What to expect: Practicality
What to watch out for: Guilt
What will it affect? Relationships, money, values

If you usually go overboard on Christmas, this year the planets will help us out. Venus will conjunct Saturn on Christmas will tame things, bringing restraint when it comes to relationships, money and all of those holiday treats. Let’s hope that Santa brings you some money this year. This energy will also have us focusing on financial concerns. It might look like you’re playing around with that new game on your new Smartphone, but you may find yourself categorizing your expenses on your Mint app or catching up on your accounting on QuickBooks, Zero or Freshbooks. Don’t let anyone make you feel guilty if you do. Though it’s Christmas, this is a day for practical concerns.

Why? Venus Conjunction Saturn

Belated Holiday Giving

What to expect: Generosity
What to watch out for: Going the easy route
What will it affect? Giving, charity, philanthropy

If you haven’t had a chance to give during the holidays, December 27th will be a great day for real gift giving. Mars is in Scorpio making a water trine to Neptune. Secret monetary gifts or gifts that embody sharing will embody the energy. Think of buying a goat for a family on behalf of someone you care deeply about. Philanthropy for a business is often momentary, but real giving is giving your time and being of service. Doesn’t our hearts turn to mush when you see someone who could easily give money, but who decides to give their time instead? Think of Scarlett Johansson handing out food to victims of Hurricane Katrina or volunteered at an AID’s clinic in Rwanda as an example. Yet, it doesn’t have to happen during a disaster or in a far away land. It’s as simple as giving a listening ear like a psychologist would. Listening to someone in their dark moments can be scary. But if you can go there, as they talk to you about their fears of death, thoughts of suicide, and experiences with sexual abuse, not only will you be honoring the energy, you may make THE difference in someone’s life.

Why? Mars Trine Neptune

Quitting Our Childish Ways

What to expect: Maturation
What to watch out for: The need for a balanced approach
What will it affect? Learning, nurturing, wisdom, direction

As the year comes to a close Mercury, now direct, will trine the North Node and Ceres in Leo.
Mercury is the wisdom-seeking sign of Sagittarius and wants to teach us a little something about nurturing our inner child. The Sabian symbol for the degree that Mercury is at is “Tiny children in sunbonnets.” The Sun gives us our much needed Vitamin D. In these last couple of weeks, those of us living in the Northern hemisphere have become keenly aware of that. But the Sun can also be dangerous, shining down on us harmful rays that can damage our skin. We can play, but do we have the right protection? We need protection, but more than that, we need teach our children about safety and moderation.

At the same time, Jupiter will square the nodes. The Sabian symbol for Jupiter’s degree is “a woman the father of her own child”. Many of us have learned to mother our own inner child, not having gotten what we needed when we were young. Maybe we were sent out to play without a hat or sunscreen, felt the pain at the time and live with the damage many years later. With mother (HEART EMOTION) we think about nurturing and caring and so we learn to put on the hat and sunscreen. With fathering (HEAD) what comes to mind are structure and rules. And this is where teaching and nurturing come together. We learn how to care for ourselves by imposing structure and boundary.

The problem is Jupiter in a square always goes over the top. It’s square to the Leo/Aquarius nodal axis, with the North Node being in Leo and the South Node in Aquarius.

Scorpio mixed with Leo is money risk taker. So there are some things you can do that will either go horribly wrong or famously right! Invest in something leading edge… like Bitcoins, but where you will find success is combining the risk (HEART EMOTION) with calculation (HEAD).

Scorpio mixed with Aquarius, on the other hand, is the powerful revolutionary. Jupiter in Scorpio is about the dark, deep truth about the dirty secret, but combine it with ‘power to the people” and the Aquarius need to change society and we may see some truths revealed…. Can you handle the truth? Parents, governments, churches and other social intuitions sometimes think not. Yet the year will end with maturation in one way or the other designed to help us to handle the truth.

When we were children, we thought and reasoned as children do. But when we grew up, we quit our childish ways. – 1 Corinthians 13:11

The ability to handle the truth may come in two ways. If we are lucky we have the right parenting when we are young, but most of us need to parent our inner child. This process of parenting our inner child helps us to grow in maturity and wisdom – but it doesn’t happen without work. Now is the time when we bring together mother and father, head and heart, masculine and feminine and what will ultimately happen is balance.

Leo is also the sign of leadership. And true leadership comes from a balanced well-nurtured child – after all, we can’t have adult children running the country.

Spend the end of the year mothering, fathering or both your inner child to prepare for the new leadership direction that the north node is taking us to.

Why? Mercury Trine North Node, Mercury Trine Ceres, Jupiter Square North Node