 Throughout this ancient tradition over thousands of years, astrologers have used a myriad of symbolic timing techniques that function according to principles that bring our experience of time into more complex and elegant dimensions.
These techniques are not only far more ubiquitous throughout the ancient tradition than the use of transits in the way we often use them today, but also offer frameworks through which to understand how a chart—and thus a life—unfolds. A number of these ancient techniques used different forms of calculations to determine which planet or planets would function as a chronocrator—often translated as “timelord”—for a specific period of time. When a planet is activated as a timelord, it takes on greater responsibility for describing the quality of time during that period, either for life as a whole or in reference to particular areas of life. Each planet brings its own qualities and significations more prominently into the periods of life for which it is activated as a timelord. This can also include indicating significant developments in the areas of life associated with the houses that planet rules as well as the house in which it is placed. The condition of a planet in the natal chart is part of the story that unfolds during when that planet is activated as a timelord. In this way, these timelord techniques are part of how ancient astrologers described when particular potentialities within a natal chart were likely to become more significant within a life. They understood that every part of the chart is not active in the same way at all times, and the variations of lived experiences could be describe by these timelord activations. One of the most common timelord technique in practice today is called annual profections. Annual profections activate a different part of the chart for each year of life, and the planet that rules the sign on the house that is activated by the annual profection is understood as responsible for that year. Starting from the Ascendant as the first year of life, with each subsequent birthday—also known as your solar return—the profection advances to the next sign in zodiacal order, activating a different part of the chart and a different planet as the annual timelord. Profections can also be advanced through the chart month by month. In both annual and monthly profections, specific areas of life take on more emphasis or focus as the profection comes to a specific house in the chart and activates a different planet as timelord for that period. Profections are relatively easy to calculate because they advance on the annual scale on your solar return and on the monthly scale counting month to month from your solar return. Other timelord techniques are calculated using more complex methods and are also capable of describing longer periods of time in your life. For example, techniques like circumambulations through the bounds—also known as distributions through the bounds—and zodiacal releasing divide the life into different periods or chapters of different lengths, for which different planets are responsible, indicating both the quality of such periods as well as the themes that can become story arcs throughout those chapters. Circumambulations through the bounds is calculated by projecting the Ascendant forward through the bounds of the signs of zodiac at a rate that is based on the ascensional time of the signs. The bounds of the zodiac are irregular subdivisions of the signs of the zodiac for which different planets are responsible. The ascensional time of a sign is measured by how many equatorial degrees—degrees of the celestial equator—pass across the Midheaven while that sign is rising over the horizon at a given latitude. This rate in degrees is translated into years of your life. As we project the Ascendant forward through the degrees of the bounds of the zodiac year by year, the planet that rules the bounds through which the projected Ascendant is moving is said to be the primary timelord for the period during which the projected Ascendant is advancing through its bounds. Zodiacal releasing starts from either the Lot of Fortune or Lot of Spirit, advancing through the zodiac at rates that are based primarily on the minor years of the planets, which are translated into a number of years, months, weeks, and days corresponding to the minor years of the planet that rules the sign that is activated according to this technique. The minor years of the planets are generally based on their synodic return cycles—the number of years it takes for that planet to make a conjunction with the Sun in approximately the same part of the sky. So, for example, the planet Mercury takes approximately 20 years to make a conjunction with the Sun in the same part of the sky. In zodiacal releasing, when one of Mercury’s signs—Gemini or Virgo—is activated, Mercury will be the timelord for 20 years, 20 months, 20 weeks, or 20 days, depending on the timescale we are examining. At any point in your life, each of these symbolic timing techniques can tell a different part of the story of how your life is unfolding, often at different scales. Zodiacal releasing can identify planets as timelords at the longest scale, anywhere from 8 to 30 years at a time—then can also identify timelords for shorter timelines at the scale of months, weeks, and days. Circumambulations through the bounds can identify planets as timelords for periods of a couple of years up to around 12 years or so—depending on the ascensional times of the signs at the latitude where you were born. Annual profections can identify planets as timelords for a year at a time, whereas monthly profections can identify planets as timelords month to month, in combination with the annual timelord. Thus, using these techniques in combination with one another, you very well may have three to eight different timelords at any given time, each one offering a different part of your story. Each planet signifies different qualities, experiences, and lessons that characterize the periods for which they are activated as a timelord in any of these techniques. During different periods, we might be learning more about responsibility and boundaries, freedom and abundance, navigating conflict and finding uses for our anger, coming into our own sovereignty and seeing things clearly in a new way, learning more about what it means to love and be loved well, focusing on your own studies or how you are putting ideas out into the world, or orienting toward caretaking and tending to the needs of the body, for example. Some planets can indicate greater ease while others can indicate greater effort—but whatever the planets describe, they are part of how we become more of who it is that we are here to be. Throughout our lives, different planets come into these timelord roles for different overlapping or coinciding periods, like a committee or council of planets guiding us through our own processes of becoming. These are relatively cursory descriptions of these techniques, but I share them as a gesture toward the ways that the ancients thought about symbolic time and how a chart can come to describe the story of a life. These are techniques that I use in all of my timing work with clients—along with secondary progressions, transits, and the solar return chart. If you are interested in exploring what these techniques can offer to your understanding of your life, you can reach out using the contact form on the Bookings page.
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 What is your progressed lunation phase?
One of the astrological timing techniques that I examine any time I’m doing timing work with a client is the progressed lunation phase. Secondary progressions is an ancient symbolic timing technique that takes a day of life to be symbolic of a year of life. So, if we want to get insight into year 40—for example—we would look at what was going on in the sky on the 40th day after you were born, almost as a foreshadowing or a microcosm of what is now unfolding at the macrocosm, like a fractal reiterating across the years of your life. Month to month, the Moon takes about 29.5 days to make a full lunation cycle—from one New Moon to the next New Moon. This cycle is divided into eight lunation phases, each one lasting between three-to-four days. By secondary progressions, this cycle becomes nearly 30 years of our lives, and each phase of that cycle describe three-to-four years of our lives. The progressed lunation phase tells us what phase of the lunation cycle you are moving through according to secondary progressions. The progressed lunation phase can describe the general quality of time through which you are moving as well as locate where you are in some of the longer stories that are unfolding throughout each progressed lunation cycle. Progressed New Moon lunation phase: This is a major period of rebirth, reinvention, or reset, the start of a new almost 30-year cycle of planting, growing, and emergence. It can be a time when we are filled with new energy, anticipation, and enthusiasm, without necessarily having a clear sense of where we are headed. It’s still a very dark time in the lunation cycle, so you might not yet be able to see your path clearly. It can be a time of planting a lot of seeds, following your intuition and instincts, not yet knowing what will take root, grow, and develop over the next three decades. Progressed Waxing Crescent lunation phase: This is the phase of the lunation cycle when the crescent Moon becomes visible in the sky, slowing waxing and growing in its light. It is a time when you start to see a glimpse of what is beginning to grow and take root during this cycle, gaining some clarity about what it is you are here to do during this period of your life. But while the light of the Moon is growing, the majority of the Moon remains in shadow—which can feel like keen awareness that what you don’t know is so much more than what you do know. The invitation of this lunation phase is often to follow the light that is visible, trusting that as you move in the direction of what you do know or understand, more will come to be revealed. Progressed Waxing Quarter lunation phase: This lunation phase starts with the Moon half in light and half in shadow—then gradually waxing into more and more light. It can be a dynamic period of life in which you are gathering more resources, opportunities, and connections. It can also be a time that requires pushing through some kind of internal or external resistance—like a new plant that has put down roots pushing through the surface of the soil in order to establish its life as viable. You are, in a sense, breaking through the ground in which you’ve been planted in order to establish your viability as this person, this self, and the life that you are creating for this