The sky is an ocean, and holds many stories. To understand and interpret properly, one needs not just knowledge but also intuitive wisdom, because it’s a language of the spiritual. Astrology is a spiritual thing, non linear, and while sometimes at first glance you may not see the exact conjunctions or parans to fixed stars, it doesn’t mean a starry energy isn’t paving your path in some way, shape or form. And if you know how to ask the right questions, the answers will reveal themselves when you need them, when it’s time.
In the oceans of our sky there are many stars, and four of them we call the royal stars: Aldebaran, Fomalhaut, Regulus and Antares. They are considered royal stars, as each is associated with a cardinal direction and marking the ancient solstices and equinoxes; and each of the royal stars indicates the potential for great eminence and success with its unique energy. Each royal star connects to an archangel: Aldebaran with archangel Michael, Fomalhaut with archangel Gabriel, Antares with archangel Uriel, and Regulus with archangel Raphael. Though of course, archangels are not bound to one thing or star, and are always with you on your path.
Today I’ll guide through the deeper spiritual and emotional landscapes of Fomalhaut; and whether or not this star touch your chart, or you seek to deepen your knowledge, may this be enriching to you. The truth is that we all carry all stars and all constellations within us, within our inner spiritual and emotional wildlands; and if we can understand that all is interconnected and interrelated, that all holds within itself both itself and everything else, this is when the wisdom reveals itself and fall into the unity and essence of love.
A current image of our sky. You can see fixed star Fomalhaut in the mouth of the fish, below the foot of the Aquarius; she is often depicted as turned upside down in ancient astronomy books, thereby facing the North direction, or “facing the divine”. With her open mouth she drinks from the waters of the water-bearer Aquarius, and swims in her faith and surrender.
Fixed star Fomalhaut is known as the Watcher of the South, and connected to archangel Gabriel. In the sky this bright star is found within the celestial constellation Piscis Austrinus, or the Southern fish, which lies at the foot of Aquarius. Whereas the Pisces constellation depicts two fish swimming in opposite directions tied together by a cord or as I say flowing within one river, the Piscis Austrinus stands alone. The name Fomalhaut comes from the Arabic “Fum al Hut”, “the fish’s mouth”, the place where the border between inside and outside is opened. In the Tropical zodiac, Fomalhaut is currently at around the third degree of Tropical Pisces.
This part of the sky is often depicted as the fish swims west towards Cetus, the whale, but she is turned on her back with her mouth up towards the north and and is swallowing the water offered by the water bearer of the Aquarius constellation. Why would a fish drink more water? What good is water to a fish so deeply immersed in sea?
Well, it’s the mouth of the deep. Here we may often find some otherworldly quality, such as dream inspirations and art and creativity. Here we find the language of poetry, the non-linear ways and languages of understanding things that only the more subtle senses understand.
Fomalhaut natives need to be mindful of self delusion, illusions, believing in their fantasies, escapism, spiritual ego and addictions, because the waters here are too deep. The spiritual and creative realms offer many riches, but only if you have strong enough foundations and discernment to know how to walk these paths and discern true from false; only then, through the spiritual development we first do building the strong foundations, we may then witness the magic within these beautiful waters without drowning ourselves or being stuck there.
The fish stands alone in Fomalhaut, and here we find the spiritual initiation through the path of solitude, at least for a while. Spiritual paths are walked alone, and they are essentially paths of purification, letting go of our attachments, illusions, false masks, conditioned beliefs and precious ego ideals, and surrendering to the will of the divine.
This is also echoed through the Vedic lunar mansion that Fomalhaut is a part of, known as Shatabisha. Shatabisha is known as the nakshatra of hundred physicians, so it carries beautiful healing energy; however, its path to its higher purpose is to go through its inner healing and growth first. The dharma of Shatabisha often relates to healing, but it heals through revealing; in other words, to truly evolve it must first let the false masks fall away.
In its higher manifestation of energy, Fomalhaut has the ability to win people’s hearts through being a vessel for inspiring visions and even glamours that exist beyond our structured or conventional realities. This is why Fomalhaut often speaks in poetry, acting and essentially, inspiring the imagination. In a way, this star helps us find the hidden treasures from the depth of seas or our subconscious, both the material and mystical treasures.
This part of the sky is quite dreamy, and often like fishing – where we sit as Zen Buddhists on the shore, meditative, and we wait for the right inspired ideas to come. There is a pregnant waiting, a kind of mirror for the spiritual path of the seeker. Often these paths require of us some silence and knowing the power and wisdom of sacred unfoldings and the waiting phases. As such, Fomalhaut may often gift us with the innate understanding and connection to the unwinding processes of life, aligned to the trust and surrender to the divine and divine timing. There is a meditative gift here also – an ability to stay with the water around you, and witness the water within also.
