This upcoming lunar cycle calls us to nurture our own growth through consistent action, like a gardener to a garden. What actions are you taking regularly to become a healthier, more expansive version of yourself? If we want a garden to flourish, we can not water it once a month. We have to tend to it daily.
Too many of us are living our lives from a place of fear and it's causing a lot of our problems. We allow fear to be the force that influences our behaviors, and therefore, we create our external lives (manifest) from this place of fear. As within, so without. This is a fundamental quantum principle of vibration.
For example, being afraid of others' judgment could keep you from sharing the art you love to make. Being afraid of disappointing your boss could keep you from pursuing another life opportunity that you know is better for you. Being afraid of feeling pain could keep you from opening your heart to a new romantic partnership. Fear typically keeps us from bettering our lives.
Fear is at the foundation of stress, anxiety, frustration, and self-doubt—a few of the main feelings (and vibrational states) that hold us back from living better lives.
If you ask me, fear is the root cause of why many of us aren't creating (manifesting) the lives we know we can live. This next lunar cycle, I challenge you to build awareness around fear in your own life and do all you can to change the state in which you make your decisions from to being more love-based.
This next lunar cycle, we are all primed to understand why we haven't been creating or living the lives we desire, and it involves the energy of a dwarf planet you may have never heard of before—Ceres. And Saturn.
This next new moon will oppose the dwarf planet Ceres, meaning that the Sun & Moon will be aligned on one side of the Earth in the sky, and Ceres will be located on the opposite. Actually, Mercury was opposing Ceres over the last two weeks, and now Venus is as well. There's a whole cluster of celestial bodies that have been calling us to look at Ceres. An opposition brings sensitivity to the themes of the opposing bodies. It creates space that allows us to see both opposition points with greater distinction & clarity. Oppositions bring awareness.
Ceres isn't one of the prominent celestial bodies discussed in Astrology because it is relatively small compared to other bodies in our solar system. In my professional practice, I've never focused on this body before. Ceres has come into my sphere in what feels like divine timing and is one of the stronger dynamics at play in this lunar cycle.
This blog will discuss Ceres's and Saturn's role in this next lunar cycle and how to tap into this dynamic over the next month to create a more fruitful life. For those who are really ready to work with these Astrological principles for success in changing your life, I invite you to invest in a Personal Lunar Cycle Forecast for $40. Every lunar cycle is different for every person based on your natal chart and the current arrangement of the solar system. This 20-minute recording shares everything you need to know to navigate the cycle ahead with greater ease, flow, and clarity. There's so much more I could tell you about how these oppositions with Ceres have been moving specifically in your life and how to use this cosmic dynamic to create healthy change.
A Little Bit About Ceres
Ceres resides in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. The asteroid belt is a significant component of our solar system in that it marks the separation of the inner rocky planetary bodies (Mars, Earth, Venus, Mercury) and the outer gas giants (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune.) Ceres is the largest object in that asteroid belt, which contains over 2 million asteroids of different sizes. This rocky body was considered an astroid until 2006 when the International Astronomical Union (IAU) classified Ceres as a dwarf planet due to certain physical factors it possesses.
In mythology, Ceres is named after the Roman goddess of agriculture, which corresponds with Demeter in Greek mythology, the goddess of the harvest and fertility of the Earth.
Ceres is the largest physical mass and energetic connection point between Mars, representing the warrior archetype, and Jupiter, representing the principle of divinity & expansion. Let’s dive into what this means in our lives.
Ceres in our Human Experience
As represented in mythology and as reflected by being a bridge between Mars & Jupiter, Ceres represents nurturing, like a gardener to a garden. Think of your life, everything you've created so far, as a garden. What have you continued to nurture, and what hasn't had a chance to sprout at all? Where are your flowers blooming? Are there any flowers blooming? Or is your garden looking relatively dull? Maybe you've been watering someone else's garden and not your own. Ceres teaches us that what you feed is what grows, including what emotions you feel inside you.
What does a healthier version of you look like? That is a question to keep top of mind this next lunar cycle. I personally believe that many of us already know the actions we need to take to better our lives (Jupiter); we just struggle to take them (Mars).
I'll use myself as an example. For a long time, I've wanted to become really good at hula hooping and take my skills to the performance level. I can feel the fulfillment in my heart as I merely imagine this dream coming true. I would love my life even more if I actually reached this goal. There would surely be another blooming flower in my garden I call life. In order to do this, it will require my practice almost every day. It will require me to put myself out there and let others see me dance. It will require that I walk myself through my fear of failure, looking stupid, and judgment from others. It will require that I act more from a place of love, my heart, than a place of fear. I would need to nourish myself with self-belief and dedication to practice.
