The Flow State Herald: Edition 1, the Herbalist (Virgo rising)
The Flow State Herald
10 to 17 October 2026 · Edition 1 · Vol. I · No. 1
The Herbalist's edition, for Virgo rising
Read this first
- The week: A New Moon on Sat 10 Oct resets the week, and Pluto turns direct on Thu 15 Oct after months of moving backward.
- For you: Your 2nd house, the Treasury and Pantry, gets the New Moon: a good week to check what you own and use.
- Do this: On Sat 10 Oct, empty one shelf or drawer and put back only what you used this year.
- Dates: Sat 10 Oct and Thu 15 Oct.
Your birth chart is a castle: twelve rooms for twelve areas of life. Each week the planets open different doors, and this paper tells you which rooms are worth entering.
New to the rooms? They are explained on the castle page.
Album of the week
Mother Earth's Plantasia, Mort Garson, 1976. About half an hour. Listen on Spotify. Source for the story.
Mort Garson made this album on a Moog synthesizer and released it himself, selling it only at the Mother Earth plant shop in Los Angeles or giving it away with a Sears mattress.
Field Notes: your sky this week
You are the Herbalist: this week the Libra New Moon falls in your 2nd house, the Treasury and Pantry, and Pluto turns direct in your 6th house.
Which things and plans do you still use, and which could go this week?
The New Moon asks what your shelves are for · Sat 10 Oct, 11:50 am ET
THE TREASURY AND PANTRY · 2nd house · money, what you own and what feeds you
A new moon is a fresh start for what you own and keep. Check whether what you keep matches how you actually live. Expect to find one thing you no longer use.
- Sat 10 Oct: Empty one shelf or drawer and put back only what you used this year.
New Moon in Libra, exact Sat 10 Oct, 11:50 am ET (15:50 UTC), your 2nd house
A gentle word between the Treasury and the Chapel · Thu 15 Oct, 4:22 am ET
THE TREASURY AND PANTRY · 2nd house
THE SECRET GARDEN AND CHAPEL · 12th house · rest, dreams, solitude and what happens behind the scenes
The Sun sextiles Jupiter, linking your 2nd and 12th houses: money and what you own meet rest and time alone. Quiet time is as useful as saving this week.
- Thu 15 Oct: Spend ten minutes alone with a warm drink before you look at any screen.
☉︎ Sun sextile ♃︎ Jupiter, exact Thu 15 Oct, 4:22 am ET (08:22 UTC), your 2nd and 12th houses
Pluto turns forward in the Bathhouse · Thu 15 Oct, 10:40 pm ET
THE BATHHOUSE AND APOTHECARY · 6th house · daily routines, health and small remedies
Pluto moves forward again after months of going backward, and your daily routines feel it. Expect one habit to loosen without effort, and do not hurry to replace it.
♇︎ Pluto stations direct in Aquarius, Thu 15 Oct, 10:40 pm ET (Fri 16 Oct, 02:40 UTC), your 6th house
Expect to find one thing you no longer use.
Tarot
Look. Two young people in wreaths hold golden cups together beneath a winged lion's head on a twin-snake staff.
Ask yourself. Two people exchange cups as equals; where in your life is the exchange uneven?
Show the reading
Then read. Two of Cups, upright, is an even exchange. It agrees with the Libra New Moon's theme of fairness and fit, and asks what in your Treasury has become one-sided.
Look. A crowned king in a blue robe sits holding a raised sword, with clouds and trees beside him.
Ask yourself. The king sits upright with his sword; what would you say plainly if asked?
Show the reading
Then read. King of Swords, upright, is a clear mind that says plainly what you value. It argues a little with the Sun and Jupiter's generous mood: he wants evidence, not enthusiasm.
Look. A horned creature sits on a block with a pentagram nearby, two naked figures chained to it.
Ask yourself. The chains hang loosely on these figures; which old habit could you simply lift off?
Show the reading
Then read. The Devil, reversed, is a grip loosening. With Pluto turning direct in your Bathhouse, an old routine can be set down, and the chain was loose all along.
The thread. Even out the exchange. Say what you value. Set the old habit down.
Cards: Pamela Colman Smith, Rider-Waite-Smith tarot, 1909. Drawn at random from one shuffle.
Planet of the week
In your chart. Pluto is in your 6th house, the Bathhouse and Apothecary, the room for daily routines, health and small remedies.
This week. Pluto turns direct in Aquarius on Thursday 15 October at 10:40 pm ET (02:40 UTC Friday); it has been retrograde, appearing to move backward against the stars, since 6 May. Pluto stands for depth, endings, buried things and regeneration.
Greek. Hades was the Greek god of the dead. People avoided his name and called him Plouton, 'the rich one'; the philosopher Plato says in the Cratylus that the name Hades frightened them.
Mesopotamian. Mesopotamian myth tells of the goddess Inanna going down to the underworld. She gives up a garment at each of seven gates and faces her sister Ereshkigal, queen of the dead, with nothing left to wear.
Hindu. In the Katha Upanishad, an old Hindu text, a boy called Nachiketa goes to Yama, the god of death. Yama offers him wealth and long life, but he refuses both and asks what lies beyond death.
