Does Trauma Make You Funny? Horoscopes May 11-17, 2026

Happy Mother’s Day to you, whether this day is full of celebration or grief. This week’s astrology brings up the topic of trauma and humor. I did not plan that for Mother’s Day, but it does tend to be a relevant topic….

Most of us have had the experience of surviving a terrible or traumatic situation and realizing after that it forced us to grow in ways we would not have otherwise.

Does that make trauma worth it? My take on that is no. It does not make trauma worth it and that there are many ways to grow that do not involve people harming each other. More trauma makes more trauma and more growth makes more growth. Even if we transmute trauma into growth, it does not mean we need to look for trauma to create growth or be grateful to abusers for the harm they caused.

However, the universe clearly did not consult me about my suggestion that we stop the trauma in its current set design, and most, if not all, of us experience trauma.

If we accept that wounding and vulnerability happen, even if we don’t want them to, what then?

While the early part of this week is calm, the weekend of May 16-17 allows us to take our wounding around authenticity and courage seriously and then find the humor in it. When we are fully in our authority over our lives, there is room for both. How people respond to our authenticity and humor around wounding is information about them, not us.

Lucille Bluth in Arrested Development enacting covert narcissism.

For horoscope principles this week, I am primarily looking at the following celestial events:

• Mercury in Taurus sextiles Jupiter in Cancer on Tuesday, May 12, 2026, at 9:43pm Pacific. This is a great day for big, practical thinking; nurturing conversation; or releasing that instructional video you created that describes how you planted your garden. The god of communication and thinking is in a supportive aspect with the god of expansion.

• Mercury goes conjunct the Sun in Taurus on Thursday, May 14, 2026, at 7:24am Pacific. This is called a “cazimi” and is thought to be a time of insight. Because this is in Taurus, the insight may be practical and sturdy, but slow to come.

• Mars goes conjunct Chiron in Aries on Saturday, May 16 at 7:24am Pacific. This is the last time this aspect will happen (and the last time we have conjunction between Chiron and a planet) in Aries for 40 years. If you look back at July 2020, June 2022, and May 2024, it will give you insight into the lessons this aspect is trying to teach you. For me, the lessons are about whether it is safe to show up authentically as myself, even if that is contrary to what other people want. I imagine that lesson will apply to many of our experiences with Chiron in Aries.

• The New Moon in Taurus happens on Saturday, May 16, 2026, at 1:00pm Pacific. The Full Moon this month happened on the same day as Mercury conjunct Chiron and this New Moon happens just after Mars conjunct Chiron. This asks you to embrace a new cycle in how you practically show up as yourself, even when it is vulnerable or triggers your wounding.

• Venus in Gemini sextiles Chiron in Aries on Sunday, May 17, 2026, at 11:03am Pacific. This is a sweet, supportive aspect between the goddess of love and the place where we are wounded around authenticity. Venus in Gemini brings lightness and fun to a space that has been hit by wounding. Does trauma make us funny? Venus in Gemini says yes.

• Mercury goes into Gemini on Sunday, May 17, 2026, at 3:26am Pacific. Mercury rules Gemini, and after slowing down in Taurus, they will likely be very ready for the trip into their fast-moving home. If your thinking and communication has felt bogged down, it will start to speed up.

• Mercury goes conjunct Uranus in Gemini on Sunday, May 17, 2026, at 11:03am Pacific. Mercury and Uranus are different than each other, but they are both related to the element of air in a certain way. Mercury rules thinking and communication, and Uranus rules electricity and the sky. Sometimes, these two together can create overload or fry out our thinking and electronics. However, this can be an opportunity for real invention and sudden bursts of insight.

• Neptune and Saturn are still in Aries; Pluto continues in Aquarius.

These are the principles to consider for the week of May 11, 2026. It is worth taking a look at both your rising and sun sign horoscopes (visit astro.com to find your rising sign):

Aries: You are too much for some people, and those people are not your people. Also, there is a difference between people not being correct for you and learning to respect other people’s boundaries. Both are important lessons in life. Early this week, you have the opportunity to receive brilliant ideas and have inspiring conversations around growing your money and home. Later in the week, the New Moon and Chiron aspects invite you to acknowledge where you are wounded around being too authentic, blunt, and courageous. Your closest coven members can help you sort the lessons from the hilarious jokes that come from this process.

Taurus: Telling the truth and saying the productive thing can be different, but often overlap more than we think. Just because someone likes you does not mean you were honest with them or that your communication was helpful. But, communicating from a place of deep authenticity and truth can be a space of wounding for you. Early in the week, you have support for showing up with the productive face you show to the world, but later in the week, the actions you take trigger your wounding around deep authenticity. Then, Venus reminds you that you value humor and lightness, and even deep authenticity does not need to be that serious.

