Tag: Sarah Varcas

5th June 2020: Lunar Eclipse in 16th Degree of Sagittarius ~ June 5, 2020


This lunar eclipse raises the issue of dependence and conditioning. In Sagittarius, it potentizes the transfer of power away from the expert elite triggered by the North Node’s arrival in Gemini last month. Against the backdrop of recent unprecedented – and in some quarters hotly debated – social and interpersonal restrictions the world over, further compounded by protests and riots in the wake of George Floyd’s death at the hands of the US police, this eclipse cycle alerts us to a burgeoning shift of perspective, auguring an ever-increasing challenge to the authorities from people who have simply had enough.

The Sabian Symbol for the degree of this eclipse speaks of seagulls circling a ship in expectation of food. It’s fair to say this isn’t the most natural food source for seagulls, but it’s convenient and reliable. That’s why they do it. If you’ve ever eaten a sandwich on the beach you’ll know how quickly you become central to their quest for an easy meal and how easy it is to lead a flock of hungry birds down the beach if you wander off whilst eating!

These images convey a warning: if we make ourselves dependent upon a single supply (of anything), the source of that supply can control and lead us where it would like us to go before we even realize we’ve been led. Focused on the satisfaction and security of an easy meal we overlook the changing scenery and the distance developing between where we used to be and where we’ve wound up now. In Sagittarius, we gain nourishment from information and learning, from broad concepts, highly sophisticated bodies of knowledge, and honed expertise. Sagittarius is the sign associated with law, religion, and medicine: three institutions that have shaped our modern world in many ways. This eclipse is an excellent time to reflect on how much power we’ve given them to determine what matters in our lives and whether now might be the time to expand our perspective beyond what they would like us to believe.

An alliance between Chiron, Uranus, and Mercury at the time of this eclipse unlocks fresh perspectives. But to benefit from them we must reclaim the fundamental right to honor our own experience and not have it dismissed, ridiculed, or silenced if it runs contrary to the received wisdom of the time. This takes courage in a world where people are being demonized and discredited for daring to question the ‘party line’ and reflect more deeply on the narrative they’re being fed. But if ever there was a time for the courage it is now! Courageous though, courageous speech, courageous hearts open to a new world in which we’re not told how things are but instead discern, through digesting many perspectives and listening, perhaps most importantly, to the voice within that knows the truth.

Mercury is currently preparing to turn retrograde in Cancer on 18th June 2020. Between this eclipse and that moment, we would do well to FEEL into what’s happening in our world right now. Let our intuition guide us towards an understanding that holds water in a deeper and more profound way. Once Mercury is retrograde, and as the next two eclipses occur, we’ll have the opportunity to recalibrate our internal knowing according to information that comes our way. But we can only do that if we give our intuition a platform from which to speak and reclaim the power invested in the experts as they dictate what our experience should be.

As we stand at this juncture in human history there are weighty choices to be made and we must each make them as best we can. This eclipse season will both reveal the shadow side of readily accepted sources of information – hidden interests, inaccurate assumptions, covert agendas –  as well as illuminate in their wake new sources of knowledge previously eclipsed by the might of received wisdom and unquestioned ‘truths’. The path ahead remains scattered with obstacles and the battle for dominion over the collective mind continues unabated. This lunar eclipse is just the beginning and there is much to be revealed and digested before we can decide, collectively, the quality of our future.

Saturn is now retrograding through Aquarius before returning to Capricorn in July. You can read more about what this means for us in terms of freedom of thought and speech here. But as we encounter this eclipse we may well find stirring within, a more insistent demand for information that challenges the dominant narrative and a burgeoning passion to forge alliances with others who sense a more pressing truth bubbling to the surface. For whatever’s going on in this world today, it is we the people, not the privileged elite with vested interests in our obedience to their cause, who can – and must – decide the shape our lives take from here.

Sarah Varcas

The Astrology of 2020: Part 2 ~ March 24, 2020


Editor’s Note: Yes, yes, yes…astrology does play a role in allowing us to peek into the effect geo-magnetic vibrations have on our human selves. Please read below to learn astrological details, learn to develop deeper levels of Love in your life, and then hold and BE in…

Quantum Joy!