The mouth is a powerful symbol as it connects us inside and outside, making us both sensitive and vulnerable to external influences. This makes Fomalhaut energy and natives quite sensitive to intuitive worlds, which emphasizes the need for discernment, and to be conscious and wise with their environments and people they choose to surround themselves with. This is a very creative part of the sky, and a portal to manifestation, meaning that you need to be mindful of how you speak and how you act and what you set in motion. The mouth begins a process by how it speaks, but as it starts within it is also about vision and intention. Vision, words. Both bring spirit into matter, and both stars may carry beautiful artistic potentials.
We see the blending of the creative and mystical with the connection to archangel Gabriel. As the Watcher of the South, which faces the North as the fish lays on her back looking up, Fomalhaut is positioned to witness the divine. Archangel Gabriel is the one who announced the virgin birth to Mary and Joseph, and he is also known as helping Daniel interpret his prophetic dreams. Gabriel is often depicted holding a mirror, and this beautifully reflects symbolically how the hidden mystery of God’s wisdom is reflected in us all.
Gabriel isn’t just offering us the receiving of insight or vision though, he promises “insight with understanding” so that we can discern the messages and meanings. So Fomalhaut isn’t just about receiving or getting lost in dreams and vision in the depths of sea, it is about “translating” these properly, and interpreting them appropriately. There is devotion and deep faith here also – as Mary was very devotional, and even though the message she received may have felt so absurd to her, she was still human after all, it was her deep faith, trust in God and devotion that guided her forward.
Fomalhaut may bless us with this devotion and faith and connection to the divine, in order to receive the wisdom of the mysterious depths of experience, which go beyond the boundaries of the norm or traditional. What we need to know though is that the spiritual realms may only be entered properly through discernment and groundedness, otherwise we get lost in mirage, illusions and delusions and fantasies.
A beautiful client of mine had fixed star Fomalhaut in the last degrees of her twelfth house, and her first child is a boy literally named Gabriel. Along with her other starry alignments, this shows that in a time of her life when she needs hope or a divine message a Gabriel would give this to her. He was born when she needed more hope in her life, and when she was going through a difficult time health wise it was him that one day spoke a sentence, which ended up lighting up a great insight on what the issue was and how to heal herself.
Another client of mine is a beautiful woman from Nepal who is a devout Buddhist, but when she was a little girl she dreamt of archangel Gabriel; since then, she’s always felt a deep connection to him, and she feels he is always beside her in her times of need, giving her a sense of comfort and spiritual soothing. While Fomalhaut is not conjunct any of her planets, this star connects in a special way to her beliefs, past life experience and what gives her a sense of home and peace, and reconnects her to her spiritual core. She is a very creative woman, and along her path she learned to release self doubt and have more believe in herself; as well as to be more patient with the process of creation and build the inner safety and stability – learning that true security comes from emotional safety and strengthening our inner spiritual core.
So here in this part of the sky, we see the importance of our spiritual core and being grounded. It’s about being patient with yourself, as you learn to refine the movements between depths and surface of waves, learning to discern truth from fantasy, and tearing away the false from the real. I know people with this star often feel a bit alone and discouraged, kind of like an alone fish on shore; they may feel no one understands their depth or ways of perceiving the world. So if you feel this way, just stay patient with yourself and your path, and use these waters for inspiration and art making, and refining your senses. Look to Gabriel, and his wise loving ways.
What I love about this part of the sky is that it offers us depth of compassion and the ability to see what’s beyond the human eyes, to feel into something much deeper and perhaps even more real than the physical experience. We may be able to see the hidden treasures, which others just can’t; we find the hidden gems rarely found. And this in itself is a gift to be treasured within yourself also, because it offers you an opportunity for a deepening.
While it is a joy to be able to connect to the mystical, you may sometimes feel like not all others may be able to understand your way of feeling or seeing the world. And that’s okay. Some of our mystical experiences are just meant to remain sacred and private to us, not all is meant to be shared with those who can’t understand it. Some people build towers, others keep their temples nurtured in the wild places. So regardless of whether or not others understand that you saw the pearl no one else sees even when it is next to them, keep it sacred to you, keep holding onto that hidden treasure and beautiful mystical experience you had.
When we enter the mouth of the deep, whether by transit or natally or because we seek the wisdom and treasures of cosmic oceans, we may find the hidden treasures indeed. And when we do, we must hold onto them. Hold onto them even as you break through the surface of the waves, because you just never know who else might be sitting on shore seeking to learn about such depths also. Or perhaps you may hold someone who is in the waves, feeling lost or not knowing yet how to flow, and you may help rise them. You just never know. But what is known is that right people always find us. Our world is so interconnected and interdependent, and all is all in all; and we are here to hold each other, raise each other, lift each other up, this is how it all will flow in unison.
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Cover art by Edward Robert Hughes, 1907.
