Said to be the stars of the show, the lovers of a good audience, the ones who shine brightest. It is the sign that is ruled by the Sun, so… it makes sense. Ever confident. Ever charismatic.

They are also pegged as being dramatic, needing attention, and all too interested in their looks and their appeal.

I mean, anyone with Leo accents, myself included, it’s all about the hair.

I have a mane myself and was recently asked, “Will you ever cut your hair?”

My answer?

“I imagine myself as a mid-70s grey-haired goddess, so… no.”

When I see others in the wild with amazing hair, I wonder if Leo is their Sun, Moon, or Rising. It’s a real thing. Accept it, you beautiful lions!

Yet, there is a different side to Leo not many people talk about.

We hear about them wanting nothing more than attention, until you meet the Leos who just want to introvert into their home space and be left the F alone.

Maybe Leo doesn’t always want an audience. Maybe what Leo really wants? Is a pride.

There is a difference between the people who watch you shine and the people you come home to. There is a difference between being seen and being known. And, there is a difference between attention and being chosen.

So, what is it about Leo and this beautiful Moon that we can learn this month?

Leo is the sign of the zodiac represented by the lion. And lions are felines.

Felines… aren’t animals I’ve generally flocked toward, until somewhat recently.

I was blessed to witness the end of a spiritually beautiful cat-human relationship. The grief of that loss hit chords in my heart I wasn’t prepared for. That sweet kitty still visits me in dreams and visions and I’m ever grateful I had the opportunity to meet her in her last year of life.

Because, for me? I’ve always been a dog girl, and believe you me, when I have my home and the land I’m envisioning, I will absolutely have another dog in my life. Their love is so pure, so genuine, so unconditional that I can’t help but get my fill from the gifts they so generously give.

But cats? Felines?

Their love is different.

It’s chosen.

They observe you. They witness you. They work to better understand you.

Then, once they’ve decided, “Yep. You’re my person.”

Whoa.

The love they can give is absolutely insane.

I moved to help my mom a couple of years ago. My sweet old dog was closing in on his last moments of life on this planet, and I cherished each and every moment I could with him until it was time to free him of his body.

The day the vet came, my mom’s cat was slinking all over my sweet Tucker. He was getting to know the vet, while also very much holding a vast container for a transition I know he knew was coming.

I think he and Tuck had a psychic moment before Tucker took his last breath, where Buddy was asked to take care of me.

I feel this because the day I said goodbye to my sweet boy was the day something forever changed between me and Buddy.

Suddenly?

I was his person.

I’d never had a cat choose me before.

I’d always been so allergic to cats that being around them would make my eyes itch, the inside of my mouth itch—basically every inner crevice of my face would light up with itchiness I could not scratch.

It was miserable.

Add in the fact that it felt like I had 20 pounds of weight on my chest to a point where breathing became difficult, and, well… I avoided them. They avoided me.

It was an agreement we’d made.

And I’d survived most of my life under this agreement.

Approximately 12 years ago, 10 years before this connection, I began experimenting with self-infection with human hookworm. A fringe, yet becoming much less fringe, way to help support a balanced immune response.

You can check out my medical practice for more information on that. Or this great RadioLab episode.

Yes, I’m a naturopathic doctor and an astrologer. I was told many times never to let people know I did both, yet, I do. And I’m not ashamed of it.

That is a rant for another day.

But I do love the microbiome, and microbiome restoration is truly my passion, so… back to the worms.

Throughout the time I’ve had these critters hanging out in my biome, I’ve become less and less reactive to the things around me.

One of the biggest changes?

Cats.

No longer reacting to cats has allowed me a deeper understanding of the capacity they have for love.

They have allowed me to receive a kind of love my body had spent most of my life rejecting.

Buddy is 13 pounds of sheer disgruntlement, and I have to admit, I could not love him more.

His grumpy nature is so endearing to me.

At night, he comes to find me. He lies on my belly as I enter my evening meditation and rides the waves of my deep belly breaths.

It absolutely melts my heart.

In the morning, he comes and puts his wet nose against mine, or gently nibbles my cheek. Sometimes it shocks me out of a deep sleep, but then I grab him and spoon his sweet self as he purrs, and I steal just a few more moments of shut-eye.

When I come home, Buddy slowly gets up, stretches, and saunters over to say hello before making his way back to his epic lounging.

He isn’t needy.

