At A Threshold: Forecast for Jan. 30 – Feb. 5

My New Year’s Reading Specials have been extended through midnight EST Tuesday, January 31. Grab these great rates while you can! Read more.

This is a week of packing (or growing) up, moving on and standing motionless inside the threshold of our new space. It’s like closing down your dorm room after graduation knowing that your time there is over for good, entering your new place and plopping down on the coach for a bit before you tackle putting your belongings in order.

We’re finishing up lots of business that won’t be with us much longer and firming up others that will with going on with us. Relationships are the arena that is most widely and obviously playing out this dichotomy. Some are falling apart. Perhaps you’ve noticed? Old fixes aren’t doing their job. If a relationship isn’t working now, we can now longer put it back together with string and chewing gum. Not all relationships are going through gloom and doom, though. Some are blossoming, flourishing, growing stronger and more supportive.

The years 1983 and 1998 have a lot to do with this end of the week’s process. The 1983 connection belongs to Saturn, the enforcer of rules and defender of the established order. As he was in that year, he is hunkered down at the end of the relationship sign Libra, bringing all kinds of associations and arrangements to a close, to solidifying or commitment, or to a new structure.

This time, though, Saturn is working with an influence that wasn’t present in 1983. That influence is tied to 1998 and Neptune, who unhinges us from mundane experience through any number of means — from insanity and substance abuse to confusion, deceit and escapism to artistry and spirituality. He’s finishing up his 14-year journey through Aquarius and is also at the last degree of his sign, which he leaves on Friday. He will not pass this way again during our lifetimes.

The connection between Saturn and Neptune has dreams coming down to earth, illusions crumbling into dust, and inspiration turning into solid, physical form. See if you can connect the dots between 1983 and the journey you’ve been on since 1998. How did developments in 1983 lead to a vision that you’ve pursued for the past 14 years? What aspects of that vision proved workable; which did not? The beginning of the week has clarity in store.

After that, fog rolls in. Neptune enters his home sign of Pisces on Friday, where he will remain until 2026. He’ll dissolve boundaries, heighten universal awareness of otherworldly aspects of existence and immerse us in the interconnectedness of all beings.

This is not all sunshine, lollipops and rainbows by any means. Water, oil, alcohol and drugs (street and prescription) will play ongoing and not always welcome roles. There will be reasons to hold hands and sing Kumbaya (likely precipitated by events involving those afore-mentioned players), but there will also be surges in media manipulation and lies, doctoring photos and film/video footage and using film, TV and Internet images to romanticize or blur perceptions of reality and history. Physical evidence and guideposts will not be consistently reliable. We’ve already got the fix for this: Our own inner knowing and guidance will tell us what is real and what is hooey, more than our physical senses will. (If you do not have my visualization for activating your internal guidance system, you can get it here.)

This first year of his time in Pisces will have us swimming in fascinating paradox. Neptune, the planet that takes us out of physicality, is traveling with Chiron, the dwarf planet that challenges us to master physicality. We’re learning through living that spirit and earth are not separate realms, but one continuum. The same applies to the differences we draw between groups of humans, or humans and animals, or humans and the natural resources of this planet.

Situations will arise that drive home the fragility of our waters (the Deepwater well blew out in the Gulf of Mexico within hours of Chiron entering Pisces). The impact of droughts or floods in one region on other parts of the country, continent or globe. The encroachment of prescription drugs on our daily routine. Our dependence on oil and ramifications to which we blind ourselves.

This will not happen all at once, though it’s entirely possible that one dramatic event next weekend will launch Neptune’s voyage. (Watch the news, and let me know if you spot one.) For most of us, this next phase will come in like fog, inclining us to move slowly and carefully.

That inclination fits in with the stillness being imposed elsewhere in the sky. Mars, the planet of action, and timekeeper Saturn are motionless, for all intents and purposes. Neither is moving out of his current degree this week. Mars is retrograde (read more about that in my forecast for the week of January 23), and Saturn is stationing to go retrograde next week. Put them together and you’ve got the sensation that time has stopped.

