly certain to yield exactly that which we expect, rather than traversing into the foreign territory of that Divine Benevolence who offers treasures of expansion, illumination, and insight… if only we'll collect our one-way ticket at the window, hop the mystery train, and hang on for the ride of our lives. The gate to that proverbial veal-pen has been kicked wide open, dismantled, destroyed. It's up to us, though, whether we'll foster the practice of stepping out into that vast unknown upon greeting each new day—or if we'll retire, by rote inclination, back into the corral, reluctant (for whatever reason) to claim our glaring freedom, yet strangely unclear about why we're still here.

When will this end? The end is the beginning is the end is the beginning…