Happy Holy Daze, Taurus! I've been meditating on the perfect holiday gift for you. What item might inspire you to take maximum advantage of the cosmic currents in 2007? I've decided on Winning With Integrity: Getting What You're Worth Without Selling Your Soul, a book by sports agent Leigh Steinberg. It'll help you be both smart and heartful as you navigate your way through the negotiations you'll be called on to do in the coming months. Here's a taste of Steinberg's advice. (1) Align yourself with people who share your values. (2) Learn all you can about the other party. (3) Create a climate of cooperation, not conflict. (4) Learn to listen. (5) Convince the other party you have an option, even if you don't.

This week my EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES offer you a preview of the major themes you'll be working and playing with in 2007. Beginning December 26, I'll begin a three-part, three-week series in which I'll talk in-depth about your long-range forecast in the EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES. Tune in!

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Beauty and Truth Laboratory researcher Firenze Matisse traveled to Antarctica. On the first day, the guide took him and his group to a remote area and left them alone for an hour to commune with the pristine air and unearthly stillness. After a while, a penguin ambled up and launched into a ceremonial display of squawks and stretches. Firenze responded with recitals of his favorite memorized poems, imagining he was "engaged in a conversation with eternity." Halfway through his inspired performance of Thich Nhat Hanh's "Please Call Me by My True Names," the penguin sent a stream of green projectile vomit cascading against his chest, and shuffled away.

Though Firenze initially felt deflated by eternity's surprise, no harm was done. He soon came to see it as a first-class cosmic joke, and looked forward to exploiting its value as an amusing story with which to regale his friends back home.

Beauty and Truth Laboratory researcher Michael Logan was the first person to hear Firenze's tale upon his return from Antarctica. "You might want to consider this, Firenze," Michael mused after taking it all in. "Penguins nurture their offspring by chewing food—mixing it up with all God's enzymes—and then vomiting it into the mouths of the penguin babies. Perhaps you weren't the butt of a cosmic joke or some Linda Blair-esque bad review, but in fact the recipient of a very precious gift of love. Who knows?"

Now Firenze has two punch lines for his tale of redemptive pronoia.
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The preceding oracle comes from my book, PRONOIA Is the Antidote for Paranoia: How the Whole World Is Conspiring to Shower You with Blessings. It's available at Amazon or Barnes & Noble.