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Pisces Full Moon: Do Nothing

By Jessica Shepherd

At the end of each summer, like clockwork, I used to anticipate surviving the fall. Thinking about back-to-school, carpooling kids, back-to-school events, weekend social calendars, travel plans… as life spun like a top perilously close to the edge of the table, I believed I could alleviate this feeling of over-extension by getting everything in order. I’d organize the dreaded tupperware drawer, and usually end up more tightly wound. One day, with one more birthday party to throw and dinner to make, I realized the honest truth was that I wanted to do nothing. I would as soon leave the birthday to fate, frisbee’d the family a frozen pizza, and head out to the beach. Which is, happily, what I did.

The tourists were trail-walking in full force. I meandered. Gratefully (because it’s hard to find a place to be alone in big California), I found a secret path no one else was on, requiring only an agile scramble up a cliffside to reach a rocky perch overlooking the sea. The wind whipped past my ears. The gulls screamed. I wondered if the little people below would hear me yell into the wind, so I did. They didn’t. It felt good. I kept yelling. I let out built up frustration and anxiety. I yelled with the gulls and the foghorns, and my problems receded with the tide. I was just a soul on a rock at the edge of the sea.

As I walked down to the beach, I felt lighter, emptier. Liberating my feet of their shoes, I waded into the cold tide pools of the Pacific. Drifting in spaciousness, I remembered the oceans I’ve visited over the years. As a child growing up in the landlocked southwest, I couldn’t wait to live by the ocean. I remembered my first beach experience at the Atlantic, a result of my grandmother’s move to someplace warm, a place she thought “the kids would want to visit me”. We visited often. The Coastal Carolina water was warm, welcoming. In my twenties, living in Hawaii, the water was alive with sea turtles, coral and tropical fish. On a Shepherd family vacation to Baja, the Sea of Cortez’s water was so magically salt-buoyant, I didn’t need to swim to float. Now, in Northern California the mussel encrusted rocks and sea-life rich tide pools made it worth getting your feet bone cold and your jeans wet, just to see.

Consciously spending “time outside of time” is one thing I often suggest to clients experiencing a Neptune or Twelfth House transit, times when uncertainty and anxiety are high. Beach-combing, meditation or getting lost in an art project are ways to spend time outside of time. These non-doing activities alleviate the anxieties and fears accompanying such a time, and loosen compulsive busy-ness at the root source of anxiety. More often, it’s about lessening one’s too high expectations and practicing self-acceptance. When I’m feeling over-extended, pressured or anxious my favorite mantra is:  Nothing to do. No one to be. Nowhere to go. It’s an instant de-pressurizer.

Paradoxically, my most creatively prolific work arises from totally letting go of accomplishing anything at all. Yet, we resist doing nothing. We have ambition drilled into us, a cult of accomplishment, that says only pushing, striving, trying yields results. My dear granny argued that meditation was a time-waster. This was a heated debate in our household because my father was Buddhist. Her parents and grandparents were farmers; manual labor, not idle, kept food on the table. Yet for hours she would sit at her little bay window overlooking her retirement village cul de sac, knitting, curiously waiting to see what or who would happen onto her street. The neighbor’s daughter was visiting …there’s a new teenager cutting the so-and-so’s yard. She would call her sister, my great aunt, who lived next door, report the goings-ons of the neighborhood. I believe this nothing doing quieted and soothed her. She was in her own way letting go and letting God.

With her Sixth House Aries Sun, she was a big believer in human do-ing. Twelfth House/Pisces retirement was hard on her. So much free time was confusing; she would complain that she felt useless. She’s not alone. Like her, we confuse doing nothing with being no one. If you’ve had a spiritual awakening, you know this from experience: our Ego is desperately afraid of going into the void, that empty space of nothingness, while at the same time craving it. Yet at the end of the cycle, or the end of the day, the simple be-ingness of Pisces allows us to, finally, receive our own good.

As the Sun transits Virgo, our pre-autumn syllabus calls for organization, scheduling, and the shoring up of a million little details which are supposed to make our lives better. Even organizing, to-do lists, and getting into better shape can be taken too far; Virgo season can be merciless and tricky when self-perfection leads to our self-undoing. Beware the promised inner peace of a yoga class becoming a full on competition to fit into your favorite dress, or to stay in handstand even longer. Beware especially, if you have an attachment to becoming more perfect. As a balance, at Pisces Full Moon it’s time to willingly turn away from activities that feed our compulsive need for doing more, better. We soul-yearn for simply be-ing good enough as we are.

