When life gets weird, should you take refuge in decorum and tradition? Should you intensify your commitment to the humdrum? Is it wise to dress more conservatively, act more dignified, and smile more automatically? I say no. When the daily rhythm veers off track into unexpected detours, I say it's prime time to gleefully depart from The Way Things Have Always Been Done. In fact, I advise you to cultivate your rebellious questions and celebrate the unusual impulses that bubble up. They will help you harvest the epiphanies that life's weirdness is tempting you to pursue.

Want to explore the coming week even further? Dig deeper? Push harder? Consider tuning in to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES

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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 Powells.

"When you die," says the Koran, "God will call upon you to account for all the permitted pleasures you did not enjoy while on earth." There's a similar idea in the Talmud: "A person will be called upon to account, on Judgment Day, for all the permitted pleasures he might have enjoyed but did not." This thought should serve as a central theme for you in the coming weeks, Taurus. Don't worry, you won't die for many years. But to activate your highest spiritual potentials in the near future, you must plumb the depths of bliss, joy, amusement, and fun.

Need more help with your riddles? Crave more support in your efforts to build your courage? Check out you EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES

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Quoting geneticists, Guy Murchie says we're all family. You have at least a million relatives as close as tenth cousin, and no one on Earth is any farther removed than your 50th cousin.

Murchie also describes our kinship through an analysis of how deeply we share the air. With each breath, you take into your body 10 sextillion atoms, and--owing to the wind's ceaseless circulation--over a year's time you have intimate relations with oxygen molecules exhaled by every person alive, as well as by everyone who ever lived. Right now you may be carrying atoms that were once inside the lungs of Malcolm X, Christopher Columbus, Joan of Arc, and Cleopatra.
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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 Powells.

Your intentions have been fine, but you've been a bit off in executing your intentions. It's like you were building a love nest in a parking garage; as if you've been hosting a dinner party with fascinating guests at McDonald's; as if you were confessing profound secrets to a narcissist who wasn't really interested. In other words, Gemini, you have been doing the right things in the wrong places. But I expect that a lucky break will soon shove you out of this awkward disjunction, bringing your style and content into harmony. (P.S. Why not go out and induce that lucky break immediately?)

No one knows you better than you do. But maybe you'll be inspired to dig up even more self-knowledge in the coming week if you tune in to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES

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You're like an arrow in flight. You're a half-cooked feast, the fifth month of pregnancy, the week before a big election. Have you ever mastered a second language? You resemble the time right before fluency arrives.
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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 Powells.

Lishui is a rapidly growing industrial city in China. With the government's help and blessing, developers have been transforming rugged farmland into level parcels suitable for manufacturing facilities. In recent years, engineers have used dynamite and dump trucks to flatten 108 hills and mountains. The official motto that guides workers is "Each person does the work of two; two days' work is done in one." While I don't normally recommend that you engage in such extreme labors, the coming weeks will be a favorable time to make an exception. You'll have cosmic forces on your side if you do the work of two as you carry out the equivalent of demolishing mountains.

What greater adventure is there than exploring the enigmas of your unique destiny? For more hints about the week ahead, listen to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES

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At a concert in California, devotional singer Krishna Das told a story of escorting his revered teachers, a frail old Indian couple, to an acupuncturist in New York. They had to walk through a neighborhood dominated by strip clubs, prostitutes, and drug dealers. Every few feet, a new salesperson approached with an offer of crack, weed, crank, or sexual adventures.

Krishna Das worried about subjecting his beloved guides to such a degrading experience, but they were unfazed. "This is heaven," said the woman. When a surprised Krishna Das asked what she meant, she replied, "Heaven is any place where one's needs can be met."
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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 Powells.

The bad news is that Indonesia has the fastest rate of deforestation on the planet, and is one of the top three producers of greenhouse gas pollution. The good news is that on November 28, the people of Indonesia will unleash the most intense orgy of tree-growing in the history of the world. They're scheduled to plant 79 million saplings in 24 hours. You Leos might also consider undertaking a massive display of fertility in the next three weeks. Your creative powers will be at a peak; your ability to coax abundant life out of seeds and sprouts will be extraordinary.

Got enough clues to chew on for a while? If you need more, give yourself the luxury of your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES

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Scientists have confirmed what we all knew: You do indeed have a little voice in your head that warns you when you're about to do something dumb. It's called the anterior cingulate cortex, according to white-coated authorities at Carnegie-Mellon University. If you're receptive to it, it's as good as having a guardian angel.

"Don't do it," the voice whispers when you're on the verge of locking your keys in your car or leaving the bar with the cute drunk you just met. "Go back," it murmurs as you start to walk away from a huge, though initially inconvenient, opportunity.
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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 Powells.

Because of changes in agricultural techniques, food is nowhere near as nutritious as it used to be. Vegetables grown on modern factory farms have 27 percent less calcium and 37 percent less iron than they did in 1975, for example, as well as 21 percent less Vitamin A and 30 percent less Vitamin C. So if you want to avoid being starved of essential nutrients, you either have to eat a huge amount, take supplements, or consume organic food. Are there any other areas of your life where the sustenance levels have dropped, perhaps without your full awareness? Is there an activity that no longer provides you with the boost it used to? Your assignment is to explore this possibility. If you find something's lacking, take immediate measures to make up for what you've been missing.

How much do you want to know about your destiny in the coming week? How far do you dare to go? For more insight into your intriguing fate, tune in to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES

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More and more creative people find they do their best work when they're feeling healthy and secure. We know writers who no longer need to be drunk or in agony in order to shed the numbness of their daily routine and tap into the full powers of their imagination. We have filmmaker friends whose best work flows not from the depths of alienated self-doubt but rather from the heights of well-earned bliss. Singer-songwriter P.J. Harvey is the patron saint of this new breed. "When I'm contented, I'm more open to receiving a lot of inspiration," she has testified. "I'm most creative when I feel safe and happy."
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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 Powells.

Talk normally as little as possible in the coming week. Instead, try to communicate primarily by whispering, singing, laughing, speaking in rhyme, using foreign accents, making animal noises, and imitating cartoon characters. In my astrological opinion, this could free you to express feelings and thoughts that you've been unwisely suppressing. It would give you the power to access potent information that neither your monkey mind nor your rational mind has much interest in.

Want more help in exploring the Great Mystery that is your life? I discuss your coming week in greater depth in your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES

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Go to the ugliest or most forlorn place you know--a drugstore parking lot, the front porch of a crack house, a toxic waste dump, or the place that symbolizes your secret shame--and build a shrine devoted to beauty, truth, and love.

Here are some suggestions about what to put in your shrine: a silk scarf; a smooth rock on which you've inscribed a haiku or joke with a felt-tip pen; coconut cookies or ginger candy; pumpkin seeds and an origami crane; a green kite shaped like a dragon; a music CD you love; a photo of your hero; a votive candle carved with your word of power; a rubber ducky; a bouquet of fresh beets; a print of Van Gogh's "Starry Night."
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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 Powells.

A while back I asked my readers, "What conditions would you need in your world in order to feel you were living in paradise?" I'll report to you how one Scorpio responded, since it's very apropos to your immediate future. "My utopia," wrote Sandra Boyd of Vancouver, "would require me to be desired, loved, and satiated amidst messy order and cockeyed perfection." I urge you to create that exact set of conditions, Scorpio. Get out there and cultivate the funny logic, wild discipline, and chaotic organization that will help ensure you'll be fiercely adored.

Want more clues? Need further insight? For more evocative questions and pithy suggestions about your destiny in the coming week, check out your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES

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What causes happiness? Brainstorm at length about this question. Map out the foundations of your own personal science of happiness. Get serious about defining what makes you feel good. To get you started, I will list a few experiences that might possibly arouse your deepest gratification: physical pleasure; seeking the truth; being a good person; contemplating the meaning of life; enjoying the fruits of your accomplishments; escaping your routine; purging pent-up emotion. Do any of these work for you? Name at least ten more.
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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 Powells.

The visionary genius Isaac Newton revolutionized science and math. His biographer James Gleick says he discovered "more of the essential core of human knowledge than anyone before or after." Ostensibly, Newton was humble, writing that "if I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants." But he did not actually believe that, writes Salon.com's Farhad Manjoo in his review of Gleick's book. And the fact is that Newton's breakthroughs "were not incremental, not the logical conclusion to centuries of study," but rather the result of "a supernatural, superhuman intuition." This is the kind of intelligence I suspect you'll be able to summon in the coming weeks as you expand your understanding of your place in the world. It will be as if you're snatching raw truths fresh from eternity; as if you're the beneficiary of utterly novel insights that nothing in your life has prepared you for.

