Full Moon September 14th - Your soul's Purpose. What's in your Acorn?

September’s Full Moon on the 14this in Pisces, sitting tightly with the sign’s modern ruler Neptune.   This is Pisces energy on steroids – an extremely hypersensitive, super dreamy Full Moon.

This is a Moon that wants to escape from reality, but she only has to look across at the four planet Virgo line-up in the opposite sign to be pulled up with an immediate reality check.

Mars in Virgo is exactly opposite Neptune, and the Sun, of course, is exactly opposite the Moon.   These two oppositions almost look like an open pair of scissors, but the question is do these scissors have the power to cut anything – are they sharp or are they blunt?

The energy is heightened by this scissor formation forming a right angle with the planet Jupiter in this chart, in his home sign of Sagittarius.    Jupiter is not a planet of half measures – he has a habit of expanding or going over the top with everything he touches.  Jupiter speaks of wisdom, faith, benevolence, beliefs – and in his own sign he could be dogmatic about these beliefs.   However, he often promises more than he can actually deliver.   This is Jupiter’s last of three meetings like this with Neptune (big dreams, scandals, risk taking, big humanitarian causes and charities) – will the dream bubble burst for some, what game is Boris really playing for instance?   So it is important to look at the harvest of this Full Moon and to fully take advantage of your skills so that the dream of your acorn can actually come into its own.

Venus and Mercury are at 29 degrees of Virgo – the very end of the sign, which is always a difficult place to be.  If you want to get Virgo type stuff done you know you don’t have very long to do it, so there’s a level of anxiety, a now or never feeling. Mercury is strong in Virgo so he is likely to be itching to get some things said or communicated before he loses his power – Mercury has to act now before it is too late.  Venus on the other hand is just itching to leap into her own sign of Libra and get back home. 

Virgo gives us the ability to discern, to pick out what is real and what isn’t.   Now the Moon/Neptune pairing in the sign of Pisces shouldgive us intuition – that ability to go beyond which, coupled with Virgo’s discerning abilities, shouldbe extremely powerful.  And this may indeed be the case, but notice I have highlighted the word ‘should’.   Neptune clouds, Neptune deceives, Neptune ducks and dives and gives the illusion of doing and of knowing.  But it very often lacks that follow through.     Moon/Neptune in Pisces is emotions on high alert; it is senses which are ultra impressionable; it is a yearning for the ideal.   It is senses on over load, which can ultimately lead to chaos if care is not taken. And Jupiter in the mix can blow this out of all proportion and/or want to just go hell for leather without thinking.    We may be led to follow our dreams or alternatively, we may be led down a road of limiting beliefs where we ourselves are not good enough or we have almost been led along to believe certain things to be true without questioning.  The energy is, however, great for meditation, for escaping, for just going with the flow and for being able to transcend realities, if we slow ourselves down through meditation for example.   But how can we follow our dreams in a way which also embraces down to earth realities, because that is what this Full Moon wants us to do?

There’s a mantra of spirituality these days.  Those who shun formal religion often regard themselves as spiritual instead.   All very lovely, but as Jupiter is saying here at this Full Moon, is there really the faith of convictions, is there real spiritual inner strength?   Do we have the inner strength of our convictions or is it all just words?  Jupiter wants an assuredness about beliefs and Virgo is pernickety enough to discover if these beliefs are real or not.   And Neptune at its finest can allow us to use our gut instincts and our intuition to decide whether those scissors will cut or not.

Neptune’s entry into Pisces in 2012 should have heralded a softer, more spiritual and more sensitive period.   And to a certain extent that is true.   But Neptune is a weird planet because he confuses, clouds, deceives, brings illusions.  Neptune brings a great longing and yearning for some kind of transcendence to a better world, and idealism for the kind of life we desire.  But do we as a whole actually have the follow through – the givingness, the consideration for others before our own needs?

Mars and Jupiter working together at their finest are capable of being the crusader, the one who protests and acts because of their strong beliefs – we can see this in Hong Kong and here at home in the UK with those committed to and against Brexit.  The Sun is sitting with the Fixed Star Denebola, the tail of the Lion.  Denebola represents the non conformist and the ability to live on the fringe and adds an element of uniqueness to the picture.  So this Sun is happy to walk the other side of the tracks and to find the uniqueness of the soul’s calling – the essence of our purpose in life.   And this Full Moon really does afford us the opportunity to try and reach this essential part of our uniqueness. 

James Hillman in The Soul’s Code – In Search of Character and Calling –discusses his ‘acorn theory’ where everyone has a uniqueness or defining image that asks to be lived.   Hillman maintains that we walk beside our daemon, our fate, our guardian angel, that encapsulates this calling for us.[1]  He speaks of the ‘myth of the hero’ calling from within his acorn.[2]   He seems to say that once we have grown up we then need to grow down.  So I guess what he means is that the acorn contains the seed of our soul and once the acorn is planted it grows into an oak tree. The soul companion sits with us, but on arrival we forget and come empty into this world.  It is the daemon who remembers and tries to guide us and carry us to our destiny.[3] 

But growing up is just the first stage and, once we have grown and achieved, we then have to grow down to search for the ‘fate’ or calling that was within our own personal acorn.  The Platonic myth of growing down says the soul descends in four modes – via the body, the parents, place and finally circumstances.   So first we have to grow into our body, then we grow within our tribe, to be followed by living in a place that suits our soul.  And lastly we reach the idea of circumstances which allow us to give back from what we have learned.[4]

So we must grow up to achieve and to go beyond, but we must go down to find what is in our acorn.[5]   Our passion is in our roots, which if you think about it are generally concealed from view, but actually our roots are part of every fibre of our oak tree – they are the soul itself immanent within us. 

Now this Full Moon is an opportunity because Pisces and Neptune want to transcend reality, whilst Virgo, as an Earth sign, wants to bring the knowledge back to earth and ground it in reality.  We can make the invisible acorn become visible, because by reaching into our unconscious parts we can find it and we can act upon it, thereby making it visible to all.   Mercury is powerful and has all the information, whilst Venus, who perhaps feels her beauty has been neglected in Virgo, can’t wait to get into her own sign of Libra where the beauty and goodness of her soul can be fully on show. Venus knows that our whole environment is ensouled, animated and inextricably meshed with us and not separate from us.[6]

The acorn theory affirms that we have an inherent uniqueness, but to find it we have to transcend into the realm of imagination to discover our destiny.   If, as Hillman insists, the creating progress has to go downward we must first enable the transcendence to the unconscious, which holds the memory of the acorn of our soul’s calling and then travel from Pisces down to more earthly Virgo in order to make it real.   And, far from feeling that this deprives of our choices in life, once we have discovered the acorn’s intentions for us we can find freedom within our passion.

So, at this Full Moon allow your intentions to aim towards your own acorn where your purpose is defined.  Let go of the limiting beliefs that are holding you back and find the passion of your destiny that will ultimately set you free.   Live according to your soul’s purpose and your authentic self. Access your highest consciousness and your intuition to find the essence of your own personal acorn and allow your knowledge to fuel your dreams – and then remember to fly. 

[1]James Hillman, The Soul’s Code – In Search of Character and Calling, Bantam Books, 1996, p.6.

[2]do.  P.16

[3]do.  P.8

[4]do. P.62

[5]do. P.44

[6]do. P.15