Today both the Sun and New Moon are in Cancer (exact at around midday). Remember that the moon rules Cancer – so this placement feels something like coming home.

The New Moon is a time of growth and beginnings – I for one am looking forward to ‘moving ahead’ after a few weeks of waning energy. I only wish I’d taken the time to clean out my wardrobe during the dark moon! If you haven’t already, there is still time this morning unclutter a few cupboards, or free some mental clutter via journalling, or some such.

A couple more points about the New Moon in Cancer:

This is apparently a very fertile time – if you are trying to conceive, give it a go. Otherwise, use protection!

And I know I’ve said it before (I’m sounding like a nagging mother now, how appropriate!) – but seriously, look after yourself. You’ll feel a lot better for it.

Venus joined the Sun in Cancer recently, and will be there until 13 July. At their best, Cancer is all lovely-nurturing-motherly-warm, and Venus shows us the beauty and pleasure of emotional self-care. So – take a leaf out of Astrobarry’s book and draw on these loving, motherly, feminine energies to take some RnR time.

Switch off the tv and listen to some soothing music. Take a warm scented bath. Book a massage. Go for a walk in the gentle wintry sunshine. Substitute healthful, nurturing food for that greasy takeaway. Snuggle with your loved one (be they significant other, family member, animal companion or best friend). Whatever your pleasure might be – give yourself permission, and then do it. I cannot emphasise this enough!

Rest is not laziness,
or torpor,
or sloth.
Rest is the arms of creation
around us,
holding us gently,
lovingly,
eternally.
It is the place of the womb.
Molly Vass

So – go forth and rest! You deserve it.

The sun moves into Cancer on or around on 21 June each year, where it will remain until around 22 July. After the dizzying search for truth ‘out there’ that is Gemini, we turn inwards. ‘A mammoth subjectivity animates this phase of the zodiac’, says Steven Forrest. To Cancer, ‘the fabric of the world… is feelings.’

The symbol for Cancer is the crab. The body of the crab is soft and squishy, defenceless. The crab must grow a shell to protect himself. ‘He must grow a wall between himself and nature’, Forrest says. ‘He is too delicate to protect himself otherwise.’

But we must not become confused by the metaphor of the crab’s shell. The lesson of Cancer is not about retreat, or walling oneself up inside a self-constructed citadel. ‘With this armour, the Crab endures,’ says Forrest. ‘But that success holds the seed of a perilous transformation. The Crab eats. He matures. And soon he outgrows his shell.’

Cancer is the fourth sign of the zodiac, and the first Water sign (following on from Aries – Fire, Taurus – Earth, and Gemini – Air). The Water element is expressed relatively straightforwardly through Cancer. Water speaks of nurturing and protection. About warmth and sensitivity. Most of all, Water teaches us to feel. ‘To feel consciousness, ‘ says Forrest. ‘To feel every nuance of life. To shed the shell of numbness that arms us against this slaughterhouse of a world.’

Cancer, then, has a lot to teach us. ‘To shed the shell of numbness that arms us against this slaughterhouse of a world.‘ You know how, every now and then, you hear something that cuts right to the heart of the issue? That speaks to how you feel, yourself, in your innermost heart? This is how this sentence struck me when I first read it. This is why it has stuck in my mind ever since.

For so many years I have travelled in this bubble of numbness, seeing it as my only protection against the horrors I see every day. I do not use this word casually, just as Forrest did not select ’slaughterhouse’ at random. You need only look around you to see. Jewel says it like this: ‘There are nightmares on the sidewalk. There are jokes on TV. There are people selling thoughtlessness with such casualty.’

How do we cope? How do we learn from Cancer – and not wall ourselves up inside a shell?

Forrest says that Cancer’s strategy is ‘to create the minimal defences consistent with survival‘ (emphasis his). Not an easy task, and certainly not one I pretend to fully understand. In this Cancerean month, though, I’m going to try.

Mercury stationed direct at 12:31 this morning. So – Mercury retrograde is officially over. Before you breathe a sigh of relief – ‘You do know that a planet’s retrograde cycle is most powerful as it stations direct or retro, do you not?’ says Mystic Medusa. Well, no – but now I do! Relief is in sight though – and today we have the practical Cap moon to help us along.

Onto the big astrological happenings over the weekend: basically, there are too many for my little brain to process! The (extremely) edited highlights: the Sun leaves chatty Gemini for motherly Cancer on Saturday morning. However, the moon is void-of-course all day Saturday, moving into Aquarius at around 7:30pm. So – think twice before making that big purchase, signing any important documents, or generally making decisions that you want to ‘take’.

Also on Saturday – and I am v. excited about this! – the Winter Solstice! AKA Yule, AKA the Shortest Night of the Year – from here on in, the days are lengthening, the darkness is receding, and the promise of spring (new beginnings) is in the air. Also – not waking up/coming home in darkness! Not now, sure, but soon! Bring it on!