Image from MESSENGER’s second Mercury flyby. Photo: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Carnegie Institution of Washington.

Dear Friend and Client:

Events of September represent a culmination of the astrology of the past 12 months, and if we look as far as late October, we see a culmination of developments of the past two years. For the next few weeks we get to ask, if not answer, the question: what have I been doing with all this time? Implied here is the question of whether you’ve been wasting your precious days, and seeking some sign from the cosmos that you have not. The astrology involves an extra-fancy Mercury retrograde that runs from Sept. 6 through Sept. 29. I say fancy because it does three unusual things: one is that it dances between Virgo and Libra and back again, which represents a balance between the mental level (analysis, Virgo) and the appreciation of beauty (aesthetics, Libra). Next, we have Mercury passing through the long-standing opposition between Saturn and Uranus. This rare aspect was exact first on Election Day 2008 and takes about two years to work out. Mercury playing in the realm of Saturn-Uranus will show us how deep thought, respect for the past, and provocative breakthroughs can work together. Finally, Mercury in Libra makes a series of squares to Pluto in Capricorn, warming up the territory for when Saturn gets to that same place later in the season. Focusing the actual evolution of our minds, for some, this will represent pain that serves as a wake-up call. For others, this series of Mercury/Pluto aspects will remind us that what keeps us alive from day to day is the awareness that we exist. By association we are reminded that existence is meaningful — no matter how many forces in society are working around the clock to make it seem otherwise.

Yours & truly,

Aries (March 20-April 19)
You must be strategic in both personal and business plans. Understand your short-range goal, such as where you want to be by the end of the year, and set your agenda accordingly. Do so in the context of your long-range goal, which in the current speed of the world would take you through about December 2011. This may seem like a lot of planning for an Aries. Accept this fact. The influences that are conditioning your life for the foreseeable future are calling upon you to rise to a new level of awareness, competence and deftness that may indeed be unfamiliar to you. Developments are in the offing that you cannot see or imagine, which you are in the position of having to be prepared for. In addition to maintaining a conscious plan or agenda, subject to revision, that preparation might include three basic steps. One, stay caught up on your work. Two, maintain healthy working relationships. Three, strive for efficiency. You need your energy to use wisely, not to waste. Remember that energy comes in the form of ideas, of money, and of many resources that are not exactly money but which may be far more valuable. Your most important resource is your wellbeing. Coming in a close second are the people in your life. Treat them well.

Taurus (April 19- May 20)
I don’t blame most people for not pursuing their creative talents as a way to make a living. Yes, our parents usually tried to talk us out of them. It’s also true that developing talent takes a lot of work, and there are absolutely no guaranteed rewards. The rewards for getting an MBA or passing the bar are not guaranteed either, but at least there are people waiting with jobs for those skillsets. Creativity is a total gamble, and taking that risk is associated with plenty of justifiable fear. The only thing is, sometimes one’s sense of necessity far exceeds that fear. The Taurus mind may be the most obsessive of the entire zodiac, and you’ve certainly been ruminating on this issue for a long time, particularly the past month, which caps off nearly two years of simply knowing you must do something better; something more worthwhile with your time and with your talent. I am pretty sure you even know exactly what that thing is and how rewarding it will be. I am not here to tell you that you will get there; but I am here to tell you that you can get there if you work with a conscious plan, if you strive to understand the nature of your own resistance (which is mostly fear) and most of all, if you want to.

Gemini (May 20- June 21)
Some people take their family and its issues for granted. Some people work these issues out in therapy for years, and get nowhere. Others set their intentions, trust themselves and blaze through the past and all its people and themes, and go on not only to lives of achievement but also lives of emotional contentment. I don’t think that one of these has to come at the expense of the other. I would propose a viewpoint where the two support one another mutually. After the equinox as the new season opens up, you’re going to feel a much more palpable sense of calling. There is something in these charts about doing what you need to do, and being willing to do the personal work to get you there. You seem to have started this work, but now you know there is really a much longer agenda than you were originally planning for. This month seems to be wrought with all kinds of loops and minor emotional torments; and one or two truly significant ones. Do the work you need to do. Get the help you need, from people who understand these kinds of issues. This will involve understanding why you might refuse to seek assistance, be it practical or directed at inner healing, and not letting that be an excuse.

