Aries Sun & Aries Rising
Little rams need a little rest just as much as the next creature, but Aries are known to build up energy much quicker than most, and when they do, they need to expend it! This week begins with a trine between Mars in Sagittarius and the first quarter moon of the month in your sign, and the lunation might have you feeling restless and eager to make some big changes. If you find yourself tempted by the old “I’ll sleep when I’m dead” mentality, it might be time for you to face it head on instead of letting it take you by the horns and wear you out. With both Venus and Mercury retrograde by the end of the week, your progress depends on your ability to assess how you can work smart instead of just working hard. While it may not be time to call in favours quite yet, there’s plenty of time to create a schedule that takes your distractions into account.ILLUSTRATION BY barbarianflower
Taurus Sun & Taurus Rising
Taurus might be a sign known for their love of things they can touch, a sign that demands proof. But to love a Taurus is to know the demanding dreamer within them. And isn’t the first step always the dream? The part where you allow your mind to wander like a bull through a field, seeking out whatever experience awaits in its fullness? Dreaming, giving your imagination range, is no small feat. It’s a courageous task and it will require some irreverence on your part. It’s your turn to turn your back on voices that speak over you, to close the book on teachings that don’t account for what you’ve learned. Let the naysayers have their say, but prioritise what your dreams lead you to this week, dear Taurus, and give them way. ILLUSTRATION BY barbarianflower
Gemini Sun & Gemini Rising
If you’re feeling more open to possibility this week, more interested in connection, you’re not alone. There’s something about the days ahead that feels not unlike a blanket of snow over a familiar landscape: a reminder that circumstance can shift your experience, transforming the known into the unknown. Here lies opportunity for wonder without expectation, a chance to touch hopefulness at its root, to find where it lives in you. And, while it may be tempting to seek out company while you go about uncovering and exploring, it’s worth remembering that what we discover on our own and what we discover alongside others are necessarily different things. Can you choose one and not relegate the other?ILLUSTRATION BY barbarianflower
Cancer Sun & Cancer Rising
It’s not always advantageous to be visible. But, neither can a person thrive in shadow, hiding oneself away in the name of growth when one look at a green living thing can tell you all you need to know about that. Of course, it doesn’t have to be do or die. You have a right to take it slow, to share yourself with the world when it feels right and real for you. But how do you know when you’re responding to your intuition and when it’s fear that limits you? Sometimes, the first step is simply making a bold move in a new direction, against the grain you’ve been going with, and assessing the results. Begin with your body, breathe into buzzing, the tightness, the emotional muscles you’re working and stretch out of your comfort a little more.ILLUSTRATION BY barbarianflower
Leo Sun & Leo Rising
Sometimes, a change of heart is a thing that happens to you, like waking up adrift and finding that the anchor which claimed you has yielded in the night. But sometimes, a change of heart is a thing you seek out for your own sake, your own sanity, because your heart is heavy, a burden you’d like to put down. Often, the first ingredient to a change of heart is a change of perspective. And, while this change of perspective can come from switching up your scene or engaging a new philosophy, it doesn’t have to. Teachers are everywhere and they often wear disguises. Their voices resonate over time but if you repeat your story loud enough, you’ll drown them out. To unburden your heart you’ll have to listen harder, stay longer, move from the understanding that what you thought you knew – you don’t know yet.ILLUSTRATION BY barbarianflower
Virgo Sun & Virgo Rising
Slowing down and back-tracking, evaluation and assessment – these steps are part of any Virgo’s trade. Even the most chaotic of Virgos has a system, a way to assess their progress and their benchmarks. Even the most wayward amongst you has a keen sense of the road – the deviation and the rerouting possibilities. This week begins with a sextile from Mercury in Aquarius to Chiron in Aries, and you might find yourself trying to balance your accounts. But, new agreements aren’t foolproof in a week that leads into Mercury retrograde. You’re better off balancing your accounts and asking for support than you are asking for what dear ones might owe you. Allow things to work out as they do, and don’t set your heart on it. ILLUSTRATION BY barbarianflower
Libra Sun & Libra Rising
