Mercury retrograde begins tonight, and if you’re not already feeling stressed over all the work on your plate, or frustrated by crossed wires with the people around you, you might now as the planet of communication begins moving backward. Try to give everyone, including yourself, a little grace today. Leave some slack in your schedule, have backup plans in place where you can, and be patient with the people around you.

Today, it could be easy to forget tasks, miss appointments, or overlook tiny but consequential details. Other people might assume that you’re being careless, but if anything, you care more than ever — it’s just that your mind isn’t on the details, but the whole story. You’re too focused on the end goal to remember the little stuff, no matter how important it is. So try to be intentional about keeping track of the details — even if they’re not particularly interesting to you right now.

You might be tired of shallow relationships and surface-level conversation, lately. You can recognize there’s a time and a place for small talk, but right now you’re hungry for deep and genuine connection. You don’t need more casual acquaintances; you want people who will be there for you through thick and thin. But be careful not to rush things today — especially with newer friends. Building the intimacy you want is a long-term endeavor, so do your best to be patient and committed.

When there’s no clear right answer, today, it could be easy to get stuck in a place of indecision. You hem and haw, gathering more information and weighing your options, but you never actually get anywhere. So if you don’t need to make a decision immediately, consider letting the question simmer on the back burner: Clarity might come once you stop thinking so hard. But if you can’t put off action any longer, get advice from a friend. One person you truly trust will be more helpful than a hundred casual acquaintances.

Maybe as a response to the chaos in the world, or maybe for reasons of your own, you might feel an urge to organize your life. You want everything in its place; you want systems to govern every area of your life. Be careful, though, not to over-plan. As much as you crave order right now, you still need space to respond to the unexpected and to change your mind, so build in some slack for yoursel

You might chafe against the rules or structures that govern your life. Even the ones you created for yourself can seem like an intolerable incursion on your freedom, and you want to shake them all off. But try to see it in a different light — annoying as they are, those systems and structures keep things running smoothly. They make it so that you don’t need to use your energy figuring out all the boring questions of daily life and instead focus it on creative projects, your relationships — the fun stuff.

Lately, you’ve been feeling especially busy at home. There’s so much work required to keep everything running smoothly, but it sometimes feels like you’re the only person who sees it — or maybe just the only one who cares. It can seem like the solution is to work harder, or to come up with ever more complicated systems for staying tidy and organized — but today, a better answer might be to practice caring less. Focus on the parts that matter most to you, and see what happens if you let some of the rest of it go.

You might feel your attention wandering today — as hard as you try to block out all distractions and stay focused on the task at hand, it just doesn’t seem to work. There are too many interesting people around you, too many wild stories you want to hear, too much unexpected beauty. Instead of berating yourself, give your attention permission to go where it wants. You might learn things that end up being useful — and, worst case, you’ll just end up enjoying your time.

Today, you’re focused on your resources — money, time, space, energy. You worry you don’t have enough, and it makes you want to scrimp and save and preserve what you’ve got. To a point, it’s useful to be careful, but it’s also possible to take that too far, to be so stingy that you only create more problems for yourself. Your resources might not be infinite — nothing is — but it is possible to have enough, so loosen up and trust that with a little effort and support from the people around you, you’ll find what you need.

Most of the time, you’re good at communicating your ideas, even the weird or complicated ones. You know how to share your grand vision with others and get them as excited as you are. Today, though, you might struggle a bit. Don’t assume that because your ideas make sense to you, other people know what you mean. Even your friends who are generally on your wavelength might get confused. You may need to put in more effort than usual, but the extra effort to get your point of view across will be worth it.

You might get drawn into thinking about the past today, reminiscing about old phases of your life, the friends you miss, or the choices you’ve made to lead you here. But while it’s valuable to reflect, it’s all too easy for your attention to snag on the bad parts — the regrets, the embarrassing moments. It’s hard to learn from the past without getting stuck in feelings of shame and guilt. Remind yourself, if you need to, that none of this defines you. You’re still growing, still moving, and you still have time.

When faced with a problem, some people gravitate toward easy solutions. You, though, are more likely to do the opposite. You like ideas that are surprising or unconventional, and you’re not afraid of complexity. You’d rather be challenged than bored. But remember that, just as the most obvious answer isn’t necessarily the right one, it’s not necessarily the wrong one, either. The weirdest ideas aren’t always better than the ones that are tried and true, so don’t jump to conclusions either way.

Sometimes, it’s necessary to speak with authority in spite of your doubts, or to move with confidence even when you don’t quite feel it. You might not be comfortable faking it until you make it, but today, you could discover that acting like you belong in the room ends up making it true. Be bold and good things will come — just be careful not to believe your own hype so much that you lose your humility or start talking over the people who know more than you. There’s still space to learn; don’t forget it.

Buy Claire Comstock-Gay’s book, Madame Clairevoyant’s Guide to the Stars, here.