February opens with a Venus-Neptune conjunction. This is a sweet, dreamy transit, which will be especially palpable to those with natal planets in late-degree mutable signs.
All of us should savor it, as one of a series of fond farewells to Neptune in Pisces, the world-altering fourteen years now coming to a close.
On the collective level, the long Neptune transit has been shrouding humanity in confusion, wiping out boundaries and eroding national shibboleths since 2011 (discussed in my 2/27 webinar, “Controlled Abandon” (details here). All this time, Neptune has been melting down our egos, trying to get us more soulful.
The Venus conjunction (peaking 2/1) uses heartfelt feeling to remind us of this decade-and-a-half-long project. Venusian experiences such as relationships and art are particularly well suited to Neptune’s inscrutable yearnings. They speak its language. As the month begins, let yourself marinate in these poignant feelings.
Then Venus slips into Aries (2/3). For those sensitive to such things, this ingress may be palpable as a shift from water (introspection) to fire (extroversion), showing up in the way we express affection. For a few weeks our relating style may be more direct and decisive than usual.
David and Goliath
February also features aftershocks of the Mars-Pluto opposition, the big drama that has had the world by the short hairs all winter (see the Skywatches from November,
December and January; and my 12/11 podcast with Frederick Woodruff).
As the month begins, Mercury is separating from a conjunction with Pluto, while 0pposing the degree of the Mars station from December (six Leo/ Aquarius). This is a case of a quick planet (Mercury) traversing the same ground that a major transit has just crossed over (Mars-Pluto). It acts as a cosmic echo, reawakening the David-&-Goliath transit still shimmering in the air.
Until late April, whenever a quick planet — in this case, Mercury — enters this degree range (late cardinal signs to early fixed signs), it will activate a trip wire. Depending on what Plutonian dramas you already have going on, the Mercury hits of early February will stimulate or trigger you.
Power plays are still alive and well, though they may not be conscious. Mars has backtracked into Cancer by now. Its ego battles may have withdrawn into the deep psyche.
Mental onslaught
Another shift early in the month will impact our mental intake and output. Jupiter is stationing in Gemini after months of being retrograde (2/4).
We’ve all been doing a lot of sifting and sorting over the past several months, trying to navigate the deluge of information that floods into our brainpans every minute of every day. The degree of Jupiter’s pivot is trine Mercury in Aquarius: an optimal moment for recognizing how we deploy our thinking mind.
Do we use ideas to make us wise, or to scatter our attention and evade responsibility? Do we let our opinions enslave us, or do we put them to honest use?
Roiling waves
When Mercury and the Sun enter Pisces (2/14 & 2/18), all this movement and flux will increase. Mars’s station (2/24) could be a steadying influence — it’ll be in Cancer, trine Saturn in Pisces — but don’t jump ahead into action until you’ve done some serious processing. This is about getting grounded emotionally.
We’ll be asked to anchor our actions internally, to secure them by means of connecting to our roots. Cancer is the sign that asks, “Where do I belong? To whom do I belong?”
How to respond to a society gone off the rails?
This is an uncommonly rocky time for the collective psyche. We are all struggling to hold onto our sanity, and to be of service to a wounded world. Can’t do one without the other.
This requires being mindful on two fronts: the inner and the outer. For people of conscience, the outer part may be painfully hard to do right now, given how
morally bereft we find the external world. Brief respites from the news can help us to maintain our sanity. But on a soul level, we know we also need to stay in touch with the collective time and place we incarnated into.
Ultimately, it’s the inner front that’s the deal-breaker. No matter how socially aware we are, or how earnestly we respond to social crises, our primary work is that of centering ourselves in our own charts: that is, hunkering down in our uniqueness. This work is primary, not in the sense of more important, but in the sense of first.
It is only when we know and nourish our own gifts that we have something to give.
Images:
Aimé-Jules Dalou, Bacchus Consoling Ariadne, 1887–1897
Frederick Woodruff (after Caravaggio): Luigi Mangione and the CEO
c. 1938
Janine Antoni,
