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Horoscopes | Week of October 5-11, 2009

ARIES (March 21-April 19): You're finishing up the last details of the portion that you can handle on your own, before you'll have to combine efforts with a partner, a collaborator or some other person whose participation is imperative for the success of the venture. Whether we're talking about a career project, a domestic situation, relationship work or an all-out redefinition of your life's course, there's only so much you can take care of as a lone-wolf individual. The rest is, like it or not, at least partly dependent on the interests and involvements of others. Take that truth all the way in, Aries, instead of pushing it away. Even if you do your due diligence with the absolute most passion and presence, the final outcome is always ultimately out of your sole control. That said, however, you're undoubtedly far likelier to achieve the outcome you desire if you do manage your pieces with comprehensive care. So spend your week neatening up and nailing down those tangible segments over which you do have control. Starting next week, the harder work ahead is about negotiating appropriate approaches for sharing responsibility with someone else.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20): Having now made your presence known (a practice your critics might unfairly deem 'grandstanding'), very little proving of yourself will be necessary in the forthcoming weeks. Questions of personality compatibility should largely be answered, Taurus… and despite whether you are content with all the replies you've received, there's not much further charming or convincing you ought to bother with. You've given every indication of who you are and who you aren't, which ways you're willing to bend to accommodate and which stances are unflappably non-negotiable. This is a timely moment, then, for accepting the scene as it appears—with pride in yourself for having pushed your truest self into unavoidable sight, first and foremost, even if it's also tinged with sadness for any sobering reality-checks that came along with it. From here, you move into a more contained phase, during which you'll have plenty of mundane (read: less emotional on a personal level) business to keep you occupied… and, when the workday passes into leisure time, more of a desire (and a freedom) to hang at home by your lonesome. Think of this next phase as your adjustment to the 'no going back' conclusions you've already reached but haven't yet integrated.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): Within these next two weeks, the general timbre of your days will undergo a notable shift from 'inwardly contemplative' to 'interactively re-energized', putting you back into the hypersocial role we'd all expect from a chatty child of Mercury. While this unfolding reemergence suits your innate personality quite well, don't underestimate the importance of such periodic lulls as the one you're now presently moving out of, Gemini. Every last one of us faces a lifelong need to balance the yin with the yang… to reserve enough of our unique spirit internally, for our own purposes of private satisfaction, that we may continue to share ourselves outwardly without feeling overtaxed or frazzled. If these coming days represent a metaphoric re-awakening, as you stir yourself from a (hopefully) restorative slumber and prepare to reenter the waking world for another 'long day' of being who we all expect you to be, you needn't jump frantically out of bed and throw clothes on as if you're running late and about to miss your train. Hit the snooze button a couple more times. Draw your week out as lazily as your schedule will allow. Enjoy your last few moments of transitioning back, before you shortly find yourself very much in the thick of things again.

CANCER (June 21-July 22): How many more angles are there from which I might confront you, Cancer, with the need (1) to assert what you want in any and every given situation that's weighing on you, even in the slightest, and (2) to do so with especially direct and detailed communications, rather than assuming the truth is self-evident based upon the feelings swimming around non-verbally between you? I'm not just harping on you to be a pest, my crabby cousin: It's that you've had Mars in your 1st and Mercury, Venus and Saturn in your 3rd combining to foster a particularly ripe environment for stepping outside your crab-shell, and giving the world distinct information about how you'd prefer to interact with 'em. This planetary blend is about to move on, however, giving way to more of the self-enclosure that's plenty familiar to you. But not before this week's third and final Mercury-Saturn conjunction of the last seven-to-eight weeks… a call to confidently ensure, once and for all, that you've done everything in your power to explicitly state the specifics of your message to the folks in your immediate vicinity who need to hear it, if you expect them to properly respect you in the manner of your choosing. In other words, this just isn't the moment to clam up. With Saturn involved, there will definitely be consequences—whether good or bad ones—to how ably, or insufficiently, you accept your responsibility to tell others what's on your mind.

