Mars Direct: Our New Micro Environment Dear Friend and Reader: Mars has been direct for a little more than a week. This is describing a new phase of astrological life, outside the somewhat contained experience of Mars retrograde from April 17 through June 29.
Mars is retrograde just 10% of the time, for about 72 days out of every two years. It's like a review and reset for Mars, which you can visualize as soaking in and charging up on the energy of the sign where it stationed direct, which was (and is) Scorpio this time. Many people were not so enchanted by Mars retrograde, however; it was tense, it seemed to never end, and it went spelunking directly into taboo territory. But I would propose that it was still a helpful investigation for most, even if it was a bit rough. Then it ended. Yet the feelings, revelations and lessons tend to come out gradually and in a more refined form in the months after the retrograde ends. That's because Mars has to re-cross the degrees where it was retrograde, which it will do well into August. So we get to live out the process in slow motion -- through the direct (rather than retrograde) motion. Since Mars is such a vital planet (directly representing vitality), and since its themes are so prominent right now, it's worth keeping the book open. Mars is the planet that represents seeking identity. If Aries is the sign of I Am, then Mars, its ruling planet, is the agent of self-discovery. Remember that Mars (the ruler of Aries) and Ares (the Greek version of Mars), are gods of war. The ancients left us with an association between identity and violence.
Desire, push energy and sexuality in the 'I want you' sense of it, are all associated with Mars as a critter of Scorpio. That is where we find Mars now, struggling to choose between these two diverging aspects of its nature. Remember that sexuality is taboo and violence is not. So the path of least resistance for Mars is to attack someone rather than invite them home, smoke a joint and voluntarily get naked. At the bottom of all this is the ongoing struggle of finding oneself. And presently we are all infused, dazed and confused with a largely unacknowledged effect of the internet, which is to diffuse identity. This is genuinely destabilizing, and all of society is feeling the effects. All electric and electronic media, from the telegraph forward, create identity chaos by cultivating tribal identity. The really big development here was radio in the 1930s, which started the process of breaking down individualism and leading our society into a state of what seems like permanent group think. The most glaring example of this was the War of the Worlds incident of October 1938, wherein just about everyone was convinced that Martians were invading the planet, based on a radio drama. Several generations of media later, the internet allows for near-anonymous, multi-personality existence. It also facilitates the total invasion of privacy, for example, by the NSA and by hackers. However you may look at it, there is no private, personal, individual existence on the internet. This is one reason why, in my view, we are seeing so much violence in the world right now, whether in reality, in fantasy or in the 'news'. There is an out-of-control war going on in Syria and Iraq, which we are told repeatedly is a function of the internet. What those who say that tend to think is that young people are hearing about the war and Islamist views via internet and are responding to recruitment propaganda. What they really mean is the internet has created the perfect conditions for people to be so clueless as to who they are that going to a battle front seems like a workable way to find oneself. I know I declared the Anti Sixties over recently, though this is a hangover of that era. Kids used to hitchhike to San Francisco, wear bright colors, smoke pot, play bongo drums and have sex with different people -- to find themselves.
That might be through participating in gang violence (group activity), planning or actually doing a mass shooting (acting on a group), and even claiming that you're acting on behalf of Al Qaeda, ISIS and Hezbollah all at the same time (hey, a group of groups). That is what I would call an identity crisis. Many who do not directly participate easily get drawn into the drama via the extended nervous system of the internet and television, which are another form of group identity as we all see the same thing over and over, then tweet about it. On the war front, violent incidents over the past few weeks are among the worst in the history of the 25-year conflict in Iraq and surrounding areas. Bear in mind that things got really nasty after the United States and the U.K. toppled Saddam Hussein, the leader of Iraq, eliminating one of the most important roots of identity for a country, especially a dictatorship: its all-powerful leader. This happned right as the internet was taking hold as a popular medium. The police, too, are seeking identity; as of today, American cops have killed 505 people in 2016, as reported on today's edition of Democracy Now (The Washington Post cites 508). A disproportionate number of these people are African Americans and other racial minorities, which is in turn spurring a response in the form of Black Lives Matter and other movements. Violence being committed against people is forcing them to commit to who they are.
