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Booking to Reopen in July!

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I am heading toward some much needed time off this summer, including a trip abroad, the Psychedelic Science conference in Denver, and a move back to my hometown of Sonoma all within the span of June! As a result, I have paused my reading schedule for a bit, but I plan to return with more availability in July. Please stay tuned and check back with my booking link (Get A Reading) if you’d like to work together this summer or beyond.

Big thanks to all my clients and students – this year has been amazing so far and I look forward to continuing the adventure of archetypal astrology with readings and classes again soon!

Much Love,

Lilly

Basics of Archetypal Astrology Intensive

I am very pleased to announce that this winter I’ll be offering a four-week online intensive on the basics of archetypal astrology exclusively designed for PCC (Philosophy, Cosmology, and Consciousness) and CIIS (California Institute of Integral Studies) students and alumni. This is not an official university class, it’s just something on the side that has been missing from the CIIS community for a couple of years. It’s also a chance for me to test out my teaching chops while I’m working on plans for classes in the future.

This intensive will consist of eight 2.5 hour sessions over four weeks, from December 20th until January 13th. Sessions will be conducted live on zoom (recordings available) with additional optional discussion space provided for mid-week questions and insights. The cost is a sliding scale (pay what you can) between $200-$400 per person (payment plans available; let me know if cost is an obstacle and we’ll work something out).

Registration will be open until December 15th, or until the course fills. You can either email me or fill out this Registration Form to sign up.

For current CIIS students, this intensive will be considered sufficient preparation in lieu of the official prerequisite course requirements for the two courses being offered by Becca and Richard Tarnas in spring 2023.

Image Description: flyer for Basics of Archetypal Astrology course consisting of a dark brown background with an etheric blue skyline image and informational text similar to what is in the blog post.

Unfortunately, this class is only open to students and alumni from CIIS, but don’t worry, I’m cooking up plans for more courses in the future – this is only the beginning!

Please don’t hesitate to reach out if you have any questions. I’ll see you in class!

Brief Thoughts on the Pluto Return: February 22, 2022.

I’m thinking about Pluto today. This dear dwarf demon has been my guiding light since I started on the astrological path. Some of you know I’m incubating a larger offering, and in recent years I have been absolutely floored by the wealth of material this archetype has brought into my life through my own biographical digging, personal/relational dynamics, client work, and synchronicities.

Image Credit: NASA
Image description from Nasa website: NASA New Horizons spacecraft captured this high-resolution enhanced color view of Pluto on July 14, 2015. Pluto surface sports a remarkable range of subtle colors, enhanced in this view to a rainbow of pale blues, yellows, oranges, and deep reds.

Today we have the opportunity to observe the first exact conjunction of transiting Pluto returning to the position it held when the founders of the United States signed the Declaration of Independence.

The United States’ Pluto Return. What an opportunity! What a moment to notice, make room for, breathe into and attempt to relax around. If we can find the courage to bear down into whatever is calling to us from below, from the places we normally try to tighten around and control — to bear down and listen — we may hear something like the sound of our own true, deep, wise, and ancient power calling us home. 

A few technical notes to set aside any catastrophic tendencies: outer planet returns are not one-day events. They take place over years, like a rolling, tumbling, restructuring massage. This is the first of three exact conjunctions that will be spread out over the course of this year, but we’ve been feeling Pluto’s signature moves for a few years now and will likely continue to feel them for a few more.

If I’ve learned anything about Pluto in these past few wild and precious – and often terrifying – years it’s that we have an opportunity to understand power in deeper, wider, wilder, and more sustainable ways when we pay attention to what Pluto is asking us to acknowledge. Sometimes the task is simpler though, and Pluto asks us to stop ignoring a basic truth which is that change is the way, dissolution is as inevitable as an exhale, and power is far more interesting (and powerful) when it isn’t held too tightly.

Today we find ourselves in the eye of a great needle; pulled into weaving a pattern that we have little control over other than our own ability to breathe, look, listen, and widen our capacity to understand. The scent on the wind is change, and I am interested in being in it with you.

In pursuit of justice, fairness, equity, inclusion, and wellbeing for all – may we know Pluto in a good way, even when it can be terrifying.

Happy New Year: Books Reopening December 31st

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I haven’t done much, or any, writing here in 2021. This year has been filled with other work: my day job, a deepening practice with clients, my own inner work; I’ve been busy, even if it might not look like it here.

On December 31st, 2021 at 11:00 AM (PST) I will reopen my books for readings in January, February, and March 2022. I’m adopting this new booking style in order to keep my reading schedule at a pace that I can handle; with a day job, PhD studies, and all that life throws out, I’ve found myself looking back on this year and wishing I had carved out a little more rest into my schedule. I think this style of booking will suit that rhythm for me.