LEO (July 23-August 22): It's coming! It's coming! No shortage of energy, excitement, compelling chaos and/or controversy will be suffered by Leos anytime in the next several months! If anything, you'll struggle to decipher which new threads of interest will lead to dead-ends and which to proverbial pots-of-gold… but 'lack of options' will be a phrase that should mean nothing, as far as your own direct experience is concerned. That said, Leo, your big-heartedness is presently undergoing pressure to give more than makes good sense—and it's up to you to temper your innate generosity with the caution of an investment manager who wants to see you get your money back (rather than, say, dole it out to anybody who asks ,just because 'you're that kind of good guy/gal'). For one more definitive instance, your most responsible voice of 'inner pragmatist' is being tested, to determine whether you can turn off your desire to please and impress long enough to calculate whether or not the numbers in the columns add up to a winning formula. Repeat after me: It's not merely about making a gesture of support, but also about understanding the limits of what you can comfortably afford.

VIRGO (August 23-September 22): Don't push the point, in last-ditch hopes of getting or keeping 'em on board with you. I'd be quite surprised, Virgo, if you haven't already made your opinion abundantly obvious to anyone within ear shot… especially after all these weeks of me encouraging you to do just that. One of the unavoidable consequences of being as unequivocally clear as you've been—and one that's frankly a very helpful consequence, in the end—is the inability to ignore places where your and another person's perspectives part ways and veer in opposite directions. And it's probably precisely because of this inability that you've previously refrained from laying down such unambiguous law: to prevent any inevitable partings, under the presumption you could always just 'suck it up' and agree to less-than-ideal arrangements to preserve the relations. But now, in case you haven't noticed, your best chance at fortuitous occurrences comes from both (1) keeping your intentions this crystal clear and (2) letting go of undue concern for interpersonal bonds that don't support those clear intentions. While the notion of bearing such self-imposed detachment in these unsupportive connections may indeed leave you somewhat misty-eyed, the alternative is to sacrifice an imminent opportunity for yourself.

LIBRA (September 23-October 22): For you Librans, this is a transitional week, framing the likely chance of one more big internal revelation (or necessary reaffirmation of a prior awareness)… in advance of the long-anticipated moment in which you make outward advances toward whatever you've decided you want. You've lately been in something of a reactive mode, especially with regards to career-related settings or in other public-community involvements where you hold little control over the big questions—not much for you to actually do, but a lot of under-the-surface dodging and shifting so as to avoid collateral consequences from others' deeds and attitudes. Take an extra-close look around, Libra, to glean a last insight into specifically which of their actions simply leave you feeling bad inside. This final bit of conclusive data-collection is crucial to the case you're about to begin presenting to those relevant parties, in order to give 'em tangible guidelines that, if followed, ought to eliminate their negative impact on your life. See, Libra, the goal we're about to tackle is you not feeling bad inside anymore, as a result of internalizing your displeasure at what someone else is doing. Your logical next step, which begins next week, will be to offer 'em the option of demonstrating greater care toward you in their actions.

SCORPIO (October 23-November 21): Once you've determined who exactly shares your outlook on that one certain issue or, more broadly, on lots of the issues facing you and your peeps these days, the knowledge of that alliance should simplify a lot of the isolating thoughts coursing through your head. Yes, there are folks on your side. No, 'me against the world' is not an accurate depiction of the situation (though I can certainly understand the 'had-it-up-to-here'-ness that undergirds such a feeling). And it doesn't presently behoove you, Scorpio, to define yourself against an individual or a group of individuals. The antagonism, whether or not directly expressed, sets up a polarizing charge that can't help but keep you actually more engaged in what the very people you aren't groovin' with are in fact doing. I suspect what you really want, on some level, is to be able to legitimately get away from those methods and mindsets that are driving you crazy… an escape which you won't victoriously attain as long as part of you is still invested in the ideological fight. You really want that respite? Solidify your allegiance with those who agree with you. Then, let them think about fighting the fight. You can rest easily, resting on the contented acknowledgment that someone else (on your team!) isn't letting 'em get away with it—and you can politely free up your consciousness.

