The 16th-century English writer John Heywood was a prolific creator of epigrams. I know of at least 20 of his proverbs that are still invoked, including "Haste makes waste," "Out of sight, out of mind," "Look before you leap," "Beggars shouldn't be choosers," "Rome wasn't built in a day," and "Do you want to both eat your cake and have it, too?" I bring this up, Aries, because I suspect you're in a Heywoodian phase of your long-term cycle. In the coming weeks, you're likely to unearth a wealth of pithy insights and guiding principles that will serve you well into the future.

You can learn to be lucky. It's not a mystical force you're born with, but a habit you can develop. How? For starters, be open to new experiences, trust your gut wisdom, expect good fortune, see the bright side of challenging events, and master the art of maximizing serendipitous opportunities. For more help, tune in to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPE.

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Somewhere in the world is a tree that has been struck by lightning in such a way that the scorch marks reveal your initials. Locate that tree.

Somewhere in the world there is a treasure that has no value to anyone but you, and a secret that is meaningless to everyone except you, and a frontier that possesses a revelation only you know how to exploit. Go in search of those things.

Somewhere in the world there is a person who could ask you the precise question you need to hear in order to catalyze the next phase of your evolution. Do what's necessary to run into that person.
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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.

"If you wish to bake an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe," said astronomer Carl Sagan in his book Cosmos. In other words, the pie can't exist until there's a star orbited by a habitable planet that has spawned intelligent creatures and apples. A lot of preliminaries have to be in place. Keep that in mind, Taurus, as you start out down the long and winding path toward manifesting your own personal equivalent of the iconic apple pie. In a sense, you will have to create an entire world to serve as the womb for your brainchild. To aid you in your intricate quest, make sure to keep a glowing vision of the prize always burning in the sacred temple of your imagination.

Somewhere there's a treasure that has no value to anyone but you, and a secret that's meaningless to everyone except you, and a frontier that harbors a revelation only you would know how to exploit. Why not go in search of those things? For inspiration, tune in to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPE.

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From the window of my office I look down on a blackberry bush whose berries are now ripening. In the last 20 minutes, I've watched a sparrow figure out the best way to feast. At first the bird tried to land on the flimsy branches of the bush, but after a few tries it realized they couldn't hold its weight. Its revised strategy was to grab a single berry in mid-swoop and alight on the branch of a nearby apple tree so it could relax with its meal. It did this 10 times.

Are you willing to collect your reward a little at a time? Explain how you will do it.
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The preceding oracle comes from my new book, PRONOIA Is the Antidote for Paranoia: How the Whole World Is Conspiring to Shower You with Blessings.

I'll quote Wikipedia: "Dawn should not be confused with sunrise, which is the moment when the leading edge of the sun itself appears above the horizon." In other words, dawn comes before the sun has actually showed itself. It's a ghostly foreshadowing -- a pale light appearing out of nowhere to tinge the blackness. Where you are right now, Gemini, is comparable to the last hour before the sunrise. When the pale light first appears, don't mistake it for the sun and take premature action. Wait until you can actually see the golden rim rising.

When they say "Be yourself," which self do they mean? Certainly not the self that wants to win every game and use up every resource and stand alone at the end of time on a mountain of pretty garbage. So which self is it? For guidance, tune in to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPE.

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Psychotherapists say it's not only naughty but counterproductive to blame others for your problems. A skilled practitioner urges her clients to accept responsibility for the part they've played in creating their predicaments. The reason is as much pragmatic as it is ethical: When you're obsessed with how people have done you wrong, you have little ambition to change the behavior in yourself that led you into the mess.

While I endorse this approach, I also know that dogmatic adherence to it can warp your mental health as much as any other form of fanaticism. That's why I urge you to enjoy an unapologetic Blame Fest.

Choose a time when you will find fault with everyone except yourself. Howl in protest at the unfair slights people have committed against you. Wallow in self­pity as you visualize the clueless jerks who have done you wrong. For best results, bark your complaints in the direction of no one but God, an inanimate object, or your mirror.
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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.

When some readers write to me, they address me as "Mr. Brezsny." It reminds me of what happens when a check-out clerk at Whole Foods calls me "sir": I feel as if I've been hit in the face with a cream pie -- like someone is bashing my breezy, casual self-image with an unwelcome blast of dignity and decorum. So let's get this straight, people: I am not a mister and I am not a sir. Never was, never will be. Now as for your challenges in the coming week, Cancerian: I expect that you, too, may feel pressure to be overly respectable, uncomfortably formal, excessively polite, and in too much control. That would be pushing you in a direction opposite to the one I think you should go.

Take inventory of the extent that "No" dominates your life. Notice how often you say or think: 1. "That's not right." 2. "I don't like that." 3. "I don't agree with that." 4. "They don't like me." 5. "I'm not very good." 6. "That should be different from what it is." For help in retraining yourself to say "Yes!" at least 51% of the time, tune in to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPE.

