Leo - wearing your heart on your sleeve

Being ourselves (Leo New Moon) requires radiating our naturalness into our world, radiating our truth. This month, we may well find the courage, even personal pride, to do that (Sun/Moon trine Uranus in Aries) but we will need to stay in touch with our emotions, and remember to be caring and compassionate to ourselves and others (Jupiter in Cancer square Uranus). A tone of voice may express a lot, but we also need to know what may be behind it and whatever else may be there.

We need to speak our truth because unspoken resentments and hurt remain in us, and get expressed unconsciously, in a judgemental tone or through strange obstructive behaviour - ‘passive aggression’. We can speak it kindly and with respect for the person who has to hear it. To radiate from the heart may be our intention, but to express the heart’s sweetness we still have to get through the clouds of old reactive emotion that obscure it (Mars in Cancer trine Chiron). So ultimately we have to just go for it, and risk that our radiance may be tainted, or simply misunderstood. To really be our true vulnerable self is only possible when we love ourselves enough to withstand our inner fears of rejection (Venus opposes Chiron).

Speaking out

When you speak out, be prepared to discover that your reaction may not be appropriate to what’s really going on (Chiron in the huge triangle of plants in water signs). It could be an out-of-date reaction that you didn’t express at the time when it was relevant! That reaction is not really your truth NOW, and it may not be safe to vent at the time when it’s triggered, nor at the person who inadvertently triggered it. Such a reaction can be safely spoken about only if we own all the emotion, directing none of it with the speech - really hard to do in the moment it arises!

And yet speaking out whatever arises offers the space for connection (Venus sextiling Mars in Cancer). When we keep these things inside, we risk separating ourselves more completely from loved ones, than any amount of honesty would achieve. Communicating emotion is a risk, but this month staying with the results of what we say, and continuing to communicate, can bring about permanent repair, healing and growth in our relationships (Jupiter in Cancer opposite Pluto).

Not everyone though is up for this depth of sharing, so the position of others needs to be respected - without compromising our own inner sense of rightness.

The truth sets us free

Your truth NOW is a deep feeling sense that your body agrees with. The ‘right’ word to describe your present true state will elicit a felt response throughout your cells, such that you may take a deeper breath, or adjust your posture, stretch, laugh or cry. Our personal truth, when brought to consciousness, frees our muscles and allows life to flow through previously stuck places in body, emotions and mind. Your truth will be more easily accessed through your heart than your head.

‘Necessity is the mother of invention’ - have courage

One of the gifts of Saturn in Scorpio (Saturn is approaching the North Node) is the gift of limitation that spurs our creativity on. I’ve put a link at the top of this letter to Paul Hanson’s 10-minute TED talk. Paul is an artist, and he demonstrates how his limitations have enabled him to create in wonderfully new ways - as long as he ‘embraces’ the limitationn, rather than letting himself feel limited.

For the next couple of months (Saturn reaches the North Node mid-September) we have the opportunity to explore our own natural limitations, often those things that we use to justify not following our dreams. We will need to look past any judgements about them, in order to see how we may move forward in ways that include them, rather than giving in to the feeling that they hold us back.

Paul Hanson speaks of eventually letting go of outcomes, failures and imperfections - showing us how letting go of results altogether, enabled him to find a new liberation (Uranus). This month offers an opportunity for all of us to find new ways to be ourselves (Leo New Moon trine Uranus in Aries). For instance, if you love colours and painting spaces, but are not allowed to paint the rooms where you live, perhaps offer to help friends refresh their places. If you are more a listener than an entertainer, rather than feeling you have nothing to offer, enjoy bringing your friends together to entertain each other. Do what you enjoy!

Have no fear for the future - live only today

Live today. We are well aware that living in the past is not a good idea, but what about the living we do in the future? On a material level, we need to do a certain amount of planning for tomorrow. But those plans need to be flexible, and we need to be prepared to adjust or drop them when the time comes. Perhaps, like me, when thinking about your plans, you tend to wonder how things will go, imagining how the different possibilities will feel. Maybe one of those feelings changes what you decide to do, perhaps fearing an outcome and so not doing something that felt good a moment before. This is trying to live in the future. It feels draining and creates tension and anxiety. Hopes, expectations, dreams, all take us away from what is here now, which is all we truly have.

Plans are mental constructs that are not meant to carry emotion or energy. Emotion and energy are about living now. So when you make plans, put no emotional investment into them, just write them in your diary ahead, and then turn the page back again. Do the work towards bringing the plans to fruition, but focus only on the relevant bit of that work today - things may unfold differently from how you thought. All we have to live is this moment, now. We don’t have to live tomorrow, or next year, or when we get older, or when things may go wrong - or right. I find this thought immensely freeing!

. . . an exercise to try

There is a little planetary ‘thing’ that perhaps is offering a chance to focus, in a calm uninterrupted way, to focus on being in touch with life itself (un-aspected Mercury in Cancer). Try being where you are and focussing on your surroundings. Let your attention be focused and yet open, wide and receptive, responsive with the whole of yourself. Eventually you may find that the outside and the inside somehow feel the same - the energy of life moving, irrespective of boundaries. We are connected, not separate - oh, joy! Remain located in your body, allowing your loving heart to receive, and you will remain strong even though expanded, containing all that is . . .

Shine on!

The sign Leo is ruled by the sun, heart of the solar system, heart of personality, the beating heart in the body. The sun’s energy is expressed most clearly during Leo times. Its light is reflected off everything material in the colours we see, glittering off water, shining at night from the moon, reflecting from windows, mirrors and metal. And in people, we see it sparkling in the eyes of those who are awake to their own spirit and allowing it to shine through the heart into their world.