He takes the space he desires and approaches me when it feels appropriate.

But he returns.

At night, he returns.

In the morning, he returns.

When I come home, he rises to greet me.

There are no grand declarations. There is no dramatic speech announcing what we are to one another.

There is the consistency of his return.

We’re soul-connected at this point.

He’s my dude, and he knows I’m his human.

What’s so wild about it is that he has taught me so much about the Moon I inhabit in this embodiment by teaching me the feline ways.

I’m a Leo Moon, and I’m a total introvert.

I’d choose spending time with myself before other people most days of the week.

It doesn’t mean I can’t or won’t spend time with people. It just means I have to really gauge whether the energy I have is enough to share with those around me while also sustaining myself.

When I tell people this who’ve met me in social settings, they’re always a little shocked.

Don’t think that just because someone is introverted, they can’t be the funniest person you’ve met while engaging you in deep conversation.

One of my astrologers told me I’m a comedian, but only with those I’m closest with, only with those who feel like home.

It’s just… introverts may not prefer to do that all the time.

Nor really, most of the time.

So, when an introvert chooses to spend time with you, I guess it’s kind of like when a cat chooses you.

The choice means something.

Cats, as a dear friend of mine shared with me, live within matriarchal communities. They look to the essence of the feminine—the dark, the intuitive, the depths of knowing that are more felt than actioned upon or consciously known.

They thrive in that more etheric, feminine space.

Call me confident, edging on conceited, but I have a feeling that’s why Buddy flocked to me.

There is something about that matriarchal energy: the ability to hold space, to protect, to notice what others need without always needing words.

Maybe he recognized that in me.

And in return, I think I recognized something in him too.

Because that is the beautiful thing about being chosen: sometimes you don’t just find someone who needs something from you. You find someone who knows how to meet you, too.

Lions themselves exist in prides, and family is their chosen group.

A lioness?

Do not even think about messing with her cubs.

She protects the pride.

And that is another part of chosen love.

It isn’t just warmth.

It is protection.

It is knowing who belongs within your pride and making sure they never have to question whether you are standing beside them.

Felines listen.

They notice the slightest change in the environment. It is what allows them to be the impeccable hunters they are.

“They are little assassins,” as another friend shared with me.

And it’s true.

Most mornings, I bring Buddy outside with me to welcome the Sun and spend some time in communion with Spirit. I usually leave the door open, and he can come and go as he pleases.

One morning, I heard a yell from inside the house:

“Piper! Come get YOUR cat! He’s got a mouse in here!”

I had to laugh before I entered the house because…

One, my mom HATES this part about cats.

When she lived at my childhood home on the seven-acre property we grew up on, Buddy would go in and out of the dog door and bring her presents.

Sometimes birds. Sometimes snakes.

Sometimes they wouldn’t even be dead!

It’s the kind of thing that sent the heebie-jeebies up her spine.

And two?

He was suddenly—and rightfully—MY cat.

I walked inside, saw Buddy with his prized possession, and had to let him know the game of cat and mouse was clearly over.

That poor little guy.

I grabbed the broom and dustpan and thanked him for his sacrifice.

I thank mice a lot. Reading human microbiome research, those poor mice give us so much information in sacrifice for so many lives. Take a moment to thank the mice sometime today. I’d greatly appreciate it.

But that is how cats are. Ever generous in showing you they love you.

They listen.

Any subtle shift and they begin their stalk.

Their paws are designed in such a way that they are literally silent until they don’t want to be.

They’re freaking ninjas!

And maybe that is part of loving with your whole heart, too.

It is listening closely enough to know when something has shifted.

It is learning another being’s rhythms, movements, silences, and needs.

It is paying attention—not because you need attention returned to you, but because the one you love matters enough to be noticed.

Cats are also incredible at taking the time to rest, recover, and take the well-earned cat nap that gives them the energy to take on the next big hunt.

They know when to approach.

They know when to retreat.

They know how to remain connected without abandoning their own nature.

That, too, is chosen love.

Choosing someone does not mean losing yourself.

Love can be wholehearted and still possess boundaries.

It can be devoted without becoming self-abandoning.

The other thing I’ve learned about cats is their immense flexibility.

The way they can contort and twist their spines is truly awe-inspiring.

There was one night, early in my newfound relationship with Buddy, when he crawled on top of me in the middle of a meditation. I was very much not in a conscious state, and pure reflex had me throwing him off my person.

