On Your Own Terms
At the New Moon, tradition suggests we sow seeds of intention in a specific area of life. The New Moon in Libra (Oct. 21, 2025, 5:25 am PDT, at 28º21’ Libra) marks the beginning of a new 12-month cycle of relationship. Whether you’re hoping to find a romance, trying to mend fences with a relative, negotiating a business connection, or hoping for a renewal of your marriage commitment, this is the New Moon for planting those seeds.
However, this New Moon is marked by a square with Jupiter, quincunx with Saturn, and dramatic square to Pluto, so don’t expect these seeds to flourish without careful nurturing, compromise, and honesty. And though all relationships encounter conflict along the way, this New Moon’s relationship seeds may contain a bit more of that we’d like. Still, any aspect to Jupiter, even a square, offers reason to hope that your seeds will flourish.
At this New Moon, let your intention be something like this: In the interest of healthy relationships, I’m willing to bare my authentic self, and I’m willing to compromise on some things… but by no means all. With the New Moon’s ruling planet, Venus, in loving trines to Uranus and Pluto, the opportunity is coming to make important and long-lasting changes in relationships – but they must be gained on your own terms.
The Dream and the Wake-up Call
Neptune re-enters Pisces this week (October 22, 2025, 2:51 am PDT) for its final passage through this sign in our lifetimes. Neptune first entered Pisces in 2011–2012, briefly dipped into Aries earlier this year, and will leave Pisces for good on January 26, 2026, beginning a new era that lasts through 2038. But before moving on, Neptune offers a few final lessons about faith, compassion, and illusion.
The dream of Neptune in Pisces is a world united in peace, healing, and spiritual understanding—but the shadow side has revealed denial, disillusionment, and a culture that often turns away from painful truths. Its Sabian symbol, 30 Pisces, A majestic rock formation resembling a face is idealized by a boy who takes it as his ideal of greatness, and as he grows up, begins to look like it, speaks of the importance of choosing our ideals carefully, intentionally. There’s no single “right” way to live or believe, only the way we create meaning through our imagination and empathy. As Neptune completes its long sojourn through Pisces, we’re asked to integrate both its dreams and its wake-up calls—and to decide what kind of ideal we’ll carry forward into Neptune in Aries.
Under the Layers
We enter Scorpio season this week, with the Sun entering this shadowy sign (Oct. 22, 2025, 8:51 pm PDT) through Nov. 22. During Scorpio’s season in the Northern Hemisphere, the flat, autumn light is unforgiving, and if we look in the mirror, we see every imperfection. The nights are longer, and in the darkness it’s somehow easier to locate our faults and weaknesses, fear and grief. But it’s a little harder to share them, because that means admitting them to ourselves first.
I don’t think we change as we age. I think we just become more comfortable being who we’ve always been. We don’t feel the need to be false—more cheerful, more accommodating than we feel—in order to make others more comfortable around us. We become our Scorpionic selves, stripped of artifice and the comforting fictions of youth.
The Scorpio journey is about stripping off layers, year after year, and getting to know the essence of who we are. We may not be able to count on good genes or good luck, and some bad decisions can’t be undone. We may lose loved ones. We will probably lose some of our health. But we never lose the person we are underneath our clothes, underneath our skin.
Course Correction
The Sun squares Pluto this week (Oct. 24, 2025, 6:24 am PDT), one of two squares the Sun makes to Pluto each year. Pluto, when it’s in aspect to the Sun, can have a way of making us feel unimportant. Anything that we very much want to do might also suddenly feel as if it’s trivial, a bit silly, and generally not worth doing. But when the Sun connects with Pluto, it’s essential to push back against this demoralizing influence. The Sun’s promise is that each of us is vitally important, and that includes you.
If you’ve been putting everyone else first while the Sun has been in Libra for the past month, now is the time for a little course correction. If you don’t stand up for yourself against the seeming indifference of Pluto, then no one will do it for you.
Promising the Moon
Today, Mercury in Scorpio meets Jupiter in Cancer in a soulful trine (Oct. 24, 2025, 8:08 am PDT, at 24º37’). Your perception is keen at this trine, and having Mercury, the wordsmith, in keenly perceptive Scorpio (on the Sabian Symbol 25 Scorpio, An X-ray) working in the service of Jupiter, keeper of the Big Picture, is the best of all possible worlds. It’s easier just now to put Jupiter’s grand concepts into easy-to-understand, usable language, and send them flying out into the world.
A word of caution, though: Mercury and Jupiter is a combination that likes to promise the Moon, and we can be endlessly optimistic about our ability to make good on those promises. Beware of guaranteeing more than you can deliver – Mercury aspects Saturn the next day, and you’ll quickly discover you’re in over your head.
Insights and Intuition
Whenever a planet connects with Saturn – an exacting planet, even in gentle Pisces, and impatient with mediocrity – it can develop a flinty edge and an over-the-top work ethic. These are not endearing qualities, but on the other hand, diligent work can yield brilliant results. While Mercury, planet of intellect, trines Saturn (exact on Oct. 25, 2025, 2:17 pm PDT), direct your focus and intelligence toward good, useful work.
With Mercury in Scorpio, deep insights as well as intuition guide your efforts. Here is the moment to finalize what you’ve drafted, to sign on the dotted line, and to take on projects that are demanding to the point of impossibility. You have the mental stamina now to accomplish impressive things. But be mindful of the language you use with yourself and with others; in the interest of digging deep and telling tough, unvarnished truths, Mercury in Scorpio can sometimes get a little rough.
Writing and images © 2012-2025 by April Elliott Kent
