In the fictional world of the wizard Harry Potter, muggles are people who have no magical powers. Because of their deficiency, certain sights may be literally invisible to them, and certain places inaccessible. I'm going to boldly predict that you Aries people will lose at least some of your muggleness in the coming year. A part of your life where you've been inept or clueless will begin to wake up. In ways that may feel surprisingly easy, you'll be able to fill a gap in your skill set or knowledge base.

This week my EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES offer you a teaser look at some of the major themes you will be working and playing with in 2012. Then, beginning December 27, I will devote three consecutive weeks of EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES to an in-depth discussion of your long-range outlook for the coming months. Tune in!

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Lewis Thomas was a physician who wrote elegantly about biology in books like The Lives of a Cell. I want to bring your attention to his meditation on warts. "Nothing in the body has so much the look of toughness and permanence as a wart," he wrote. And yet "they can be made to go away by something that can only be called thinking ... Warts can be ordered off the skin by hypnotic suggestion." Thomas regarded this phenomenon as "absolutely astonishing, more of a surprise than cloning or recombinant DNA."

Using your mind power, go ahead and shrink, dissolve, or banish a wart or wart-like vexation.
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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.

On January 15, 1885, Wilson Bentley photographed his first snowflake. Over the course of the next 46 years, he captured 5,000 more images of what he called "tiny miracles of beauty." He was the first person to say that no two snowflakes are alike. In 2012, Taurus, I suggest that you draw inspiration from his example. The coming months will be prime time for you to lay the foundations for a worthy project that will captivate your imagination for a long time -- and perhaps even take you decades to complete.

This week my EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES offer you a teaser look at some of the major themes you will be working and playing with in 2012. Then, beginning December 27, I will devote three consecutive weeks of EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES to an in-depth discussion of your long-range outlook for the coming months. Tune in!

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"I am a devout atheist," writes Tom of Ohio, "but I have to explain to my atheist friends that I do pray to the 'GodIdontbelievein.'

"My first direct contact with this Divinity arrived when I was coming out of anesthesia after surgery. I was somehow aware of my existence but totally ­sensory-deprived. As I emerged from total unconsciousness, a tiny flickering Tinkerbell-like creature in the form of a shimmering globe of light fluttered into my consciousness and hovered irresistibly before my internal eyes. I was in love with it and it loved me.

"In fact it was me, or at least the manifestation of cosmic energy that settles in me and is my being. It gave me a blessing of good will, then went about its business of operating my body. In parting, it gave me the assurance that it would always be there for me and with me, and would join me after it shut the body down for the last time.

"Since that first encounter, I commune with the little sparkling wonder every so often. I thank it for its presence and it thanks me for mine, though we are actually one and the same. I find myself praying to it, though there's really no need to -- it knows me better than I do, and guides me toward my goals, though I know not what they are."

Inspired by Tom's report, write a love note or an expression of appreciation for the shimmering globe of wonder that animates your 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.

In her memoir Blood, Bones & Butter: The Inadvertent Education of a Reluctant Chef, Gabrielle Hamilton suggests my horoscopes were helpful to her as she followed her dream to create her New York City restaurant, Prune. "I killed roaches, poisoned their nests, trapped rats, stuffed their little holes with steel wool and glass shards," she wrote, "while my girlfriend . . . walked through the place 'purifying' it with a burning sage smudge stick and read me my Rob Brezsny horoscopes in support." I would love to be of similar service to you in the coming months, Gemini, as you cleanse whatever needs to be cleansed in preparation for your next big breakthrough. Let the fumigation, purgation, and expiation begin!

This week my EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES offer you a teaser look at some of the major themes you will be working and playing with in 2012. Then, beginning December 27, I will devote three consecutive weeks of EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES to an in-depth discussion of your long-range outlook for the coming months. Tune in!

