Wednesday morning at 5:35 am EDT, we get an Aries New Moon with some serious mojo to it. Not only will the Sun and Moon be conjunct, but within about three degrees are Eris, Mars and Venus. Yesterday Genevieve Hathaway offered one solid perspective on what it means to have Eris sandwiched between two pairs of personal planets (focusing on relationships). This is also a moment to pay attention and see what the astrology brings, to observe how it manifests.
We call this a ‘proving moment’ for a new planet. A proving moment is an event when the properties of a newly discovered planet are likely to manifest in some way. It might not be immediate — it might take a week or two, though the Aries New Moon might represent something about your life right now. (In fact, a number of people seem to be dealing with Eris-type conflict lately within themselves, and it’s getting played out in their relationships.)
Both the Sun and the Moon are applying to Eris — meaning that they are approaching Eris, which moves waaaaaaaay slower. Eris is spending more than a century in Aries (and takes about 557 years to go around the Sun once). Venus and Mars are also close by, making them active participants in this New Moon even though they have already conjoined Eris and moved on. We’ve only known of Eris since 2005, but already we have some idea that it has to do with the quest for self-knowledge and the sensation of a kind of identity anarchy. With Venus and Mars involved, we can extend this idea into the realm of sex and gender.
Even those who consider themselves heterosexual, or who are described as “hetero-normative” by gender-queer people, have questions about their sexual identity. Much of that involves gender, the roles that are assigned to the sexes, and taking steps to understand who we are as sexual people. Sexuality is close to core identity on our particular planet. It resides deep in the psyche and is a realm where all kinds of alchemy takes place.