Near immediately, I realized it was just Buddy and felt horribly bad for sending him across my room.

Only to find?

Cats always land on their feet.

Try and knock them down, and the moral of that story is: good luck.

They find their way to their feet and keep moving forward.

Love will have moments like that.

Moments of misunderstanding. Moments when instinct takes over. Moments when one person gets startled and the other gets tossed across the proverbial room.

But wholehearted love is not the absence of rupture.

Maybe it is the willingness to find your feet, return, and choose one another again.

And maybe this is why the lion represents Leo.

They listen with all their heart, hunting for the bit of information they can reflect to you, especially if you’re talking to a Leo Moon, to remind you of the light you yourself possess in this world.

They’re flexible, sometimes to a fault.

Of all the fixed signs in the zodiac (hey, Scorpios, Aquarians, and Taureans) I would say they are THE most flexible in comparison.

They’re love.

They’re joy.

They’re compassion.

Funny as fuck, too.

And when you are chosen by a Leo?

When you’re chosen by the cat of the zodiac?

You’ll know.

There is no second-guessing.

No wondering where you stand.

They choose you and stand by you.

They’re loyal like that.

I had someone ask me once, “What do you mean when you say you want to be chosen?”

I’m pretty horrible with on-the-spot questions like that.

I need time to let things simmer and percolate.

At first, I didn’t know how to explain it.

But I think this entire relationship with Buddy has been teaching me the answer.

Being chosen does not mean being preferred for a moment.

It does not mean someone says they love you and then leaves you to decipher whether their actions agree.

It is never having to wonder whether someone is on your side.

It is the deep inner knowing that, through it all, you are going to figure out how to make shit happen together.

Because love is a choice.

And it is entirely your choice to make.

But once you make it?

Stay true to it.

Not by abandoning yourself.

Not by accepting whatever another person decides to give you.

Not by confusing loyalty with allowing yourself to be walked all over.

But by being honest about what, and whom, you have chosen.

By showing up.

By returning.

By listening closely enough to notice the subtle shifts.

By protecting what belongs within your pride.

By letting your love be seen in such a way that the people you choose do not have to survive on crumbs, ambiguity, or uncertainty.

Maybe that is the deeper truth of Leo.

Leo is not simply the sign that wants to be seen.

Leo sees with the heart.

And once Leo recognizes its beloved, it loves visibly.

An audience may watch a Leo shine.

But the pride is who Leo comes home to.

Lions take pride in the family they create.

They love fiercely. They protect what they love. They remain sovereign within that love, and they never let you walk all over them.

This Leo New Moon asks us to look at the love we have chosen.

Have we chosen it only in words, or have we chosen it through our actions?

Do the people we love know where they stand with us?

Are we asking another person to choose us while remaining unwilling to fully choose ourselves?

Are we returning?

Wholehearted love is not proven by intensity alone.

It is proven through the ordinary, repeated acts that say:

I see you.

I know you.

I choose you.

I am here.

To love with all of your heart is to choose consciously, love visibly, and remain honest about what that choice asks of you.

It is allowing yourself to be known.

It is refusing to make the people you love endlessly wonder whether they are loved.

And it is becoming someone whose love feels like a place another heart can safely come home to.

Come home to yourselves this New Moon, brothers and sisters.

Big hug to you all,

Dr. Piper

The Astrology for this Moon

Ah, the nodes of fate have shifted out of the Pisces–Virgo axis and into the Aquarius–Leo axis. Meaning, with this Moon in Leo? It’s eclipse season.

This can mean fresh starts, or big endings. It may or may not hit you as strongly depending on where Leo is in your chart, but I will tell you—it is going to hit me.

My Leo Moon is in my 4th house of home, one degree away from this eclipse.

Woo-wee.

Ok. Good to know.

I’ve been looking for land, looking for a place I can steward and call home, and if this eclipse brings me that? I would be ever grateful.

And, I can also be patient.

With this Leo Moon of mine, I’ve learned patience in how I love, in how I tend a home, and in how I allow life to unfold.

I have big plans for that land, so when it is right, it will reveal itself. I just pray Spirit continues to guide me and say, “That’s the spot.”

Only time will tell with that one.

And, after writing an entire essay about chosen love, pride, belonging, and what it means to come home, apparently the astrology would like to point directly at my 4th-house Moon.

Cute.

