Moon’s Nodes

Welcome to the briefest of beginnings on understanding your Path to Wholeness. Or karma. Or “what you are here to learn”. Or goal. Or however you choose to regard the gifts and insights of Knowing Your Nodes.

You will be reading TWO descriptive passages.

One will be for the signs of your North & South Nodes. (Look for the description of the signs of your Nodes, doesn’t matter about the House).

The other will be for the House location of your Nodes. (Look for your Nodes’ Houses, doesn’t matter about the signs in that description.)

Two descriptions – Signs and Houses – combine to make your personal Nodal Path.

If you are just starting, and need step-by-step instructions on figuring out the sign and house placement of your Nodes, here is detailed guidance.

Beginning and intermediate students, alike, will also want to become familiar with the concepts of energetic spectrum and how opposites are not unconnected. Those are outlined below, after the nodal descriptions, in the “Why Nodes First” section. (Put at the end, because, basically everyone wants to get to the “It’s me-eeee-eee” part first, and hear about their own Nodes.)

The little –> glyph indicates that it is a path. Moving from the known of the South Node to the learning of the North Node.

Aries or 1st House South Node –> Libra or 7th House North Node
Known: Self. Self-focus. Quick to cut to new. Going it alone. Pioneering. Fiestiness. Standing up for yourself. Detachment. The thrill of beating an opponent. Starting new things. Being first to react and jump into action. The lessons of Mars.

Learning: The rewards of involvement with others. How to include others, including considering the feelings of others first. Valuing others fully, helping others. Diplomacy. Beauty. Harmony. Relationships. The relationship lessons of Venus.

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Taurus or 2nd House South Node –> Scorpio or 8th House North Node
Known: Concrete values. Earthly awareness. Earthly pleasures. Comforts of food, fabrics, beautiful earthly things and enjoyments experienced through the physical body. Money. Firm belief in one’s own ideas, without thinking much about it. Not always open to other’s ideas. The earthly delights lessons of Venus.

Learning: Deeper, bigger, more mystical values. Bigger picture of mystery, energy, causation. Handling energetic power – of any and all kinds from monetary, to magical to sexual. Mystery. Clarity. Change. Penetrating situations to the core. Transformation and rebirth. Being open to other people’s ideas. Use of other people’s money. Higher, deeper, clearer understanding of cosmic, universal, spiritual forces. The lessons of Pluto.

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Gemini or 3rd House South Node –> Sagittarius or 9th House North Node
Known: Gift of gab. Verbal dexterity. Written wordplay. Love of lightweight info. Fun with communicating. Quick wit. Involvement with close by relations – like siblings and neighbors. The conversational, communications lessons of Mercury.

Learning: Higher philosophy. Deeper synthesis of information into enduring knowledge. Higher level education. Justice. A complete spiritual/religious philosophy of one’s own without cruel or authoritarian dogma. Creating a fully realized philosophical container of personal expansion that balances earthly appetites and spiritual precepts. Foreign cultures, long range travel. The wild, wide, replenishing joys of being in Nature and communing with the outdoors. The lessons of Jupiter.

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Cancer or 4th House South Node –> Capricorn or 10th House North Node
Known: Inner world. Home, hearth, snuggling in. Feeling deeply. Family. Need for emotional security. Quick to protect your feelings. Intimately aware of your own emotions at the deepest levels. Love of house, nesting, staying in, making you and those in your world comfortable, nurtured, well fed, safe and secure. The lessons of the Moon.

Learning: Bigness. Being out in the world. Achieving. Knowing how to solidly establish well-regarded excellence in wider involvement with society. Handing Fame. Understanding the productive uses of status, rank, and the opinion of others. The lessons of Saturn.

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Leo or 5th House South Node –> Aquarius or 11th House North Node
Known: Creativity. Generosity of heart. Joy of performance. How to shine. Inspiring others. The importance of individual creativity and creations. Radiating enthusiasm. Natural leadership. Motivating others. Love of Applause. Romance. Creative risk. Child-like fun. And children. The lessons of the Sun.

Learning: The Universal Perspective. The importance of groups. Political activism in groups. New ways of thinking that consider the collective first, not individuals. Advancing society as a whole. Valuing the unexpected, unapproved, and unusual. New ways of approaching interactions in society. Valuing change that benefits the largest possible number of people. Uses of technology and bringing innovation. The lessons of Uranus.

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Virgo or 6th House South Node –> Pisces or 12th House North Node

Known: Discernment. Pinpointing what needs improving. Being of service in betterment of the planet. Making choices that are healthy for the body and environment. Enjoyment of small animals. Understanding the value of health. Being fully involved with working daily. Articulating precisely, for others, where, when, and how better choices and more productive modes of behavior can be established. The detailed perception lessons of Mercury.

