If you’ve been feeling tense and anxious over the past few days, you are not alone!  Mars, planet of aggression and the pure expression of Will, has been in a square formation to Jupiter, Chiron and Neptune.  The square of Mars to Jupiter expands our desires and fuels our physical energy, but also makes us resistant to authority and longing for freedom.  Mars in square to Chiron irritates our sensitive places and induces emotional reactivity.  Mars square to Neptune can erode our confidence and create confusion.  We know we don’t feel good, but why?  It’s a mystery.

Mars is in Taurus now, and the Triple Conjunction is in Aquarius.  These are fixed signs and there is not a lot of flexibility here.  Often with a fixed square like this there must be an eruption before the adjustment can take place and you may be feeling this come to a head today.

All of this is part of the Full Moon eclipse in Capricorn that occurs today.  The Full Moon occurs when the Moon is 180 degrees from the Sun, and the two are in signs that are polar opposites.  With the Cancer/Capricorn polarity we are needing to balance the outer and inner worlds, the practical application of matter (Capricorn) and the sensitive emotional needs of the heart (Cancer).  

Saturn is interacting harmoniously with the Full Moon and that helps us to ground the energy better than we would otherwise with all of the Mars chaos swirling about right now.  Over the next couple of days, though, Mars will begin to settle down as it moves away from the Big Three and prepares to enter Gemini on the 12th.

Warning:  Geeky astrological details ahead.  A lunar event becomes an eclipse when it conjoins the lunar nodes.  In astrological symbolism the nodes of the Moon represent our evolutionary direction from the past (South Node) to the future (North Node).  As eclipses go, this one is not as powerful as some because the nodes of the moon are about as far as they can be from the Moon and still be called an eclipse (I believe the scientists use a 15 degree orb, or range, for an eclipse).  Plus, the lunar nodes are what we call “out of sign,” because they are in a different sign than the Moon and Sun which means at 14 degrees apart, and in different signs, they are not really conjunct.  In my view this lessens the eclipse effect.