Oh Ego, My Lionheart!

Leo Season & the Aquarius Supermoon

Today is the birthday of our Queen Mother, Kate Bush.

A Leo Sun born on an Aquarius Full Moon, Kate Bush was the most honored meme topic in our early Instagram days and remains an ever-long icon. Only appropriate to hold the Kate-inspired Sensual World zine release near the Full Moon of Kate’s Solar Return with a symposium + poetry party this Thursday at Argosy (more info on the FB invite and Eventbrite). All images and memes today in her honor!

August steps directly into neo-pagan Lughnasadh, a late Summer agricultural festival celebrating the abundance of harvest. While Sun-ruled Leo Season reigns, a pause of gratitude is acutely craved, even with the irony of the current heat intensity and the harrowing future of “global boiling”. While Venus and Chiron Retrograde simmer with Mercury soon back-spinning on August 23, we are dealing with a tense build-up and aftermath to the Sturgeon Moon. More on the current Astro Season and how it spars with Super Aqua Luna. 

7/22 - 8/23 LEO SEASON

As perhaps the most bold of Zodiac personalities, Leo has a rather regal reputation for being an impossible-to-ignore presence. The Lion’s trademark creative expression and public performer persona can also dip into the negative stereotypes most Fire Signs are burdened by:  prone to competition and jealousy or being hot-headed and reactive. Demonstrating these cliches for the Leo FFFA with Showgirls, beneath Leo’s glitter and grit dwells a big heart that prides on respect and honesty.

Charismatic, confident and true-to-herself, a loyal Leo fiercely loves her carefully chosen inner circle, yet tends to keep #1 at the forefront. Leo loathes self-betrayal, though an optimized Leo is diplomatic with decision making, encouraging equal playing ground for all. Leo’s diamond mindset doesn’t totally forgo center-of-attention charm as deprecation and denial can make Leo placements feel dead inside. Losing oneself creates more chaos than fostering a strong sense of Self. In this, the journey to find Healthy Ego is centric to Leo’s leadership role and range of seeing possibilities in everything instead of falling prey to Feast or Famine thinking. 

With discerning taste and attention to the “feeling” of interactions, the Lion has been the star of more than its Season lately. Venus Retrograde in Leo is a bold blessing for fine-tuning challenges around self-love AND increasing generosity, helped by Chiron Retrograde’s breakthroughs. However, deconstructing the “safety” in staying stuck or keeping oneself “small” to please a stagnant narrative or outside force is a bumpy road. Leo as a resource of inner light and love uses Inner Child vibrancy to connect, create and fight against injustices, even though sometimes they can be very “world revolves around me” like the Sun they are ruled by. To reach a level of giving and sharing requires the release of defense mechanisms that drive a wedge between empathy and understanding.

8/1 SUPERMOON IN AQUARIUS

With the Aqua Full Moon illuminating on Day One, August is book-ended by 2 Supermoons. 

Since Supermoons are closer to the Earth and the gravitational pull between them stronger, those who experience emotional effects from the Full Moon may find the August 1st Aquarius Supermoon exceptionally charged. Expressing emotion is not an Aquarian strong suit, yet this Supermoon overfloweths with discomfort, shining a bright light on the nuance we don’t include in our views. As an eccentric Air Sign, Aqua tends to be more collective-minded yet hypocritically can set themselves apart in their individualistic bubble. Against show-and-tell Leo Season, the intellectual Aquarian energies pushes an unintentional “We vs. Me” clash to the forefront. 

The Aquarius Supermoon is a challenge to the annoying attachments of being both perceived AND perceiving but pushes us to reframe our attention and revalue the heart of the matter.

As different as oddball Aquarius and loyal Leo may seem, they have countless similarities as iconoclastic taste-makers and conversation starters. At the ready to share either revolutionary ideas or hot takes, Aqua and Leo are very strong in their opinions, sometimes unmovingly so as Fixed Signs. In detriment this Astro Polarity can be:  overbearing and obsessive, highly prone to gossip, opinionated with an overindulgence in generalizations, judgmental while relying on too little information, quick to dismiss, insult or ghost. Underneath this behavior may be an underlying insecurity that many would not initially associate with either Sign. As they are masterminds of seeming sure of their feelings (Leo) or highly-informed (Aquarius), when the tables turn, those that talk shit do not want the shit talked back upon them.

Particularly sticky for hanging on how others feel about us and vice versa, this Supermoon wants us to let go of comparisons to and judgments about others. Reacting through the default of critique or conflict, the easy emo-vom of overwhelming Supermoon energies can too often become a blame game with difficulty to mind one’s own business. We are encouraged to put so many scenarios and people in a box with trendy therapy language and assumed identities, as living in a chronically online age where our perspective on anything and everything is an addictive blood-sport. 

Both the Leo Sun and Aquarius Moon square with Jupiter in Taurus, inflating stubbornness or helping us accept what stance we need to protect our peace or stay in our lane.

It would not be a surprise if hard-headed reactions abound the week leading up to and after this current cosmic stew:

We lean harder into quick viewpoints and absolutes about others to avoid authentic connection. We fear being judged so we judge first. Some may thrive in creating friction or feel safer with fictions they are familiar with. At times, situations will trigger our needs but we will blame others for not meeting them, whether it is their responsibility to or not. When people do not respond the way others want, insults feel easier than acceptance, extra so when the other party is assertive. Projection around this Supermoon is grotesquely possible while Saturn, Pluto, Neptune, Venus and Chiron are all Retrograde.

This is not a suggestion to “live and let live” when it comes to harm or hatred, but it is advice to keep your own side of the street clean and, above all, question why we need to control conversation. Unfortunately, this habitual culture of conflict inevitably carries over into our interpersonal relationships. Loved ones and enemies alike are often a mirror of what we hold dear or want to avoid seeing within ourselves. When we let relationships breathe instead of cave to the dreaded overthink, we move further away from behaviors made in anxiety, for attention, or out of sheer boredom.

Resisting to philosophize instead of just vibe is not the easiest task for the Aqua Moon agenda, but letting go of a need to be nosy, pedantic or “right” can be freeing. Disengaging is less about avoidance and more a lesson in self-reflection. Looking inward has powerful payoffs and is the most caring choice for starting the month with intention. Once learned, we can find our values once again and make bolder moves in our hopes for change, pursuit of creativity and more fulfilling relationships with others fostered in understanding.

After all, Aqua-Leo Duality loves to fuse life and art with exploration and expression. This Supermoon says “go forth with an open mind AND heart”, even when the terrain is wildly extraterrestrial. Revolutionize from loops of over-intellectualizing or false pride (or false humility!) and allow some joy in the idea that we are on this unknown life together. It’s like the best Leo Sun / Aqua Moon says: