The oracle I'm about to present may be controversial. It contains advice that most astrologers would never dare to offer an Aries. But I believe you are more receptive than usual to this challenge, and I am also convinced that you especially need it right now. Are you ready to be pushed further than I have ever pushed you? Study this quote from novelist Mark Z. Danielewski: "Passion has little to do with euphoria and everything to do with patience. It is not about feeling good. It is about endurance. Like patience, passion comes from the same Latin root: pati."

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SACRED ADVERTISEMENT. The oracle below is from my book PRONOIA Is the Antidote for Paranoia: How the Whole World Is Conspiring to Shower You with Blessings.
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Have you said a prayer of gratitude any time recently for the fact that your feet remain steadily on the earth? Gravity is giving you the same gift it always does, pulling on you with neither too much nor too little force.

You should be glad for its versatility, too. It's working for the heavenly bodies with the same tender attentiveness it bestows upon you. As all the other planets do, the Earth relies on gravity's genius to keep orbiting the sun in its ancient hallowed groove, thereby providing you with all of the favorable environmental conditions you need to live.

Magicians of the Western Hermetic tradition say that gravity is actually a form of love -- the irresistible attraction that all things have for each other over even the vastest distances.

You're in a phase of your cycle when you'll be rewarded for your freshness and originality. The more you cultivate a "beginner's mind," the smarter you will be. What you want will become more possible to the degree that you shed everything you think you know about what you want. As the artist Henri Matisse said, if a truly creative painter hopes to paint a rose, he or she "first has to forget all the roses that were ever painted." What would be the equivalent type of forgetting in your own life?

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SACRED ADVERTISEMENT. The oracle below is from my book PRONOIA Is the Antidote for Paranoia: How the Whole World Is Conspiring to Shower You with Blessings.
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Of the many things that have gone right for you during your time on Earth, the most crucial was your birth. As you crossed over the threshold, trading the warm dark sanctuary for the bright noisy enigma, you didn't die! It was a difficult act of high magic that involved many people who worked very hard in your behalf. The skills they provided in helping you navigate your rite of passage were in turn made possible by previous generations of threshold-tenders who bequeathed their expertise.

Months before that initiation, a more secret miracle bloomed: Your life began as a single cell, spawned by the explosive fusion of two highly specialized bundles of chromosomes. How could that tiny package of raw material have possibly grown a brain and liver and heart and stomach over a period of a few months? What inscrutable genius guided and oversaw the emergence of your fully formed infant body, that virtuoso creation, from the slimmest of clues?

"Something unknown is doing we don't know what," said astrophysicist Arthur Eddington about the universe. And we are the beneficiaries.

P.S. You have continued to grow since your birth, with millions of new cells continually blooming to replace the old ones that are always dying. At this moment, you're host to about 50 trillion cells, and each of them is really a sentient being in its own right. They all act together as a community, implementing the monumental collaboration you call your body.

"Am I still a hero if the only person I save is myself?" asks poet B. Damani. If you posed that question to me right now, I would reply, "Yes, Gemini. You are still a hero if the only person you save is yourself." If you asked me to elaborate, I'd say, "In fact, saving yourself is the only way you can be a hero right now. You can't rescue or fix or rehabilitate anyone else unless and until you can rescue and fix and rehabilitate yourself." If you pushed me to provide you with a hint about how you should approach this challenge, I'd be bold and finish with a flourish: "Now I dare you to be the kind of hero you have always feared was beyond your capacity."

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SACRED ADVERTISEMENT. The oracle below is from my book PRONOIA Is the Antidote for Paranoia: How the Whole World Is Conspiring to Shower You with Blessings.
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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.

"We need people in our lives with whom we can be as open as possible," declares psychotherapist Thomas Moore. I agree. Our mental health thrives when we can have candid conversations with free spirits who don't censor themselves and don't expect us to water down what we say. This is always true, of course, but it will be an absolute necessity for you in the coming weeks. So I suggest that you do everything you can to put yourself in the company of curious minds that love to hear and tell the truth. Look for opportunities to express yourself with extra clarity and depth. "To have real conversations with people may seem like such a simple, obvious suggestion," says Moore, "but it involves courage and risk."