We all have “bad” habits and fear-based patterns that are hard to break. Maybe you are lonely and desire a community, yet your fear of rejection keeps you in patterns of self-isolation. Maybe you want a more fulfilling job, yet your fear of change and risking the stability you do have keeps you stagnant. Maybe you are so tired of feeling anxiety, yet your fear of making mistakes or disappointing others keeps you in a place of always trying to be perfect. We can become comfortable in our suffering, and it's ultimately the fear of the unknown that keeps us in this place of stagnancy. What would happen if you decided to try something new? This is called growth, and growth is inherently uncomfortable.
Love calls us out of our comfort zones (change), while fear keeps us in our comfort zones (stagnancy). Choosing to take no action is action. When we choose to perpetuate the same fear-based patterns, this is what we feed, and this is what grows. Fear is running rampant in how we are co-creating the social climate today. When we take action (Mars) that harms us by continuing to feed our fear-based patterns, will will never grow into a healthier, more expansive version of ourselves (Jupiter). That is not nurturing. Let Ceres teach you another way of being this next lunar cycle.
We are beings of the light and the dark. We all know fear, and we all know love. We all have a thread of self-destruction in us. We all have a thread of self-expansion in us. What I'm discussing here is not about ignoring your darkness for the sake of your light. It's actually about approaching your darkness from a place of your light. I will walk myself through my fear of performing in front of others because I love myself, and if I really love myself, I will not allow my fear to keep me from experiencing what I know life can offer me. My heart is the most trustworthy force inside me that I can follow. So is yours. If you truly desire to live a life of joy, passion, purpose, and abundance, you will follow your heart.
We are primed to examine this area of life in the next lunar cycle, with the new moon opposing Ceres. What are you feeding with your conscious focus? Your light or your dark? What you feed is what grows. This is a lesson from Ceres, represented in mythology as a force that brings healthy growth and harvest through regular nurturing. Now, let's look at the role Saturn takes in this cycle.
Saturn Retrograde from June 29th to November 15th
Another prominent energy shift coming our way is Saturn's retrograde cycle over the next several months. Retrograde cycles call us to analyze, reflect, and reassess the energy associated with the planet in retrograde. For Saturn, that is your discipline, responsibility, and achievements. Are you reaching these goals you have for your life? Do you have goals? Saturn tends to be associated with feelings of frustration and restriction. It can feel like an "all work" and "no play" kind of energy, though it doesn't have to be expressed or experienced this way.
The true purpose of Saturn in our human lives is to pull us out of our emotions (like fear) so we can actually get things done. Even when we don't feel like doing something, we can't neglect our responsibilities if we want to achieve a certain goal. The dog needs to be fed whether you feel like it or not. Your children need to go to school. If you want a thriving business, you need to set up your accounting system. If you want a healthy body, you need to feed it healthy foods and stay active.
This retrograde chapter will invite you to consider where you've maybe been neglecting your responsibilities. Perhaps it's not so much about your responsibilities to others as the responsibility you have to take care of yourself. Maybe you're beginning to feel and see that not taking responsible action to prioritize yourself is actually costing you your quality of life. How exciting. Do something about that. Your Saturn placement and how to harness this disciplinary energy this next cycle is something I'll also focus on in a Personal Lunar Cycle Forecast. This, combined with Ceres, is a really beautiful combination for enacting change.
Nutrient Soil Produces a Healthy Garden
Have you learned about how the mass production of food and agriculture has left the soils of our Earth barren? The soil of the Earth is in desperate need of nutrients to sustain the current demands of life on this planet. We cannot grow a healthy garden if the roots below the ground don't have what they need to feed the life that results above the ground.
I see this pattern reflected in our human dynamics. Your soil and roots reside in your inner world. Your body is your Earthly home. What you create in the physical world is a result of the nutrients available in your inner world.
So many of us desire better lives, relationships, jobs, and results from our actions, yet our inner worlds, our soils, are riddled with fear, anxiety, frustration, and stress (fear.) We all want to create lives with more joy, peace, and abundance, yet we are trying to do so without the nutrients we need to do so (love.)
When you are in a state of fear, anxiety, frustration, or stress, your behaviors (actions) come from that vibrational state. You cannot create a thriving outer world when your internal one is struggling. As within, so without. A vibration of fear cannot create something in a vibration of abundance. It is against quantum principles. These experiences are tuned to different channels.
