Even if you are a wild-eyed adventure-seeker with extremist views and melodramatic yearnings, you'll benefit from taking a moderate approach to life in the coming weeks. In fact, you're most likely to attract the help and inspiration you need if you adopt the strategy used by Goldilocks in the fairy tale "Goldilocks and the Three Bears": neither excessive nor underdone, neither extravagant nor restrained, neither bawdy, loud, and in-your-face nor demure, quiet, and passive -- but rather just right.

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Do you wish you could get more clarity about Would you like to hear more about the hidden factors influencing your life? Do you want to uncover the secrets you've been hiding even from yourself? Listen to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPE. the foggy, ambiguous situations you're dealing with? Want more help in exploring the Great Mystery that is your life? I discuss your coming week in greater depth in 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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Review in painstaking detail the history of your life, honoring every moment as if you were conducting a benevolent Judgment Day.

Forgive yourself of every mistake except one.

Create a royal crown for yourself out of a shower cap, rubber bands, and light bulbs.

Think of the last place on earth you'd ever want to visit, and visualize yourself having fun there.

Test to see if people are really listening to you by asserting that Karl Marx was one of the Marx Brothers.

Steal lint from dryers in laundromats and use it to make animal sculptures for someone you admire.

Fantasize you're the child of divine parents who abandoned you when you were two days old, but who will soon be coming back to reunite with you.

Meditate on how one of the symbols of plenitude in Nepal is a mongoose vomiting jewels.

Once a year on the day before your birthday, say these words into a mirror: "It's bad luck to be superstitious."

Start a club whose purpose is to produce an archive of controversial jokes and obscene limericks about beauty, truth, and love.

Some of my readers love me but also hate me. They are drawn to my horoscopes in the hope that I will help relieve them of their habitual pain, but then get mad at me when I do just that. In retrospect, they feel lost without the familiar companionship of their habitual pain. It had been a centerpiece of their identity, a source of stability, and when it's gone, they don't know who they are any more. Are you like these people, Taurus? If so, you might want to avoid my horoscopes for a while. I will be engaged in a subtle crusade to dissolve your angst and agitation. And it all starts now with this magic spell: Your wound is a blessing. Discover why.

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Do you want further explorations of the intriguing twists and turns of your personal evolution? Would you like help in solving the riddles that confuse you? Check out 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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Say this: "Novel intuitions are now erupting from my smart heart, awakening me from any trance I've been ensnared in. I am hereby breaking and escaping obstructions that have hindered my ability to express my soul's code. All of my unique capacities are being unleashed, all of my potentials activated. I recognize that I'm a miraculous work of art, a masterpiece unlike any other ever created in the history of the world."

Say this: "I am a genius. I am a lucky, plucky, good-sucking genius."

In my dream last night, bad guys wearing white hats constrained you in a canvas straitjacket, then further wrapped you up with heavy steel chain secured by three padlocks. They drove you to a weedy field behind an abandoned warehouse and left you there in the pitch dark. But you were indomitable. By dawn, you had miraculously wriggled your way out of your confinement. Then you walked back home, free and undaunted. Here's my interpretation of the dream: You now have special skills as an escape artist. No cage can hold you. No riddle can stump you. No tangle can confuse you. (P.S.: For best results, trust yourself even more than you usually do.)

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Need more help in figuring out the questions life is asking you? Crave more support in your efforts to build your courage? Check out 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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In some spiritual traditions, devotees attempt an arduous process of self-transformation as they retrain themselves to perceive the world from God's point of view. If they succeed, they're honored with an initiation ritual and given a new name to consecrate their altered state.

I have the same problem with this custom that I have with the idea of enlightenment: Once isn’t enough. Just as anyone in his or her right spiritual mind has a duty to keep claiming fresh varieties of enlightenment until the end of time, so should the initiations and renamings continue forever.

In my opinion, these considerations apply to you. You may not have sequestered yourself for years in a mountaintop monastery, and you may not have risen every morning at 5 a.m. to say prayers for hours, but you are an authentic devotee who has undergone equivalent ordeals. Your spiritual transformation has unfolded as you've dealt with the challenges of daily life during our epic moment in history, when unprecedented levels of annihilation and resurrection are the norm.