This New Moon is happening around 20 degrees Leo. If you look at your own chart and have anything around 20 degrees of Leo, Aquarius, Taurus, or Scorpio, you may feel this eclipse energy more strongly as well.

I have many aspects that talk to my Moon, so it may be bigger than just land, but sometimes keeping those changes private is just as important as sharing the vulnerable sides of a chart.

A solar eclipse is where the Moon moves between the Sun and the Earth, momentarily blocking the light of the Sun.

Some cultures view this as a moment of intimacy between the Sun and the Moon and honor it by allowing these two light bodies the time and space to share their moment.

Others?

View it as an attack to the light, where darkness engulfs the light and asks the humans to get their shit together—for lack of better phrasing. It can also mean the fall of a king… (I mean, it is Leo, in all its royalty)

The word eclipse itself carries this idea of abandonment, of something leaving or disappearing, and I think that sums up some of the astrological understanding of this time beautifully.

Abandon what was once there in order to start fresh.

Or maybe, more accurately:

What can no longer come with you into what you are becoming?

Less demons and darkness, and more: what is it about your life that needs a radical shift?

Assess it.

Pay attention.

And see how the next 18 months unfold for you.

New Moon Trine Saturn in Aries

This New Moon trines the father of the zodiac, good ol’ Saturn.

In a very fiery sign!

Saturn in this position is supportive. He’s asking us to be clear about our boundaries, to stand up for what is right, and to forge forward with the passion we so deeply house, with no remorse.

Fire in general is passion.

And I think Saturn adds another question here:

Can you sustain what your heart chooses?

Leo says, “I love this.”

Aries says, “I’m going after it.”

Saturn says, “Ok. Will you still be here when it requires work?”

And maybe that is part of chosen love too.

Not just the passion of choosing something, but the willingness to keep showing up for what you chose.

To return.

Mercury in Leo Square Chiron in Taurus, Opposite Pluto in Aquarius, Trine Neptune in Aries, Conjunct Jupiter in Leo

This placement touches on communication in the current moment

A square to Chiron may mean internal struggles around wounding, whether it is your own, or the wounding of those you’re speaking to.

Mercury in Leo wants us to speak from the heart.

Chiron asks us what hurts when we do.

And the opposition to Pluto?

Your words can be deeply transformative.

So yes, be careful with what you say and how you say it.

But I think it goes deeper than that.

What truth is sitting underneath the words you are speaking?

Are you communicating what is real, or are you trying to control how someone else receives it?

Is there something underneath the thing you are saying that actually needs to be said?

Because Pluto has a way of taking us to the depths.

And then we have Jupiter.

Mercury is moving toward an exact conjunction with Jupiter in Leo on August 15th, and if Mercury represents our words, thoughts, and communication, Jupiter makes things big.

The love is big.

The impact of our words is expansive.

What we say may carry farther than we realize, and what we hear may have the ability to shift something much larger within us.

Jupiter is associated with the Wheel of Fortune in Tarot. The wheel turns. Life changes. Something opens that may move us closer to where we are meant to be.

But we still have choice.

That is the beauty of free will.

You can listen.

You can recognize the opening and step into flow.

Or you can continue choosing the chaos that feels familiar.

The older I get?

The more my peace is of the utmost importance to me.

I don’t need every opening to become a battle. I don’t need every lesson to arrive through chaos. Sometimes Spirit opens the door and our only job is to notice it, trust it, and decide whether we are willing to walk through.

And maybe Jupiter beside Mercury is asking us to pay attention to the conversations, words, ideas, and realizations that suddenly make the path ahead feel a little bigger.

A little clearer.

A little more possible.

But Mercury is also trine Neptune in Aries, bringing intuition, compassion, and maybe even a little Spirit into the conversation.

Neptune speaks to that part of us that knows before we have proof. Before we have the language. Before we can sit someone down and explain exactly why we feel the way we do.

It is that inner nudge. That feeling in your body. That quiet sense that something has shifted, even if you cannot yet name what it is.

Sometimes we know long before our conscious mind catches up.

And with Neptune in Aries? Maybe there is courage in actually trusting that.

Trusting what you feel.

Trusting what you sense.

Trusting that inner knowing enough to let it guide what comes next.

Not blindly, not recklessly, but without constantly talking yourself out of what you already know.

Neptune is also sextile Pluto, creating this really beautiful undercurrent between what we intuitively sense and the deeper transformations already taking place beneath the surface.