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Meditation teacher Wes Nisker helps students learn to calm the frenetic chatter of their minds. As earnest as he is in this heroic work, though, he also appreciates the importance of not trying too hard. As you pursue your pronoia practice, call on his influence now and then. It'll keep you honest and prevent your anal sphincter from getting too high-strung.

Here's a blurb for one of his workshops. "This day will be of absolutely no use to you. Nothing will be furthered or accomplished by coming. Expect a time of effortlessness, relaxation, and poetry, hanging out, maybe a little mindfulness meditation -- all for nothing. Some might understand this as a protest against our culture's speedy, goal-driven nature, but we know it won't amount to a hill of beans. Good intentions and purposefulness must be checked at the door."
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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 1992, 30,000 Americans signed a petition asking the governor of Hawaii to change the name of Maui to "Gilligan's Island." Fortunately, the request was turned down, and so one of the most sublime places on the planet is not now named after a silly TV sitcom. I'm urging you to avoid getting swept up in equally fruitless causes during the coming months, Cancerian. You will have a lot of energy to give to social causes and collective intentions in 2012, but it will be very important to choose worthy outlets that deserve your intelligent passion and that have half a chance of succeeding.

This week my EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES offer you a teaser look at some of the major themes you will be working and playing with in 2012. Then, beginning December 27, I will devote three consecutive weeks of EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES to an in-depth discussion of your long-range outlook for the coming months. Tune in!

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At New York's Museum of Modern Art, I brought my face to within a few inches of Vincent van Gogh's painting The Starry Night. It looked delicious. I wanted to kiss it. I wanted to eat it. Its stars were throbbing and voluptuous. The night sky shimmered with spiral currents. In the foreground, the cypress tree flared like a shadowy flame.

I could also see that the artist had been less than thorough in applying his paint. Especially on the edges, but also in the middle of the painting, slivers of untouched canvas showed through. Fierce, innocent, nourishing, reckless, unfinished, this priceless work drank my attention for a long time, constantly refreshing my eyes with its ceaseless movement.

Can you be at peace with the fact that your masterpiece may always be unfinished?
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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.

The Palace of Versailles once served as home for French kings and their royal courts, and was the hub of the French government. To this day it remains a symbol of lavish wealth and high civilization. Set on 26 acres, it has 700 rooms, 67 staircases, 6,000 paintings, and 2,100 sculptures. The grounds feature 50 fountains and 21 miles of water conduits. And yet the word "Versailles" means "terrain where the weeds have been pulled." Prior to it being built up into a luxurious center of power, it was a marsh in the wilderness. I nominate it to be your inspirational image for the coming year, Leo: a picture of the transformation you will begin.

This week my EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES offer you a teaser look at some of the major themes you will be working and playing with in 2012. Then, beginning December 27, I will devote three consecutive weeks of EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES to an in-depth discussion of your long-range outlook for the coming months. Tune in!

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"I usually solve problems by letting them devour me," wrote Franz Kafka. That's an interesting approach, I guess, and though it might work for a tiny minority of introverted, melancholy, hypersensitive artists, it's probably not a wise policy for you. It may be better to fervently resist any temptation you might have to allow your problems to gobble you up.

Instead, why not be like a gargantuan sea monster in the midst of a perfect storm? Rise up as high as the dark sky and growl back at the thunder. Shoot flames from your mouth at the lightning. Become too big and ancient and wild to ever be devoured.
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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.

A guy named George Reiger is a certifiable Disney freak. He has covered his skin with 2,200 tattoos of the franchise's cartoon characters. If you plan to get anything like that much thematic body decoration in 2012, Virgo, I recommend that you draw your inspiration from cultural sources with more substantial artistry and wisdom than Disney. For example, you could cover your torso with paintings by Matisse, your arms with poems by Neruda, and your legs with musical scores by Mozart. Why? In the coming months it will be important for you to surround yourself with the highest influences and associate yourself with the most inspiring symbols and identify yourself with the most ennobling creativity.