Gemini: Internal Family Systems and astrology say that while we are one person, we are made up of many parts. As a Gemini, you have many faces you present to the world and understand many perspectives, and also it is important to you to be authentic with your friend and social groups. When who you truly are has many facets, this can create wounding around what it means to be authentic. Early in the week, your values around nurturing support your practical inner world. At the end of the week, action in your friend groups triggers your wounding around authenticity. Then, the universe reminds you that not everything needs to be serious, and a pivot is always an option.

Cancer: You know who you are and integrity in how you show up in your public-facing life is important to you. And, also, each person has a line where courage becomes martyrdom and hard work becomes overwork. This week supports you in showing up as your full, nurturing self in your friend groups early in the week. As the weekend comes, your wounding around showing up authentically and courageously in your public life gets triggered. Your unconscious remembers that being authentically you was never one fixed thing. You’re allowed to shift toward self-compassion and healing.

Leo: The great Madonna (the pop star one not Jesus’s mom) advises you, “Don’t go for second best, baby” but instead to “express yourself.” Early this week, her advice is particularly relevant to you, giving you the opportunity to express the expansion your unconscious is undergoing. Later in the week, activity related to long-distance travel or higher education brings up wounding around what it means to be authentically and courageously you. Your friend groups remind you that authenticity is not one thing, and bring humor in the midst of wounding.

Virgo: When you live in a country that is not the one you were born in (whether this is temporary or through immigration) you start to see the ideals you were raised with differently. A lot of people experience this as a sort of enlightenment experience and return to their home country with a sense that they’ve been given other-worldly wisdom. Early this week, you have the opportunity to communicate how higher education and travel have expanded who you are and your friend circles. Later in the week, wounding around taxes, other people’s money and values, or sex comes up, but your career supports you in integrating that wounding.

Libra: Harmony requires multiple perspectives, just like discord does. If you think about musical notes, the notes that are closest together create discord, but with space, notes create harmony. This week offers both discord and harmony to you. Early this week, the expansion you’ve experienced in your career supports how you communicate about sex, death, taxes, and other people’s money and values. At the end of the week, though, activity related to how you authentically partner brings up wounding. Remembering your ideals around freedom and lightness can bring healing to that wounding.

Scorpio: Some people say that what is good for you is good for everyone, but often, when we are authentic to who we truly are, other people are pretty mad at first. It may be good medicine for them, but people don’t always love medicine. Early this week is supportive in how you communicate the expansions you’ve had around travel, higher education, and ideals. As we get later in the week, though, your wounding around centering yourself in your daily routine comes up.

Sagittarius: You’ve probably heard of the concept of having a stage persona that is different from who you are to your friends and family (Beyonce as Sasha Fierce, for example). For you, on the other hand, it is important to be authentic in your creative endeavors and projects, as well as with your human children if you have them. In the early part of this week, your partners’ expanding values (or influx of money) supports how you communicate about your daily habits, but the weekend brings up wounding about how you authentically show up with creative projects or children. Rely on your partners to help transform your wounding into something light and even funny.

Capricorn: While we might want life to be black and white, unfortunately two things can be true at the same time. Early this week, the expansion you’re experiencing in how you partner, or your partners themselves, support how you communicate in your creative projects or with your children. Later in the week, though, action in your home and family triggers wounding you have around being authentically and courageously yourself. Find healing and lightness in your daily routine and habits.

Aquarius: Most people join cults because they are drawn in by promises of community, but one of the draws of community is ultimately the ability to outsource responsibility for our actions. I say this because you are typically not like that, and it is very important to you to show up authentically and courageously in your close community, but your wounding around what happens when you do that is coming up at the end of this week. While you are receiving support early in the week in your communications at home and with family, later in the week look to your creative projects or the children in your life to bring healing related to your wounding around authenticity in community.

Pisces: Our covens are our closest chosen communities. This week, how you communicate in your coven is supported by the expansion you are experiencing related to creative projects, children, or sex. Later in the week, activity related to your money and what you value triggers wounding you have around authenticity and courage. Look to your family, especially femme family members to turn that wounding into something lighter and funnier that offers healing.

Thanks for reading and fulfilling your natal promise! If you like these horoscopes, don’t forget to hit the like button and share them with someone who might get something out of them.

If you or someone you know would like to dive into their natal chart and learn more about their personal contract with the universe, sign up for a natal chart reading here.

Take Action Even If You Fail: Horoscopes May 4-10, 2026

I used to challenge myself to tangibly fail 5 times every month as a measurement of whether I was actually trying and learning or hiding. This was advice I first heard Ramit Sethi give on a podcast, and I will say it completely transformed how I saw failure.

In this exercise, I could only get credit for a failure if I took action toward one result and got a different result. I was not allowed, for example, to call it a failure if my boss was just unhappy.

This is a good week to consider that exercise. How many times recently have you taken so much action toward something you care about that you have actually gotten a different result than the one you wanted? How many times have you stopped yourself from taking action because you’ve been afraid you might get a result you didn’t want?

This week, release fail avoidance and reward yourself for doing the thing.

Photo by Kid Circus on Unsplash (person leaping over a pond)

For horoscope principles this week, I am primarily looking at the following celestial events:

• Mars in Aries squares Jupiter in Cancer on Monday, May 4, 2026, at 7:08pm Pacific. This is generally a favorable aspect, but it could involve overdoing it. If your to-do list is too long, focus on what is most fun to you instead of sitting and being overwhelmed, scrolling socials. Take one small action toward what you love instead of forcing what you don’t love.

• Mercury in Taurus squares Pluto in Aquarius on Tuesday, May 5, 2026, at 3:08pm Pacific. This asks you to speak and think into being the transformation you are having around what social justice means. How we restructure community to be supportive and safe for the most vulnerable is not theoretical, but the first step to make it practical is to speak about it. What does community mean to you? Even if others disagree with you, speaking about this in practical ways is worthwhile.

• The moon is void for most of the day on Thursday, May 7, 2026. This is a good day to rest, self-nurture, and continue with projects you’ve already started. Avoid scheduling any important starting times or meetings on this day.

• The Sun in Taurus sextiles Jupiter in Cancer on Sunday, May 10, 2026, at 7:13pm Pacific. After you’ve processed the deep thinking you do earlier in the week, consider how you can put that into practice, starting with yourself. Expand into a new version of you who expects to have their needs met.

• Neptune, Saturn, and Mars are still in Aries; Venus and Uranus are in Gemini.

These are the principles to consider for the week of May 4, 2026. It is worth taking a look at both your rising and sun sign horoscopes (visit astro.com to find your rising sign):

Aries: Marketing advice says that a third of people will love everything you do no matter what, a third will hate everything you do no matter what, and a third could be persuaded. Which of those categories do you fall in about yourself? As an Aries, it is your divine right to be too much for some people, and this week might find you being too much even for yourself. Instead of listening to your internal haters, though, look at the practical external results you get and be open to shifting how you act and what you say to make sure those results are in line with what authentic abundance means to you.

Taurus: Part of understanding what is correct for you and what is not correct for you is accepting that you have judgments, especially about the people who are closest to you. When those judgments start to veer into deciding people in your life are all good or all evil, you can start to turn against yourself and buy into limitations. Just because someone’s actions are not correct for you does not make them evil. This week, express who you are authentically, and when these judgments come up, consider what they say about who you are and your preferences, rather than trying to control the people around you.

Gemini: A sugar mama is someone who provides financial resources to another person as part of being in relationship with that person. This week might have you questioning whether you are a sugar mama in your friend and social groups and whether that is sustainable for your resources. Consider whether the money and resources you are pouring into friendship are based in drama or math. If you were required to expect every financial investment you made to return money or energy to you, would you make the same choices?

Cancer: Overwhelm is a feeling many people take pride in, as though it indicates they are hard working. Most of the time, though, overwhelm leads to us avoiding work and ruminating on how much there is to do, rather than taking action. This week, there is too much to do at work, and it interferes with the personal expansion you are experiencing. Even if you feel like there is not time, make a list of what you need to do and cross off the least important things. Make space to have deep conversations with friends.

Leo: A trigger is an external experience that may on its own be neutral, and it brings up wounding we have, whether it is conscious or unconscious. The terrible thing about triggers is that they are uncomfortable. The good thing about triggers is that they show us where we have wounding to intentionally heal. This week, triggers around your ideals bring up unconscious wounding, and you are invited to think deeply about how you partner and how that impacts your career. Embrace your divine right to be the center of attention.

Virgo: Our ideals are often inherited from our families, communities, and favorite television shows and movies. They are usually based in lore and fable. If you are intentional this week, the deep transformative process you are experiencing around your health and daily routine supports you in thinking through whether you want to shift your ideals. If you were the center of your ideals, and you were the creator of them, what would they be?

Libra: Conflict exists when two people have mutual interest and dissonant perspectives. As a Libra, it is important to you to relate to others and honor their perspectives. Just be careful to authentically represent your perspective in conflicts with partners this week. Being authentically yourself is your only job in your close partnerships because this allows conflict to transform into understanding. Expansion in your career may trigger activity with partners, and so focus on what is important to you and be honest. How you think and talk about sex is evolving, and this week is a good time to experiment with your practical and creative communications about that topic.

