Ooh, Heaven is a Place on Earth

New moon at 18° of Taurus

All the paintings in this post are by a magnificent ancestor, the Japanese artist and illustrator Hiroo Isono (1945-2013) who channeled exquisite and heavenly visions.

It is so sweet to be writing to you from the other side of the eclipse portal, which, wow. The last six weeks have not been easy, and for some of you, that’s a dramatic understatement. It’s possible you’ve been going through enormous suffering or struggle, and feel like you are emerging from a battle. The tree of life teaches us that there is a moment in any cycle where all the struggle and grief, all the pain and fear and waste, all that has been lost and shed, it fertilizes the way forward; a new way of being grows up out of the center of it, like a spring sprout rising out of the earth, green and wet. We are at that moment of renewal and rebirth in our great lunar cycle, and I hope, in our personal and collective life. Tuesday evening, May 7th, at 8:22pm PT, the moon is brand new at 18° of Taurus, the holy bull. Taurus is fixed earth, the most earth, an archetype of creativity and resourcefulness and abundance and growth that gives us the power to concentrate on and nourish that which is valued and desired. Taurus is all about root systems: the way that life digs down to grow up, how it connects to the resources it needs to survive and thrive. Where Aries pushes us up and out of our unconscious seed state, out of our stuckness and frozenness, initiating spring and new cycles of growth, Taurus tends to the long term potential of that growth. It knows that to secure future abundance, we need a proper foundation.

To get this done, Taurus slows us way down. It stabilizes us and sensitizes us at the same time, and this is very different than the kind of stability we get from numbing and disconnecting. We’ve been getting a lot of lessons about this—stern invitations really, to tend to our inflammation and defensiveness, risk trusting ourselves and others a little more, and rediscover what comes from honest, vulnerable, open-hearted bids for connection and support. Last week, as Taurus’ ruler Venus entered her home sign, she did so in a square with Pluto, and you may not have felt it, but many of us did. Some old wounds that shut us down and have prevented deeper intimacy were activated and remembered. It was a little like, how could we possibly still be going deeper into this healing, but we were. Now, perhaps, we are finally receiving the support we need to move through the eye of the needle, or emerge from the underworld, blink in the light, and start relating and creating in a new way. With Venus in Taurus on this new moon, granting all loving, pro-relationship requests, we can anchor ourselves more in the present moment. We can rest if we need to. We can more easily explore the ecstatic state of being gentle with our bodies, going slow, and savoring simple pleasures. We can take stock of where our counter vortex is at, whether we have enough safety, beauty, good food, good wonder. We can start again, from wherever we are now, to build a life, a world, better suited to our needs.

Healing is a complex labor that requires periods of detaching from and grieving old forms, then being horribly lost without those old forms, in the pain and disappointment and vulnerability of an undoing. And it requires periods of generativity and creativity, when we wonder what new forms might want to be created from the pieces. We fumble around a bit, getting our land-legs back. We hold these new possibilities and forms lightly, but also lovingly attach to them, just enough so that they can grow and discover what they are meant to become. This is what time it is. That doesn’t mean our grief is over, or our necessary pain and struggle. We are not abandoning any difficult inner or outer work. Rather we are just moving into another phase of it, one that emphasizes joy and birth. It requires as much bravery as being with the grief, and it’s just as necessary to our healing. We must let ourselves move away from the known, towards the unknown and unimagined and unwritten. We have to let the light in. We get to keep and relish the new perspectives we have won and are winning, and see if we can turn those perspectives into wisdom somehow. We get to try again. Make art. Make dumb jokes. Make something delicious with all that is fresh and tasty in the garden.

Look at me trying to sell us on life! Like a life salesman! Like a person with all her planets in Taurus, who finally has permission to give permission! I know I’m laying it on a little thick, but I also know that how hard its been, how harrowing it continues to be, how much we are all carrying as we worry for ourselves and each other and the world, and seek to act in loving ways that preserve hope and sanity and sincerity. I know how hard it can be to believe in ourselves, and in the possibilities, and to know which possibilities to attach to and nurture and risk our hearts in loving and bringing into the world. We deserve a little coach speech at this point, or a little love letter to ourselves, and here it is: you are beautiful, and perfect, and critically important. We need you, and we need your gifts. Even if you feel you may have been hurt or damaged along the way, even if you feel you have hurt or damaged, this is the moment of renewing, of preparing to give of yourself anyway.

This new moon is also initiating a pretty radical and abundant current of manifestation, so please consider using it to call in what you need. What is it that your soul is longing to make with your life? This is Taurus, so what is it that you want to build long term? What would it feel like to be fully/actually supported in building that? Setting fixed goals aside, what conditions could you manifest that would make your process more harmonious? If none of these questions are getting it done, make up your own—find a way to open this door. Not only is Venus in Taurus, giving Taurus full access to its gifts, but Jupiter is here, planet of mercies and blessings and expansions, and Uranus is here, planet of freedom and revolution. Saturn’s even giving us a little exact sextile to the Sun, and Saturn loves to help us manifest. The Sabian symbol for 18° of Taurus is “a newly formed continent rising up out of the ocean.” This degree is a bridge between spirit and matter. So whatever you do, don’t rush through it—this is not a time to take action for the sake of taking action. Please allow yourself to relax and just gestate, imagine, receive inspiration. See what is arising in your conscious attention. Notice what specific visions of beauty and harmony and fulfillment are visiting you. If and when you’re ready to make a wish, and call something in, making an offering first to the earth—something beautiful and/or nourishing for the soil; a gift for a gift. Then let yourself be open to the possibility that you will receive exactly what you need.

Ritual & Writing Prompts

(Disclaimer: Prompts are suggestions, not instructions. Play with what inspires you, ignore what’s doesn’t. Adapt in any way you see fit.)