DAY: 22.5 - 26
PHASE ARC: 270º - 315º

Keynote: Crisis of significance - Integrating the Past.

The broader issues and situations faced during this and the proceeding phase may precipitate a crisis of significance. The Lunation Plan you formulated during the New Moon, three weeks ago, and subsequently nourished, put into action and worked for during the waxing hemicycle, and which was tempered and given expanded scope and purpose during the two previous phases, is now an organized network involving others. Your plan has seen increased involvement with others and outside agencies, and their varied activities, functions and responsibilities need to be clearly delineated and understood. Even if your Lunation Plan regards inner work and self-improvement, now your place and purpose within a large whole comes into focus, and issues of public-image and how others perceive you may come into play.
      The Third Quarter Moon is the opposite of the First Quarter Moon. Both are half-illuminated, half-dark — but opposite sides are illuminated and dark. The First Quarter Moon calls for gradually expanded organic, form-building activity. The Third Quarter Moon is a time for giving meaning to what one has accomplished, and of greater participation in the community. One calls for action, the other for meaning. Success and failure, both call for meaning. Mere material (or even spiritual) success, comfort and accomplishment are unfulfilling without purpose, without a sense of contribution to a larger whole. You may have worked hard to see the fruits of your labors, but recent success may not seem enough — your efforts must mean something, they require significance. Failure also calls for meaning, and meaning can ultimately transform failure into success.
      Perhaps more than any other phase, the Third Quarter Moon is a tester and a maker of character. Here success may lead to ultimate failure if one's principles and intellectual honesty are compromised by greed and a thirst for power and control. Success, economic power and social responsibility can quickly expose any weakness of character. Having money and power, or being the boss, doesn't make one correct. The goal of your Lunation Plan and what lies beyond it may be very compelling, and you may find yourself entirely involved in and dedicated to making the most of it. But along with such dedication and total involvement comes a tendency to be intolerant or thoughtless of others, especially when they don't see things your way. Your goals may require the work of others, and now is the time for self-examination regarding your treatment of co-workers and employees.
      It is time to reflect over the past weeks, to place everything within the broadest perspective, to shed outmoded patterns, and to move toward new possibilities which may unfold in the coming cycle — just a week away. If your Lunation Plan didn't get off to a fruitful start, don't feel badly. Instead try to move beyond the past and start working in earnest to make a fresh start at the coming New Moon.