Dear Friend and Reader:
As you know, I am passionate about news astrology, and using it as a way to illustrate the personal impact of current events on our private lives.
I’m equally passionate about personal astrology — the kind that helps us figure out where we’re at in life and how to consider our current circumstances. The astrology that helps reveal our life plan, purpose, talents and resources. The astrology that can really, truly help with career, relationships and business.
Even within our wild era, 2014 is no ordinary year — it’s unusual even on the scale of the past 50. We’re now in the peak of the Uranus-Pluto square, a time that will be remembered for its many changes and developments.
Astrology changes the world, influences every personal chart, and touches the experience of every person. How are you handling being on the planet right now? How are you keeping up with the constant need to adapt, to rethink, to confront the unknown? How are you handling the lack of certainty?
I have information that can help you — the results of four months of work, and the latest edition of a 15-year tradition of Planet Waves annual editions.
Our cresting moment is indicated by the presence of Mars within the slow-moving Uranus-Pluto aspect. Mars will soon be retrograde and will make a series of aspects to powerful forces, bringing many things to the front of consciousness. This is what I’m calling The Mars Effect. That term is also a reference to a scientific study that established a connection between someone having a strong Mars and being a star athlete — one of the most helpful scientific studies of astrology ever.
Mars is here to provide energy, to provoke action and to pose deeper questions. Mars is here as a tool for making your potential real. It’s going to be retrograde in Libra, the sign of relationships, which influence every facet of our lives.
In April, there will be an unusual grand cross (Mars, Jupiter, Uranus and Pluto in an exact X around the Earth) followed one week later by an eclipse of the Sun in Taurus. Many other events cascade later into the year, including nearly simultaneous Mars-Saturn and Venus-Jupiter conjunctions.
It would be easy for astrologers to make dire predictions about some of these scenarios (those will show up on the Internet in early April or so). This aspect pattern has some shadowy elements, and to be sure, it will present unusual challenges and opportunities.
I have viewed my job as getting underneath the surface level, and to apply the astrology on the most creative dimension, relating it to each of us as individuals.
Since late August, I’ve been exploring the 12 signs and rising signs for 2014, working from the most intimate and personal perspective, using a diversity of astrological tools: classical and modern planets, asteroids, centaurs, Kuiper objects (Pluto, Varuna and others) and some points that are way beyond them — such as Eris and Sedna.
I’ve been boiling my research down to two recorded readings per sign and rising sign, plus an extended written reading for each of the signs and rising signs. The result is a comprehensive work of applied astrology: The Mars Effect annual edition.
Astrology reveals itself in layers. I’ve learned to do the audio first, working the wheel in the conventional direction — Aries to Pisces. I started with gathering a chart file for each sign, added in the minor planets (with the help of Serennu.com). Then I opened my intuition and recorded the spoken-word portions, two segments per sign.
Then I took a pause — an actual holiday break — did additional research, and wrote the signs in reverse, starting with Aries and heading backwards to Taurus. In the school of astrology taught by Alice A. Bailey, the reverse wheel method gets you closer to the soul level.
The written interpretations go to another depth, focusing on specific, high-energy, challenging or especially unique facets of your astrology.
I view my role as someone that is here to help ease your way, point out opportunities, explain where challenges might arise and help you use them to your benefit. I have set out to inform and motivate you to make the most out of your time and energy.
Reading your rising sign will provide you with two distinct points of view. If your rising sign and Sun sign are the same, then study your opposite sign. My readings also work for Moon signs and they are (I am told) helpful for unintrusively sussing out where your partner is coming from.
Each of these readings has an investment of at least 10 hours of preparation, recording and writing. These readings work within the rarely entered borderland between a good prepared report and a personal consultation.
They are also a study in modern astrology — how to apply and explain the classical and modern factors, and come out with a reading that not only works but that you will refer to all year.
Lovingly,
Weekly Horoscope for Friday, Jan. 17, 2014, #983 | By Eric Francis
Aries (March 20-April 19) — I suggest you respond with awareness to the subtle change of direction that’s come over your life in recent weeks. It may not seem like you’re being dragged toward any specific destination, but neither are you drifting, nor are you stuck. It’s not necessary to make elaborate plans to get where you want to go, and I suggest you notice the worthwhile opportunities and extraordinary resources all located within arm’s reach and a one-hour trip of where you are now situated. Not only isn’t it too late; you’d be right on time.
Taurus (April 19-May 20) — You sense something big is coming on — a revelation in the true sense; a creative burst; the opportunity to have an experience you’ve wanted for a long time. That moment has not quite arrived, but it’s inevitable. Meanwhile, this would be an excellent moment to reflect on how restless you’ve been for how long. You’ve spent much of your energy in recent years adapting to your own emotional instability, and that constant adaptation has eaten up a lot of energy. You’ve been encountering a series of stabilizing forces that have given you a chance to relax and put some of your resources into more creative endeavors, and I suggest you keep up with that process. You face a risk that you can head off early on, which is the potential to respond defensively to an opportunity from which you will only benefit.
Gemini (May 20-June 21) — It’s clear that the past couple of months have presented certain difficulties communicating about a sensitive matter or whole subject area that you really need to get out into the open. Actually, the person or people you need to get an exchange going with have been working their way onto the same page, though they have not necessarily been saying much about it. Once the conversation begins, it has the potential to go some interesting places, and into some deep places. There may be some role reversal involved. There will be some transposing of words into actions and actions back into words. Be bold, and please allow yourself the space to allow any idea to become a potential reality.