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There's a three-mile stretch of Interstate 880 south of Oakland, California, that I call the Singing Highway. For reasons I don't understand, it generates low humming melodies every time I drive over it, similar to the guttural chants of Tibetan monks. Sometimes I swear I can even hear lyrics.

Once, as I was driving to the airport on the Singing Highway, I swear I heard the same lyric repeating over and over again: "a shortcut to the path with heart / a shortcut to the path with heart / a shortcut to the path with heart."

Where's the path with heart for you? What would it involve for you to take a shortcut to get on it?
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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.

At one point in the story "Alice in Wonderland," a large talking bird known as the Dodo organizes a race with unusual rules. There is no single course that all the runners must follow. Rather, everybody scampers around wherever he or she wants, and decides when to begin and when to end. When the "race" is all over, of course, it's impossible to sort out who has performed best, so the Dodo declares everyone to be the winner. I encourage you to organize and participate in activities like that in the coming weeks, Leo. It's an excellent time to drum up playful victories and easy successes not only for yourself, but for everyone else, too.

How's your fight for freedom going? Are you making progress in liberating yourself from your unconscious obsessions, bad habits, and conditioned responses? For assistance and inspiration, tune in to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPE.

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Change the burned-out light bulb.
Water the plants.
Take your multi-vitamin.
Wash the dishes.
Put new batteries in the TV remote.
Bow down to the Great Mystery.
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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.

In his book The Rough Guide to Climate Change, Bob Henson talks about the "five places to go before global warming messes them up." One such beautiful spot is Colorado's Rocky Mountain National Park. Vast swatches of its trees are being ravaged by hordes of pine beetles, whose populations used to be kept under control by frigid winters before the climate began to change. Australia's Great Barrier Reef and Switzerland's Alpine glaciers are among the other natural beauties that are rapidly changing form. I suggest that you apply this line of thought to icons with a more personal meaning, Virgo. Nothing stays the same forever, and it's an apt time in your astrological cycle to get all you can out of useful and wonderful resources that are in the midst of transformation.

Assume that your drive to experience pleasure isn't a barrier to your spiritual growth, but is in fact essential to it. Proceed on the hypothesis that cultivating joy can make you a more ethical and compassionate person. Imagine that feeling good has something important to teach you every day. For inspiration in practicing this approach, tune in to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPE.

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I know a dyke punk witch who loves to rub up against Hasidic Jews in the New York subway when she's menstruating. I know a mischief-maker who sneaked gobs of bacon fat into the broccoli and carrot stir-fry he cooked for his vegetarian friends.

While I'm entertained by the hijinks of these two tricksters, I have more respect for people who mess with their own totems and taboos -- like my anarchist acquaintance who disturbed his fellow agitators by burning his prized black flag in front of them.
Catch my drift? It's more aesthetically pleasing to violate your own damn dogmas, not your neighbor's. Try it.
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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.

There's not a whole lot of funny stuff reported in the Bible, but one notable case occurred when God told Abraham that he and his wife Sarah would finally be able to conceive their first child. This made Abraham laugh out loud, since he was 99 years old at the time and Sarah was 90. It may have been a while since God has delivered any humorous messages to you, Libra, but my sense is that She's gearing up for such a transmission even as we speak. To receive this cosmic jest in the right spirit, make sure you're not taking yourself too damn seriously.

"Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show." So begins Charles Dickens' novel David Copperfield. I'd like to inspire you to write a story of your own that begins like that. For help, tune into your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPE.

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Tantric sex practitioners say an artful lover never makes love the same way twice.

Similarly, chanteuse Billie Holiday believed a good singer should never sing a song the same way twice. If you use all the same phrasing and melody, she said, you're failing your art.

The only Zen master we know -- whose name we can't tell you because she changes it every week, and we haven't heard the latest one—likes to quote the ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus: "You cannot step into the same river twice, for fresh waters are ever flowing in upon you."

Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh has the last word: "Thanks to impermanence, everything is possible."
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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.

No one in history has ever drunk the entire contents of a regulation-size ketchup bottle in less than 39 seconds. So says the Guinness Book of World Records. However, I believe it's possible that a Scorpio daredevil will soon break this record. Right now your tribe has an almost supernaturally enormous power to rapidly extract the essence of anything you set your mind to extracting. You've got the instincts of a vacuum cleaner. You're an expert at tapping into the source and siphoning off exactly what you need. You know how to suck -- in the best sense of that word -- and you're not shy about sucking.

I invite you to keep a running list of all the ways life delights you and helps you and energizes you. Describe everyday miracles you take for granted . . . the uncanny powers you possess . . . the small joys that occur so routinely you forget how much they mean to you . . . the steady flow of benefits bestowed on you by people you know and don't know. What works for you? What makes you feel at home in the world? For inspiration in this noble effort, tune in to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPE.

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Nothing primes your ecstatic skill better than invoking and expressing thanks. So consider the possibility of celebrating regular Gratitude Fests. During these orgies of appreciation, you could confer praise and respect on the creatures, both human and otherwise, that have played seminal roles in inspiring you to become yourself. Who teaches and helps you? Who sees you for who you really are? Who nudges you in the direction of your fuller destiny and awakens you to your signature truths? Who loves you brilliantly?
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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.

