Ariana Grande, Lana Del Ray, and Sandra Oh, all Cancers.
Photo-Illustration: by The Cut; Photos: Getty Images
Two planetary retrogrades begin this week: First, Saturn starts moving backward in Aries early Sunday morning, and then, early Friday morning, Mercury reverses course in Leo. During Saturn retrograde, which lasts until late November, you’ll have a chance to reflect on your responsibilities. If you’re feeling dragged down by meaningless busywork or constrained by unnecessarily rigid structures, now is the time to think about what needs to change. Mercury retrograde is shorter, lasting just over three weeks, but you’ll probably feel its effects more intensely. With the planet of communication moving backward through bold, persuasive Leo, it’ll be easy to get dragged into arguments you don’t actually care about, or to overbook yourself socially. Remind yourself to slow down and think through your actions, and you’ll avoid any serious headaches. In the meantime, find the weekly horoscope for each zodiac sign, below.
It might feel like your mind is moving faster than anyone else can keep up with this week. It’s frustrating to feel like you’re constantly having to stop and explain yourself; you wish others could just get on your level. Do your best to be patient: Just because your ideas seem perfectly simple to you, that doesn’t mean they make sense to anyone else. As much as you’re eager to keep moving forward at your own pace, putting in the effort to clarify your thinking to others will be well worth your time.
When life isn’t going your way, it can be easy to start imagining that frustrations and setbacks are the natural state of things, and you’d be foolish to hope for anything better. Try to remember that there’s a difference between realism and cynicism: You can accept that some roadblocks are inevitable without giving up hope for more. It’s still possible for good things to happen, and it’s up to you not to get so fixated on the bad that you don’t see the opportunities.
When exciting new people and opportunities enter your life, it could be tempting to drop all your usual responsibilities and routines in order to pursue them. But while big, reckless life changes aren’t always the worst idea — sometimes, they’re the best way to get out of a rut — it’s likely to create unforeseen problems for yourself this week. If there are deeper issues in your life, you won’t fix them by jumping at every shiny new thing that presents itself. Slow down and consider things carefully before making any changes.
You’re smart enough not to accept the easy answers; you’d rather dig deep and find the truth than settle for a comforting platitude. Occasionally, though, this means that you overthink things. If you’re not getting along with a friend, you imagine it must be driven by a profound incompatibility when the problem is simply a bad mood. If you’re unhappy with your life, you worry the cause must be something multilayered and profound when you just had a frustrating day at work. Consider the simple answers before you start looking for anything more complicated this week.
Part of you wants to dig in your heels at the very suggestion that you could change. The way you see it, you are who you are, and others need to accept that if they want to be in your life. On one hand, that’s true; you shouldn’t have to change your core self to make someone else happy. But this week, remember that this doesn’t mean you’re stuck exactly as you are now. Some of your traits and innate talents might be fixed, but others can shift and evolve over time. Leave yourself room to grow.
It can feel like everyone underestimates you. Even if you can tell that they enjoy your company, you sometimes suspect that they don’t quite recognize your complexities and hidden depths. It might be tempting to set out to prove them all wrong, to show that you’re more complicated and more interesting than anybody gives you credit for, but try to resist the impulse this week. Chasing others’ approval won’t work and will only make you feel worse about yourself. Trust that plenty of people do fully see and appreciate you, even if you don’t feel it at the moment.
You’re good at smoothing over conflict, but that doesn’t make it your responsibility to manage every petty drama that arises in your friend group or community. This week, taking it upon yourself to deal with everyone else’s interpersonal issues won’t feel satisfying, just stressful — and there’s a chance your efforts, however well intentioned, might only make things worse. If you feel genuinely moved to get involved, remember that, sometimes, you can be most helpful by giving people the space and support to sort their issues out on their own.
In general, you don’t worry much about others’ opinions; as long as you feel good about your actions, that’s enough. But this week, you might start to worry that this attitude is hindering you — that if you were more focused on climbing the ranks and racking up impressive achievements, your life would be somehow better. In reality, competing with others for prizes you don’t even care about won’t make you any happier, so try not to get drawn into the fray. If you can live with integrity and work toward goals that are genuinely meaningful to you, you’ll be ahead of many people.
You aren’t someone who fears change; if anything, you tend to welcome it. You understand that when you’re feeling unhappy or stuck, it’s generally better to take a leap and try something new than to stew without taking action. This week, though, it might be easy to put too much faith into the possibility that reckless actions will fix your whole life. This isn’t the time to be jumping at every random opportunity that comes your way. For now, it’s better to be slow and thoughtful than impulsive.
You understand that the occasional bad mood or bad day is inevitable: It doesn’t necessarily signal anything wrong, it’s just part of the ebb and flow of life. It might be easy to forget that this week, though; you’ll imagine that every bad feeling is a sign that you’ve made all the wrong decisions, that your life is falling apart, that you need to make some serious changes starting immediately. Try to be patient. If your discontent doesn’t pass, then you can start making plans to deal with it, but there’s a good chance you’ll feel differently soon.
In conversations with the people you’re close with this week, don’t automatically assume that you understand each other. Even if you’re normally on the same page, small miscommunications could easily creep in and you’ll be talking at cross-purposes without realizing it. It doesn’t have to grow into a bigger problem, as long as you make an extra effort to communicate. Listen to what your friend is actually saying, not just what you imagine they really mean — and don’t be surprised if it takes a bit more effort to get your meaning across, too.
The people around you could seem hypercritical this week. Nothing you do feels like quite enough: No matter what you achieve, they have criticisms, and no matter how well your methods work, they still have ideas about what you could have done differently. It would be easy to let the constant nitpicking get in your head and make you doubt yourself — but while it’s valuable to be open to feedback in general, right now, everyone’s complaints probably have more to do with them than with you.
Read the weekly horoscopes for the week of July 6–12. The weekly horoscopes for the week of July 20 will be online next Sunday.
Buy Claire Comstock-Gay’s book, Madame Clairevoyant’s Guide to the Stars, here.
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