Rather than barreling ahead through the fog, we are suspended in each moment, with movement and progress occurring on such a minute level that we probably don’t perceive it. Think of this time as stop-action animation, or one of those old Disney nature films that tracked a flower’s blossoming. At the end, in retrospect, we’ll see the constant and even quick passage of time. The way it feels now is slower than baby steps. Be gentle.

Read the day to day forecasts here.

Listen to my five-minute-ish podcast for the week.

Time Stops….Forecast for Jan. 23-29, 2012

Surely this has happened to you: You head out for a day’s worth of errands and are making really good time when you start wondering whether you left the iron on. Or maybe it was the oven, or the back door, or something else in a condition that could endanger your home.

Oh, yeah, you know this phenomenon. And you know what happens next: You search for a memory to shut up the thought…and you come up blank. You don’t want to spend the day worrying, and you certainly don’t want to risk coming home to fire trucks or a burglary. So you turn around, because there’s no point in continuing on till you know for certain.

That’s where we are now. The year’s first big shift in energy has arrived, and it’s going to lure us back over territory we’ve recently traveled. Mars, the planet that rules action, drive and ambition, is stationing to go retrograde for just under three months.

Three. Months.

Yes, that’s a long time. Mars generally blasts his way through a sign in a matter of weeks. Uncharacteristically, he’s spending the entire first half of the year in Virgo, and half of that retrograde. His energy is most comfortable in all-systems-go mode, so it’s probable that shifting into reverse is going to kick up some discomfort and resistance, not to mention irritation, resentment and frustration.

Now, Mars retrograding does not mean that all progress will stall, much as some people react to any inner planet retrograde as a threat to Life As We Know It. The sun will continue to rise. Plants will continue to sprout and blossom. Developments will continue to unfold and grow.

In fact, this about-face has benefits, and they are practical and tangible indeed. Just as Jupiter injected Miracle-Gro into the Taurus area of our lives during his retrograde last fall, Mars is now improving the Virgo aspects of our existence. We get a do-over.

Read the rest of my extended weekly forecast, including the daily entries.

Learn more in my five-minute podcast.

And in my forecast for the Aquarius New Moon.

Gotta Be Me: Aquarius New Moon

January 22-23, 2012
11:41 PM PDT /2:41 AM PM EDT / 7:41 AM GMT
2 Aquarius 41

January’s New Moon kicks off the theme that will unfold all year and beyond: brassy, radical individualism confronting the status quo. We’ll be witnessing and experiencing a tug of war between those two influences well into 2015. For now, we’re stepping into the mode that we will use to navigate this ever-changing landscape.

This Aquarius New Moon is liberating, energizing and catalyzing, while recognizing the presence — and importance — of our social context. Each one of us is a free agent, but no one inhabits a planet of one. Our actions affect other people and have consequences for our relationships and agreements. Sometimes the agreements have to give; sometimes we do. This Moon fuels that dichotomy.

Our rules, agreements and conventions create the walls that humans need to coexist in society, much like predictably enforced rules giving young children a sense of security and safety. And just as children test the rules to explore their own power and identity, we are now pushing back against all manner of norms. They’ve defined and supported our lives in the past, but now they are up for challenge and testing.

This New Moon amps up a high-voltage drive to challenge, to break free, to take risks and to pursue our unique, individual paths. Accept the impulses, brainstorms and out of the blue opportunities that erupt now, even — especially — if they veer from your expectations. The ones that truly suit and support your uniqueness have every likelihood of opening up and flourishing.

That’s because the New Moon is making a tight cooperative aspect to its ruler Uranus, the awakener, the rebel, the bringer of the unexpected and alternate perspectives. This combination can shake you out of the winter doldrums and fan your inner flame. No matter how trying and difficult the last few months have been for you — and they have been daunting for a lot of people — this is the moment of crawling out of the hole — no, bursting out of the hole. See if you don’t feel this week that you’ve got your groove back. Life feels fun and hopeful again, and you have the enthusiasm and energy to jump into the game.

