In Tune with the Moon

The Moon

The Moon, as ruler of our moods, emotions, instincts and unconscious mind, is our monthly guide to the ever-changing background cosmic weather that affects us all.

On the left, you'll see the current Lunar Phase and Sign, and if you know your time of birth, the area of your Natal Chart it's travelling through, as well.

The Moon's Phases

For everyone, the New Moon is a time of new beginnings. It's where we can turn the page, start afresh and initiate new projects. As it waxes from New to Full, we become more focused on the outer world and on fulfilment. As it wanes from Full towards the Dark, Balsamic Moon, we tend to be more inward-looking, until a New Moon ushers in a whole new cycle.

The Moon through the Signs

As it travels round the Zodiac each month, spending two days or so in each Sign, the tempo changes, each sign it passes through acting as a different cosmic lens. The Moon in civilised and diplomatic Libra creates a very different atmosphere to the Moon in sultry, passionate Scorpio, or adventurous Sagittarius!

In Tune with Your Personal Moon

But to fine tune our all-important sense of timing, we also need to know our own personal moon cycle.

In Tune with Your Personal Moon

The Moon's Monthly Journey

When the Moon returns to the phase, the zodiac sign or the area of our chart it occupied when we were born each month, we are more in tune with our instincts and emotions. We feel more 'at home' and can function at our best.

Check on the left to see the Moon's current phase and sign, and if you know your time of birth, its house position.

Your Natal Moon in Capricorn

Emotionally, you are loyal but reserved and it can take you time to trust someone enough to open up and share your feelings. To those who do not know you well, you may seem cool, but when you feel secure with someone, your inner warmth comes through. Because you have been hurt, or passed over by those looking for more dramatic and extravagant displays of feeling, you tend to hide behind your strong facade. But you have learned the value of real, tender loving care and have a powerful instinct to protect those who are more vulnerable than you are. Accepting the support of others in return can be harder for you, as you do not like to show your weaknesses, or admit your needs to anyone if you can help it. But, unlike many people, you know what commitment means and understand its real value; once you have decided to stand by someone, you will stick with your decision, for richer or for poorer, for better or for worse.

Your Natal Moon in the Third House

With your Moon in the third house, your home life is important to you, as are your siblings and close neighbors. As the Moon is feminine and passive, you tend to take your lead from those around you when it comes to new ideas. In fact, you can pick up others' attitudes and accept them with alarming ease. But you always know precisely what is going on in your close circle. You have a sensitive and subtle mind, and picking up on others' feelings is no problem to you.

The Moon's Monthly Journey through the Houses of your Natal Chart

Each month, as the Moon travels round the zodiac, it passes through your Natal Chart's twelve Houses. Each House represents a different area of your life, so check on the left for the House it's travelling through right now, or on any date you choose, to see where your natural emotional focus is now falling.

How often do the Moon's natal phase, sign, and House position coincide?

Every year, there's a rough approximation, but it takes over eighteen years for all three to recur at exactly the same time! Because the Sun and Moon are the most important aspects of our Natal Charts, these are life's major turning points and times of growth and change.

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The Nodes of the Moon, which mark the points where the Moon's apparent orbit crosses the Sun's, help us to understand our lives as a dynamic journey of growth and change. Their position in our Natal Chart show us our natural strengths and weaknesses, helping us to understand where we are coming from, and where we should be going.

We come into this world with inborn tendencies and talents. The sign occupied by the South Node of the Moon in your natal chart, and the house it occupies, reveal the ways of thinking and behaving that are second nature to you, and the area of life that you feel most at home in and find easiest to deal with.
Whether or not these are gifts developed in a previous life, or are just a part of our genetic inheritance, we tend to fall back on what is most familiar to us, and can fail to develop the qualities of the sign and house position of the South Node's opposite, the North Node of the Moon.

The North Node of the Moon always occupies the opposite zodiac sign, and house, to the South Node. It shows us the qualities we need to develop in order to evolve and to become more whole and balanced, as well as the area of life that we need to learn to deal with better.