Want to hear more about the hidden factors influencing your life in the coming week? Listen to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES

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Late at night when there's no traffic, stride down the middle of an empty road that by day is crawling with cars. Dance, careen, and sing songs that fill you with pleasurable emotions. Splay your arms triumphantly as you extemporize prayers in which you make extravagant demands and promises. Give pet names to the trees you pass, declare your admiration for the workers who made the road, and celebrate your sovereignty over a territory that usually belongs to heavy machines and their operators.
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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 Powells.

George Washington and Thomas Jefferson were great leaders who were instrumental in creating the United States, but they shared a flaw with most of the other founding fathers: They owned slaves. Only one of the men who midwifed the birth of the nation freed his human chattel: Virginia plantation owner Robert Carter, whose heroism has been largely unsung in the history books. Make him your role model in the coming weeks, Capricorn. It's a good time to meditate on those people you've held down, oppressed, or manipulated (even if it was inadvertent or unconscious), and then correct for how you've interfered with their full blossoming. I'm not saying you're any guiltier of this sin than the rest of us; just that this is your special time to atone.

What blessings will life bring you in the coming week? What challenges will you be invited to dive into? To explore the ripening trends further, tune in to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES

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The sage and her student were standing by a pool discussing longing and ambition.

"What do you want more than anything else?" the sage asked.

"To perfect my ability to love all of creation the way I love myself," the young man replied.

At that moment, the sage tackled the student and shoved his head beneath the water. Accustomed to letting his teacher shape the unpredictable contours of his education, he did not resist.

One minute went by. Then another. The student began to struggle and kick. His teacher was strong.

Finally she released her grip and the student surfaced, fighting for breath.

"What did you want more than anything else during these last few minutes?" the sage inquired.

"Nothing else was in my mind except the desire for air," gasped the student.

"Excellent," beamed the sage. "As soon as you are equally single-minded in your desire to perfect your ability to love all of creation the way you love yourself, you will achieve your goal."
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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 Powells.

In the coming weeks, you will have an unusually large capacity to see what has been invisible and name what has been unspeakable. You will be adept at solving dull old problems and creating brilliant new ones. You will also have extraordinary power to dissolve restrictions and impose creative limitations, outwit evil and dream up tricky ways to be good, drum up freedom and escape apathy, and rebel against or uphold tradition as necessary. Use your amazing mojo craftily, Aquarius!

Need a few more whacks applied to your mental blocks in the coming week? A few more caresses administered to your growing edge? Cruise on over to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES

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Astrologer Caroline Casey offers an apt metaphor to illustrate how crucial it is for us to hear and read good stories. She notes that if we don't have enough of the normal, healthy kind of iodine in our bodies, we absorb radioactive iodine, which has entered the food chain through nuclear test explosions conducted in the atmosphere. Similarly, unless we fill ourselves up with stories that invigorate us, we're more susceptible to sopping up the poisonous, degenerative narratives.
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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 Powells.

"You owe it to us all to get on with what you're good at," said poet W.H. Auden. Make that your motto in the coming weeks, Pisces. Your motivation for doing the useful work you love to do should not come from you alone. We, the rest of the world, want to be there inside you so that we can root you on and encourage you to give us your very best gifts. Tap into and refine and explore your talents for your own sake, yes -- but do it for us, too.

Where do you want to go in the coming week? Who do you want to be? For more clues, tune in to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES

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In the early years of Christianity, there were hundreds of books interpreting the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. But by 325 A.D., a group backed by the political and military might of the Roman Empire had determined which few of the stories about Christ would thereafter be considered the canonical New Testament, and which would be regarded as heretical bilge.

No better evidence exists for the saying, "History is a tale told by the victors." Keep this in mind as you strategize your way through your personal War of the Stories. Your account of events may have more truth in it than everyone else's conflicting tales, but that won't carry much weight unless you obtain the power to enforce your version.
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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 Powells.