Sometimes the intuition comes first.

Then the transformation makes sense later.

Sometimes a conversation can fundamentally change the way we understand ourselves, someone else, or the situation we’re standing inside.

But maybe not every transformative conversation begins with having all the right words.

Sometimes we have to feel our way toward the truth first.

And with Mercury in Leo, maybe the invitation is to speak from the heart clearly enough that there is no guessing.

No crumbs.

No ambiguity.

No uncertainty.

But also softly enough to remember that there is another heart receiving what we have to say.

Which feels pretty fitting after everything we just talked about.

This eclipse may not only be asking us what we want to begin.

It may also be asking us what we are willing to choose… and whether we are willing to live like we have chosen it.

Venus in Libra Opposite Neptune in Aries

And then there is Venus opposite Neptune.

If Neptune can connect us to our intuition, to Spirit, to that deep inner knowing that exists before we have the words to explain it, Neptune also has a darker side.

It can deceive.

It can create illusions.

It can make something appear to be one thing when, underneath the surface, something entirely different is waiting to be revealed.

Maybe that is part of the symbolism of this eclipse too.

For a moment, the light disappears.

What was once clearly visible becomes obscured by darkness.

And sometimes Neptune can feel like that.

It can eclipse the light just long enough to tempt us into believing what we want to believe, seeing what we want to see, or questioning the very intuitive knowing that was trying to guide us in the first place.

Venus is the planet of love, beauty, aesthetics, nature, relationships, and what we value.

Opposite Neptune?

We may be asked to look at where we have idealized something.

Where we have fallen in love with the potential instead of what is actually standing in front of us.

Where beauty, longing, or desire has made it harder to see clearly.

And maybe even where deception has caused us to question our own inner knowing.

Because there is a strange thing that can happen when the wool finally gets pulled from over our eyes.

We look back and realize some part of us knew all along.

Maybe we felt the shift.

Maybe something in our body knew.

Maybe Spirit whispered.

Maybe our intuition kept nudging us, but what we wanted to believe was louder.

The lesson? Be patient.

Like the felines have taught us throughout this entire Moon, observe.

Listen.

Notice the subtle shifts.

Allow things to unfold over time.

You do not always have to decide what something means while you are standing inside the fog.

Sometimes clarity comes when the light reappears.

And once it does?

You may find what you were looking at was never quite what you thought it was in the first place.

Or maybe you will discover that your intuition saw it clearly long before your conscious mind was ready to accept what it knew.

How do I even start this one? I’m not entirely sure, but that is the beauty of these newsletters - I never really know how it’s going to turn out until it’s been written. So, here goes.

Cancer is the initiator of summer, the beginning of the sunnier months. The solstice welcomes in this sign with the longest day of light in the year; a period where the sun lingers a little longer. It is also, our first introduction to the element of water. The first sign in the Western zodiac that asks us to feel. To really feel.

Emotions are some of the most difficult challenges of being human. Cancer is ruled by the Moon, our emotional landscape, our memories, our attachments, our need for safety and belonging. She also governs what we inherit emotionally—the memories, survival strategies, and ways of loving that are often passed down long before we’re old enough to understand them. Yet every year, the Sun enters this Moon-ruled sign. The light enters the dark. The conscious-self illuminates what has been tucked away beneath the surface.

The Moon is unassuming in this way. Hanging quietly in the sky as if she’s merely there to reflect and light up our night.

Yet her influence reaches far beyond what we can see.

Born of the earth, she pulls the tides in and out. She helps steady our planet, giving rhythm to our seasons and movement to our waters. She doesn’t demand attention, yet life on Earth has quietly unfolded in relationship with her for millennia.

Emotions have always felt a bit like that to me.

Easy to dismiss because we can’t hold them in our hands. Easy to tuck away because they’re invisible. Yet they shape the landscape of our lives just as surely as the Moon shapes the sea.

If Cancer and its rulership by the Moon has taught me anything, it’s that what we bury emotionally never really leaves us. It simply waits until we’re ready to feel it.

Ya see, my dad was a Cancer.

He was born on July 2nd, 1953. He would have been 73 this year. That is so wild for me to think about. He’s been gone 13 years. And if I’m being honest, those 13 years have brought us closer than in the 25 years I had with him here in the physical.

I don’t talk about him often, but this year… I felt called to share a bit more. Step into the vulnerability of the Cancer feels and shed some light on the man who is half my genome.