With the South Node of the Moon in Aries, you are a natural leader and your pioneering spirit makes it easy for you to branch out and break new ground. In fact, you are always on the go, looking for new lands to conquer, and finding time to just relax and take life as it comes is hard. However, with the North Node of the Moon in gentle, easy-going Libra, you will find the inner peace and balance that you need by slowing down and putting others' needs and feelings first. In order to develop your true self, you need to concentrate on helping others, both emotionally and financially, instead of putting your own comforts and aesthetic pleasures first.

The South Node in the Sixth House: Your Line of Least Resistance: You tend to focus on the details, and can fail to see the bigger picture. The North Node of the Moon in the Twelfth House: Your Life Path Challenge: To learn to look beyond the here and now, to tune in to your deeper feelings, and to use your intuition.

As the Moon's Nodes travel backwards through the Zodiac and the Houses of our Natal Charts, they focus our attention on the different areas of our lives those Houses represent.

Because they can only occur within a certain distance of either the Moon's North or South Node, the meaning of the Sun's and Moon's eclipses is closely intertwined, by sign and house position, with that of the transiting Nodes themselves. They act as heralds of change and pointers on our true life's path.

A solar eclipse is a conjunction of the Sun and the New Moon. The Sun, our conscious self, our sense of identity, is temporarily eclipsed by the Moon, which represents our emotions, our subconscious mind and our past.

A solar eclipse near the North Node brings evolutionary growth and change. It is a positive, forward-looking event, helping to free us from old habits and limitations, and to break new ground.

A solar eclipse near the South Node emphasises the past, and opportunities for transformation of the known. It helps us to focus on old issues, rethink our attitude towards them, then move forward.

Lunar eclipses always occur at the time of the Full Moon, when the earth stands between the Sun and Moon, preventing the Moon from reflecting the Sun's light. Our instinctive, intuitive, subconscious mind is temporarily in shadow and we may feel cut off from our emotions.

As with North Node solar eclipses, lunar eclipses that fall near the North Node are more future-orientated, pointing us forward on our life's spiritual journey.

Lunar eclipses that occur near the South Node also help us to focus on the past, to rethink where we stand, and to free ourselves from restrictions, and from emotional attitudes and habits that have held us back.

A few months before the return of the Nodes themselves - roughly every eighteen years, eleven days - the pattern of the Sun's and Moon's eclipses also comes full circle.

These eclipses, that fall near in time to your Nodal Return, are extra important. They echo, for the first time in eighteen years, the same major life themes as the eclipses that occurred when the Nodes returned eighteen years before.

They belong to the same 'family' of eclipses and continue the same story. So be sure to check their sign and house position on the left!

Between every eighteen and nineteen years, the Sun and Moon complete a full celestial cycle. As the Sun and Moon are so important in our Natal Charts, the ending of one cycle and the start of a whole new one, always marks a major turning point in our existence. These are truly times of destiny, and of growth and change.

Roughly every eighteen years, seven months and nine days, or so, although this can vary slightly, the Nodes of the Moon return to the exact degrees of the zodiac that they were in when we were born. And at 18, 37, 56, 74, and 92, we often find ourselves at some kind of turning point in our journey. These are times when we are likely to encounter a soul mate, or forge meaningful and lasting friendships. Major changes in our life-style or career path can also occur then.

At 9, 28, 46, 65 and 83, when the North Node reaches the position in the zodiac that was occupied by the South Node when you were born, and vice versa, we are also more than usually aware of our life path, and in tune with our destiny. These times give us the opportunity to deal with unfinished business, or to pick up where we left off, with a person or a situation, and to reassess what we have achieved, to date.

These, too, are fateful times when we are likely to encounter soul mates, and forge or rekindle our most meaningful love affairs and friendships.

Last but not least, once every nineteen years exactly, plus two hours, the Sun and Moon return to the same positions in the Zodiac they occupied when you were born. Coming, as they do, at the end of a year in which the Lunar Nodes and the Saros cycle of eclipses have also come full circle, these Super Birthdays, which fall either on your actual birthday, or on the next day, depending on what time of day you were born, mark the ending of an era and the start of a new chapter in your life.

Super Birthday 1 = Aged 19
Super Birthday 2 = Aged 38
Super Birthday 3 = Aged 57
Super Birthday 4 = Aged 76
Super Birthday 5 = Aged 95

Plan to celebrate in style!