cycle. Progressed Waxing Gibbous lunation phase: This is the phase just before the Full Moon, and it can carry a similar sort of feeling, of being “almost there” or in the final stretch of the effort needed to bring something to its culmination. It is often a time of refining, revising, optimizing, and improving—clarifying the vision of what it is you are bringing into the world, and taking the steps that are needed to move toward that offering. Often, there are seeds that were planted back during the progressed New Moon period that are moving toward their blossoming during the progressed Full Moon. Thus, these are the years of the buds of what you’ve cultivated emerging and swelling, the final stages of development before blossoming. Progressed Full Moon lunation phase: This is the brightest part of the lunation cycle, when the Moon makes its culmination into full visibility. It is a period of something coming to fruition that was seeded or planted back during your progressed New Moon. It is a period of greater resources and opportunities, greater potential for connection with others, and a sense of having access to all that you need in order to handle what is coming up for you. It doesn’t mean there won’t be any ups and downs or challenges, but it suggests that you have everything you need to meet the challenges or victories as they arise. The progressed Full Moon phase can also mark a major turning point, from moving in one direction in your life toward moving in another. Progressed Disseminating lunation phase: This phase follows after the Full Moon, when the Moon is still abundant in its light but also technically waning and releasing the light that it has gathered. That waning can describe a time of sharing from a place of abundance, giving back to others, our communities, and society at large. It is a time when we are finding ways to offer the wisdom, insights, and resources that we have accumulated over the course of this progressed lunation cycle—since the start of the progressed New Moon phase. Sometimes this can literally take the form of doing more teaching, training, or mentoring others, but it can also coincide with significant periods of creative output as well. Progressed Waning Quarter lunation phase: At the start of this phase, the Moon is once again half in light and half in shadow, then waning into the darker half of the lunation cycle. It can be a time for making dynamic changes in life, especially stepping away from things you’ve built that are no longer working or no longer in alignment for yourself. Sometimes it’s simply a matter of no longer needing some of what you have built. Just because those were the right choices at the time all along the way doesn’t mean that they are all still what you need now. This can involve a reorientation, getting clear about your own personal truth, and making changes that are necessary for you to live in alignment with that truth. Progressed Balsamic lunation phase: This is the final and darkest period of the lunation cycle, when the Moon is releasing its light and moving deeper into shadow. These are years that will most likely require slowing down, turning inward, making more time for rest, retreat, reflection, and recovery. It can be a time of significant endings—which is not to say that everything in your life will end, but that you may experience or observe some significant stories in your life reaching their conclusion during these years. It correlates with the season of winter, a necessary time in the cycle when you are allowing the ground to lay fallow, releasing what has come before, and composting the remains of the last several decades, in preparation for the start of the next progressed lunation cycle. The progressed lunation phase is only one part of the astrological stories that are unfolding for you at any particular time, but I find it provides a significant context within which we can then interpret many of the other developments that unfold on shorter timelines. It can give us a sense of the bigger picture, where you are in a larger nearly 30-year cycle, almost like situating you in your own personal cycle of the seasons or your own process of planting, growing, harvesting, and resting. I bring the progressed lunation phase into all of my timing work with clients, so if you are curious about your progressed lunation phase and how it is woven into all of the other stories that are unfolding for you, I have a few consultation sessions remaining in January, February, and March. If this is work you would like to do together, you can contact me through the Bookings page on my website.  When looking at where the planets will be moving in 2026—which astrologers describe as “transits”—there are a number of significant stories developing in the sky this year.
Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune will move fully into new signs that they visited briefly in 2025. Saturn will be in Aries until 2028. Uranus will be in Gemini until 2033. Neptune will be in Aries until 2039. We will have our first eclipses on the Aquarius/Leo axis—an eclipse cycle that will continue until January 2028—along with eclipses continuing to unfold on the Virgo/Pisces axis. Jupiter will finish its time in Cancer and move into Leo, a sign that it visits only once every 12 years. Venus will have a retrograde cycle that moves through parts of Scorpio and Libra, a part of the sky where Venus’ retrograde cycle only occurs every 8 years. And we will have Mercury retrograde cycles in all of the water signs—Pisces, Cancer, and Scorpio. While these are planetary movements that we will all experience collectively, they may be more or less significant for different people personally depending on the unique configuration of each person’s chart. And as always, transits are only ever one part of the story. Transits tend to get much more discussion online because they are more easily generalizable, but transits are only one way that astrology describes the quality of time with which we are moving. Throughout this ancient tradition over thousands of years, astrologers have used a myriad of symbolic timing techniques that function according to principles that bring our experience of time into more complex and elegant dimensions. So, even as I offer these details about the transits of 2026, remember that even if these transits are making degree-based connections to your own chart, they are only ever a part your own personal astrological story. If any of these transits are making connections with your chart this year, and you would like to talk through how they could be part of the multiple stories developing in your life throughout the year ahead, I still have a few sessions remaining in January, February, and March. If that is work you would like to do together, you can contact me through the Bookings page on my website. Pluto: -Pluto starts the year at 2º43’ Aquarius -Pluto reaches 5º30’ Aquarius, then stations retrograde on 6 May 2026 -Pluto retrogrades back to 3º04’ Aquarius, then stations direct on 16 October 2026 -Pluto finishes the year at 4º19’ Aquarius So, if you have any planets or angles between 2º43’ and 5º30’ Aquarius—as well as those same degrees in Taurus, Leo, or Scorpio—then you will be having a Pluto transit in 2026. Neptune: -Neptune starts the year at 29º30’ Pisces -Neptune ingresses into Aries on 26 January 2026 -Neptune reaches 4º25’ Aries, then stations retrograde on 7 July 2026 -Neptune retrogrades back to 1º36’ Aries, then stations direct on 12 December 2026 -Neptune finishes the year at 1º42’ Aries So, if you have planets or angles between 29º30’ and 29º59’ Pisces—as well as those same degrees in Gemini, Virgo, and Sagittarius—then you will be having a Neptune transit in 2026. And if you have any planets of angles between 0º00’ Aries and 4º25’ Aries—as well as those same degrees in Cancer, Libra, and Capricorn—then you will also be having a Neptune transit in 2026. Uranus: -Uranus starts the year retrograde at 27º57’ Taurus -Uranus retrogrades back to 27º27’ Taurus, then stations direct on 4 February 2026 -Uranus ingresses into Gemini on 26 April 2026 -Uranus reaches 5º41’ Gemini, then stations retrograde on 10 September 2026 -Uranus finishes the year retrograde at 2º20’ Gemini So, if you have any planets or angles between 27º27’ and 29º59’ Taurus—as well as those same degrees in Leo, Scorpio, and Aquarius—then you will be having a Uranus transit in 2026. And if you have any planets or angles between 0º00’ and 5º41’ Gemini—as well as those same degrees in Virgo, Sagittarius, and Pisces—then you will also be having a Uranus transit in 2026. Saturn: -Saturn starts the year at 26º10’ Pisces -Saturn ingresses into Aries on 14 February 2026 -Saturn reaches 14º45’ Aries, then stations retrograde on 26 July 2026 -Saturn retrogrades back to 7º55’ Aries, then stations direct on 10 December 2026 -Saturn finishes the year at 8º17’ Aries So, if you have any planets or angles between 26º10’ and 29º59’ Pisces—as well as those same degrees in Gemini, Virgo and Sagittarius—then you will be having a Saturn transit in 2026. And if you have any planets or angles between 0º00’ and 14º45’ Aries—as well as those same degrees in Cancer, Libra, and Capricorn—then you will also be having a Saturn transit in 2026. Jupiter: -Jupiter starts the year retrograde at 21º21’ Cancer -Jupiter retrogrades back to 15º05’ Cancer, then stations direct on 11 March 2026 -Jupiter ingresses into Leo on 30 June 2026 -Jupiter reaches 27º01’ Leo, then stations retrograde on 13 December 2026 -Jupiter finishes the year retrograde at 26º30’ Leo So, if you have any planets or angles between 21º21’ and 29º59’ Cancer—as well as those same degrees in Libra, Capricorn, and Aries—then you will be having a Jupiter transit this year. And if you have any planets or angles between 0º00’ and 27º01’ Leo—as well as those same degrees in Scorpio, Aquarius, and Taurus—then you will also be having a Jupiter transit in 2026. Venus retrograde: -Venus will station retrograde at 8º29’ Scorpio on 3 October 2026 -Venus will station direct at 22º51º Libra on 14 November 2026 Mercury retrogrades: -Mercury will station retrograde at 22º33’ Pisces on 26 February 2026 -Mercury will station direct at 8º31’ Pisces on 20 March 2026 -Mercury will station retrograde at 26º14’ Cancer on 29 June 2026 -Mercury will station direct at 16º21’ Cancer on 23 July 2026 -Mercury will station retrograde at 20º58’ Scorpio on 24 October 2026 -Mercury will station direct at 5º04’ Scorpio on 13 November 2026 Eclipses: -17 February 2026: Solar Eclipse at 28º Aquarius -3 March 2026: Lunar Eclipse at 12º Virgo -12 August 2026: Solar Eclipse at 20º Leo -28 August 2026: Lunar Eclipse at 4º Pisces  What if we didn’t presume to know who someone is based on their Sun sign—or based on any part of their birth chart?
