Here Comes the Sun

Astro Notes for Leo Season (July 22-August 22, 2025)

Leo season occurs at the peak of summer in the northern hemisphere, the time of year when the Sun is at its brightest. It’s a time associated with summer vacations, hot weather, no school, frolicking at the beach, music, parties, and fun. Leo symbolizes the peak of individual human expression, the glorious radiance of inner light, the willingness to be visible, the courage to be gregarious. 

Let’s linger for a moment on that last phrase – ‘the courage to be gregarious’ – for we do need to be brave to let down our guard and enjoy people and life. This speaks to an aspect of the Leo archetype that is rarely emphasized – its tenderness and vulnerability. Joy, happiness, and healthy self-esteem are precious human qualities. When we touch them in a real way, especially through playful contact with others, everything seems right in our world. But the pain of being disconnected from these qualities is particularly acute. 

Indeed, I have noticed that many people with prominent Leo placements tend to think that they ‘are not like typical Leos’ because they don’t feel themselves to be the life of the party. Instead they are aware of their tenderness and the emotional risk of self-exposure. Yet this vulnerability is part and parcel of the Leo archetype. Leo represents the supreme radiance of true light – the fall from this glory is not just personal, but mythic. Leo carries both the wound of the fall and the courage to shine their light regardless. 

And in today’s world of digital addiction, social isolation, and rigid groupthink, we need Leo’s warmth, heart, and sense of humor more than ever. In fact, as we move more deeply into the Age of Aquarius – an era defined by technology, networks, and collective systems –it’s Leo, Aquarius’ opposite, that offers the crucial complementary medicine. So, this Leo season, let’s honor the King or Queen within us and dare to have a little fun. 

This may be especially fitting since the astrology of this particular Leo season is quite spectacular – and potentially pivotal. 

Since November last year, Pluto, Neptune, Uranus, Saturn, and Jupiter have all moved into new signs. It’s been a head-spinning stretch of time. As the outer planets set the tone for the cultural zeitgeist at any given time, the placement of Uranus in Gemini, Neptune in Aries, and Pluto in Aquarius signals that the underlying pattern of the next seven years is now set (even though Uranus and Neptune will briefly dip back into Taurus and Pisces respectively in late 2025 and early 2026). The new era is here. 

The energetic shift is striking. Each of the outer planets have moved from Earth or Water (Yin) signs to Fire or Air (Yang) signs. There’s a new pace, a new cadence, a fresh sense of dynamism in the air. My feeling is that many of us are still catching our breath, still adjusting to the new reality. 

This transition phase may not last for long. Leo season promises to kick off the party in glorious style. 

With their recent sign changes, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto have now formed an exceptionally rare and auspicious pattern known as a Minor Grand Trine. This configuration will be the dominant motif for the next 3-4 years, a remarkable celestial window of harmony, momentum, and creative possibility. 

One of its key aspects is the trine between Uranus in Gemini and Pluto in Aquarius. This is the opening trine of the Uranus-Pluto synodic cycle that began with their conjunction in the mid-1960’s. In other words, it’s the first harmonious aspect between the principles of revolutionary innovation (Uranus) and total transformation (Pluto) since that iconic decade. This holds the potential for a flowering or maturation of the original 60’s impulse. 

From late July to mid-August, Mars forms a Grand Trine with Uranus and Pluto. Transits from Mars frequently serve to ignite longer-term planetary alignments like the trine between Uranus and Pluto. Despite the widespread angst about the state of the world, we may see breakthrough developments that allow us to get truly excited about the new era dawning. Since Uranus-Pluto also represents the liberation of Dionysus, the Grand Trine with Mars may initiate us into our own Summer of Love. 

But this isn’t about mere hedonism. Alongside the Grand Trine, Saturn and Neptune move to within half a degree of each other at 1 degree of Aries – the closest they will come together until they meet in an exact conjunction in February next year. Saturn-Neptune adds a note of sobriety, discernment, and gravitas to the cosmic ensemble. This configuration supports us to see through illusions and ground our dreams in reality. We may find ourselves stress-testing new inspirations, projects, and technologies to see which ones will endure. We might feel ourselves grieving the world we’re leaving behind, or reckoning with tragic realities we’re witnessing today.  At the same time, we may experience a new level of determination to steward long-held visions into actual form. 

While this aspect may somewhat temper our playful mood, its deeper blessing is to make the revolution real. 

The New and Full moons this Leo season exemplify its creative potency.