"I'm not superstitious," said Michael Scott, the former boss in the TV show "The Office." "I'm just a little stitious." From my perspective, Sagittarius, you shouldn't indulge yourself in being even a little stitious in the coming weeks. You have a prime opportunity to free yourself from the grip of at least some of your irrational fears, unfounded theories, and compulsive fetishes. I'm not saying that you suffer from more of these delusions than any of the rest of us. It's just that you now have more power than the rest of us to break away from their spell.

All of creation loves you very much. Even now, people you know and people you don't know are collaborating to make sure you have all you need to make your next smart move. But are you willing to start loving life back with an equal intensity? The adoration it offers you has not exactly been unrequited, but there is room for you to be more demonstrative. For help in cultivating this approach, tune in to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPE.

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Jungian analyst Arnold Mindell explores the relationship between mind and body. He thinks you can achieve optimal physical health if you're devoted to shedding outworn self-images. In his book The Shaman's Body, he says, "You have one central lesson to learn -- to continuously drop all your rigid identities. Personal history may be your greatest danger."

Kate Bornstein, author of Gender Outlaw: On Men, Women and the Rest of Us, agrees. Raised as a boy, she later became a woman, but ultimately renounced gender altogether. "I love being without an identity," she says. "It gives me a lot of room to play around."

What identities would be healthy, even ecstatic, for you to lose? Describe the fun you'd have if you were free of them.
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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.

In Plato's Republic, Socrates speaks derisively about people who are eu a-mousoi, an ancient Greek term that literally means "happily without muses." These are the plodding materialists who have no hunger for inspiration and no need of spiritual intelligence. According to my reading of the astrological omens, Capricorn, you can't afford to be eu a-mousoi in the coming weeks. Mundane satisfactions won't be nearly enough to feed your head and heart. To even wake up and get out of bed each morning, you've got to be on fire with a shimmering dream or a beautiful prospect.

What is the obvious secret you can't quite see? How could you turn your challenges into daily gifts for yourself? For clues to mysteries like these, tune in to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPE.

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I swear the strange woman standing near me at Los Angeles' Getty Museum was having an erotic experience as she gazed upon van Gogh's Irises. She was not touching herself, nor was anyone else. But she was apparently experiencing waves of convulsive delight, as suggested by her rapid breathing, shivering muscles, fluttering eyelids, and sweaty forehead.

Fifteen minutes later, I saw her again in front of Jean-Honoré Fragonard's The Fountain of Love. She was only slightly more composed. In a friendly voice, I said, "This stuff really moves you, doesn't it?" "Oh, yeah," she replied, "I've not only learned how to make love with actual flowers and clouds and fountains, I can even make love with paintings of them."

Do you have any interest in mastering the method in this maestro's madness? Where will you begin?
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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.

In his Book of Imaginary Beings, Argentinian writer Jorge Luis Borges reports the following: "Chang Tzu tells us of a persevering man who after three laborious years mastered the art of dragon-slaying. For the rest of his days, he had not a single opportunity to test his skills." I bring this to your attention, Aquarius, because my reading of the astrological omens suggests that you, too, may be in training to fight a beast that does not exist. Luckily, you're also in an excellent position to realize that fact, quit the unnecessary quest, and redirect your martial energy into a more worthy endeavor.

Grace emerges in the ebb and flow, not just the flow. The waning reveals a different blessing than the waxing. Where are you in the great cycle of your life? For inspiration in figuring it all out, tune in to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPE.

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While putting on your shirt or blouse some morning, fasten the top button in the second hole, the second button in the third hole, and so on all the way down. For the rest of the day, preserve this dishevelment with all your composure intact, even in the face of odd stares and snide comments. If anyone says, "Hey, your shirt's buttoned wrong," reply calmly, "No, it isn't. I buttoned it this way on purpose."
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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.

Want to see a rabbit chase a snake up a tree? Go watch this video. If for some reason you don't have access to Youtube, then please close your eyes and visualize a cute bunny harassing a six-foot-long snake until it slithers madly away and escapes up a tree. Once you have this sequence imprinted on your mind's eye you will, I hope, be energized to try a similar reversal in your own sphere. Don't do anything stupid, like spitting at a Hell's Angels dude in a biker bar. Rather, try a metaphorical or psychological version.

Whether it's your time to ferment in the shadows or sing in the sun, fresh power to transform yourself is on the way. Life always delivers the creative energy you need to change into the new thing you must become. For more help in understanding it all, tune in to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPE.

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Mythology is replete with tales of substances that can be both curative or harmful, depending on how they are obtained and used. The ancient Greeks believed that Asclepius, founder of medicine, possessed vials of Medusa's blood. "With what had been drawn from the veins of her left side," Robert Graves notes, "he could raise the dead; with what had been drawn from her right side, he could destroy instantly."

What has been a comparable substance or influence in your own life?
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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.