Horoscopes | Week of February 4-10, 2008

ARIES (March 21-April 19): I should've known there was funny business going on as soon as I accidentally wrote some other sign's horoscope when I'd intended to write yours, Aries. These things happen, you know… completely forgetting about what you might be expecting from me, with no disrespect meant of course, because there was another evidently-more-powerful pull on my intuitive brainwaves from somebody else who, just then, apparently needed my energy more. And this is also, not surprisingly, a beautiful parallel to other events that could occur this week—namely, that whatever ideas or desires you intend to pursue may easily be intrusively circumvented by forces much larger than you, due to more urgent matters on the plates of friends or teammates. Go along with them on it, rather than trying to carry out your grand plan alone at the same time (maybe even at odds with) another set of strategies is being enacted by a colleague or ally. As brave as you are, your job is too big for one person (if, that is, you want it done right). Thankfully, you've got folks in your court who'd ordinarily share your eagerness, as long as these other pressures weren't reaching the climactic point in their lives they now appear to be reaching. You're all in this together. Offer your helping hands if they need 'em… and only after the timing seems right (determined by putting yourself in their shoes for a second) should you ask them to help you. Get into the group groove, and you'll all benefit from each other's mutual consideration.

 

TAURUS (April 20-May 20): In the cushiony prison of our own minds, many of our most cherished goals and dreams can sound quite silly, not to mention ridiculously unrealistic. And I'm sure this last piece—'realism' and whatever we may (falsely) assume falls into that category—is an especially relevant consideration for you, Taurus, being the ultra-super-grounded pragmatist that you are. But there's nothing particularly 'realistic' about taking the too-almighty-and powerful position of deciding in advance, totally enclosed within your own self-referencing frame, what likely will or will not happen out in our wide wondrous world. If anything, it's a bit self-aggrandizing, don't you think? Reality, after all, is something we all must mutually agree upon… and maybe, just maybe, what you think couldn't possibly be brought to manifestation might be something somebody else thinks is well within reach. You, however, would never know that, as long as you stay silent about what you want a chance at achieving. If you crave a bigger role in a professional setting or out in the community, the number-one most important step to getting there is to simply be more direct. Explain what you bring to the table, what you may be lacking, and what you hope could happen, given the right collaborations, resources and support. Once others understand where your ambitions lie—and how your advancement would also boost the whole team—they'll gladly bump you up a notch, if it's under their power, or turn you in the right direction however they can. It's only a matter of widening your idea of 'reality'.

 

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): What's the meaning of life? Wait, I should rephrase that into a slightly more digestible query: What brings the most meaning to your life, Gemini? And have you asked yourself such questions anytime lately, to check in as to whether your old reliable answers need revision… or whether it's finally time to take a first stab at it? Don't let this week slip by without pausing to contemplate your place in the world. Like most of us, you probably grin and resign yourself to bearing certain less-than-desirable factors, the necessary sacrifices we all must make, ends-justifying-the-means-style, to buy ourselves the opportunity to do that which we do care deeply about. But if you don't know which are which (i.e., sacrifices made on behalf of what), that's a real problem. Such indiscriminate expenditures of your life-force (toward 'what matters' and 'what doesn't matter' with equal abandon, but without full awareness) leads logically to a haphazard existence of spinning your wheels, futzing around or, if you're lucky, stumbling into something that proves significant only by chance. Look around you: Our collective initiative suffers at the hands of this passivity in consciousness. There are unpleasant examples everywhere of folks who couldn't care less. No matter how fortunately our lives turn out, they are never without the inevitable tradeoffs—mundane for rewarding, trivial for profound—at virtually every step. The element of tragedy, however, only arrives when we're unable to recognize these deals or refuse to differentiate between the prices we pay and the payoffs that make 'em worth the cost.

 

CANCER (June 21-July 22): What's 'easy' isn't always what's best, though it may seem like an extremely appealing option, simply because making that choice can almost feel as if taking no action at all. In fact, Cancer, taking the simplest path of all—which presumably entails dodging most all direct confrontations and judgment calls altogether—is liable to leave you with lifelong hypotheticals that never receive the ol' college try and thus never get officially resolved. And that, alas, may bring you a lot closer to regret than actually proceeding into the storm, umbrella in hand and galoshes on feet, inviting the cloud to pour down and the lightning to strike. Do not back away, just because things have quickly become more complicated. This is the rich stuff of life. You won't feel quite so vulnerable forever, though these painstaking present moments may seem to take too long to pass. (But what's 'too long'? Is it a trick of the antsy emotional beast?) Trust me, though it's scary enough to wonder about what's coming around the next bend, it'd be far worse to leave it hanging into infinity's bottomless black pit, never to find out what could've been… simply due to a lackadaisical (or is it lazy?) urge not to bother bothering to be bothered. Bother.

