The Harvest Moon is the full moon that falls closest to the Autumnal Equinox. This years Harvest Moon is Friday, September 16th at 12:05pm PDT at 0 degrees Pisces in Purva Bhadrapada nakshatra. The Harvest Moon for 2016 will be a lunar eclipse as well, but not one that will be visible in North America. In ancient times eclipses were dreaded as omens of disaster, and while it is true that they are not the best times for beginning new projects or advancing one’s material affairs, they can be excellent times for some internal “housecleaning” and meditation. The symbol for Purva Bhadrapada nakshatra is the funeral cot used to cremate bodies. This rather ominous symbol relates to the sign of Pisces, the 12th and final sign of the zodiac—the sign of completion. They say the spiritual path does not begin in earnest until the recognition of one’s own mortality. From a universal perspective, the energetic quality of Purva Bhadrapada is called ”Yajamana Udyamana Shakti”—the power to raise the evolutionary level. Aja Ekapada, the “one footed goat”, a member of Lord Shiva’s entourage, is the ruling deity of Purva Bhadrapada. Under the influence of Aja Ekapada we have a strong desire to be absolutely independent and self-reliant. This desire, when directed towards the material world, can manifest itself as eccentricity, originality, rebelliousness, or self-centered and anti-social behavior. Individuals interested in the path of personal evolution express the influence of Aja Ekapada as the urge to attune one’s self with the universal principle of transformation symbolized by Shiva. With the combined influence of the full moon in Purva Bhadrapada, the lunar eclipse, and Mercury’s continuing retrograde, it seems that the Universe is telling us that it’s a good time to let go of some things that are no longer serving us.
Our yoga practice can be very helpful in this regard. In sutra I.12 Patanjali says, “Abhyasa vairagyabhyam tannirodhah”—Control over the mind’s fluctuations comes from persevering practice and non-attachment. Human beings seem to have a great talent for attachment—our bodies, minds, and hearts are very sticky and many things seem to adhere to us on a physical, mental, and emotional level. All of these things that stick to us accumulate over time and begin to clog up our being. Eventually we begin to experience duhkha, a word that is usually translated as suffering, but that literally means “bad space”. Our yoga practice represents an opportunity for us to release things we’ve been clinging to physically, mentally, and emotionally. If we are successful in this endeavor we can experience the transformation from duhkha to sukha—“good space”. Speaking of good space, on Saturday, September 17th Mars officially moves from Scorpio into Sagittarius, after 7 months of living in the same sign as Saturn. With these two malefic planets no longer conjunct we can look forward to a little more sukha.
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