The New Moon in Leo, coming after the inward turn of Cancer season, always represents a powerful rebirth of creative self-expression. The Moon is bathed in solar vitality, purpose, and radiance. This New Moon (on July 24) is opposite Pluto in Aquarius, trine Neptune and Saturn in Aries, and sextile Uranus in Gemini. In other words, it’s the first lunation to activate the Minor Grand Trine that will define the last half of this decade. 

New Moon in Leo -- opposite Pluto in Aquarius, sextile Uranus in Gemini, trine Saturn-Neptune in Aries

The trine to Saturn and Neptune is especially meaningful, suggesting that the visions seeded earlier this year — when these planets entered Aries — are now ready to take form. With the opposition to Pluto in Aquarius, we might experience creative tension between the part of us that wants to express our unique essence (Leo) and the pressures we feel to conform with the group or system (Aquarius). The higher purpose of this transit is to purify our creative expression of performative elements so that we can bring forth the radiant truth of our heart. This may be a moment to step fully into soulful leadership and start to give voice to our highest inspirations, even (or especially) when they challenge the status quo. 

The Full Moon in Aquarius on August 9 (12.55AM US Pacific Time) shines like a lighthouse of visionary power. With the Moon unaspected — meaning it doesn’t form major angles to other planets (apart from its opposition to the Sun in Leo) -- this Full Moon will offer an undiluted transmission of Aquarian light. We might experience it as an individual and collective quantum leap, involving exciting downloads, liberating insights, technological breakthroughs, and emergent group intelligence. 

The Full Moon chart is bursting with creative potential, featuring not one, but two, Kite aspect patterns. A Kite is one of the most auspicious and dynamic configurations in astrology because it combines the ease and grace of a Grand Trine, the creative flow of a Minor Grand Trine, and the evolutionary drive of an opposition. One of the Kites has Mars at the base, energizing the Minor Grand Trine of Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto. The other involves Mercury in Leo at the apex of a Grand Trine of Mars, Uranus, and Pluto, suggesting bold and flamboyant expressions of the incoming revolutionary energies and the power of words to catalyze change.

Full Moon in Aquarius highlighting two Kite aspect patterns

Adding to the elevated emotional tone of this Full Moon is a beautiful conjunction of Jupiter and Venus in Cancer. The meeting of the two traditional benefics in this empathic and intuitive sign marks the beginning of a new cycle of abundance, personal love, and emotional nourishment. At the very least, we’re likely to feel pretty darn good.

Finally, a Mystic Rectangle linking Mars, Pluto, Mercury, and Neptune-Saturn adds a profound capacity to hold complexity and transform polarities into higher order synthesis, translating the high-flying Kite energies into committed purpose and grounded service.

We’ve been living with a sense of crisis for so long we may have forgotten what it’s like to experience joy and optimism. There is still a long way to go in our collective birthing process. We are still at a critical juncture. But this Leo season we may find that — despite ourselves — we can’t help but start to move to the beat of the new cosmic rhythm.

Crossing the Threshold

I’m writing these monthly notes the day after the Summer Solstice in the northern hemisphere, marked by the Sun’s entrance into Cancer. I’ve decided to organize these notes around the astrological ’seasons’ — Cancer season, Leo season, etc — rather than the lunar cycle, because the journey of the Sun around the zodiac describes a universal developmental sequence that, to my mind, is easier to follow. The entire logic of the zodiac was originally anchored to the solstices and equinoxes, observed ritually by human cultures since the dawn of time. There is ancient human memory of this annual solar rhythm.

When the Sun is in Cancer, our focus softens and turns inward, encouraging us to prioritize our sense of emotional well-being and belonging. Cancer represents our emotional and psychological foundations — where we feel nurtured, safe, and unconditionally accepted. It rules the home, the family, children, and motherhood. It is, perhaps, the most human of all the signs, connecting us to the loving bonds that matter most.

In Cancer season, we’re better able to feel our feelings, explore our inner world, and listen to our intuition. It’s a potent time to initiate a healing process. We may find ourselves more emotionally attuned to both our loved ones and to our own unmet needs. Our personal happiness moves into the foreground.

This year, with Jupiter recently entering Cancer — where it will stay until June 2026 — these themes take on a new level of meaning. Jupiter represents the principle of wisdom — the higher plane perspective that helps us understand how the events of our lives fit a broader cosmic pattern. It brings opportunities to explore new realms with a spirit of adventure, knowing we’re supported by a benevolent universe. It opens doors, fosters growth, and expands whatever it touches.

Jupiter in Cancer will elevate the importance of our personal lives and emotional well-being. It will highlight the wisdom of prioritizing self-care, home, and our connection to loved ones and ancestral roots. We might find ourselves less willing to sacrifice our personal happiness for professional success. We are being asked to discover a new approach where our personal contentment is properly valued as the cornerstone of our public success. In the face of the dawning AI revolution, this is the transit that will help us stay human.