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Wouldn't you love to learn more about who you really are? What better adventure is there than learning about your soul's code? For more hints, listen to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPE.

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SACRED ADVERTISEMENT. The oracle below is from my book PRONOIA Is the Antidote for Paranoia: How the Whole World Is Conspiring to Shower You with Blessings.
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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.

I watched a video of a helicopter pilot as he descended from the sky and tried to land his vehicle on the small deck of a Danish ship patrolling the North Sea. The weather was blustery and the seas were choppy. The task looked at best strenuous, at worst impossible. The pilot hovered patiently as the ship pitched wildly. Finally there was a brief calm, and he seized on that moment to settle down safely. According to my analysis of the astrological omens, you may have a metaphorically similar challenge in the coming days. To be successful, all you have to do is be alert for the brief calm, and then act with swift, relaxed decisiveness.

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I hope the oracle above provides you with the inspiration you need to do what you've got to do and change what needs to be changed. But if you need more clues, listen to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPE, where I go further in exploring your mysteries.

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SACRED ADVERTISEMENT. The oracle below is from my book PRONOIA Is the Antidote for Paranoia: How the Whole World Is Conspiring to Shower You with Blessings.
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You are a genius. Maybe not in the same way that Einstein and Beethoven were, but still: You possess exceptional capacities that are absolutely unique. You're a masterpiece unlike any other that has ever lived in the history of the world.

Furthermore, the precise instructions you need to ripen into your genius have always been with you, even from the time before you were born. In the words of psychologist James Hillman, you have a soul's code.

You might also call it the special mission you came to Earth to carry out; the divine blueprint that contains the open secret of how to be perfectly, unpredictably yourself; the master plan that is your heart's deepest desire.

Would you like help in deciphering it? The Divine Intelligence Formerly Known as God is always on call, ready to help. It's your birthright to ask Her a specific question every day about what you need to do next to express your soul's code; it's also your birthright to receive a response.

The divine revelation may not be as unambiguous as a little voice in your head. It might appear in the form of a TV commercial, an odd dream, or an encounter with a stranger. It could be demanding and difficult, delivering information you'd rather not have to deal with. Or it might show up as a clear and simple feeling of knowing exactly what to do, and it could be easy and fun.

What's the most important question for you to ask today?

"Show me a man who isn’t a slave," wrote the Roman philosopher Seneca. "One is a slave to sex, another to money, another to ambition; all are slaves to hope or fear." Commenting on Seneca's thought, blogger Ryan Holiday says, "I'm disappointed in my enslavement to self-doubt, to my resentment towards those that I dislike, to the power that the favor and approval of certain people hold over me." What about you, Virgo? Are there any emotional states or bedeviling thoughts or addictive desires that you're a slave to? The coming weeks will be a favorable time to emancipate yourself. As you do, remember this: There's a difference between being compulsively driven by a delusion and lovingly devoted to a worthy goal.

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SACRED ADVERTISEMENT. The oracle below is from my book PRONOIA Is the Antidote for Paranoia: How the Whole World Is Conspiring to Shower You with Blessings.
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Take inventory of the extent to which your "No" reflex dominates your life. Notice for 24 hours (even in your dreams) how often you say or think:
"No."
"That's not right."
"I don't like them."
"I don't agree with that."
"They don't like me."
"That should be different from what it is."

"Everyone who has ever built a new heaven first found the power to do so in his own hell." That noble truth was uttered by Libran philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, and I bet it will be especially meaningful for most of you during the rest of 2016. The bad news is that in the past few months you've had to reconnoiter your own hell a little more than you would have liked, even if it has been pretty damn interesting. The good news is that these explorations will soon be winding down. The fantastic news is that you are already getting glimpses of how to use what you've been learning. You'll be well-prepared when the time comes to start constructing a new heaven.

