Virgo Solar Eclipse 2025
The Virgo new Moon (and solar eclipse) is exact at 29°05’ on Sunday, September 21 at 2:54 pm CST. This is both the second Virgo new Moon this year and the second eclipse of this Eclipse Season. We mentioned at the lunar eclipse two weeks ago that Eclipse Season can be thought of as not just the one day - the day that the eclipse falls on - but as the time leading up to the first eclipse, through the two weeks to the next eclipse and into the days following. So we’re currently “in the shit”, a phrase that I borrow from my dear Taurus Sun friend Sarah; a phrase that she used years ago when our precious old dog Mandy was fast approaching the Rainbow Bridge, and we were dealing with all of the inevitable emotional and literal shit of that time period. Is there anything more refreshing than the Real Talk of a Taurean? They make it so real, yet so apt and weirdly appealing - “le mot juste” as les Français say.
Back to the solar eclipse, which is of course, also a new Moon. Let’s revisit the symbolism of an eclipse again, this time with a solar rather than lunar bent. A solar eclipse occurs when the light of the Sun is obscured by the shadow of the Moon. Where there was once light, there is now suddenly and unexpectedly, darkness. As stated last time, our cultural bias unfortunately tends toward vilifying the dark and glorifying the light, and again, I could give you many examples of this, but I’ll save that lecture for yet another time, and allow you to come up with your own examples.
Revisiting the teachings of the brilliant Demetra George, the light of the Sun or Moon can symbolize the life force, and eclipses can therefore bring up emotions such as anxiety and fear, as that symbolic life force is being unexpectedly and suddenly obscured during an eclipse. It follows then that this fear or vilifying of the dark is understandable on simply a survival instinct level. If the life force is being obscured, what does that mean? We don’t actually know for sure, do we? We can imagine what happens when the life force is obscured, and we could probably really freak ourselves out with our imaginings if we are so inclined. But instead, what I will now do is to once again make a brief argument for glorifying the darkness, and give some suggestions for how we can utilize this eclipse season to consciously work with this “sacred darkness”, a fabulous term I came across in Steven Forrest’s Book of the Moon. While darkness can often evoke fear of death, the unknown or pain, darkness is also the place we go to seek solace. We close our eyes to calm our minds, to collect our thoughts, to sleep, to meditate, to pray, to rest in savasana, and to commune with the Divine. Out of the darkness of the womb or eggshell comes life - life literally comes from darkness. If this isn’t enough to argue that darkness should be glorified and held sacred, I could probably go on, but let’s just call that good enough for who it’s for.
With a solar eclipse we have the Sun’s light obscured by the shadow of the Moon, unexpectedly bringing darkness where there was once light. Symbolically this can be an optimal time to engage in some Shadow Work, which is an intriguing phrase to describe simply taking a long hard look at our own selves - our behaviors, our beliefs, our thoughts, our emotions, our attitudes, etc., and seeing how they may be contributing to our experiences. Now, this can create discomfort, and even downright pain, but it’s a super useful tool for helping us along our path towards our highest and best expression of our highest self. Put simply, it’s called Shadow Work because it’s work, not play. Play is when we put all the blame on others for our experiences - which I’m not denying that there is certainly enough blame to go around these days, but where does that get us on our journey? As the youngest of five children, I’ve danced with the blame game throughout my life for sure, but as my dad used to say to us, “keep your distance if you can’t get along.” So yeah, you can distance yourself from those who you’ve identified as not helping you along your path toward your highest expression of Self, but that’s not the whole answer. Shadow Work shows us where we may be contributing to our challenging experiences. Since we can only change our own behaviors, thoughts, beliefs and attitudes, and not those of others, Shadow Work can give us the tools to begin to change unhelpful behaviors, thoughts, beliefs, and attitudes.