Everything is connected, the rain, the dirt, the rose, the spider, the aphids. In the natural world, all you have to do is witness. But, in our interior world, witnessing is harder. It takes a great deal of patience with yourself, a commitment to extricating projection from perception, a desire to know yourself fully without relying on the mirror of the other – things that are hard to cultivate at first but strong and persistent as you keep going. Like roses. And like a garden, relationships change all the time, but to change alongside each other is work. It requires companion planting, understanding what each plant needs separately and then together. This week offers you invitation after invitation to get your hands into the dirt of yourself and assess the quality of the soil, what it nurtured before, and what wants to live there now. ILLUSTRATION BY barbarianflower
Scorpio Sun & Scorpio Rising
In some ways, time is an arbitrary thing. The days and weeks and months that lead into years can have you waking up nursing a heartache from a different decade, before you remember who you are in this moment, in this age. But one does remember, even if that remembering is more ritual than revelation. In this way, keeping time is a kind of magic, a kind of spell against stagnation, and far from arbitrary. If you mark these moments of heartache and acceptance by the hour, like one writes dreams down in a journal, even if the moments themselves feel small, you’ll find that you return to yourself throughout the day. This is a week that demands your attention, your commitment to ritual. If you have been waiting for a change to come, assess what has already changed. If you’ve been waiting for all your selves to return, stand vigil. ILLUSTRATION BY barbarianflower
Sagittarius Sun & Sagittarius Rising
Fire signs can be described as pretty direct people, but directness isn’t always the best way to start a fire. Imagine a fireplace: the seasoned wood won’t take on its own. A fire requires kindling. The twigs, the occasional – and contested! – pinecone, some shredded paper bags, and the treasured fire-starter all come into play. And, even then, there’s work to be done, rearranging, a gentle blow at the dwindling embers, a bellow if you’re feeling bold. What I’m saying is, while something might seem easy enough to attain, the truth is that even the most basic pleasure requires a certain amount of build up and sustained attention. If what you’re longing for is slow going, let it be slow. Give it kindling, give it a firm prod, and don’t give up.ILLUSTRATION BY barbarianflower
Capricorn Sun & Capricorn Rising
The astrological weather might seem formidable in Capricorn territory, but the truth is that most things Capricorn-related can seem formidable at first. Upon closer inspection, even the most demanding transits can grant us a great deal of grace and permission to approach difficult interactions with clarity and compassion. Of course, grace, clarity and compassion can feel like a tall order when all one really wants to do is relish the month of your solar return and let off a little steam. Well, let it off Capricorn, open the pit, beat the earth, wear the playground out. But do yourself a favor and don’t do it alone, not if you can help it. Call in your heart’s cavalry, the people who see the child in you and celebrate it. Let them remind you what it means to feel at home with others, let them remind you where you belong.ILLUSTRATION BY barbarianflower
Aquarius Sun & Aquarius Rising
It’s true the Mercury stations retrograde in Aquarius this week but that doesn’t mean you’ve got to close your date book. If anything, you might find yourself called to crack it open and pore over the days ahead, looking for the rhythm in them, a sign that something good this way comes. What if, this time, a sign is something you have to call in, like a petulant child that requires attention? Could you let yourself ask for a little bit more than synchronicity; could you give yourself permission to make demands of the universe? This is not a time to be demure, Aquarius, and it’s certainly not a time to pretend that you’re better off going at it alone. Spells are amplified by energy, by like minds and willing hearts. Treat Monday night as your witching hour, this week as your window of invocation.
ILLUSTRATION BY barbarianflower
Pisces Sun & Pisces Rising
As Jupiter continues to spread out in Pisces, you might find yourself growing more ambitious, more invested in a new story about yourself. And while the first quarter moon in Aries and a sextile from Mercury to Chiron might have you securing some sure bets in the name of remediation, it’s important that you set some limits for yourself – even if they are ultimately arbitrary. Imagine what lies before you as a feast, a table bedecked with the stuff of dreams not unlike the kind the boys imagined in Hook. Look around the table and see who sits beside you, whose company enriches the feast and who is missing. Give yourself time to take in what’s now available to you, to appreciate how much has changed, to assess what has remained the same within you despite those changes. Start small and start slow, knowing faith breeds continuing abundance. ILLUSTRATION BY barbarianflower
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