by Erik Roth

The Total Solar Eclipse of August 21^st will go down as one of the most watched in history, certainly most watched in the United States or North America. For a few moments or hours of time, we were all transfixed and united for the most part to witness this phenomenon.  This eclipse on an astrological level, was truly tuned into the natal chart of the United States and its President.  For a fraction of us, it was an activation of part of our own natal charts personally.

The fallout from this totality will be felt for months and months after, potentially even for years.  The ideals of the founding of a democracy, which was at the time, an experiment in the Western World, was uncertain whether it would or could be sustainable.  America’s natal Moon in Aquarius was activated by this eclipse.  This leads to helping us understand who we are now (as a country and personally), what are we and how we can find the breath of love and creation in our own hearts.

We’re already seeing a shift that had been building in the last few months, when it comes to our government.  The power that the President seemed to wield like a sword (mostly for show) appears to be ebbing, but we won’t truly understand until much later as other astrological alignments take place.  The natural disasters that are now plaguing the US are not due to the eclipse, but are part of the larger schemata in this transition from one great year to another great year (or age).  The confluence of events is bringing people together and activating our hearts as extreme events like these tend to do.

The fires out here in Oregon has been some of the worst in recent memory, especially the pall of smoke that has covered the Willamette Valley for weeks at a time this summer.  The two major hurricanes that hit the Southeastern US is a rarity and broke all kinds of records for storms, rain and wind.  The powerful typhoon that hit India as well around the same time as Hurricane Harvey hit Houston, Texas.  If anyone needed confirmation of Climate Change, this is it.

The astrology bears out the shifting of humanity and consequences of the Western World, which includes the results of pollution, breakdowns of governance and bureaucracy, economic structures and major social changes, including revolutions in defining what makes us human and our roles.  With it comes incredible breakthroughs of awareness of environment, consciousness, science and technology and spirituality.  The total solar eclipse is helping us become more authentic as we get in touch with our humanity.

I will go into some upcoming planetary alignments shortly after I relay my personal experience with the total solar eclipse next.

MY PERSONAL EXPERIENCE

Standing at the edge of river gorge, I was recovering from disturbed sleep, lack of energy, crankiness and a dream where the solar eclipse was covered in clouds and smoke.  My mood had been poor the morning of the Total Solar Eclipse, waking up in a tent at 6 am with less than 4 hours of sleep mainly due to the dream and garbage truck banging around at 1 am.  It took a few hours to get back to restful sleep and REM, but soon the Sun was rising and it was time to get moving.

I knew I had to get myself together for what could be the moment of a lifetime and I didn’t want to lose that moment.  That thought kept me going as I ate briefly, changed and brushed my teeth before jumping into the 3^rd of 3 vehicles carpooling to a spot much closer to the 2-minute (of totality) mark in Central Oregon.  Where our gathering slept, we were close to one minute of totality and I was wavering back and forth as to why an extra minute made a difference in this experience.  But all went along as Daniel Giamario and Cayelin Castell experienced these eclipses before and knew it was important to get closer to maximum totality (of the center line of the shadow).

We drove through back roads from Redmond to the Crooked River Gorge near Madras.  Smoke from several fires burning in the Cascade Mountains became thick in some parts of the road as we meandered further north to the center line of the eclipse shadow.  Close to half an hour of going, we made it to the end of the paved road.  There was a choppy dirt road ahead where locals had gone and setup viewing all along the Crooked River.  We weren’t prepared or had planned to walk.  A few brought water bottles and I was fortunate to have brought a snack as well as water.  So we walked and walked and walked.  Well over an hour later, the group split into 2 groups of five.  In the group I was in, we made our way through Juniper, sage and other desert brush to the edge of a smoke-filled gorge over 100 feet down, making seeing the river impossible.

But as the 5 of us sat on rocks overlooking the gorge, the winds shifted and slowly cleared out the smoke in the gorge and the eastern sky.  At about 9:05 am, the first moment as a sliver of the Sun was covered by Earth’s only natural satellite.  It was just a few minutes before that I felt myself recovering, processing and moving beyond the wounding in the middle of the night and early morning hours.  The fatigue was ebbing and I gathered my strength (after dragging my feet hiking over the dirt road).  The Total Solar Eclipse woke me up.

All of us began to feel or sense a change in the air around us as the Moon cut into the Sun, making it slightly resemble Pac-Man.  The martins danced and winged across the top of the gorge (hunting insects) like it was twilight.  Colors changed and a strange light began to emerge around us and there was a deepening of a shadow when we looked to the west, where totality was hitting first.  As it got to within 15 minutes of totality around 10 am, the light was unlike anything I had experienced until then.  My mind raced to find some sense of what it reminded me of but could only see it as some form of twilight, but bizarrely different.

TOTALITY

I was feeling more and more awakened and filled with anticipation while others had differing experiences with one person moving into a state of ungroundedness.  We all saw a few high elevation planes zooming near the eclipse as totality crept up closer.  At about a minute before the complete covering of the Sun’s disc, the fragment of the Sun that still shown, shown brightly and still produced a lot of light.  With my small piece of welding glass in front of my eyes, I saw the dwindling of the Sun and then like some waving of a wand, the Moon eclipsed the Sun.

Totality happened.  While I am still processing this entire experience, the knowledge of why there are many people in the world chase total solar eclipses and why the ancients looked upon this with profound spiritual meaning was understood in those 2 minutes of totality.  I had not realized, even as an astrologer, how powerful this experience would be.  Whatever expectations I had were annihilated in that moment.  I was elated, in awe as if I was seeing The Great Temple of the Cosmos, revealed to my humbled human eyes for the first time.