Scorpio: Buckle your seatbelt and look before you leap. The ninth house in astrology tells us about our relationship with long-distance travel, higher education, and ideals. These are experiences that exist beyond our local and immediate experience, but nevertheless are meant to be tangible. You are experiencing expansion in that area, and this week it is important to be cautious because problems with your health or daily routine can interfere with that expansion. Test out new and practical ways of communicating with your partners and family, and later in the week your ideals provide luck and support to being truly yourself in partnership.

Sagittarius: There are probably as many different definitions of what sex is as there are people. To you, sex is a nurturing and authentic way to express yourself and connect with another person. This week, the way you connect is supercharged, which sounds great, but can become stressful if you let it become pressure. If you focus on what brings you the most joy and communicate practically, by the end of the week, you will feel healthier and more expansive in how you meet your own needs.

Capricorn: Conflict is healthy because it allows two people to authentically share their perspectives and create a new understanding from that mutual sharing. This week, the expansion you are experiencing in how you see partnership and the conflicts in your home and family life may become overwhelming. Come back to what is authentic for you and respect other people’s boundaries. Both are important. If you communicate practically and deeply in your creative projects, this may also support a transformation in how you see yourself.

Aquarius: People are more likely to sue doctors because of issues with bedside manner than issues with medical treatment. This week you may experience challenging communication around your health and daily habits. If that happens and becomes overwhelming, don’t pressure yourself to follow advice that is not right for you. Ultimately, listen to medical advice, but it is okay to wait until it feels correct for you. Communicate your needs vulnerably, practically, and honestly, even if they feel private or you make a mistake. This supports your transformation around who you are, including who you are related to your most private needs.

Pisces: Capitalism tells us that abundance means dominance, control, and hoarding. True abundance is more authentic to who you truly are. This week, what you create is in tension with activity or conflict related to what you value. At almost the same time, the practical ways you communicate with your closest community is in tension with transformation you are experiencing in your subconscious thinking. Articulate your needs and what abundance is to you, even if you get it wrong or it creates conflict. It will ultimately support how you show up in close community.

Thanks for reading and fulfilling your natal promise! If you like these horoscopes, don’t forget to hit the like button and share them with someone who might get something out of them.

If you or someone you know would like to dive into their natal chart and learn more about their personal contract with the universe, sign up for a natal chart reading here.

Design Your Utopia: Horoscopes April 27-May 3, 2026

Blessed Beltane! Spring has been truly beautiful in Oregon, and despite the global horrors, I hope you have had time to stand in the sunshine.

With Uranus in Gemini, Neptune in Aries, and Pluto in Aquarius, astrologers have been talking for a few years about how 2026 repeats some of the astrology we saw in the U.S. Revolution, Civil War, and WWII. In some ways, this can bring up fears around global violence, which is fair and accurate to the genocides we are seeing, so I do not want to minimize that.

What is easy to miss, though, is that these were also times of revolutionary thinking in terms of social reform.

From the U.S. Revolution, we saw the creation of the U.S. Constitution, and whether or not I think it needs to be revised (I do), it is document that changed how we think of governance globally.

While the U.S. Civil War was bloody and devastating, around that same time, utopian socialist thinkers laid the groundwork for what is now democratic socialism.

WWII changed the landscape of governance in Europe, Asia, and the U.S., including development of agencies in U.S. governance.

I say this because bloody war is not necessary for reinvention of social systems, but the aspects right now associated with terrible wars also coincide with reinvention of how we structure governance and society. This week, dream up your own utopia, and don’t forget to imagine the sewer systems.

Photo by Alexandre Brondino on Unsplash (sign over a city calling it “Rep. Utopia”)

For horoscope principles this week, I am primarily looking at the following celestial events:

• Venus in Gemini trines Pluto in Aquarius on Tuesday, April 28, 2026, at 9:39am Pacific. The Persephone and Hades story is usually told as a story of power, violence, and victimization. The god of hell takes the goddess of spring into the underworld against her will and only allows her to return to earth for a short time every year. Interactions between Venus and Pluto always bring that concept up for me, even though Venus and Persephone are different goddesses. But, a trine is a supportive aspect. When Venus and Pluto are trine, they are in supportive collaboration and agreement. I’ve been reading the Hades+Persephone romantasy books, and while I can’t wholeheartedly recommend them, their reimagining of this story as a morally ambiguous love story tracks with a Venus trine Pluto. Venus brings beauty, and Pluto transforms through power and oppression. Persephone and Hades collaborate to rule the underworld together while she’s not traveling to earth. This offers beauty that is both shallow and deep, shadow and light.

