Buckle up, buttercup. This New Moon Eclipse feels purposefully disruptive.

You don’t need to be sitting down for this, but if you are, take a moment to appreciate that - the earth that holds you. Sitting, standing, driving, walking, just shift your attention as you listen to EARTH and give thanks for the stability she offers, then bring your attention to AIR and take a deep breath. 

It’s here - the season your animal body has been sensing, the tension in the wild knowing that has been with us for the last year, varying in measure but always in the background - informing us that BIG CHANGE is coming.

Aquarius 28º New Moon ‘Ring of Fire’ Annular Solar Eclipse

Tuesday Feb 17, 2026 at 4pm PT / 7pm ET / 11:59pm GMT

The new moon solar eclipse in Aquarius is a tarot ‘Tower’ moment for all that needs to be left behind in the corrupt world of illusions. Shit may fall apart, from literal natural disasters to shocking revelations in structures and systems. It’s been a long time coming, thirty years in the karmic Saturn cycle, 165 in the Neptune chapter that just ended.

We went from having abundant earth energy to nearly none now. Water has evaporated into air. Both are being transformed by fire. We are the stewards of a new era. This moon makes a tight square to Uranus in Taurus and a loose conjunction to Mars in Aquarius. It speaks of disruption and desire.

“Fuck it,” we say, before boldly daring to make a choice that will make us freer, but not without burning some system or structure we perceived as keeping us safe. 

Something needs to break free before we can move into the new era. This is a North Node eclipse, designed to move us forward and out of familiar patterns, pushing us along our evolutionary path. The type of story we’ve been living by so far is no longer the type of story we’re meant to live going forward. Uranus, ruler of Aquarius, is in a near-exact square to this new moon, implying we need to make a choice that will liberate us, or a choice will be made for us.

Poet Rainer Maria Rilke wrote that the future enters into us for the sake of transformation, long before we actually see the change. My dear friend Lis Best recently said (and it shook me to my core, “Desire is intelligence from our future reality.” 

When you long for freedom, what is the flavor of that deep desire?

Aquarius is ruled by Uranus, the zodiac’s ‘Great Awakener.’ As a sign, it is like electricity, a current of energy with the potential to illuminate or destroy. In its highest expression, Aquarius seeks to disrupt traditional systems, innovate new ideas, and invent more liberated ways of being, to help move humanity forward. It’s most interested in collective liberation. 

When Aquarius energy is active, it invites us to be wildly authentic, to give freely, universally, wholeheartedly, to live a life on the cutting edge, to share our resources, find our people, and build community. By being fully, unapologetically, completely ourselves, we challenge authority and group-think patterns inherited from our family of origin or cultural upbringing. By pushing the edges of the ‘known,’ we collect new ideas to bring back to the collective. Only when we dare to be different, buck convention, and think outside the box, embracing the archetypes of sacred heretic or unorthodox rebel, can we innovate and think beyond what has already been done.

As a fixed Air sign, Aquarius uses the intellect in a highly focused way to build new worlds, and infuses us with the insights cultivated by the exile, who is no longer constrained by outdated social mores. Fixed energy means it can be relentless in breaking the mold and disrupting the status quo in pursuit of freedom. The Aquarian soul is here to shape the future by exploring everything outside the box, connecting with individual and collective goals and dreams, and being willing to be misunderstood in their evolution and growth. Mature, healthy Aquarius rising finds ways to shine and honor their individual liberation, which in turn gives others permission to seek their own freedom as well. 

That is the endpoint of Aquarian energy - freedom, individuality, and the ability to pursue one’s own path.

Cosmic Reset: The Portal Is Open

Saturn & Neptune are officially in Aries. New paradigm, here we are. 

This great, intelligent, organic divine desire (Neptune & Saturn in Aries) is demanding that we now converge the points of dreaming and doing. We are mandated to merge what we imagine and what we are committing to. To do this successfully, we must venture into the unknown and turn from a false sense of certainty to a willingness to ACT, even with no guarantee of a victorious outcome. 

Because actually, the action is victory itself.

This eclipse will topple and deconstruct some of the belief systems, coping strategies, or narratives we have built or inherited that gave us a sense of security in the face of life’s endless uncertainty. 

