♓ Moon Musings - Pisces Full Moon + Eclipse

It’s time for the BlissWitch blog section to get a little more personal!

This full moon in Pisces was revelatory in so many ways, gave clarity from several directions and allowed me to realize the aha! moment I’ve been subconsciously awaiting. So I’d like to share my personal experience with the Pisces Full moon, the eclipse, and Virgo Sun season.

♓I identify as Pisces - my sun sign & rising sign both dreamily float in Pisces. I only have those 2 placements in the sign of the fish, with Aries & Scorpio dominating the rest of my chart. Even so, I really am very Piscean. I’ve evolved out of the common stereotypical Pisces pitfalls - escaping, self-sacrificing, overly empathizing - but creating structure has always been a struggle for me. I’m never happier than when my creativity, my energy, my intuition & imagination can flow freely, without constraints, without boundaries. For a few years, this is where I’ve been stuck - actively banging my head against a wall trying to stuff all of my gifts into a box to turn out some kind of product, something from which my fellow humans will benefit, something that generates material sustenance. Does that sound like a Pisces to you? Because what this lunar eclipse revealed to me, is that I am not acting from a place of authenticity at all. I am not flowing my gifts, expressing my Piscean nature, giving my imagination free reign to flood my life with all the dreamy things that are real in my mind. Everything I’ve been doing is actually a shining example of what it looks like when a Pisces tries to be a Virgo.

♍I’m fascinated by the Virgo-Pisces axis, how it perfectly illustrates polarizing views on the best way to interact with this 3D Earth plane. In real talk – how we get shit done. And here comes the twist – my dad is a Virgo. Not only a Virgo, he’s the most Virgo Virgo I know. A lifelong mechanic & carpenter. Meticulously measuring then measuring again to be sure – like, literally with a tape measure, everything from where to install the screws for a shelf to go on the wall, to where to slice a 10lb roll of bulk ground beef so that every slice is precisely 1lb. Analyzing (overanalyzing), thinking (overthinking), strategizing, planning. And my very Virgo dad has always demanded very Virgo evidence. He has had such a powerful influence on me to get grounded, be realistic, produce results, make the money, work the hardest. Being the sensitive soul I am, I’ve always wanted to make him proud, but more than that, I’ve wanted his seal of approval.

If you had asked me 2 weeks ago how much I care about what my dad thinks of me, I would have said not a bit, not even on my radar, long ago I gave up trying to please him. I’m successful on my own terms, and that’s honestly good enough for me. But his Virgo way of thinking, his Virgo way of getting things done is so embedded in my bones, so engrained in my brain that I did not even see that I was dismissing everything I am, and trying to BE a Virgo.

💗 We’re on good terms, but have never been very close. He is my stepdad technically, but he’s the only father I’ve ever known, and he’s done a hell of a job raising a little monster like me. I had always hoped we’d get closer someday, that I could be more myself around him. When my mom passed away in January, she had one request – take care of dad. He had been her caretaker these last 20 years since she began experiencing an astonishing array of illnesses and chronic conditions, and we all wondered who he would be without her as his purpose. Honestly, he’s been a little lost I think. Grieving in a way that I can’t even fathom, and hope to never have to experience. They were soulmates, a perfect match. They challenged each other, they laughed at each other, they lifted each other, they perfectly complemented each other. And last week was his first birthday without her.

I did something quite out of character and invited myself to his house for a few days. I had a bit of a packed schedule, but I could not stand the thought of him being alone on his birthday, and mom’s spirit would not let me ignore that feeling. So I canceled my plans and made the trip. My teenager came along too – voluntarily! which was unexpected.

🎂Now this tricky part – how do we celebrate? And how do we spend 4 days together? It crossed my mind to do things mom used to do, but that felt wrong. He can’t eat the chocolate cake she used to make, his blood sugar would take weeks to get back to normal. He can’t eat the indulgent gourmet meal she would have made, he’d have heartburn for days. He likes projects, but can’t do much handyman stuff or yard work because of the heat. They I realized what I was doing – trying to Virgo the situation. Trying to over plan in hopes of compensating for a void in his life that’s impossible to fill. Trying to strategize and anticipate how he’d want to spend what would likely be a sad day no matter what we did. So I allowed my Pisces to come through.

