Dear Readers,
Thank you for being here. When I first started writing about astrology, it was in a one-shot brief email to a group of friends I’ve been involved with spiritually for many years about the Jupiter-Neptune conjunction in April of 2021.1 They liked it, so I kept going. A few people asked if they could forward my emails and some of those folks joined my Excel spreadsheet list. This went on for most of a year until last January when I moved the list and my writing to Substack. Over the last year, thanks to you, my subscriber list has doubled and some of you have chosen to be paid subscribers—for which I am immensely grateful. This edition is a celebration of these milestones.
Today I’m writing under a Virgo Moon. Virgo is an earth sign, concerned with practicality, effectiveness and order. It wants to create a system and work within it. There’s an interest in improving things with a tendency towards perfectionism. Craft and skill matter. Like Gemini, Virgo is ruled by our friend Mercury, but while Gemini delights in flights of fancy and gathering information for the sake of it, Virgo is discerning and excels at the organization, classification and use of information acquired. A humble and hard-working sign, we’ll often find Virgo people behind the scenes making sure that things are organized and running efficiently. I have a Gemini heavy chart, so this is not my go-to way of operating, but this morning I found myself filling in several weeks’ worth of entries in my new planner without forethought or intention of doing so.
The Moon may move on into Libra by tomorrow, but thinking about New Year’s resolutions or intentions under this Virgo Moon seems an auspicious way to begin the year. Indeed, this month we have strong support for getting our ducks in a row for 2024. This isn’t always the case, but this year, with no planets in idea-oriented mental air signs until late in the month, a heavy emphasis on Earth signs, and a couple of ongoing stabilizing aspects, January is great for this.
Mercury stations direct today. Yesterday Jupiter did the same, and we know that when planets station either retrograde or direct their energy is more noticeable than at other times. The “station” means that they’re in a pause between forward and backward motion. So right now, neither Jupiter nor Mercury is moving much. They’re both in holding patterns with other slower moving planets. Jupiter with Saturn in a stabilizing sextile and Mercury in a square with Neptune. As I mentioned above, Mercury is interested information. Jupiter is interested in turning knowledge into wisdom. With Mercury coming out of retrograde in broad-minded, freedom-loving and visionary Sagittarius, and Jupiter in grounded and practical Taurus, this week has a certain feel of “yes finally!” We’ve done a lot of reviewing, revising and rethinking. We’ve got something of a clean slate. Time to get going, time to take what we’ve learned and grow with it—a nice way to start a new year. At the same time however, lovely Venus, having just joined Mercury and Mars in Sagittarius, is squaring Saturn, which might feel like consequences of overindulgence or, “No. Not so fast…” And with the Mercury-Neptune dynamic potentially fogging up our minds and communications for another week or so, we begin the year with a sense of potential and possibility but without a clear view of the horizon, and perhaps that feeling of trying to drive with the emergency brake on.
This Thursday January 4, Mars moves into Capricorn where he’ll be until February 12. We’ll feel this. Mars is exalted in Capricorn. It’s as if he’s an important guest in the home of Capricorn while traveling through the sign. He’s responsible, courageous, clear, efficient and strategic. In other words, Mars is ready and willing to help us focus on our goals, get through our to-do lists or apply our energy to our intentions.
In general, January is a good month for all these things. None of us need an astrologer to tell us that 2024 promises to be challenging. The expression, “May you live in interesting times”2 comes to mind, but here we are, all living in interesting times together, and during the less volatile moments, such as (fingers crossed) January, it behooves us to take advantage of them to create space in our lives for when things are more chaotic.
Later in January, Pluto will re-enter Aquarius, this time until September 1, before he dips back into Capricorn for one last hurrah, or rather, one last round of turning up the muck and abuses of power related to societal structures and institutions. Last March, he made a brief foray into Aquarius from March 23 to June 11. I wrote an introduction to this 20-year transit here. Also later in January and February, each of the personal planets will meet up with Pluto in Aquarius, giving us a chance to get a better feel for what the next 20 years might hold.
If we think of Pluto as the rototiller of the planets, revealing what is toxic, diseased, decaying or currupt in order to allow us to purify, whether personally or societally, we can understand this work as empowering. In Aquarius, technology, individuality, humanitarianism, idealism, revolution and what it means to be part of a community will all be under review.
2024 might not promise a breakthrough in terms of a more peaceful world, but by all measures, we’re in a transitional and transformational moment in history. The outer planets, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto, each one spending many years in a sign are barometers that indicate epochal changes. Pluto is the only one to change signs this year, but Uranus and Neptune are at the end of their runs in Taurus and Pisces as well. In 2025, they will test the waters of Gemini and Aries respectively. By mid-Spring of 2026, Saturn too will have changed signs, meeting Neptune at 0° Aries, so we’ll have all the outer planets in new territory. The world will feel like a different place.
Last year, I had the pleasure of consulting with some of my readers. If you’d like to begin 2023 with a better understanding of yourself or what the year might hold for you, I’d be delighted to serve as your guide to the current astrology and how it relates to you personally. 2024-2026 promise to be big years and I love doing private consultations.
All my best to you and your loved ones in 2024!
~ Cami
Pre-Mercurial Musings, Camille Sheppard, April 2021 https://camisheppard.substack.com/publish/post/140261757
May You Live in Interesting Times': Definition, Origin, Examples, Sophia Merton, February 21, 2023. https://writingtips.org/may-you-live-in-interesting-times/