Horoscopes | Week of February 18-24, 2013

ARIES (March 21-April 19): Inside this temporary holding-chamber, there is still scant little to actually progressively do, Aries. Even though you may still have plenty of in-process worldly activities to continue participating in, I'd really think of this odd-feeling moment as something of a retreat… a relative calm (though I'm not sure 'calm' is the most precise descriptor) before a super-dynamic, onward-ho, ultra-Aries phase beginning in mid-March. As I've been repeatedly telling you, this is not the time to defiantly push forward, in willful resistance to the macro-level state of affairs. You are in motion anyway, in a manner similar to the way we stay in our sector of the spinning planet while the days and nights rise and fall, changing our apparent circumstances due to no instigating action on our part. To extend this metaphor into advice, then, I suggest simply paying appreciative mind to the ever-changing light: waking to newness with the dawn, shining your brightness at high noon, grieving the diminishing splendor by dusk, sinking into dark at midnight. Sync up with these rhythms, noticing the subtle passing differences, catching inspiration. In the smallest observations, you'll detect natural wisdoms that illumine all of life's biggest struggles—yes, even your current ones.

 

TAURUS (April 20-May 20): At the moment, you're quite literally nothing, Taurus, without a social context of community-identity to bounce your individuality off of. Okay, maybe not literally nothing since you wouldn't completely cease to exist as a living breathing being if you stayed wholly isolated from everyone else and quietly nibbled your unremarkable dinner in front of the echoing boob-tube. But I think you get my point nonetheless: Without staying in active relationship with spirited friends and/or strong-minded colleagues, you are merely reiterating your own unchallenged beliefs and habits and, in the process, crystallizing your blind-spots (and we've all got 'em) into calcified crustiness. You need others' probing curiosities, their devils'-advocate stances… and, perhaps most of all, their supportive willingness to hold space for you to openly fess up to shifting self-conceptions, internal conflicts, vexing confusions and other such symptoms of dynamic evolution. Let your people hold you while you dodder around on the fledgling young legs of your developing tomorrow. If you remain too self-enclosed, you'll inhibit your present potential for growth… by internally reinforcing all the self-fulfilling prophecies you really want to change.

 

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): There remains a faint pressure on you, Gemini—so faint, in fact, that 'pressure' may not be quite the right word, though its suggestive flutters still possess a potent directional persuasiveness—to orient your public self more distinctly toward service of that sort only you can provide. I have no doubt the signs are there, beckoning you with their 'this way, this way!' flashes, hoping you'll heed their informed desire to have you doing what you're supposed to be doing. No, I cannot tell you exactly how, on the practical level, you should make whatever adjustments need be made in order to orient this way. Not only does that go beyond the scope of your current astro-forecast, but it would rob you of the necessary connect-the-dots wandering that'll actually help you meet this divine request. It seems that those of you who quietly (or not-so-quietly) know you're not engaged in the 'right' career for your interests and talents ought to raise your hands to the gods and goddesses in surrender… and humbly ask them to deliver you where you need to be. Otherwise, you probably need to settle into the awareness that you'll be carrying out your 'service' in a non-career context—and then go carry it out. If you are on the 'right' path, raise those hands in gratitude.

 

CANCER (June 21-July 22): Fixations on the everyday can be blinding, Cancer, if they continually monopolize your mental attentions. Just like you, most of us are 'too busy' (or so we think) to 'navel-gaze' (which is just a derogatory term for chewing on life's big questions about Meaning and what-not). Yet, if we do not consciously choose to pause and ponder where these frantic wheel-spinning machinations are ultimately leading us (or not leading us, as the case may be), we end up tripping over the shocking discovery that our precious time is ticking away so much faster than we'd realized… and what do we have to show for it? Such ponderings are less about critically assessing our actual achievements, by the way, and more merely an opportunity to reflect on whether we earnestly tried to do the things we're interested in, whether we pushed our experiential knowledge into new terrain, and/or whether we made the most out of what's at our disposal. This year is a profound one for you Cancerians, with endless possibilities to smoothly extend yourself into these areas of personal interest. This month helps shine light, in a mysteriously mystical manner, on what your interests genuinely are.

