Taurus Season: Let Me Find Peace

One of the things I love about being an astrology teacher is that my own study progresses like a spiral staircase. I am constantly returning to the same material. Each time I do, I deepen my knowledge of the symbols through experience. 

I believe strongly in the value of personal experience in the study of astrology. You can study a book or take a class and learn how to make adequate predictions, but you can do the same thing with an economics or history degree and get smiles instead of awkward silences when you talk about what you do at parties. 

The thing that makes astrology really special is its symbolic language. The sign Leo can be used to describe a child, a king, a rockstar, a summer day, the sun, a lion, or the flooding of the Nile in ancient Egypt. What do those things have in common? The heart can touch the similarities when we watch children playing or bask like a cat in the sun, but the mind is reduced to cold abstractions, muttering something about “joy.” 

It is easiest to feel astrological symbols when they are active in the sky. The sun and moon are constantly cycling through the signs and interacting with the other planets in an orderly way, so I like to encourage the members of my group mentorship program to follow the sun and moon. This means hitting the books—you can’t feel the symbols in the world around you if you don’t know how to recognize them—and spending time observing the way that the signs and planets show up when they are highlighted by the sun and moon.

Taurus and Scorpio: Peace Foot, Wisdom Foot

One of the texts I use in my with my students is the elements series by Steven Forrest. Since my students are reading it, I’ve been following along, too, reading Book of Earth section on Taurus while the sun is in Taurus. 

An image Steven uses that really stuck out to me compared the relationship between Taurus and Scorpio to walking. When you are in a Scorpio time, Steven says, you are putting your wisdom foot forward—often, through difficult experiences. When you are in a Taurus time, you are putting your peace foot forward, recovering from those difficult experiences, processing, and taking the opportunity to just be alive. 

I have planets in Taurus and Scorpio, so whenever either Taurus or Scorpio are activated, my peace foot and my wisdom foot argue about who gets to take the step. You would think that Taurus would have the upper hand (or foot) in those circumstances, but I have a very heavy Scorpio with the south node, Pluto, and Scorpio. A lifetime (or more) of Scorpio habits means that I jump into difficult experiences with both feet, and when they’re over, I’m out looking for more. 

For people who are truly scorpionic (or Martian or Aries flavored), there’s nothing wrong with the way I’m behaving. We might shake our heads at Odysseus for getting bored and heading right back out for adventure after a decade fighting to get home, but the world needs people who are specialists in being good in a crisis. 

I, however, have a Taurus sun in a day chart. Even if that scorpionic territory is more familiar, I am profoundly tired of drama. My chart says that I am here to get my peace foot forward, and I can feel the truth of that in my bones.

I’ve been aware of my tendency to give Scorpio more than its share of attention for a long time, but I’ve struggled to give Taurus the space it deserves. 

Taurus Season: Peace Foot Forward

During Taurus season this year, I was determined to do something to find the right balance, and I’ve had one of those beautiful seasons where intention and synchronicity align. 

Overall, it has been a difficult season. What should have been a simple surgery to remove a tumor on my boyfriend’s dog’s shoulder has become a nightmare of complications, sleepless nights listening to her whimper, and daily drives to her vet, who is an hour away. 

In many ways, it has been a season of putting my wisdom foot forward, yet I have been able to find a sense of rhythm. When I have a difficult day or a night with especially bad sleep, I make time the next day to sit in the sun with a cup of tea or set aside an hour to read a novel.  

I have been startled by how much that time spent “doing nothing” has fortified me. It doesn’t change how hard things have been. I’ve still had moments of angst and panic, but I’m not crashing into body-enforced recovery mode in the way I usually do.  

It seems so simple: Take time to recover after a stressful event. Rest when you’re tired. And yet, these are lessons it has taken me thirty-five years to begin to learn.

The Druid’s Prayer for Peace has become my constant plea:

Deep within the still center of my being,

May I find peace.

Silently, within the quiet of the grove,

May I share peace,

Gently, within the greater circle of humankind,

May I radiate peace.