Learning: To choose a spiritual practice of the highest level. To define the Divine in largest possible terms. To seek spiritual union. The mystical place where we are all one. Valuing mysticism, merging, and joys of uniting in transcendence, including the power of music. Value of fantasy, illusion, including film and dance, the unlimited potential of the gift of imagination and free will. Valuing the full circle, how ending is a beginning. Resting, trusting, relaxing into the eternal openness of possibility. The lessons of Neptune.

(also see special Virgo note at end)

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Libra or 7th House South Node –> Aries or 1st House North Node

Known: Others. What others want. What others need. How to help others. Diplomacy. Harmony. Innate refinement. Innate sense of beauty. The relationship lessons of Venus.

Learning: Who you are. Self Identity. Authenticity. Valuing True Self. Who you truly are without the opinion of others involved. How to initiate things for yourself. How to not care what others think. Putting yourself first in a healthy, self-empowering way. How good romantic relationships are impossible unless you know and value yourself. Hearing your own voice. Standing up for yourself. Fighting for yourself. Healthy winning. The lessons of Mars.

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Scorpio or 8th House South Node –> Taurus or 2nd House North Node

Known: The Great Mystery. Penetrating issues to the core. Energy manipulation including magic, other people’s money, mysticism. Phoenix skills: Rising from the ashes. Change and transformation. Knowing why. The lessons of Pluto.

Learning: Appreciation of earthly delights, including having your own money, and the beauty of surfaces both textural and energetic. Valuing the tangible, touchable, 3-D. Valuing rich pleasures of Earth. Feeling solidity in your own personal values. Appreciating the physical as much as the metaphysical. The physical celebration lessons of Venus.

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Sagittarius or 9th House South Node –> Gemini or 3rd House North Node

Known: Doctrine, Dogma, Philosophy, Higher Learning. Schools, law, education. Religious tenets, sometimes even strict religious life. Issues of balancing earthly indulgence and spiritual philosophy. Ability to speak for long periods of time – soap box, hold forth, carry on about range of knowledgable subjects. Foreign lands and wide roaming travel – even if only mental. Love of nature and outdoors. The lessons of Jupiter.

Learning: To lighten up. To release tight, over-zealous narrow beliefs. To employ your wit in happy ways. To appreciate near-by connections, like neighborhood and siblings. To communicate – especially write well – without doctrinal confinement, ponderous pronouncements, or rambling endlessly. The communication lessons of Mercury.

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Capricorn or 10th House South Node –> Cancer or 4th House North Node

Known: The Big Time. How big stuff is done in big ways. Being out in the world, successful, achieving things. How to do things for the approval of others. Concerns of status, social clout. Issues of permission and societal expectations. The lessons of Saturn.

Learning: Your true heart – what you, personally, deeply feel. How to be nurturing, caring, and supportive to your own sweet self. Mothering yourself, possibly for the first time. How to have a home, emotionally and literally. The lessons of The Moon.

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Aquarius or 11th House South Node –> Leo or 5th House North Node

Known: The humanitarian, universal viewpoint. The power to the people right on, freedom of thought approach. The attraction of the unexpected and innovative. Contributing to higher causes and group movements that are beneficial for the largest possible amount of people. Wanting to prosper change that prospers large groups of humanity. The lessons of Aquarius

Learning: That the individual matters. To believe in the power of one creative heart hearing its true work of art and expressing it for themselves. To applaud your own courage and creativity. To understand the two-way power of applause, that both audience and performer experience connection and joy. To resist the detachment of higher causes and truly see the essential and unique contribution of the individual. To shift aloofness. To do things because they are fun. To risk romance. To lead with heartfelt generosity and courage, not just theory and principle. To understand change happens one person at a time, from the inside out. And that the most important change is knowing your own heart. The lessons of the Sun.

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Pisces or 12th House South Node –> Virgo or 6th House North Node

Known: Spiritual energies. Psychedelic. Transcendental. Mystical Spiritual Union. Fantasy, from movies to other illusionary drugs. The knowledge that we are all one. The cosmic, including music and dance. The lessons of Neptune.

Learning: The beauty of the Earth. The importance of discernment. Of physical health and precense. Valuing separation and distinction. The joy of small animals. How individuals can serve the bigger picture by even the smallest, carefully chosen contributions. Valuing details. Becoming grounded, present, aware and not flaky, lost, or trippy. The detailed perception lessons of Mercury

(also see note about Virgo)

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Note About Virgo:

Because Virgo is The Goddess, and all aspects of what would constitute Feminine Service have a long history of collective misjudgment, your faculty believes any nodal path including Virgo, or the 6th house, has an extra aspect: Redemption of Virgo.

