Taurus Full Moon + lunar eclipse
October 28, 2023
Power & Value Judgment
Evolution is both purposeful and problematic
Our well-designed corpus
with its in and out valves
awake and sleep modes
its mammalian water reflex
sensory processing sniffers the skin and nervous system have great value.
We feel disgust and experience repulse to avoid consuming the unsafe and toxic
We feel shame to prevent us from damaging required social connections and secure survival.
Yet these skill sets have bled into our bland automatic activities and cultural undercurrents.
We humans avoid discomfort.
we will take the shortcut to pleasure to avoid pain
Choose sugar despite the belly ache and insulin spikes
we unconsciously pick the quick and sweet over the too-many-steps and nutritious
there is an island of plastics in the ocean to illustrate our need for convenience.
we may prefer a pill or someone else to fix us
when in truth our micro choices impact the macro experience.
And though choosing beauty is powerful in practice — it is not enough.
we cannot turn our gaze from the reality of our compost heaps
that our refuse ends up somewhere to be dealt with.
That our choices have consequence.
What in you needs to be brought into the light?
Taurus is the garden and Scorpio is the compost heap. A Full Moon in Taurus would normally be the point of aspiration for the “garden” we aspire to for next year… but with a lunar eclipse, this is a giant toilet portal of reset and release.
The Taurus Scorpio axis is another “self and other” dynamic. Our body and everything else that has ever existed. How the nutrients that build our blood and bones are repurposed from a million years of evolution. The energy from fossil fuels we use today is retrieved from captured ancient sunlight. The soil we grow our food from is composed of last season’s garden waste.
We say ew, gross when we smell compost. We are disgusted by the scraps that we refuse (refuse=garbage)but that stuff is the food for microbes and scavengers.
Taurus is our throat, what we consume — and Scorpio is the end of that cycle and releases that which cannot serve us. Poop. I feel like the Taurus/Scorpio axis is its own kind of lunar North/South Node analogy: where we are going cannot be nourished by what is behind us.
This Full Moon comes fraught with tension — Jupiter highlighting the shadow excesses or the potential of emotional expansion or the experience of grief and looking at what we’ve lost rather than what’s ahead. Mars in Scorpio conjoins with Mercury in Scorpio highlighting the power of anger, and the tenacity of the mind when we fixate, obsess, or roll around in the shit we’ve created rather than finding a place and purpose for our paths.
Pluto, Neptune, and Uranus continue this fine-tuning process of seeking clarity between the subconscious, the fantasy, and the radical vision. This week may very well be the reality check you’ve needed. Something may surface you weren’t expecting.
You can’t carry all that (emotions, beliefs, belongings) on your back as we head into winter. Take only what serves you and your community to navigate these cold, dark days.
val·ue
/ˈvalyo͞o/
noun
1.
the regard that something is held to deserve; the importance, worth, or usefulness of something.
a person's principles or standards of behavior; one's judgment of what is important in life.
val·ue judg·ment
/ˈvalyo͞o ˌjəjmənt/
noun
an assessment of something as good or bad in terms of one's standards or priorities.
“who controls the past controls the future, who controls the present controls the past.”
NOTES FROM THIS ONE…
I wasn’t sure if I’d get a mailer or a podcast completed this week.
Better late than not at all.
While processing so many feelings and holding space for so many through my clinical internship, with my clients and for myself and all the change before me, grief, sorrow, and rage have been powerful tools to reflect and sit with rather than run away from.
How much fear can I swallow when the world feels ablaze around me? Would ignorance be a better method, turning a blind eye to all the ugly horrors and focusing on what’s in front of me? How can my shouts and screams and letters to legislators make an impact on calling upon a cease-fire to all the traumatized human fellows so far away from my physical reach? What good is sending sanity via light messengers to those who are burying their children in shallow graves?
Value is a word associated with Taurus and Scorpio. Our values, what we find meaningful; our assets and tools that we have at our disposal to navigate life: the Taurus piece is our body, our stuff, our beliefs, our skills, and what we deem important spiritually and materially. Scorpio is the collective value and how we tap into other people’s resources, assets, money, beliefs, and skills when it comes to stuff outside our wheelhouse. That is a sign of vulnerability. It is a sign of “I can’t do this on my own.” Mental health, psychologists, death doulas, midwives, magicians, and occultists are all associated with Scorpio — it is the unsavory or hidden stuff we often opt out of or evade.
Value Judgment is a monster that divides us. Not just a categorization of merit or beauty— I’m talking about those in power deciding who deserves to live and who deserves to d*e based on politics and allyships and the game of thrones that is our current reality.
Scorpio teaches us about Power, and that is such a big part of this astrology — recognizing that if we have power, we are valued. Those without power, are not, despite their importance in the cycle of existence. We seek power, we seek glamour, prominence and proximity to power because it keeps us safe in the system we live in. The divisiveness is no surprise.
Who do I deem important enough to share my resources with? My attention to? If it’s not shiny I may not be interested. If I can’t get dopamine from it, what is the point? Where do I withhold generosity or concern because they are not on my team or that I will not receive reciprocally from?
You reap what you sow summarizes some aspects of the Taurus/Scorpio axis.
You may be interested in reading more about the biology of us vs them and why we have to work against the evolutionary features that serve us to get to the other side. In Buddhism, the Paramitas(meaning TO GO BEYOND or to the other side) offer us keys to compassion. It takes work to develop compassion. It takes practice to love ourselves, forgive our shortcomings, and be merciful toward others’ disappointing actions and behaviors.
I believe it is worth the effort. That is where true transformation lies - the alchemical process of dealing with our shit.
stay inspired.
lauren
