It’s a new moon in cancer, and the waters of her womb invite us into the vulnerability of the tender tissue of the crab. Sensitive. Sensual. Soft. As we swim through delicate textures of the inner realms of emotions and feelings, we simultaneously search for, or find ways to construct structures of protection, and the shell of the crab becomes the safe home for our vulnerabilities.
Where do you find yourself on this day, as a new lunar cycle begins? What kind of a home are you becoming to your tenderness?
Summer envelopes us in heat and showers us with light. Fruit is in abundance. The earth offers an expansive array of food that grows into expression now. The cancer archetype takes us into the depths of the ocean, where we connect ourselves to the resourceful, generous, caring parts of who we are and where we are.
As we arrive in the comforting, caring arms of the mother – mother nature, our own mother, being a mother (for some of us), and our own inner processes of reparenting ourselves – we are entering the delicate space where we learn to embrace but not suffocate, to be held but not too tightly, to build a home but to branch out, to be receptive and have boundaries, to delight in the bounty of the season, and to begin to plan for the the next.
I’m not an astrologer, and I come to this space not looking for belief in the way that the constellations our ancestors found in the sky, named, and told stories about, influence our lives. But I plunge into this pool where a mythopoetic exploration can open us up into deeper connections with ourselves, each other, the interspecies relationships woven together by mythology and biology, the environment we’re in, the cycles of nature, and the depth of imagination and creativity.
Cancer abides in the realms of the water. It invites us into the unconscious, where imagination and emotion tangle and create worlds. These waters are nourishing, life giving, and dangerous at the same time. We have a choice in how we show up. And yet the depth of what is hidden only grows in relationship to what we discover. The unseen always remains much larger than the known. The unconscious animates us, and yet we have a say in how we move. We are a part of an immense creative force with which we get to co-create. We are creativity embodied.
With Cancer we are invited to dance in the liquidity of streams that commingle softness and safety, tenderness and toughness, danger and deliciousness, domestic and wild. To have shelter in a world of storms. To let the storms regenerate who we are. To breathe with the notion that we have no idea where the flow of life’s river might take us. And to bring a motherly love to the aliveness of unpredictability. To nurture the wild. To build a home for the untamed.
The crab walks sideways, reminding us that life’s paths are many, that the ways in which we can participate in the complexity of existence are as abundant as food during this season. Find new ways. Find more ways. Carve paths you never thought could be walked before. Walk known roads in new ways. Figure out how to move through life’s rocky terrain. You are innovative. You are resourceful.
This lunar cycle begins with the nurturing mother, with the soft elegance of her strength, with the cooling waters and the warm embrace of her love. The majority of this moon ride will take us through the fire of Leo, the burning heat of Summer’s sun, the ferocity of the inner beast, the wildness of our heart’s desires, and the intense journey of individuation.
May the waters of the womb and the protection of the mother carry us into our continuous process of becoming ourselves. May this self-becoming weave itself in reciprocity with what surrounds us. May we breathe with care for the inner and the outer, for what nourishes us and what we offer back. May the waters be there not to tame the fire, but to cool us when the heat is unbearable, when we scorch ourselves and others in a culture where the individual is more dominant than the collective, and to offer healing when individuality burns our ability to see our interconnectedness.
Watch a (free) video to explore the mythopoetic play of this new moon.
If you’d like to go deep into the season, into the abundance and the bounty, into the wisdom of our cyclical nature, into the generosity we can cultivate and bring forth from within, join us for the next Seasonal Somatic Ceremony that celebrates the mid point between Summer Solstice and Autumn Equinox.
May this new moon wrap you in love.
With deep gratitude and love,
Hagar