April brings another wave of astrological intensity, but before you get tense and brace yourself for impact I invite you to just duck under water with me and pause — maybe holding each other’s hands with bubbles rising from our floating hair, just noticing how quiet and gentle it feels underneath it all. Waves will keep moving overhead. Waves will be waves. What matters for us is to make spaces to feel our togetherness right now.

The world continues to be a lot. Overwhelm, anxiety, and burnout are common and appropriate reactions to the scope and scale of alarming change right now. I want to you to hold the astrological details of this month as a mirror, not as a warning sign. The chaos of our world is reflected in the stars is reflected in the world, and so on. If reading about the astrological indicators of this will stress you out even more, I’d say skip this intro and just go to your sign’s horoscope. My goal here is to offer tools, not contribute to overwhelm.

That said, April brings some unsettling energy. We’re entering eclipse season, which can always shake up our sense of safety and certainty (to whatever degree we’re at all holding on to those right now). And this month’s solar eclipse will be a second New Moon in Aries, which is itself a jarring repetition. Last month’s New Moon in Aries happened at the very first degree of the sign, this one happens in the very last. It’s rare, and a good reminder that even predictable cycles can throw us curveballs. And this solar eclipse, happening at 12:12am April 20th New York Time (it’s April 19th in some other time zones), will also receive a challenge from Pluto, newly in Aquarius. I knew you were waiting for that as soon as I started gentle-talking you through the first few paragraphs. “What godawful thing is Pluto doing now?” you were probably thinking, and you were correct to do so.

Don’t get me wrong, I love Pluto the way I love going to therapy and composting. It’s important to deal with the shit that might otherwise pile up and attract flies, quite literally (Pluto rules waste, among other things). Pluto aspects force us to get real and take care of what’s rotten, often by transforming it into fertilizer.

But I would not describe Plutonian times as “fun” or “relaxing,” two adjectives I have been longing to apply to my own life of late. Working with Pluto, we’re working with our anxieties, our pain, our recognition that nothing gold can stay. Working with Pluto, we can quickly move from courage to exhaustion, from interest to anxiety. And during eclipse season, our goal should be to keep calm and keep listening. Eclipses bring us important and sometimes surprising information that arises emotionally first. During eclipse season, your feelings may be bigger than usual and more changeable than usual. I’m a big fan of feeling the feeling and THEN making the decision. This is why astrologers generally recommend that you take notes, do some journaling, and pay attention to what’s arising but don’t take big dramatic steps to change anything until eclipse season is over and you have a little more emotional detachment. This particular eclipse season will end on May 19th with the New Moon in Taurus.

That can be a long time to wait if there’s an urgent decision you need to make, so please trust your own process and that you can make good decisions for yourself, even during eclipses. I’m describing best practices for anything that can wait, especially if it is prompted by new information you’re just learning. Mercury will also turn retrograde the day after the solar eclipse, so I invite you again into that slow, underwater space with me where the waves of the world are crashing above us without knocking us over. There’s a lot of noise going on up there, but you can always come back down here. I can hold your hand while we’re here together. Who else do you want to be reaching for?

My books are open for readings (a slightly less metaphorical handholding) so please get in touch. To know when I offer classes and deals, follow me on Instagram and for expanded horoscopes with each month’s significant dates and how to handle them, join me on Patreon for only $2 a month. May you find your sweet spot, reach out to your people, and most importantly create a calm space for listening this month. Underneath the emotions there’s always important information.

Aries

Get quiet and listen to: your enthusiasm. It may be buried somewhere under the rubble of daily life during global crisis, but it’s still calling to you. It’s not trying to distract you away from what’s serious and important, or ask you to shirk your responsibilities. It’s not being disrespectful to grief, your own or other people’s. What it is doing is insisting that you pick it up again and claim it, as a way of inciting a kind of fire in your own being that can burn away what’s hurting you and what was never yours.

Taurus

Get quiet and listen to: your desire to not be here. It may lure you all day long into daydreams or reading YA novels or doing anything on a screen that lets you forget that you’re here and now, in a body, subject to the rules and conditions of this universe. Or it may be more painfully pulling at you, tugging you toward depression and despair. Your goal, in listening, isn’t to surrender to those feelings. Rather, now is a time to acknowledge and gather up the parts of you that are in pain and need a goddamn break. The parts that wish you had an easier task ahead of you, a more just and kind world to call home. The parts of you that need to grieve. It’s okay to let them. Let them speak loudly enough that you can hear them and hold them. Feel their grief. Then let yourself good read a good book.