What if astrology has always been a practice of coming to know ourselves and one another with greater specificity, nuance, and situatedness, rather than a cosmic personality quiz or yet another system of reductive categories into which we can sort ourselves and one another? This is not to say that astrology—the planets, the signs, the houses, and so on—can mean anything we say they mean—although it is true that there is no final authority who decides what is or is not a valid interpretation of this system. Rather, astrology is a practice of making meaning of our lives through the alignments and correlations we discover with attributions that people have made with the sky for thousands of years, finding how these ancient traditions bring greater awareness to who we are and who we can become. You will very rarely see or hear me sharing generalizable statements about what specific signs or placements will mean for everyone, and especially not how they tell us who someone will be. I am not interested in more ways of making universalizing claims about who people are, who they will be, or who they should be. I think we already have enough of that in the world. I am invested in what we can discover about our lives when we consider them through the lens of this ancient tradition. Some people seem to take a lot of satisfaction in identifying with things they have heard or read about their Sun sign, and if that makes their lives more livable, then I am glad. Perhaps it offers a sense of belonging to a group to say that everyone who was born when the Sun was in a specific sign of the zodiac is “this way,” and “so am I.” But my concern is that at best, these kinds of generalizations flatten nuance and potentially get in the way of knowing ourselves with greater specificity—and at worst, it foments a kind of sectarianism that fosters greater separation. What if astrology is capable of describing not only ways in which we are similar to one another—our commonalities—but also, and perhaps more importantly, describing our differences, our uniquenesses, and the ways that we are not the same? When we examine our lives through the lens of astrology, we come to discover how the same qualities, attributes, and significations articulate in diverse and vastly different ways. And coming to recognize and value our differences is a vital and necessary part of coexistence. If we can only value others because of the ways we perceive ourselves as being the same, we will inevitably reach a point when those values falter or fail. It is not enough to build a world on the celebration of sameness. Truly ethical coexistence requires acknowledging and celebrating of difference. Audre Lorde taught us, “Without community there is no liberation, only the most vulnerable and temporary armistice between an individual and her oppression. But community must not mean a shedding of our differences, nor the pathetic pretense that these differences do not exist.” She also wrote, “Certainly there are very real differences between us of race, age, and sex. But it is not those differences between us that are separating us. It is rather our refusal to recognize those differences, and to examine the distortions which result from our misnaming them and their effects upon human behavior and expectation.” So much of my work with clients is describing my understanding of what the placements of the planets, signs, and houses in their chart have meant to people across different cultures for thousands of years, then asking, “What does that bring up for you? How does that show up in your life?” It is one of the great joys of my life to be in conversation with people about their charts and lives, not as a practice of telling them who they are or who they should be, but instead discovering what comes into focus and what becomes more meaningful for them as we follow the principles of this ancient tradition into a fully situated, unique, and nuanced account of the lives they are living. Rather than the imposition of reductive categories and generalizable personality traits, astrology can be a co-creative process of acknowledging, describing, sharing, and embracing more and more of who we are—our differences and our commonalities. And from that place, we become more capable of showing up in the fullness of our uniqueness and building the communities that we need for our collective liberation, recognizing the celebration of our differences as our strength.  An ancestor altar for Samhain including objects that belonged to my father and my grandparents Maybe it’s the time of year, but I’ve been talking with a lot of clients about ancestors. We are moving through the autumn in the northern hemisphere, and we are approaching a sacred time when a number of different cultures honor their ancestors and the dead. This is a time between the autumnal equinox and the winter solstice, when the nights are growing longer and we are journeying deeper into the darkness. Many witches celebrate Samhain on October 31. Samhain is often called the witches’ new year, the ending of one year and the beginning of the next, sometimes described as the final harvest of the year as the crops release their fruits and the trees surrender their leaves. With the end of the harvest season and the gradual turning toward winter, it makes sense that we would be thinking about death and dying, and with the descent into darkness, it can feel as if we are moving deeper into the underworld—the realm of the ancestors.
Ancestor work has been part of my practices as a witch for many years. I generally think of ancestors in four ways: -Ancestors of blood, those with whom we are related through heredity -Ancestors of path, those who moved along life paths similar to those in which we are engaged, with whom we may or may not be related by blood but with whom we are related through practice. For me, ancestors of path can include dancers and choreographers with whom I am in some form of lineage, witches, astrologers, tarot readers, feminists, etc. -Ancestors of possibility, those who lived in such a way that our lives are made possible. These ancestors are similar to those we might think of as “possibility models,” people who show us what is possible for our lives and inspire the shape our lives might take. For me, ancestors of possibility include queer and transcestors, people who lived beyond the conventions of gender and sexual norms in such a way that queer and trans life became more possible for me and others like me, for example. -Ancestors of place, those human and more-than-human lives who belonged to the land where I live, to whom I am responsible, especially as a descendent of white settlers on colonized lands. We do not always know who our ancestors of blood may have been or where they may have come from. Ancestral lineages can be disrupted or broken through war and displacement, through the violence of colonization, and through the devastation of slavery. Sometimes people who are adopted don’t have access to records about their birth parents, but do have access to the lineages into which they have been adopted. Even when we don’t know the details of our hereditary lineages, we are still a part of those ancestral lines, and we can honor those ancestors even if we will never know their names. And: this is also one reason why I think it’s important to acknowledge and recognize these other forms of ancestral connection because blood lines are only one way in which we are shaped by those who came before us. By acknowledging ancestors of path, possibility, and place, we shift into a more expansive understanding of kinship, all the ways we make chosen family through the lives that we create and by which we are created. Being in practices that honor our ancestors can be profoundly meaningful and even healing, especially during this time of year but also not limited to this time of year. Doing different kinds of ancestor work can remind us that we are not alone—we have never been alone. We are accompanied and supported on our journeys by those who came before us, those who continue to live through us because of the life that they gave to us. Ancestor work can give us a sense of purpose. When we accept that we are responsible to those who came before us and those who will come after us, we move beyond the dominant culture of hyper-individualism and live in ways that understand that we are part of much larger processes unfolding through many lives and lifetimes. Locating ourselves in such lineages can bring greater meaning to the choices we make, not only for ourselves but as part of these much longer stories. It can also be healing to cultivate these kinds of connections. I often use the words “healing” and “connection” synonymously, and when we engage in intentional practices for connecting with our ancestors, that can be a powerful remedy for experiences of disconnection, loneliness, ruptured attachments, abandonment, and the absence of belonging. We can find and develop an abiding sense of connection and continuity, presence, secure attachment, belonging, and care when we tend to these ancestral relationships that are always already available to us. Sometimes people don’t know how to begin to connect with their ancestors. I would say that there are many ways that we can honor our ancestors of blood and path and possibility and place. Perhaps the simplest form is acknowledgement, bringing these ancestors to mind, giving them our attention and holding them in our awareness as part of the world with which we are moving. Simply thinking about our ancestors can already shift our perception of ourselves and how we are moving through the world. The ancestors are actually already part of our daily lives in countless ways, and we can choose to bring greater awareness to these conditions. For example, we are always moving with the dead. Go for a walk, and every place your foot falls is full of those who have come before, those who have passed back into the great cycles of decomposition and regeneration. We can know this, even as we also know that death is a great mystery. Whatever you believe happens after death, in some sense, there is no death, only life, the endless transformation of states. As you walk, you might contemplate the countless lives—human and more-than-human—who have been supported and sustained by the land where you are, all those you will never know who have now become part of the land that supports and sustains you. When we honor and take care of the land, we are also honoring and taking care of those who are part of the land. We can create altars to our ancestors, creating a place in our homes where we gather together objects and artefacts that perhaps belonged to our ancestors or that were connected to them in some way, photographs, or anything that brings your attention back to them, as well as offerings of things they enjoyed, candles, or incense. An altar to your ancestors can be a meaningful place to sit with memories, to offer love and gratitude for all that you have received from them, and to sit quietly and listen for their wisdom. We can also honor our ancestors by continuing their traditions and dedicating those practices to their memories. For example, I love to cook my maternal grandmother’s corn casserole recipe that she made for me when I was a child, and I grew up in Louisiana, so I also love to cook gumbo to honor my paternal grandmother—although mine is vegan and hers was full of seafood, sausage, or chicken. Sometimes I dance in ways that connect me to my teachers and their teachers in the modern and postmodern dance traditions in which I have trained. Sometimes going out dancing at a queer club is part of my practice of honoring my queer and transcestors who also danced the nights away, claiming public space for their pleasure, joy, community, and connection. You might consider cooking some of your own family recipes or telling family stories as a way of honoring your ancestors of blood. You might revisit the writing, artworks, music, teachings, or other offerings that have been left behind by your ancestors of path, offering gratitude as you return to those sources of inspiration. You might think about the lives of those who made your life possible, the things they did to celebrate, build community, or share pleasure, and engage in your own versions of those practices as a way of honoring those ancestors of possibility. We can also honor our ancestors through ritual. Some people come from traditions in which there are clear guidelines for ritual ancestor veneration. Some of us create rituals of our own to honor our ancestors. Here is a simple ritual for Samhain that I created several years ago: Bring your hands to the ground and say: “We bow our heads and hearts to our beloved and mighty dead. We bring our hands down to the earth to honor our ancestors of blood and path and possibility and place. We know that we are always standing on and with those who have come before us. We know that those who have died have returned to the earth itself and have become more than they were. We know that death and dying are part of life and living, that our lives are shaped by those who have died just as we ourselves will die and continue to shape the lives of the living.” If you like, you might bring your body to the ground, let your eyes close, and allow yourself to rest in the darkness and in the knowledge that you will one day be among the beloved dead. Listen for the wisdom of your ancestors. And practice dying, surrendering to death knowing that death is not the end but is a process of becoming other and more than we were, re-entering the cycles of birth and growth and death and rebirth, the cycles of matter becoming energy becoming matter becoming energy. Stay here as long as you like. And then arise, greeting tomorrow’s dawn as the start of a new cycle in the wheel of the year. I hope this time of year can be meaningful for you and that these ideas and suggestions can support you in cultivating your own ancestor practices, whether you celebrate Samhain, another sacred day for honoring the dead, or want to bring such practices into your life in an ongoing way. My thinking about ancestors has been inspired by a number of teachers, collaborators, and friends over the years, including Starhawk, Keith Hennessy, Pavini Moray and the Bespoken Bones podcast, Alexis Pauline Gumbs, Dori Midnight, Daniel Foor, and the writings of Tatsumi Hijikata. I am grateful for all of their work and wisdom.  No, your zodiac sign is not 2,000 years out of date.
