Scorpio Full Moon May 2025

Mars and Pluto: the personal will and the wilderness of momentum.

The Sahara Desert.

I mostly riff on Mars and Pluto in this article, as they are co-rulers of Scorpio, but also because we’ve been experiencing their opposition over the past few months. For me, this Full Moon has been a sort of full body summing up of what that opposition pushed me to see, feel and digest, perhaps in part because this moon culminated right on top of my natal Scorpio sun, with only one degree of separation.

Mercury in Taurus is squaring Pluto, and Uranus in Taurus is in opposition to this moon. Taurus is associated with the physical body (explains the full body part). The experience was sudden and slow at once, the way tectonic plates can be very slowly grinding into each other, building pressure until a big slip escapes. The words (Mercury) came after the tectonic shift (Pluto, Uranus).

There is always an element of chaos, inside and outside, so take any sort of forecast with a grain of salt and your own lived experiences. What does salt do? It amplifies the sense of taste so you can detect more deeply what is occurring.

Sink into your senses, do what helps you open to your body and its voices, even if (maybe especially if) that means doing less. Doing less is often the foundation that holds space for feeling more but often requires us to pass through discomfort. Perhaps this discomfort is a sort of initiation, but an impersonal one. The natural unsettledness that occurs when we are recalibrating to forgotten or even resisted rhythms.

It’s just true that we must be continually balancing our humanity - our emotions, our feelings, our personal will - with the existence of everything else, and to remember that it is not all about us. I think for humans this is genuinely difficult, because we are so focused on ourselves both individually and as a species. Perhaps this is true for all species, I don’t know. But it seems a great temptation for us to believe everything revolves around us.

Astrology itself is based on the individual’s perspective from earth, the sky as seen from a human on earth. I think this is just how we are, how we function, so it is not wrong.

But we also have this capacity to acknowledge that which is not us, to listen to it deeply, to be curious about other life forms and what their existence is like. And to care. We are not perfect in this, but we are adept enough to build bridges in astonishing ways. Will our creativity be enough for us to survive this current wave of momentum we all find ourselves in? I honestly don’t know. But I deeply believe it is not time to give up.

Yesterday started out with strange and slightly repulsive reminders to pay attention: I bit into a strawberry and realized it had a huge rotten spot. I spread some butter on toast and when bringing it up to my mouth the smell clued me in to it being rancid. All very Mars (I want this) and Pluto (Nature’s will prevails), and Taurus (informing through the senses). So, I sat for a moment, feeling the impulse to keep doing things writhing inside: specifically, to reach for the phone. I resisted, and eventually it settled, and this spaciousness entered.

What is this like? Familiar yet long lost, like visiting a childhood place and smelling that particular pine species in the sun. Bittersweet, full of all the light and dark qualities of childhood, each such a specific shape for every individual. But it also reminded me of stepping out of my friend’s truck and seeing the sage fields in the Eastern Sierras for the first time. Breathing them. Such a deep pleasure leaning right up against loneliness, which leaned against solitude.

Perhaps solitude is loneliness after some self-care, rest and a good meal.

But at that time, I hadn’t learned the difference yet, I just felt fear like a deep hum beneath it all, like some vibration embedded in my nervous system, quiet like the bare mountains, like the ancient lake with its cinder center and memories from before humans existed.

I walked into the lake (Mono Lake, please go if you haven’t). It wasn’t deep, but so thick with salt that it lifted me the way deep water does. All my mosquito bites started ringing but I stayed, because though painful it felt necessary. Swarms of these endemic flies, which are actually related to crustaceans, passed in murmuration, seemingly unconscious of me.

I was just something to pass.

My self-important maneuvering, my personal will, found this hard to truly imagine. Not in a self-deprecating way, but in a simply true way; that I am just something to pass to much of this place, and that I have related to so many whole lives this way and continue to. But we are all this.

We are all passing to and fro, in and out, actions upon actions. Actions begetting actions. I see personal actions, personal will, that self-important maneuvering, as Mars energy. And it is necessary. We all have a little Mars that drives us, and there are so many of us. So many little Mars that together we make up this collective “will”, which is really the momentum of all the individual actions colliding with each other. I feel this collective will or momentum as Pluto, or Plutonic energy.