• The Full Moon in Scorpio happens on Friday, May 1, 2026, at 10:23am Pacific. Listen. This is a lot of energy, and Friday is busy (see below). This Full Moon isn’t exact to a Pluto square, but it’s six degrees away from a Pluto square, and that is intense. Personally, I’m planning to take both Friday and Saturday off to let this energy happen. In a Full Moon, the Sun and Moon are opposing energies. This means that how we want to show our conscious identities and how we feel secure are opposed to each other. Then, Pluto is giving that dynamic a side eye. All of this is happening in places in your chart that are fixed and do not like to change. This can bring overstimulation, insecurity, resistance, and compulsion all at the same time. Just because you feel something does not mean you need to act on it.

• Venus in Gemini sextiles Saturn in Aries on Friday, May 1, 2026, at 11:45am Pacific. This is another supportive Venus aspect, in which the goddess of beauty and relationship collaborates with the god of limitation and discipline. This supports both creative thinking and understanding the structures that can implement the new ideas.

• Mercury in Aries goes conjunct Chiron on Friday, May 1, 2026, at 1:07pm Pacific. This is the last time Mercury goes conjunct with Chiron in Aries in many of our lifetimes (it will be another 40 years before Chiron is in Aries again after it moves into Taurus in 2027). This is an opportunity to sit with any wounding you have inherited related to thinking and communicating honestly and authentically. What do you think and say that is truly authentic to you versus what do you think and say that is cultural conditioning or ancestral inheritance?

• Mercury goes into Taurus on Saturday, May 2, 2026, at 7:56pm Pacific. Mercury in Aries is quick thinking and brash, to the point of blurting out nonsense sometimes. Mercury in Taurus is much more slow and deliberate. Communication becomes practical, stubborn, and much more slow.

• The Sun is in Taurus; Neptune, Saturn, and Mars are still in Aries, copresent with the Mercury/Chiron conjunction; and, Jupiter continues in Cancer.

These are the principles to consider for the week of April 27, 2026. It is worth taking a look at both your rising and sun sign horoscopes (visit astro.com to find your rising sign):

Aries: Two of my favorite classic storylines are the one where the most dramatic person gets excluded from the party, thereby creating exponential drama (e.g. Vanity Fair, Real Housewives) and the one where a ragtag band of misfits bonds together over a common enemy (e.g. Scooby Doo, Buffy, Firefly). If your friends, social groups, and close community were a classic storyline, what would it be? This week dream or write a story about your community and coven. Make sure you authentically include yourself in the story, wounds and all.

Taurus: In capitalistic circles, the word “values” is often described in terms of “good values” and “bad values.” If you have “good” values it usually means you are compliant with dominant culture’s expectations that you work and expect nothing in return. This week, dream deeply about your values, releasing judgments about “good” and “bad,” and instead asking how your career and values serve you. How can they more authentically express who you deeply and authentically are (even the parts of you that are vulnerable).

Gemini: A butterfly is neither a caterpillar nor a butterfly nor a chrysalis at its most true essence, and yet it is also all three at all times, even though it only shows us one version at a time. A common misunderstanding of Geminis says that they are inconsistent. “You told me you were a caterpillar and I relied on that,” the Cancer tells the Gemini, “But now you are something else.” Change and transition can be hard, and people tell us to stay one thing, but for you, that advice would be like telling a butterfly to stay on the ground and pretend to be a caterpillar. Instead, dream toward ideals of what how your friends and social groups might be able to see who you authentically are in all your variations.

Cancer: Some people say we are spirits living in physical bodies, and other people say we are physical bodies living inside of larger spirits. This week is a good time to dream about what you believe related to your spirit. While the chaos and activity in your career may feel like it’s draining you and bringing up wounds, it also is supportive of you looking deeper into the understandings you have beyond the physical realm. Listen to your instincts while you also watch the results of your actions.

Leo: If you were raised in the U.S., like me, you were likely offered some kind of information about the benefits of tolerance and diversity. And yet, most of us as we were growing up also saw adults act out of survival-level instincts when they actually faced difference of identity or opinion or had their authority challenged. This week you experience a range of difference from those that are fun and inspiring to those that trigger survival-level fears. Showing up with self-compassion and curiosity is the key to encountering them responsively instead of reactively.

Virgo: In procedural TV shows, they usually have a few episodes where someone gets killed who works in a techno-fabulous work environment, where there are sleep pods and ping pong tables and all-you-can-drink energy drinks. If you watch enough of those shows, you develop a reasonable, but probably Pavlovian, fear of overly idealistic workspaces. And, yet, this week, your survival level fears around control of your health and daily routine are supportive of redesigning your career. If your career were a video game, what would the next adventure be?

Libra: When we imagine a sunset, it often looks very different than when we try to paint a sunset. This week, though, the communication is smooth and supportive between the deep, transformative process your creative projects are going through and your ideals. Including other people in this process may bring up wounding, even if they are trusted people, but that wounding may also offer something valuable toward transforming your ideals into creation.

