Welcome to the October 2017 Satya Center Cosmic Weather Forecast. Warm greetings from your co-editors, Curtis Lang and Jane Sherry.
Cosmic weather patterns have been creating maximum environmental overload since the last week of August, and maximum stress for millions of people in North America.
Millions viewed the fiery August 21 Total Eclipse in fiery Leo trine volatile Uranus in fire sign Aries. Since then cosmic weather patterns have been dominated by a Full Moon conjunct watery Neptune in Pisces.
Since the eclipse we have experienced apocalyptic weather events across the country, and around the world, featuring earthquakes, floods, hurricanes and raging wildfires.
Throughout August and September, from Oregon to Wyoming and all the way to Southern California, widespread, often uncontrollable fires scorched the American West.
On August 25, Hurricane Harvey hit the Texas coast bringing nearly 5 feet of rain and triggering the worst flooding ever seen in the entire history of this country.
Within the next two weeks, Irma became the strongest Caribbean hurricane ever recorded, slammed the Caribbean and enveloped the entire state of Florida. Then Hurricanes Jose and Maria denuded Caribbean islands with 170 mph winds. This series of mega-storms have created an unprecedented humanitarian crisis in the Florida Keys, the US Virgin Islands, the French Antilles, and Puerto Rico.
On our wedding anniversary, September 23, massive earthquakes hit Mexico, California, North Korea, Japan and the Philippines.
Washington's response to the hurricanes in Texas and Florida was swift and decisive, but the scale of the destruction will require rethinking of the way people live in coastal areas, especially in Houston.
Officials in Puerto Rico complain that ten days after Maria's passage, which left the entire island without electricity, the federal response has been slow and ineffectual, with ten thousand containers of supplies stranded in San Juan harbor.
On Tuesday, October 3, Oxfam America released a rare statement criticizing the administration for their response to the disaster: “The US has more than enough resources to mobilize an emergency response but has failed to do so in a swift and robust manner.”
Very little is heard from representatives of the US Virgin Islands, or the French Antilles, where most structures were damaged, crops destroyed and entire forests splintered and stripped of leaves.
US Customs flyover of Puerto Rico after Maria passed through
Estimated damages from Harvey are $180 billion, for Irma $75 billion, for Maria $85 billion and for Jose $50 billion for a total of $390 billion, somewhere between 1/3 and 1/2 a trillion dollars.People all over the Southeast Coast and Gulf Coast are revising their views of risks involved in living near the water as repair and rebuilding continue. Is this the new normal, or is this year's hurricane season an anomaly that we can safely dismiss as a statistical outlier?
". . .Colorado State university hurricane expert Phil Klotzbach reported that by two measures, September has already been the most active month for Atlantic tropical cyclones in records going back to 1893," according a blogpost on the Discover magazine website. Accumulated cyclone energy this September was the highest in nearly 100 years, and ditto the total number of days with hurricane activity in the Atlantic.
"According to the 2014 National Climate Assessment, the intensity, frequency and duration of North Atlantic hurricanes have increased since the early 1980s," reports Inside Climate News. "The frequency of the strongest storms—category 4 and 5 hurricanes—has increased too."
"Surface temperatures in the eastern half of the tropical Atlantic Ocean were between 0.5°C and 1°C above average this summer, as the NOAA maps below of the sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies from mid-July to early September show."
"Those higher temperatures (as well as higher temperatures in the atmosphere) feed the storms, helping them strengthen, says Inside Climate News. "One study based on two decades of data found that hurricanes intensify significantly faster now than they used to. The researchers found that storms reach Category 3 wind speeds nine hours faster than they did in the 1980s."
So when we hear about climate change creating a slightly warmer planet, perhaps 1-4 degrees warmer, it is tempting to think, hey that's not so much. But here is evidence that slightly warmer temperatures can create conditions that threaten island societies and coastal cities very existence.Scientists say that it is too early in the ongoing climate change saga to verify that there will be increasing numbers of hurricanes this century, but they do expect storms of greater magnitude around the world.
We can also expect more storms that strengthen quickly as they approach land, because of warmer waters just offshore, and hurricanes that move in unexpected directions as they near landfall. This means that the window of warning for larger, more dangerous hurricanes may be much narrower than in the past.