Interconnectedness is not just a fine web; it’s also a chaos of forming and breaking. It’s as violent as it is nurturing at times. Sometimes the violence begets the nurturing. Perhaps always, if one looks deeply.

This momentum, or Pluto energy, is not concerned with personal preferences. It’s the tsunami that comes after tectonic shifts: it just is. When we humans experience it inside of our communities, our relationships, our bodies, it feels unfair. The illnesses, addictions, the injuries, breakdowns, wars, things that are so horrific I will not put words to them here.

Unjust.

Plutonic energy, and the experiences it drives, can dredge up emotions of an intensity we didn’t think possible. And these emotions are also Pluto; the result of momentum in the body which cannot be stopped.

That interconnection again: it permeates all perceived barriers. We share cells with the earth, DNA with mushrooms. We breathe whatever exists in the air at a given moment.

So, I am not saying that war is out of our hands or excused by inevitability. It is absolutely not. But it is driven by many factors, by momentum, and once it is set in motion it takes great momentum to stop.

And every Plutonic experience can be traced, though the paths are complex and sometimes hidden. Pluto rules the Underworld, the unseen. Any realm that we cannot easily see can be an underworld, including our own bodies, our psyches (Pluto rules psychology too), and the unseen webs of actions taken by those with power in our societies and governments. The explosion of a war, or more accurately a genocide as we are seeing now in Palestine, can be traced back. How did it get to this point? One, and very difficult, answer is because many of us didn’t want to see where things were headed. Many still do not.

This is also true when it comes to illnesses, addictions and injuries. The signs and signals are often there, but we didn’t want to see it. Plutonic experiences are often so overwhelming because by the time we acknowledge them the momentum has built to overwhelming proportions. This is not to say that we could have stopped them if we had acknowledged them sooner; sometimes that is the case but not always.

Perhaps this is because in life, causality cannot be simply traced as one would trace the steps of an equation. But often when faced with these experiences, tracing the past is not the most useful response. To survive and integrate Pluto, we must face “what is” and start there. This is where Mars and our personal will comes in.

Mars is the ancient ruler of Scorpio, and the planet was once associated with the Sumerian god Nergal, deemed “Lord of Peace, Afflicted Death and Pestilence”, all very Plutonian themes in the sense of not being concerned with our personal preferences. Even peace is not something one can force into existence. Over time Mars became associated with more anthropocentric themes: strategy in war (the art of war), weaving, agriculture, sport, competition, etc.

Mars became willpower, motivation and drive in a general sense. But I believe this reflects the long-developing overemphasis on personal will which has contributed to the current mess humanity is in concerning the planet: for too long we’ve been focused on self-important maneuvering without an eye on the momentum of our actions.

And so now we are feeling the Plutonic energy big time, and I think it’s no accident that Scorpio has acquired an additional ruler, as if the will of the planet has been split into two categories that can really get into it with each other: the will of humanity and the will of the earth.

But Pluto erupts inside of us too, with the skyrocketing prevalence of mental illness, exhaustion, anxiety, violence, addiction. It is not a coincidence that the upheaval of the earth is coinciding with upheaval in ourselves; we share cells with the planet, it has never been otherwise as far as we know.

Another side to this sharing of cells is that we can align our personal will with the momentum of the earth:

Mars and Pluto can work well together.

Not to just blindly go along with that momentum, but to see it clearly so that our actions can be rooted in “what is” and therefore as responsive to reality as possible.

The great courage of Mars can be directed at the action of seeing. It can take a warrior’s strength, perseverance and attitude to face the truth, and it is interesting that the home sign of Mars, Aries, rules the head and eyes - both very important body parts to use when developing and employing efficient strategy. Though there is an emphasis on brute force and hand to hand combat in popular astrology when it comes to both Mars and Aries, I feel that Mars has a particular talent when it comes to facing the truth, to seeing what is really happening, before actions are taken.

This is no small task, especially when we haven’t wanted to see the truth of things. Seeing the truth does not stop the wave, but it can increase our chances of riding the wave with less harm to ourselves and others. For example: if one has an addiction, facing the existence of that addiction is the first step to asking for help. But if one does not face the addiction, the Plutonic momentum will keep grinding on, often with tragic consequences for that person and anyone close to them.