You have earned the right, therefore, to enjoy enlightenment after enlightenment and initiation after initiation and renaming after renaming.

I invite you to get started with a do-it-yourself initiation ceremony. It doesn't have to be long and complicated, and you can create it yourself. As an example of what you might do, here's a ritual that some Beauty and Truth Laboratory's initiates have performed: 1. Eat a pinch of dirt to declare your solidarity with Mother Earth. 2. Burn a five-dollar bill to purify your relationship with symbols of wealth. 3. Kick yourself in the ass to affirm your ongoing intention to discipline your shadow.

As one of your initiatory rewards, consider adopting a fresh alias during this and every initiation you carry out in the future. You can abandon your existing name if you want, or simply add your new tag to the current mix.

To celebrate the occasion, I invoke on your behalf the inspiration of all shedding things. Your tree of power will be the eucalyptus, whose bark peels away to reveal fresh layers beneath. Your lucky symbol will be the molting snake. Your sacred insect will be the silverfish, which bursts through its exoskeleton as it grows a new and bigger one. Your role model will be Japanese artist Hokusai (1760–1849), who had such a passionate commitment to reinventing himself that he celebrated 60 births, each time giving himself a new name.

The next four weeks will be a favorable time to come all the way home. Here are nine prompts for how to accomplish that: 1. Nourish your roots. 2. Strengthen your foundations. 3. Meditate about where you truly belong. 4. Upgrade the way you attend to your self-care. 5. Honor your living traditions. 6. Make a pilgrimage to the land where your ancestors lived. 7. Deepen your intimacy with the earth. 8. Be ingenious about expressing your tenderness. 9. Reinvigorate your commitment to the influences that nurture and support you.

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What fresh blessings will life bring you? What questions should you be asking? To explore the ripening trends further, tune in 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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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.

What tools will work best for the tasks you'll be invited to perform in the coming weeks? A sledgehammer or tweezers? Pruning shears or a sewing machine? A monkey wrench or a screwdriver? Here's my guess: Always have your entire toolbox on hand. You may need to change tools in mid-task -- or even use several tools for the same task. I can envision at least one situation that would benefit from you alternating between a sledgehammer and tweezers.

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Want to explore this chapter of your life story even further? Dig deeper? Push harder? Consider tuning in to your EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES.

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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'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.

I'm confident that I will never again need to moonlight as a janitor or dishwasher in order to pay my bills. My gig as a horoscope columnist provides me with enough money to eat well, so it's no longer necessary to shoplift bread or scavenge for dented cans of beets in grocery store dumpsters. What accounts for my growing financial luck? I mean besides the fact that I have been steadily improving my skills as an oracle and writer? I suspect it may in part have to do with my determination to cultivate generosity. As I've become better at expressing compassion and bestowing blessings, money has flowed to me in greater abundance. Would this strategy work for you? The coming weeks and months will be a good time to experiment.

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You're got more strength and intelligence than you realize. For help in accessing those untapped inner resources, tune in 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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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."

Here's my translation of a passage from the ancient Gospel of Thomas, a gnostic text about the teachings of Jesus: "If you do not awaken and develop the potential talents that lie within you, they will damage you. If you do awaken and develop the potential talents that lie within you, they will heal you." Whether you actually awaken and develop those talents or not depends on two things: your ability to identify them clearly and your determination to bring them to life with the graceful force of your willpower. I call this to your attention, Libra, because the coming months will be a highly favorable time to expedite the ripening of your talents. And it all starts NOW.

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How are you going to change what needs to be changed and accept what needs to be accepted? To get some support from me, tune in 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."

You can't completely eliminate unhelpful influences and trivial saboteurs and debilitating distractions from your life. But you're entering a phase of your astrological cycle when you have more power than usual to diminish their effects. To get started in this gritty yet lofty endeavor, try this: Decrease your connection with anything that tends to demean your spirit, shrink your lust for life, limit your freedom, ignore your soul, compromise your integrity, dishonor your reverence, inhibit your self-expressiveness, or alienate you from what you love.

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Sometimes it's a challenge to try to figure out what's important and what's not important. If you'd like more of my input, tune in 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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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.