The future is now alive and moving inside you in the form of imagination and dreaming, coalescing in longing and desire, and with this eclipse, a Uranian lightning bolt ignites the desire into a kindling fire of vision and inspired action towards your next evolution of Self. Trust in the good things coming. The universal renovation, the Cosmic Reset, is upon us. 

Change is here.  

Eclipses: Sacred Reversal of Known Order

We are beginning a new eclipse cycle on the Aquarius-Leo axis. To understand this energy, think back to the shifts in your life that unfolded between 2007-2009, and 2017-2019, especially in relation to what shadow was revealed in you. 

The same areas will be further developed over the next 18 months, but with greater wisdom and power, as you have lived many lives since then.

Eclipses recalibrate our lives and create portals outside of the normal space / time continuum. 

During a Solar eclipse,  the moon outshines the sun (instead of the normal other way around). With a Lunar eclipse, the earth moves between the sun and moon and ‘overshadows’ the moon. In both, eclipses suspend the normal rules, and a different (seemingly chaotic or karmic) order emerges. 

The Universe says: “Pause. Recalibrate. Reverse roles. What is hidden is now seen, what is normally visible is obscured.”

From a depth-psychology standpoint, that which is not invited or allowed into normal waking consciousness becomes a shadow. Eclipses reveal the shadow, force us to reckon with it, and disrupt the ‘normal’ order so that we can return to wholeness. 

This eclipse is connected to the North Node. It calls us to become, venture, and grow. We’re pulled to travel into the unknown, write a new chapter, and accept an invitation to go beyond our comfort zone and into new territory. 

South Node eclipses reveal what must be released and what has ripened, so we can move to the next stage and go beyond our old, familiar patterns (which are often full of suffering). Each type of nodal eclipse (North Node or South Node) succeeds the previous. They alternate, so we move between unexpected developments towards one zodiac ideal (NN eclipse) and a culmination or ending that helps us go beyond old patterns (SN eclipse). 

Bigger Picture: Eclipses Across Time

Eclipses fall into two broad patterns that shape stories across generations: the Metonic and Saros cycles. 

The Metonic cycle repeats lunations at the same degree every 19 years. With a moon at the precise same degree, we may experience deja vu and feel echoes of the past. This eclipse mirrors a new moon from February 17, 2007. Who were you then? How did you change in the following two years?

The Saros cycle is a more complex concept, but stay with me. Eclipses happen in families, great spans of cosmic events that unfold over an approximately 1300-year time span. Each Saros cycle starts with a tiny partial eclipse at one of Earth’s poles, and over a millennium, conducts a symphony of cosmic re-ordering, ending with a tiny partial eclipse at the opposite pole some 1200+ years later. 

This eclipse is part of Saros cycle 121. The first eclipse in the series was on 25 April 944 CE and the last will be on 7 June 2206. The most recent eclipse was an annular eclipse on 7 February 2008, and the next is NOW, the annular solar eclipse on 17 February 2026. 

What does the Saros cycle tell us about the bigger story and the shadow to be revealed?

Aquarius Shadow and the Salem Witch Trials: An Eclipse Story

To understand the potential of Aquarius-Leo shadows, let’s look back at a story from the past, from approximately 748 years into the Saros 121 cycle.

Time-travel with me back to 1692, to New England and the shocking start of the Salem Witch Trials. The Salem witch trials were a series of hearings and prosecutions of people accused of witchcraft in colonial Massachusetts between February 1692 and May 1693, and the eclipses were part of the greater Saros cycle - in fact, the February Aquarius new moon eclipse at 28º was the longest annular eclipse (8 minutes) of the entire 1300-year cycle.  

In 1692, two significant solar eclipses occurred. The first was at 28º Aquarius on February 17, 1692. Two young girls (Betty Parris and Abigail Williams) began to have convulsive fits, uttered strange sounds, crawled under furniture, and contorted themselves into peculiar positions. This wild, electric nervous system energy couldn’t be ascribed by the doctors of the day to any medical cause. 

So, the community and authority of the day (groupthink, the worst of Aquarius) decided it was witchcraft. The subsequent madness reached a fever pitch in midsummer and early fall, in the weeks surrounding the total solar eclipse of August 12, 1692. Between June and September, nineteen people were tried, convicted, and sentenced to death. In October, a convening court ruled that the type of evidence used to convict these 19 souls was not admissible, and the court system changed. The following winter, five more people were tried and found not guilty. 

