Virgo Full Moon – PROCEED

The Virgo Full Moon (February 27th, 8:17 GMT) is ruled by Mercury, who has just turned direct. Yay! The intense period of inner change and communication with those dark parts we usually prefer to keep hidden (which we have – hopefully – been working on since the new moon earlier this month) can now transform into some tentative steps forward.

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When taking tentative steps it is helpful to have someone kind to help us. Ideally someone who is stronger in the way which we want to be, or who knows the path, or who loves us unconditionally. Do you have someone like that? It doesn’t need to be one person, or a person.

“Resign your destiny to higher powers.”

― William James

Divination/ Journalling Prompts

Ritual/ Spellwork/ EveryDayMagic Suggestions

*Examine how you feel about asking for and accepting help (often in our culture it is not seen as a good thing, and that’s something which needs working through)
*Take a leap – do something which challenges you, ideally with someone supporting you
*Reach out to someone. Ask them for something or offer to do something for them. Remember that it’s not an exchange economy though, this is for practice and getting those asking and receiving muscles strong.
*Maybe read Amanda Palmer’s The Art of Asking

Aquarius New Moon – RECALIBRATE

The New Moon falls on the 11th of February (19:06 GMT) with the moon joining the pile up of Sun, Jupiter, Saturn, Venus AND Mercury retrograde in Aquarius (phew!). The Aquarius stellium is also squaring off against Mars and Uranus in Taurus.

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The change that we have been resisting, on both a whole world scale and in our individual lives, is coming. Time to recalibrate, shed the dead stuff, breathe in the new possibilities.

“Pain in this life is not avoidable, but the pain we create avoiding pain is avoidable.”

― R.D. Laing

Divination/ Journalling Prompts

*How do I currently approach change?
*How can I embrace change?
*What change do I need to welcome now? (don’t be freaked out of you get the death card here, 99.9% of the time it’s a metaphor – but heed that metaphor)
*How does a recalibrated me look/ think/ feel/ do? (you can take a card for each, or one card to represent the whole recalibrated you)

Ritual/ Spellwork/ EveryDayMagic Suggestions

*Purification ritual, a smoke bath using incense would be Aquarius appropriate
*Burn and release spell work (which is exactly what it sounds like, more info on how that might look here)
*Creating space for change, and new ways coming in, by doing the mundane time management type stuff

Leo Full Moon – SOFTEN

Yes, the world is going to hell in a handbasket, but at least there’s plenty of fire to toast the marshmallows (or marshMELLOWS as my kids like to say and I love to hear). The first full moon of 2021 is in Leo (January 28th, 19:16 GMT). Leo, sign of the sun, of direct action, of joyfulness, of play! Remember when we used to do that?

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When things are difficult we have a choice. We can let that difficulty make us hard, or we can witness that difficulty and still find areas of softness. Seeds don’t grow well in compacted soil.

“History isn’t like that. History unravels gently, like an old sweater. It has been patched and darned many times, reknitted to suit different people, shoved in a box under the sink of censorship to be cut up for the dusters of propaganda, yet it always – eventually – manages to spring back into its old familiar shape. History has a habit of changing the people who think they are changing it. History always has a few tricks up its frayed sleeve. It’s been around a long time.”

― Terry Pratchett, Mort

Divination/ Journalling Prompts

Ritual/ Spellwork/ EveryDayMagic Suggestions

*Get back to gratitude. Write down something(s) everyday which you are grateful for.
*Do something which brings you joy, just because. Let it be something which doesn’t earn you any money or kudos. Do it for fun.
*Every time you encounter something which is upsetting and you feel that tightening try and release and breathe and remember the thing you last wrote in your gratitude list.
*Breath practice (Yoga With Adrienne on YouTube has an amazing playlist this month for Breath).

Capricorn New Moon – Push

The first new moon of 2021 is in Capricorn (13th January, 5:00 GMT). I have been watching the shadow advancing over the moon’s surface this past week with a sense of … what? Relief maybe? Like the shadow is a blanket we can cover ourselves with, and rest a while, to be born anew a few days later.

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Saturn and Jupiter have left Capricorn, true Pluto is still close by, but even so the energy feels less complicated. Or more ordinarily complicated, if that’s a thing? The usual Capricorn new moon darkness and concern with what is going on within the earth (literally and metaphorically), the realm of Pluto. Inanna is with her sister Erishkigal. We know what happens now.

“I wish it need not have happened in my time,” said Frodo.

“So do I,” said Gandalf, “and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.”

― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring

Divination/ Journalling Prompts

*What am I willing to do now?
*What am I clinging on to?
*How can I release that ready for necessary change?
*How can I be born anew?

Ritual/ Spellwork/ EveryDayMagic Suggestions

*A ritual bath to cleanse and release old patterns
*Asking for help
*It would be a good time for past life work and/ or ancestor connections

Cancer Full Moon – NEW COMFORTS

I am writing this at the beginning of the month (so before the huge happenings of the solstice and Grand Conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn) and it feels like I’m only getting a glimpse of something very very far away. From this vantage point, the full moon in Cancer (December 30th, 3:28 GMT) looks like a strange and unfamiliar jewel.

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With Venus on the south node and and Jupiter and Saturn (in Aquarius) inching ever further away from Pluto, I’m going to stick my neck out and suggest this full moon is about time and pleasure. Patterns of behaviour around what brings comfort, delayed (or not) gratification, and which things in our lives we give value too, and the themes that I feel will be at the forefront now. And if we don’t like our current modes of comfort then we are able to make big or small changes now.

“Change happens when the pain of staying the same is greater than the pain of change.”

― Tony Robbins

Divination/ Journalling Prompts

*What comfort (or comforts, take more cards if you need them) have I outgrown?
*What is most important to me now?
*Where am I wasting time?
*How can I align my time-spending with my values

Ritual/ Spellwork/ EveryDayMagic Suggestions

*A ritual to cast off old pleasures and comforts.
*Some (not-so) mundane time management planning.
*A social media break, or break-up if you’re feeling bold.

New Moon Eclipse in Sagittarius – RESPOND

On the 14th of December (16:16 GMT) we have the Sagittarius New Moon and Total Solar Eclipse (16:13 GMT). The eclipse isn’t visible in the UK as the sun has already set (you can see where the eclipse is visible on this map), but the energy will still be felt. It is extra dark.

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The moon in front of the sun creates a portal, and an invitation; Do you want things to stay how they are right now? Or do you want to step into a different but unknown future? How will you respond? It is time to choose your next adventure, and to work out why – and who – you are called to adventure for.

“I should like to save the Shire, if I could – though there have been times when I thought the inhabitants too stupid and dull for words, and have felt that an earthquake or an invasion of dragons might be good for them. But I don’t feel like that now. I feel that as long as the Shire lies behind, safe and comfortable, I shall find wandering more bearable: I shall know that somewhere there is a firm foothold, even if my feet cannot stand there again.”

― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring

Divination/ Journalling Prompts

Ritual/ Spellwork/ EveryDayMagic Suggestions

*Solar eclipses are not easy times to do magic, you really need to know what you’re doing and be sure that the eclipse energy is compatible with what you hope to achieve, for this reason its simpler to avoid spellwork at this time.
*That said, simple rituals to help with moving forward/ crossing the portal would be effective and especially if combined with a cleansing – a ritual bath would be good.
*Sagittarius is about truth and big adventure so journaling/ pulling cards/ vision boarding etc what you would like your new quest/ adventure to be would be good, just wait until the eclipse is passed before taking action.

Full Gemini Moon – REBEL

The last day of the month brings the Gemini Full Moon (November 30th, 09:30 GMT). It is also a penumbral eclipse (09:43 GMT) and a faint shadow will be seen on the moon before sunrise (in the UK, for other parts of the world check a local almanac). Gemini is a sign that enjoys light and fun, and with Mars direct in home sign Aries, it could be a tricky time for anyone wanting to place heavier restrictions on movement and get-togethers. The mood isn’t one for toeing the party line. 

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There is a tension now between lightness/joy/ play and restrictions/ rules/ responsibilities. Wherever you fall politically this moon will shine a light on some things which you’d rather not notice are there. But, like so many terrifying things, they can be less scary when we face them head on.

“Each of us must confront our own fears, must come face to face with them. How we handle our fears will determine where we go with the rest of our lives. To experience adventure or to be limited by the fear of it.”

― Judy Blume, Tiger Eyes

Divination/ Journalling Prompts

*What am I most afraid of now?
*What do I need?
*What happens next?

Ritual/ Spellwork/ EveryDayMagic Suggestions

*With Mars direct in Aries and out of shadow it is a good time for fire magic. Candle spells to increase courage would be effective.
*Free-writing/ doodling. Don’t worry about what it looks like, let your unconscious/ spirit guide/ ancestors speak to you through the movement of pen on paper.
*Ritual to release fears.