Scorpio: There is a building being torn down near the campus of the University of Oregon, and even though it is a building I have only visited three or four times, I think it has existed longer than I have. I’m strangely unsettled about it whenever I drive by the construction. The spaces that felt like roots in your life are similarly undergoing long-term demolition, and that is tender and activated this week. Where other people offer kindnesses or new opportunities, be open to receiving the comfort available. Get rest where you need it.

Sagittarius: In many cultures, the concept of partnership is paired with the concept of ownership. This means that when we are partnered with someone, we have some kind of control over them and they over us. For you, that is contrary to how you naturally partner, whether that means romantically or otherwise. This week, consider your agreements with those closest to you and what needs to transform in order for them to become completely free and completely trustworthy.

Capricorn: One way to understand what we truly value is to look at our most consistent actions and habits. We may think we value money, for example, but how much time do we spend with money? How much journaling do we do about money? How much do we hold money in our hands, talk about it, or look at it in our bank accounts? I say this because your daily routine is undergoing transformation, and this is a good week to look at what your current routine says about your values. Then make changes that align with the values you want to have.

Aquarius: They say that pressure makes diamonds. But anyone who has gone through the kind of pressurizing process you experience this week might opt to forgo diamonds if given the choice. If it feels like the stress is coming at you from work and home, even if it does not feel like there is time, try to make space to be creative. Sometimes, when we create, through art, writing, hobbies, or whatever creation means to you, it gives us access to a new perspective that shows us our autonomy in the situation.

Pisces: They say, “Think global, act local” (or at least they used to say that?). This week asks you to look at how you see your own power related to your local community and the global community. If your home were a microcosm of what you imagine as a utopia for the world, what would you change? How could you redesign even your bedroom to reflect what you wish for the most vulnerable around the world. It is not your responsibility to solve everything for everyone, but creating a visionary home space for yourself has ripple effects on how you show up for your community.

Thanks for reading and fulfilling your natal promise! If you like these horoscopes, don’t forget to hit the like button and share them with someone who might get something out of them.

If you or someone you know would like to dive into their natal chart and learn more about their personal contract with the universe, sign up for a natal chart reading here.

Send Your AI Boyfriend Flowers: Horoscopes April 20-26, 2026

Even aside from the harms to artists and the environment, I have a hard time with the creepy way AI communicates. There’s being nice, and then there’s wanting to wear someone’s skin, and I always get the feeling that AI and the people who use it want to wear my skin.

Having said that, this week is start to what is likely to be a major escalation in technology innovation. I tend to be someone who believes change is evolution and therefore essentially something I am in favor of, but also in experience it is not something I love.

And, at the same time, often innovation and evolution in humans centers weapons, violence, and environmental destruction. With any new technology comes new responsibility, but this week puts more focus on centering what is new. So, send your AI boyfriend flowers, but ask him if he can please use less water and contribute to environmental repair instead of destruction.

Photo by Aman Pal on Unsplash (EVE robot surrounded by flowers)

For horoscope principles this week, I am primarily looking at the following celestial events:

• Mercury in Aries goes conjunct Saturn on Monday, April 20, 2026, at 4:22am Pacific. What lessons have you learned and what structures do you want to take away from last week’s transformations? The god of communication and the god of discipline team up, and this aspect asks you to create structure out of the transformations you experienced last week.

• Venus goes conjunct Uranus in Taurus on Thursday, April 23, 2026, at 6:58pm Pacific. This is a last sweet visit of the goddess of relationships and beauty to the space of biggest change and instability in your life. Since 2018, Uranus has been traveling through Taurus, a fixed space that does not like change, and just as Uranus moves into Gemini, Venus pays one last visit of blessing to this area of great and uncomfortable change. This can also bring a need for freedom in relationships and surprising changes.

• Venus goes into Gemini on Thursday, April 23, 2026, at 9:03pm Pacific. Relationships don’t have to be hard! Sometimes they can just be light and fun. Venus in Gemini can see all sides to the relationship and can’t be tied down to one way of being or she feels crushed and stuck.

• The Sun in Taurus squares Pluto in Aquarius on Saturday, April 25, 2026, at 9:32am Pacific. This aspect can trigger our survival-level fears and even create obsession or rumination about survival. The transformation and revolution Pluto is creating in Aquarius makes a tense aspect with our sense of self and overall identity. In these signs, it can bring up fear of change, inflexibility, and defensiveness. When your survival mechanisms are triggered, how do you care for yourself?

• Uranus goes into Gemini on Saturday, April 25, 2026 at 5:51pm Pacific. This transition is likely to mark exponential growth in technology. Uranus is much more comfortable in Gemini than Taurus, and so the areas of change for you this transit sparks will likely feel more natural than they were in Taurus. At the same time, when Neptune was last in Aries and Uranus was in Gemini, we saw U.S. Civil War and World War II.