Here in Boca Raton, we have seldom seen a hurricane that comes from the south of Florida and travels due north. Storms that travel east to west or west to east do much less damage to the peninsula, which is long and skinny.
Clearly we now know what a Katrina scenario would look like here -- a major storm that travels up the I-95 corridor from Miami through Palm Beach county would totally transform this part of the country, creating a flood of climate refugees, a shrinking human footprint, a diminished tax base, and dimming future prospects for the entire peninsula.
We also know now that this type of disaster can happen to South Florida. It very nearly did.
What then will we do about the potential for rising sea levels and intensified hurricane seasons?
That is the question in the wake of the Great American Eclipse, a question that will be revisited during the Neptune in Pisces era all over the world, from now through 2025.
What will we do about the potential for dramatically increased large, potentially uncontrollable fires across the American West?
Scientists are certain that fires will worsen with increasing global climate change.
"Warming due to increasing greenhouse gas emissions will likely increase the potential for ‘very large fires’—the top 10 percent of fires, which account for a majority of burned areas in many regions of the United States," reports the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. "Climate change is expected to both intensify fire-friendly weather conditions, as well as lengthen the season during which very large fires tend to spread."
"The map [below] shows the projected increase in the number of 'very large fire weeks'—weeks in which conditions are favorable to the occurrence of very large fires—by mid-century (2041-2070) compared to the recent past (1971-2000). The darkest shades of red indicate that up to a six-fold increase is predicted across parts of the West. This area includes the Great Basin and Northern Rockies, as well as the Sierra Nevada and Klamath Mountains in Northern California."
"The potential for very large fire events is also expected to increase along the southern coastline and in the forests around the Great Lakes, although the number of events along the northern tier of the country should only increase moderately given the historically low potential for these events."
No wonder. Fire and flood, wind and earthquakes dominated the news this last month, although Donald Trump and Korea's Kim Jong-Un have engaged in a steadily escalating war of words all month long, threatening one another with nuclear weapons.
The sad truth is that as climate change, sea level rise and monster storms render the world's coastlines and most all of the major cities in the world increasingly risky places to live, increasing desertification and the failures of many major rivers worldwide, from the Ganges to the Colorado, will create tens of millions of new climate change refugees in the decades to come.
The most likely cause of the major wars in the 21st century will be related to environmental catastrophes, immigration issues and resource depletion. How we deal with these monumental crises will define us as a species, and as individuals.
Jane's Garden Report
It has occurred to me in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma, which dealt Boca Raton only a glancing blow, that we live in a time where there is no longer a safety net, if ever there was one being human on Planet Earth.
Dawn by Jane Sherry, 2016
Irma was only a category 1 or 2 hurricane, which was still terrifying in its power and noise and persisted for more than 24 continuous hours. I was sure our roof would be pulled off or trees crash into the roof, but we were spared any real damage. Only a neighbor’s 15 foot wide ficus hedge fell down into our yard and had to be cut down away from our trellis and raised bed. Thankfully our trellis and raised beds were made by an engineer and blocked the hedge from fully entering the tiny yard!
For so many hours those two nights, I lay sleepless remembering the verses from The Three Little Pigs fairy tale where the “big bad wolf would huff and puff and blow the house down”. [House still standing with our gratitude!]
I realized I’ve always been in search of freedom and security at the same time, two opposing states of being. In my younger days, I had a certain ferocity born of fearlessness and a willingness to take great risks. In recent years, as parents die, siblings age and our world seems on the verge of self-destruction, fear threatens to become a constant companion. Not good for my health or for finding inspiration. Fear also blocks love, so how do we overcome our own natural desire for safety without giving up our freedoms?
The concept of safety is surely a chimera and has never truly existed, or it has co-existed in hand with danger and life’s precarious trajectory. Environmental catastrophes, institutionalized racism and sexism on the rise, greed-is-good materialism, vast storms, wars and rumors of war, all surround us in a toxic stew of social and ecological illnesses. We are witnesses to outer world events that are so so deeply disturbing that I feel we are at the crux of a point in human culture where we must evolve or disappear.
It’s time to end the war between the sexes and end the war of all against all. That includes individuals, family, work, group & national & international relationships as well as our relationship with Nature. And if you don’t have a relationship with Nature, then I fear you’re part of the problem.
During the Black Plague, I imagine people felt enormous depression, anger, sadness & betrayal. I cannot imagine having lived and fought in a war like WWII that my parents experienced nor can I imagine what it’s like to live in a country which in a short space of a day, has lost its entire electrical grid and agricultural system.
Revenge/Dynamite by Jane Sherry, 1980
As a young artist, I was very intrigued and fascinated by the eruption of Mt. St. Helens in Oregon. I created several drawings at the time because it was clear to me after that all bets were off about what to believe. Even our language seemed inadequate. No longer would I consider “extinct” volcanoes, extinct!
Now so many events leave me almost speechless. The enormity of our problems threatens to overwhelm us, as individuals and as a global civilization.
The New World Order won’t be about which political team is on top. It will be about who still has drinking water, who still has topsoil in which to plant food? For that matter, who will still have seeds to plant in the ground?
Time to live life as if there is no safety net!! Take your love -- we all have it inside of us, find a way to connect to that stream of energy -- and spread it around the world, your neighborhood, your family in whatever way you are able. Talk to a tree in your neighborhood, leave offerings for the Nature spirits, they are still around, whether or not you can see or perceive them.
Talk to the Benevolent Universe on behalf of us all.
Rainbow by Jane Sherry 2016
Connect with Nature
On a spiritual level, the ongoing climate emergency is a golden opportunity for humanity to connect consciously with the elemental beings present throughout all the realms of nature, found in the wind, the water, the fire and the earth, in minerals, plants, and the animal kingdom.
Take time to visit nature in your own neighborhood or your own backyard. Use your intuition and spiritual guidance to identify the focal point of elemental energies in your own little corner of the natural world.
This could be a large or unusually formed tree, for instance, which acts as an overlighting deva for the plant denizens of the area.
It could be a place where the water in a stream creates eddies and whirlpools, or a spot on the beach where low tide reveals a variety of living beings inhabiting an ecosystem shaped by the energy of the water in that power spot.
This could be a hill or mountain top near you which has a unique energy signature that vitalizes you when you visit.
Anywhere you sense Earth Magic is a spot where elemental beings gather and an energy vortex which holds the templates for the dynamic equilibrium of the micro-local ecosystem around you.
Take the time to bring offerings of small crystals, bowls of milk, flowers, and sacred figurines to those focal points of Earth Magic you find around you, as appropriate. Connect with the devas and nature spirits in that spot, and offer your energy to the Elementals that work tirelessly to maintain the balance of nature in the surrounding area. Performing Reiki, or using crystals to project energy to the entire area around your mini-Power Spot will energize the nature spirits.
Roxbury Road Offerings by Jane Sherry and Curtis Lang 2008
It is only through a new covenant between humans and the Elemental Kingdom that we can work together with the forces of nature to establish a new equilibrium on our planet that will be optimal for humans and other living beings.
Every day while doing Reiki self treatment Curtis takes a moment to send energy to the nature spirits. You can too. Curtis says "I call upon the devas, elementals and nature spirits in Boca Raton, in Palm Beach County, and in the offshore waters extending as far as the Bahamas and the Bermuda Triangle. I offer you Reiki rain and giant evanescent, iridescent bubbles composed of the rainbow radiance of pure Universal Life Force energy."
"I visualize the Reiki rain of golden light and I see rainbow bubbles of light forming in my yard, extending into my neighborhood, throughout my city, across the county to various spots I've visited again and again, along the beaches and in the waters of the ocean adjacent to our area."
Fairy Offerings by Jane Sherry and Curtis Lang 2008
"In this way I attune myself to the nature spirits around me and I nourish the earth, the waters, the plants, the minerals and the animals in my corner of this vast world."
This Full Moon is the ideal time to try this little nature meditation for yourself. The Sabian Symbol for the Sun at 13° Libra is "Children Blowing Soap Bubbles", so have some fun with the elementals in your world. This will benefit all of humanity and help to prepare the way for us to work with the spirits of nature in the time of planetary emergency to come.