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By Sarah Varcas

Imagine That….

All dates are UT

If you’re seeking some astrological background to the current moment please read my January update here and my Uranus in Taurus update here.

It goes without saying that we’re living amidst intense times. Fear is rife, isolation everywhere and contradictory information and opinion abounds, clarifying one minute, confusing the next. Communities are in lock-down (how easily that word has become an everyday utterance) and no one knows quite what happens next. A deepening unease is growing. Something in our world is very wrong which surpasses the apparent threat of physical disease. Rectification has long been needed on this planet and the current state of affairs is, in its own strange way, delivering it. Rivers are running clearer. The air is cleaner. Bird song can be heard in cities, usually drowned out by the roar of engines and machinery. Mother Nature continues business as usual, while the human race locks itself away. From our mass withdrawal, nature benefits. This tells us something we cannot ignore for a second longer. We have been a virus on this planet for way too long and must heal ourselves before it’s too late.

The Pause

Despite first appearances, we live in a time of opportunity, of fundamental and irreversible change. Things are never quite as they seem, nor as clear cut as they first appear. Truths are surfacing, along with the fear. As is compassion, innovation and a deeper sense of community as a gathering stillness spreads across the globe. The pause button has been pushed. We are being reset. Imagine if this made 2020 the year the human race recognised so deeply our destructive force upon this planet that we collectively vowed to change right here, right now, and halt this unending march to destruction? Imagine all it took was this one global pause that brought us up short and opened every eye….

Current planetary activity certainly speaks of the potential for great challenge and deep healing in equal measure. Truth rises like a bubble, shattering the hardened surface of complacency or denial. No one expected to be where we are so quickly. Of course, many fear for their own life or the lives of loved ones right now, but amidst this planetary panic all efforts to hold the collective space and maintain clarity contribute calmer ripples to the global pool. Every moment of peace aids rebalancing of the collective scales.

Fear is also a virus, and a highly contagious one! We don’t even need to be in physical proximity to catch it. It passes through the airwaves and the internet, over the phone, in text messages and videos. Through the TV and radio. And it’s tough to build immunity to it. It seems the more exposed to it we are, the more fearful we become. That’s why it’s important to take extra care of ourselves and each other right now. To be gentle and kind, to consider those who struggle the most. For some isolation is a panacea that creates feelings of safety. For others, an existential threat to a fragile stability held in place by the grounding nature of social connections, now severed amidst a climate of uncertainty and fear.

The Solution

We’re all part of the cause and the solution. The multifarious aspects of our world are so intertwined it isn’t possible to stand apart and claim no share in its fabric. Neptune still travelling through its own sign of Pisces reminds us we each arise from and return to the same source. We wrap our body and mind, heart and soul, around our presence and call it ‘me’. We feel ourselves as individuals, which we are at a relative level. But in the absolute we are simply parts of a whole, each uniquely fashioned to play its’ specific part. Reflection on this inter-connectedness is vital now, to counter any movement toward polarisation, ‘dog-eat-dog’ mentality or the alarming ‘every person for themselves’ approach which has emptied shop shelves and left the most vulnerable struggling to get by.

But with Jupiter about to conjunct Pluto (5th April 2020), both squared by Eris never has there been a more potent time for breakdown to become breakthrough or tragedy to become triumph. Unlike the single Saturn/Pluto conjunction of January 2020 this conjunction occurs three times (the next two being 30th June and 12th November 2020) reflecting a lengthier process of adjustment and recalibration than the sudden shift in January. Having arrived swiftly in our new Saturn/Pluto terrain we’re now in the orientation process, discovering how things work in this strange new world and just how influential we can be in its future shaping.

Jupiter speaks to us of learning through experience, of discovering the greater truths of this life through living it with an open heart and a mind to match. It reminds us there’s always more to know, to experience and to wonder at. Jupiter keeps us ever expanding, nudging us to explore beyond our comfort zone and embrace what we find there. It’s little wonder, then, that as Jupiter conjuncts Pluto – Lord of the Underworld – most people are feeling pushed to some degree or other outside of their personal safe zone!