We might well ask why there is not more public outrage at this. It's been going on and on, seemingly without end. The two kinds of domestic violence we hear about on a regular basis are mass shootings by apparent civilians, and shootings of people of color by the police. They might seem unrelated, though they -- and the pro-gun movement -- are all features of the same environment, as is domestic violence, the third pole in the tripod. This is not happening because there are so many guns. The issue is why there are so many guns, and why so many people want them so much, which is the product of a mentality that cannot be explained merely by availability and paranoia. One of the core messages of the gun is "I am someone important," or rather, "I am someone." You might say that the war and murder of people of color is about racism -- which is nothing more than inflamed, entrenched sickness related to identity. This includes personal identity and tribal identity, which in the case of racism is established on the basis of who one is not. Disgusting as this can be, we live in a society that seems to only respect violence and murder. (As Noam Chomsky said in The Culture of Terrorism, if you want to impress Congress, tell them how many people you've killed.) There's a prurient excitement about these events, which totally seize consciousness each for days on end. It's as if killing is not just acceptable, it's admirable -- and I think the reason is that it touches some deep-seated need to know who we are. It touches that need, of course, without doing much to satisfy it, so the cycle continues. My uncle Anthony Mazza from Brooklyn, who died many years ago, was a gun-toting, Confederate flag NRA type who said he wanted to join the KKK. His wife, my aunt Joan (who is somewhat more literate), explained to him that they didn't accept Sicilians or Catholics. (Maybe they've become more progressive since then.)
Then there are the less exciting forms of killing, such as risk assessment. The most banal form of murder is no less effective. If war is the extension of diplomacy, then murder is the natural extension of business. Every bite of food you eat comes from a business, and most of them are industrial scale. Existing law allows chemical manufacturers to murder one person per million per chemical. We accept this as the cost of living, partly because it's necessary to eat, and partly because we know that most food has to come from these big corporations. We might figure one in a million gives us a pretty good chance of surviving, but not with tens of thousands of chemicals on the market -- and with nobody studying the enhanced killing power of exposure to multiple toxins. Neither is it shocking with so many random carcinogens floating around; just the background levels of dioxin raise the floor on chemical deaths to more like one person in 1,000 or even one in 100. That should not be shocking with nearly half of all people getting cancer sometime in their lifetimes. This is why there is such resistance by industry to GMO labeling. No matter how safe they say it is, you can be sure it's orders of magnitude more dangerous. Yet there's not much of an on-the-ground movement to demand that labeling. We seem to willingly accept that some among us will be murdered by glyphosate in their nacho chips. Yet I would contend that people with a stronger identity are more likely to be driven to take care of themselves, and to eat real food.
I was curious about this conflation of identity meltdown and violence, so I called up someone who has written a lot about it: Eric McLuhan. "Violence results from somebody ripping off an identity, recovering one, or establishing one. These are the three main provocations for violence," he said. "This would apply at any level, personal or group. In a group you have a feud or a war. A feud is always about identity." He continued: "Identity is getting weakened daily by the new technologies. There's nothing on which to base a private identity anymore, except a group. Group identities are weak and fragile and very subject to insult. A guy with a strong private identity can take a lot of kicking around. But you insult a group and you start a war, whether it's a feud or something like ISIS." In an email a little while back, he continued: "Private identity depends entirely on a culture of detachment and objectivity. Without detachment, everybody is always completely involved in and with everybody else: no privacy. Privacy makes sense ONLY in the context of a society composed of private individuals. "The private individual has private thoughts and private ambitions. Such people are considered to be a mortal threat to any group society -- or any group for that matter -- and must be ostracized. Tribes often go to the extent of not just expelling the offender but killing him or her.
