by Eric Francis
ARIES — It’s time to set your own definition of success, and start working for it right now. The chances are, though, that you’ve already made considerable progress, and what you now need to do is to refine your methods, eliminate any goals that you don’t intend to pursue, and keep your focus. A matter of partnership is crucial; while the person may or may not be a sexual partner, there must be chemistry between you and whomever you work with — chemistry that is cellular, hormonal and pheromonal. By that I mean simpatico and sublime, where you work for the same goal in an intuitive way. In the absence of that, pursue your interests with gusto and see who shows up, wanting to play and participate, for its own sake, and for your sake. You’re working on something that can change the world in some way — if not the big, wide world, then the cosmos of whatever field you’re involved with. You’re onto something real.
TAURUS — David Byrne, one of the mighty ones born under your sign, penned the lines, “Years ago who would believe it’s true? / Goes to show what a little faith can do.” The core lesson of this time in your life is having faith in yourself. Nobody would suspect you otherwise, though you know the truth of the matter. This goes deeper than self-confidence, to the core essence of your purpose for living. One key to this is to connect with your purpose in everything that you do. Purpose goes beyond any one activity, idea, or belief. You possess your core purpose at all times, in all places and with all people. That is useful: you can take it with you everywhere you go, and put it to work no matter what you do. If nothing special is ringing a bell, consider that this is about the life of your soul. Soul is not a thing; it’s a verb. It’s a process by which you integrate the spiritual essence of your being into the rest of your being. Do what feels right, and participate fully in your own existence.
GEMINI — You may feel like there’s so much going on around you, it’s impossible to keep track of it, much less exert any control. That’s one side of the story. The other side of the story is to remember that you’re bigger than all of it combined: you are more than the sum total of all the separate elements of your life, or any one of them. Matters of finance and business partnership are a top priority, though you can afford to stand back a little, and propose the ideas that you want to manifest. You can afford to observe, and intervene right when you think you need to. However, the one thing you must do is to be observant. You really have to pay attention to the details and to the positions of others, which means conversing with them throughout whatever process is going on. Your ability to shape the outcome is manifested not through power but through influence, which means ideas, a vision, and seeing the scenario from the widest, and highest, possible viewpoint.
CANCER — This week’s astonishing astrology — an alignment of Venus, the Sun, Mars, Jupiter and Pluto — is all over the sex and relationship houses in your solar chart. You get a blend of teenage passion with the intensity of a commitment that is really working. This is fun and somewhat wild astrology, though it’s also deep, and it could be daunting. However, you can summon your courage, as if you’re on a diving board and you really want to jump into the water headfirst, and you know the water is deep enough, and you know you can dive, and you can swim, and it’s just a little much — and then you’re happy you did it because you really needed to. The thing you want to avoid is people you have actual conflict with: bad vibes, bad karma, a negative history or any need to deceive anyone. Those are exactly, precisely the people you don’t want to be involved with.
LEO — You are done planning and pondering; it’s time to start doing, by which I mean doing what you know you want and need to do You have leverage right now, which will be helpful, though you don’t need much. Lean into the challenges you are facing just a little and you’ll see how much power the weight of your mind and your intentions carries. Efficiency is essential, which means placing your emphasis on ideas; and where labor is involved, using the concept of leverage. Be certain to balance your creative efforts with proper rest, recreation and nutrition. You don’t need to become a health guru; you only need to take care of yourself sufficiently well to stay in balance, and keep your stress level down. Where your work seems to conflict with relationships, make sure you consider both sides of the equation. What is the actual source of the seeming conflict?
VIRGO — You must be naughty if you want to do the right thing. That means that in order to truly serve your happiness and your growth (personal, creative or whatever), you will need to break some rules, violate some taboos and do some things you think people will disapprove of. Negative emotions such as guilt, embarrassment, fear, or shame can serve as an invitation. Rather than assume they point to the ‘wrong thing’, try the assumption that they point the way to what will serve you the best. I’m not making this up, by the way — this is very old wisdom, though not exactly well understood or overplayed these days. Taboo is a veil over the truth; it’s a scrim thrown over your creativity; and it’s a social control device that serves no purpose in your life. You have a lot of mojo running right now. You don’t need any holy types of people, or holy voices in your mind, stopping your fun.
