January Horoscopes

Astrology of January
Current Configurations
Past Months

Aries	Libra
Taurus	Scorpio
Gemini	Sagittarius
Cancer	Capricorn
Leo	Aquarius
Virgo	Pisces

January 2012

Current Astrology

	The Sun is in Aries
	The Quarter Moon is in LeoThe First Quarter Moon is in Leo: All day
	Next Mercury Retrograde Apr 21 - May 14

January Horoscopes

by Henry Seltzer

The Astrology of January features Mercury, Jupiter, Chiron, Uranus and Pluto. As we enter another radically transformative year, these powerful symbols are very much focalized. The Christmas Eve New Moon from the last week of December strongly aspected these four outer planets, continuing the trend from the fall, so that the significant archetypal energies of Zeus/Jupiter, lord of death and radical transformation/ Pluto, plus the Wounded Healer/Chiron and Prometheus or the Trickster/Uranus are very much in evidence in our individual lives, and in the life of the surrounding collective. That New Moon in early Capricorn was conjunct Pluto as well. What this looks like will depend on us, but we might imagine further surprises and opportunities for transformational growth and enlightenment, as our inner wounding becomes both more drastically activated also as a consequence more apparent to our conscious thought process.

The chart for the New Year, midnight on December 31st, is quite interesting. This chart can be thought of as an indicator for the entire year to come, and it features the Sun and Moon in square with each other, and occupying the signs of Pluto and Uranus as their forming square gets underway, to complete the first pass of a total of seven on June 24th. We will therefore have Uranus-Pluto with us throughout the remainder of the decade. As for the climactic and powerful year of 2012, the beginning of these intense years still to come, the fact that the First Quarter Moon square exists in this New Year�s Eve chart is indicative of a highly contentious year, as symbolized also by the powerful outer planet energies that are currently configured.

We could add dreamy Neptune as well as stern and unforgiving Saturn to the above list as the year gets underway. Saturn is stationing in early February in close trine with Neptune, while Neptune is conjunct both to Chiron and also to the January 22nd New Moon. Neptune is also changing signs, entering its own sign of Pisces in that same early February time frame. Thus, all the outer planets are extremely active in this important year of 2012.

This year is likely to be very intense and is of course made even more so by the mythology that has risen up in our culture surrounding these numbers of 2012, we have an opportunity to tune in and really think about where we are going and why, both in our individual lives and in terms of the surrounding collective. It is well to remember that our every thought and action has a ripple effect throughout the increasingly larger concentric circles of societal connection that surround us: friends and family, community, state or province, country, world and cosmos.

In the current month, the very potent Full Moon of late evening, January 8th on the American West Coast, early morning January 9th elsewhere, features a yod to Mars from Venus and the heavily aspected newly named �dwarf� planet Eris, plus the Moon in contra-parallel to Pluto, so that the potential for anger or at the very least strong determination is there, plus the transformational changes implied by Uranus-Pluto. Mercury in the second degree of Capricorn aspects the same trinity of outer planets as did the late December New Moon in Capricorn, namely Chiron, in conjunction with Neptune, Uranus and Jupiter. There are brilliant ideas now in plenty, and they come at the right time, for creative and compassionate solutions and �out of the box� thinking might be just what is needed now as we try to get it right for this climactic month and year.

The New Moon of Sunday, January 22nd also aspects these three planets, so that it kicks off another very intense lunation cycle is that will take us into February. Mars turns retrograde the next day, January 23rd, and the sign of Virgo is the scene of even more internal reflection as symbolized by normally outgoing Mars turning inward. The Mars retrograde period takes place in the sign of Virgo and lasts until mid-April. February also features Neptune�s entrance into Pisces followed by Saturn�s stationing retrograde itself in almost exact trine with Neptune, a few days later at the time of the February 7th Full Moon. Saturn with Neptune implies grounded spiritual activity in support of high ideals, perhaps in the form of peaceful protest, or else mislaid idealism bordering on illusion that can sidetrack concrete plans and turn negative thinking and vocal criticism into deceptive propaganda.

With Uranus and Pluto emphasized at the very beginning of the year, and completing the first exact hit of their square aspect in June, this year is bound to be an extremely potent one, picking up where the intensity of 2011 left off and taking even further this past summer�s revolutionary energy for necessary change. We can work with this energy, promoting radical transformation as needed in our own lives, and in the life of the society that surrounds us. We win when we choose to be part of the solution rather than remaining outside of the flow of history and increasingly irrelevant to it.