Of course, Mars in Scorpio wants to keep its privacy. It wants to keep its secrets, or share them with one other person. It's in a long discussion with Uranus and Eris in Aries -- the very image of individual identity exploding into group environment. If you go within, you might be able to feel just where that tipping point is, and claim some of yourself back. You have the tools you need; you're self-aware enough. You merely need to turn that awareness on; or, said another way, to remember who you were before the internet. Lovingly,  Planet Waves (ISSN 1933-9135) is published each Tuesday and Thursday evening in Kingston, New York, by Planet Waves, Inc. Core community membership: $197/year. Editor and Publisher: Eric Francis Coppolino. Web Developer: Anatoly Ryzhenko. Designer: Lizanne Webb. Finance: Victoria Pomante. Astrology Editor: Amanda Painter. Astrology Fact Checker: Len Wallick. Copy Editor and Fact Checker: Jessica Keet. Eric's Assistant: Cortney Britton. Client Services: Amy Elliott. Media Consultant: Andrew Marshall McLuhan. Research, Writing and Editing: In addition to those listed above, Planet Waves is produced by a team consisting of Fe Bongolan, Kelly Janes, Amanda Moreno and Carol van Strum.
 Surfing Cancer's Waves, and Loving It By Amanda Painter One way to read the planets right now is that they are all about relating and relationships. But what if you're not in a capital-R 'Relationship' currently? That's okay: as a human being, a great part of your existence is concerned with relating to others in a wide variety of roles -- work colleague, friend, sibling, parent, child, etc. -- in addition to lover/partner/spouse.
It's the ways you navigate challenges and opportunities, the stories you tell yourself about them, and how those stories make you feel. I'm not talking about self-absorption or narcissism. More like, the more clearly you can relate to yourself, the more clearly you can relate to others. Currently, the Sun, Mercury and Venus are clustered in Cancer. On one level, this suggests domestic, family-oriented, mother-child and caring/caretaking themes and energy. You might be noticing this in your inner experience as well as in your conversations and impulses (such as to bake, clean the house or have a heart-to-heart; yes it's cliché, but clichés exist for a reason). Yet those three objects in Cancer are making some very interesting and potentially provocative or compelling aspects to other planets around the zodiac wheel. The first of those is a grand water trine between Venus in Cancer, Mars in Scorpio and Chiron in Pisces. A grand trine connects planets in the same degree of all three signs of one element (in this case, water) with a sense of flow and harmony. 'Emotional awareness' is the phrase that comes to mind. Chiron brings the awareness piece; Venus and Mars add the relational element, especially with regard to sexual or romantic relationships (and there may be an element of 'family' involved). The water signs are all about emotion.
There can be a kind of whirlpool effect with grand trines. If you're noticing that your creative or sexual desires, some past sore spot/issue/pattern, and your ability to offer and receive caring seem to be feeding each other in a big ol' circle, what's the way out of the circularity and into constructive action? That's where the other aspects to those three Cancer planets come in. In a nutshell: be open to surprises; be willing to air out what has stalled or reached a plateau; be curious and willing to discover what has been secret. Speaking in 'I' statements and listening with compassion can help to keep things clear, gentle and more likely to open out into new understanding, rather than triggering the impulse to close up and hide. Again, this relates to your interpersonal relationships -- but also to yourself. You might be surprised how often people 'hide' things from themselves. Then again, you might not; denial is a popular vacation spot (and no, I'm not talking about that river in Egypt…). The aspects offering the nudges to dig (or dive) deep and surf the unexpected waves are the Sun and Mercury opposite Pluto in Capricorn, and Venus square Eris and Uranus in Aries. Mercury exactly conjoined the Sun on Wednesday; their respective oppositions to Pluto are both exact today, almost eleven hours apart. Venus squares Uranus today in between the oppositions. It all can be taken as one event. Essentially, it's okay to recognize that someone you're close to and care about has changed; it's okay to show others the ways you're changing and growing and cycling through phases, too. It's okay to experiment, to shake up routines, and to shift your attention from something that hasn't been working so you can focus on something new that just might do the trick. It's okay to let love and caring (and desire) lead you. Fear just keeps you in denial -- complete with metaphorical crocodiles. Surely you can think of a better trip to take with your hard-earned time on this planet, and all of this beautiful energy.   Marie Poppins and Sadeck Waff double up in their 2x2 Mirror Dance. Image: video still.