On 7 September 2025, the New York Times published an article entitled “Your Zodiac Sign is 2,000 Years Out of Date.” To be honest, I stopped reading the New York Times years ago after they made a habit of publishing anti-trans op-ed pieces that have gone on to be submitted as reputable evidence in lawsuits deciding access to gender-affirming care throughout the United States. And because their coverage of the genocide in Gaza has been consistently biased in favor of Israel and against Palestinians who are being eradicated. But my critiques of the New York Times aside, after several friends and clients messaged me asking what I thought of this article, I gave it a look. Articles like this one show up every year or so, and they generally demonstrate a fundamental misunderstanding of the history and practice of astrology, namely that the signs of the zodiac are not the same thing as the constellations with which they share names. Many astrologers throughout that history and working today—including me, including most of the astrology apps you might read, and including most of the astrologers you might follow on social media—work with what is called the tropical zodiac. The tropical zodiac is a division of the path of the Sun as viewed from the Earth—called the ecliptic—into twelve segments, each measuring an equal 30 degrees. These signs are aligned with significant astronomical times throughout the cycle of the year, namely the equinox and solstice points. In the northern hemisphere, the spring equinox occurs when the path of the Sun crosses the celestial equator on its northern journey, and the hours of day and night are equal. The summer solstice occurs when the Sun has reached its maximum northern declination, and we experience the longest day of the year. The autumnal equinox occurs when the path of the Sun again crosses the celestial equator on its southern journey, and the hours of day and night are once again equal. And the winter solstice occurs when the Sun reaches its maximum southern declination, and we experience the shortest day of the year. The Sun’s journey through the sky relative to our observation here on Earth—which aligns with the cycle of the seasons throughout the year—is the basis for the tropical zodiac. In the tropical zodiac, the first degree of Aries is always aligned with the spring equinox in the northern hemisphere, the first degree of Cancer is always aligned with the summer solstice in the northern hemisphere, the first degree of Libra is always aligned with the autumnal equinox in the northern hemisphere, and the first degree of Capricorn is always aligned with the winter solstice in the northern hemisphere. So, from the Sun’s journey through the sky over the course of each year, we get the signs of the zodiac—the great circle of the sky divided into twelve equal signs, each with its own qualities derived from its place relative to the equinoxes and solstices, as well as the planets that are said to rule the sign, and elements that came to be associated with them. In other words, the significance of the signs of the tropical zodiac do not primarily derive their meaning from the constellations with which they share their names. Constellations are groups of stars that have been seen as making a particular shape and then given names, most often associated with mythological figures or other cultural artefacts. Thousands of years ago, the tropical zodiac—described above—aligned roughly with twelve constellations through which the ecliptic—the path of the Sun—can be traced, from which the signs of the zodiac took their names. However, the signs of the tropical zodiac are not the same as these constellations. For one thing, these constellations vary dramatically in size, meaning that they have never been an even division of the sky into twelve segments of 30 degrees. Also, due to a phenomenon called precession—the wobble of the Earth’s axis of rotation over the course of 26,000 years, resulting in a gradual drift of the equinox and solstice points at a rate of about 1 degree every 72 years relative to the backdrop of the stars—the signs of the tropical zodiac no longer align with the constellations with which they share their names. Astrologers have known about this phenomenon for thousands of years. Hipparchus wrote about precession in the second century BCE, and Claudius Ptolemy wrote explicitly about using the tropical zodiac—not the constellations themselves—in the second century CE. The primary confusion that articles like the one published this week perpetuate is a misunderstanding of the difference between the signs of the tropical zodiac—which are tied to the cycle of the seasons and anchored to the equinox and solstice points—and the constellations with which they share names. Articles like this also somehow assume that astrologers don’t know anything about this distinction or the phenomenon of precession, which is an error. It is worth noting that different astrological traditions work may with different zodiacs. The tropical zodiac which I have described above is the primary zodiac used throughout a tradition of astrology that emerged from the synthesis of Mesopotamian and Egyptian astrologies by the first century BCE. However, there is also what is called the sidereal zodiac, which is an abstract or symbolic division of the constellations themselves into twelve equal segments of 30 degrees, keeping the signs of the zodiac anchored to particular stars in the constellations. The sidereal zodiac has been the zodiac in use in India for thousands of years, a tradition that works with the fixed stars themselves as a primary system of reference. The development and practice of multiple zodiacs anchored in different systems of reference can also contribute to misunderstanding and confusion—especially for those who are not students or practitioners of astrology. All of this is to say: if you or the astrologer with whom you are working or following online are using the tropical zodiac, then the signs in which your Sun, Moon, and other planets are located is based on the cycle of the seasons, not their relationships with the constellations. Regardless of precession, the signs in which the Sun, Moon, and other planets were located at the time of your birth will be calculated in reference to the 30-degree equal divisions of the ecliptic, anchored to the contemporary equinox and solstice points. It's also perhaps worth noting here that even the language of "your zodiac sign" is reductive if not misleading, most likely referring to your "Sun sign." But in fact, every chart includes every sign of the zodiac, and while the Sun can be an important consideration in a birth chart, you will have planets placed in a number of different signs and houses placed in all of the signs of the zodiac—and all of these factors are part of describing the story of the life you are living. This recent article somehow names many of these factors—the range of different sizes of the constellations, the phenomenon of precession, Hipparchus’ observation of this phenomena, even a vague suggestion of a distinction between the signs of the zodiac and the constellations—while completely misunderstanding or misrepresenting the basis of the tropical zodiac. It’s disappointing that such a widely circulated media outlet would publish an article that is somehow well-researched in some ways while also misrepresenting its central topic—namely the practice of astrology.  What are asteroids, and what do they offer to astrology?