Cancer (June 21- July 22)
Reckon with how powerful ideas are; with how much work they save; and with how good they are. You may not think so, at least not right now. You may not be the best judge. You seem to be working out a complex equation, for which there is no easy solution. It may involve a business, your profession, or something in your community. The issue actually surfaced a year or two ago, but you didn’t necessarily give it a name, or set a goal associated with resolving it. I can assure you that your mind has been working to develop not just solutions but something original through most of this time. That effort is now coming to fruition, though it seems to be preceded by a moment of uncertainty. There are true gems of thought amidst any mental turbulence, overwork or doubt that you may be feeling. You can therefore afford to relax, on several accounts. Trust that you’re making progress; trust that the answers will come to you as you need them. Be particularly sensitive to ideas that seem too subtle to be effective, or so strategically clever that you can’t believe they would work. There are some very good ideas that are in the ‘tried and true’ category. The touch of genius may come as applying an old idea in an original way. It often does.

Leo (July 22- Aug. 23)
Your particular genius with money involves caring about the value of things: and by things, I mean everything, from effort to love to actual cash; from a concept to your value on serving others. You are — or have the potential — to be good with money because you are someone who puts thought into your life and who recognizes that everything and everyone has value. Therefore you survive in tough times, you thrive in good times and you have the potential to do quite nicely all the time. Remember that, and tell yourself a few times a day. We’re all participants in a culture that is sick with greed; you take part as a matter of necessity and in truth as a revolutionary. Events this month and into next month give you a series of opportunities to outsmart some pretty big players in some complex games. They may be the bank, they may be your boss, they may be the stilted values of your parents, or your actual parents. More to the point, you have the ability to put whatever you encounter to work for you, though you have to be clever about it. The invention of a lever makes a simple metaphor. It’s hard to roll a boulder; it’s easy to put a lever underneath it and have that do most of the work.

Virgo (Aug. 23- Sep. 22)
For a while, no decision may feel like the right decision, and no set of facts may seem to fit the scenario you are in. I suggest you stop looking for any ultimate explanations or solution sets and accept that currently everything is a variable. True, there are X-factors all over the place most of the time, but the current aspects include Mercury retrograding in and out of your birth sign, which will accentuate the effect. The more room you make for things to change not just around you but within you, the more you will be able to profit from those developments. This being said, an observation or conclusion you reached in late August will provide a reference point for what you know to be true, or at least what you are assuming to be true. By a reference point I mean a basic set of facts on which you based a series of derivative ideas or assumptions. I suggest going back to what you were thinking and doing during that timeframe (around Aug. 15 through 18) and considering the various people and situations that you were involved with. There is a phase of history that you want to avoid repeating; recognizing that, knowing and understanding the recent past and what motivated you then will be your first and best ally.

Libra (Sep. 22 – Oct. 23)
You often struggle with being influenced by others when you make up your mind, but you’re currently involved in a decision-making process that is pretty much airtight. Those around you might feel a certain distance or alienation as you work through some deep material. I suggest you not chalk it up to Libran indecision if you can’t resolve the matter quickly; this one deserves true contemplation. You’re attempting to get clear on something that may go back decades and is indeed part of your family’s legacy. It’s truly strange when we discover that something that occurred years before our own birth actually affects the way we see and think about ourselves generations later. I would propose that nearly all of our self-concept is the product of a past so distant that we don’t even know when it dates to, much less with whom it originates. Part of the reason why we don’t attempt to work these things out involves the feeling that the past is intractable; that we cannot do anything about it. What you are discovering is that the most meaningful thing you can change is your interpretation of what it means to you, and therefore revise how it is shaping your idea of who you are today. The distant past is always an influence; whether it runs our lives is another story.