I was riding in a Lyft recently after a conference with a coworker and dear friend of mine. We were off to the airport. The driver was an interesting dude to say the least, and as he engaged my friend, I couldn’t help but hear the old 90s country station playing softly through the speakers. Songs from my past that I rarely revisit, but somehow still know every word to.

After this guy shared about his meth use and losing his wife (slight over-share, but ok) — I thanked him for the music. It really took me back to when I used to ride along the I-5 corridor in Oregon with my dad while he was stocking ice cream in the store freezers. It wasn’t a bad gig for a sugar-fiend of a kid.

Funny how one memory opens the door to so many others.

My friend looked at me and said “I did not know that about you and your dad.”

It made me realize…

Neither did most people.

I loved cooking with him (Cancers love a good meal, it is the sign that rules the stomach), loved singing in the car with him, and also loved playing tennis with him. When I started tennis in high school he picked up a racket and learned to play too. He absolutely annihilated me on the court, but we had so much fun talking shit to each other and when I’d get a clean shot he couldn’t salvage?! Man, those were some of my favorite moments.

He loved sports and was a walking encyclopedia of athletic stats. I think it was his way of escaping. When free-throw shots became my nemesis? He came to the gym with me and had me practice my shot, over and over and over again, until I became the go-to shooter for technical fouls. He was also a human calculator. One of my favorite games to play with him when we’d go to work together was to pull out his calculator and give him insane number combinations to crunch while he drove. He never missed a single one.

Our relationship, however, was not all roses. In fact, it was more thorn than rose.

The Rapid

Being careful is something my dad taught me. With his Cancer sun, Pisces moon, and Scorpio rising… he was a class V rapid waiting to eat you alive, but if you were careful to exit the river, scope the rapid, and determine your passage - you were granted a chance at survival.

My dad was the first to criticize my efforts. From my earliest years, I can remember him saying things to me no father should say to their daughter. Negating my intellect, judging my every move, commenting on how much I ate, and ensuring I knew my efforts would never be enough.

I remember finishing a basketball game where I’d scored in the double digits. I was so excited! It was my best game all year. I left the locker room feeling so good. When I got in the car, I spent the 30 minute drive home hearing all the places I’d messed up. The cut I could have made, the missed baseline shot that would have increased the point accumulation. I was suddenly unimpressed with my performance. Like a balloon, fully deflated. I’ll just… keep working harder. My determination in this life is kind of insane and I do have my dad to thank for that. I was driven to show him I had value.

But, if I’m being honest? I didn’t know this was a problem until my first year of medical school.

What we grow up in, is what we know. It’s normal - until you realize it’s not.

My dad was diagnosed with stage IV terminal cancer two weeks before I left for new student orientation. We were told in private he had three months to live, he was told six. (Reality? He lived three months and 9 days post-diagnosis.)

My dad… didn’t take the news all that well. For someone who had spent most of his life avoiding big emotions - to the point where he’d erupt like a volcano, then disappear - facing the finality of life was more than he could handle. He entered a state of psychosis that followed him through his remaining days.

In the midst of processing that the patriarch of my family was soon exiting, I was learning how to be a doctor. About two weeks into the program, there was a lunch-and-learn on trauma-informed care. I remember thinking, “that’s probably something I should have in my toolbox. I’m sure I’ll see people who’ve been through horrible things and I want to be sure I know how to navigate that well for them.”

What happened next was unexpected yet, everything I needed in that moment. As the presenters put up slides about abuse and abusive behavior, I soon realized abuse has many different flavors - how I learned to approach my dad over the years, how we were coached to calm the storm - all of those feelings of “walking on eggshells” were actually born from an abusive parent.

The thing about emotional abuse is that it rarely leaves bruises. It leaves confusion. It leaves self-doubt. It leaves children wondering if they're the problem. Sometimes it takes years—even decades—to realize what happened had a name.

I’d never put the word abuse to my childhood until that moment. I felt like I was in a tunnel. Like I was the only person in the room and these women were speaking directly to me. I was faced, for the first time, with a truth and reality, I had never been able to put words to - but suddenly, the earliest critiques no child should hear were identified as wrong. Said to be, abusive. My world stood still.

I called my mom after and said, “Mom! Dad’s abusive.”

“I know.” Was her response.