Again, we’re going to change up our new Moon practice for the solar eclipse. Once again, I will be providing the dates of the last several eclipse seasons, and you can go back and see what was coming up for you at these times. It is easiest if you keep a journal, but not necessary in this day and age - you can simply take a look at your digital footprint for these times; emails, texts, photos, social media posts, and apps you may use to track your days can all be mined for information. Try to find a common thread and, instead of blaming the folks who may be causing problems or simply resurfacing in your life at those times, follow that common thread around those folks back to your own self and your own behaviors, thoughts, beliefs, emotions, and attitudes, and from there you can develop a strategy to work with your own self to improve your experiences, and subsequently, the experiences of those around you. And by all means, if you discover through this work a pattern of folks who seem to contribute to unsustainable experiences in your life, please do distance yourself from those folks if possible and if necessary. Try to do this in a way that allows you to get back on path, so to speak, as this is more about changing a behavior on your end than it is about blaming these folks for your experience. If you’re of the high-minded variety, imagine letting them go with love and best wishes. If not, give them the imaginary finger and imagine telling them not to let the door hit them in the ass on their way out. Your choice!
When reading the description of the energies of this current solar eclipse chart, try to put that into the context of which of these planetary tools you can use to develop that strategy for working with your own self. Again, we won’t bother with the houses, as the eclipses often show us an overarching theme that pervades every facet of our lives.
As we said before, since the eclipses follow one another, lunar eclipse (full Moon) and solar eclipse (new Moon), we typically call it simply Eclipse Season. So when looking at the dates of the prior eclipses, don’t think of it as just the one day - the day that the eclipse falls on - but think of it as the time leading up to the first eclipse, through the two weeks to the next eclipse and into the days following. Hopefully the following eclipse dates will give you enough to work with to establish a common thread, and from there to develop a strategy to work with your own self. Here are the dates of the last several eclipses, starting with the most current one, and working backwards:
Virgo Solar Eclipse at 29°05’ on Sunday, September 21 2025, at 2:54 pm CST
Pisces Lunar Eclipse at 15°22’ on Sunday, September 7 2025, at 1:08 pm CST
Aries Solar Eclipse at 09°00’ on Saturday, March 29 2025, at 5:57 am CST
Virgo Lunar Eclipse at 23°56’ on Friday, March 14 2025, at 1:54 am CST
Libra Solar Eclipse at 10°03’ on Wednesday, October 2, 2024 at 1:49 pm CST
Pisces Lunar Eclipse at 25°40’ on Tuesday, September 17, 2024 at 9:34 pm CST
Aries Solar Eclipse at 19°24’ on Monday, April 8 2024, at 1:21 pm CST
Libra Lunar Eclipse at 05°07 on Monday, March 24, 2024, at 2:00 am CST
As far as the energies present in this current Virgo solar eclipse chart, Mercury at 05°59’ of Libra is the ruler of this new Moon in Virgo, and Mercury is in a kite formation with Pluto in Aquarius at 01°28’, Neptune in Aries at 00°48’ and Uranus in Gemini at 01°21’. An argument could be made that since the Sun and Moon at 29°05’ Virgo are in an out-of-sign conjunction with Mercury in Libra, the Sun and Moon are also part of this kite formation, but let’s not complicate matters, shall we?
More importantly, the Sun and Moon in Virgo are opposing Saturn in Pisces at 28°27’ - Saturn, the cosmic taskmaster who seems to be telling us all to get our shit together. Or, in a more Piscean expression, we could say that Saturn is providing us the tense opportunity to earnestly and methodically delve deeply into our selves to search our own self for unsustainable thoughts, behaviors, emotions, attitudes, and beliefs.
To seize this opportunity that Saturn is providing at the time of the eclipse, Demetra George taught us to slip into the void during the eclipse time by trying to make our minds as calm, still, and as meditative as we can; as any unhelpful thoughts arise, we try to release them so that we are better able to enter that interstitial space or Bardos between one state of consciousness and another. If you personally have any type of meditative practice, and are able to engage with that practice during the eclipse time, please do so, so that you can still your mind from being over active and over processing. If you love a good ritual like I do, feel free to to do what Demetra often does during the solar eclipse and close the curtains, light a candle, and do a meditative practice, or simply be still and aware. Demetra taught that in some traditions, it is said that whatever your thoughts and intentions are, they become greatly magnified during eclipses. So to the extent that you can have positive, peaceful thoughts during the eclipse, then you may be able to affect not only your own inner reality, but may be contributing to peacemaking and harmony in the world. It’s worth a shot, right? And luckily we have Saturn there in watery Pisces to spur us on in the possible drudgery of our own Shadow Work. Nobody thrives in drudgery like Saturn!