If that is too complicated, just hug a tree you are particularly attracted to! Or simply sit in silence and gratitude beneath it.
"You have a tree in your garden: you can pass it several times a day without paying it any attention, as if it were a piece of stage set made from plaster or cardboard," says spiritual master Omraam Mikhael Aivanhov. "But you can also be conscious that it is a living being, and you can even approach it, greet it, talk to it, and absorb what it represents. You may say, ‘Greet a tree, talk to it, what good can that do?’ Of course, physically and materially, this changes nothing. But, on the subtle planes, the tree is enriched by your presence and, at the same time, you are enriched by it. It is you, in fact, who gains the most: you enter into communication with the life that circulates from the roots all the way to the tips of its branches, and you also become acquainted with the invisible creatures who live in it and look after it. Yes, for there are beings who work to maintain life everywhere in nature. "
Full Moon in Aries Cosmic Weather Forecast
This month's Full Moon occurs on Thursday October 5, 2017 at 2:40 pm Eastern time, when the moon reaches 12°42’ Aries with the sun in opposition at 12°42’ Libra. The Aries-Libra axis highlights relationship issues, and dramatizes the tension between individual rights, drives and desires and the compromises and sacrifices required for healthy relationships and healthy integration into social structures we inhabit.
The tension between individual rights and social responsibilities underlies the vast questions surrounding climate change, intense hurricane impacts, rising sea levels and global warming. These questions have been brought to the forefront of collective consciousness for careful consideration, but there is zero appetite in Washington for contemplating these existential questions, or in forging pro-active responses to future catastrophes.
This feeds the frustration we feel as individuals, because as individuals we are virtually powerless to affect the trajectory of future climate disruption.
This frustration is building in the collective consciousness, and unstable personalities can become vehicles for violent energies seeking release. In such cases individuals can run amok in psychotic episodes that threaten entire communities.
On Monday October 2, a lone gunman using automatic weapons stationed in a 32nd floor hotel room in Las Vegas rained death on 22,000 people attending a country music festival, some 500 yards away, killing 59 people and injuring some 527 at last count. Stephen Paddock was found dead in his hotel room after the massacre, but authorities have yet to uncover a motive in what appears to be a senseless killing spree, the worst mass shooting in US history.
Our hearts go out to the victims of this unthinkable crime against humanity, a crime that highlights the tensions between individual rights and collective safety and security. Paddock had amassed an arsenal of dozens of weapons, including at least two semi-automatic rifles with tripods that had been customized to allow full automatic fire.
Clearly there is a failure of political leadership in our winner-take-all hyper-individualistic society which assumes that the magic of the marketplace and the genius of individual entrepreneurs will manifest technological solutions for our social problems and our reckless recalibration of climate constants that maintain a Goldilocks equilibrium that sustains human civilization.
Yes, this Full Moon there is a lot of energy available for those who seek to explore and understand changing climate conditions, and for those who are trying to reset individual and collective assumptions about the sustainability of our current lifestyles and the viability of our coastal cities. There is a lot of energy available for interactions with the Elemental Kingdoms. All this is Libra work, of course, on the transpersonal level of existence.
On a personal level, if you like excitement, this is your Full Moon to shine!
Cosmic weather patterns indicate a month of personal passion when we can reboot love relationships and rediscover the magic connecting us. Collective consciousness is dominated by social anxiety, tension and conflict as our rigid but brittle social structures undergo increasing pressures to transform existing social contracts and status quo lifestyles in response to ongoing crises.
On the Full Moon this month, Venus and Mars are conjunct in Virgo, which kindles sexual desire and enhances feelings of harmony between the sexes. We may find that we can more easily accept both masculine and feminine aspects of our personalities, incorporating the positive traits of both sexes into ourselves.
Philly Moment, Aline Mayer 1980
Venus and Mars in Virgo are both trine Pluto in Capricorn, which indicates a profound depth of feeling in our love relationships, which can be transformative under this influence. Take advantage of this opportunity to dive deep with your loved one, and to nourish one another physically, emotionally, and mentally. You may be surprised at the healing that your love connection can provide this Full Moon week.
