The New Moon in Libra

Last night, Saturday 10 October, at 11:50 Perth time, ten minutes before midnight, the Moon was new at 17 degrees of Libra.

So a new cycle began while you were asleep, and it began in the sign of the scales. Three weeks ago the equinox asked you to find the middle.

Two weeks ago the Aries Full Moon asked you what YOU want. Last Sunday, Venus turning retrograde asked you to review everything you love.

And now the Moon asks you to plant something.

That is the whole shape of spring so far, and the New Moon is where it goes into the ground.

A New Moon in Libra is about the other person. Partnership, marriage, the business partner, the friend you have known thirty years, the neighbour, anybody you have to weigh yourself against to get along.

Libra’s question is always the same.

What would be fair here?

And most of us answer it badly, because we answer it for the other person and forget to include ourselves in the weighing.

Here is the unusual thing about this particular New Moon, and it is the teaching.

Venus, the planet that rules Libra, is retrograde.

So the sign that governs partnership is being asked to begin something, at the exact moment its own planet is walking backwards over the last few months of every partnership you have. It is an instruction, and it goes like this.

Plant the intention.

Do not sign the contract.

A New Moon under a Venus retrograde is the right time to decide what a fair relationship would look like, what you would give, what you would ask for, where the line is. It is the wrong time to lock those terms in, because Venus is going to show you things about the relationship between now and mid November that you cannot see yet.

Decide the shape.

Leave the details open.

Here is what I have noticed in forty years of watching people do this. The people who rush the beginning, who propose, sign, move in or go into business in the first flush of a new cycle, are usually trying to stop themselves from looking too closely.

And the people who never begin at all, who wait for a perfect moment that never comes, are doing the same thing from the other side. The New Moon asks for the middle, which is very Libra.

Begin.

Then keep your eyes open while Venus does her work.

I wrote a while ago about half circle relationships and full circle ones, the ones that come back around to be completed and the ones that end where they end.

A New Moon in Libra during a Venus retrograde is the classic time for a half circle to come back around. Somebody from the past turns up, or an old arrangement asks to be renegotiated.

If that happens this fortnight, treat it as information rather than a signal to go back. It is a chance to finish the conversation properly this time, and then decide.

One more thing about this morning.

At 5:31 today, Sunday 11 October, just before sunrise, Venus and Mars squared off across the sky, Venus in Scorpio, Mars in Leo.

What you want against what you agreed.

So today of all days you might feel the pull between the deal you made and the thing you actually want, and it can come out as a small sharp argument about nothing.

Notice it, name it, and let it be the first piece of evidence in the review rather than the last word.

So here is the practice for this New Moon, and it runs for the fortnight.

Pick one relationship.

Write down, in one sentence each, what you give it, what you ask of it, and what would be fair.

Do not show anybody.

Put the paper away, and take it out again on 14 November when Venus turns direct.

You will be surprised how much of it you would change by then, and that is the point. Which relationship are you planting something in this fortnight?

There is more teaching like this in The Library, and every daily post is in Daily Posts. If you would like guidance on your own path, see Readings.