Capricorn Full Moon: July 3
The Capricorn Full Moon at 7:38AM ET on July 3, is inviting us to create a safe(r) space through constructing a container of care. Whether that's in our external environment, our home and with those we live with, or within ourselves in the inner realm of our emotions and thoughts. The polarity of cardinal earth and water work together in Cancer season to connect us with the felt truth of our experiences. The little crab needs to know it will be held and cared for through life's big storms. That may sound like a big ask, but Cancer is the archetype of the Divine Nurturer, who’s just waiting to wrap its arms around you in tender embrace. Capricorn’s mission is to hold the space for the love to flow forth.
The Sun’s journey through the Moon’s water sign of Cancer from June 21-July 22, connects us with compassion. For ourselves and the wider world. Cancer is the season of the empath or highly sensitive person; someone who has a heightened capacity to feel and understand themselves and others from an emotional point of view. Highly sensitive people (HSP) have sensory processing sensitivity (SPS) a condition characterized by greater reactivity of the central nervous system and deeper cognitive processing of physical, social, and emotional stimuli. Studies have approximated that between 15-20% of the population have SPS traits. Of course, heightened emotional reactivity can have both positive and negative outcomes. The sign of Cancer is a great study in what’s wonderful and difficult about being a sensitive soul in a tumultuous world. More people have started identifying as empaths in the last several decades, but science has been slow to verify the numbers.
Empaths are people who are strongly impacted on an emotional level by what happens in their external environment. They feel things bigger and deeper than others. This is both a gift and a challenge. Sympathy is offering condolences when someone is suffering, but empathy is the ability to relate or imagine what it must be like to go through such pain. Empaths are better able to place themselves in another person’s position and therefore are more likely to consider the emotional impact of their own actions. Compassion and increased empathy are goals of spiritual development and hallmarks of peacemakers, but they can make it difficult to feel well adjusted to a violent society.
Empaths have long been connected with psychic ability in the way they can perceive and identify other people’s feelings without any information being communicated directly. This is a talent that all water signs have (Sun, Moon, ASC), but some feel it more acutely and use it with more alacrity. Cancers intuitively understand the conditions needed for their loved ones to feel reassured and held. Their love language is creating that quality of experience for people to bond. The Capricorn Full Moon is illuminating what's required to grow the intimacy Cancer craves.
Cancer is ruled by the Moon and evokes the truth of our bodies. Our emotional needs and wants and our desire for acceptance and belonging, especially in our families and social networks. During Cancer season we consider where we fit in, if we feel cherished, and what connections we want to nurture so they grow stronger. The impulse of the Cancerian crab to hide away in its shell is demonstrative of how empaths can find the world too intense. It's easy to become overwhelmed and withdraw when so many heartbreaking things happen all the time. Over the Capricorn Full Moon weekend, we’re encouraged to rest, recuperate, and recharge as much as needed.
The Sun in Cancer is moving from a trine with Saturn in Pisces and a sextile with Jupiter from June 28-July 1, reminding us of the connection between our emotions and the Earth. The Earth is ensouled by a higher dimensional being, Gaia, and we are her children. We are Gaia-beings made of her form and what happens to Gaia is felt in our bodies. Cancer season highlights our interconnected nature. It raises awareness of the inherent web of creation and invokes the indigenous wisdom concept of all my relations:
“‘All my relations,’ means all. When a speaker makes this statement it’s meant as recognition of the principles of harmony, unity and equality. It’s a way of saying that you recognize your place in the universe and that you recognize the place of others and of other things in the realm of the real and the living. In that it is a powerful evocation of truth…Because when you say those words you mean everything that you are kin to. Not just those people who look like you, talk like you, act like you, sing, dance, celebrate, worship or pray like you. Everyone. You also mean everything that relies on air, water, sunlight and the power of the Earth and the universe itself for sustenance and perpetuation. It’s recognition of the fact that we are all one body moving through time and space together." -Richard Wagamese, Ojibwe Canadian author and journalist from the Wabaseemoong Independent Nations in Northwestern Ontario
As the principle of cause and effect, Saturn reveals the impact of our actions. It can foreshadow the future or simply get us current with the here and now. The recent catastrophes in water from overfishing causing the extinction of coral reef sharks, to the orca uprising, and the absurd tragedy of OceanGate and its ties to oil and gas drilling, serve as a reminder that exploitative and dominating behavior towards the ocean and its creatures is not just unsustainable, but may bring about our immediate human demise.