I looked up a last-minute recipe for a mostly sugar-free no bake-pie (he freaking loved it!). I picked up a last-minute random family trivia game at the store when shopping for road-trip snacks (ended up being not only fun, it also sparked conversations). I grabbed a silly birthday crown, found the perfect card, and let go of the need to get him a gift because this man constantly complains about having too much of everything, and besides, my presence would be the present! *hair toss*

🧜‍♀️I did the best I could do, but I did it MY way, and it couldn’t have turned out better. We sat on the porch talking for hours, we left the trivia game open on the table and casually threw questions out at random times throughout the visit. We sang happy birthday, he watched his daughters and granddaughters have a dance party in his kitchen, we dried his herbs, we went to war with a swarm of horseflies, we laughed a lot, we talked about life, we watched the lunar eclipse together.

🌘Eclipses are a really funny energy. They break things down, they bring up memories long forgotten, they cast a very special light on things you didn’t know you were missing. They allow you to see what your soul needs to see. And it was a beautiful, almost poetic, convergence of energies - to zoom out and see how this very Pisces woman on a very Pisces full moon, watching a lunar eclipse with her very Virgo dad during Virgo season. If I had tried to do it his way, none of it would have ever been done. And that’s the aha!

Everything I’ve been trying to do, not only to build my business, but to express my gifts in general, has been unsuccessful because I’m trying to do it my dad’s way. In my defense, I’ve been trying his method because his method WORKS.

The catch is, it only works for him.

Everyone has their own nature, their own way of living, of getting things done, of chasing their dreams, of being in a relationship, of parenting, of doing human stuff. And anytime we do it in a way that is not fully authentic, it will fail. When I do things my way, I do succeed, every time. It feels like a breath of fresh air and a sign of relief all at once, like a rebirth into a new awareness and new surge of energy to stay committed to my dreams and goals, but to allow myself to freedom to do it MY WAY, for real this time.

🌬️It can’t be left unsaid that there was a very strong anchoring third energy at work during this adventure. There is something special, actually critical, in having a balancing element when polarized energies are trying to communicate. I’m a very watery water sign, my dad is a very Earthy Earth sign. As we sit on extreme ends of the axis we share, there has always been a balancing third energy – my mom was a Gemini, my sister is a Libra and my teenager is an Aquarius.  Goodness, do air signs lighten things up! Any extra water, and we’d all be floating in our feelings. Any extra Earth and we’d all be overly grounded. The masculine nature of Fire and Air do wonders to lift the spirits, keep the conversation going, make it fun for us feminine signs that are content to stew in our own stuff forevermore. It was a lovely balance of energies, but it wouldn’t have been, if everyone were busy trying to be someone they’re not.

🔄If you look at the people in your life, you’ve likely bumped into your polar opposite in a big way, or if not, you likely have these polarities within yourself. Aries-Libra. Taurus-Scorpio. Gemini-Sagittarius. Cancer-Capricorn. Leo-Aquarius. Virgo-Pisces. These people are not in our lives to show us how to live, they are in our lives because we anchor each other. It would be a pretty lame seesaw if we both sat on the same side. It’s more fun to sit on our own side and just play with each other. We balance each other. We teach each other. As we play on the seesaw of life, there’s a moment in each up-down cycle that we can see each other perfectly across the way, eye-to-eye. We don’t have to be the same to see each other. Actually I think we’re all here to experience each other's differences, and ultimately to experience ourselves as the entirety of creation in as many different facets as possible. But no one can experience your unique facet, your special one-of-a-kind personality, your essential nature, unless you are being YOU.

This is a lot of words, but I’m wordy. I’m a feeler not a writer, but I hope to get more concise, more well-spoken. Thank you for reading 😊

Bunches of love ~B

“Be you. Everyone else is taken.” ~Mac Miller