Driving down the winding mountain road this morning, I noticed that some of the foliage is already turning a blazing orange-red. The iridescent glow of Autumn is the Northeastern United States’ gift. And while it’s distinctly still summer right now, gift is also the offering of this astrological time.

The Sun entered Leo July 22nd, and the Moon is new August 8th at 9:30 am ET. We rise in the sky and shine between Cancer’s emotional home and Virgo’s pragmatic work and service. Leo the Lion is the 5th House, a fire sign ruled by our brightest star. The Sun warms and lights us and is the center of our solar system. This is the house of play and fun, children and creativity, abundance, good fortune, and love. It’s also the house of depression, for when our creative juices dry up, where else do we go but the desert?

Leo shines a spotlight on and for us. The lion is charismatic and optimistic, a born-performer, a star. Every sign has a shadow, and this performer must be seen. The Lion wants to be the whole show, feel important and influential, and have all eyes on them alone. They need recognition and can become overly dependent on attention. Just as the Sun is the center of our galaxy, Leo longs to be that center too.

While the 5th House brings an air of frivolity, it is much deeper than it first appears. This is where we feel good about ourselves and discover love. It’s the house that makes us happy to be alive. While recreation may sound like a leisure activity, the word itself means to make new; to create again. This is the energy that drives procreation, so it’s the house of our children if we have them and our inner child too. In the 5th House, we discover that you can always have a happy childhood, no matter when it occurs.

The gifts we discover in this house matter not just because of the joy they bring us but because of what our happiness generates. While the 11th House is where we give our gifts to the world, the 5th House is where we first discover them. I am convinced that our pleasure is not just for our own benefit but is felt by the collective as well, for it feeds the Imaginal Realm, that reciprocal wellspring of guidance, support, and blessing. Love doesn’t just feel good because we feel it. It feels good because, like Leo’s energy, it shines and recreates itself.

I did not write a Leo New Moon article for any of the years I’ve been writing for my business. Instead, I was amid tragedy and loss in my personal life. Sandwiched in-between was a dream come true. In 2017, I left for Hawaii to help care for my sister’s partner Clark who was dying of cancer, I bought my farm in 2018, and last year I lost my cat, pig and two turkeys – all under Leo’s Sun and Moon.

I have lost five animals this year; four died, and I had to give up my horse because he was dangerous. Between all this loss and the coming struggle to care for three old dogs, two with terminal illness, I have decided to sell my beautiful little farm and my pigs and barn kitties with it. This decision has been a slow winding down of a decades-long dream and a fairly short time living it. I bought this house during Leo’s reign, and I’m selling it under the same. It may seem they’re opposing themes, but they’re not. Loss wouldn’t be loss if it wasn’t also love.

So let yourself shine under Leo’s Moon. Play, create, love, life. Fan the fires of this brilliant light with yourself and do what makes you happy to be alive.

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“The great affair, the love affair with life, is to live as variously as possible, to groom one’s curiosity like a high-spirited thoroughbred, climb aboard, and gallop…”

Diane Ackerman
“A Natural History of the Senses”

“One comes of it,
love it, love it.
Let go of it,
love comes from it.”

Life
The Avett Brothers