Yeah, Mars is stationing retrograde today and suspending you in time. With the furnace-stoking this Moon delivers, that’s not such a bad development. That only prolongs your sensation of enjoying the moment. And it offers you a longer, more careful look at the rules, agreements and conventions that delimit your life — the walls against which you are now pushing.

And that’s because the New Moon is making a square, or challenge, aspect to Saturn at the last degree of Libra. This pressure forces a review and action on the relationship laboratory we’ve been in since the fall of 2009, when Saturn entered Libra for the first time in some 30 years. Since then we’ve been grappling with issues of reciprocity and renegotiating ground rules and specific relationships alike. Now the impulse is firing to take what we’ve learned in the lab and push out on our own.

Stifling agreements are up for rewriting or breaking. Solid ones will come through this strengthened. All of them provide a surface from which to push off, in much the same way that a swimmer uses the edge of the pool when doing laps.

We’ve been heading for some time toward a new relationship model, that replaces codependence and neediness with intact individuals choosing to travel alongside each other. This New Moon shoves us all toward the new model.

We have no choice but to respond to that shove and express our individuality. The New Moon is also squaring Jupiter, the planet of expansion and across the sky from rule-protecting Saturn. This line-up creates a dynamic configuration called a t-square and funnels simultaneous pressure from Jupiter and Saturn right into the New Moon. The way out of the pressure is Leo, which rules our personality, our inner child and our need to express ourselves out in public. No more hiding. Come out and show the world who you are, dramatically, flamboyantly and playfully.

So take bold, daring, innovative action, the truer to yourself, the better, and let the chips fall where they may. There will be consequences. There will be changes. There will be surprises. All of them ultimately benefit you. Proceed with integrity and you’ll be fine.

© Kathy Biehl 2012. All Rights Reserved. You may forward this article as long as the copyright notice is intact. No part may be used or reprinted without my prior written permission. Karma, ya know.

48-Hour Reading Specials!

Have you been thinking about treating yourself to a reading? You won’t get a better deal from me this year!

From now till 2 PM on Sunday, January 22, 2012:

Astrology consultations are $100 for 45 minutes (otherwise $120); $120 for 60 minutes (otherwise $150).
Tarot consultations are $50 for 30 minutes (otherwise $60), $80 for 45 minutes (otherwise $100) and $100 for 60 minutes (otherwise $120).

Buy one for yourself; buy one as a gift — or more; there’s no limit!

Sessions must take place by 5PM EST on March 31, 2012.

Read more and order at EmpowermentUnlimited.net!

Snail’s Pace: Forecast for Jan. 16-22

This is the last week to push and prod for a while. Next week brings the end of the lovely stretch of progress we’ve been enjoying, thanks to every single planet being direct. So make hay while the sun’s shining!

Plan, work, apply and exert yourself and generally go for it. You may not break out or through (yet). You may not hit your big target or goals (yet). Progress, though, will be real and tangible…if slow.

The slowness is due to one of the three main astro-events of the week. Mars, the planet that rules our action, drive and energy, is reaching the degree where he will turn around and retrograde on the 23rd. This will have an effect on how we experience the pace of life.

That rarely feels quick when Mars is in any earth sign; stationing to go retrograde in one will make life feel as if it has gone into slo-mo — or, just as possibly, as if time is stretching. See if you don’t settle into a task, look up after what feels like an eon and see that the clock has hardly moved.

Go with it. The goal this week isn’t reaching any particular destination; it’s simply engaging in incremental action. Mars is stationing to go retrograde in the most careful, analytical, pain-staking, detail-oriented sign, Virgo. We can’t rush ahead. We can’t skip steps. We can’t broad brush or gloss over anything, or flip to the end of the book. (Sorry, all you fiery types and, yes, I share your pain.)

But we can take action, however small it might be. Push this week. Stretch. It’s okay if this week’s efforts are incomplete or imperfect. Attention to the task is more important than the outcome. We’ll have lots of time to go over everything with a fine-toothed comb. Mars will be retrograde for nearly three months, an unusually long time for the god of gung-ho. We will be rethinking and reworking and retooling and cleaning up and perfecting our lives on a near-microscopic level.