So, if you are hoping for a reading in January, February, or March 2022, please come back on December 31st at or after 11:00am (PST), click on Get A Reading, and follow the prompts to book your space.

My prices will also be getting an update for the new year. Effective in 2022 my sliding scale will be adjusted slightly to reflect my cost of living and ongoing sustainability. I hope that this shift doesn’t cause sticker shock; it shouldn’t, as the sliding scale still indicates a range that my clients can choose to pay within, but if there is anyone for whom the scale is not reasonably accessible, please know that you can always reach out to me for a discounted rate, which I attempt to accommodate monthly as I’m able.

I hope to see you in the new year; until then please be safe, kind, and generous to yourselves and those around you (sometimes safety, kindness, and/or generosity means allowing for strong, steady boundaries).

Photo: Lilly Falconer – Muir Beach, CA, December 2021 with Venus (conj. Pluto) barely visible near the top left.

Podcast! When Will This Transit End?

Y’all know how pleased I was to be invited to give a talk at the Astrology University summit a few months ago, so when Tony Howard invited me on the Astrology University Podcast to talk even more I was, to put it simple, stoked. I had a great time talking too fast and about way too many things and Tony was kind, clear, and collected as usual. It was a blast.

Working with the theme, When Will This Transit End? our conversation centered around the practice of tracking outer planet transits to natal charts for both clients and ourselves. I share a couple of personal examples of ways I’ve experienced time in a nonordinary way through my personal practice of transit astrology, and I get to use my new favorite term – mystical fascia – to describe a connective tissue of patterned meaning which may reveal itself through this practice over time in our lives, in the arts, and in the world.

CLICK HERE to listen or look for the Astrology University Podcast wherever you like listening to podcasts (iTunes, Spotify, etc.)

Big outer-planet transits can be a long, hard slog sometimes, but hopefully this conversation will shed some light and curiosity into what can otherwise be a tough spot.

Let me know what you think!

Image by Noel Bauza from Pixabay

PS. At one point in the podcast I say Venus-Saturn when I meant to say Saturn-Pluto; it shouldn’t be too hard to tell that’s what I meant, but if I don’t come clean about this I know it might haunt me and my Virgo placements forever 😉

Where is the Knife? Mars Movements in Late 2020 (An Archetypal Perspective)

In preparation for the Astrology University Summit this weekend I thought I’d give a little preview of my lecture, Where is the Knife? Mars Movements in Late 2020.

I had a lot of fun putting this together. And by fun, I mean hours glued to the computer and ephemeris looking up charts, tracking data, paying attention to the news, and thinking about how and what information I wanted to share in my hour of time.

I thought it might be interesting to share a bit of what I came up with for my blog audience as both a preview and introduction to my talk (note: if you haven’t yet you can still go HERE to purchase the All Access pass which gives access to my lecture, three more bonus lectures, and recordings of everything for you to keep).

The first part of my lecture is spent working over Mars as a planetary archetype by itself as well as in the context of the Saturn-Pluto conjunction. While exploring the square of Mars to Saturn-Pluto-Jupiter viewers are guided through the Mars retrograde in Aries culminating in a date I’ve got my eye on, the December Solstice.

Next we hit the difficult territory; possibly the most difficult of the lecture, and certainly some of the most difficult of my lifetime (and too many before mine): systemic racism, white supremacy, and police killings in the USA. We look at a few charts here including the Rodney King assault and riots, the murder of Trayvon Martin and emergence of #BlackLivesMatter, and the recent murders of both Breonna Taylor and George Floyd. In each of these cases we explore some of the themes that Mars, Saturn, Pluto, and Jupiter correlate to in terms of activism, resistance, and organization. Why is it that among hundreds – thousands? – of violent white supremacist incidents, only a dozen or so victims have become household names? Why when video evidence of George Floyd’s horrific murder hit the internet were so many white people suddenly invested in ending racism in the US? Mars as the activist/warrior, Saturn as the organizer/general, and Pluto as the power dynamics of oppression, repression, and change might have some clues for us.

Moving on to the climate catastrophe and a larger framework of world emergency we look at charts from Greta Thunberg, Bill McKibben, the recent LNU Lightning Complex wildfires that engulfed the state of California in August, and the horrific explosion at the Port of Beirut in Lebanon. Each of the charts here show some significant alignment between our three key players, Mars, Saturn, Pluto, and Jupiter.

Then, the chart I could not ignore, we look at the transit bi-wheel for president Donald Trump on the night of the first presidential debate this past Tuesday. Oof… this one is a doozy. Honestly, I hate to give the Cheeto in Chief any more airtime than he already has, but the Mars-Saturn-Pluto action is just too hot not to handle.