On the down side, Venus and Mars in Virgo are square Saturn in Sagittarius, and oppose Neptune in Pisces. This creates a mutable T-square, which indicates a big dose of wishful thinking and astral glamours surrounding our romantic and sexual relationships. These aspects underscore the need to exercise discernment and transcend our Neptunian illusions about love and our loved ones, while maintaining Saturnian boundaries in sexual relationships. We may also find that outer world circumstances constrain our ability to really let go and experience the physical, emotional and soul fusion with our lover that we so desire this Full Moon.
In addition Sun in Libra and Moon in Aries are both square Pluto in Capricorn creating a Cardinal T-square that reactivates the energy of the dreaded Grand Cardinal Cross, which has dominated celestial weather patterns for this entire decade.
The Grand Cardinal Cross has been active since the Global Financial Meltdown of 2008, and signals that stresses in our largest institutions and social systems are nearing a critical point, leading to major conflicts between political parties, classes, races, and religions worldwide.
This is the no man's land between the Age of Pisces and the Age of Aquarius, a time when the Industrial Age of Cheap Hydrocarbons is coming to a close, and the new Age of Solar Energy and Energy Conservation has yet to be born.
We may feel fear, stress, anxiety, anger, depression and sorrow as we contemplate the difficulties our civilization has faced over the last decade, the crises of the current season, and the looming, unknown global challenges we face in the years to come.
It is no exaggeration to say that we face a 75 year period of global emergency as humanity struggles to reconfigure our current hydrocarbon based economy during a period of global climate change, rising sea levels, monster storms and a fast-warming planet.
One antidote to negative feelings this Full Moon is to connect with those we love and share with one another. Now may be the time to tune out news reports, retreat to our safe, happy space, and enjoy activities that soothe the heart, mind, and body.
Scarecrow Harvest Figure by Jane Sherry 1987
Think hot chocolate by the fire or in the garden, shared meditation, long luxurious massages and reading in the bathtub. There are times when it's simply imperative to recharge and this Full Moon is an ideal time for nurturing and healing the stresses and wounds recently encountered.
Giving to those in need, performing selfless service, and offering energy, prayers and spiritual practices for those afflicted during this time of global turbulence will also bring us increased peace of mind.
It is difficult to write about these topics month after month, for years at a time, as we have done in the Cosmic Weather Forecast, and we know it is difficult to read these newsletters as well.
Jane and I salute and honor our readers, who have chosen to fearlessly face today's global climate emergency with an open mind and compassionate actio.We are confident that it is only by continuing to do our best to monitor, understand and respond to the unfolding crisis that we have any hope of minimizing human suffering during this Eopchal transition period.
Thank you for tuning in, for having the courage to accept the challenges around us, and for your continued support.
Jane and I affirm that you will receive the grace and guidance you require in these turbulent times to attain your spiritual and material goals, and we hold you all in our prayers during our spiritual practices. Love and Light to one and all!
Meditation Moment: Salute to Nature
“When initiates open their door in the morning, before doing anything else, they salute nature: the trees, the sky, and the sun, the day itself and the whole of creation. You will wonder why they do that and the answer is – that is how they put themselves in direct contact with the source of life. Yes, for nature responds to their greeting…
"How often have I gone out into my garden in the morning and greeted the angels of the four elements, the angels of fire, air, water and earth, and even the gnomes, nymphs, sylphs and salamanders. And when you do this you see them dancing and singing for joy. I send greetings to the trees, the rocks, and the wind, too. Try it yourself and you will feel that something inside you slips into place and becomes more harmonious, and that many elements of obscurity or misunderstanding fade from you simply because you have decided to salute living nature and the creatures that dwell within it.
"You might think, ‘What difference does it make whether I treat the earth with respect or not? It doesn’t feel anything…' If you pay attention to stones, plants, and animals, your awareness of the invisible world will develop much more readily. To follow an initiatic teaching is to develop the awareness that all things in nature are alive, and consequently to respect, care for and protect them; it is to develop a profoundly constructive spirit."
Omraam Mikhael Aivanhov