And there are no guarantees with Pluto, just as there are no guarantees with a storm.

Even if face that addiction, the momentum may have already gathered to the point where our health, certain relationships or time cannot be restored to us. Again, this isn’t punishment, just Pluto. Just the momentum.

That doesn’t make the experience of it less harrowing.

Mars can also help with these experiences, not to try and stop the emotions (which again are Plutonic forces within us, unconcerned with whether we want them there or not, with a momentum of their own) but to face them and stay with them, the way a brave comrade might stay steadfast with his injured friend in the trenches until the battle passes and they can move on.

Often outwardly expressed violence is the result of suppressed emotions, a misuse of Martian energy where rather than using the courage of Mars to acknowledge and be with '“what is”, one funnels energy into denying the truth: the truth of the present emotion, the experience, the fear… Mars explodes into rage in these cases because he’s been given a mission that cannot be accomplished. It is unjust.

But it is possible to stay with an emotion as it passes. It may take practice, the helpful presence of others, time and it may be exhausting, but it is a mission that Mars can accomplish. Eliminating feelings is not. A frustrated Mars energy is often the result of being given impossible tasks, by ourselves or others. And impossible tasks often are assigned when we are hiding or running from something, or if someone is trying to control, coerce or conceal something from us.

Of course, and unfortunately, sometimes the oppression is coming from external forces, from those misusing their own Martian energy to do harm in order to get what they want. I will not say that in this case, in resistance to such forces, violence is right or wrong. But it does seem to be a natural response, just as when we are oppressed internally, the response is often, eventually, explosive.

Even and perhaps especially in these cases, titrating between the release of that pressure and the attempt to see clearly is important: continually employing discernment can mitigate the potential for unintended victims. This is not easy, and sometimes all we can do is try to ride the wave out until we can find enough stillness to reorient.

So, we have come through an opposition of Mars and Pluto, a transit that pushes us to face “what is” and use our energy, drive and courage to take actions that are rooted in present reality. But facing reality can be a harrowing experience, and the emotions and even personal traumas that are summoned by Plutonic energy cannot be bypassed; they must be faced as part of the overall reality, but not necessarily to inform that reality.

One may have anger over past hurts that needs to be felt and acknowledged and allowed to pass through the system, but that anger does not always mean that one is currently being hurt. This is a delicate process, because sometimes there is present pain, but it’s compounded by the past. What has worked for me is not trying to trace the past but becoming as clear as I can about what is really happening in the present while acknowledging and “being with” the feelings.

I’ve not always been able to do this alone, in fact the first time I did it successfully without disassociating was with a trusted mentor. Getting help is highly encouraged if you find yourself struggling.

Despite the emphasis on the lone wolf myth these days, humans are wired to work together, to carry and resolve burdens together. It took me decades to accept this because going at it alone felt safer, given my particular past. But again, that uncomfortable initiation: the discomfort is perhaps the necessary disorder of changing rhythms from what you’ve known, to the unknown.

Often the mind will look for reasons in the present to explain old pain or built-up emotional momentum, and this is an attempt to help us. The strategic-Mars can be helpful here: having a series of moves that help you orient yourself in present reality even if the feelings are disorienting. A simple example is having a strategy of taking space when you feel a strong emotion or reaction coming on, perhaps journaling or going for a walk. In any case taking a break from the situation that is igniting the emotions, rather than denying their existence and causing yourself and others harm.

This break, this momentary disengagement, can feel like a retreat to courageous Mars, who may want to stay in the fight and keep pushing. But remember that periodic retreat is a strategy: it allows us to endure. And with the amount of Plutonic momentum that we are all currently faced with, endurance is essential. In these moments of retreat, especially if we are recovering from addiction or trying to reflect on and process explosive situations, the need to make reparations may come up. The realization of this may bring up grief but try to leave guilt and shame behind, for they can drain your energy away from taking necessary actions.

Remember that we are all swept into Plutonic forces, and sometimes that violence is expressed through us. I am not excusing harm but am reiterating that what is most important is the next action taken, and whether it is rooted in the reality of the present (more likely to be helpful) or rooted in a denial of the present reality (more likely to compound difficulties). While we may not be able to change the past, we can begin a practice of facing the present and being with “what is” now, which can transform how we move with the momentum, inside and out.