Finally, we wrap it all up with an offering of song by one of my favorite musicians, Lhasa de Sela. Some of my favorite moments in astrology are when I get to slip into archetypally rich artistry and let the experience reveal deeper layers of how these planetary combinations speak through us in our lives, work, and creations. Get your headphones ready, folks, because I somehow found time to play an entire song! Lhasa de Sela’s music can be found on Bandcamp.

I truly do hope you all get time to tune in to this Summit. There are so many amazing lectures that I am hoping to catch, and I am so honored to be a part of this offering as a whole. All Access Passes are still available HERE, so purchase one or sign up for the live event today at the Astrology University Summit website.

Stay sharp, Mars-kin,

Lilly

Astrology University Online Summit

I am pleased and honored to announce that I have been invited to join Astrology University for their upcoming summit, Astrology and World Events: Challenges and Opportunities this October 3-4, 2020 online.

My talk will be included as a bonus lecture for those who purchase the all access pass, but the summit is FREE to watch live for 48 hours! Register today and you’ll be emailed the details for how to watch the live event.

Sign up for free here:  https://www.astrologyuniversity.com/summit/

If you would like to download the summit lectures to keep and watch at your own pace, or if would you like to support Astrology University’s mission of keeping this event free to watch live for those in need while also supporting the astrologers themselves, you can get the ALL ACCESS PASS and all of the talks are yours to keep, plus some great bonus videos (wink wink, nudge nudge – this is how you’ll get to see my talk).

 Get your all access pass here

Where is the Knife? Mars Movements in Late 2020 (An Archetypal Perspective), will be an expansion of the themes I explored in my last blog, Caution: Mars Goes Both Ways:

A sharp knife is useful for cutting away the bindings of time, habit, and oppression. It can be necessary when freeing ourselves from our own fear or complacency. In this time of mounting overwhelm, remember the red flame of Mars: courage and compassion that shines like the well-loved knife or the well-tended flame; what can it tell us? In this talk we will explore Mars in the context of late 2020 with an archetypal take on the retrograde cycle and square to Jupiter, Saturn, and Pluto.

Let me know if you plan on watching the summit live on October 3 & 4! My lecture is set to air for pass-holders on October 4th after Lynn Bell gives her lecture on Saturn and Uranus (excuse me while I completely geek out about that for a moment…).

Thanks to everyone for your warmth and encouragement as I continue to sow the seeds of my astrology practice and bring it out into the world. I am so grateful to each of you for your kindness, brilliance, and generous attention.

Caution: Mars Goes Both Ways

It’s 11:30 am in Northern California and my house is completely dark inside. Outside, the sky is also dark; a deep sepia color caused by an inversion of wildfire smoke in the upper atmosphere moving over a marine layer. The air is cool and damp, as if the fog rolled in rusty.

The Light at 9:30 AM, September 9, 2020 in Mill Valley, California. Photo Credit: Lilly Falconer

I’ve spoken a bit in past posts about the way an astrologer, or really anyone skilled in a divinatory art, begins to read the patterns of their archetypal language in the world around them. Over the course of the past few months I have begun writing posts on the current patterns many times but stopped because it felt too much like trying to lasso a speeding train when what I really needed to do was simply ride, watch, and wait (and hang on for god-damned dear life). This morning, with the rusted sky and my coffee gone cold; the world on fire, and the knife of a Mars retrograde twisting in the sky, it feels like time has slowed, or the train has changed tracks, or something has happened that makes it feel like time to write it down.

Let’s talk a little bit about Mars and catch up about these days we’re in. Since my last blog post (where I spoke briefly about the Jupiter-Saturn-Pluto synchronicities and correlations in the stories of John Barleycorn as told by Jack London and Robert Burns) the many fires of our world have been raging: George Floyd’s death hit a nerve that woke many white people in the US from a complacent slumber; protests, counter-protests, the Covid-19 pandemic, and a tidal wave of conspiracy theories pointing to and from unimaginable angles of collective psychosis, illness, and absurdity have been raging across the United States. To say there is unrest is a criminal understatement. An increasingly brazen form of modern nationalist and white supremacist-driven US fascism is boiling over as we wind tighter toward the center of the inferno of election day. The pressure we spoke of in January and March has intensified so much that many of us are experiencing internal collisions of anxiety, depression, and burnout on scales only previously known to us in abstract theory as stories heard from the past, wartimes, or from the places like the Middle East and Central America, who have been terrorized by a web of US bombs and trade warfare for decades.