The Power

Jupiter’s current alliance with Pluto begins a thirteen-year process of unearthing both the darkest aspects of humanity’s shadow and the most transformative energies available. In Capricorn, it affirms that pragmatic self-reliance is key to our journey ahead, whilst the North Node still in Cancer reminds us we are all part of the One Self, reliant upon each other too. What we do for each other we do for ourselves. Neither Jupiter nor Pluto would dream of giving their power away. And nor must we, especially not to fear. Which isn’t the same as denying or suppressing it. But we can know our feelings without giving them the final say on how we behave and the choices we make. Jupiter and Pluto invite us to discover just how expansive we can be around fear, just how vast we can become, giving it space to be without it defining all that we are.

We can all do this. But we can’t do it alone. We mustn’t let isolation define us nor let it deteriorate into fear and recrimination, blame or finger-pointing. Isolation is a behaviour, not a state of being. We’re all trying to get through this the best way we can and some may make mistakes. There will be differences of opinion about what’s needed, what’s happening and what to do about it. But still we are one and can join hands in spirit even when we can’t in the physical! Open hearts and expansive minds can prepare us to entertain new possibilities rather than calcify in fear.

Mars is conjunct Saturn in Aquarius with both trined by Venus at the first Jupiter/Pluto conjunction. Here we see the potential for innovation – a chance to birth sound and solid ideas about how to move us all forward out of this time of fear. If you’re stuck at home, perhaps it’s time to write that book you always said you would, work on that invention you’ve had in the offing forever, come up with a new business plan, rethink your career, write poetry, paint, dance, write some new jokes, pen a few letters, spring clean, dig the garden. Or simply spend time with yourself, in the quiet of isolation, listening to the still small voice within so often drowned out in the modern age. You may be surprised at what it says about these days.

The Renewal

This time makes mystics of us all, retreating into our inner worlds as we withdraw from the outer one. Who knows what will be revealed if we allow ourselves to settle into the stillness and silence, what pearls of wisdom await on the edge of awareness for a time such as this? Jupiter and Pluto have so much to reveal this year: great wisdom, deep truth and astounding potential. We mustn’t let the narrative of fear drown any of that out or blind us to the pure possibility of each moment. And even fear can be a wise teacher if we let it.

Mars conjunct Saturn in Aquarius tells us to hold our nerve and stay strong. We need a bold new perspective to move forward from here, not a return to the old ways once this time has passed.  We can only move forward. There is no other direction now. The world has changed in the blink of an eye, but we are the real change, waiting in the wings like caterpillars in a chrysalis. As the world retreats we liquify in our isolation chamber, awaiting re-emergence when the time is right. Jupiter and Pluto say it might be a while before we can stretch those wings, but when we do…oh my! What a beautiful sight they will be……

Sarah Varcas

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28th October – 20th November 2019: New Moon & Mercury Retrograde in Scorpio – Healing Revelations ~ October 25, 2019


Sarah Varcas

Healing Revelations

The moon is new in the 5th degree of Scorpio at 3:40 a.m. UT on 28th October. This moon marks an opportunity to stop and take stock, turn within and ask some probing questions about what’s really going on in the places we most struggle in our lives. Excuses won’t cut it now. Pussy-footing around the point won’t work. Honest answers are necessary. We’ll know them by their energetic charge which floods our being when we articulate truth. We don’t even have to share it with others right now. It may indeed take some time to come to terms with it ourselves! But truth spoken in the privacy of our own hearts is still truth nonetheless. Doing so can be the first step to integrating its catalysing presence in our life. Even the most unpalatable truths can still set us free.

With the moon’s north node crossing the solar eclipse degree of 2nd July at the time of this new moon, feelings which arose back then – and the circumstances which triggered them – may find resolution now. Insights gained in July are coming into their own, paving the way for a manifest change of pace or direction. If it feels like slipping back into a state you thought you’d finished with, remember that life is a spiral not a roundabout! We do indeed revisit things many times, but always from a slightly different perspective or point of view. We are never the same person twice, no matter how much we may feel ourselves to be. The North Node facilitates the manifestation of our future not entrapment in the past. But we must do our part to make that happen, and if life is full of ‘déjà vu’ right now we may well be receiving a precious opportunity to revisit issues from earlier this year, to make different and better choices.