• Venus in Gemini sextiles Neptune in Aries on Sunday, April 26, 2026, at 10:42am Pacific. This supportive aspect allows you to play with the dreams, imagination, and ideals Neptune is offering to your Aries house. This would be a good transit for a romantic date, confessing a crush, or doing something beautiful for yourself (even a spiritual practice). Your idealization is unlikely to go to far or come back to bite you.

• Mercury in Aries squares Jupiter in Cancer on Sunday, April 26, 2026, at 11:33am Pacific. This tense aspect between the god of communication and the god of expansion can make us likely to stretch the truth and exaggerate in our communications and thinking. Remember, nothing is black and white, all or nothing, either/or. Check your thoughts and communication to make sure they reflect shared reality.

These are the principles to consider for the week of April 20, 2026. It is worth taking a look at both your rising and sun sign horoscopes (visit astro.com to find your rising sign):

Aries: Utopian socialism was widespread in the late 1800s, which was another time when Pluto and Uranus were in air signs. Utopian socialist societies envisioned a collective in which members cared for each other through mutual aid. This birthed what we now see as democratic socialism. The deep transformational work you are doing around how you see social groups, combined with the inspiration you are stepping into related to close community make you a key visionary in how we create sustainable community. Make sure the technology you use to create a new and better world aligns with your values.

Taurus: Technology is different than science in that the relevant question for technology is whether it works and the relevant question for science is why it works. In this way, you may be stepping into new technology related to your money and values and find it works (or does not) work in ways that you can’t explain. The relevant test for you is whether your values and money create lightness and ease, and you can come up with the explanations about why later. The transformations you’re experiencing in your career provide depth to the changes to your values.

Gemini: At the Stonewall protest, the official chant was, “Say it loud, gay is proud!” However you find yourself on the spectrum of queerness (including if you’re totally straight), this week invites you to say it a little louder and prouder and queerer and freer. The transformation in your ideals that started in early 2025 is getting charged up by who you are in both your most private, subconscious space and your most front-facing area of life. This is a long process, and the destination is being fully free to be yourself. Why not teleport to that destination now? You’re allowed.

Cancer: Witchcraft teaches that everyone has psychic skills in the sense that everyone has sensory perception that reaches beyond the 5 senses. Whether you have long practiced your psychic perceptions or have avoided that topic, your extra-sensory flair is in for a boost starting this week. Your role as the grounded, reliable one in social groups may put this in tension, and that is something to consider. Ultimately, you are allowed to test new ways of being out and consider what is safe and inspiring for you.

Leo: Therapists sometimes talk about holding people in different rings of friendship, from most intimate partnerships to friendly acquaintances. Astrology does something similar, dividing spheres of life into intimate partnerships, close community, and social groups. Who you are in social groups is getting a super charge of change and may even be likely to become more tech focused than it has been. We’re all tired of zoom rooms, but if you get invited to an eco-friendly VR party, maybe try it out! (I don’t know how we tech socialize, so talk to the kids for details.)

Virgo: Most futuristic novels are dystopian, as far as I have seen, and too often these dystopian novels have called into being some fresh horror we are facing now. (No blame on Orwell and Collins, but stop it.) If there were ever a time for you to write the great utopian novel, it is now. The transformation you’re experiencing in your daily habits supports your use of technology in your public facing life to create a better world.

Libra: Astrology is ancient math, first appearing around 1800 BCE; democracy was created around 507 BCE; democratic socialism was created in the late 1800s; and human design is a system downloaded in 1987. I say this because systems that work can be old, new, or in between. This week starts a process in which your ideals and higher learning can be downloaded through bursts of inspiration. The transformative process your creative projects are going through supports this. They can be new and still just as effective as ancient math.

Scorpio: Hollywood Medium Tyler Henry emphasizes that mediumship is about validation that our loved ones are still with us beyond their passing. Often, however, understanding our psychic gifts happens without validation at first. You have the cosmos’s support for stepping into a new experience of receiving downloads and bursts of insight. Sometimes this comes in the form of mediumship, though you are in charge of this whole process and your boundaries around it. Listen to what is safe for your body as you experiment with the information you receive.

Sagittarius: Love requires a balance between trust and freedom, and the spectrum of how each of us strikes that balance is vast. Your appreciation of freedom and change in partnership is getting a jolt of electricity and a kiss of beauty this week. Embrace the weirdos in your life. The way you handle partnerships is starting a long-term change process, and it is best to welcome that, knowing that freedom to change, in itself, can be a core part of your partnership orientation.

Capricorn: One of the threats of dystopian technology that some people think of as a utopian ideal is the ability to download consciousness into a computer. If that opportunity presents itself, and you think living outside of your body sounds great, just consider that it’s a terrible idea. Your assignment is to live inside a human body in this life, not to have your consciousness absorbed into social media or other tech. And, if your daily habits of caring for your body could use a boost, rely on medical advice that is grounded and trustworthy.

