TAURUS (April 20-May 20): During my recent visit to the Burning Man festival, I faced a dilemma: What should I do with my eyes as I talked with the many women who wore no clothes above the waist? At first I steadfastly kept my gaze from dipping below their necks. Then I decided that was silly: If they were strongly opposed to me looking at their breasts, they wouldn’t be naked. On the other hand, I didn’t want to steal furtive glances when they were momentarily distracted. Ultimately, I asked each woman for permission to indulge in a brief ogle. That way we could get the issue out of the way and conduct our conversations in peace. They all thought this was a sensible approach. I hope this tale will inspire you to deal expeditiously with the 900-pound gorilla in the corner of your world.
GEMINI (May 21-June 20): "If I keep the green bough in my heart," says the Chinese proverb, "the singing bird will come." Have you been doing that, cultivating the green bough in your heart, even when the world around you has been a barren wasteland? If so, the singing bird will alight on your inviting perch very soon. If you haven’t, get to work immediately and the singing bird may yet arrive by mid-October.
CANCER (June 21-July 22): In the coming week you will be invited to partake in a mythic feast. While a gourmet meal may be involved, the essence of the experience will be metaphorical food that nourishes your soul. This uncannily satisfying sustenance will be a gift from eternity — a blessing that comes from outside of time. It will be intimately meaningful for the person you are now, but even more so for the person you are striving to become.
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): If you’re fascinated by really big secrets, it will be a banner week for digging up suppressed evidence about the lies and deceptions your government is trying to get away with. If midsized secrets are more your style, it’ll be a good time to uncover the inner workings of your social circle, place of employment or local scene. And if you get turned on by small, subtle secrets, this is a perfect moment to find out what you’ve been hiding from yourself.
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): You are not competing in a sprint — you are running a marathon. Be sure to pace yourself and not be overly concerned about those who have sped ahead of you. Clear your beautiful mind of envy and self-doubt, as well as the pushy expectations of people who don’t know the intricacies of what you’re doing. Most importantly, use your fine mind to figure out how to be motivated by pleasure, not pressure.
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): Here are tasks you should studiously avoid in the coming week: painting the bathroom, fixing the smoke alarm, changing the burned-out light in the hallway, getting an air freshener for the car and buying new batteries for the TV remote control. You should instead delight in your sudden access to spiritual resources that have been closed to you before; commune with beauty that does not depend on artifice; and capitalize on your new ability to change something about your life that you thought would remain stuck forever.
SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): On the eve of the American Revolution, Paul Revere rode from Charlestown to Lexington, Mass., warning the population that British troops were on their way. Last night I dreamed you were like a modern Paul Revere, only instead of yelling "The British are coming!," you were shouting "The smiling agents of confusion are coming!" What do you think that means? Here’s one interpretation: In your waking life, you should expose the dangers posed by fuzzy-brained catalysts, no matter how well-intentioned they might seem. Here’s another: Be on the lookout for polite manipulators who use their sweet charm to get their selfish way.
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): My friend Jane Heaven lives by a motto that would be a good tonic for you this week: "the ruthless truth, kindly told." It won’t be smart or effective for you merely to expose the sticky subtexts that everyone’s trying to avoid dealing with. You’ll have to convey those unsettling revelations with all the tender compassion you can muster. Expressions of tough love will be half-assed unless the love is at least twice as big as the toughness.
CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): "Artist Jeff Koons, author Martin Amis, and musician Sean ‘Puffy’ Combs once had a genius for knowing how the times were changing," wrote Nicholas Blincoe in Black Book magazine. "They always managed to stay ahead of the curve. Then, suddenly, instead of surfing the waves, they scrambled for dry land. Each tried to conjure up stability and solidity through more and more monumental undertakings. They lost their former lightness and fluidity, becoming mired in pomposity." This is a worthy meditation for you. Every successful person has to periodically negotiate the turning point that Koons, Amis and Combs seem to have failed to master. We’re all tempted to cling to the winning formula that brought us so far. But this is a perfect time to release your attachment to and dependence on your past triumphs, and go off in quest of fresh magic.
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): It’ll be a good week to do all of the following: play soccer in the kitchen with Barbie doll heads; wake up in the morning to salsa music and start dancing while you’re still half-asleep; talk about your problems until you’ve talked them to death; get the equivalent of a first kiss or a last laugh; seek out a mystical sign from an enigmatic saint wearing black gloves and a wry smile; call yourself Mumso, Mutiny or Goofmaster as you upgrade your graffiti-scrawling skills; join Charles M. Young’s campaign to change the name of the Pentagon to the "Emma Goldman World Cathedral of Ecofeminist Goddess Worship;" and be a vivid embodiment of Deena Metzger’s idea that "Beauty appears when something is completely and absolutely and openly itself."
PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): Have you ever played "Tell me the story of all your scars?" It’s best to do it when you want to break through to a deeper level of intimacy with a friend or loved one. "How’d you get that blotch on your knee?" he or she begins, and you describe the time in childhood when you fell out of a tree onto the sidewalk. Then maybe he or she says, "Why do you always look so sad when you hear that song on the radio?" And you tell of how it was playing when an old flame broke your heart. The questions and answers continue until you unveil the entire history of your hurts, both physical and psychic. Treat yourself to this ritual in the coming week. You can achieve a miraculous healing in the presence of a good listener who is curious about your mysteries and skilled at helping you find redemption in your wounds. Comment on Nietzsche’s belief that "One must have chaos within oneself if one is to be a dancing star." Testify at
