astrology

Madame Clairevoyant: Horoscopes for the Week of May 23

Naomi Campbell, a Gemini. Photo-Illustration: by Preeti Kinha; Photos: Getty Images

Sunday night, Mercury (still retrograde) moves from Gemini back into Taurus. While the communication planet is there, everyone around you may seem particularly stubborn, and you may not be able to persuade them of anything. Your own thinking might become inflexible too, but remember that it’s still worth trying, at least, to keep an open mind. Then on Tuesday evening, action planet Mars enters its home sign of Aries, activating your confidence and competitive spirit. For the next month, your belief in your worth as a human being will be unshakeable, and you’ll be ready to fight for yourself. Finally, on Saturday morning, Venus enters its home sign of Taurus. The thrill of the chase loses some of its appeal. Instead, Venus in Taurus teaches you to value love — be it romantic or platonic — that makes you feel safe and supported, like you’re exactly where you belong.

Weekly Horoscope Aries

Aries Weekly Horoscope

You’re at your best when you’re focused on your own work, not getting distracted by others’. Concentrating on what you’re doing doesn’t mean ignoring those around you or disregarding their emotions and needs. It’s about avoiding the trap of comparison and jealousy. Normally that comes naturally to you, but this week, you might struggle a bit. Don’t worry about it too much, and don’t doubt yourself. You can let yourself experience the moment of jealousy, acknowledge it, then refocus your attention and continue on your way.

Weekly Horoscope Taurus

Taurus Weekly Horoscope

After this spring’s eclipses, you may be disoriented. Maybe certain relationships proved to be less dependable than you believed, or unanticipated roadblocks have delayed your progress. But all the unpleasant chaos has a flip side, too: Some people may turn out to be unreliable, but others will prove themselves to be more generous and supportive than you would ever have imagined. If some of your plans have dissolved, then thrilling new ones will reveal themselves. Unforeseen problems may have risen to the surface in your life, but you’ll find unexpected friends and sweetness, too.

Weekly Horoscope Gemini

Gemini Weekly Horoscope

Lately, you can’t shake the anxiety lurking in the back of your head, the voice saying you’re inadequate, that you’ve failed to live up to your potential. You wonder if you’ll ever find lasting satisfaction and love, or if you’ve made the wrong choices and now it’s too late. In these moments, it can be hard to tell whether you’re judging yourself according to your own standards, or somebody else’s; they’re usually entangled. Even so, this week, it’s important not to strive for someone else’s idea of success if it’s not also yours. Your personal goals might be beautiful or weird or even boring to someone else — what matters is that they are yours.

Weekly Horoscope Cancer

Cancer Weekly Horoscope

When faced with a decision, it’s useful — even necessary — to step back, reevaluate your thinking, and ask whether there’s some perspective or crucial piece of information that you’ve failed to examine. This week, however, don’t get too comfortable in this posture of constant self-doubt. You don’t have to game out every possible scenario before you take your first step. You are human, and your knowledge will always be incomplete, and it’s okay. Your instincts are better than you give them credit for. Don’t overthink it. Just decide.

Weekly Horoscope Leo

Leo Weekly Horoscope

When you’re feeling lonely or dissatisfied with your life, you may begin to wonder if the problem lies with the people in it. Maybe they’re acting thoughtlessly, maybe they can’t express love in a way you can understand. Maybe they’ve simply been busy. This week, it might be freeing to temporarily remove others from your thinking. You can’t control what they do, or what they’re able to give. If it were entirely up to you to find the fulfillment you’re looking for, where would you go? What project, what dream, would you turn to? What happiness would you finally grant yourself?

Weekly Horoscope Virgo

Virgo Weekly Horoscope

You’ve worked long and hard to create a stable life for yourself, to build an existence you can be genuinely proud of. Lately, though, it feels as though the universe is determined to rattle you, to leave no area of your life untouched by change. When the beauty and order you’ve cultivated are unsettled, you’re left with the work of fitting the pieces back together again. Just remember that you don’t have to reconstruct it all exactly as it was. Every disruption is a chance to grow, to create space for more joy or love or spontaneity that didn’t fit into your life before.

Weekly Horoscope Libra

Libra Weekly Horoscope

You’re usually on guard against other people’s judgment, wary of appearing frivolous. You know that you’re interesting, even wise, and that you’re as deep and complex as anyone else. You’re also aware that other people don’t always recognize the value of kindness and beauty as highly as you do. You know, too, of the ways others’ misconceptions can shape the way you’re treated. But this week, it’s crucial not to let other people’s potentially unkind assessments determine the path you take. The world is strange and the future bleak, but you don’t have to renounce pleasure. There is still value to be found in the love we show to one another.

Weekly Horoscope Scorpio

Scorpio Weekly Horoscope

Intellectually, you know you deserve a chance to grow. But in practice, you hesitate to seek out those chances, to take risks. You deem it safer to make the most of the options you’ve been given, rather than risk failure in your pursuit to create something completely new. And so many of the possibilities that do present themselves to you just don’t seem worth the uncertainty of putting yourself out there. But this week, your faith in yourself becomes bright enough to make whole new futures appear. When you attempt to expand, to grow, to change your mind, it makes you braver. It makes your whole life brighter.

Weekly Horoscope Sagittarius

Sagittarius Weekly Horoscope

There’s nothing weak or shameful about needing a support system. It sounds so obvious, put like that. But lately you’ve been feeling pressure — perhaps only from yourself — to be savvy and strong, entirely self-sufficient. This week, keep in mind that you’re allowed to call on your friends for aid. They probably don’t realize how much you’ve needed them this whole time: From the outside, you look strong and independent. The community that you’re yearning for exists; the challenge for you is to make your need known.

Weekly Horoscope Capricorn

Capricorn Weekly Horoscope

You’re rarely idle: You work hard to commit to the long game. But when it comes to big choices or dramatic actions, you like to hit the brakes, waiting for a sign from the universe, for permission from the people you respect, for external validation that your big dreams are worthy. This week, though, you don’t have to keep delaying. You have the skills and the courage to transform your life, and nobody else’s approval (or withholding it) will change that. If an opportunity arises for action that you want to pursue, don’t hesitate.

Weekly Horoscope Aquarius

Aquarius Weekly Horoscope

For a long time, you’ve felt trapped in an existence too small, too ordinary for you. Your ideas are shimmering, expansive, but your daily life is unexciting, your work and family obligations limiting. You’ve learned how to shrink yourself down to better fit in, but this week, you deserve a chance to be your whole self. You have the opportunity to stop trying to force what doesn’t fit, and instead to create a life that is not just bearable, but interesting, abundant, big enough for your full, wild self.

Weekly Horoscope Pisces

Pisces Weekly Horoscope

One of your greatest gifts is your willingness to accept complexity. You don’t demand easy answers or reduce the full, chaotic world to a single narrow story. This week, though, you may need to remind yourself that there’s value in simplicity too. Sometimes, the simplest solution is the best one, and the most obvious explanation is the one that’s true. You don’t owe it to anyone (yourself included) to craft justifications for why you deserve peace and happiness or why you shouldn’t be treated poorly. If you step back, you’ll see that it’s very simple: Just by being a person in the world, you’re entitled to the pursuit of joy.

Read the weekly horoscopes for the week of May 16. The weekly horoscopes for the week of May 30 will be online next Sunday.

Get Claire Comstock-Gay’s book, Madame Clairevoyant’s Guide to the Stars, out now.

Basically, every planet has a home sign (“domicile,” in astro jargon) where it is most “itself” and can express its qualities with a minimum of complication or obstruction.
Madame Clairevoyant: Horoscopes for the Week of May 23