With Mercury turning retrograde in Scorpio on 31st October, this is no time for obfuscation to escape the pain of waking up. What we avoid at this moon may well come back to slap us in the face in November! It can hurt to be confronted with the fact and consequences of our denials, deceptions, avoidance and projections. But when we refuse to dramatise that pain into a crisis it can eventually subside, leaving the fresh air and space of a psyche cleansed of emotional debris. Uranus opposing this moon offers exactly this freedom. For many, recent times have been extremely intense and the future looks like more of the same. But this moon reminds us respite and relief exist right here, right now. In accepting that the path of wisdom leads us through scary terrain, we’re no longer beholden to the power of unbridled emotion or the imposing nature of our personal shadowlands. We can face what we must and still prevail. Then we are truly free.

Mercury Retrograde in Scorpio

On 31st October at 15:35 UT, Mercury turns retrograde in the 28th degree of Scorpio and remains so until 20th November 2019. In this sign Mercury engages with secrets and lies, investigations and exposés. It will dig as deeply as needed to reach the root of an issue. Polite chit-chat is not the domain of Mercury in Scorpio. Be prepared for some uncomfortable but enlightening conversations! Conjunct Venus as it about-turns, this retrograde phase is well placed to expose the deceptions in our relationships, illuminating where we subtly – or not so subtly – play with the truth to retain control and stay safe.

We may, of course, resist such revelation with all our might.  But no matter why we keep secrets or hide aspects of ourselves, this Mercury will root them out, sometimes in the guise of other people digging their nose in where it’s least welcome! However adept we may have been at maintaining a smoke-screen or pulling the wool over certain eyes, this Mercury retrograde could change all that. And if it does… don’t panic! Whatever’s revealed now is better out in the open than hidden in the shadows. It has less power that way. And its revelation may just transform it into a more wholesome force in our lives, no matter how mucky it appears on first exposure to the light of day.

True protection is found in a Moon/Jupiter conjunction in Sagittarius at Mercury’s retrograde station, assuring us it’s okay – all this exposure, all these revelations. Look upon them as a release of stale breath held tight for years. It’s been poisoning us and we don’t need it anymore. This planetary alliance reminds us how resilient we really are and how the power of realistic positivity can bring us through what at first appears insurmountable. So whatever may be upper-most in your life during the month to come, remember the following will carry you through: hope in the potential for change, faith in your ability to rise and commitment to using even the sharpest challenges as fuel for the journey ahead.

Click here to understand the impact of transiting Mercury retrograde in your own natal chart

Sarah Varcas

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30th August 2019: Super New Moon in Virgo – Beautiful Flaws ~ August 29, 2019


By Sarah Varcas

This super new moon in the 7th degree of Virgo – conjunct Venus, Mars & Mercury – is a cleansing moon. Virgo is a deeply healing sign imbued with ancient knowledge often lost to us in favour of modern reductionist approaches to health. Whilst different models of healing have their place, this moon favours holistic systems, inviting us to regain balance, energy and health through their application. This is not about quick fixes, but a reminder that everything that enters our body – be it food, drink, air, drugs, sound or energy – impacts our well-being at all levels. The more conscious we can be of this the more carefully we can choose what we expose ourselves to and why. Beware, however, accepting any statement of ‘fact’ at this moon without analysing its meaning, source and application. Asking ‘who tells me this is so and why?’ can be a useful start to exploring the options available.

In its alignment with Mercury, Venus and Mars, this supermoon illuminates self-knowledge which allows for greater clarity in communication. But pay close attention to the motivation for speaking your mind! Assuming we have a right to say whatever we choose to anyone because ‘I’m just speaking my truth’, may become a subtle form of aggression at this point, intended to hurt or gain one-over on another. Used in this way, communication contributes little to greater accord or understanding. Recognising that however we feel doesn’t absolve us from the shared duty of mutual respect and consideration aids honest and meaningful connections which take account of other’s feelings, our own subjectivity and a shared pursuit of more abiding truths.