Scorpio (Oct. 23- Nov. 22)
If you shift your awareness regarding a professional question into long-term mode, you’ll have the ability to take advantage of events later in the year and early next year. If you keep your nose to the grindstone and don’t look up, this will not be as easy. I am suggesting specifically that you think ahead and stack the deck in your own favor. Moreover, consider that you recognize that in any situation involving your reputation or the focusing of personal power, there is almost always a setup involved. Very little ‘just happens’. Yes, providence can intervene, and we do seem to be in a moment when pushing pushes us backwards. Clearly, this is a risk. You need to use your mind, and you need to think in more than one dimension. I’m suggesting something gentle, which is maintaining awareness of the diversity of factors necessary in attaining success. Closer to the point is having a clear enough definition of success that you know it when you see it. The angle you are working for is quite specific in nature; not the success of a new car, but rather of knowing that you have your role to play in the cosmic drama, and that you are playing it well.

Sagittarius (Nov. 22 – Dec. 22)
Progress has been slow in coming this year, while many other factors seem to be moving out of your control. Certain activities that have gone well on one level may have produced less than satisfactory results. I suggest you keep your faith. You are now in what I would call the ‘finishing phase’ of a long process of self-reinvention. You are a person of the world, so your self-reinventions need to be something other than purely introspective or oriented on growth; there has been plenty of that, anyway. What you want are results. You’re in a phase now requiring your undivided attention if you’re going to collect the gains on so much effort. This will call on you to focus on your single most important objective; that, in turn, will call on you to figure out what that objective is. This may seem strange — putting the goal at the end of what may indeed have been a two-year process. Think of it this way. What you’ve mainly created for yourself are viable options. This month you will get to test them out one at a time, and by the time Mercury stations direct on the 29th, make a choice that will not feel like a sacrifice. More accurately, it will feel like a discovery.

Capricorn (Dec. 22- Jan. 20)
Most breakthroughs are mental or emotional. They don’t actually involve things in the physical world, and when they do, the change is in the mind. Some of these changes come over many long evolutions; others come with what seems like a quantum jump to another dimension. You are carrying plenty of tension right now; so is the world. There will be times this month you feel like you’re at a snapping point, like you’re carrying the weight of the world or like a decision you need to make has much greater consequences than anyone knows. It is true that so much that you’ve been working toward has the opportunity to come to fruition in the coming weeks, but it’s an odd-feeling kind of progress, and it’s likely to be preceded by a measure of real discomfort. The key will be to persist, but to persist gently. At times you will need to know when to apply less pressure to the situation or to count a reversal as a kind of progress because of the opportunities it reveals. The breakthroughs over the next few weeks will arrive mainly in the form of what you learn from challenging circumstances but at what turn out to be opportune times.

Aquarius (Jan. 20- Feb. 19)
Once again, the two planets that are involved with your sign are approaching to an exact opposition. This would be the Saturn-Uranus opposition, which was exact for the first time on Election Day 2008. Most interpretations you read will describe this as a clash of energies; to me it’s about a synthesis. Here’s my take. You’re an innovative person, and you constantly run into resistance from people who want life to be like it was yesterday. Of course, were you not so focused on progress you would not encounter this, but that’s not your karma. The problem is that it rarely comes down to a real conversation about what was, what is, and what can be. Now the sky comes into focus where just such a conversation can happen. It may not be easy and you’re going to need to keep your head. Plan for nothing to be resolved for a while, but also prepare for all the necessary facts and viewpoints to come out. You will learn a lot, and discover more than once how people whose views differ from yours can make your own position stronger.

Pisces (Feb. 19- March 20)
Aspects that have been unfolding for nearly a year involving your sign and your opposite sign, Virgo, are particularly personal, and that may mean that the stress has been manifesting as an emotional condition. You have been a rolling stone; you want progress and you want it now. If you want progress, I suggest you be content, at least, with change. One implies the other; improvement implies movement. Through this process you’ve encountered one person after the next who seems intractable. It’s not that they desire stability as much as they seem to be making a case for being stuck. You are mainly what they are using to help themselves get unstuck: and you’ve learned to watch where your energy goes and why, because part of being stuck is that you get to skim off of the energy of everyone else while taking exceedingly few chances. I suggest you think of this as a dialog rather than as a power struggle. Certain individuals in your life who have been obsessed with the past are about to figure out that this is serving nobody. You, in turn, will figure out that it really does pay to give the people you love the benefit of the doubt.