For now, get moving, on anything and everything that you would like to bring to fruition later this year. Do something even if it’s symbolic. You can flesh it out and polish it later. Just start.

As for the rest of the action in the sky: Another round of heart-healing and letting ourselves off the hook is on tap with Venus crossing Chiron. Forgiveness begins at home, you know, and the place to start is in the mirror. You could open to a more compassionate perspective on all manner of relationship history and issues, particularly that recurring one that leaves you feeling so alone and misunderstood.

And speaking of being misunderstood, the Sun shifts on Friday into the sign for which that’s so often the case, Aquarius. His entry into this idiosyncratic, progressive energy injects some objectivity and breathing room into the mundane, practical, make-it-happen emphasis in the sky. When he links to Aquarius’ ruler Uranus on Saturday, we’ve got the impetus (and invitation) to do things our way.

For another take on this week’s events, listen to my five-minute (ish) podcast.

2012 Astro-Overview

Join me Tuesday, January 17 for my astro-overview of 2012 by conference call. I’ll discuss the year season by season, from the times of growth and the retrogrades to the outer planet sign shifts and the first big clashes of the change aspects. 9 PM EST. Only $20; register here. Everyone on the call will receive an mp3 of the talk. Not sure you can make it? Register anyway to receive the mp3 as soon as it’s ready.

Heart Light: Forecast for Jan. 9-15, 2012

Get ready for another week of steady, forward progress. We’re still in a rare stretch of every single planet being in direct motion. Nothing in the sky is getting in our ways. Nothing is making big demands on us, either…for the most part. This week’s aspects are nudges instead of shoves, whispers instead of orders, suggestions instead of ultimatums … for the most part.

I’ll explain the allusion in a few paragraphs. But first: How have you been doing with the pace? Have you had slow-building momentum or a dizzying rush? Most of the people around me are in the first category. If you’re in the first, take heart; your efforts are indeed getting somewhere (and somewhere you want to be, to boot). If you’re in the second, find your moments and points of ballast/balance and sink into them. They will prove very, very useful. What we’re getting now is a warm-up for the acceleration we’ll experience in the spring, when the glimmers of hope and growth you’re seeing will erupt into bloom.

Keep looking to the future, even when you’re dealing with the past. Some of that will continue to wash up at the beginning of the week, as Sunday/Monday’s Cancer Full Moon gradually recedes. Waves of emotion will continue to crest for a bit, drawing attention to issues of home, security, belonging, nurturing, support and success. We’re seeing the logical (and, in some cases, completely illogical — nothing rational about a Cancer Moon!) outgrowths of decisions and reprioritizing that have been going on for the past 18 months.

Some of the outgrowths will be reassuring, some bittersweet, some nostalgic. All of them are signs of your personal evolution — the happier ones showing how loved you are (or how far you’ve come), the others pointing to chapters that are (or require) closing. In many instances, there’s really nothing overt for you to do besides acknowledge and accept what has washed away, like writing in the sand at the edge of the ocean.

The rest of the week, with the exception of Friday, has a dearth of major aspects, even to the Moon. Influences are subtle, nuanced, vague, just uncomfortable enough to egg on ambitions, motivations and momentum. We’ll have plenty of incentive to keep plugging along, and lots of teeny irritants to discourage growing complacent or feeling stuck.

The main event — the exception to “for the most part” — peaks on Friday. We’ll be seeing a build-up all week, but so much crystalizes on that day, which brings unprecedented clarity, truth and sacrifice. We are completing a significant chapter in the journey of our hearts and spirits, one that we will never experience again.

Four big events happen on Friday. Jupiter, the planet of growth and expansion, finally moves from the first degree of Taurus, where it has been seemingly lounging for the past three weeks or so. Moving an inch has the impact of traveling a mile; see if it doesn’t.