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SACRED ADVERTISEMENT. The oracle below is from my book PRONOIA Is the Antidote for Paranoia: How the Whole World Is Conspiring to Shower You with Blessings.
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You can drink a glass of water. You can spread butter on a slice of toast. You can wash your hair and prune your plants and draw infinity signs on a piece of paper. Your hands work wonderfully well! Their intricate force and sustained grace are amply supported by your heart, which circulates your blood all the way out to replenish the energy of the muscles and nerves in your fingers and palms and wrists. After your blood has delivered its blessings, it finds its way back to your heart to be refreshed. This masterful mystery repeats itself over and over again without you ever having to think about it.

Contemplate the unfathomable prowess of your digestive system. Countless chemical reactions have to unfold with alacrity in order for it to work as well as it does. The gastric juice has to be composed of just the right mix of pepsin, rennin, mucus, and hydrochloric acid. The bile and pancreatic juice must arrive at the right spot and at the right time. The enterocytes in your small intestine always have to remember anew how to carry out their uptake of ions, lipids, and peptides. How can they possibly be so good at knowing exactly what to do and when to do it?

The circulation of blood and the conversion of food into fuel are just two of many alchemical feats that the secret intelligence within you takes care of. Thousands of other exchanges and transformations and syntheses are ceaselessly working their wizardry inside your body without your conscious participation.

"Zugzwang" is a German-derived word used in chess and other games. It refers to a predicament in which a player cannot possibly make a good move. Every available option will weaken his or her position. I propose that we coin a new word that means the opposite of zugzwang: "zugfrei," which shall hereafter signify a situation in which every choice you have in front of you is a positive or constructive one; you cannot make a wrong move. I think this captures the essence of the coming days for you, Scorpio.

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What exactly are you looking for? How would you describe the experiences you want more than anything else? It's possible my EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPE could give you additional help in figuring that out.

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SACRED ADVERTISEMENT. The oracle below is from my book PRONOIA Is the Antidote for Paranoia: How the Whole World Is Conspiring to Shower You with Blessings.
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What causes happiness? Brainstorm about it. Map out the foundations of your personal science of joy. Get serious about defining what makes you feel good. To get you started, I'll name some experiences that might rouse your gratification: engaging in sensual pleasure; seeking the truth; being kind and moral; contemplating the meaning of life; escaping your routine; purging pent-up emotions, doing practical work that helps others or that serves your high ideals. Do any of these work for you? Name at least ten more.

"We have to learn how to live with our frailties," poet Stanley Kunitz told The Paris Review. "The best people I know are inadequate and unashamed." That's the keynote I hope you will adopt in the coming weeks. No matter how strong and capable you are, no matter how hard you try to be your best, there are ways you fall short of perfection. And now is a special phase of your astrological cycle when you can learn a lot about how to feel at peace with that fact.

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SACRED ADVERTISEMENT. The oracle below is from my book PRONOIA Is the Antidote for Paranoia: How the Whole World Is Conspiring to Shower You with Blessings.
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You don’t have to be anything you don’t want to be. You don’t have to live up to anyone’s expectations. There’s no need to strive for a kind of perfection that’s not very interesting to you. You don’t have to believe in ideas that make you sad or tormented, and you don’t have to feel emotions that others try to manipulate you into feeling.

How do plants reproduce? They generate seeds that are designed to travel. Dandelion and orchid seeds are so light they can drift long distances through the air. Milkweed seeds are a bit heavier, but are easily carried by the wind. Foxglove and sycamore seeds are so buoyant they can float on flowing water. Birds and other animals serve as transportation for burdock seeds, which hook onto feather and fur. Fruit seeds may be eaten by animals and later excreted, fully intact, far from their original homes. I hope this meditation stimulates you to think creatively about dispersing your own metaphorical seeds, Capricorn. It's time for you to vividly express your essence, make your mark, spread your influence.