Asteroids — which are sometimes called minor planets — are rocky, airless remnants left over from the early formation of our solar system about 4.6 billion years ago. So, while the discovery of the asteroids has taken place throughout the last 200 years or so, they are ancient celestial bodies in the scope of deep time. The current known asteroid count is: 1,457,452. There are around 25,508 asteroids with names, with which we might work in astrology. Most asteroids are in the main asteroid belt between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter, although there are other asteroid groups with more eccentric orbits. The majority of asteroids cannot be seen without a telescope, which means that like Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto, they are basically not visible to the naked eye. While much of astrology involves the interpretation of the visible light of planets and stars, I see the asteroids as one practice of engaging with the invisible—and often in people’s charts, asteroids name experiences or subtle nuances that are not necessarily explicitly revealed elsewhere in the chart. In other words, they bring nuance and complexity into how we understand and describe a life, sometimes bringing in details that simply are not or cannot be described by the planets. The first four asteroids—often called the Goddess Asteroids—were discovered between 1801-1807, 20 years after the discovery of Uranus—the first of the outer planets to be discovered—and 40 years before the discovery of Neptune. So, in terms of the development of the astrological tradition, if you work with the outer planets, the asteroids entered our collective consciousness around the same time. These first four asteroids were named after four great goddesses of antiquity: Ceres (1801), Pallas Athena (1802), Juno (1804), and Vesta (1807). In addition to the four Goddess asteroids, I work with approximately 60 minor asteroids that are named after deities and other divine figures who are venerated in the surviving Orphic Hymns. The Orphic Hymns are a collection of 87 short religious poems or invocations to different Greek goddesses and gods, most likely composed sometime within the 1st to 4th centuries CE. There are around 60 asteroids with names that correspond to the figures venerated within the 87 Orphic Hymns. Working with these asteroids—the four Goddess asteroids along with those named after figures and forces venerated in the Orphic Hymns—connects us to ancient myths, illuminating the ways that our own lives are woven into archetypal stories that have been part of making meaning for thousands of years. We can come to see ourselves in these stories, discovering a mythic context within which we might recognize more of who we are and who we can become. By working with these asteroids, we can identify and describe particular themes, archetypes, or qualities instantiated within a person’s life—and with the asteroids named after figures and forces venerated within the Orphic Hymns, we can also engage with an ancient tradition of ritual practice or devotion through the hymns themselves in order to develop a more substantial relationship with such figures, forces, and their qualities. While my astrological practice is primarily rooted in the Hellenistic tradition, sharing the asteroids that are prominently placed in clients’ charts—telling the myths associated with these figures and forces, participating in an ancient oral tradition, and finding how the themes and qualities of these stories are significant in describing a person’s life—is one of my favorite parts of doing natal astrology consultations. If you would like to learn more about working with asteroids in astrology, a presentation I gave entitled "Asteroids in Astrology: Nuance, Subtlety, and Direction" is available for download here. And a presentation that I gave entitled a presentation I gave entitled "Minor Asteroids in the Birth Chart and Ritual" is available for download here.  What is feminist astrology?
I believe that a feminist astrology seeks ways of recognizing, describing, and holding more of our stories—especially those stories that are denied or suppressed within conditions of oppression. Feminist astrology recognizes that the ancient astrological tradition that we inherit emerged under intensely patriarchal conditions, and so it is our responsibility to examine and transform any structures of patriarchal thinking in our practice of astrology. Feminist astrology must be capacious enough to describe and affirm not only the experiences that align with and reproduce the normative expectations of our cultures, but also those experiences that take root in the shadows, blossom at the margins, and thrive in the cracks, the stories that have hardly ever been spoken, the deviant, fugitive parts of our journeys that escape reductive categorization or the definitions given by dominant culture. Feminist astrology must be capacious enough to acknowledge and value the stories of women, queer and trans folks, Black and Brown people, disabled people, poor and incarcerated people, as well as experiences that exceed the human. Feminist astrology must be capacious enough to guide us to our truths that exceed acceptability, invite us to speak what we’ve never said out loud, to share what we did not know could be put into words. Feminist astrology must also be able to expand our ability to feel and think beyond the limits of who we were told we could be. These are ancient traditions that we are practicing, in collaboration with a cosmos that moves beyond our human conceptions of time, planets that hold assemblages of archetypes that have been unfolding throughout myriad civilizations. As we inherit and innovate these traditions, it is our role to ask whose lives these archetypes are capable of recognizing and to trust that this cosmos is vast in its variance and its potential to reflect difference. In offering recognition to more of what we have lived through, who we are and who we can become, feminist astrology has the potential to support us in living otherwise, bringing more of ourselves into our conscious awareness and shared realities, and co-creating a world that is capable of holding and responding to that more and otherwise. I first started talking about feminist astrology in 2019 when I was a guest on the Queer Skies podcast hosted by by Daniel Bernal and Drew Levanti: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FS924o9UzMg In 2020, I was delighted to talk about astrology and feminist praxis with Melissa LaFara on the Energetic Principles podcast: https://open.spotify.com/episode/5qJk9w4erLaQFx450zqola?si=ETs0bpj4QsmZjVgykzae9w Also in 2020, I gave a presentation entitled "Astrology Consultations as Feminist Praxis" at the Queer Astrology Conference 2020, which you can download here. In 2022, I gave a presentation entitled "Feminist Astrology and the Moon: Engaging Ancient Traditions with Feminist Thought" as part of the 54th Annual conference of the Astrological Association, which you can download here. Also in 2022, I gave a presentation entitled "Feminist Astrology: Mars, Violence, and War" with the Aquarian Organization of Astrologers, which you can download here. Feminist astrology continues to be integral to my practice, and it is also the focus on a manuscript in progress that I hope will make its way out into the world someday soon.  Astrology and tarot are both practices that remind us that there is no one singular answer or monolithic truth.
In astrology, every planet, every house, every sign, every aspect, and every timing activation carries a number of different significations and can be made meaningful in multiple ways. Nothing in astrology means only one thing. In tarot, every image on every card in every deck can mean any number of things in the context of different questions and situations, and in relation to the other cards that we pull alongside them. In other words, neither of these traditions are predicated on an assumption that there is some kind of static objective truth that exists out there that we are simply attempting to reveal through our divinatory practices. Rather, the inherent multivalence of these practices attenuates us to an understanding that the same situation, the same question, the same life will take on different forms of meaning under different conditions and at different times. Rachel Pollack writes, “Story. It’s all story … Some people love the cards because they can give us glimpses of the future. Still others love Tarot as a spiritual science. To me, these too are stories, for all time, and all science, are sets of interlocking stories. For some, this might sound as if I’m suggesting that nothing in the cards is true, that it’s all made up. But I’m not sure truth is something that simply lies there, like a rock. We engage it, we bring it into being.”[1] This is why I have said for many years that astrology and tarot have much more in common with artistic practices than attempting to frame them as some kind of science. These are practices of making meaning, and just as with making meaning of art, the meaning that we make with astrology or tarot will always be plural in its potential. Elizabeth Grosz writes, “Art is created, always made, never found, even if it is made from what is found. This is its transformative effect—as it is made, so it makes.”[2] Art is what we make from what we find—both in terms of the creation of art objects from the materials we encounter on this planet as well as the meaning that we make from what we find in the art that we experience. Truth is not something like a rock simply lying there waiting to be found, but truth, like art, may be what we make from what we find. In astrology, what we find is the movements of the planets through the sky, then we make meaning of those qualities of motion, light, proximity, and so on. In tarot, what we find is the images on the cards themselves, renderings made by artists in other times and places, with which we make meaning here and now. Like making meaning of a dance, a painting, a poem, or a piece of music, the same astrological chart can be interpreted in a myriad of different ways by different astrologers—or even different ways by the same astrologer at different times. The same tarot cards can generate countless possibilities for interpretation by different card readers, in the context of different questions, and under different conditions. While I would not say that astrology or tarot is inherently feminist, queer, decolonial, anti-racist, or anti-fascist, both of these traditions move us away from systems that perpetuate belief in a singular truth and toward emergent practices of making meaning that are necessarily plural and multivalent. They remind us that more than one thing can be true simultaneously, that meaning is co-created with what we find, and that how we are making meaning is just as important as what we are making meaningful. [1] Rachel Pollack, “Tarot is Story, All Story,” https://www.tarotassociation.net/tarot-is-story/. [2] Elizabeth Grosz, Becoming Undone: Darwinian Reflections on Life, Politics, and Art (Durham: Duke University Press, 2011), 189.  What if your life is right on time?
What if you are doing exactly what you need to be doing, precisely when you need to be doing it—no matter your age? What if you are not behind and there is no such thing as a “late bloomer”—only all the different ways and times in which we bloom? What if your life has its own unique rhythms and cycles and chapters, and living in alignment with your own timelines is more important than living in alignment with the timelines that have become normalized in our societies—particularly within hetero-patriarchy? What if your relationships with yourself and others, your successes and failures, your education and your careers, when to relocate and when to put down roots, when to grow and when to rest, when to persist and when to fall apart, when to come out, when to share what you’ve learned, and when to let go are all unfolding exactly as they need to unfold—even if those stories look really different from how other people’s stories unfold? What if your purpose is to live a life that is uniquely your own, rather than striving to live a life that approximates anyone else’s life or normative social ideals? And what if your unique life has specific roles to play in the lives of those around you and in moving us all toward collective futures that are more aligned with who we all are and what we want and need? Part of what I love about practicing astrology with the people who invite me to do this work with them is that together we get to study and interpret their natal chart to discover how it describes their unique purpose and the timelines along which their lives unfold. It is a practice that divests from normalized ideas of what a life should be and instead explores a range of possibilities for what a life could be. If this is work that you would like to explore together, it would be an honor to work with you. You can contact me through my bookings page.  What is feminism?