Venus, ruler of what we value (relationships, money, talents, possessions), makes a stabilizing, grounding link to Saturn, the bringer of rules and order, who’s occupying the last degree of the relationship sign Libra (and one of Venus’ homes). What’s important to us settles in; whew. We’re setting up structures and commitments for the future, built on reciprocity and mutual independence (ponder that one), affecting and supporting our whole web.

Mercury, who rules what we think and say and how we get around, meets up with potent, all-transforming Pluto. Thoughts are crystal clear and bottom line. We are brutally, ruthlessly honest with ourselves and with others. Messages and conversations are enormously important, to the point of life-changing. They clarify. They end. They cut away. They simplify. They empower. While they may not be fit for a Hallmark greeting card, they’re not necessarily cruel or vicious, though. In fact, they are likely to be expressions of love.

That’s because the two planets of love, earthly and spiritual, are meeting on Friday at the last degree of Aquarius, just before Venus moves into Pisces and a few weeks before Neptune follows suit. The vibe has staying power throughout the weekend, too, since Venus and Neptune are meeting again on Sunday, that time by declination. When earthly love meets the divine, hearts swell with compassion and understanding and a gentle sweetness pervades everything else in the sky. (Hence the Mercury/Pluto developments really being for the best.) This particularly meeting has definite contours, though, and not merely from, again, those Mercury/Pluto developments.

This is the last time in our lives that Venus and Neptune will conjoin in the sign of Aquarius. It’s the last time that we will experience the merging of worldly and higher love as a futuristic, progressive concept. It will be far more immediate, real and a natural way of life when they next meet, in Pisces in two years, when we will have first-hand familiarity with the universal waters that connect all existence. (Yes, we’re in them now; what will be different is our level of awareness of that.)

As the aspect builds, the week will take on more and more of an era-ending quality. We are wrapping up a cycle that began in February 1998. Since then Neptune has been obscuring, softening and dissolving situations and issues connected to the Aquarius area of our individual charts. During that time our existence has increasingly bridged the mundane world and spiritual realms, with people becoming more openly guided by a knowing that has little to do with the five physical senses.

Amazing clarity has clicked in since November, when Neptune ended his final retrograde in Aquarius and kicked into exit mode. Each of us is now viewing affected areas of our lives completely differently than we did fourteen years ago. A moment of peace is now coming. That peace involves letting all kinds of people off the hook and viewing them with love and compassion. You are at the top of that list.

On Saturday, Venus moves into Pisces for about three weeks. She is said to be “exalted” in this sign, because she takes on the highest, most inspired and spiritual qualities here. Within days she will meet with Chiron and continue the vibe of conciliation and forgiveness. The Golden Rule is firmly in effect, with a twist. Do unto others as you would do unto yourself — but start by treating yourself lovingly. The more you do, the more all your relations will follow suit.

For the day-by-day forecast, read the full weekly forecast at EmpowermentUnlimited.net.

Listen to my shorty-short podcast about the week at EmpowermentUnlimited.net or my page in the iTunes store.

Get ready for the aspects to come with my resources for navigating 2012.

Resources for Navigating 2012

It’s finally starting to feel like a new year, isn’t it? In honor of that I have compiled resources I offer to help you make the most of it.

My astro-overview of 2012 discusses the year season by season, from the times of growth and the retrogrades to the outer planet sign shifts and the first big clashes of the Uranus/Pluto square.

• By conference call, 9 PM EST (8 PM CT, 6 PM PT), Tues., Jan. 17. Only $20; register here. Everyone on the call will receive an mp3 of the talk.
• By mp3. Not sure you can make the conference call? Register anyway to receive the mp3 as soon as it’s ready.
• By live presentation, 7:30 PM ET at The Goddess in Eden (inside Blu Lotus), 20 Church St., Montclair, NJ. $20; does not include mp3 (but you get to talk to me in person!) Contact the store to register.

My 2-mp3 talk on the process and potentials of 2011-2013 gives lots of practical doable strategies. $30, or half-price if you order it with the 2012 overview. Order the mp3s alone here; get them half-price with the 2012 overview here.

My Jupiter in Taurus guides explore where good fortune is growing for you sign, through June 2012. $12 for one sign; $20 for two. Details here.