Now is the time to reverently do nothing. Pisces Full Moon is perfect for daydreaming, spacing out, creating, discovering our hidden fantasy life, helping us to find our particular form of doing nothing. The idea that relaxation, doing nothing, pays dividends in fulfillment and happiness is utterly counterintuitive to our Ego. Pisces asks us to go beyond that idea, and eventually every other, too. Even doing nothing. When we discover that doing nothing helps us do everything better -and- that our Ego can use doing nothing into a way to be more… productive, happier, aligned, enlightened, whatever goal we have made for our self… “doing nothing” then becomes something to transcend, too.  With Pisces, the cosmic joke is on us. Eventually, we will give up all of it, as it all merges into the sea of oneness and Divinity. Then, like the Buddha, the only thing left to do is laugh.

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About Jessica Shepherd

Jessica Shepherd is a writer, astrologer and health coach who has studied and practiced modern astrology since 1992. She is the author of A Love Alchemist’s Notebook: Magical Secrets For Drawing Your True Love Into Your Life (Llewellyn, 2010) and the books Venus Signs: Discover Your Erotic Gifts and Secret Desires Through Astrology
(Llewellyn, 2015) and Karmic Dates and Momentary Mates: The Astrology of the Fifth House (Moonkissd, 2014). In 2018, after living in California for twenty years, she relocated to Honolulu, Hawaii with her husband, dog, and cat. Find out more about Jessica at Moonkissd (www.moonkissd.com).

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The Moon is in its
Full Phase

in the
Sign of Capricorn


Today's Lunar Aspects (Greenwich Mean Time)
(subtract: PST -8 hours, PDT -7 hours, EST -5 hours, EDT -4 hours)

  • Moon square Neptune, 10:55pm  May 15 2025
  • Moon trine Mercury, 5:29pm  May 16 2025
  • Moon square Venus, 5:45pm  May 16 2025

Venus is currently
The Morning Star

in the sign of Aries


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Astrologers use a variety of house systems, or methods of dividing up the sky into twelve sections. I use the Porphyry house system; another popular house system is Placidus (this is the default on https://astro.com). If the chart I send you looks different from what you are used to seeing, then likely a system other than Porphyry was used. Whole signs, Equal House, Regiomantus, and Campanus are examples of other systems. If you find all of this confusing, do not worry. It is likely not critical to your report.

m  Conjunction:  Like peas in a pod, planets in conjunction tend to come from the same place. They act together, but it’s also hard to tell them apart. This aspect can increase talent, focus, and intensity (“two are better than one”). Or one planet can disappear as the other dominates. Their connection feels so natural, it’s easy to think everyone blends these planetary energies just as you do—but mostly, they don’t!.

p  Sextile:  Planets in sextile are compatible, though without any fireworks. This aspect doesn’t demand your attention. It quietly presents an opportunity. You can join these archetypal forces. Donna Cunningham has called this the “Oh, that!” aspect, because that’s generally what her clients say when she describes their benefits.  To get the most from sextiles you need to actively work them.

q  Square:  Squares are wild and wonderful—but difficult too. The power struggle between these planets was likely defined in your youth, when they were impossibly challenging. People are usually aware of their squares. They force the issues that make you to grow. And that’s their gift. They ensure you learn your lessons. When you rise to the occasion, they bless you with energy, action, and success.

r  Trine:  Michael Munkasey has dubbed this the “goddess aspect” because it’s so lovely. Identifying talents you may have perfected in a previous life, trines can bring you joy. There’s a nice flow of energy between planets in trine. They support and reinforce each another. But without any struggle, you might take them for granted—neither using nor developing their gifts. An unattended trine can sometimes trick you into negative behaviors.

t  Inconjunct/Quincunx:  Your quincunx planets are innately incompatible. Bringing them into harmonious expression requires constant adjustments. This can be stressful, also motivating. You’ve got to keep changing your process, opinions or attitude—which promotes highly creative solutions.

u  Opposition:  They say opposites attract—and planets in opposition are never far from each other, though they’re constantly bickering. You may be triggered into awareness of this aspect by other people who seem to resist or undermine you.  An opposition can make you feel uncertain, insecure, or discontent, until you can accept and see yourself in both energies. Typically people find it easier to identify with one side and project the other onto unsuspecting others in the outer world.

First House: Personality, physical body, beginnings. Includes the Ascendant and rules physical appearance, the image you project to others, your general outlook on life, how you start things; may describe your role in your family system, often guides your first impression of immediate environment.

Second House: Money and personal finances, sense of self-worth and basic values, personal possessions, talents.

Third House: Communication, thoughts, language skills like writing and speaking, early schooling, siblings and neighbors, short trips, coming and going around town.

Fourth House: Your home, psychological foundations and roots, family, parents, domestic life, instinctive behavior, ancestry, your connection with the past, sense of security, domestic life, real estate. conditions at the end of life.

Fifth House: Children, creativity, romance; pleasure, entertainment, self-expression; all forms of “play”, speculation, gambling, and attitude towards taking risks; hobbies, attitude towards romance, lovers as opposed to partners, attitude towards having fun.

