I’m having the week from hell – well, relatively speaking. It’s all First-World stuff. My home isn’t being invaded by neo-Nazis, burned by militant Islamists, or bombed by U.S. airstrikes.

No, I just had a three-day migraine, followed by two days of a “regular” headache. Right before it started, my darling kitty knocked my phone off the desk with enough force to blow off the cover and eject the battery. For several hours, it appeared dead (the phone, not the cat).

On the afternoon of headache day three, I received a warning from my hosting service that RealAstrologers had gone over its resource usage limit – the second warning in just over a month. If I don’t do something about it, the site will be shut down.

I suspected right away with the first notice that the overage was caused by attempted hacking by bots. I asked tech support to look into it, but I got the run-around and have been in a prolonged, time-consuming and extremely irritating exchange with them. Until Friday, they wouldn’t even admit that RA was being targeted by brute force attacks. It’s still up in the air whether they will fix it or insist that I do it myself, which involves inserting lines in the code for the site and is way beyond my capabilities.

Once the headache began to subside and I could think clearly, I realized that this incident is a road sign, the kind that I’m always pointing out to clients but don’t seem to see myself until I’m speeding past the exit ramp. I went back and looked at my chart, and sure enough, there are signatures for disrupted communications and tussles with authority. Apparently, this sign is pointing me toward a new hosting service as well as possible changes to the site overall that will help keep the focus on the epic planetary cycles behind the global chaos and the craziness in our personal lives.

This “mission” really hit home for me a few days ago with the release of a new study by the World Health Organization showing that more people die by suicide every year than in all global conflicts and natural disasters combined. Every 40 seconds, someone somewhere in the world commits suicide, and for every one that succeeds, there are many more attempts. Unfortunately, this is a First-World problem. Some of the highest suicide rates are in the so-called “developed” world.

It’s not hard to imagine how hopelessness and despair can escalate in times of global economic crisis, especially given the widening gap between rich and poor. There are plenty of other factors, as well. WHO recommends that governments adopt a national suicide prevention strategy, which certainly seems like a priority over, say, bombing foreign countries back to the Stone Age. But somehow I think that governments are part of the problem. For one thing, they tend to form bureaucracies that quickly become entrenched, putting their own survival over the needs of those they were intended to serve. Standing in line for two hours only to be told you have the wrong ID is frustrating enough for someone who’s mentally healthy, let alone for those on the edge.

The bigger issue, though, is that I doubt that any government in the world would address the key underlying issues such as income disparity, feelings of powerlessness to do anything about government corruption and the steady erosion of civil rights, and the sense of alienation in a system that encourages competition over cooperation. I’m sure you could add more to that list. Instead, they position the problem as one of individual mental health, divorced from any social, political, or economic context. The large pharmaceutical companies have got to be jumping for joy over the prospect of more corporate welfare.

Although I’ve addressed depression and suicide before, the topic is especially timely with this week’s Full Moon in Pisces, since mental health falls under the twelfth house, traditionally associated with Pisces and its modern ruler, Neptune. Pisces also is the sign of compassion. There’s a lot of stress and trauma in the world right now, and we all need to have compassion for one another. It can be a challenge with people who react to stress in negative and possibly aggressive ways. We also might feel a need to distance ourselves from the messy reality of a depressed friend or relative, often because we don’t know the right thing to do or say. You don’t necessarily need to talk. Just sitting with someone or holding their hand can be all it takes to create a momentary connection that, however fleeting, helps heals the feeling of separation.

Pisces and Neptune also represent the collective unconscious and the interconnectedness of all things, not just between humans. Indeed, that’s what allows us to have compassion for others. Compassion literally means “to suffer with.” When we understand how we’re all connected, we feel not only the pain of people whose homes are destroyed in a war zone, but also the fear and panic of the defending army, the invading forces, their commanders, and the “evil” leaders who play with their lives like pieces on a chess board. Compassion is often misunderstood as approval, acquiescence, or excusing bad behavior. Not true. We can have compassion for a serial killer and still want him in a high-security institution for life. Truly compassionate people aren’t stupid or naïve; they understand that the interconnectedness of all beings means just that, whether we’re talking about the Dalai Lama or Hitler.