How to Double Your Harmony and Reflection By Amanda Painter With the sky giving us the mirroring effect of a solar opposition, the surprise of a square to Uranus, and the flow of a grand water trine, what is the best way to move through your life? If the crabwalk and swimming like a fish are both out, why not dance? In this visually mesmerizing video of the 2x2 Mirror Dance, conceived of and choreographed by Marie Poppins and Sadeck Waff, the whole is definitely greater than the sum of its parts (just like you). With a videographer situated at just the right angle and distance, Poppins and Waff perform a series of moves that are often angular, yet as fluid as water. Keeping contact with the mirror for most of the dance, they multiply themselves to form beautifully symmetrical shapes of connection and separation -- before disappearing off the margins, into the void.  This Week on Planet Waves FM Hello Jupiter: The U.S. Chart and Medicine for the People Dear Friend and Listener: In this week's program [play episode here], I look at the new environment in the days and weeks after Mars has stationed direct. There's a grand trine in the sky -- planets in all of the water signs. How does that feel, and how do you keep your room tidy?
There's a streak of planets across the 8th house in the sign Cancer: Venus, Jupiter, the Sun, Mercury and others. This is a huge legacy of some kind, an inheritance. Who is it from, and what are we supposed to do with it? Finally, I look at the Juno mission to Jupiter, which arrived Monday night to not enough fanfare. A bunch of rocket scientists successfully slowed down their robotic probe (previously traveling at 130,000 mph) and parked it in a safe orbit around Jupiter. There, it will photograph into the interior of the planet, measure heat and radiation, and perhaps give us a glimpse into the early origins of the solar system. My musical guest is Nahko and Medicine for the People. If you're wondering what new music is getting the kids going out on the festival scene, Nahko Bear is a great place to start. You can visit his website here; there's a new album, called Hoka. I think you'll like it. Special thanks to Amy Jacobs for selecting today's music and sending Nahko my way. During the program I mentioned that we have a combined summer sale of Vision Quest, the 2016 annual, and the 2016 Spring Reading. You will love these practical, visionary and creative astrology readings -- that's a promise. Ordering information is here and also below. With love, Planet Waves TV: Cancer New Moon, and the USA Horoscope
The new edition of Planet Waves TV covers Monday morning's Cancer New Moon, the grand water trine and kite pattern with Pluto. I also cover the United States Sibly chart, the most widely used chart for July 4, 1776. I look at the question: why is the United States so neurotic? Why do we squander our resources? The answer seems to be that we feel guilty about how we got them. Please subscribe to our YouTube channel.  More information on the Summer Sale is available at this link.
Don't forget to take advantage of our Summer Sale on Vision Quest, the spectacular 2016 annual edition, and the audio-video Spring Reading on Mars retrograde. We've knocked down the prices for individual sign purchases and for the complete readings, making this a bargain simply not to be missed. If you already have the readings, why not give them as a gift?Spring Reading: Purchase all 12 Signs | Purchase Individual Signs Or get both full readings here for just $67.  Your Monthly Horoscopes -- and our Publishing Schedule Notes Your extended monthly horoscope for July was published Thursday, June 23. We published your extended monthly horoscope for June on Thursday, May 26. We published your Moonshine horoscope for the second Sagittarius Full Moon, by Len Wallick, on Thursday, June 16. Len's Moonshine Horoscope for the Cancer New Moon was published Thursday, June 30. Please note: we normally publish the extended monthly horoscope on the first Friday after the Sun has entered a new sign. Short Monthly Horoscope for July 2016, #1107 | by Eric Francis
    Photo by Andy Spearing under Creative Commons.
"Your readings are always so insightful and their timing tends to unfold in a way that refers to a point that we may not have reached yet but will be experiencing soon (at least that's how it has felt to me). Thank you for listening and for your art, which nourishes us all!"-- Winter Clark
You don't have to jump from a cliff to discover exhilarating insights about your year: anyone with a Cancer Sun, Cancer rising or a Cancer Moon can wade in gently with the two audio segments (currently available for instant access!) of the 2016-17 Cancer Birthday Reading (order here). Eric will have the video tarot reading and summary portions of the reading ready very soon.
        
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