SAGITTARIUS (November 22-December 21): Let me remind you, Sagittarius, that any walls you've recently been hitting your head against (by choice or circumstance) have not been built to block you from the entire galaxy of opportunities. Sure, one of the more appealing objects of your ambition may be trapped from your grasp behind a barrier that's appearing impossible to breach… and that frustrating unreachableness surely warrants any miffed feelings you've endured as a result. But please don't permit yourself to remain caught there much longer. The 'coming to grips' moments are passing by, opening into the excitement of diving into the 'figuring out what's next' creative freedom that now awaits. In the short term, though, you need to make a few immediate plans: how to extricate yourself from what you don't like about your prior or existing professional lifestyle, and how to sustain yourself during the transitory phase with some marginal degree of security. I almost wrote 'stability' to cap off your last sentence, but we all know how ridiculous-sounding the notion of anything being too stable these days really is. Embrace the instability, but from the perspective of someone who's foreseen the shaky ground ahead and made enough perfunctory preparations to ward off disaster… for the so-called 'instability' itself is nothing but a sign that a new adventure is beginning, and, hell, that's far more suited to your style than the stifling stagnancy of boredom.

CAPRICORN (December 22-January 19): It's becoming increasingly impossible not to take on a more 'out there for the world to see' position. You've had quite a while now, both recently and on a longer-term basis, to get your ideas straight, Capricorn… and there's now growing a pressure from those in powerful spots (through their explicitly expressed desire to see some more defining actions from you, or through their disappointing behaviors implicitly having made it unavoidably obvious that someone's got to take charge) on you to assume an authority altogether appropriate, considering your achievements. The old self-deprecating script really doesn't serve you at this present moment, though I suppose you ought to thank it for keeping you modest and hard-working. Rather than quietly squelching your criticisms of 'The Man' or other such personifying manifestations of everything that's wrong with the present structure, you're at the point where you've got to start pragmatically responding—simply by modeling how else it might be done. Rest assured, continuing to silently imagine an improved external atmosphere, in which folks are recognized for their successes and held accountable for their fallings-shorts, does nothing to actually change anything. You must take the recognizing and the holding-accountable into your own highly capable hands.

AQUARIUS (January 20-February 18): Reread last week's horoscope now, dear Aquarius, before you permit yourself a nitpicky focus on how to punitively avenge crossed boundaries, overlooked details or improperly met commitments. If you want to do what's fair—and I believe you do—then you'll have to limit the amount of mental energy you devote to pointing out every one of their perceived lapses in correctitude (a la rubbing their snout in it like one would do with a dog who urinates on the rug). Harping on bumps from the past will get you less of what you want than laying out a renewed vision for the future, complete with agreements that'll prevent more of what you don't like from happening again. Mercury moves into your justice-inspired 9th by week's end, setting you up for a bit of distance from the immediate stresses, so you can regain a productive tone and move forward in articulating clearer expectations for all parties. Before that can happen, alas, you must process any fury—especially involving self-directed resentment regarding instances in which you haven't owned up to the duty of passionate assertiveness—yourself first. It's only fair to divorce your personal issues from the genuinely interpersonal ones.

PISCES (February 19-March 20): In present relationships great and small, romantic and professional, chosen or inherited, you will soon welcome signs or symptoms of the next logical development in your mode of interaction, based upon whether you've (1) put in concerted effort to solidify the terms and conditions of your coupling or (2) avoided the challenging conversations in hopes that everybody's needs would magically be met by letting everything flow organically. Soon, Pisces, in those relationships you've intended to keep around, you'll experience either (1) greater intimacy, trust, passion and/or genuine collaboration or (2) further complications, headaches, hurt feelings and/or confusing contradictions. Having gotten this far into it, there really aren't any other choices. Still, it's not too late to attend to the unglamorous labor of stipulating specific guidelines you each ought to follow, to foster authentic goodwill on both sides… much as a lawyer would scour each clause of a soon-to-be-iron-clad contract, to ensure her client won't be signing off on anything that could come back to screw him over later. If you haven't put an end to the relationship yet (or aren't stepping visibly forward toward such a termination), then it's clear you plan to stick around. Having made that decision, consider this week a final review of the contract—and, essentially, its ultimate signing into law.