Your personal 2012 forecast by Tarot: only $25 for a month-by-month overview, up to 15 minutes. Email me (kbiehlATempowermentunlimited.net) to book! Available at this price only through Jan. 30.

Personal astrological consultation. $150 for a full consultation; $90 for a 30-minute SWAT look at what’s being activated in your chart; $200 for a relationship analysis. More information about my services is at my site, EmpowermentUnlimited.net. Email me (kbiehlATempowermentunlimited.net) to book!

Today’s Special: Comfort Food, by the Light of the Cancer Full Moon

January 8-9, 2012
11:30 PM PST / 2:30 AM EST / 7:30 AM GMT
18 Cancer 25 / 18 Capricorn 25

The beginning of the year naturally invites looking backward and forward. Our first month is named, in fact, for the two-headed Roman god Janus, who faces both directions simultaneously. The first Full Moon of the year follows that god’s lead. It turns our sights to the past — way back, further than you might expect — while firming up the pathway to the future.

The Cancer Full Moon is a late-to-over night event, peaking just before midnight on the West Coast and in the morning hours to the east. As this weekend approaches, watch for developments to take on the air of wrapping up. Long-standing sagas may or may not end, but episodes definitely will.

As emotions crest (and crest they will, with the Moon in her home base of Cancer), key situations may feel like they’re coming to a point of harvest or culmination, with family, tribal, goal or security issues likely to be involved. The question on your end will be how nurturing or nourishing the payoff turns out to be. In some cases, the answer will be yes; in others, you may feel a definite shortfall in emotional support and satisfaction.

The answers are likely to be a mixed bag. (And some people may be very, very, very sensitive, touchy, moody, sentimental and maudlin. Be kind.) Some should not be surprises, though. The story lines date back to the Cancer New Moon solar eclipse in the summer of 2010, when you sent out certain goals, energies or intentions having to do with your place in and comfort level with the world.

That eclipse, which occurred within one degree of this week’s Full Moon, was smack in the middle of the Cancer/Capricorn eclipse process, which pushed us into rebooting all manner of foundational issues: who we are, what we need to feel safe, where and with whom we feel safe and loved, what kind of family interaction we want, what we want in a relationship, what we want in a career or outside the home — all the big stuff. Now you get to see some of what’s come from that rebooting. Use the events and choices of 18 months ago as a framing device for what you see happening now.

Let emotions pour out, joyful and otherwise. You can’t think your way out of this kind of event. Your outpouring can, however, prep the ground for the future. For one thing, if you are mourning a disappointment or a passing, you are clearing out emotional space for other situations to come in. For another, the outpouring may be watering and priming your metaphoric garden.

And that’s where the future orientation of this Full Moon comes in. Mars, the planet of our drive, ambition and actions, is in harmonious contact with the Sun and the Moon. Mars in Virgo encourages healthy, deliberate, considered, narrow-lensed and incremental steps. He’s into cleaning, perfecting, taking time and measuring two, three, even four times before cutting. His easy flow to the Sun puts all those qualities into an effortless collaboration with our conscious personalities and makes following his lead the natural course of action. He’s got the Moon’s cooperation, too, bringing our emotional selves on board with whatever step-by-step program we launch as a result of this Full Moon.

This teamwork furthers the practical, down-to-earth, making-it-real-and-tangible imperative of the ongoing grand trine in earth (which I just, appropriately, mistyped as “ground trine” — you may quote me). It’s a lovely and manifesting round robin of energy flowing from Jupiter to Mars to Pluto, which will bring more refocusing in March and then, at last, a grand blossoming around the spring equinox.

The emotional information you receive from this Full Moon plays into that refocusing and blossoming both. You’ll see where you’re watering stone and where you’re watering fertile earth; where to continue to invest your heart and where to move on.

If you can’t address everything right now, don’t push or beat up on yourself. You have other shots at tinkering with the garden. Besides the promised refocusing in March, when Jupiter and Pluto trine one more time, Mars will rework this turf, too. He goes retrograde on the 23rd and will cross his current degree again in February and once more in June.