This week my EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES offer you a teaser look at some of the major themes you will be working and playing with in 2012. Then, beginning December 27, I will devote three consecutive weeks of EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES to an in-depth discussion of your long-range outlook for the coming months. Tune in!

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In the film Fight Club, the character played by Brad Pitt storms into a convenience store with a gun, then herds the clerk out back and threatens to execute him. While the poor man quivers in terror, Pitt asks him questions about himself, extracting the confession that he'd once wanted to be a veterinarian but dropped out of school. After a few minutes, Pitt frees the clerk without harming him, but says that unless he takes steps to return to veterinary school in the next six weeks, he will hunt him down and kill him.

In my opinion, that's an overly extreme way to motivate someone to do what's good for him. I wish I could come up with a less shocking approach to coax you into resuming the quest for your deferred dreams. Can you think of anything?
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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 the Classical Nahuatl language of the Aztecs, the word teocuitlatl literally meant "god poop." It was used to refer to gold, which was regarded as a divine gift that brought mixed blessings. On the one hand, gold made human beings rich. On the other hand, it could render them greedy, stingy, and paranoid. So it was potentially the source of both tremendous bounty and conflict. I suspect that in 2012, Libra, you will have to deal with the arrival of a special favor that carries a comparable paradox. You should be fine -- harvesting the good part of the gift and not having to struggle mightily with the tough part -- as long as you vow to use it with maximum integrity.

This week my EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES offer you a teaser look at some of the major themes you will be working and playing with in 2012. Then, beginning December 27, I will devote three consecutive weeks of EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES to an in-depth discussion of your long-range outlook for the coming months. Tune in!

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"The important thing," said French critic Charles Du Bos, "is to be able at any moment to sacrifice what we are for what we could become."

Did he really mean at any moment? Like while we're in a convenience store buying a magazine? While we're lying in bed ready for sleep and reviewing the events of the day? While we're adrift in apathetic melancholy, watching too much TV and neglecting our friends? At any moment?! I say yes. At all times and in all places be ready to sacrifice what you are for what you could become.
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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.

What spell would you like to be under in 2012? Be careful how you answer that; it might be a trick question. Not because I have any interest in fooling you, of course, but rather because I want to prepare you for the trickiness that life may be expressing in your vicinity. So let me frame the issue in a different way. Do you really want to be under a spell -- of any kind? Answer yes only if you're positive that being under a spell will help you manifest your biggest dream. And please make sure that whoever or whatever is the source of the spell is in the service of love.

This week my EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES offer you a teaser look at some of the major themes you will be working and playing with in 2012. Then, beginning December 27, I will devote three consecutive weeks of EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES to an in-depth discussion of your long-range outlook for the coming months. Tune in!

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Lie on your back with your arms outstretched and have a friend measure the distance from the tip of one middle finger to the other. Do you have a wingspan similar to that of a hawk? Eagle? Osprey? The mythical thunderbird? Pterodactyl? Close your eyes and visualize yourself hovering and swooping above the treetops. What do you see below you?
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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.

The Environmental Working Group wrote the Meat Eater's Guide to Climate Change and Health. It concluded that if every American avoided eating cheese and meat one day a week, emissions would be lowered as much as they would be by removing 7.6 million cars from the roads. This is the kind of incremental shift I urge you to specialize in during 2012, Sagittarius -- whether it's in your contribution to alleviating the environmental crisis or your approach to dealing with more personal problems. Commit yourself to making little changes that will add up to major improvements over the long haul.

This week my EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES offer you a teaser look at some of the major themes you will be working and playing with in 2012. Then, beginning December 27, I will devote three consecutive weeks of EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES to an in-depth discussion of your long-range outlook for the coming months. Tune in!

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Russian scientists have discovered gold deposits in the dust of decayed tree stumps. The phenomenon occurs in forests growing in ground where there is gold ore. Over the course of centuries, the trees' roots suck in minute quantities of the precious metal, eventually accumulating nuggets.