Feminism has been integral to my life and livability, to my political consciousness, to my work as an astrologer, an artist, and an academic. And yet it is also a contested term. There has never been a single, monolithic consensus as to the definition of feminism, so I want to share some of the definitions and descriptions of feminism that have been most important to my own: bell hooks defines feminism as “the movement to end sexism, sexist exploitation, and oppression.” -bell hooks, Feminist is for Everybody: Passionate Politics (Cambridge, MA: South End Press, 2000), viii. Judith Butler writes, “For the most part, feminist theory has assumed that there is some existing identity, understood through the category of women, who not only initiates feminist interests and goals within discourse, but constitutes the subject for whom political representation is pursued … Recently, this prevailing conception of the relation between feminist theory and politics has come under challenge from within feminist discourse. The very subject of women is no longer understood in stable or abiding terms. There is a great deal of material that not only questions the viability of ‘the subject’ as the ultimate candidate for representation or, indeed, liberation, but there is very little agreement after all on what it is that constitutes, or ought to constitute, the category of women.” -Judith Butler, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (New York: Routledge, 1990), 2. Angela Y. Davis writes, “Feminism involves so much more than gender equality. And it involves so much more than gender. Feminism must involve a consciousness of capitalism … It has to involve a consciousness of capitalism, and racism, and colonialism, and postcolonialities, and ability, and more genders than we can even imagine, and more sexualities than we ever thought we could name … feminist methodologies impel us to explore connections that are not always apparent. And they drive us to inhabit contradictions and discover what is productive in these contradictions. Feminism insists on methods of thought and action that urge us to think about things together that appear to be separate, and to disaggregate things that appear to naturally belong together.” -Angela Y. Davis, “Feminism and Abolition: Theories and Practices for the Twenty-First Century,” Freedom Is a Constant Struggle: Ferguson, Palestine, and the Foundations of a Movement (Chicago, IL: Haymarket Books: 2016), 104. Marquis Bey writes, “Our feminism is inextricable from being able to live otherwise” (209). Bey also writes, “Feminism, which is to say trans feminism—which is, more to say black feminism—is an agential and intentional undoing of regulative gender norms and, further, the creative deconstructing of ontological racial and gender assault; a kind of gendered deconstruction, an unraveling that unstitches governant means of subjectivation; feminism as the reiterative un/gendered quotidian process of how not to be governed and given from without. That is, feminism marks here the vitiation of imposed racial and gendered ontologies that then demands an abolitionist modality of encountering the racialized gendered world” (3). -Marquis Bey, Black Trans Feminism (Durham: Duke University Press, 2022). Alexis Pauline Gumbs teaches us that “Black feminism is all about interconnection. Right, so Black feminism is a political imperative, it is an ethic, it is an intellectual framework, for me it’s also a spiritual practice, that says that we are simultaneously all that we are, and we are facing multiple oppressions as who we are. Right? That really is the genesis of Black feminism—in the tradition of Black feminism that I follow and really am created by.” -Alexis Pauline Gumbs, “Episode 3.1 – Pseudo-Objective Scientific Language and Black Feminist Lessons from marine Mammals with Dr. Alexis Pauline Gumbs,” 99 Questions Podcast, 20 April 2023. Roxane Gay writes, “We don’t all have to believe in the same feminism. Feminism can be pluralistic so long as we respect the different feminisms we carry with us, so long as we give enough of a damn to try to minimize the fractures among us.” -Roxane Gay, Bad Feminist: Essays (New York: Harper Perennial, 2014), xiii. While bell hooks offers, “You know that … I mean, one thing that, this is something that’s been on my mind lately, and it’s been disturbing me, is that, if feminism is all things to all people, then what is it? I mean, how do we locate it as a radical political movement in our lives if everybody just makes of it … which doesn’t mean that we should demonize, but we do have to be clear about: what are the boundaries? What is the line that you cross that you can in fact say ‘I’m a feminist’?” -bell hooks, “bell hooks and Laverne Cox in a Public Dialogue at the New School,” YouTube.com, October 13, 2014: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9oMmZIJijgY. So then, we might say that feminist is a movement to end oppression—including but not limited to sexism and sexist exploitation. As such, feminism has historically been initiated by the interests of women—while the category of women and who is represented by such interests has been an open question that cannot be answered in any final, conclusive, and comprehensive way. Feminism involves more than gender or gender equality. It involves a consciousness of capitalism, racism, colonialism, ablism, and other intersecting forms of domination and oppression. Feminism impels us to explore connections that are not always apparent, thinking about things together that appear to be separate, and disaggregating things that appear to naturally belong together. Feminism is inextricable from being able to live otherwise, a movement toward living in ways that are no longer constrained by regulative norms, demanding an abolitionist modality of encountering the racialized gendered world. Feminism—particularly Black feminism—is about interconnectedness. It is a political imperative, an ethic, an intellectual framework, and a spiritual practice that insists on recognizing all that we are, as well as the ways we are facing multiple oppressions as who we are. Feminism is pluralistic—we can affirm that there has always been more than one feminism, while also maintaining that feminism is a radical political movement, and if feminism is all things to all people, then what actually is it? This is not an exhaustive account of what feminism might mean. But when I talk about feminism, these are some of the perspectives and priorities with which I am aligned. Today, the president of the United States bombed Iran. Uranus is at 29º Taurus and will enter Gemini on 7 July 2025. Some history: World War II began when Uranus was in Taurus in 1939, then Uranus moved into Gemini in 1941—the same year the U.S. joined the war—where it would be for the remainder of WWII. In fact, the American Revolutionary War, the American Civil War, and World War II all coincided partially or entirely with periods when Uranus was in Gemini. Uranus only returns to Gemini approximately every 76 years—so the last three times Uranus was in Gemini, the U.S. was engaged in these wars: the American Revolutionary War in the 1700s, the American Civil War in the 1800s, and World War II in the 1900s. This will also be the Uranus return for the United States: Uranus was at 8º Gemini when the U.S. was founded. In other words, since the founding of the U.S., every time Uranus has been in Gemini, the U.S. has been at war. This is not to say that Uranus moving through Gemini causes the U.S. to go to war, but it is to say that there is a consistent historical precedent, and mere weeks before Uranus once again enters Gemini, the U.S. has bombed Iran. Uranus will first move into Gemini this year, and it will not fully depart Gemini until 2033. I guess we’ll see what happens. I don’t share any of this to fuel fear, and obviously Uranus transiting through Gemini has coincided with plenty of other historical world events. But part of what astrology can offer is a meaningful context within which to make meaning of our lives, and this historical context feels particularly relevant right now.  Previous and upcoming dates for Uranus in Gemini for reference:
Uranus in Gemini in the 1700s: June 19, 1774-December 1, 1774 April 8, 1775-July 12, 1781 January 11, 1782-April 28, 1782 Uranus in Gemini in 1800s: June 1, 1858-January 1, 1859 March 13, 1859-June 25, 1865 February 16, 1866-March 27, 1866 Uranus in Gemini 1900s: August 7, 1941-October 4, 1941 May 15, 1942-August 30, 1948 November 12, 1948-June 9, 1949 Uranus in Gemini 2000s: July 7, 2025-November 7, 2025 April 25, 2026-August 3, 2032 December 12, 2032-May 22, 2033  Most of the astrology you might read or hear about on the internet is based on what are called transits—the movement of the planets through the sky in real-time, like changing celestial weather patterns with which we can describe collective and personal experiences and events.