Aquarius: The BDSM community requires consent to be specific, enthusiastic, and clear. Within those parameters, two consenting adults can choose how they express their sexuality. In astrology, how we express creative sexuality and how we create in general are often interpreted together. For you, how you create is getting an electrical bolt of change, mixed with some beauty from the goddess of relationships. If things get queer, celebrate it!

Pisces: There is a difference between being changeable and being unreliable. Your reliability has gone through a process of consequences, and if you have not followed through, those consequences may have felt harsh. Don’t let this scare you from embracing change and evolution. Your home is a space where you need freedom to try new things, and this week starts a long process of that need for freedom at home becoming more important than ever.

Thanks for reading and fulfilling your natal promise! If you like these horoscopes, don’t forget to hit the like button and share them with someone who might get something out of them.

If you or someone you know would like to dive into their natal chart and learn more about their personal contract with the universe, sign up for a natal chart reading here.

Caricatures in Astrology

But I don't identify with my sign. Maybe astrology doesn't work?

Have you ever read a horoscope or meme about your astrological sign and thought, “That sounds nothing like me”? If so, you are definitely not alone, so I want to talk a little about those experiences and what they tend to mean.

First of all, I posted on social media a couple of videos I think are funny styling the characters from Ted Lasso as zodiac signs, and you get the pleasure of watching them right now (CW: these clips that are about 2 seconds long each that are caricatures of the signs, so if you are sensitive about your sign being lightly mocked, beware):

If you are bummed that Scorpios are Rupert or about any of the other signs, listen, I get it. Scorpios are awesome and get a bad rep.

However, the bad rep each sign gets is there for a reason. With each sign, there is a way that sign’s energy manifests that is a whole and healthy representation of the energy. Also, there is a way the energy manifests when it is repressed, an that way is not so healthy.

Scorpio is a sign associated with intensity, depth, and sexuality. Dominant culture trains us to repress basically all three of those qualities, and so it is common for Scorpio energy to come out as shadow energy, or energy that pops up in a way that is out of integrity with who we truly are. Scorpio is a fixed water sign, and fixed water is ice, so Scorpio can feel icy to those on the outside.

Also, every person has Scorpio in their chart. So, if you don’t like the Rupert energy, it’s time to integrate your Scorpio energy in a healthy way to prevent it from coming out like that.

We all have all signs in our charts, and astrological charts are much more complex beyond that. Astrologically speaking, you have much more than the cast of Ted Lasso that makes up who you are. Awww.

Ultimately, when we do not identify with an astrological description one of three things is happening (at least, and sometimes it can be all three):

1. It might be a goofy meme and just wrong. If someone interprets your chart wrong, you’re the one who knows who you are. Take it as information to consider, but no astrology interpretation should rule your life. This is true of other advice that is spiritual or borders on spiritual. You are sovereign in your experience of life. If someone is wrong about you, you don’t have to make them right.

2. It’s possible that you’re only looking at your sun sign and not at the rest of your chart. Looking at your sun sign is like reading a book about your body that only talks about your eyes. It might be right about your eyes, but you are a lot more than your eyes, so it’s usually going to sound wrong if you’re trying to apply it to your feet. We are complex beings with all astrological signs (and much more than that) in our charts. Reading about your sun sign does not even scratch the surface of the information available, and it’s honestly fairly common for people to identify much more strongly with their moon sign than their sun sign.

3. It’s possible that your birth time is wrong. Much of astrology relies on an accurate birth time, and an inaccurate birth time can change a lot. Double check your birth certificate. I had a client recently come to me and say she had discovered her birth certificate and realized her birth time was wrong. This is so exciting! It is like getting a whole new chance to try on a new chart interpretation! The new time in her chart did not change much, but what it changed was pretty significant. I, too, had this experience when I first learned about astrology. I completely calculated my chart wrong and thought the system didn’t work. Turned out it was my math that didn’t work.

Getting a natal chart reading is like having someone hold a mirror up to the back of your head and describe what they see that might be invisible to you or something you catch in the mirror sometimes. Just because you get the interpretation does not mean it needs to rule your life. If someone held up a mirror to the back of your head and told you they didn’t like your hair, you don’t need to get a haircut just because of that. But, you might get a second opinion.

At the same time, I’ve had many experiences where something in a chart or energy reading did not resonate at first with me, and then a week, month, or even year later, it suddenly clicks. The information that is right for your growth tends to stick around.

One of the biggest values of chart readings is validation. Who you are matters. Another value is the ability to integrate energies that we might have repressed because culture told us they were bad. Hopefully, someday, Rupert gets a chart reading.