 

LEO (July 23-August 22): Okay, now I'm going to play devil's advocate to most everything I wrote last week (which also references the week before)… and ask you to trust the person you're hanging with, as much as you possibly can, at least for the time being. Yes, that contradicts the advice I already gave you to think about and/or do something else, so you only get my true support for returning to giving him/her your undivided attention if in fact you took a brief break from it. And yes, I still stick firm to the notion that you haven't reached resolution yet (nor will you this week, despite any dramatic turns that may mislead you to conclude otherwise)… but that doesn't mean you can't enjoy yourself in the meantime. That's why it won't make much sense to bombard your special someone with suspicious questions or needy directives, which only go to show your discomfort with an open-ended future (though, truth be told, the future's always that open-ended, anyway, no matter what he/she might say). Instead, give 'em the benefit of the doubt. Release the control-freak tendencies that might drive you to demand certain gestures or statements. That individual you so desperately want to love you, trust you, dedicate his/her life to you, and/or make a particular water-tight commitment to you… he/she just might offer you something just as good as what you think you want (or better!), if you simply provide 'em the chance to do it his/her own way.

 

VIRGO (August 23-September 22): The week's solar eclipse in your 6th continues the shake-up in your daily routine I've recently warned you about… as if Mercury retrograde conjunct Neptune in that same zone weren't enough. The funny thing about it, though, Virgo, is that I believe strongly you're supposed to keep on working on whatever you're working on—though the process may continue to frustrate you, and your results are likely to remain somewhat unreliable. This is the healthy challenge for you: Can you meet your requirements dutifully, without fixating on whether what you produce is 'up to your standards'? Let's be honest… by simple mathematics, not every piece of work can be our best (or quickest) work. Efficiency is inconsistent, often affected by variables we cannot possibly control. Please build into your self-judgments a sufficient allowance for everything that's in the midst of changing, which necessitates relaxing your tightly wound expectations. All the while, I also urge you to forget about such trials the moment your workday is done… or you'll miss this simultaneous opportunity for romantic fun. Should you step away from your computer long enough to get all gussied up (to impress your honey, woo a new guy/girl, or paint the town red with an open mind), you'll certainly have somebody flocking to your hot side to help distract from this especially knotty daily grind. Make the time for playful pleasure. Your health (as affected by your relative stress level) wants it for you.

 

LIBRA (September 23-October 22): To hear the conventional wisdom tell it, you Librans have a delightful habit of filtering your true feelings through a smoothing-and-buffing apparatus that polishes away many of the sharpest edges—before they ever make it to the outside world. Well, at least this habit is 'delightful' to all of us out here, who clearly benefit from the one fewer headache you spare us from suffering on your behalf, were we to confront anything less than easy agreement on your part… freeing us up to continue absorbing ourselves in our way of seeing situations, without having to muster concern for your potential considerations and reactions. Naturally, I expect you to notice the glaring lack of delight due to you, should you prove this habit true in your case. Why? Because that internal pressure you place on yourself to suck it up only builds and builds, without the simple alleviating act of blatantly making it all about you and venting both the good and bad of what's happening inside. Aren't you tired of pretending to care only as much as you consider 'socially appropriate'? Quit it already. Your only escape from the hellfire of protocol is to choose not to care what they think—and to let your true personality shine through, complaints and criticisms and crying spells included, without any sort of apology.

 

SCORPIO (October 23-November 21): I hope you like where you're laying your head each night, Scorpio, because I'd recommend spending lots of time there this week. You need the personal space. Though you may find yourself angry or sad or uncannily elated (with a creepy edge to it, perhaps?), you shouldn't assume to know who or what is causing the surge. (I mentioned this last week, remember?) And I wouldn't advise taking any super-noteworthy, out-in-the-world, taking-charge-of-the-situation steps that appear like you're trying to move your understanding along. Just chill out about it. Even if you were to uncover some obvious reason for your upset or excitement, the feelings go way deeper than that. In the meantime, if your home environment requires you to share-and-share-alike with flatmates or family members, be aware of your tendency to take out your frustrations on those who may feel 'too close for comfort' during this phase of necessary privacy. You're not actually doing yourself any favors by using this as your chance to sort out who is or isn't doing his chores, who is or isn't a self-centered slob, and who is or isn't in charge of organizing bills or decorating the living room or weeding the backyard. Despite your sincere thoughts on the matter, just don't go there right now. It'd be unfair to all parties to attempt negotiating domestic issues while under this eclipse-whipped emotional froth. Rent a weepy movie, and cry it out… or do whatever you to take care of yourself, without dragging anyone else into it.