 

LEO (July 23-August 22): The first step is admitting (to yourself, if not to anybody else) that there is presently some kind of mess to contend with, Leo. And then the second step is facing up to the fact that, despite any disorienting or difficult consequences which this mess may have exposed you to, at least some part of you has actually craved such sensational excitement. This second acknowledgment doesn't necessarily deem you a glutton for punishment, by the way… merely someone who's currently midstream on a expedition to uncover more knowledge about the labyrinthine nooks and crannies of your psyche, which obviously includes lots of contrasting drives and desires that don't always converge into coherent sense and, in fact, sometimes seem to subvert the very goals you consciously claim to hold. That's a big mouthful to swallow, I know. Which is why, beyond that, you needn't 'know' much more about what to do next and/or how to resolve these messy internal struggles. The time to act in decisive forward motion isn't quite yet. For now, you simply ought to commit to exploring all the different dimensions of your mess, sloshing around in it for a while… owning up to the ways in which you enjoy wading in the muck, as well as the reasons why you really can't stay there too much longer, not if you know what's good for you.

 

VIRGO (August 23-September 22): Every relationship we have is a hands-on spiritual lesson in how we treat ourselves… and those few most important relationships, with spouses or best-friends or partners-in-crime, show up with such significance precisely because they hold up an especially vibrant and vivid mirror to our faces. You Virgos are at a rather uncannily rich moment in your relationship lives, whether you're feeling lonely or isolated or smothered or contentedly coupled, during which you can attain a new height of self-acceptance through the reflection of your behavior towards that certain special someone or the glaring absence of that someone. If you are caught in critical evaluative mode (like Virgos often are), your preoccupation with what they are doing wrong is, if you're being honest, more a statement on your unforgiving stance toward your own imperfections. Learning to accept their so-called flaws (or shall we say 'quirks'?) will help you learn to accept your own. If, on the other hand, you're allowing sincerely problematic ethical lapses on their part to slide by unremarked-upon, it's probably because there's something in your own makeup that you don't want to deal with. Confronting it with them will help you confront it in yourself.

 

LIBRA (September 23-October 22): You, dutiful servant to the purpose laid out in front of you, mustn't worry that this utter immersion in productivity will ultimately swallow you whole. You will not be expected to function like this forever, Libra… though you will prolong the experience, to an uncomfortable point, if you dare try to weasel out of this too-timely-to-pass-up grindstone sentence. Buck up, slugger! No need for complaints, no need for instantaneous evidence that your efforts are adding up to something… just in-the-moment losing of yourself in the labor. For just this passing period, conceive of your physical specimen as a well-engineered machine: Provide all its parts the proper upkeep, and it'll work miracles! Keep it fed and rested, neither overstressed nor overindulged, and you will feel fantastic as you complete these grand feats! There's only a few more weeks of this fevered workday pace, and, dang it, you're really starting to get the hang of it. You may be beginning to actually revel in the glory of this unusual pocket of such total engrossment. Stay engrossed in the functional, and postpone any more contemplative matters.

 

SCORPIO (October 23-November 21): Romantic gestures are presently all the rage in the hottest Scorpio circles. A tinge of magnanimous drama surely wouldn't hurt your case… and, if aimed at the right recipients, could put big fat smiles on the appropriate faces. As long as the feelings being voiced are wholly authentic in nature, then I see no reason not to use bright colors, capital letters and exclamation points, decadent fabrics, an extra couple tablespoons of butter, and/or the most flattering lens-filter you can find. If you're going to dare to love, love big. If you want to tell someone something, make it a statement. A declaration. A full-on production, with plenty of attention paid to the aesthetic details, if only so that it most properly represents you, the poet-laureate of this extravaganza. Please have a fucking brilliant time pulling off this spectacle. Touch the soul(s) of your audience member(s) way down deep, in that strangely ticklish spot most of us keep decorously covered. Lay it on thick, and pull back on the editing. Who needs to be economical with expressions of the heart? There's plenty to go around, and we're always making more. Give 'em a show to remember, passionate Scorpio.