Let’s look at this in the context of eclipse energy: Most of the people accused and convicted of witchcraft were women. Overall, the Puritan belief and prevailing New England culture were that women were inherently sinful and more susceptible to damnation than men. This unequal and unjust social construct led to horrors at the hands of authority (shadow of Aquarius). Yet it was precisely those horrors  - the dangers of isolation, religious extremism, false accusations, and lapses in due process - which led to what historian George Burr called “the rock on which the theocracy shattered.” 

February 16, 1692: Aquarius NN Annular Solar Eclipse 28º, square Uranus in Gemini 01º

February 17, 2026: Aquarius NN Annular Solar Eclipse 28º, square Uranus in Taurus 28º

August 12, 1692: Leo SN Solar Eclipse 20º25’

August 12, 2026: Leo SN Solar Eclipse 20º02’

When I look at what is happening today in the United States and globaly, I ask myself, did the patriarchal theocracy really shatter? Or did it live to die another day?

Ring of Fire Eclipse: New Beginning (But-)

Annular ‘ring of fire’ eclipses bring a “new beginning with a caveat,” or in this case, a turning point with a choice. The choice back then was related to groupthink and the dangers of blind obedience to authority, particularly one infused with religious zeal. The revolutionaries who disrupted the system were those who refused to participate in the herd's movement to accuse and destroy. They were the ones who embraced the best of what Aquarius has to teach us. 

So, we arrive again at an annular ring of fire eclipse in Aquarius, a turning point of choice, reversing light and darkness, revealing the shadow and shifting the natural order of everything in that inversion. 

Eclipses affect the world, but they only affect us personally when they activate personal chart points - planets or angles. The intensity is determined by what part of the chart it activates, and how many aspects it makes to personal planets. 

The house where the eclipse falls indicates the area of life most affected. Because eclipses are recalibrations, they work on the house they fall in, as well as the house opposite it. Over the 18-month eclipse cycle on each zodiac sign axis, we adjust and recalibrate those areas of life. Mark your calendar for the following dates, then read on for the house impacted by this eclipse.

Aquarius-Leo Eclipses 2026-2028

2026

• 17 February 2026 (28°49' Aquarius) Solar Annular
• 12 August 2026 (20°01' Leo) Solar Total

2027

• 6 February 2027 (17°37' Aquarius) Solar Annular
• 2 August 2027 (09°55' Leo) Solar Total
• 17 August 2027 (24°11' Aquarius) Lunar Penumbral

2028

• 26 January 2028 (06°11' Aquarius) Solar Annular

So, what might all this mean for YOU? 

Read on for insights into how the Aquarius new moon and total solar eclipse will bring necessary disruption to an area of your life, a personal revelation of shadow or a revolution against the system, for the sake of reconstruction, transformation, and liberation.

Making It Personal: Aquarius New Moon Eclipse in the Houses

Author’s Note: If you use Whole Sign, read for your ascendant. If you use tropical / placidus, read for the house in which the New Moon Eclipse falls for you. For the most precise information, come in for a session. 

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Aquarius Rising (Moon in 1st House / T-Uranus 4th House)

You can shake the world just by being who you are. This new moon eclipse jolts the provocateur awake, bringing an electric glow-up to identity, self-esteem, and how you enter the room. The desire to liberate your self-expression is quantum intelligence from your future self, inviting you to reclaim your full weirdness. Fun fact: weird originates from wyrd, meaning ‘having the power to control fate’. All choices ripple outward, impacting the whole. Are you willing to be more you to help humanity be more free?

Capricorn Rising (Moon in the 2nd House / T-Uranus 5th house)

You’re shaking up old values, because it’s time to get free in relation to money and material resources. Richness comes from sensual delight, not just a bank account. You may be carving out greater independence or rebellion through your money, or divesting from systems of financial oppression. A radical restructuring is taking place in your creative self-expression, opening a new pathway to understanding abundance through joy, pleasure, adventure, recreation and creativity. If you’re a parent, some old structures of belief about yourself in relation to your children may be liberated with this eclipse (also applies to your inner child). Getting free means you cannot be a tyrant to your own self-worth.

