The Cancer New Moon, Astrology, and Your Healing Process
Welcome to the Cancer New Moon. This one would have been a big one anyway, because three of the biggest planets of transformation and change (Pluto, Neptune, and Saturn) are retrograde. Because of the ways the shift in cultural consciousness is moving and has moved (and how that is blowing up my phone), this one has taken a bit of a turn. As a result, I am doing a little something different with this newsletter. When the news broke and my phone started ringing early Friday morning, I said a prayer and I drew this card. Based on these things, and on the calls I have been getting, I am giving this newsletter more of a healing focus, because that is what seems to be needed. Hopefully, it helps assuage whatever pain you are in and whatever burdens you and your sisters are carrying. Let me know how it works for you.
The Spirit of Cancer
I practice Western Psychological Astrology because it was designed by healers specifically for healing. It utilizes a blend of psychology, astrology, religion, and metaphysical spirituality. I use this method because it is widely considered to be the best for healing and for facilitating your soul’s evolution, regardless of one’s religion or faith.
As astrological luck would have it, these new traumatic, dramatic national developments are happening in the sign of Cancer: the sign of healing. The New Moon usually occurs in the same sign as the Sun, heavily amplifying the energy of the archetype. Because of that, for the last several years I have been writing the newsletter at the New Moon because it is when the energy of a sign and its archetype are usually the most obvious and therefore more accessible. Additionally, that moment sets the tone for the next 28 days or so. Print this out for future reference and mark your calendars; there is going to be an extraordinary focus on healing for the next month: yours, mine, and ours.
For those of you who are feeling a little frustrated and stuck with your healing path and process of late, remember that all New Moons represent opportunities for fresh starts and new beginnings. The key is knowing which ones to take (and then making peace with them – sometimes the answer can fell a bit counter-intuitive). If you have been considering trying a new or different healing method or modality, I would encourage you to do it now. Regardless of the method(s) you use, there are a couple of key areas you should explore – or, perhaps for those of you who have been at this awhile, revisit.
At the risk of sounding a little too Freudian, start with mothers, motherhood, and mothering, as that Cancer’s archetype. Some of you may want to start a little further back than that – at fertility and conception, pregnancy, and childbirth, as Cancer rules that, too. Many of the habituated struggles and repetition compulsions that dominate our daily lives have their origins there. Although it may sound cliché, do not overlook these crucial areas in your healing process, especially right now. So many of our mothers and mothers-in-law, sisters (both of the soul and of the blood) daughters and daughters-in-law are going to need our love and devotion, protection and care, nourishment, sustenance, and support now. More than ever. And so much of our ability to be there for those we love is dependent on how healed and whole we are in the area.
I have heard from so many women, in the depths of helplessness and despair, who believe that the only thing they can do to help - the only thing they can do to address this crisis – is to vote. And while voting is definitely one thing we can do to help, it is not the only thing. If voting the only thing you can see, be grateful that you can see at least that, as many cannot. And know this. After voting, the best thing you can do right now is to stay focused on your own healing – make a New-Moon-new-beginnings intention around your own healing in some way. And here is why.
We keep thinking things cannot get weirder or worse, only to find out they somehow can. We are all carrying metric tons of existential emotion now, on top of whatever personal issues we have. At the same time, we are being called upon to use whatever superpowers we have in service of a higher good – much higher than our doctrines or our dogma. We are going to have to figure out how to participate in our lives in more constructive ways. But in order to do that, we are going to have to heal so we can see what those constructive ways are, and then do them. If we remain triggered and unhealed, we can be of little or no help to the ones we love most when they need us the most.
Ruled by the Moon, the Greek Goddess Artemis and the Roman Goddess Diana, Cancer is infinitely strong, physically, intellectually, and emotionally. She is compassionate, sympathetic, empathetic, intuitive, spiritual, and spiritually connected, caring and protective. Cancer is a Cardinal Water Sign, and its Gender is Female/Yin. She governs the fluid realms of love, especially the love expressed and experienced by families, and especially by and in the mother-child dyad: fertility, conception, pregnancy, childbirth, and mothering.
Everyone has the sign of Cancer somewhere in their natal chart. Where Cancer lives in yours is where on a good day you will be the most loving friend and family member anyone will every have in the most righteous and mentally healthy way possible. On a bad day, it is where you will be the most defensive and well-defended. Especially around your family, your politics, your sense of what it means to be patriotic. Confused? Don’t be.
Just as Cancer rules mothers and mothering, home, and family - and it also rules countries and nations, nationalism and patriotism (as well as a nations public policy on mothers and their children). Why? Your country, your nation, is the ultimate extension of your family. To make matters a little more, ummmmmm, intense, America has a Cancer Sun. Born on the 4th of July, America has a sense of national destiny that makes her citizens fiercely protective of what they believe her – and it – to be. For the last several years, it seems like every Cancer New Moon there is some new challenge in this arena that forces us all to open our eyes a little wider and take a fresh look at things we thought we believed and understood. Sadly, this year is no different, and much more dire.
When there is a lot of emphasis in the sign of Cancer, as there is now, you absolutely must return to your home and your roots – those of your blood root, and those of your land, the land you choose to inhabit. The tricky part is it is easier said than done. Especially now. The changes in the political landscape and our public policies are putting our most vulnerable citizens at risk: women and children, especially women and children of color. The dystopian brave new world we have been trying desperately to avoid is now here: it is time to level-up in order to behave more appropriately and develop some sense of momentum. For some areas of our lives that just means a little fine-tuning. For others, it’s more of a major overhaul. It can be a little overwhelming, but do not panic. Cancer rulers healing and healers, and it is time to focus on yours. Until we truly have a true culture of life, where every child born is given everything it needs to survive and thrive, equally, we must protect a woman’s right to choose, and compassionately support women who are having to make these choices.
In closing, for whatever reason, all of us at some point decided that we needed to reincarnate when we did, in order to be on the planet for this moment in human history. If you do not already know, now would be a good time to find out (or remember) what you and God (or whatever you believe the organizing forces of the multiverse to be) were thinking when you signed on for this. What is your role? What are your responsibilities? How do you keep your intentions and your integrity as a soul? That’s where the healing come in, or comes back in. Whatever we signed on for as individuals, Friday’s Supreme Court ruling, and the subsequent list of rulings they now intend to overturn, is changing our lives.
If you are currently not allowing yourself any sort of regular healing support, now would be a good time to get some. If you already are, now would be a good time to add to your regimen. Read – or listen to – everything you can find on the sign of Cancer and the archetype of the mother. Channel the strength and compassion of Cancer, and be the mother, the daughter, the sister that the women of this world need you to be. And if you get stuck, call me. We’ll figure it out.