Scorpio New Moon – INTEGRATE

Mercury and Mars are direct but still in their shadows (explanation here) as we reach the Scorpio new moon on November 15th (05:07 GMT). A lot of shit has gone down these past few weeks and you may be feeling scattered and unsure about how to pick up the pieces. I feel like this new moon offers the possibility of integrating those crappy and good things that have happened and start fitting things back together into some kind of (new) coherence.

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Finding creative ways to integrate new understandings, while allowing space to grieve for the old ways, is necessary now. Even if you don’t believe that linear time is true (and, on a grand scale, it probably isn’t), it is the way our human lives are experienced. And so, forward we go.

“Go back?” he thought. “No good at all! Go sideways? Impossible! Go forward? Only thing to do! On we go!” So up he got, and trotted along with his little sword held in front of him and one hand feeling the wall, and his heart all of a patter and a pitter.”

― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Hobbit, or There and Back Again

Divination/ Journalling Prompts

*What have I learned about myself this year?
*What have I learned about the world this year? (you can add more similar and specific questions here too e.g. what have I learned about my relationship with … / my dreams etc.)
*What am I yet to learn? (sometimes the cards will be vague about this, but it’s worth a try)
*How can I integrate what I have learned?

Ritual/ Spellwork/ EveryDayMagic Suggestions

*A ritual to call back any lost parts of yourself could be intensely healing now.
*Water elemental work, like a cleansing bath, would be effective.
*And last but not least, that Scorpio cliche, but for good reason, some shadow work.

Full Taurus Blue Moon – All Shadows Eve

Samhain + Blue Moon = Strong Magic.
There is an awful lot of fire and Earth energy out there right now, and not all of it (probably not even half of it) is particularly well-directed or contained. Which is to say, on this Full Taurus Moon (October 31st, 14:44 GMT), take care. Do your halloween things, call up your ancestors and helpful spirits, but take more care than perhaps you would in a year that is not this year.

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Things on this beautiful planet are changing more quickly than they have done for a couple of thousand years. An epoch is coming to an end, another is struggling to be born. We are in the throes of labour. It feels like hard work. It is hard work. It is what we are here to do.

“Truth is the daughter of time, and I feel no shame in being her midwife.”

— JOHANNES KEPLER

Divination/ Journalling Prompts

Nos Galan Geaf/ Samhain is the end of the Celtic year, and the beginning of the next. It is a great time to consult your ancestors (not just human) for guidance. I don’t really use a spread as such for this, as its more like a conversation than a fixed reading, you can keep pulling cards and let things flow. But I’ve tried to pull things together into a starting point that might be helpful. Let me know how it goes if you use it.

Ritual/ Spellwork/ EveryDayMagic Suggestions

*This is the point in the year where I do my year ahead reading for the following 12-18 months. I have a blog post with a card layout and prompts, which you are welcome to use.
*With Mercury still retrograde take extra care with any wordy magic, like charms, right now. Personally, I favour spirit work over all other forms of magic at this time.
*Clean/ Refresh/ Start an ancestor altar. Everyone should have one (and I almost never say that about anything).

New Libra Moon – STIR THE POT

Whoo, we are still right in the thick of things aren’t we? The Mars retrograde continues and now Mercury has turned (not actually pedants, it just looks that way from Earth) too. All that backwards and forwards energy swirling around this New Moon in Libra (October 16th, 20:31 BST) and a time (Libra season) when we are usually talking about balance and setting goals and priorities for the next 6 months has become altogether more … unpredictable?

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So what do we do with those swirling, unpredictable, bubbling pots? I think that depends on what is brewing in each. I am going to take a few off the fire (or at least try) so that I can focus my love and efforts on those which matter most.

“The most precious gift we can offer anyone is our attention. When mindfulness embraces those we love, they will bloom like flowers.”

— THICH NHAT HANH

Divination/ Journalling Prompts

*What pots am I tending right now? (pull as many cards/journal as many responses as feels right)
*Which need to be stirred? (I’d be using a pendulum over the already pulled cards for this part)
*Which need to be taken off the boil?
*Which can be safely/ better moved to the backburner?

Ritual/ Spellwork/ EveryDayMagic Suggestions

*Clear out your worst drawer/ cupboard of hell, you know the one with the elastic bands and string, and the mixture of used and new batteries, tea lights, receipts for things you don’t own any more etc. There is energy available to tackle such grim jobs right now.
*Get your wards and protections in place
*Ditch any lingering commitments which no longer resonate (even/ especially those which are now only via zoom)