Sixth House: Work and job (as opposed to career), daily life, attitude towards service and coworkers, helpfulness, pets, attitude towards routine and organization, how you refine and perfect your skills.

Seventh House: Partnerships, one-to-one relationships, marriage, the first marriage, the “significant other”, business partnerships, competitors, open enemies, lawyers, mediators, counselors, contracts, negotiations, agreements. clients/the public.

Eighth House: Transformations and crisis, your ability to meet and rebound from crisis and change, sexuality; sex, death and rebirth, rituals and personal growth, your partner’s resources, addictions, psychology, other people’s money, taxes, divorce/alimony, inheritance.

Ninth House: Attitude toward expanding horizons, religious beliefs and personal philosophy, higher education, long-distance travel, morals, foreign languages and cultures, personal truths, publishing, commerce, advertising, your sense of adventure.

Tenth House: Career and profession, your contribution to society, social status, public reputation, material success, how you carve out a public identity for yourself; attitude toward authority figures, parents, caregivers, bosses, governments, attitude towards responsibility, desire for achievement.

Eleventh House: Friends, groups, organizations; hopes, wishes, aspirations, personal goals; your philanthropic attitude, concern for the collective, humanity; like tenth, can bring recognition and honors for fulfilling hopes and dreams.

Twelfth House: What’s hidden beneath the surface, karmic dustbin, limiting childhood/past-life messages, self-undoing, hidden enemies, hidden weaknesses, dreams, secret affairs, lost items, hospitals and prisons, hidden strengths, spiritual studies and soul growth.

A  Sun: Our vitality and magnetism; self-identity, ego.
Roles: The Self, the Hero, the Performer, the King.

B  Moon: Intuition, emotion, nurture.
Roles: The Mother, the High Priestess, the Child.

C  Mercury: Mind; physical dexterity and mental agility.
Roles: The Thinker, the Communicator, the Student, the Trickster, the Merchant, the Thief.

D  Venus: Our capacity for pleasure, receptivity, creativity, and social connection. Also indicates our relationships, self esteem, and financial abundance.
Roles: The Lover, the Seductress, the Artist.

E  Mars: Desire, initiative, anger.
Roles: The Protector, the Athlete, the Warrior.

F  Jupiter: Luck, opportunity, expansion, higher learning, religion.
Roles: The Scholar, the Gypsy, the Traveler, the Monk, the Professor.

G  Saturn: Hard work, commitment, focus, inadequacy, leadership, suffering, loss.
Roles: The Task Master, the Grim Reaper, the Wise Old Man, the Builder, the Cynic, the Boss.

H  Uranus: Change, breakthroughs, upsets, discoveries.
Roles: The Revolutionary, the Humanitarian, the Visionary, the Snob.

I  Neptune: Imagination, spirituality, idealism, addictions, deception, compassion.
Roles: The Artist, the Romantic, the Guru, the Addict, the Martyr, the Victim.

J  Pluto: Transformation, power, psychological dynamics, helplessness.
Roles: The Terrorist, the Detective, the Psychotherapist, the Dictator, shady people.

a  Aries: Pioneering, competitive, selfish, impatient, courageous, reckless, independent, dynamic, domineering, “Me first!”

b  Taurus: Patient, stable, lazy, dependable, practical, sensual, stubborn, artistic, possessive, greedy, gentle, loyal.

c  Gemini: Intelligent, curious, adaptable, quick-witted, restless, clever, scatterbrained, lacking follow-through.

d  Cancer: Nourishing, intuitive, protective, moody, sensitive, maternal, domestic, childish, cautious, creative.

e  Leo: Proud, dignified, vain, expressive, romantic, generous, childish, overbearing, self-assured, creative.

f  Virgo: Perfection-seeking, practical, methodical, petty, critical, studious, discriminating, cautious, never satisfied.

g  Libra: Charming, sociable, peace-loving, refined, diplomatic, artistic, indecisive, apathetic, easily deterred.

h  Scorpio: Passionate, secretive, penetrating, resourceful, suspicious, manipulative, jealous, sarcastic, intolerant, determined, aware.

i  Sagittarius: Freedom-loving, philosophical, optimistic, enthusiastic, careless, impatient, talkative, a know-it-all, broadminded, athletic, honest.

j  Capricorn: Serious, responsible, practical, hardworking, stubborn, brooding, inhibited, status-conscious, domineering, unforgiving.

k  Aquarius: Progressive, individualistic, unpredictable, cold, intellectual, artistic, eccentric, shy, impersonal, scientific.

l  Pisces: Compassionate, intuitive, ungrounded, romantic, impractical, self-sacrificing, seductive, musical, artistic.