 

SAGITTARIUS (November 22-December 21): Nesting, to the best of your present ability, would be a pretty good idea. Your skin's thinner than usual. Your tolerance for others' inconsiderate acts is lower, and your knack for coming out with the spiked one-liner that'll conspicuously expose their inconsiderateness is temporarily stymied. None of this needs to be cause for concern, however, if you simply keep largely to yourself and loll about the house with relatively little external purpose (other than, of course, fulfilling any obligatory duties you can't get out of). The present image I'm holding, Sagittarius, is of you blissfully unzipping your skin… and the weightless light-body that exists within your fleshy earth-trapping stepping out, with tremendous relief, stealing itself a few precious moments without a coherent outward identity. I know that sounds a bit (or more than a bit) 'out there', but if you can get past the cheesy terminology, I think you'll understand what I'm talking about: Your true inner-self is probably feeling pretty exhausted with 'holding it all together' in order to meet the conventional expectations of functional sanity. Wouldn't it be nice to snag a temporary hiatus from all that external 'togetherness'? Nesting for a brief spell seems the best way to successfully snag it, don't you think?

 

CAPRICORN (December 22-January 19): Dissolve yourself into the local cast of characters, Capricorn, even as you retain consciousness of your presently profound impact on others. You are simultaneously (1) special, as we all are, and (2) just another human soul among the many, none of whom are any more 'important' than any other. Leave your need to differentiate yourself from the crowd at the door, please, and replace it (at least for the time being) with a glad acceptance of your perfect commonplaceness. Your neighbors do not care which awards you have won or how hard you slave away at your passions, but merely what quality of camaraderie you bring to the neighborhood. Your siblings do not rate you by your job title or income bracket, but by how consistently you continue to sing your part in the family chorus. These reminders not only keep you modest, but also connected. The trappings come and go; the manner in which we greet our fellow voyagers, regardless of their lot-in-life, speaks volumes about how earnestly we approach life as being much more than a competitive challenge. Slow down, dilly-dally, mosey along, smile at the kids playing games and the pups wagging their tails, chit-chat about the weather, buy an acquaintance a cup-o'-tea, stick around a while, experience…

 

AQUARIUS (January 20-February 18): Though we could probably agree that your version of 'practical' may not look exactly like the textbook definition, Aquarius, that doesn't make it any less important for you to be approaching the various (and potentially conflicting) elements in your life with a requisite practicality, whatever that may entail. This is no time for lofty questions about life-trajectories or what-not: You've already got plenty of bouncy balls flying through the air, tokens of your prior responses to such questions… and these need to be properly managed, shepherded to stabler safety, before any additional ones are gleefully tossed upward. Please don't take this as punitive counsel, for what you've presently got going is the perfectly logical progression of what you started—and, despite any practical-minded headaches that have resulted from it, should therefore be viewed as a relative success even if your interest-level and/or availability is no longer what it once was. Yet, you may not jump ahead to the future, skimming over the administrative efforts you still need to invest. After all, you Aquarians often struggle to remain in the present moment… though, by projecting yourselves too far forward, end up caught in the irony that your visionary ideals cannot be effectively manifested unless and until your right-here-right-now foundation is made sufficiently solid.

 

PISCES (February 19-March 20): By early next week, this already-pretty-damned-Piscean atmosphere will hit a pinnacle: The Sun and Venus will have joined Mercury, Mars, and Neptune in your sign, positioning you, Pisces, at the astrological center of our collective experience. With so much planetary energy to draw upon, you should really view your current situation as a totally open field of promising possibility, which you can use as a personal canvas for painting whatever picture you'd like to spend your days lovingly gazing upon. Under such energetic concentrations in a single sign, the advice I can offer is somewhat limited in specificity… mainly because you really can deploy it to your advantage, in basically whichever arena of life now compels your interest. You are at the obvious advantage now; don't passively push away this grand potential by indulging doubt, fear or laziness. I should probably also mention that Mercury will be going retrograde in your sign this week (on Sat Feb 23), an indicator that you ought to feel completely free to change your mind over the coming weeks, if suddenly what you've been thinking in the past month no longer appeals as strongly. There's absolutely no harm in acknowledging these shifts; after all, isn't that how intuition really works?