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SACRED ADVERTISEMENT. The oracle below is from my book PRONOIA Is the Antidote for Paranoia: How the Whole World Is Conspiring to Shower You with Blessings.
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When many people talk about their childhoods, they emphasize the alienating, traumatic experiences they had, and fail to report the good times. This seems dishonest -- a testament to the popularity of cynicism rather than a reflection of objective truth.

I don't mean to downplay the way your early encounters with pain demoralized your spirit. But as you reconnoiter the promise of pronoia, it's crucial for you to extol the gifts you were given in your early years: all the helpful encounters, kind teachings, and simple acts of grace that helped you bloom.

"It is a fault to wish to be understood before we have made ourselves clear to ourselves," said philosopher Simone Weil. I hope that prod makes you feel a bit uncomfortable, Aquarius. I hope it motivates you to get busy investigating some of your vague ideas and fuzzy self-images and confused intentions. It will soon be high time for you to ask for more empathy and acknowledgment from those whose opinions matter to you. You're overdue to be more appreciated, to be seen for who you really are. But before any of that good stuff can happen, you will have to engage in a flurry of introspection. You've got to clarify and deepen your relationship with yourself.

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SACRED ADVERTISEMENT. The oracle below is from my book PRONOIA Is the Antidote for Paranoia: How the Whole World Is Conspiring to Shower You with Blessings.
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When you're an aspiring master of pronoia, you see the cracks in the facades as opportunities; inspiration erupts as you careen over bumps in the road; you love the enticing magic that flows from situations that other people regard as rough or crooked.

"That which is not slightly distorted lacks sensible appeal," wrote poet Charles Baudelaire, "from which it follows that irregularity -- that is to say, the unexpected, surprise and astonishment -- is an essential part and characteristic of beauty."

"I have never let my schooling interfere with my education," said writer Mark Twain. That's excellent advice for you to apply and explore in the coming weeks. Much of the time, the knowledge you have accumulated and the skills you have developed are supreme assets. But for the immediate future, they could obstruct you from learning the lessons you need most. For instance, they might trick you into thinking you are smarter than you really are. Or they could cause you to miss simple and seemingly obvious truths that your sophisticated perspective is too proud to notice. Be a humble student, my dear.

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SACRED ADVERTISEMENT. The oracle below is from my book PRONOIA Is the Antidote for Paranoia: How the Whole World Is Conspiring to Shower You with Blessings.
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One of life's great bounties is its changeableness, which ensures that boredom will never last very long. You may underestimate the intensity of your longing for continual transformation, but the universe doesn't.

That's why it provides you with the boundless entertainment of your ever-shifting story. That's why it is always revising the challenges it sends your way, providing your curious soul with a rich variety of unpredictable teachings.

Neuroscientists have turned up evidence that suggests you love this aspect of the universe's behavior. They say that you are literally addicted to learning. At the moment when you grasp a lesson you've been grappling with, your brain experiences a rush of a natural opium-like chemical, boosting your pleasure levels. You crave this experience. You thrive on it.

So the universe is built in such a way as to discourage boredom. It does this not just by generating an endless stream of interesting novelty, and not only by giving you an instinctive lust to keep learning, but also by making available an abundance of ways to break free of your habitual thoughts.

You can go to school, travel, read, listen to experts, converse with people who think differently from you, and absorb the works of creative artists. You can replenish and stretch your mind through exercise, sex, psychotherapy, spiritual practices, and self-expression. You can take drugs and medicines that alter your perspectives.

And here's the best part of this excellent news: Every method that exists for expanding your consciousness is more lavishly available right now than it has been at any previous time in history.

Never before have there been so many schools, educational programs, workshops, and enrichment courses. Virtually any subject or skill you want to study, you can. You don't even have to leave your home to do it. The number of online classes is steadily mounting . . . .

Read the rest of this essay here.