Gemini

Get quiet and listen to: a message from your future self. Imagine them shouting to you as though from some yards away—maybe from across a subway platform or from a backyard a few houses down from your own. It’s a little hard to hear, but their tone of voice seems encouraging. Don’t be startled if they wave their arms, it’s not a warning but a celebration—see, they’re giving you a thumbs up. They are grateful to you, standing where you are in the past, facing what you have to so they can celebrate right now. If you can, give them a signal back.

Cancer

Get quiet and listen to: your oldest, wisest self. You as the queer elder you will someday be for the kids, the one you wish you had had when you were younger. Notice what your experience is telling you to remember, which is different from what your anxiety insists you never look away from. This isn’t about hypervigilance, but about all the nuance and complexity that comes back into focus when you get centered in what feels right. Reframe your life history so far through the lens of what it has taught you, what you’ve survived, and what you can now teach to others.

Leo

Get quiet and listen to: your improbable optimism. The voices of panic and pessimism are loud enough, don’t worry about the risk of ignoring what they need you to know. Instead, pay closer attention to where you are improbably and perhaps deliciously being called toward joy right now. It can be a small one, like the joy of being able to walk outside after a few days of being sick in bed. It can be the joy of perfectly ripe grapes, or a phone call with a friend whose laugh you missed. It doesn’t have to change the world, but it will change you. Remember that as much as anything else, it’s why you’re here.

Virgo

Get quiet and listen to: the part of you that hates change but knows you’re ready for it. Somewhere in your life, your metaphorical recycling bin is full. You’ve maybe even balanced things precariously on top of it—a tin can dangling from a bottle neck, an empty plastic salad tub covering them both, all rising architecturally above the bin itself. Your kitchen may or may not look this way, but how you’re running your life right now does. It’s time to get rid of some things that will be hard to release but so satisfying to be rid of. The process may feel messy or uncomfortable, but you get to make choices that mean the past is no longer piling up around you.

Libra

Get quiet and listen to: the voices you’ve internalized from people you love. Not because those voices are more right or valid than your own, but because you need to be able to tell them apart from your own. Whether it’s a phrase of judgment or praise that you repeat to yourself, an anxious reminder you picked up from your mom, a flare of pride about your talents—recognize what you’ve absorbed. Keep listening for what’s underneath all that. Libra energy often discovers its own center through being mirrored by others, so this is a time to listen for the parts of you that need to be seen more clearly, more compassionately, or at all. And yes, you can do this with someone but they also need to promise to listen well.

Scorpio

Get quiet and listen to: what you’re body has been waiting to tell you, either with a polite cough or a full-on tantrum. This means being in a process of attunement over time, with the goal of learning more and more about how you fluctuate and what helps you feel that you and your body are not enemies and may even be (or become) friends. Reach for where you’re hurting with compassion and curiosity. Pay attention to what small changes might improve conditions within your skin. Remember that you are the miracle that your ancestors longed for, even if it hurts to be here sometimes.

Sagittarius

Get quiet and listen to: the part of you that needs this all to be more fun. Something that used to enjoyable may have become a chore lately. Listen to the part of you that needs to feel more energized and less exhausted, and consider all possibilities for how to get that spark back. You can say no to something you thought you might like but don’t. You can change course if your current trajectory is dreary. And remember you don’t need to decide anything just yet, but it’s good to let yourself reconnect to your desire for a different future.

Capricorn

Get quiet and listen to: what the youngest part of you has to say. Whether you cringe at the thought of your inner child or embrace opportunities to reach for care and comfort, this month brings an opportunity to reorient and deepen into conversation with you-as-a-child, you-as-a-family-member, you-as-a-body-that-deserves-care, you-as-a-temporary-ecosystem-with-moods-and-cycles. If the idea of listening to this part of you prompts resistance, start by being kind to the part of you that feels that resistance.

Aquarius

Get quiet and listen to: the conversations happening beneath the ordinary chatter in your mind. What beliefs or fears are scripting your thoughts from backstage? Can you invite them into the spotlight to speak frankly? Your goal is to be better positioned to know what’s motivating you and how that shapes the way you think about your life. You may find some beliefs that are outdated or contradictory, some fears that are overblown. Hearing them more clearly can help you change and heal them. You are more than a set of ethical principles imperfectly applied. You are more than an engine of activism or future visioning. What is that more saying?

Pisces

Get quiet and listen to: the part of you that responds to your fear of scarcity by giving everything away before it can be taken from you. Can you negotiate with this part a little better? Maybe bring it into conversation with the part of you craving the stability of having enough—asking them to get on the same page together, not retreat into feeling irreconcilable. Pisces energy often prefers flow (of resources, of feelings, of time) to containment, but this month reminds you that you may need more containment. It’s okay to fill your own cup. It’s okay to let your cup overflow and fill other cups, as long as it also stays full. It’s less advisable to empty your own cup into someone else’s and then walk around thirsty all day.

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