This moon also fortifies our connection with Mother Nature who will provide all the support we need. Our beautiful planet calls to us now, offering wisdom and guidance, solace and comfort. A single dewdrop on a leaf, a flower growing through a crack in the wall, a bird circling above us as we rush through city streets – all are our Mother assuring us we’re not forgotten and imploring she not be forgotten too. While many are busy and there’s much to be done, nurturing our connection with nature enables not only a deeper and more heartfelt response to life, but also greater clarity and effectiveness. Aligning the pulse of our life with the rhythm of the natural world allows a smooth and effective flow of energy which connects us to the deeper rhythms of wakefulness and sleep, activity and stillness. The more we isolate ourselves from life’s heartbeat, the more we’re drained of the energy needed to live it. Like a torch with flat batteries, we can’t summon the power to shine when we must, instead becoming a fading light in a world that needs us bright.

This supermoon illuminates the perfection found at the heart of our apparently imperfect lives. When resistance to unwanted conditions seems to strengthen their grip, embracing them may allow for rectification. This is how love changes all things: in acceptance, a deeper alignment is forged with the natural arc of change that bends towards balance and wholeness. In the Virgoan realm, truth is found in the paradox that holds perfection and imperfection in a state of creative tension. But its human face can become nit-picking perfectionism, demanding exactitude and purity from self and others: we believe that life should be better, things should be more ordered, other people more careful. So beware an obsessive focus on minutiae now. Whilst seductive, it will do no more than obscure deeper, more radiant truths. Instead, observe how your own search for truth manifests. Does it energise and inspire you to greater self-enquiry? Or does it stultify your spirit, paralysing you in a maze of demands and dictates, obsession over detail and fear of letting your perceived imperfections show? If so, gentle and loving acceptance may be the very thing which finally allows old issues to resolve.

Attention to detail can reveal incisive truth or information overload! We must know when to stop questioning as much as when to start; when to cease improvements and when our best is yet to come. At this moon we may view the world through a microscope that magnifies the faults in its shiny veneer, when we could simply marvel at life’s miracles and accept with good grace its many beautiful flaws.

Sarah Varcas

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Eris ~ The Radical Feminine Awakens ~ Jan. 18, 2018


By Sarah Varcas

An eclipse season began on 17th January 2018 and ends on 21st February 2018. To find out what this means for us go here. 

*Greek myth tells that, upon exclusion from a wedding, Eris threw into the midst of its revellers an apple marked ‘for the fairest’. An argument ensued between the goddesses Athena, Hera and Aphrodite as to its intended recipient, the settling of which eventually led to the Trojan War*

On 5th January 2005 the dwarf planet Eris stepped onto the astrological stage to shake things up like never before. Her recent formative conjunction with Uranus (June 2016 – March 2017), required our eyes wide open and hearts to match, ready for anything, fierce as they come and focused enough to do what we must. Her alliance with Uranus, ruler of Aquarius, marked a watershed time of formation for the incoming Aquarian Age which will challenge all that perpetuates inequality, oppression and exploitation, demanding searing integrity and the courage to stand up and be counted. Eris insists we face uncomfortable truths about humanity’s exploitation of Mother Earth and what we, as individuals, have done to ourselves and each other.

In myth, Eris is the goddess of discord and rivalry. On the face of it, the trouble she caused in response to not getting a wedding invitation sounds petty, but she knew something far more important was going on. In fact, her exclusion epitomises the experience of the feminine throughout history: snubbed, shunned, marginalised, demonised, ignored and rejected. In her reaction, Eris embodied the dark and feared feminine which rises up to reclaim her place in a world long fractured by patriarchal power.