And now, about that kite formation, of which Virgo-ruler Mercury is “peak planet” and also part of the Air Grand Trine, with Pluto in Aquarius and Uranus in Gemini. We all know by now that Pluto and Uranus are both sextile Neptune in Aries, meaning that Mercury in Libra is opposite Neptune in Aries. Since fleet-footed Mercury is seeming to activate that currently ever-present energy of the “small talent triangle”, what does that seem to indicate for us in this moment?
Let’s first revisit the energy of the small talent triangle; according to the Hubers in their book Aspect Pattern Astrology, this energy is one of a “still developing talent”, with growth achieved by adapting, and a gradual development into a “distinctive and specialized talent” over time, with knowledge and skills gained by calmly absorbing experiences into our consciousness, and not necessarily through active striving. These three outer planets will remain in this aspect pattern for several years, hopefully providing calming support for the social changes of this new Air and Fire era that we are slowly but surely entering.
How can we as individuals calmly absorb experiences into our consciousness, with the aim of gaining knowledge and skills, while growing by remaining adaptable? This growth that we achieve by remaining adaptable may gradually develop into a distinctive or specialized talent over time. What does that look like to you? As we established, there are many years to ponder these ideas while this aspect pattern is in effect, but perhaps Mercury’s ‘activation’ of this small talent triangle during this liminal eclipse time will provide some more ready availability of insight into ourselves, and some fodder with which to develop some possible answers to these larger questions?
Once again, we have a Grand Air Trine, meaning that since all three Air signs are involved, this means that all three modalities - Cardinal (Libra), Fixed (Aquarius), and Mutable (Gemini) - are working together in this trine aspect. This means that there are three possible ways of expressing this airy, intellectual and communicative energy - a drive toward initiating with Cardinal, a stick-to-it-ivness with Fixed, and an ability to pivot with Mutable. If you remember back to the Aquarius full Moon in August, we also had a Grand Air Trine, and we explored the Huber’s idea of this pattern being likened to the tree that is bearing ripe fruit, waiting to be picked. We also explored the inherent dangers of complacency that can be present with the easy flowing energies of the grand trine - thinking that there will always be ripe fruit available to us, and consequently letting that ripe fruit rot on the ground, which in turn invites all manner of complications. But lo, quicksilver Mercury is here! Mercury is here, forming the grand trine, and activating the kite formation; but before you know it, Mercury will have moved on, so let’s seize this opportunity that is before us during this liminal eclipse time.
The Hubers describe the kite formation as one that has an intrinsic motive of security, influenced by the principles of pleasure and harmony, but also a feeling of ambivalent striving toward further development, which we likened back in August to Goldilocks, going from one extreme to another to find the best choice. Since Mercury is the peak planet in this configuration, Mercury is the planet to which the other planets in the aspect pattern must work towards the development of, so it would follow that we all have a lot of support from these outer planets to seize on fleeting insights, to thread ideas together, and to learn something new about ourselves and our experiences. With Neptune as the planet in opposition to Mercury, let yourself go into that meditative state with abandon, wander through the mists and fog of the in-between states of consciousness, though there may be tension that you experience during this exploration, let that tension dissolve into the mists. In doing so, maybe Mercury will come glimmering out of the mists and gift you with an insight, idea, or thought pattern that will help you in your shadow work, allowing you to move toward becoming your best version of your higher self, and maybe provide some insight into the following questions that the outer planets seem to be asking us during this transitional time.
How can we as individuals calmly absorb experiences into our consciousness, with the aim of gaining knowledge and skills, while growing by remaining adaptable?
This growth that we achieve by remaining adaptable may gradually develop into a distinctive or specialized talent over time. What does that look like to you?