How are you doing bb? I’m going to be honest: I’m feeling scattered as hell. Getting this missive out of me was a struggle. But when I finally sat down to focus and type, a tiny chirping sparrow flew onto my fire escape. Birds are always my cue to keep going, that I’m in transition but everything’s going to be alright. (Also, as a side note, I keep waking up to chirping birds…in February. Oh winter, where art thou?)
My state of mental overwhelm is pretty apropos for the current astrology: the moon is in Aquarius with Mercury and Pluto, squaring Jupiter in Taurus. So many thoughts about the future, but is there a comfortable place to put any of them? The moon acts as a cosmic spotlight and this time what it’s lighting up is the route to the future. Omens are everywhere even if they’re hard to decipher. Aquarius challenges us to go against the usual flow so that we can conduct our experiments in peace. When we get the results, we’ll either let you know about them, or let them disappear into the abyss. A lot of my struggle today was around the question: “Is this an experiment worth sharing?”
What’s more important: being consistent or being profound? Or, is there a difference? I get annoyed with people who get away with rarely sharing, who are met with praise and adoration when they show up without an RSVP. As someone who shares a lot, I’ve come to accept that opening the shop everyday is appreciated, but not met with applause. There’s also more room for criticism when you’re consistent. Your audience knows when you’re on the top of your game and also when you’re phoning it in. There’s also an assumed status when you commit to showing up too. The struggle is masked by the virtuosity of presence.
“She must be doing ok,” they all think. “She’s here, isn’t she?”
According to my self-imposed editorial schedule, I’m meant to write to you today about the Balsamic Moon. But as I tried to gather my thoughts, I found my mind spinning in circles. Part of me felt uninspired. Another part felt unprepared. When I’m feeling particularly scattered like this, I convince myself that before I can even gather my thoughts on something, I have to read an entire book on the subject first. Just to make sure. I think this comes from my fear of not having enough expertise. The anxious storm of triple checking is only quelled by actually sitting down to write. When I’m in the flow, I know that what’s interesting isn’t the answers but the questions. The point isn’t being “right.” It’s more interesting to show than to tell. I remember that my ancestors were farmers, but I don’t want to run a content farm. (Though I would like a rooftop hydroponic garden someday.)
It’s strange that writing about the Balsamic Moon of all things put me into such a panic because truly, this is a topic I could write about in my sleep. If you’ve been around for a while, you know that the balsamic moon is the end of the lunar cycle: the last few days of reflection, distillation and integration before the new moon. The best thing to do is float, close things out, and tidy up your space. But also: when all else fails, take a nap. It’s permission to get it together or let it all fall apart.
As my mind kept twisting yesterday, I took a walk to calm down on another suspiciously sunny day, (again, wherefore art thou winter?) and came across this poem, displayed in front of a house in Ditmas Park; an oracular blessing if you will:
Yes
Burden and blessing—
two blossoms
on the same branch
To be so lost
in this radiant wilderness
- Gregory Orr
The poem made me think about the quality of all dark moons, which is both the balsamic phase and the new moon phase that comes after it. There are a few days in every lunar cycle where there’s absolutely zero moon in the sky. This is when the sun holds the moon in her cradle. When we can imagine, if only for a moment, that something we want is something we already have. The beauty and the horror of that.
Not only do we experience these dark phases collectively each month, but we all go through them in our personal cycle over the course of about five years. (To figure out when your dark phase was, use this tool and identify the years of the Progressed Balsamic Moon and Progressed New Moon—make sure to set the date back to see the past). The progressed balsamic phase is when life feels like “Closing Time.” Dane Rudhyar wrote of it, “The painter doesn’t paint. Guru loses his followers.” It’s a time of gestation. But focused growth doesn’t always mean obscurity. Timothée Chalamet’s progressed balsamic phase was his journey to become a movie star: cast in Call Me By Your Name at the dark phase onset in 2016, and finishing filming the first Dune movie in 2019 as it came to an end.
On the other end of the spectrum, Mike White’s progressed balsamic phase was a lot darker. White had a nervous breakdown while working as the showrunner of a FOX sitcom, ironically called Cracking Up. But this break led him down a spiritual path (and a health journey) that years later inspired his (imo) greatest work, Enlightened. Sometimes the balsamic phase is a dark night of the soul, but ultimately, it leads us somewhere more aligned. My own balsamic phase included its own breakdown but is also the story of me becoming an astrologer.
All these threads of stories in mind, what I thought I’d do today was write something definitive about this balsamic phase. I wanted to package it up and deliver it with the ease of an Emily Mariko video in a neat little box. But, I’m not sure the balsamic moon can ever be a neat little package. I’m not sure I’m meant to package things.
Austin Coppock calls Aquarius III (where today’s New Moon in Aquarius takes place) The Knot because it’s a place where we commit to the great untangling, or cut the whole thing off. Consistent or not, the point is to leave them wanting more, right? To say it all from within a beautiful tangled mess or say nothing at all. I want to show up as who I am now, not who I planned to be. Met with excessive admiration or not, I think it’s worth opening the shop.
good fortune will have its 48th episode this week!!! (Lucky number for me).
Catch up on the forecast.
I have a few openings left for February! Book a reading.
I am very committed to moon missives. Often, it softens some edges that were sharp during a good fortune forecast, and to that, I listen at least twice a week. I feel like I was raked over the big holes side of a cheese grater all of 2023. You were so lovely about it. "Only a few more pinch points. Oh look, Jupiter is in the fray keeping the worst outcomes at bay. Of course you feel like a dried-up exoskeleton...so many planets in Scorpio! Oh, you really should be paying attention to Scorpio Rising." 2024 will be better but... But THANK you! By listening to the weekly forecast and bolstering all with moon missives, I finally insist on tiny chunks of life, agree to nap, redefined sweet energies for a sexagenarian, sometimes feel a part of the throng that is bewildered by contemporary weather patterns, and I have a new appreciation of the balsamic moon. And it has been such a relief to go watery and emo rather than Libra enforced gaiety. I think you are the only "influencer" in my life. You are great. I'll keep coming back.