Why Does My Head Feel Like It's Gonna Explode?!

An Addendum to Fear-Mongering and the Eclipse

There’s a moment right before water boils where it teeters between states, the build of energy suspended like a tsunami preparing to roil. It’s a liminal space, a catch that precedes the inevitable. Eclipse season is like that.

Okay, I have to be honest, words are not gonna come across like we want them to this week. I’m trying to make a metaphor here and it’s just not panning out—where did I even start this thought? Personally, my brain is not functioning clearly or concisely or even in any significant way at all. But I wanted to get some things across to anyone interested in knowing what the astrology of the moment looks like, and how we might take some comfort in it.

I wrote in this article about what’s happening with both Venus and Mercury (and this one particularly about Venus) in retrograde periods and how that lends to the confusion of the moment (the titular, “head feeling like it’s going to explode” situation). You can read those articles for more details about what you might experience, and some advice for how to move through it and process. I wrote about the collision of the past and present, the power we can find in grief, and the tools unexpected expressions of art can provide.

I also talked in this one about fearmongering in astrology, briefly mentioning why eclipses are often unduly feared. It’s natural for humans to find discomfort in such reversals of celestial orders—ie, the luminaries of the sun and the moon being darkened to our eyes by shadow. But eclipses happen all the time, like at least four times a year (sometimes more; 2020 indeed had a total of six). They tend to go in a solar lunar solar lunar (or vise versa) pattern, because they’re simply marking moments when earth’s path aligns with those luminaries’ paths. They’re not always intense for everyone; it very much depends on an individuals chart or even their location in the world. Eclipses’ expression by the Zodiac are also not independent occurrences, but happen on a cyclical, ever-occurring basis that can be seen from Earth, following planets across the belt of associated constellations visible on the same plane as our solar system’s orbit.

This specific eclipse season (the time of and in between the lunar and solar eclipse of one cycle, see the diagram below for reference) feels really intense for a lot of reasons, but in my opinion it has to do with its location near the equinox. Spring is already a time of a lot of change and restlessness, and the now massively globalized world documents and spreads human fears to every corner of the planet. There’s a lot of upheaval happening, but talk to any elder and they can tell you the world has always been that way. What’s important isn’t that there is some kind of unprecedented transformation taking place, but that we must to have values that can transform with the times. We must to make communities that take of each other, that have empathy for different ways of living, that distribute wealth and labor so we can all do what we dream. It might be a lofty goal, if you are thinking about it like, attempting world peace or something. Did you know you can just start small? Start in your home. Start in your connections with others. Start in your commitment to yourself.

You might hear this is a time of new beginnings. And it is—like any spring. Plant your seeds, the ones whose fruit you long for, and know that time will take care of the growing.

graphic done by me in procreate!

I post about astrology, tarot, and other occult related things, and I do personalized divination and commission based art. Follow me if you are interested, and on Instagram and TikTok @ponderfoxobscura, or visit my website, theponderfoxobscura.wordpress.com!