But this is only one way that astrology describes the quality of time. Throughout this ancient tradition over thousands of years, astrologers have used a myriad of symbolic timing techniques that function according to principles that bring our experience of time into more complex and elegant dimensions. These techniques are not only far more ubiquitous throughout the ancient tradition than the use of transits in the way we often use them today, but also offer frameworks through which to understand how a chart—and thus a life—unfolds. Some techniques—like circumambulations through the bounds and zodiacal releasing—divide the life into different periods or chapters of different lengths, for which different planets are responsible, indicating both the quality of such periods as well as the themes that can become story arcs throughout those chapters. These ancient techniques are usually referred to as “timelord techniques” because they indicate specific planets as the lord of the times. Another timelord technique called annual profections activates a different part of the chart for each year of life, and the planet that rules the sign on the house that is activated by the annual profection is understood as responsible for that year. Profections can also be advanced through the chart month by month. In both annual and monthly profections, specific areas of life take on more emphasis or focus as the profection comes to a specific house in the chart, suggesting that the whole chart is not active in the same way at all times. Along with annual profections, the solar return chart—a chart that is cast for the moment when the Sun returns to where it was when you were born, your astrological birthday—can be used in relation to the natal chart as a way of considering how that year of life compares to the baseline description of the life established by the natal chart itself. Secondary progressions is a symbolic timing technique that understands a day of life to describe a year of life. So, if we want to get a sense of what might be unfolding in a specific year of life—year 30, for example—we look at what was going on in the sky on the 30th day after you were born, almost like a foreshadowing or like a microcosm that then unfolds like a fractal across the macrocosm of the years. We can look at the progressed chart in relation to the natal chart, the changing conditions of the progressed planets, as well as relationships they make with the natal chart over time. Other techniques like the minor periods of the planets or the ascensional times of the signs take astronomical phenomena—like the synodic recurrence cycles of the planets or the time that it takes for each sign of the zodiac to rise at a specific latitude—as the basis when different parts of a chart will be most active. These techniques can indicate when specific parts of the chart and areas of life ripen and come to fruition. Many of these ancient techniques are far more personal and specific to how they function in each unique chart. That means that it is more difficult to talk or write about these techniques in a general way that will apply to a wide audience. In the age of social media—or in the previous age of newspaper horoscopes—mass appeal is often the priority. This is one reason why transits tend to be quite popular on the internet because while transits may be occurring in relation to different parts of each person’s chart, where the planets are moving through the sky in real-time is the same for all of us. Transits also tend to appeal to a post-enlightenment privileging of causal rationality. Whether or not we believe that the movements of the planets “cause” specific events and experiences in our lives, the correlation of such experiences and events with the real-time motion of the planets can easily align with a rationale of causation—which is a familiar way of thinking for many of us since modernity. In contrast or compliment, I find that symbolic timing techniques appeal less to a sense of causation and more to a sense of description and meaningful correlation. When we work with symbolic timing techniques, it is more like telling a story that we discover is uncannily significant to our lived experiences, rather than seeking out evidence that aligns with a model of cause and effect. Giving greater attention to symbolic timing techniques is not to depreciate the value of working with transits—transits are an integral part of my own astrological practice. But it is to suggest there are social, cultural, and technological reasons why certain parts of the astrological tradition circulate more widely, and also to remind us that the methods we incorporate into our practice of astrology not only offer different possibilities for what meaning we might make, but also shape our perception and experience of time itself. When we work with a range of astrological timing techniques—both symbolic and real-time—we cultivate an experience of multiple temporalities moving simultaneously, in concert with each other, each with different qualities and all unfolding across different scales. This experience of multiple temporalities expands our understanding of time beyond a singular linear trajectory—like the presumption of uniform life stages marked by significant life events, often dictated through the bias of compulsory heterosexuality, or the idea of linear progress narratives. We come to experience time beyond quarterly projections and annual reports, beyond the calendar year, the 40+ hour work week, the 24-hour news cycle, the endless scrolling of social media feeds, and other ways our perception of time is structured under the conditions late-stage capitalism. This is one of the great gifts of astrology: attenuating and orienting us toward more expansive, complex, and nuanced experiences of time at both personal and collective scales. So, if you are a student of astrology or someone who is really interested in astrology, I encourage you to continue to pay attention to the real-time transits of the planets, and also go deeper into this rich tradition to discover what more it might reveal about your own life—and time itself. Whether you are a student or practitioner of astrology or not, we might all ask ourselves: What am I practicing that shapes how I perceive and experience time? How might changing my relationship with time be part of my resistance and liberation?  I don’t believe in astrology.
I practice astrology. I practice astrology in the same way that I practice dance and writing. I don’t ‘believe in dance’ or ‘believe in writing.’ They are practices that shape who I am, how I live, and what I bring into the world. They are practices that connect me to traditions and lineages of practitioners across generations. Similarly, for me, astrology isn’t a belief system. It is a practice that connects me to myself, the earth and sky, the more-than-human world, and an ancient tradition that has been practiced by people across this planet for thousands of years. I do not ask whether astrology is real or not. I do not ask whether it can be proven or verified or not. I ask: what does it do? What are its affects and effects? What do I become more aware of because I practice astrology? What becomes more possible because I practice astrology? Astrology provides a context within which to make meaning of our lives—a context that is composed of celestial phenomena, embodied observation, ancient mythologies and symbolic archetypes, language, and both human and more-than-human agencies. Astrology cultivates multiple interwoven experiences of cyclical time—expansive and immediate symbolic and real-time nonlinear temporalities unfolding simultaneously across different scales. Astrology attenuates us to complexity, subtlety, nuance, and awe. Astrology gives us a sense that our lives are part of much longer stories that are bigger than any one of us. It becomes more possible to live our lives with a greater sense of purpose and connection, with more intentionality and less urgency, more slowness and spaciousness, and less conformity to rigid, reductive, unchanging categories. What comes into focus when you consider your own life through the lens of practice rather than belief? What becomes more possible because of what you practice?  Devotion is a remedy for despair.
To what are you devoted, and what does your devotion inspire or require you to do? We are living through devastating and disorienting times. It seems like everyone I know is overwhelmed by the relentless headlines detailing the actions of this administration. Most of us are exhausted. Many of us don’t know what to do in the face of so much assault and uncertainty. In the midst of personal and political despair, what becomes possible when we return to our own devotions? What practices and responses come into focus when we reorient our lives around that to which we are devoted? Perhaps you aren’t immediately clear about your devotions. Another way of approaching these reflections would be to consider your life as a practice or even a ritual and ask: to what or to whom is this practice or ritual devoted? What do I revere or to what am I committed through this life that I am living? Devotion also brings us into a temporality that is deeper and longer than the urgent crises of this moment. We remember our reverence and commitments that have guided our paths for many years before, and we ground ourselves in the ways that same reverence and those same commitments will guide our paths for many years to come. This is not in any way to say that we ignore the crises of this moment, but rather it is to suggest that our devotion has the potential to inform our actions in ways that are in greater alignment with the worlds for which we long, rather than constantly organizing ourselves and our actions from a state of reaction to tyrannical policies and forces. I am devoted to spaciousness, slowness, subtlety, and pleasure as some of my most sacred values. I am devoted to embodiment, personal and collective healing and liberation, nonviolence, and multi-species flourishing on this damaged planet. I am devoted to learning, making meaning, and producing knowledge as well as mystery, questions that refuse to be fully answered or contained, and the bright Black field of possibility—to use language from Alexis Pauline Gumbs. Each of these devotions informs how I move and respond, both in moments of crisis as well as all the moments that come before and after. Each of these devotions brings me into greater alignment with the worlds I am working toward and others who are also working to bring such worlds into being. As you bring your attention again to your devotions, may they inform how you move and respond, and may they bring you into greater alignment with the worlds for which you are working and others who are also working to bring such worlds into being.  Today we will be moving through the first in a series of eclipses in the signs of Pisces and Virgo that will be unfolding from September 2024-February 2027. Eclipses occur when a New or Full Moon occurs in close proximity to the lunar nodes—where the paths of the Sun and Moon intersect. Tonight’s partial lunar eclipse will occur at 25º Pisces around 10:33pm eastern, about 9 degrees from the nodal axis.