Have you ever known someone who spends a lot of time in a state of anger and impatience? Have you noticed that it radiates from them? You can see it in their behaviors—from how they drive their car to how they speak to others to how they treat themselves. It’s no wonder why that person struggles to cultivate a peaceful life.
This is the main theme and pattern to analyze in your own life this next lunar cycle. What emotional state do you spend most of your time in? That is the vibrational state in which you create most of your life. I welcome us all to look at our internal worlds with greater attention this next lunar cycle, the place at which our actions are born. Do you spend more of your time in states of fear, anxiety, frustration, or stress? How can you nurture your inner world and water your garden so that what grows from you through your actions can flourish and thrive? Step into your light.
Where thoughts go, energy flows. Literally, every thought you think produces electricity through the neural synapses in your brain. The more time you spend thinking about how frustrated and anxious you are, the more energy you are literally producing in that frequency. This next lunar cycle will entail you monitoring your thoughts, something you can control, even if it's a challenge. If you allow your conscious focus to go to the thoughts of fear, anxiety, judgment, anger, or frustration, that is what you're feeding. It will be in your frequency. You'll cultivate more of these thoughts. If you can practice catching your mind when it encounters darkness and gently guide it to a lighter place, you'll nurture your inner world with your love.
There's a term for this, and it's called metacognition, thinking about your thinking. That is where your consciousness actually lives. I want to be very clear. This practice is not about denying your darkness. It's about loving your darkness. Good and bad exist in every moment. Just because you focus on the bad doesn't mean the good disappears. Just because you focus on the good doesn't mean the bad disappears. You're still always choosing what you focus on, even though the opposition point exists.
This skill of focus is to be developed in the next cycle. Some days will be easier than others. That's OK. I have days where I surrender to the spiral of my darkness and simply let it be. I make space for it, which is a sign of expansion in itself. I stop judging myself for having darkness, and I embrace it. That is nurturing the self. Just because I feel fear doesn't mean I don't also feel love. Where is your love? Find it. It's always there somewhere. Celebrate any moment in which you successfully navigate your thoughts to a lighter place, and love yourself for the moments where you encounter your darkness. Even if you spend 10 more minutes in a state of love this month over last month—heck, let's make it 10 minutes a day—you're making vibrational improvements. Don't sell yourself short for taking small steps. This is where I've personally found the most success.
As you do this work, you nourish your inner soil with more self-acceptance, kindness, forgiveness, and love. Your actions will begin to reflect this inner nourishment and become more fruitful. Again, this inner work is based on quantum principles. Some spiritual teachers out there call it the path to manifesting. That word never really resonated with me and actually made it more difficult to approach that concept. Can you relate? Once I understood the Universal Law of Vibration that I described above, I could successfully apply it to my own life for actual results. It's really about nourishing our inner soils, which, in other terms, is raising our emotional state. When you feel emotions like gratitude, self-acceptance, or joy, you are vibrating at a higher frequency. All of your actions will be infused with this frequency. There's no way you couldn't create better results in your life.
What's so cool is I haven't really had to do much extra work in the external world to create a more abundant life for myself. The majority of the work I do (and help my clients do) is internal, and I've watched the external simply reflect it back to me.
Nourish Your Inner World to Create a Thriving Outer World
Have you been desiring to make changes for the better? Do you know what you need to do to be a healthier, more expansive version of yourself but have struggled to do it? I completely relate. I want to help you break old patterns and pour some nutrients into your inner world so that every action you take produces more fruitful outcomes.
Use the lunar cycle as a growing season to make small changes. With a Personal Lunar Cycle Forecast, I help you navigate your inner world this month ahead, giving you additional information to make more aligned decisions. Creating change doesn't have to be hard. It can actually be as simple as raising your frequency by changing the emotional state you spend the most time in. With this forecast, I want to help you take more responsible action from a place of love. I'll share what area of life to focus your energy (AKA the House Position), as well as any other major themes I see that are there for you to work with. For example, if your natal Mercury position takes a prominent role in this cycle, I would guide you to focus on your communication.
If this work calls to you, you can invest in a Personal Lunar Cycle Forecast below. Even if the cycle has already started, you can still purchase this recording. I'll pick up right where we are in the cycle and help you navigate the remaining weeks. Go forth and nurture your aspirations. Follow your sparks. This world has so much more to offer you!
Very helpful, thank you for such a great article.