At 2:44 am Pacific time on December 21st, 2016, the Sun arrived at it’s farthest point south of the equator, which officially brings in the season of Winter (and consequentially the Summer Solstice in the Southern Hemisphere).  This signals a solstice point (literally, a Solar Standstill) where the Sun rises in virtually in the same point and sets in the same point for 3 days.  No matter the calendar one uses, the standstill point is the standstill point regardless of the name of the month.  This is one of 8 points (4 seasons and 1 mid-point in each season known as the cross-quarters) in the solar year that can be used to mark the beginning/end to the solar year and one of the more well-known to be used this way.

Each solstice features either minimal light or maximal light, depending where you are located on the Earth.  But we could also look at it from the point of view of shadow or darkness.  So winter

December Solstice 2016

would be maximum darkness at the beginning of the season and summer minimal darkness.  The Winter Solstice has a powerful symbolic meaning every year, which is the “birth/rebirth of the Sun” or “birth/rebirth of the light”.  It is not a coincidence, of course, that Christmas (Son of God or Sun of God) falls where it does so close to the solstice point.  We all celebrate Solstice/Christmas (or however one chooses to name it) in our own way.  The holiday point’s origins go as far back as humanity’s awareness of the Sun’s see-saw journey north and south beyond the equator (setting on the equator at each equinox).   It marks a time of reflection, consolidation and preparation for the next year.  It’s also a time of celebrating the rebirth of the light (just as summer could be celebrated as the rebirth of the darkness).

This year at December Solstice, we find Mercury (in Capricorn) 3 days into it’s retrograde movement still hanging very close to the dwarf planet Pluto as if the messenger-trickster is flirting with Kali or Pele herself as the speedster slowed to it’s own standstill (from our perspective) before beginning to move backwards toward the Sun and become hidden from view in the Underworld.  In that sense Kali becomes an initiator into the ways of shadow, death & rebirth, surrender and ultimately empowerment.  Uranus (in Aries) and Jupiter (in Libra) are dancing opposite each other while both looking at Pluto (in Capricorn) between then, as if each of them is inviting the Underworld goddess herself into their electric tango.  That will be a general theme for 2017 as well.

• Uranus is exactly opposite Jupiter December 26, 2016, March 2, 2017 and September 27, 2017
• Jupiter is exactly square Pluto November 24, 2016, March 30, 2017 and August 4, 2017

That alignment of planets is the most prominent of this solstice period.  The energy is radical, otherworldly, dark and shadowy, greatly spirited with an embrace of the pearl of personable relationship.  The “surreal” year or what I like to call (we entered) bizzaro-world in 2016 is in the aftermath of the 3-year Uranus-Pluto square (2012-2015) which is completely redefining humanity by shaking up the world, allowing all of the dirt to come to the surface, revolutionizing technology so we can truly see everything like never before.  The inner mechanisms of economic, social and political systems are laid bare for the world to see.  It’s almost impossible to avoid looking at it.  We can now see the soul debris of a hundred generations at this crossroads.  These planets and their alignments are our guides and navigators should we choose to listen, see and feel into their messages.

This solstice let’s take a look and reflect upon not just the past year but years before so we can see our personal patterns, the patterns of our cultures, communities and nations. It is not a time for business as usual unless that business is effective and healthy change.    We are in the “cleaning and renovating the house” stage of this Turning of the Ages where we see behind and under the furniture, the attic and the basement clutters, the state of wiring and plumbing and the it opens up cans to see the family dynamics in the actions, which require cooperation, care and understanding that some things have to be let go to invite other things into our lives.  We are creating humanity’s new story, but in doing that, the old story must be read, understood and integrated in a healthy way where it stops “drawing” from us, unconsciously running our lives.  Here at the solstice, between the worlds of death and life, we can all see the depth of our being and that as a collective.  The new story wants to be written.  In fact, it is an inevitability.

For those of us who are feeling a sense of powerlessness in these times, it is natural to have that feeling.  It is one of the clues and markers on the way to becoming more empowered in our lives.  Here at the solstice, feel those feelings, follow the thread about where the feeling comes from, what shadow or dark spot does it root down in our soul.  That spot is important.  Honor it as it lives inside you and no one else.  Without acknowledging it, we can let it control our lives.  But there is a deeper wound that many feel in this modern time and that we all have in common and that is the loss of who we once were many thousands of years ago in our relationship with the Earth/Gaia.  Some of what has taken place in the world is because most of us have yet to grieve over that loss or even realize it is there.  At the solstice, we can reflect on that, we can see that the grieving can be a part of how we open the space to create a new story that balances our lives in harmony with the Earth/Gaia.

At the solstice, we arrive at a rebirth or new birth of ourselves and the light (which needs the shadow/dark and vice versa) in unending quest for harmony, balance and meaning.  We have the freedom to utilize our free will to choose how we arrive, consciously choosing what we let go and embracing the new story that yet to be written.

Be well and happy solstice.

Erik