Correspondences
Colour: black
The sources give black for Pluto, with dark red borrowed from Scorpio, and both are modern assignments.
Metal: plutonium
Plutonium was named after the planet in the 1940s, so this link is a modern tradition with no classical roots.
Gems: obsidian, garnet, black tourmaline
Stone sellers popularised these pairings, and no ancient source backs them.
Plant: pomegranate
Hades gives Persephone pomegranate seed in the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, and it binds her to the underworld for part of each year. The link is from myth, not astrology.
Foods: mushrooms, onions, leeks
Modern folk astrology lists these under Scorpio, Pluto's co-ruled sign, and they grow in or near the ground.
Body: the system of elimination
Astrology links Scorpio, and so Pluto by extension, to what the body lets go of. This is symbolism only, not a health claim.
Altar suggestions
Ideas, not rules:
- A bundle of dried rosemary and cypress
- A piece of black tourmaline
- A jar of barley grains
- A dish of mushrooms or leeks
- A pomegranate
- A plain white candle
Vedic note: no Pluto
Jyotish uses nine grahas, the Sun, Moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, Saturn, Rahu and Ketu, and leaves Pluto out.
The Drawer: the museum object
Look first. A manuscript page with Arabic text framing a small scene. Three men work around a pot, a blue basin and a pitcher beneath a leafy tree, and two of them have golden haloes. A small blue bird sits in the tree.
Context. A page from an Arabic herbal, a translation of Dioscorides' Greek Materia Medica, written and illustrated in Baghdad in 1224 by Abdallah ibn al-Fadl. The red lines are titles for medicine recipes.
Notice. Look at the large basin in the middle, where the recipe's washing takes place, and at the leafy tree with a small blue bird.
Sources: Cleveland Museum of Art, three physicians preparing medicine; The Met, a related Dioscorides folio of 1224.
The deep dive
A herbarium sheet carries a label with a name, a place and a date. Pluto's name has a documented story too.
Clyde Tombaugh found Pluto on photographs taken at Lowell Observatory in Arizona in January 1930, and spotted it on 18 February with a blink comparator, a device that flips between two plates. The discovery was announced on 13 March 1930.
Venetia Burney, aged eleven, heard about the discovery from her grandfather Falconer Madan, a former Bodleian librarian, and suggested Pluto, an unclaimed god of a dim and distant place. Madan passed the idea to Herbert Hall Turner, who cabled Lowell, and the director, Vesto Slipher, made it official on 1 May 1930. The breakfast date, March 1930, varies between tellings.
In Greek the god of the dead was Hades, but people often used the title Plouton, 'the rich one', because, Plato says in the Cratylus, the name Hades inspired fear. The Roman Dis Pater means 'Rich Father'.
In 2006 the International Astronomical Union voted to class Pluto as a dwarf planet. Before 1930 astrologers had no Pluto, so its astrological meanings are young.
To think about: Did a label ever change how you treated something?
Go further: Smithsonian Magazine, the story of the name Pluto
Sources: Smithsonian Magazine, how Pluto got its name; APS News, the discovery of Pluto; Wikipedia, Venetia Burney; Wikipedia, Pluto (mythology); Scientific American on Venetia Burney.
Movement
Take a long, slow walk, or do some slow stretching and carrying.
Look up. Saturn rises in the east after sunset and stays up until sunrise, brightest of the year just after its opposition on 4 October. Before dawn, Jupiter in the constellation Leo and Mars, which passes the Beehive star cluster on 11 October, rise in the east.
This week's calendar
- Sat 10 Oct: Hindu: the day of all ancestors (Mahalaya Amavasya). Source.
- Sun 11 Oct: Hindu: first of nine days of the goddess (Navratri). Source.
- Sun 11 and Mon 12 Oct: Jewish: new month of Cheshvan (Rosh Chodesh). Source.
- Mon 12 Oct: Civil (Canada): Thanksgiving. Source.
- Wed 14 Oct: Eastern Christian: Mary's veil of protection (Pokrova). Source.
Navratri dates vary by region; Jewish days begin at the previous sunset.
Eat & wear
Eat. Green lentils with leeks, mushrooms, parsley and pomegranate seeds. In the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, an ancient Greek poem, Hades gives Persephone a pomegranate seed that ties her to the underworld.
Wear. Soft grey, olive, sage and stone: a sage knit over linen, with flat shoes. Warm: a long wool cardigan. Cool: a linen shirt.
A line to keep
We must cultivate our garden.
Voltaire, Candide, or Optimism (1759), last chapter, in the common English translation of 'il faut cultiver notre jardin'
How this was made. The sky is calculated with the Swiss Ephemeris, tropical zodiac, whole-sign houses from the rising sign. Times are ET with UTC in brackets, for the window from Saturday 10 October 11:50 am ET (15:50 UTC) to Saturday 17 October 11:50 am ET. Tarot cards are drawn at random from one shuffle.
Pictures are public domain or CC0 from museum open access collections (cma:149174, met:206757, cma:139897, met:38341, met:890793, cma:394307); the mother of pearl band is cropped from The Met object 40526.
The paper is for reflection and enjoyment and is not medical, financial or legal advice.
