The long days are now just a distant memory and while we are speeding our way to the end of the year the brevity of each day almost takes your breath away. This time of advent is a time of preparation, waiting for the most important moment of the year, the coming of the light in Capricorn.
We are being asked to find patience and slow our pace of life down. The winter months are a time when Mother Earth stops breathing out and begins breathing in, when everything on the surface seems to have died, a time of hibernation. The outward energy of growth is exchanged for one of germination as the seed goes underground, out of sight and is growing in the earth’s fiery belly.
We are asked to do the same, to go within, to slow our energies and hunker down for the long winter months ahead. This allows us to take stock of all that we have propagated in the year, honed down and harvested in autumn, so that we can fully absorb, digest and process it all, ready for the next year’s spring growth.
It has been a tough year, no one can deny that, but we humans have an amazing capacity for resilience, to make good things out of bad. We all hear about the Blitz spirit in times of difficulty, well this is when we must dig deep and find it again, if we are to survive this dark time.
As a culture, we are terrified of the dark, of feeling unhappy and of death. It seems to be that now we are being asked to face all these fears at once. Although this might feel unbearable, there is not only light at the end of the tunnel but light beyond our greatest dreams. I am not speaking of this year, the journey’s end is still a long way off, but this is worth the wait and we still have a great deal to learn and remember.
This month of Sagittarius, ruled by Jupiter, the great planet that teaches us how to expand our energy and reach for new heights and scale new mountains, is leading to one of the most important astrological moments in our history. On December 21st Jupiter and Saturn will be conjunct at 0 degrees Aquarius. This will look like one big star in the sky much like the one the three wise men saw two thousand years ago. This has huge portent and if we wish to make the most of what this might mean we would do well to pause for a moment and follow the journey of the sun as it slows and reaches its time of rest; the solstice, meaning ‘sun stands still’.
This Christmas star, as it has been named, will remain in view like this for a few days, while the sun appears to stop. Then, when the sun begins to move again on the 25th of December we experience the coming of the light. This is the dawning of the Age of Aquarius, of the Cosmic Mind, the time of the community, when the light can be found within us all. Then we may learn to allow our minds to be governed by our heart rather than our heads governing our heart.
This will not hit us like a thunder bolt or a huge shift in our lives. The feelings will be subtle. This is what we are being asked to do; to listen to the subtle energies that we have lost connection with for Millennia. When we still our minds, these energies may start to be felt and the more we feel the more we will be able to feel. We will be able to use our senses in ways we have long forgotten, retrieving many ancient ways of being.
The Sagittarius archetype, looked at with a modern view, is often seen as the traveller, the one who shoots the arrow to far off lands in search of the truth. Another interpretation of this archetype is to know that the inner, rather than the outer, physical, journey offers far more wisdom with infinite worlds to explore. In the stillness we can expand our lives in limitless ways and discover truths beyond facts and figures, books and words.
In this time of preparation we can only imagine what is to come but the more we let go of wanting to know and learn to become still, like empty vessels, we can allow Jupiter to guide us and expand our possibilities beyond the limits of the ego.
This is such an important time, I truly hope that despite all the fear and pain we see around us we can choose to remember that this must be balanced by the same amount of joy and love in the world. I have faith, in these days leading up to this auspicious moment, that we will open our hearts to the amazing opportunities we are being offered during this incredible time.
