The Libra New Moon of 2023 will be exact at 21 degrees of Libra on October 14 at 10:54 a.m. on the West Coast. When the Sun and Moon are just a few degrees apart from the Moon’s own nodes, this is an eclipse. It’s an extra-potent lunation because the signs of the Moon’s nodes—those invisible points in the sky where the Moon’s orbit intersects the apparent path of the Sun—symbolize personal and collective destinies.
We are said to be in an “eclipse season” now, as eclipses come in twos or threes. There will be a lunar eclipse at the end of October.
In ancient times, people feared eclipses because it’s just plain scary to look up at the sky and see the Sun or Moon shadowed in red or hardly visible at all. The October 14 eclipse will be visible in parts of the United States, Mexico, and Latin America.
The October 14 eclipse will highlight Libran themes, including justice, aesthetic and value systems, and consideration for the needs of others.
For the most part, there’s nothing to fear during eclipse times, though they may be more emotionally fraught. Personally, this eclipse draws my attention more than others, for reasons particular to my chart. The Sun and Moon will conjoin my natal north lunar node in Libra, the north node having to do with what I am drawn toward and yet find to be challenging. I am currently in a period of time called a “nodal reversal.” The transiting south lunar node is conjunct my north node, and vice-versa, pressing on questions of how I can remain a fiercely assertive individual while also navigating a partnership. (Who said it was supposed to be easy?)
The Moon’s nodes shift gradually through the signs, in backward zodiacal order, on an approximately 19-year cycle. There was a solar eclipse in Libra in October 2004, back when I knew little about astrology. As I review that time in relation to my natal chart, I see how that eclipse coincided with one of my worst personal disasters. I will never pass that way again. But I am heeding the hint now to exercise caution. This is one of the beauties of astrology. Knowing the potential impact of an eclipse conjoined with my lunar nodal axis, I can make different choices now.
For everyone, at any lunation, the planetary alignments hint at how things might play out.
For the October 14 eclipse, Pluto will be playing a starring role. Pluto’s still in the final degrees of cardinal earth sign Capricorn, and making a tense square aspect with the Sun and Moon, as well as with the lunar nodes. Pluto represents power, both inwardly and outwardly directed. The square between Pluto and the already eclipse-intensified Libran Sun and Moon means: watch out for conflicts in all relationship realms.
One graceful feature here is that Mercury—the planetary force of perceptions, ideas and communications—is also in Libra at this time, close to the Sun and Moon. Mercury, while in airy Libra, is an inclusive thinker and careful communicator.
Even better is the mutual reception at play now. A mutual reception occurs when two planets pass through one of each other’s home or “exalted” signs. The two planets strengthen and bring out each other’s best possible manifestations. At this October 14 lunation, Mercury is moving through Venus’ socially engaged sign of Libra, while Venus, the dispositor (ruling planet) of the New Moon, is now in Virgo.
Venus in Virgo is a symbol of feminine (and by that, I don’t mean just for women) dedication to scrupulous ways of being: doing the right thing, for its own sake and not because anyone else says so. In recent days, Venus has been opposing Saturn, now in Pisces for the next couple of years.
Together, Venus in Virgo, opposite Saturn in Pisces, gives a clue for weathering the potential for emotional volatility during the October 14 eclipse. Saturn provides a kind of containment for the otherwise boundarilessness of Piscean love, to channel it into something enduring. All the while, Venus in Virgo—again, the ruler of the October 14 eclipse—invites readiness to relate with precision and skill, while not giving up on one’s personal sovereignty. Venus in Virgo is a force of independence, so much needed now.
Blessings for the Libra New Moon eclipse!
~Sara
Sara R. Diamond, an astrologer based in the San Francisco Bay Area, is a life-long student and practitioner in several esoteric paths. Her style of astrology combines modern-psychological astrology with insights from traditional astrology. Sara is also an estate planning attorney. In addition, she has published four books on right-wing movements in the United States and earned her Ph.D. in Sociology at the University of California, Berkeley. You are invited to contact Sara via her website at www.SaraDiamondAstrology.com.
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