Mars is an archetype of action, courage, anger, zero hesitation, ignition, aggression, passion, and instigation. Mars imagery includes but is not limited to: a raging wildfire; a blaring red siren; a razor-sharp knife; a warrior in the fury of battle; an inflamed lover; a passionate encounter; the breakout excitement of a young child running – yelling at the top of their lungs – out to play; the dive, pounce, and ripping into flesh of an apex predator to their prey; the blaze of spark on tinder.

When a client has a heavily or un-aspected Mars I will often find us exploring themes of anger in a reading. My most common question is simply, “how do you deal with anger; your anger?” Often, they don’t know and I invite them to explore that a little. Mars, anger, is like a knife we have with us all the time. It is part of who we are, included in our basic form; so, I ask myself as often as I ask clients, “where is your knife right now?” One cannot simply toss this thing into the bottom of their bag and pretend it isn’t there; it will cut its way out because that is its nature. It is not sharp or hot or pushy because it’s wrong; it just is those things. Where is the knife? Is it being taken care of? Sharpened, sheathed, and at the ready? Is the knife-bearer skilled enough to know when and when not, or how and how not to use it? A sharp knife is useful for cutting away the bindings of time, habit, and oppression. It can be necessary when freeing ourselves from our own fear or complacency. So in this time of mounting overwhelm remember the red flame of courage and compassion in your heart that shines like the well-loved knife or the well-tended flame; what can it tell us?

What does it mean when Mars goes retrograde and what is so special about this one?

First, we must acknowledge that every planet goes retrograde (Mercury is just the chattiest about it). I tend to think of retrogrades as a waltz in that they have three steps that repeat in an orbital dance around our Sun: a planet moves direct, then circles back (retrograde) over a portion of its previous path, then it turns again and passes for a third time over the same space until it moves beyond in a large stride before turning again and circling in a continuous repetition of the dance.

This particular Mars retrograde feels to me a bit less like a waltz and more like a boomerang, and is significant for a few reasons: one, Mars is in its home sign of Aries, which it rules and so is extra Mars-ey; two, the point at which Mars has paused to turn around (the twisting of the blade/returning of the boomerang) is very close to a square (90 degrees) from Saturn and Pluto, which are still in late Capricorn, tightening back up in their ongoing conjunction. This Mars retrograde will double back through Aries until it turns direct in early-mid-November, after which it will again square Pluto from Aries in mid-late-December and then Saturn from Taurus in early-mid-January. Suffice it to say, we are not at the end of the hellfire and fury, but we may be in a position of greater understanding of what heroics may be necessary to receive the blows that are doubling back upon us.

What is Mars great for?

Well, since you asked, Mars is amazing at practically everything it does: from igniting the passion of lovers, to sparking the fires of the final blaze of late-stage Capitalism toward full climate change and the sixth mass extinction, even on to a falsely orange-faced US president (with Mars on his Ascendant, receiving a trine from this transiting Mars) who incites violence in rapid-fire tweets that are full of lies and thickly fascist bravado. But let’s not lose the signal in the fog! Pay attention. Mars is also excellent at boosting the courage of protestors and progressives who are running for office, calling to defund the police, reform incarceration and the legacy of colonization and white supremacy; and combined with Saturnian wisdom, Uranian insight, and Plutonic depth it can be an excellent strategist for collective liberation and a thorough composting of the extractive and exploitative evils of our world: remember the Zapatista saying, “Other Worlds are Possible,” and know it to be true.

What can we do?

At the moment, I think it is a good idea to reflect on what it feels like to experience Mars as it turns back on us. Modernity is experiencing the ricocheting boomerang of centuries of colonization, extractive capitalism, racism (primarily in the form of white supremacy), sexism, Christocentrism (I said what I said), cisheteropatriarchy, transphobia, ableism, and so much more. The bravado driving most of these movements is the same Mars energy that plunges us seemingly so suddenly into full-on Fascism; and the answer must be, “I SEE YOU COMING, Mars, and I will no longer pretend that you and I have nothing to do with each other.”

I speak for myself as a descendant of colonizers who were also colonized at some point; we have got to get ahold of what our knives are doing. Instead of wildfires, let’s repair our relationship to place-based regenerative indigenous fire ecologies. Instead of boosting military and police budgets let’s fund and build back up public education, healthcare, childcare, eldercare, and basic necessary domestic infrastructures. Instead of border walls, fences, and prison camps for refugees let’s bring some courageous compassionate heat to immigration reform and become a sanctuary for anyone fleeing violence. Instead of billionaires, let’s imagine ourselves as earth defenders: plugging excess profits right back into public services, environmental regeneration, and the wellbeing of our fellow creatures in the Earth community. We can be heroes; warriors for peace; thoughtful architects of other ways and other worlds right here where Mars waltzes.

Peace and blessings to each of you. Please be kind to yourselves and each other.

Jimi Hendrix: Bold As Love