Cancer (June 21-July 22) — During the course of the past year, an energetic condition or state emerged in your life that seemed to pick you up and carry you. The truth is, it took you by storm, making it difficult to track the decisions you were making as you made them; and made it more difficult to assess your motives. The more recent news is that what was once an onslaught of progress is more understandable in its constituent parts. Everything is composed of elements. The ones that are influencing you are in the process of distinguishing themselves from one another, but only so that they can re-form again in new ways. In fact there are so many possible combinations that it will be very helpful to work from the goal backwards to the process of getting there. This will save time and energy and maximize the results that you want.
Leo (July 22-Aug. 23) — My friend Greg, a Gemini moonboy, had a most interesting experience recently. Quite by surprise, his own reflection called to him from a mirror, and a kind of dimension shift happened. After a while, his reflection started speaking to him, representing the mind beyond his normal waking consciousness — what some call the higher self or superconscious: “I don’t understand you any better than you understand me,” is what it said. And then: “You are one of the more interesting ones.” And finally, the promise that his self-beyond-self would always be there with him, no matter how close he got to the edge, watching and protecting him through his journey in this strange world.
Virgo (Aug. 23-Sep. 22) — The continuing adventure of your life is about to chill a bit, but before that happens you’ll likely start to feel like you have more energy to meet the many challenges you face. But the greatest virtue you could hope for now is just simply patience because it’s going to take a little while for things to work out. You would do well to disconnect from what seems like the state of perpetual flux of one particular person or situation. Remember that no one can enter into a clear agreement unless they know where they stand and that, if it’s not obvious, is the root of the problem. But meanwhile don’t be surprised if your own position starts to squirm. Everything will squirm around right eventually.
Libra (Sep. 22-Oct. 23) — Surviving is a gift you were bestowed with long ago and have proven over and over again that you can make use of. Yet is human life about survival? It may be, in sub-Saharan Africa. It may be, when an earthquake hits China. But as people living in an advanced culture with many creative and economic opportunities, we need to do better, and you need to do better. I suggest you go on a hunt for where your ideas about life came from. I would propose that most of them are not really ideas — they are really emotions that pass for ideas, or emotions that you try to explain or deal with rationally. Please, stop explaining and start feeling. If you can do that for a while, you will start to feel like one person instead of one person cut into many parts.
Scorpio (Oct. 23-Nov. 22) — Your relationships may have taken a serious turn lately but I suggest keeping things a little lighter. Make sure you can always see yourself in others. And remember to focus on options rather than seeing one dubious choice staring you in the face. You have at this point in your life a responsibility not only to fulfill your commitments; you have a responsibility to shed commitments that no longer work for you. This may seem contrary to what everyone is saying and what everything is pointing to but I assure you it is true.
Sagittarius (Nov. 22-Dec. 22) — By the time you convince yourself that it’s okay to really get involved in a rapidly developing situation, the action may have subsided. I understand that your commitment is a precious thing, though this preciousness also provides a cover story for a kind of annoying reticence that you’ve long had to contend with. What you’re really committing to is having an opinion or idea that you’re willing to state openly rather than merely contemplate. You may be concerned that if you say anything directly, you won’t be allowed to change your mind. That’s not true, but you’ll just need to say that’s what you’re doing. Closer to home is why you wonder so much what people might think about what you think. Once you call back the projection, you’ll see that this is nothing other than self-doubt. And the only thing you can do about that is take a chance on your own intelligence.
Capricorn (Dec. 22-Jan. 20) — I’m concerned that the pressure you’re feeling will translate to a hasty or premature decision on a financial matter. Let me be the first person to remind you that you have time to bide, and that there are certain key facts of which you are not aware. You will know when you’re working with enough information to make a key decision; it will be obvious. The fact that you’ve noticed that certain people are far from agreement does not count. You’re the person who holds the key to what everyone has in common, and that ‘what’ may be a who, in the form of yourself. But you haven’t figured out how powerful your bargaining position really is. Just be patient, like a spider in her web.
Aquarius (Jan. 20-Feb. 19) — It would seem you’re not getting a particular message because you’re either not believing something that’s true, or because people don’t seem to believe you. In any event, credibility is at stake at a time when you’re feeling very strongly about your values and your ideals. And whether you have all of what you want, or what you need, or not, there is a critical element of truth that’s coming into your life. Part of that truth binds you to your reality, and part of that truth leaves you free to grow into your purpose. Speaking of truth: while you’re obviously in a very excited state of sexual desire, you also seem to be a bit guarded and in an odd way, curiously asexual. Work that out and you’ll feel better.
Pisces (Feb. 19-March 20) — Normally astrology would caution against being overly ambitious; understatement is a key aspect of writing horoscopes. It’s been a while, but to tell this story we would really need to go back to around autumn 1995, when Pluto moved into Sagittarius. This marked a time of transition from what you could call the seeking phase of your life to the actional phase. You made a commitment, or understood what was always in your heart. In the process, you’ve actually started to question what you thought was your tragic flaw, discovering that it’s different than you thought. Keep asking. There are answers.