Sagittarius Rising (Moon in 3rd House / T-Uranus in 6th House)

Say hello to liberation in communication, and a voice that speaks like lightning, even if it trembles while doing so. With ruler Uranus in your sixth house, getting free in your speech is mandated with this moon, or your body will speak what your lips won’t. There may be some pot-stirring you need to do you in your local community, with neighbors, friends, or siblings. What have you been wanting to say, but holding back because it’s not acceptable in those circles? It’s time to rock the boat. The choice to change the way you do things in your daily ritual, routines, order and organization will make you more free, but first you’re going to have to be willing to say “no more” to the status quo and “hello” to doing things your way. No is a complete sentence, and saying no is it’s own revolution.

Scorpio Rising (Moon in 4th House / T-Uranus in 7th House)

Your soul is calling you to bring the revolution into your home and inner self. Wake up and shake up. Step up and speak up. Your vision, voice, and values are needed now, particularly those that caused parts of your younger self (inner child or adolescent) to be exiled, or those that made you a black sheep in your family of origin. With the moon in your fourth house, you’re reminded that stepping fully into your authentic self-expression may shake the foundations of old structures ready to be rebuilt. This might be partnerships, romantic relationships, old family stories, outdated traditions, inherited trauma patterns about security, or liberating your contracts, legal agreements, or physical home. Expect an inner awakening, like a lightning bolt of awareness that you won’t always be understood, but it’s worth the risk to truly feel free.

Libra Rising (Moon in 5th House / T-Uranus in 8th House)

There are no rules in art. Life is art. Whatever you’ve been keeping hidden, secret, taboo, repressed wants to come out and be expressed, in creativity, pleasure and play. A new electric romance might arise with this moon, one that sizzles with loving yourself first and marching to the beat of your own drum. It’s possible that shocking revelations will arise from your own shadow or deep psyche in relation to sexuality and desire, or that you’ll feel walls crashing down where you’ve had blocks up to stay safe from the wildness of your own creative expression. New joy is calling you, and it may feel intensely disruptive to your peace-making nature, because it may be inherently rebellious against what others desire or expect from you. Follow that joy anyway. Make art with the shadows you find in yourself - write, paint, draw, sing, or act them out through movement. You’re eclipsing creative constraints, all of life is a canvas for your imagination.

Virgo Rising (Moon in 6th House / T-Uranus in 9th House)

Your nervous system is awake, alive, electric, and you’re renovating old beliefs that have kept you from truly embracing your own radical rhythms in your daily routines, health, wellness and path of service. You can’t be of service to the revolution unless you’re well, and you can’t be well unless you say ‘fuck it’ to the traditional path of life organization and set forth on your own adventure of well-being. You might be hit by spiritual lightning as a new philosophy, thought pattern, or religious system comes into your awareness, or perhaps you realize that a huge part of what’s making you unwell has actually been in your own belief systems, and it’s time to get well. Disrupting the daily routine may feel uncomfortable, even edgy for your perfectionist side, the part that wants to do it right or do it the way everyone else does. This eclipse may even shatter the boxes that you’ve carefully created for your path of service, and push you to embark on a much broader quest - one involving long distance travel, higher education or an entirely new spiritual or philosophical perspective. Trust that your inner rebel knows whats best for you, all new rhythms start with dissonance.

Leo Rising (Moon in 7th House / T-Uranus in 10th House)

This eclipse electrifies your axis of self and other and activates a powerful impulse to tend independence and expand beyond any constraints you’ve placed on yourself in relationships and partnerships, especially those inherited or assigned by traditions and institutions. You’re gonna get free, no matter what the cost is to your public image, or how others see you. Over the next 18 months, you’re going through yet another restructuring of identity, and it calls your closest relationships into question as you explore whether they can meet you in your next iteration of a more liberated identity. Be wary of tendencies to burn it all down and become a lone wolf, even lions need their pride (the pack, not the emotion), but know that you might be heading for what feels like exile in order to get crystal clear on who you are, so you can bring that self-authority back to the collective. Love and partnership can come from many places, so lean into the communities, friendships and non-romantic relationships that also reflect to you the fullness of who you are. Remember, we find who we are in the mirror of the other.