Work too much and push yourself too hard, Sagittarius. Eat corn chips for breakfast, ice cream for lunch, and French fries for dinner -- every day, if possible. And please please please get no more than four hours' sleep per night. If you have any extra time, do arduous favors for friends and intensify your workout routine. JUST KIDDING! Don't you dare heed any of that ridiculous advice. In fact, I suggest you do just the opposite. Dream up brilliant excuses not to work too much or push too hard. Treat yourself to the finest meals and best sleep ever. Take your mastery of the art of relaxation to new heights. Right now, the most effective way to serve your long-term dreams is by having as much fun, joy, and release as possible.

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How well is your imagination working these days? Could it use a boost? A prod? A jolt of inspiration? Try tuning in 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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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.

I propose that you and I make a deal. Here's how it would work: For the next three weeks, I will say three prayers for you every day. I will ask God, Fate, and Life to send you more of the recognition and appreciation you deserve. I will coax and convince them to give you rich experiences of being seen for who you really are. Now here's what I ask of you in return: You will rigorously resolve to act on your core beliefs, express your noblest desires, and say only what you truly mean. You will be alert for those times when you start to stray from the path with heart, and you will immediately get yourself back on that path. You will be yourself three times stronger and clearer than you have ever been before.

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Want more clues? Need further insight? For more evocative questions and pithy suggestions about your unfolding destiny, check out 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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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.

If you loosen yourself up by drinking an alcoholic beverage, don't drive a forklift or ride a unicycle. If you have a hunch that your luck at gambling is peaking, don't buy lottery tickets or play the slot machines. If you're drawn to explore the frontiers of intimacy, be armed with the ancient Latin maxim, *Primum non nocere,* or "First, do no harm." And if you really do believe it would be fun to play with fire, bring a fire extinguisher with you. In presenting this cautionary advice, I'm not saying that you should never push the limits or bend the rules. But I want to be sure that as you dare to experiment, you remain savvy and ethical and responsible.

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How much do you want to know about your life? How far do you dare to go in your quest for self-mastery? For more insight into your intriguing fate, tune in 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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I'm allergic to dogma. I thrive on the riddles. Any idea I believe, I reserve the right to disbelieve as well.

But more than any other vision I've ever tested, pronoia describes the way the world actually is. It's wetter than water, stronger than death, and truer than the news. It smells like cedar smoke in early spring rain, and if you close your eyes right now, you can feel it shimmering like the aurora borealis in your organs and muscles. Its song is your blood's song.

Some people argue that life is strife and suffering is normal. Others swear we're born sinful and only heaven can provide us with the peace that passes understanding. But pronoia says that being alive on the rough green and brown earth is the highest honor and privilege. It's an invitation to work wonders and perform miracles that aren't possible in any nirvana, promised land, or afterlife.

I'm not exaggerating or indulging in poetic metaphor when I tell you that we are already living in paradise. Visualize it if you dare. The sweet stuff that quenches all of our longing is not far away in some other time and place. It's right here and right now.

Poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning knew the truth: "Earth's crammed with heaven."

I invite you to explore the healing power of sex. The coming weeks will be a favorable time to do so. You are also likely to generate good fortune for yourself if you try to fix any aspect of your erotic life that feels wounded or awkward. For best results, suspend all your theories about the way physical intimacy should work in your life. Adopting a beginner's mind could lead you to subtly spectacular breakthroughs. (P.S. You don't necessarily need a partner to take full advantage of this big opening.)

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Would you like to hear more about the hidden factors influencing your life? Do you want to uncover the secrets you've been hiding even from yourself? 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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Most religions designate a special class of people -- priests, rabbis, ayatollahs -- to oversee official communications with the Source. This has led to a prevailing assumption, even among those who don't follow an established faith, that we can't initiate a divine conversation without the aid of a professional class of trained mediators. Among some sects of the ancient gnostics, in contrast, everyone was regarded as a potential prophet who could experience epiphanies worthy of becoming part of the ever-evolving doctrine.

As you create your own spiritual path, experiment with this approach. What might you do to eliminate the middleman and commune directly with the Source?

Name the ways you already use this approach, and brainstorm about others you might like to try.