This month features the North Node departing your rising sign after a year and a half of accelerated growth, as well as your ruling planet, Mars, still frustrated by retrograde motion. This most recent season of your life was powered by your own self-determination, and you have yourself to thank for how far you’ve come. Right now, though, switching into a different gear might be necessary to avoid wearing down your transmission. With the North Node, Saturn, and Venus convening in Pisces this month, there’s simply more gravity pulling you down into the depths of the sorrows and vulnerabilities keeping you anchored in place. With Venus’ help, those stories may appear more seductive than ever, but also more malleable inside the crucible of your heart space. You might benefit from being in an unfamiliar environment this month to help you detach from some of your familiar conditioning, but try not to suffer in silence too much. You never know who might be able to actually meet you in those lonely places.

Meanwhile, Mars is still doing too much (or not enough). On January 3, Mars opposes Pluto for the second time since early November, intensifying the stakes of your current mission. Whether you’re facing an active threat of some kind or a less tangible radicalization in the face of impossible-feeling circumstances, this is the sort of tension that can nurture extreme reactions, especially if compounded by the loss of control you’re currently experiencing.

Then, between January 13 and 15, Mars opposes the Sun during a full moon in Cancer. Mid-month brings a lot of pent-up tension to a head and possibly offers some space for release, but not without some collateral. Watch for defensive, reactive behavior, both from yourself and from your closest of kin. A thorn that’s been digging into your side since early fall, particularly involving your current living situation or relationship with your parents, will officially be too sharp to ignore at this point. If you even have it in you to be reflective right now, try to see your discomfort as a catalyst. Without it, you may have never moved to make a change.

Taurus Rising

There is power in numbers no matter how you look at it, but you probably don’t need to be told that twice. The question of community, friendship, belonging, and exclusion has been shaping your trajectory for the past two years or so. And right now, you’re about to experience a good deal more buy-in from the squad than you probably have so far. With Venus spending the month in Pisces and the North Node also sliding in there for a new year-and-a-half-long journey of acceleration, there is an urge to merge constellating in your eleventh house of groups and communities, and it asks of all of you: how are you willing to commit to each other? Though you probably won’t arrive at a definitive answer until April, pay attention to these stirrings and bids for deeper connection, because they’re important, and they’ll likely play a pretty big role in how your 2025 unfurls.