Nonetheless, at the beginning of this year’s Cancer season, there’s friction in the air. Sun and Jupiter in Cancer form a square to Saturn and Neptune in early Aries, creating a challenging push-pull dynamic. We might feel torn between a part of us inspired by a bold new vision — and the disciplined routines necessary to achieve it (Saturn-Neptune in Aries) — and a part of us that wants to slow down, spend more time with loved ones, or go within (Sun-Jupiter in Cancer).

Between June 21-23, two potentially explosive Yod formations appear — one with Mars at the apex, the other with Pluto. A Yod is an aspect between one planet (the focal planet) that forms quincunxes to two other planets that are in sextile. This intense pattern creates an inescapable dilemma that demands resolution through a fated or unexpected shift.

This configuration carries the energy of a precision strike, demanding some form of decisive action that cuts through the Gordian knot. In the context of the Israel-Iran war and the tornado of furious debate about potential US involvement, it does not augur well for a peaceful outcome.

On a personal front, this pattern may catalyze some form of sudden evolution that may come in unexpected ways or outside of our conscious control — we might feel pushed into a new direction, yet not necessarily understand why. The deeper invitation is to trust the timing, even if the changes seem incomprehensible to our linear minds.

But while the conflict in the Middle East may dominate the news, the deeper story of this Cancer season lies in an extraordinary cosmic threshold. Here we have to understand this year’s Cancer season in a larger context. For this is no ordinary year.

Since last November, we’ve seen an unprecedented series of planetary sign changes: Pluto into Aquarius, Neptune and Saturn into Aries, and Jupiter into Cancer. This rapid procession of planetary sign changes signals the final push out of the birth canal for the new era dawning on Earth.

And now, on July 7, Uranus will move into Gemini — the last major planetary shift in this sequence. Uranus is the archetype of breakthrough — the sudden release from struggle and unexpected emergence into a new world. As such, it is connected with the liberating experience of birth. With the ingress of Uranus into Gemini, we cross an incredible threshold. This moment could mark the official birth of the New Earth.

When Uranus, the planet of brilliant innovation and disruptive change, moves into Gemini, the sign of learning and communication, we may witness a revolution in our education systems, communications technologies, and media. More profoundly, we may also experience an activation of inner technologies of communication, such as telepathy, multidimensional awareness, and new forms of communion with non-human forms of intelligence. The image I get is of a lightning storm across the noosphere, linking minds across the globe in a dazzling network of thought and telepathic connectivity.

Meanwhile, during Cancer season, Saturn and Neptune move to within half a degree of an exact conjunction in early Aries — the closest they will come to meeting until February 2026. The last time these two planets conjoined was in November 1989, coinciding with the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Eastern Bloc. When Saturn, the principle of form, meets Neptune, the principle of the formless, long established structures can dissolve seemingly overnight.

We are entering sacred ground — an extraordinary passage when personal and planetary plot lines converge. Cancer season calls us to ground down in what matters most — love, home, family — even while humanity crosses a historic threshold to a new world.

A Moment to Breathe

Astro Notes for New Moon in Taurus monthly cycle (April 27-May 26)

Let’s zoom out once again to the big picture to understand the context of this monthly cycle. Since 2020, we’ve been engaged in an epic struggle to mid-wife the birth of a fundamentally new era for humanity. The period from November 2024 to July 2025 represents the final push out of the birth canal, with Pluto, Neptune, Uranus, Saturn, and Jupiter all changing signs — marking the most concentrated period of cultural change in our lifetimes. In my annual astrological year-ahead overview, I named this first quarter (from the Spring Equinox to the Summer Solstice in the northern hemisphere and from the Fall Equinox to Winter Solstice in the southern hemisphere) Crowning, the phase when the shape of the new era will first come into view.

Pluto’s ingress into Aquarius in November 2024 signaled the beginning of this culminating sequence. Yet just as the contractions started to intensify, Mars moved retrograde (December 2024-late February 2025), applying a cosmic brake, and inviting us to slow down, recalibrate, and come into deeper alignment before the final push. Venus followed with her own retrograde (March 1-April 12), drawing us inward to reflect on deeply personal issues regarding love, relationships, and self-worth.