LIBRA — This week you’re likely to discover just how much you have, or don’t have, in common with family members or those you share your household with. You are growing in your own direction, and you need to do your own thing. One of the overarching themes of a long phase of your life is cultivating bona fide emotional independence, or you could say, getting a life. It’s easy to go from one type of family system of control to another. It’s easy to transform being trapped in one kind of environment to being stuck in another. Your goal now is to shift that whole paradigm and set yourself free — free enough to make decisions without the meekest thought of needing to ask permission. Nobody should be walking into your private space without knocking, or anything of the kind. Borrowing from the nearly forgotten author Virginia Woolf, you need a room of your own.
SCORPIO — Have you considered that fear stops you from doing what you want to do? I know that as a Scorpio, you’re supposed to be the first in line to walk on hot coals, the first out of the airplane door on the skydiving trip, or to suggest that the dentist hold the Novocain. But what’s your relationship to fear, really? Do you say what you need to say? Do you feel what you need to feel? Do you admit what you actually know? You’re well past the point of being able to hide who you are, and at the moment, you’ve probably figured out there’s no point trying. Now you might direct your efforts into the other direction: do exactly what might intimidate you. Say what you want to say, not what you think people want to hear. More than anything, admit what you know, and put your knowledge to work for your own benefit. You will have many such opportunities this week.
SAGITTARIUS — Recently a Sagittarius friend said she was interested in having a source of “passive income.” That’s the kind where the checks allegedly come rolling in like interest accrued on a trust fund. This, ostensibly, would be used to support her creative interests. It took me a couple of weeks pondering to see the problem with this theory. When you’re at your best, there’s nothing passive about you. You need passionate income. You need to be well paid for what you love to do, and/or what you do the very best (there’s a relationship between them; if not, it would be wise to develop one). You will succeed financially to the degree you’re wholly engaged with your values and your priorities. Rather than farm out the income aspect of work, it’s essential that you marry it to the creative aspect, generating a reaction that, once it gets going, is difficult to stop.
CAPRICORN — Your sign is somewhat famous for a priggish attitude toward sex. That’s funny, since you’re probably one of the more sexual people you know, even if you veil that with proper attire and an insistence on seeming prim, at nearly any cost (including resisting fun that might appear in any way untoward, or revealing your true desire). It’s time to throw that approach and all the theories that support it into a bonfire. It’s time to ask yourself who you were trying to impress, and then decide that you don’t care. More than that, it’s essential you recognize the ways in which people blame others for their own impulse to restrain themselves with morality; i.e., what would mother think? If you really want to go there, though, ask yourself that very question. If she had a porthole into your life, she might be shocked for a moment, and then have a very, very different reaction — as will you.
AQUARIUS — Are you experiencing fear, or desire? Something is definitely moving within you. You seem ready to release yourself from an old emotional bond of some kind, as if you discovered some beautiful aspect of yourself trapped in a dusty old cellar. What is that part of you, what’s this cellar, and who put you there? This is old material; you may be reversing something that was done to an ancestor many generations ago. This may have been repeated through the years, and inflicted directly on you — or not. Whatever the case, you’re ready to set something free from deep in that realm known as the unconscious. Step one in doing so is to make it conscious — to fully awaken to whatever this feeling, need, fear or desire is. The second is to give yourself a push, in the direction where you feel the most energy is contained. You need access to that energy, and to get it, you must go to it: it won’t just come to you.
PISCES — If you’ve wanted to go public with something, this could be the week. There’s some genuine harmony between what you are thinking and feeling, and what has suddenly become publicly acceptable. What could this be about? The range of possibilities spans from sharing something with your friends that you’ve long kept secret (a kind of coming out) to revealing a project you’ve been working on for years. It might be a statement you need to make, something you’ve written that you want to share, or artwork nobody has seen. This could be anything that is currently something in your personal world that wants to find a home in some wider community — including you announcing your existence in some way. So, consider the possibilities. Don’t worry if what you do, or who you are, is good enough. Take the chance and let yourself be known, seen and recognized.