For now, give the controls to the little kid inside you. What was going on with him/her two summers ago? What’s going on now? What feels good? What doesn’t? Then project yourself a few months ahead. What would s/he prefer to be feeling then? Best of all, draw a line from summer 2010 to next summer. What next chapter feel best?

I have lots of resources for navigating 2012 at my main site EmpowermentUnlimited.net, from talks to guides to personal Tarot forecasts. Drop by, why don’t you?

© Kathy Biehl 2012. All Rights Reserved. You may forward this article as long as the copyright notice is intact. No part may be used or reprinted without my prior written permission. Karma, ya know.

An Easy Intro to a Startling Year: Forecast for Jan 2-8, 2012

Happy New Year! Yes, the much ballyhooed 2012 is here at last. Are you shivering with antici….pation? Probably not. You wouldn’t know 2012’s here except for the change in the calendar. The memorable nature of this year will make itself unmistakably known in a few months, but as for now, the sky is hardly tipping its hand. It’s not even delivering a week with anything noticeably new, much less the feeling of the start of a new year.

What we have instead is a dawning sense of progress, slow, steady and palpable. For a rare, welcome and brief change, all the planets are in direct motion, which translates down here into the feeling — and actuality — of getting somewhere at last.

Developments may not be quick, dramatic or huge just yet, because the preponderance of planets are inching along. Mars, the planet of action, barely covers two degrees of the painstaking sign of Virgo, and since he likes to go, go, go, this opposite of speed may spark frustration and nitpicking. Jupiter, the planet of growth, is even more leisurely. He’s in its second week of ambling through the first degree of Taurus, the sign most inclined to an unhurried pace. Slow doesn’t begin to describe this influence, but it promises a tangible payoff, as if Jupiter is slowly, carefully, methodically dousing the Taurus area of our charts with cosmic Miracle-Gro.

Work with this vibe. Don’t run around in a frenzy trying to force things to happen. Pace yourself. Tend to each tiny detail as it comes up. Make lists. Recraft your action items — and your resolutions, if you make them — from big goals or generalized targets into a sequence of steps. Incremental actions are leading you onward, rather than in a loop or back on themselves or into a repair shop, as was so often the case last fall.

Mars (drive and ambition), Jupiter (expansion) and Pluto (penetrating change) are all in earth signs, which means the forward motion is taking place in practical and mundane arenas of life. With Saturn (structure) and Neptune (inspiration) in an easy flow of energy, progressive, otherworldly visions of how life could be are coming down into reality and taking physical form. You are laying your path with solid and sturdy paving stones, working carefully on your garden and/or firming up the foundation for the next levels of your structure. (Pick as many metaphors as you like).

Our thought processes and communication flow get on board with this when Mercury takes on the long-term goal orientation of Capricorn on Sunday. The emotional side of the process heightens, too, with the build-up of the Cancer Full Moon just before midnight Sunday on the West Coast and on Monday elsewhere in the northern hemisphere. (More on the Full Moon in my report, which will be posted by Saturday.)

So we get to ease into this year and into forward motion, without any violent lurching or whiplash. Lord knows, there’s still plenty to sort out and put in order from the Plutonian activity that marked the holiday season. This week has the space for that and more. Settle into each moment. Look up occasionally for an idea of where the sequence is leading; take the time to bring form to your vision of the future, too.

We’ll be backtracking again in a couple of weeks, when Mars goes retrograde. By spring, gardens will be sprouting and change will be busting out all over. For now, we have this optimism-inducing, potential-laden snail’s pace. Enjoy.

Visit my site for the day by day forecasts.

For another take on this week’s events, listen to my five-minute podcast. If you like it, please give it five stars on iTunes!

RESOURCES FOR 2012: I have two tools (so far!) for navigating this monumental year, which will not be like any in our lifetimes:
Jupiter in Taurus guides: Where you are cultivating good fortune, through June
It’s All in Your Mind mp3s: A discussion of this year’s eclipses and challenging aspects, with strategies for making the most of them