astrology

Madame Clairevoyant: Horoscopes for the Week of August 12

Kate Bush, a Leo. Photo-Illustration: by Preeti Kinha; Photos: Getty

Thursday brings a full moon in independent, idealistic Aquarius. Think about all the wildness that’s been building inside you. Think about all the new worlds and new selves you’ve been dreaming and working into being. Under the light of the full moon, can you see what changes have been made, and what work still needs to be done? Then, on Sunday, assertive Mars moves into wise and careful Virgo. With this energy, you can get things done, and get them done right.

Weekly Horoscope Aries

Aries Weekly Horoscope

It’s okay, even valuable, to let yourself get competitive sometimes—to let the feeling of competition illuminate the full size of your powers and show you what your real desires look like. This week, though, remember that you don’t have to compete over everything all the time. You’re worthy and good, whether or not you’re the best in the world at everything you do. Hold onto the option of not competing at all, of simply walking away, of refusing to do anything just to show other people you can.

Weekly Horoscope Taurus

Taurus Weekly Horoscope

You might be feeling drained by the endless challenges and provocations the world keeps throwing at you. You may struggle with feeling like you need to keep reacting to all of them, one after another, with no real end in sight. This week, it might be helpful to remember that there are other ways to act. This week, carve out just a little space, just a little time, not to react at all, but to choose for yourself how to spend your time.  

Weekly Horoscope Gemini

Gemini Weekly Horoscope

It’s possible to be generous with your time without living your whole life for somebody else. It’s possible to be generous with your attention without neglecting your own ideas. And it’s possible to be generous in your love without compromising all your own weirdness and desire. It can feel, sometimes, like generosity only ever leads to loss in the end—loss of time, loss of clarity, loss of self. But this week, it’s possible to be generous without giving the core of yourself away. This week, everything you give away can come back to you again.

Weekly Horoscope Cancer

Cancer Weekly Horoscope

This might be one of those times when nothing ever feels like enough—nothing you do, nothing you say, nothing you give. This isn’t exactly pleasant, but it’s the condition of being human. None of us are big enough to mend the whole world on our own; none of us are strong enough to stop every bad thing from happening. You can’t be more than human, but you can join together with other people. You can’t be more than yourself, but you can be part of something that is.

Weekly Horoscope Leo

Leo Weekly Horoscope

It’s possible sometimes to forget just how much risk is involved in really living, because you’re comforted and distracted by the size of your voice or your dreams or the love of your friends. This week, you may be more aware of that risk — but don’t let it intimidate you out of taking action. You can choose the life you really want, even if it means less comfort. You can tell someone about your feelings, even if you don’t know where it will lead. Risking your comfort, your certainty, your power, can remind you that your heart is beating, that there’s a huge life worth living.

Weekly Horoscope Virgo

Virgo Weekly Horoscope

Just for now, just for a little bit, let your dreams get wild and messy. Just as an exercise, just as practice, try wanting things that are contradictory, unrealistic, impossible.
Just as practice, let yourself imagine that you’re here on earth to do more than clean up messes, more than accept compromises, more than labor for the smallest crumbs of beauty. It’s painful, sometimes, to want the impossible, to open your heart to desires that will only disappoint you—but sometimes magic happens, after all.

Weekly Horoscope Libra

Libra Weekly Horoscope

You might find that you keep trying to adjust your vision in order to make the world match the ideal you hold in your head. This week, try to relax your eyes, or relax your mind, and let yourself see things as they actually exist. Sometimes, there’s just no sense, no order, no balance to be found. This doesn’t mean your ability to interpret the world has failed. You can see the world as it is—no illusions, no wishful thinking—and love it anyway.

Weekly Horoscope Scorpio

Scorpio Weekly Horoscope

This week, you might feel enormous pressure from the people around you to believe everybody else’s grand stories about themselves. Sometimes, of course, their beautiful stories are true, but you shouldn’t believe them simply because they’re beautiful. Don’t let anyone make you believe that your commitment to the truth is too harsh. You aren’t required to be inspired by every dream everyone else has had; you don’t have to indulge anybody’s singular vision of the future they want.

Weekly Horoscope Sagittarius

Sagittarius Weekly Horoscope

This week, you can find a way to create the mood, the space, the light you’ve been seeking. This week, don’t wait for anybody else to notice your weirdness, your brilliance, your spark. You can wear the clothes you never really have occasion to wear, or cook the foods you never really have a reason to make. This isn’t a week to try and slip quiet and unnoticed through the world. You’re a human person living through a strange, dark time, and there’s nothing wrong with needing color and light, even now.

Weekly Horoscope Capricorn

Capricorn Weekly Horoscope

This is a week for learning, again, how to say yes and how to say no. No matter how many times you’ve learned and how much you’ve practiced, it can still feel so difficult to refuse the glittering ease of the wrong life, to reject the wrong kind of generosity. And sometimes, the more difficult task is to wholeheartedly say yes, to reach out for the right life, the thing you actually want. This week, don’t let the world’s current drag you along; choose your yeses and no’s with purpose.

Weekly Horoscope Aquarius

Aquarius Weekly Horoscope

This is a week for loving the most difficult part of yourself. It’s a tricky thing to try to do — it’s not the same thing as giving absolute free reign to jealousy or greed or unkindness. Rather, it’s about being gentle with the bits of you that are most susceptible to pain, the parts of your heart that are soft or defensive or so full of frustrated desire they feel close to bursting. You’ll be so surprised, this week, at the power that can come loving the places in yourself that need it most.

Weekly Horoscope Pisces

Pisces Weekly Horoscope

This is a week not to channel your emotions however you want, without worrying about what others may think or expect of you. If your anger is going to make you brave, let it make you brave on your own terms. If sadness is going to make you empathetic, decide for yourself how you’ll express all this love. Your feelings are wild and powerful, and nobody else gets to manipulate them. They’re for you to process, for you to feel, for you to draw power from. It’s not their fuel, not their raw material, but yours.

Read the weekly horoscopes for the week of August 5 here. The weekly horoscopes for the week of August 19 will be here.

Madame Clairevoyant: Horoscopes for the Week of August 12