Venus and Mars, the archetypal feminine and masculine, joined forces three times in 2015 (February, September and November). Their first meeting saw them cross from the final to the first degree of the zodiac, a sure sign of the birth of a new paradigm. In doing so they shone a bright light upon patriarchy’s legacy the world over, reminding us there is still much to be done before the feminine in all its guises is embraced within the collective psyche. Still the gendered split between, not the integration of, masculine and feminine define the lives and experience of so many. The deep wounds of patriarchy continue to fester around the world and it is easy to sink into despair at the seemingly unlikely prospect of global change. Women and girls the world over are treated as chattels and boys and men brutalised to continue this inhumanity. Ultimately there are no winners in patriarchy, for even those holding the keys to power have sacrificed their humanity to own them. No matter who, what or where we are, we cannot stand aside from the world into which we’ve been born and ignore what we’ve created. Our very existence makes us part of the landscape, a fragment of the collective psyche living these experiences here and now. We can be part of the problem or part of the solution, perpetually divided or seeking wholeness – within and without – in which apparent opposites become one united force for change.

Eris, in all her mighty glory, comes to set things straight, to balance the scales and establish an order of being that honours diversity, recognising the microcosm in the macrocosm and the natural forces which pulse through our veins. Eris knows the power of the feminine, the raw, primal force of childbirth, the fierce protection of a mother’s love, the enduring strength of a broken but embracing heart and the power of an awakened womb which nurtures deep within the hopes and dreams of generations. Eris augurs the upwelling of a radical force in the human psyche: the primal feminine which knows that life is both bloody and beautiful, dangerous and vibrant; that to exclude the feminine from the central paradigm that shapes our existence is to render life sterile, a sterility which enables us to plunder natural resources, favour financial profit over fundamental well-being and short-term power over long-term survival. Thus is created a world devoid of basic compassion which can dismiss the traumatised refugee as a drain on ‘our’ resources, the orphaned child as a ‘lost cause’ and the lives of countless women and girls as meaningless in the context of a masculine-dominant discourse which serves only its own perpetuation.

Eris is the most awesome force of cosmic nature encountered to date. That’s why she took so long to show up! We had to be ready, able to stay the course and up the pace. She challenges us to look with eyes wide open and free from all guile. To see who we are and what we do – personally and collectively – to perpetuate inequalities and oppression the world over. She invites us all, regardless of gender, to embrace the hope of a fair and just world, a nurturing world, in which all life is hallowed, all beings honoured as a vital spark of sacred source; the divine feminine and divine masculine forever locked in a fulsome embrace. When Eris was snubbed at the wedding a ferocious force was let loose: the furious feminine, dishonoured and diminished. She refused to slink away silently but began a war to make her point. She let loose chaos and demands we be swept up in its unremitting force. Pitting the goddesses Athena, Hera and Aphrodite against each other in competition for the title of ‘fairest’, she exposed the diminished feminine, divorced from its sovereignty and subordinated to the power of the masculine gaze. Now she returns power to us all, inviting us to embrace the light and dark feminine and all shades in-between: the Venusian delights of sensuality, the cyclical intuition of our lunar nature and the viscerality of Eridian challenge of all that perpetuates patriarchal mores of gendered worth.

Eris uproots all that exploits and oppresses. Her arrival changes everything. Even now that the exact conjunction has ended, she stands aside Uranus, guardian of the Aquarian Age, and demands we create a world in which dignity is a universal right not a privilege, where life is honoured in all its forms, where gender is not an arbiter of a disenfranchised fate and the intuitive heart is aligned with, not subordinate to, the incisive mind. Her world is radical, daring and free. She is unafraid to face the wrath of those who prefer the status quo, the denial of those who seek to side-step truths that stare us in the face. She will not tolerate the fractured disconnection of disengaged spirituality that seeks escape from, not radical engagement with, this world. Nor will she allow to go unchallenged the retention of power in the hands of the few in a world on fire. And nor must we, for only in standing firm for change can we draw upon her power and know her mighty heart and fierce commitment to a world born anew.

Eris reminds us in no uncertain terms that with every breath we give birth to the world, shaping its future and sealing its fate. Her arrival throws down the gauntlet. She’s a warrior spirit with nothing to lose; a formidable force whose time has come. Love her or loathe her, follow or fear her, she sparks a revolution of unstoppable and liberating change.

This essay first appeared in Trivia: Voices of Feminism here

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