I was in so much shock trying to process this new information that I realized in that moment - therapy was next on my list, full stop. Healer heal thyself, a major tenant of the medicine I practice, was one of the first I became deeply acquainted with.

In those last months, my dad was the worst parts of himself exponentiated. That October, I turned 25. I waited all day by my phone anticipating the last happy birthday I’d ever hear from him. He never called. I shared with my mom that this was disappointing for me, but that it was ok - he was dealing with a lot.

He called me a few days later and said “I heard you were upset I didn’t call you on your birthday?” When I admitted I was he told me,

“I had better things to do.”

Sounds good, dad.

We often joked when I was younger that he was “Dave Dobner, the man, the myth, the legend.” He was easily the strongest man I’ve ever known physically. My brothers and I believed that if someone pissed Dad off enough, he could lift a car. And honestly? I still believe that to be true.

One day, my brother took him to the high school gym and discovered that a man who had never formally lifted, could casually out-bench most of the boys in the 1000 lb club.

I learned to be very careful around my dad.

I had this uncanny way of making him completely lose his shit. Zero to one hundred. Just with my presence.

At his celebration of life, after a few drinks, my oldest brother approached me and said, “I don’t know why Dad was always so hard on you.”

It was one of the most validating statements I’d ever heard from someone in my family.

“You saw it too?”

Later that evening, my dad’s best friend asked me how I liked the slideshow he’d put together for his half of the celebration of life.

I told him I noticed there weren’t any pictures of me.

He looked at me and said, “Well Piper, it’s because your dad didn’t really like you.”

Ouch. There are moments in life where something you’ve quietly suspected gets spoken aloud.

That was one of them.

I couldn’t leave it alone.

When my dad died, I did a one on one astrology course with my mentor to talk through ancestral astrology. We pulled my dad’s chart, his dad’s chart, and my great-grandfather’s chart and overlaid them onto my own.

What I came to find in that series, was a deep wounding of the masculine that came to a pinnacle - right at my Chiron, in my 2nd house.

The wounded healer. In Cancer. In the house that governs self-worth and value.

The symbolism wasn’t lost on me.

For years I had been searching for my value in the eyes of a man who could never give it to me. Yet there it was in the map of the stars - a wound asking not to be healed through achievement, but nurtured and held.

Cancers are often called the nurturers of the zodiac. The full-term pregnancy. The mother who can hold it all.

But what happens when the one born under that sign never experiences that kind of nurturing themselves?

I found myself wondering that after my dad died.

What I know of my grandmother is that she was a staunch Catholic with a deep commitment to liquor. Likely to survive the overbearing energy of the grandfather I never met. To be fair, I never met either of my grandfathers. What I inherited instead were the stories.

To say I was left with a lot to detangle after my dad died is an understatement. I put myself into therapy and began the grueling process of unpacking… everything. I withdrew in those years, slowly realizing that my experience of my dad was entirely my own. Separate from everyone else in the house. (Isn’t it wild how that works?)

Therapy genuinely saved my life. The voice I learned to keep quiet started speaking up again. It wasn’t pretty, and in many ways, still isn’t. I spent years working through anger, realizing I’d denied an entire emotion because I didn’t want to become the angry man my dad could be. By the time I graduated, I was pretty unimpressed with my degree, recognizing it as yet another attempt to prove to him, I had value.

In that season of my life, I read a book called “I Don’t Want To Talk About It: The Secret Legacy of Male Depression.” In this book author Terrence Real discussed how these patterns, these harder sides of men often came from abusive upbringings. He talked about getting in touch with the anger in these men so he could get to the deeper hurt beneath the shield of rage.

I called my mom and started asking questions. It turned out my dad was hurt, badly, as a young boy. When he told his parents what had happened, the good Catholics they were told him they’d never speak of it again. When he needed safety and protection the most? He was given silence and told to shake it off, most likely the precursor of his infamous phrase “walk it off.”

His hurt - traversed the entirety of my childhood. All because no one gave him the space, time, or safety to show him he was protected. Like so many wounded Cancers, he built a strong sturdy shell no one could penetrate, and resided there indefinitely.

“The love you withhold is the pain you carry” -Ralph Waldo Emerson

Somewhere in the midst of all that, I started having little moments that felt like psychic hits and I had no idea what to do with this newfound intuition. A friend told me “you have to see my lady” - so, I did.

She was an Akashic Record reader. I had no idea what that meant. Her card said Reiki and Grief Recovery Coach, so I figured I’d try Reiki, something I’d also never done.

