Astro Notes for New Moon in Capricorn cycle (December 30, 2024-January 29, 2025)
I’m writing these notes on New Year’s Eve — Happy New Year everyone! — with a weighty, yet excited sense that we are on the precipice of an historically significant passage of time.
Pluto moved into Aquarius in November, where it will stay for the next 20 years. Between now and mid-July 2025, all the other outer planets -- Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune — will also have changed signs. When any one of these heavy-hitting outer planets change signs, there is a distinct shift in the zeitgeist, a new chapter in the collective narrative. With all five of them changing signs within a cosmic blink of the eye, it suggests a period of unprecedentedly rapid, concentrated, and consequential cultural change. Although I feel like a broken record on this point, it bears repeating that this has never happened before in recorded history.
At the start of this year, however, there appears to be a relative calm before the storm.
This month’s cycle is still colored by Mars moving retrograde, a period that occurs every two and a bit years. When Mars moves retrograde, it’s generally a time more conducive for reflecting inwardly on our strategies for action rather than making large strides forward in the outer world. We’re still mostly in behind-the-scenes planning, rather than out-in-front doing mode throughout this month’s cycle. There are big questions being decided for each of us about how we want to situate ourselves for the ride through the rapids just ahead.
We started the cycle on December 30 with a New Moon in Capricorn, with a supportive sextile from Saturn. It doesn’t get much better than this for making New Year’s resolutions!
As the beginning point of the monthly cycle, the New Moon is always the best time for setting intentions for the phase ahead. With the New Moon in Capricorn, our intentions carry real weight, for the Sea Goat loves nothing more than to set meaningful goals. And Capricorn means what it says. Add to that picture Saturn, the ruler of Capricorn, being in a harmonious sextile with the New Moon, and it’s clear that we have cosmic support this year to set powerful and realistic New Year’s resolutions that we can actually achieve.
Even though for many of us the start of the year entails a more sedate time, the first week could present an unexpectedly intense trial. From January 1-5, Mars moving retrograde to Leo forms an opposition to Pluto in Aquarius. Mars represents our personal will or drive; in Leo this can be felt pridefully. In opposition to Pluto, the principle of power and transformation, we might encounter frustrating delays or reversals in our plans and ambitions, or power struggles in our relationships. And those roadblocks might sting our pride a little. (Or a lot.) We may be forced to see something we don’t like about how we wield our personal power. The higher road for navigating this transit will be to transform that pattern rather than act it out.
One of the most important transits of the month — if not the year — occurs on January 12, when the Nodes of the Moon change sign. The position of the Lunar Nodes is significant for signifying the general evolutionary direction of humanity for the 18 month period they take to move through a sign. The North and South Nodes are always exactly opposite each other, and are linked in meaning. Simply stated, the South Node signifies the traits and tendencies that no longer serve us and that we are attempting to outgrow; the North Node symbolizes the qualities that represent our healthy growth edge. Knowing the position of the Lunar Nodes is actually a useful life hack, since the universe will tend to reward those people, organizations, and initiatives that embody the North Node attributes at any given time.
Since mid-July 2023, the South Node has been in Libra and the North Node in Aries. Libra is the sign of the peacemaker and diplomat; Aries is the sign of the warrior. During this period, it could be said that “fortune favored the brave” and that those embodying the noble attributes of Aries — courage, forthrightness, daring — broadly won the day. In contrast, Libran traits during this time -- such as the tendency for fence-sitting -- were often judged negatively as lacking bravery to take a definitive stand, or were otherwise seen as inadequate to the needs or temperament of the times.
On January 12 the South Node moves into Virgo, and the North Node into Pisces. What this symbolizes is that, for the next 18 months, Piscean values of sensitivity, compassion, mystical transcendence, and universal love will tend to be seen by humanity as the ideal traits to cultivate, while Virgoan tendencies to over-think, over-analyze, and over-think will be seen as more problematic.
We encounter a spirited Full Moon in Cancer on January 13. The Moon is conjunct Mars, which is in a trine to Neptune in Pisces. The Moon is at home in Cancer, at her most nurturing, caring, and loving. Yet Mars brings a potential feistiness and irritability to our emotional expression — or we may simply feel energized to act on our feelings and intuitions. With Mars in Cancer in a trine to Neptune in Pisces, the Full Moon could also be an ideal time for us to actively channel higher energies for personal and collective healing.
The Sun enters Aquarius on January 19. Aquarius season is our annual time of year to become more visionary, innovative, and idealistic. We can more easily open up to downloads about new structures and forms that are carrying the codes from the future. This can be a very exciting process. With Pluto having moved into Aquarius in November 2024, there is now massive support from the universe for novelty and innovation, especially in ways that bring liberation to humanity.
On January 20, the day of the Presidential Inauguration, the Sun is exactly conjunct Pluto at 1 degree of Aquarius. The Sun symbolizes leadership and authority, and Pluto represents power and transformation. No doubt it will be a day of high drama.
For many, the event will likely be experienced as a kind of crisis (Pluto), but for others the inauguration may symbolize a new kind of transformative (Pluto) or visionary (Aquarius) leadership (Sun), one that represents a rebirth (Pluto) of sorts for the country. The deeper meaning of these symbols will, of course, be revealed in time.
This New Moon in Capricorn cycle sets the stage for an extraordinary year ahead. With so much shifting in the cosmic landscape, this is a precious time to lay strong foundations for the transformative period to come. Capricorn is not into fluff; it rewards discipline, strategy, and showing up when it matters. Think of this as your chance to lay the groundwork for navigating the wild ride ahead.