Describe a metaphorically comparable process you could carry out in your own life over the course of the next 20 years. What invisible part of you is like a tree's roots? What's the gold you'd like to suck up?
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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.

Suzan-Lori Parks is a celebrated American playwright who has won both a Pulitzer Prize and a MacArthur Foundation "Genius" Grant. During the time between November 2002 and November 2003, she wrote a new short play every day -- a total of 365 plays in 365 days. I think you could be almost as prolific as that in 2012, Capricorn. Whatever your specialty is, I believe you will be filled with originality about how to express it. You're also likely to have the stamina and persistence and, yes, even the discipline necessary to pull it off.

This week my EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES offer you a teaser look at some of the major themes you will be working and playing with in 2012. Then, beginning December 27, I will devote three consecutive weeks of EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES to an in-depth discussion of your long-range outlook for the coming months. Tune in!

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Visualize in detail your dream lover . . . your ideal soul mate . . . the embodiment of everything you find attractive.

Imagine that although this person feels the same way about you, there is a very good reason why the two of you can't make love or be together as a couple for a long time. Feel the sweet torment of your unquenched longing for each other, the impossible ache of fiery ­tenderness.

Picture all the ways you will work on yourself in the coming years to refine your soul and perfect your love, so that when the two of you can finally be united, you will have made yourself into the gorgeous genius you were born to be -- a pure blessing and uncanny gift for your beloved.
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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.

Pigeons are blessed with an extraordinary ability to find home, even if they're hundreds of miles away. They have an internal compass that allows them to read the Earth's magnetic field, and they also create a "map of smells" that gives them crucial clues as they navigate. A team of scientists performed some odd experiments that revealed a quirky aspect to the birds' talent: If their right nostril is blocked, their innate skill doesn't work nearly as well. (It's OK if their left nostril is blocked, though.) What does this have to do with you? Well, Aquarius, you've been like a homing pigeon with its right nostril blocked, and it's high time you unblocked it. In the coming months, you can't afford to be confused about where home is, what your community consists of, or where you belong.

This week my EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES offer you a teaser look at some of the major themes you will be working and playing with in 2012. Then, beginning December 27, I will devote three consecutive weeks of EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES to an in-depth discussion of your long-range outlook for the coming months. Tune in!

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I hope you can obtain the Avatar Elixir stashed in the golden obelisk in the underground fortress beneath the glass mountain. It will allow you to produce the "triple-helix" energy that will give you the power to cross freely back and forth through the gateway between universes. Then wild beasts will obey your commands. Rivers will become your allies. Every star in the sky will shine directly on you. And if for some reason you're not able to get your hands on that Avatar Elixir, you may be able to achieve similar results by drinking a bottle of beer stashed in the lower left rear section of the beverage cooler at a convenience store within five miles of your home.

Magic might be wherever you think it is.
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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.

One of Alexander the Great's teachers was Aristotle, who was tutored by Plato, who himself learned from Socrates. In 2012, I'd love to see you draw vital information and fresh wisdom from a lineage as impressive as that, Pisces. In my astrological opinion, you need much more than a steady diet of factoids plucked from the Internet and TV. You simply must be hungry for more substantial food for thought than you get from random encounters with unreliable sources. It will be time for you to attend vigorously to the next phase of your life-long education.

This week my EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES offer you a teaser look at some of the major themes you will be working and playing with in 2012. Then, beginning December 27, I will devote three consecutive weeks of EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES to an in-depth discussion of your long-range outlook for the coming months. Tune in!

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After rejecting proposals from many directors, Bob Dylan finally authorized Oscar-nominated Todd Haynes to make a film about his life, I'm Not There. Five different actors and one actress portrayed Dylan, including Richard Gere, Cate Blanchett, Marcus Carl Franklin, Heath Ledger, Ben Whishaw, and Christian Bale. "I set out to explode the idea that anybody can be depicted in a single self," Haynes told The Sunday Times.

Name the six actors and actresses you would choose to play you in the movie about your 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.