Virgo has the worst PR in the Zodiac. Again, mysogyny is not extinct. Part of the bad rap of Virgo – and indeed females who are accused of portraying it – as being nit-picking and over-critical– is not accurate as a universal female energy.

Virgo is about discernment and attention to detail.

Women for centuries who might have an ability to discern where improvement to any system or structure could be made were not usually encouraged to make this contribution.

Indeed, knowledgeable women with highly detailed knowledge of how to use sharp-eyed discernment in matters of health – a Virgo focus – by using natural remedies such from another Virgo concern the Earth – like herbs – well, in fact, burnt for it. Along with their knowledge. And their small animals, cats in particular, another area of Virgo care.

The sheer frustration of collective dismissal is part of the collective promotion of Virgo as a critical, unfeeling shrew.

This is not Virgo. This is the misguided ancient patriarchy in action.

Virgo, at her essence, is not cruel. She is just the opposite. She is here to serve. She loves Earth. She loves its animals especially. She celebrates health, healing and working hard.

She loves the 3-D. And she is ruled by Mercury who wants us all to communicate.

Notice Virgo’s dominion covers a whole lotta things that get beat-up by the misguided patriarchy: Earth, health, animals.

“Virgin” in its original meaning wasn’t about never having sex. It means “woman unto herself”. A person that discerns and supports her own health so clearly, she needs no help from others, in fact, can give from the bounty of herself to help those things she values

If your South Node is in Virgo, or the sixth house, especially if you are female, and you have been an over-critical harpie, search out why. Search out what circumstances, events, or frustrations changed you from discerning to hyper-critical. And make amends with others and your own sweet clear-eyed, Earth-loving child self. And then reach for the lessons of Pisces.

If your North Node is in Virgo, or the sixth house, you can take your mystical insights into the hippiest trip of all: Redeeming Virgo. By learning to pinpoint the exact ways each of us, the Earth, and the four-leggeds upon Her, may both join together, yet also stand fully ourselves within our selves. Which will be serving yourself, and the whole planet.

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Why Nodes First?

Learning about the Moon’s Nodes is an excellent way to start learning about yourself, Psychological Astrology, and all the energies of the Zodiac.

For two reasons.

One, the Moon’s Nodes are an energetic spectrum. And understanding spectrums is extremely valuable not just in life, but also in Astrology.

Get out your handy Natural Zodiac chart. (Download here if you need.)

Locate a house chosen completely at random, oh, say, The Fifth.

You’ll see that the pie wedge of the 5th house is directly opposite the pie wedge of the 11th house. 

And if you lifted both pie wedges of the 5th & 11th houses, along with the little circle in the middle, you’d have a perfectly balanced bow tie.

Same is true for the directly opposite 1st & 7th houses, 2nd & 8th, 3rd & 9th, 4th & 10th, 6th & 12th.

These “bow ties” represent a spectrum of energies. A spectrum ranging across the areas, emotions, arenas, feelings, things and situations each house and its ruling sign and planet represent.

Like the six “bow ties”, there are six energetic spectrums possible for the placement of your Moon’s Nodes. Because the Moon’s Nodes are always directly opposite each other by sign and house.

Some of those energies might seem so polar opposite that the little circle in the middle might as well be a moat or canyon. And, indeed, some of the signs, planets, and houses are known to have little tolerance for the signature energies of their opposites.

Yet, when discussing the Moon’s Nodes – and, as we will see, much of life – these polar opposites are not so unattached.

Like so many seemingly opposite energies, there is no having one without the other. They are connected. And at every point along the Nodal spectrum you are experiencing a different mix of the two.

And, while there are six spectrums, your South or North Node might be in either one of the houses in the spectrum. And that makes for a very different ride. So much so, that we think of learning about the Moon’s Nodes as experiencing 12 very different journeys.

Which brings us to Reason #2 why studying the Moon’s Nodes is a great place to start: You’ll cover everything.

Which is so very convenient, because all of us are experiencing the entire Zodiac, all the time.

But Now, Here We Are

Every Astrology chart has every planetary body somewhere. Every chart also has all 12 houses. And all 12 signs.

Every chart, somewhere, in uniquely personal expression and uniquely personal combination, it’s in there.

So as we discuss the various learning opportunities of the different placements of the Moon’s Nodes, you’re going to resonate – sometimes a little, sometimes a lot – with all of them.

Which is a good thing.

Because the point of Psychological Astrology is to help you truly know yourself so you can make the most productive, creative, supportive, expanding highest good choices about your life possible.

So, as you’re reading the first, brief toplines about each of the 12 spectrums outlined below, when you feel some identity with a journey that is not your Nodal placement, recognize that, actually, it is your placement, somewhere in your chart, about something.

And identifying an energy that has meaning to you is important, no matter what.

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