Interlude: All In a Row

Jupiter, Earth, Sun, Venus, and Mars align this week

Solar System snapshot on January 8, 2026. From Mobile Observatory Pro app, which I highly recommend for anyone interested in exploring and understanding our celestial neighborhood.

Mars and Venus have disappeared from the sky, from our perspective. Mars has been sinking slowly into the sunset over the past months, while Venus has been more rapidly sinking into the dawn. This week they cross paths behind the Sun, in synchrony. In the months ahead, Venus will rise brilliantly into the sunset, and Mars will rise more slowly and subtly into pre-dawn skies.

Jupiter reaches “opposition” this week, high overhead in the constellation Gemini, directly opposite the Sun. Although it can be challenging to visualize, this means that Jupiter, too, is a part of this momentary alignment. If we were standing on Mars, we would see a sky temporarily depleted of planets, with Venus, Earth, and Jupiter all hidden in the glare of the Sun.

I am not going to tell you what this “means”, only that I find it interesting, profound, worthy of note.

I am intrigued by the intersection of astronomy and astrology, the way that the grand dance of gravity wells and electromagnetic fields shapes and patterns the living, conscious universe of which we are a part.

Scientists are beginning to explore correlations between these alignments and cycles of solar activity, proposing that orbital tidal forces create a “metronome” that guides rhythmic patterns of sunspots, flares, and solar storms.

When we look at the Sun at this time of year, we are also looking into Sagittarius (the constellation, not the sign), the archer or teapot that marks the center of our galaxy. Although this larger alignment is not as perfect, being a couple of weeks past the winter solstice when the Sun and the galactic center align, we also have the collective gravitational tides and magnetic fields of millions of stars and a four-million-solar-mass black hole pulling in roughly the same direction as our planetary neighbors.

Perhaps we may see increased solar activity in the weeks ahead, or tectonic activity, or shifts on more subtle levels. So many humans become attached to outcomes and predictions, seek to demystify the dance into rules and lines and definitions.

Let us be open to mystery. Let us see what this alignment brings. Let us pause to notice the great, slow, rhythmic, harmonic dance of creation.