 

SAGITTARIUS (November 22-December 21): In the current realm of Mercury retrograde, everything is up for rethinking… even the horoscopes of the past two weeks, which may seem to flip on their ears all nausea-inducing-like, once I tell you that your recent exercise in self-directed focus now must give way to something else entirely. Where, just days ago, I would've recommended shutting off both your peripheral vision and all outer influences you'd consider 'short-sighted' (or downright 'harebrained'), now I'm changing my tune—and advising you to suddenly heed all such seemingly tangential signs and subliminal messages. That's not to say you were previously wrong in uncompromisingly fixing the lens of your attention right where you wanted it to be. This quick-fire shift in perspective I'm suggesting is simply following a natural chain of development, from finer concentration to more diffuse observation. (And I just wanted you to get the ordering of the timing right, that's all.) It's been helpful to concern yourself (maybe even obsess?) with the same principal person(s) or issue(s) recently. But don't you think it's time to allow others in? Call up different folks. Frequent different spots. Get out of the same 'rut' I just urged you to create, and respond to a totally unrelated set of defining circumstances… preferably suggested by someone else entirely.

 

CAPRICORN (December 22-January 19): Making your dreams come true (in the real world, at least) almost always requires a chunk of cash… which is probably why your big bad earth-sign self might struggle to even allow 'dreams' to develop beyond fleeting images into more fully flushed-out visions. Yet, you possess all the qualities necessary to manage the process of budgeting, fundraising, and responsibly spending that'd get you to that pivotal point of success. You simply have to decide you're really going to make it happen—then, commit to maintaining your patience over the long term. Over these eclipse-intensified few weeks, Capricorn, your 2nd house of material resources (and self-worth, the most valuable 'resource' you bear) is being wrapped in a silky swaddle of innovative imagination… a perfect setting for nurturing your ability to see farther, freer and more faithfully. Instead of letting the presumably high costs of dream-realization scare you away from even trying, start working on a financial plan and timeline that'll set you on the right path. This isn't the moment for working out the kinks and details. (Mercury is retrograde, after all.) Worry about the grand blueprint for the time being. It's an energetic investment in the notion of building your own future, stone by stone, with your own hands, from empty lot to architectural masterpiece. You have to start somewhere, right? During a Capricorn-friendly year and within close orb of a solar eclipse is as good a time as any.

 

AQUARIUS (January 20-February 18): Hey, Aquarius… 'all over the map', are ya? Well, give yourself that freedom to be a bit more impulsive than usual. As if a solar eclipse in your sign on Wednesday (Feb 6) weren't enough to excuse you from orderly conduct… wait a minute there, it is enough of an excuse. So can I just leave your horoscope there? Ah, hell, I'll throw in a few more sentences to officially endorse the beauty of following the moment's whim, rather than entertaining too much anxious worrying about what might happen if you do. (How could you know until you try?) The happiest mind-frame from which to embrace spontaneity, by the way, is one that refuses to fall complicit victim to the agreed-upon rules of time as we know it. You could stretch these coming seven days into the equivalent of a year's worth of meaningful living—or just as easily compress them into one light-speed beating of a hummingbird's wings—merely by staying with your breath, radically dedicating your consciousness to each inhale or exhale as the world goes crazy around you. You set the pace of how you move through existence, after all. Play with bending this continuum, so you might win yourself the fullest presence of every instant… motivating you to foster greater courage for confronting terrifying unknowns, since the perfection is always already complete before any next move is taken. If all my waxing new-physics seems somewhat beside the point to an otherwise shaken-up-and-stirred eclipse week, I only follow this line of belief in honor of Neptune's residence alongside the eclipse in your sign and his mad relevance to your current North Node-dictated purpose: to neither know nor to care about the not-knowing, but merely to experience its wonder. (And you don't have to be smart about it either. 'Smart' gets tedious, don't it?)

 

PISCES (February 19-March 20): Increasingly over recent weeks, you've managed to wiggle or waft your way off the main straight-and-narrow road that the rest of us are proceeding down (in a more or less orderly fashion)… and onto some circuitous detour through a weird and wacky landscape, where weather patterns may abruptly shift without warning and the color balance may be tweaked to oddly brilliant hues and the maps you might've consulted earlier will no longer accurately describe the territory you're now treading. Feel like acting totally off the wall? Well, no wonder, Pisces. Just do your best to record—on film or digital media, in drawings or literary notebook scribbles, through interpersonal exchanges—some of the more artful, meaning-filled details of your week. This is raw material from the collective unconscious (nothing you're too unfamiliar with, eh?), which contains cryptic but holy messages for you, once you get enough psychic distance from this presently strange energetic climate to properly interpret them. I must warn you to keep one foot on the ground at all times… or at least somebody who you trust nearby, to watch out for you when you (consciously or not) opt not to heed standard cautions. (Case in point: While you're under the influence of intoxicating substances or all-consuming relationships, you absolutely need a stabilizing character close by your side.) There's really no fighting the drive to unhinge your connection to dreary ol' normalcy, with tremendous 12th-house activity spinning your fantasyland into a pillowy sanctuary of too-vivid-to-really-exist imaginings (or maybe they really exist somewhere else in the universe?) that may be temptingly comfortable to escape into. At least minimize the earthly-plane risks. Be zany as a bat, but safe and sound.