The chart for the Full Moon is a tangle of interconnections of all kinds. Some are supportive, some are combative. Some have absolutely nothing to do with each other. Some are constructive, some aid in breaking down.

The most compelling aspects in the chart are the conjunction of the Moon and Chiron by less than one degree and the favorable angle from the Sun and Moon to Saturn. There also is a strong inconjunct from the Sun and Saturn to Uranus, and contacts from Mercury to Jupiter and Pluto.

The Moon-Chiron conjunction in Pisces represents emotional trauma in the collective unconscious, particularly from wars between clans and ethnic groups or tribes. These conflicts can go back centuries, as in the case of Russia and Ukraine. When I was 9 years old, I wanted to join the Girl Scouts, but my mother, a devout Catholic (and a Pisces), disapproved, because the meetings were held in a Protestant church. Her prejudice had to have been passed down from her parents and grandparents, who lived in Catholic Quebec. I thought Protestants were bad all the way into my early 20s. Religious differences like this are easily exploited for political purposes.

The Sun and Moon are opposed at 16 degrees Virgo and Pisces, both at a supportive angle to Saturn at 18 degrees Scorpio. Saturn is the planet of structure and order, but since he entered Scorpio in October 2012, building solid, lasting structures has been extremely difficult, whether you’re talking about a career path, financial plan, project team, committed relationship, or something else. Scorpio is about breaking down what’s no longer useful. So we’ve been in this weird space of repeatedly trying to start something new, only to have it collapse every time after barely getting off the ground.

My take on this is that we’ve been trying to do something new and different, to have a new and more sustainable way of living and being, but we’re still operating on old assumptions, beliefs, and values, so what we’re producing is structurally unsound and needs to come down before we get too far along. A good example would be the new governments in countries where large demonstrations resulted in the removal of corrupt leaders. They aren’t doing so well, mostly because the new governments are just a different set of corrupt leaders with the same basic values as their predecessors. It always fascinates me to read about a group of “freedom fighters” rising up against tyranny, only to become tyrants themselves when given the power.

With the Sun, Moon, and Chiron favorably angled to Saturn, some of us finally could find the magic combination that forms the foundation under something that will last, be it career, money, or something else. I’m also hopeful that we might see some progress in international relations. I’ve read that the cease fire in Ukraine has been violated, with both sides blaming each other, but at least it was a step in the right direction. The Sun in Virgo favors practical, measurable objectives.

The Sun and Saturn form a Yod with Uranus. I find this somewhat helpful, in that we’ve at least got two parties (or sides of an issue, parts of a project, etc.) that are talking to each other, when before there was only discord, without much hope of resolution. The pressure will be on whatever Uranus represents. You probably know what that is already. If not, just think of what has been most frustrating in the past two months. For me, it has been interruptions with my Internet service (down multiple times today while I was in the middle of posting) and problems with my web host, at a time when I’m still fatigued from moving and adjusting to the many changes in my life since late spring. The Sun sextiles Saturn on Thursday, but we could see some improvements starting right away on Monday.

Mercury squares Pluto on Tuesday and sextiles Jupiter on Wednesday. We haven’t had a lot of balanced news coverage lately, but we could be surprised on Tuesday by the surfacing of facts that irritate some very powerful people. Grandstanding politicians might use them to justify their agendas, but there’s also a good possibility of their being used by leaders genuinely interested in finding middle ground. Venus in Virgo opposes Neptune on Wednesday. Facts could get muddled, but I think that truth and balance will prevail.

The biggest potential game-changer this week is the entrance of Mars in Sagittarius on Saturday, although we may not see any immediate correlation, seeing as it’s the weekend. Then again, we might. Sagittarius is fast, and Mars is impulsive. Among other things, Mars in Sagittarius is the religious warrior, but Sagittarius also aims for truth. Let’s hope that’s Truth with a capital “T” and not the kind of “truth” a reporter can claim by accurately quoting a lying sack of s—– politician.

Yeah, that’s my Saturn in Sagittarius talking.

Much love and courage to all,

Pat

© Pat Paquette, RealAstrologers.com, 2014.