The All My Relations podcast hosted by indigenous artists and activists, Matika Wilbur and Adrienne Keene, is an platform that shares sustainable solutions and supports leadership of Native peoples. Saturn’s journey through Pisces is sure to transform our perspective on land and sea from now till 2026. We should expect even more to surface from the abyss during Cancer season in the coming years.
The Full Moon at 11°18 Capricorn, ruled by Saturn in Pisces, is testing our emotional intelligence and asking us to take responsibility for our needs and reactions. The concept of Emotional Intelligence is having its Saturn return. “EQ” first rose to popularity when Saturn was last in Pisces in 1995, when Daniel Goleman published Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More than IQ.
Saturn unlocks doors and during its return takes us to the next level of mastery and responsibility. In this case, that's whatever developed from January 1994-April 1996. We're invited to consider the ways society's relationship to emotions has shifted over the last 30 years, and how we measure up in managing our own empathic impulses.
Saturn entered Pisces on March 7, 2023, and stationed retrograde at 07°13 on June 17, having reached its farthest distance for the year. It will now transit back through the first decan of Pisces until November 4, reviewing what we’ve learned. Saturn seeks to order the space it moves through and is bringing more structure to the amorphous watery sign of Pisces. Emotional intelligence is the perfect way to evaluate where we’re a little blurry about boundaries and behaviors.
EQ is defined as the ability to understand and handle your own emotions, as well as recognize the feelings of those around you. The premise was hailed as inherently feminist for valuing sensitivity and intuitive ways of knowing, while also emphasizing the importance of taking responsibility for one’s reactions and the impact of our behaviors.
There are four core tenants of Emotional Intelligence:
Self-awareness: the ability to recognize your emotions and the effect they have on you.
Self-management: the ability to manage emotions and process them at appropriate times.
Social awareness: The ability to read the room and recognize the emotional dynamics at play.
Relationship management: one’s ability to influence, coach, and mentor others, and resolve conflict effectively.
Capricorn is the ultimate manager. We’re encouraged to consider these four cores over as theSun and Mercury trine Saturn in Pisces from June 28-30, and then conjoin in Cancer on July 1. Mercury’s exterior conjunction with the Sun at 09°09 Cancer at 1:06AM ET on July 1, marks the midway point between the last Mercury retrograde in Taurus and the upcoming cycle in Virgo in August-September. The interplay between water and earth is present as we consider whether we have enough resources to peer into our shadowy depths. The Mercury-Sun cazimi in Cancer is helping us to see what’s true so that we can give ourselves (or ask for) what we need.
Questions to consider: can you identify what you’re feeling and the cause? Is this assessment something you’re able to do in the moment? Does it take time to process–maybe you’re only able to understand what was evoked after the fact? Is it clear the effect your emotions have on you (e.g. if you suffer from depression are you able to see the role that difficult family dynamics are contributing to your condition)?
The Moon is in fall in Capricorn where it can experience a withholding of affection. It's easy to get depressed when it feels like no one cares for us and they never have. The Sun in Cancer wants to create more nourishment and support, but Saturn in Pisces is pointing to where there are emotional tears in our energetic fabric. Where we need stronger boundaries, to put ourselves first, and greater support.
The Capricorn Full Moon is proving a piercing insight into our emotional self management: how, when, and with who we process our feelings. Are these safe and emotionally available people? Identification of emotions is an important first step, but emotional maturity involves actually processing our feelings to get the information encoded in the reaction. Saturn wants us to access these riches at a time and place when it’s safe and appropriate.
Watch out for the emotional hangover during this time. When we have big feelings there can be an over-identification with our emotions. Its easy to believe they are the truth of what we are. Most people don’t say, “I’m experiencing sadness,” we say, “I am sad.” Being emotional has been labeled as dangerous, weak, and bad by the patriarchy, and part of our work in the great awakening is healing this wound.
Cancer season reminds us that feelings are an important part of who we are and to suppress, repress, or deny them will lead to disaster and disease. Saturn is offering the counterpoint that if we let our feelings run the show our life can become as chaotic and dramatic as the ocean on a stormy day.
At the Capricorn Full Moon, consider what your super sensitive skills have got/taught you and where you’d like to create more stability, within and with others, to access your empath magic.