It was utterly surreal.  Groups of people nearby, including us, gasped in awe and feelings of elation and joy broke the stillness.  All at once.  Humans were sharing a moment that transcended differences of all kinds.  The moment also felt as if a portal to something beyond intelligence opened momentarily.  While we can take thousands of different kinds of measurements of a total solar eclipse, the totality of the human experience is, in my opinion, beyond the intellect, beyond the ego and beyond the mind.  Even my soul strained to know from its depths.

The Sun’s corona blasted out around the edges of the Moon, making it impossible to try to see the star Regulus, which was only a degree or so away from the eclipse.  Venus was visible a bit higher up and what I had originally thought was Jupiter near the horizon turned out to be the star Sirius, the brightest star in the sky (after the Sun, Sol).  Visibly, the light of the Sun (while covered completely) wasn’t completely punched out, but more like it was shortly after a sunset with only the brightest of visible objects appearing in the night sky, except this was daytime.  The weird light surrounded us and made for a complex cauldron of feelings that bordered on bliss, fear, apprehension, total understanding, joy, gratefulness and of course awe and reverence at the same time.  And yes, it was a magical, mystical and spiritual experience that ended quickly.

AFTER

The moment of first light as the Moon passed over the bottom-left side of the Sun also had its own magic.  It was amazing to me how a very small fraction of solar light can brighten the Earth.  The Sun awakened as if from a miniature nap.  The Sun continued its escape from the Moon or the Moon’s completed thought projected upon us.  With an imagination, I can think of what the Moon might say after the eclipse: “Yeah, that just happened.  It really did.  Ha!”

Many were on a high after the eclipse experience, like myself and few felt drained from it and need to rest.  We were certainly blessed to have the privilege of the totality and we now know, as Stephen King once wrote (and I’m likely paraphrasing here), “there are other worlds than this one”.  We glimpsed one outside of linear time, but still part of linear time.  That may look a bit strange to read that, but it is like worlds within worlds and non-time within time.  Full connection took place and there was an “other side” to the eclipse.

POST SOLAR ECLIPSE ALIGNMENTS

28-29 degrees Leo/0-1 degrees Virgo has now become a fairly sensitive area of the sky due to the recent eclipse.

Mars crossed that area between September 1^st and 7^th,

Mercury between September 6^th and 11^th

Venus between September 17^th and 21^st

They will all help in activation of this vulnerable spot in and around the star Regulus.

These inner planets tend to cross any point in the sky once per year, except for Mars, which happens typically once every two years.  The alignments take on a new life when an outer planet factors in to the equation in a conjunction, square or opposition of a certain point.

While those planets will not have a dynamic (or hard) aspect between 28 degrees Leo and 1 degree of Virgo, the planet Jupiter will cross into Scorpio in October and get to within 6 degrees of squaring the total solar eclipse point in early March of 2018, then really hit it late October and early November of 2018 just before ingressing into Sagittarius.  Venus will cross the area again from July 7^th to 11^th of 2018 and the Moon will be in conjunction of that point at least once per month.  These are all times or periods of time in which to tune into the area around Lion’s heart symbolized by Regulus.

The masculine and feminine energies figure prominently right now as Mars emerges from behind the Sun, put in other words, the underworld.  Mars will “see” Venus in the early morning sky in the eastern skies while Venus begins to move ever closer to Mars as September rolls along, finally meeting in a spectacular conjunction on October 5^th where the 2 planets will be extremely close to each other.  It will be worth getting up early to see it!

This conjunction (and period of time where Mars and Venus will be close) marks something to help us understand more about our relationships (especially those between men and women), the growing distaste and outlived gender and sex definitions held onto since the rise of Christianity as well our roles in the world.  “Who are we on a personal and intimate level?”  That is a question we are all facing, whether we want to admit it or not.

Jupiter, as the “Year-Star” (known by the Chinese), moves through one sign per year and on October 9^th, moves (ingresses) into the sign of Scorpio for the first time since Oct 2005 – Nov 2006.  Jupiter has a tendency to expand and amplify anything it touches/transits so for those who have Scorpio featured on your chart (primarily the personal points Moon, Mercury, Nodes, As/Ds/Mc/IC, Mars, Venus, Jupiter and even Saturn) will be more of what that brings into your life and will generally expand whatever you are feeling in your life at the time of the transit (8 months to a year).  I know many who have Scorpio featured in their lives (including my own natal Mc-Midheaven) and will be waiting to see how that goes for them.

Beyond those alignments, we have Saturn moving in a sign that will be entry of the beginning of the climatic point in the alignments this century.  Saturn in Capricorn.  This takes place around the December Solstice and will be the talk of many astrologer for many moons, including myself (who happens to have a Capricorn Ascendant). Saturn takes nearly 3 years to move through a sign, so this won’t be quick.  And in 2019-2020, Saturn will join Pluto, then comes Jupiter to form the triple conjunction.  It is a centerpiece of this early part of the 21^st century with the epicenter in 2020.

I won’t get too far out in time here because there will be more writing on my part in October, November and so forth.  I want to share my empathy for all of you reading and all those not reading this for we are all in together as souls coming to know themselves in this lifetime and more.  I send out my heart to those suffering and reeling from natural calamities and personal tragedies and well as crises of the soul.  We are entering as newbies in this accelerated time and it is mostly unknown territory for us.  But we have free will to choose how to apply our roles.   The musical chords of the Universe include chaotic vibrations along with those in linear order and all of those notes are important for us to know thyself.

Cosmic blessings,

Erik