March also brought a powerful eclipse season marking the end of long-standing karmic cycles and the release of deeply embedded patterns and scripts. Then, at the end of March, Neptune entered Aries — the second major planetary shift in this birth sequence — rekindling our spiritual flame and calling us onto the path of the soul warrior. March and April also saw an extraordinary alignment of planets in late Pisces — Venus, Mercury, Saturn, and the North Node — bringing profound soul lessons, weighty decisions, and karmic completions. The new frequencies, directions, and soul assignments have been arriving thick and fast — exhilarating, yes — but with all the Piscean energies in play it’s like we’ve been asked to run at full speed in soaking wet clothes. It’s been inspiring, demanding — and at times utterly exhausting. And there’s still a way to go before the baby is born.

The good news is that the intensity will likely ease noticeably during this month’s cycle, especially toward the second half. It’s not a total release — we are still in labor, after all — but we’ll have a welcome chance to catch our breath after a couple of pressure-filled months.

Yet to gain entrance into this more spacious realm, we first have to pass through a fiery gate of initiation.

Since early November 2024, Mars and Pluto have been engaged in a tense oppositional dance. They first came into exact opposition on November 1, then again on January 2, and for the third and final time on April 26 (with Mars at 3 degrees of Leo and Pluto at 3 degrees of Aquarius). The Mars-Pluto oppositions on November 1 and April 26 bookend the most intense and trying phase of the birthing process.

When the God of War and the God of Death do battle, it’s no small matter. A profound conflict must be resolved between our survival instincts (Mars) and our need to transform and evolve (Pluto). Mars doesn’t want to reflect, it wants to act, move, do. It wants to gratify its impulses. But Pluto demands consciousness: that we become aware of our deeper drives and heal the wounds that cause us to act out destructively. Ultimately this transit calls for a deeper integration between our personal will and the collective will, so that what we want for ourselves aligns with what the universe wants for us. With Mars in Leo and Pluto in Aquarius, we’re being asked to mold our creative self-expression and desire to be seen into forms that serve the greater whole.

At the New Moon on April 27, this Mars-Pluto opposition forms a t-square with the Sun and Moon in Taurus.

New Moon in Taurus April 27 - t-square highlighted

This tense aspect pattern, active since April 20, reaches a climax with the New Moon. With all planets in fixed signs, we may feel compressed into a very tight, pressurized place, pulled in different directions by powerful forces unwilling to budge an inch. Alongside the fireworks of the Mars-Pluto clash, the Sun in Taurus adds a strong determination to stay put -- to seek peace, comfort, and stability. Pluto in Aquarius compels transformation. Mars in Leo drives us toward self-expression and visibility. Yet another part of us just wants to sleep in, eat comfort foods, and stay cozy.

It’s a very uncomfortable jam.

The way out is offered by Venus, ruler of the Taurus New Moon, who is conjunct Saturn and the North Node in Pisces. Venus calls us to draw from our spiritual maturity and act from the highest consciousness we know. Maturity here means embodying the wisdom we’ve already realized, however imperfectly. All we can do is our best. This conscious effort unlocks the gate, allowing us to absorb and integrate powerful archetypal forces and realize our capacity to be a steady rock in times of crisis.

From April 27 to May 4, all planets are moving forward, generating considerable momentum for our life and projects. Pluto stations retrograde on May 4, which may intensify themes of power, control, and the need to release compulsive patterns.

But when Mars finally moves out of opposition to Pluto, which it will by May 6-7, we may feel that we have passed through a storm into calmer waters. The astrology for the remainder of the cycle is relatively quiet compared with recent months, dominated by harmonious aspects.

The Full Moon in Scorpio on May 12, opposite Uranus in Taurus, could bring unexpected developments — particularly around financial or material matters — leading to emotional disruption. However, the overall trajectory this month is calmer and lighter. For the final two weeks of the cycle, Mars in Leo forms a flowing trine with Venus in Aries, while the Sun, Neptune, and Pluto create an auspicious Minor Triangle from May 19-25.

In the background, Saturn moves through the final degrees of Pisces, closing out a thirty-year cycle of manifestation. On May 24, Saturn enters Aries — the third major planetary shift in our birth sequence. Saturn in Aries will play a pivotal role in the massive changes to come, anchoring the revolutionary energies with patience, discernment, and grounded wisdom. As the Time-Keeper, Saturn reminds us that true creation cannot be rushed, but comes through alignment with diving timing and awareness of consequences. With Saturn’s entrance into Aries, many of the nascent dreams and visions seeded during these intense months will start to take concrete form.

(I’m excited to announce I’ll be offering a live, experiential workshop on the archetype of Saturn in Aries with internationally-renowned channel Kahreela An-Ra on May 19 — announcement coming soon!)

Amid the monumental shifts unfolding, this Taurus New Moon cycle offers us a precious opportunity to catch our breath. While profound changes continue to unfold within and around us, we are invited to find moments of peace, ground ourselves in what is true, and gather strength for the path ahead.