October's Cosmic Invitation: Using Art Therapy to Navigate Transformation, Truth-Telling, and Authentic Power
October: The Month of Revelation and Reclamation
October brings a potent cosmic shift. The month opens with a Full Moon in Aries (October 6th) that illuminates where you've been abandoning yourself in service to others. It closes with the Sun entering Scorpio (October 22nd), inviting you into the deep work of transformation and shadow integration.
Between these two powerful moments, Mercury moves through Scorpio, intensifying the call toward honest communication and unflinching truth-telling. For highly sensitive, creative, and spiritually-oriented people, October is a month of reckoning—a time to align your outer life with your inner truth.
But here's the thing: cosmic intensity doesn't have to feel like crisis. With the right tools and creative support, October's transformative energy becomes a portal to profound healing and authentic living.
The Full Moon in Aries: Reclaiming Your Power Through Art
October 6th brings a Full Moon in Aries—the warrior, the pioneer, the one who dares to be authentically themselves. This Full Moon illuminates a specific question: Are you honoring your true self, or are you performing a version of yourself to keep others comfortable?
For people-pleasers, empaths, and highly sensitive souls who've spent lifetimes dimming their light, this Full Moon is a wake-up call.
What the Full Moon in Aries Brings Up:
Anger about how you've abandoned yourself
Clarity about relationships that require you to be inauthentic
Impulse to set boundaries others won't like
Desire for independence and space
Physical restlessness and need for movement
Raw honesty about what you actually want
Why This Matters for HSPs: Full Moons amplify already-heightened sensitivity. Your emotions feel bigger, your intuition clearer, your body's signals louder. Rather than resisting this intensity, art therapy offers a container for it—a way to channel the Full Moon's powerful energy into meaningful work.
Art Therapy Practices for the Aries Full Moon
Fire and Rage Release: Create with the colors of Aries fire—reds, oranges, yellows. Work large. Use aggressive brushstrokes, splatter paint, tear paper aggressively. This isn't about making something beautiful. It's about letting the warrior energy move through you.
Give yourself permission to be angry. If you've been people-pleasing for years, rage is appropriate. Paint it. Sculpt it. Release it through your hands so it doesn't have to live in your body.
Boundary-Setting Mandala: Create a circular boundary mandala. The center represents your authentic self. The circle represents protection and healthy limits. Use colors and symbols that feel protective. Is your boundary soft or strong? Permeable or solid? What does it need to be to protect your truth?
After creating, place this mandala somewhere visible. Let it remind you that your boundaries aren't selfish—they're sacred.
Authentic Self Portrait: Without planning, create an image of yourself as you truly are—without performance, without softening, without adapting to what others need from you. What does your raw, unfiltered self look like? What colors? What energy?
This isn't about making yourself look good. It's about meeting yourself honestly.
Anger Collage: Gather images and words that represent what makes you angry about your self-abandonment. Relationships that require inauthenticity? Situations where you couldn't say no? Times you sacrificed your needs? Create a collage that externalizes this anger.
Then, after sitting with it, create a companion piece—what would authentic power look like? What would you do if you honored yourself first?
Mercury in Scorpio: The Truth-Telling Transit
Throughout October, Mercury moves through Scorpio, creating powerful truth-telling energy. Scorpio doesn't do surface-level—it demands depth, honesty, and confrontation with what's been hidden.
This is the time to:
Have difficult conversations you've been avoiding
Speak your truth even when it's uncomfortable
Ask probing questions and demand real answers
Express what you've been suppressing
Name the patterns you've been overlooking
The Shadow of Mercury in Scorpio: This energy can be cutting, obsessive, or destructively honest. There's a difference between honest and cruel. Use this powerful communication energy wisely—for healing and clarity, not for weaponizing truth.
Art Therapy for Mercury in Scorpio: Depth Communication Work
Dialogue Through Drawing: Choose a difficult conversation you need to have. Create two drawings: one representing what you want to say, another representing what you're afraid to say.
Then create a third piece: what would happen if you said both? What would the other person's response be? What would you need to feel safe saying your truth?
This visual dialogue helps your nervous system prepare for real conversation.
Writing as Art: Use art materials to write letters you'll never send. Paint words directly onto paper—the words you can't say, the rage you can't express, the needs you've hidden.
Scorpio season makes invisible things visible. Sometimes we need to make our invisible truths visible through art before we can speak them aloud.
Shadow Map: Create a visual representation of the shadows you've been carrying—the parts of yourself you've hidden, the emotions you've suppressed, the desires you've denied. Use dark colors, hidden spaces in your drawing, symbols that feel shadowy.
Then, using another color or light, illuminate one shadow at a time. What would it mean to bring this shadow into the light? What would change?
Sun Enters Scorpio: The Season of Transformation
October 22nd marks the Sun's entry into Scorpio, beginning a month-long season of deep transformation. Scorpio is ruled by Pluto, the planet of death and rebirth. This season asks: What needs to die in your life so something new can be born?