Cancer Rising (Moon in 8th House / T-Uranus in 11th House)

Time to clean out the psychic closet, because nothing is as transformative as what’s been hidden in the shadowy depths. The parts of you that have been relegated to the shadows are invited to emerge and join the revolution. Eroticism, power dynamics, addiction, secrets, and the ‘dark’ parts of our own psyche are lit up with this eclipse. Shared resources are up for a surprising revelation, or there may actually be a death that sets you free. Changes in your communities, networks, friend groups are possible, and you may realize that there were relationships there that just needed to die. The 8th house is about endings that lead to new beginnings; this may involve literal or symbolic "deaths" of old habits, situations, or relationships. You’re going through yet another major transformation over the next 18 months, and this is only the beginning. Pay attention to where you feel emotionally activated, especially when rage, defensiveness or judgment arises - what triggers us is often a clue to what we’ve deemed unacceptable. What we’ve cast into the shadow is often a clue to what is ready to be recollected, integrated, healed and transformed. 

Gemini Rising (Moon in 9th House / T-Uranus in 12th House)

It’s time to deconstruct old belief systems and question everything. This eclipse is asking you to look at the bigger picture, to trade in the confines of a too-small life philosophy, religion, or way of knowing for something more inclusive, radical, and liberatory. Ruler Uranus is working on your 12th house, renovating the subconscious and making way for a nervous system reset. Pay attention to your visions and dreams, especially those that show you the potential of a whole new spiritual framework or way of seeing the world. This eclipse may call you into a new path of learning or course of study, or direct you into travels and adventures which expand your communities, networks, culture and consciousness. There may be some humanitarian need that you suddenly have to go serve, or an impulse to pull away from people entirely and spend some time in contemplative solitude, exploring the archetype of the Hermit. Whatever arises, know that this eclipse is activating the path of the seeker-sage, and over the next 18 months, you’ll be wildly expanded in your concept of Truth, and the pursuit of mutual understanding. 

Taurus Rising (Moon in 10th House / T-Uranus in 1st House)

Get ready to be seen in a completely new light, because you no longer give one single solitary fuck what they think, whoever they are, and it shows. You’re front and center in rebellion, whether that’s in your work and career, social roles, or traditional institutions like government or even marriage. Bottom line is that you’re meant to stir things up by letting your own revolutionary energy be witnessed, and by putting your body on the line. What does it mean to liberate your public presence? What kind of legacy are you leaving when it comes to radical, future-oriented work that moves humanity forward? Is it time to step into greater leadership in your career, institutions or the roles you’re seen in, and be willing to be a voice of dissent for the old ways that aren’t working anymore? This may also be an ideal time to incorporate technological advancements into your work, revise a website, refresh a brand identity, or update your resume with more nonconformist, rebel-genius energy. It’s not just how others see you, but how you see yourself that is transforming. The next few months will be a potent time of self-reinvention, in everything from your appearance to how you enter the room. Don’t resist the change, this makeover is part of your soul’s evolution.

Aries Rising (Moon in 11th House / T-Uranus in 2nd House)

Lead the way, future-shaper. It’s time to light a new fire of inspiration, vision, and action in the communities, networks, and friend groups that are yours to tend. You may even be called to boldly begin a new ‘people movement’ of some sort, oriented to tech, humanitarianism, social justice, community organizing, or shared values. Your leadership is powerful now in digital spaces as well. Don’t be afraid to disrupt and remodel the way things are done on social media, we’re past due for a refresh. Sudden or surprising developments may unfold in realm of finances, money, and values. You may feel called to make a bold financial move or invest in community development, because you sense that the future return on investment is in power to the people. The next few years bring a shift in the circles you run in, and it starts with embracing leadership, creative self-expression, and being willing to bring all of who you really are into the circle.

Pisces Rising (Moon in 12th House / T-Uranus in 3rd House)

We’re only ever truly as free as we are in the recesses of our minds. This new moon eclipse is activating and liberating the deepest layers of your subconscious; ancestral inheritances, past life karmas, beliefs formed in the womb, and the layers of knowing about who you are that transcend this life and body. Old karmic habit patterns, those that hold the potential to drive you towards suffering and madness, are being sifted, sorted, and shaken loose, and fragments of them may arise in dreams and theta state activities. Eclipses in the 12th house can also bring about endings, the big picture kind that speak of a final letting-go, forgiveness, dissolution and absorption back into the Allness of Being. Make space for solitude to truly be with the energy of this Cosmic Reset portal, because for you, it marks a profound period of spiritual closure, karmic release, and ending old cycles of fear and illusion so that you can step fully into the new chapter being written with the entrance of spring.