Eclipses can describe a disruptive quality of time. Eclipses are fundamentally an interruption in the usual cycle of light. When we would usually see a bright and luminous Full Moon, the Moon becomes darkened in the Earth’s shadow. During a solar eclipse, when we would usually see the radiant Sun moving through the sky, instead we are confronted with darkness. This quality of interruption is integral to how we might experience eclipses unfolding in different areas of our charts. Eclipses can also describe a process of shadows being revealed—things that perhaps we have not yet been ready or able to recognize coming into focus, witnessing shadows that start to become visible during this period of time. When we are confronted with things that we have not previously been ready or able to recognize, that can present a kind of interruption in and of itself. We cannot unsee what we have seen, and so often we must find another way of functioning in the parts of our lives touched by eclipses. From my view, it can be useful to think about eclipses as part of an ongoing story rather than as isolated events. Eclipses occur in the same part of the sky for approximately 2-2.5 years. Astrologically, that corresponds to eclipses occurring in the same signs during that period. We have been experiencing eclipses on the Aries/Libra axis since April 2023, and that series of eclipses continues until March 2025. Tonight’s eclipse is the first on the Pisces/Virgo axis, initiating a 2.5-year story of significant interruptions and revelations in the parts of our charts occupied by Pisces and Virgo. What houses in your chart are occupied by the signs of Pisces and Virgo? These houses are likely to describe where you will be experiencing these eclipse stories over the next several years. Eclipses are always happening somewhere year by year, and some people experience eclipses more dramatically than others. There are several factors worth considering here. First, eclipses may be more personally significant if they are making close conjunctions with placements in your natal chart. When an eclipse occurs close to a planet or angle in your chart, that eclipse may describe a more concentrated or potent part of the longer eclipse stories that are unfolding. Second, I have observed in client work that eclipse stories tend to be more dramatic when they occur in a sign that is being activated by annual profection, an ancient Hellenistic timing technique that activates a particular sign/house for each year of life and the ruler of that sign/house as the ruler for that year. So, if you are in a Pisces profection year, for example, you may experience these Pisces eclipses in a more pronounced way. Finally, if you are in a Cancer or Leo profection year—making the Moon or the Sun the profected ruler of the year—then you may experience eclipses in a more significant way because of the eclipsing of the luminaries. Whether you experience this series of eclipses in profound or subtle ways, I hope you give yourself the time and space to ground, to observe, to reflect, and to meet this quality of time from a place of steadiness and ease.  How much of your hopelessness and despair are tied to urgency, the feeling that something has to happen right now and if it doesn’t happen right now then it will never happen or can never happen?
What else becomes available or possible when we back away from urgency as our default temporality? What are the practices in your life that support you in slowing down and connecting to deep time beyond this moment, this year, this lifetime? There are times when urgency is necessary—in the case of imminent physical harm, in the wake of natural disasters, in the face of ongoing war and the devastation of life and livability, for example. And still: I think about this quote from @adriennemareebrown every day: “There is such urgency in the multitude of crises we face, it can make it hard to remember that in fact it is urgency thinking (urgent constant unsustainable growth) that got us to this point, and that our potential success lies in doing deep, slow, intentional work.” I believe this as deeply as I believe anything. While there are times when urgency is necessary, I am convinced that when we live in a constant state of urgency in all parts of our lives, we are not only creating more crises, but we are also sowing more hopelessness and despair. I turn again and again to practices that cultivate temporalities other than urgency—the deep cyclic time of astrology, the quiet stillness of sitting with stones, the glacial intentionality of dancing butoh, the steadiness and ease in asana practices, moving at the pace of my own body when I choose to walk rather than drive somewhere, and more. I hope you also have practices for cultivating possibilities other than urgency.  Tomorrow the Sun crosses the celestial equator and enters the sign of Aries, marking the vernal equinox and the start of spring in the northern hemisphere.
The Aries ingress chart can be really useful in mundane astrology for describing the qualities of the year ahead, and setting the chart for the capital of a specific country makes those planetary configurations relevant for that particular part of the world. When set for Washington, DC, Scorpio is on the Ascendant—here representing the U.S.—ruled by Mars closely conjunct the IC in Aquarius. This may describe domestic conflict, unrest, or even violence, perhaps related to lands and territories, our roots and histories, or perhaps the founding ideologies of the nation. This makes me think of the Land Back movement and the reclamation of Indigenous lands, for example, but also the ongoing contestation of American history and the ways politicians are already denying the colonial and oppressive roots of the United States in both Indigenous genocide and hundreds of years of slavery. For what it’s worth, the last time Mars ruled the Ascendant of the Aries ingress in the U.S. was in 2020—another presidential election year—as well as the assault on the capital on 6 January 2021, which doesn’t mean we will see the exact same events repeat, but it does offer a sense of the quality of time we are moving into. The Moon in Leo is in a tight opposition with Pluto in Aquarius, which looks to me like the people or the body politic rising up to challenge deeply entrenched consolidations of power, especially in terms of issues of bodily autonomy. The Moon rules the 9th House, so it’s possible that such challenges will also concern education and religion and be worked out in the courts. Education, religion, and judicial branches of governance are all associations of the 9th House. I wonder if we will be seeing the courts decide cases regarding the banning of books or curricula—like critical race theory, for example—which have been fomenting in the U.S. over the last few years. The 10th House—which can represent the political party that currently holds executive power—is ruled by the Sun, exalted in Aries in the 6th House. The Sun’s exaltation here looks promising for the party in power, and its sympathetic aspects to the Moon and Pluto could indicate some kind of benefit from what may be civil unrest. I can only hope that the Sun’s placement in the 6th House indicates greater concern and action for those who are marginalized and subordinated within oppressive systems and institutions. Jupiter—the ruler of the 2nd House—is closely conjunct the Descendant, perhaps indicating generous financial aid to foreign powers. The 7th House itself is ruled by Venus—exalted in Pisces and in its own bounds—which could suggest some strength or improvement in international relations. However, Venus is applying to a conjunction with Saturn—the ruler of the 4th House, which can describe political parties opposing the one in power. Venus—the ruler of the 7th House—bonifying the ruler of the 4th could indicate foreign aid to the opposing political parties. It would not be the first time that foreign powers contributed support to a political party during an election year. No hard predictions here, just observations and themes to observe over the year ahead.  “The past … is filled with repeating cycles of strength and weakness, wisdom and stupidity, empire and ashes. To study history is to study humanity. And to try to foretell the future without studying history is like trying to learn to read without bothering to learn the alphabet.”
“How many combinations of unintended consequences and human reactions to them does it take to detour us into a future that seems to defy any obvious trend? Not many. That’s why predicting the future accurately is so difficult.” “It’s also true that where we stand determines what we’re able to see.” “No matter how hard we try to foresee the future, there are always these surprises. The only safe prediction is that there always will be.” “So why try to predict the future at all if it’s so difficult, so nearly impossible? Because making predictions is one way to give warning when we see ourselves drifting in dangerous directions. Because prediction is a useful way of pointing out safer, wiser courses. Because, most of all, our tomorrow is the child of our today. Through thought and deed, we exert a great deal of influence over this child, even though we can’t control it absolutely. Best to think about it, though. Best to try to shape it into something good. Best to do that for any child.” -Octavia E. Butler, “A Few Rules for Predicting the Future,” Essence Magazine (May 2000): 165-166. Butler was writing about predicting the future as a science fiction author, but I take these insights seriously as an astrologer and tarot reader who spends much of my days casting my gaze toward the future. I share these words from Octavia E. Butler with all of us who are trying to imagine worlds to comes—including those of us engaged in divinatory practices.  Your purpose is more than your work or even your career.
Audre Lorde wrote, “I am who I am doing what I came to do.” Who are you—and what did you come here to do? I spend a lot of time talking about life’s purpose through the framework with astrology, in conversation with so many brilliant people doing so many remarkable things in the world. And often in these conversations there is a subtle or sometimes not-so-subtle tendency to immediately try to relate the idea of purpose back to the career or work. And for some people, their career or work may be integral to their life’s purpose. And I certainly hope that we all find ways to spend our days that feel meaningful and satisfying and yes, even purposeful, including in the work that we do. And also: Your purpose might be to love, deeply and passionately investing yourself in the well-being of others and yourself. Your purpose might be to grieve, to hold and process the immensity of loss that you encounter personally and collectively. Your purpose might be to build community, to connect with others who share your views and visions and values, to generate solidarity and meaningful relations across partial alignments. Your purpose might be to study, to learn, to be a reader of great thinkers and voices and artists, to become a living archive and site of synthesis for the wisdom that came before. Your purpose might be to tend the land, to care for the more-than-human relations within which human lives are woven, to honor the histories of place. Your purpose might be to heal—to do the work of healing within your own life, perhaps to support others in their healing, knowing that personal healing is never separate from collective liberation. Your purpose might be to make art that is not for sale—not because art is not a valid and valuable vocation or profession, but because maybe your reasons for making art exceed its potential market value. Your purpose might be to reclaim pleasure that has been taken from you or denied to people who have lived as you live, to celebrate the erotic, the depth and fullness of feeling of which you are capable. Your purpose might be to commune with the ancestors, to piece together broken genealogies, to tend relation of care across spacetimemattering, across the expanse of death and life. And so on. I think many of us are living in societies that have already conditioned us to believe that our work, our careers, what we are paid to do is or should be the most important thing. I want us to think about our purpose, who we are and what we are here to do, as bigger and perhaps even other than our careers. Again, I hope we all spend our days in meaningful ways, including in the work that we do. And I also hope that we can see all the ways that our purpose is bigger and other than that work. |
AuthorMichael J. Morris is a witch, an astrologer, a tarot reader, an artist, a writer, and a teacher. Categories
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