This isn't morbid energy. It's the energy of necessary endings—relationships that no longer serve, beliefs that limit you, identities you've outgrown, patterns that create suffering.
Scorpio Season Themes:
Going beneath the surface to find root causes
Releasing what you've been clinging to
Facing your fears directly
Discovering hidden power and resilience
Experiencing emotional catharsis and purification
Sexual and creative renewal
Intimacy and vulnerability with trusted people
Art Therapy for Scorpio Season: The Work of Transformation
Death and Rebirth Series: Create a three-piece series: What is dying? What is the death like? What is being born?
Use symbolism, color, and movement to represent this transformation. Many find it powerful to actually burn or destroy the first piece (safely and respectfully), allowing the destruction to be ceremonial. The second and third pieces represent the journey through and beyond.
This series helps your nervous system process that death isn't failure—it's part of the cycle.
Creating Your Underworld: In mythology, Scorpio rules the underworld—the hidden, shadowy places within us. Create an image of your inner underworld. What lives there? What do you fear meeting?
Then create an image of yourself navigating that underworld with courage. What resources do you have? What allies? What wisdom emerges from going deep?
Intensity Containment Mandala: Scorpio season brings intense emotions—jealousy, rage, shame, deep sadness. Create a mandala that contains and honors this intensity without letting it consume you.
The circular boundary of the mandala provides containment. Inside, use colors and images that represent the full spectrum of intense emotions Scorpio brings up. This validates the intensity while providing a container for it.
Sacred Sexuality and Creative Power: Scorpio rules sexuality, creative power, and shared resources. Create art exploring your relationship with your own sexual/creative energy.
This isn't about making something provocative—it's about reclaiming your embodied power. What does your creative/sexual energy feel like? What would it mean to honor this part of yourself?
Somatic Practices for October's Cosmic Shifts
Your body processes cosmic energy directly. Support yourself somatically:
Aries Full Moon:
Power poses—stand in your strength
Fast, intense movement—dance, run, shake
Solar plexus work—hand on your power center, breathing into it
Boundary practices—physical movement that says "no"
Mercury in Scorpio:
Throat chakra work—speak your truth
Writing and expression through your hands
Vocal release—screaming into a pillow, humming, toning
Deep listening—hear what others are saying beneath words
Scorpio Season:
Grounding practices—connecting to earth, stable foundation
Pelvic floor awareness—your creative/sexual center
Heart opening—vulnerability and intimacy work
Slow, deep movement—tai chi, yin yoga, intentional stretching
October Rituals to Anchor Your Transformation
New Moon to Full Moon Release Ritual: On the Full Moon, gather small papers and write or draw what you're releasing. Create a safe fire ceremony or bury them in earth. As they're released, create art representing what you're calling in. This honors both release and invitation.
Mercury in Scorpio Truth-Telling Ceremony: Write or paint a truth you've been avoiding. Speak it aloud (alone or with someone safe). Feel what happens in your body when you say it. Create art afterward—what shifted?
Scorpio Season Transformation Altar: Create a small altar representing your transformation. Include images of Scorpio symbols (scorpion, eagle, phoenix), deep colors (black, deep red, purple), and elements that represent death and rebirth (seeds, fallen leaves, stones).
Add to this altar throughout the season as your understanding deepens.
Who Feels October's Cosmic Intensity Most Strongly?
Aries Energy: This Full Moon activates you directly. Expect clarity, excitement, and powerful impulses toward change.
Libra Energy: The Full Moon opposes your Sun. Relationship dynamics and questions about balance come to a head. When Scorpio season begins, you're invited into depth and transformation.
Scorpio Energy: The Sun enters your sign October 22nd. This is your season of power, clarity, and renewal. Use October to set intentions for the year ahead.
Highly Sensitive and Empathic People: All cosmic shifts affect you more intensely. October requires extra self-care, creative processing, and support.
Those with Planets in Early Aries or Libra: Direct contact with the Full Moon intensity brings significant life themes to the surface.
October's Gift: Authentic Living
October doesn't ask you to be comfortable. It asks you to be real. It doesn't ask you to stay the same. It asks you to transform into who you're meant to become.
For highly sensitive, creative, spiritual people, this is your season. Use art to channel the intensity. Use creativity to process transformation. Use your sensitivity as the gift it is—to feel deeply, know truly, and live authentically.
Ready to Navigate October's Cosmic Shifts?
If you want support processing October's powerful transits, creating art that honors your transformation, or exploring how astrology and psychology intersect in your healing, I'd love to work with you.
Book a free 15-minute consultation to explore how astrology-informed art therapy can support your journey through this transformative month.
Offering spiritually-integrated art therapy for highly sensitive, creative, and spiritual individuals in Brooklyn, NYC, and throughout New York State via secure virtual sessions.