I showed up, sat down across from her, gave her my full name, and she opened my records.

I had absolutely ZERO idea what I was walking into.

Mere moments later... she put her hand out to her right side and audibly said “HOLD ON!” — then looked at me and said, “you’re pretty young… did your dad die?”

It had been nearly five years since his death.

“Yes,” I said.

“Well, he’s here and he’s got something he needs to say.”

She spent the next 45 minutes communicating, only the things me and my therapist had spent years uncovering. I was sobbing.

He was sorry.

That moment, something changed. Though, I could no longer physically see him… I knew he was there. I was still working on forgiving him and knew the forgiveness wasn’t for him - it was for me. So I could move on. Move forward.

If I close my eyes, I can still find myself in that room, on the sheep’s rug on the floor, listening as my dad apologized for it all. It cracked me open and accelerated my path to forgiveness.

A few years later, on what would have been his 68th birthday, I got my nose pierced. Not because it would have fully enraged him in his physical body, but because I knew… it was something I wanted. I waited almost five years from wanting it, to finally getting it because I needed to make sure, it was not something done in spite of him.

After years of hearing what kinds of women got piercings, that distinction mattered to me.

Life continued. I kept doing my work, and my anger became more balanced among the other emotions I experience as a woman. Then a business partnership began crumbling. I could feel it. I knew in my heart it was happening, but I didn’t quite know when.

I had an acupuncture appointment with this brilliant man in Arizona. After he placed the needles, he moved to my head to do what I thought would be craniosacral. Instead, he stopped and said, “This may sound weird, but your dad is working through my hands. He wants you to know he’s here, and he wants so badly to help you. He’s just waiting for you to ask. To invite him in.”

It had been nearly nine years since he’d passed.

By then, I’d become pretty accustomed to him showing up in my spiritual life, so it wasn’t shocking. But it did give me a tool.

The strongest man I’d ever known, now on the other side, wanted to help?

You got it, Dad.

I started talking to him more after that. Sometimes a song comes on. Sometimes a memory quietly finds me. Sometimes I’ll simply say, “Hi, Dad.”

We’ve worked together a lot since he passed.

Our relationship today is stronger than it ever was when he was here in his earthly body.

I love my Dad.

Part of me wonders what life would have been like had someone extended him a hand when he was little and so hurt… but I hope he knows now, he’s more than welcome in my life. I put everything in the hands of my Father. And giving it all up to the Father - that’s what we do. He continues to show up in my dreams and I continue to welcome him into my life.

As children, we look to our parents for safety, security, stability, and protection.

He didn’t have that.

So he didn’t know how to give it.

The greatest blessing of our relationship since he’s passed has been discovering the ways he shows up now—in ceremony, in dreams, in breathwork, and in those chills that run through my spine when he suddenly comes to mind.

When I have a problem?

I simply pray.

To my guides.

My angels.

Spirit.

The Father.

He was an imperfect man trying to make his way in this world. And. He created an imperfect daughter who’s merely hoping to do the same.

Just when I think I’ve got it figured out, the universe throws me a connection and I realize how easily I can still fall into the pattern of working for love.

Today? I realize that losing him here in the physical is what brought me into my wholeness.

If you’d asked me thirteen years ago who I’d become because of losing him... I never could’ve imagined her.

I can now feel my whole spectrum of emotion without having to play small. To me, that’s one of the most beautiful gifts of being human in this simulation we call life.

I work a lot with people who feel they simply cannot go there, cannot access the pain they so meticulously packaged away. But I think if Cancer teaches us anything it’s not to stay hidden in your shell, but to let the sweet, vulnerable softness pull those feelings out and allow light to be shone on the box you’ve thrown into emotional storage.

Don’t hide your emotions. Allow the Sun to illuminate the dark and reveal the soft, sweet human that lies behind those walls.

Because, you - are beautiful.

And you are worth showing your most vulnerable self.

Maybe that’s Cancer. Or maybe… that’s Cancer through the eyes of Chiron.

Not pretending the wound never happened.

Not drowning in it either.

But allowing the light of the Sun to illuminate what the Moon has been carrying all along.

May you have the courage to feel it all.

Big hug, sweet peas.

Dr. Piper

And now? The astrology.

Sun and Moon in Cancer, conjunct Mercury retrograde — all squaring Saturn in Aries

This shouldn’t shock anyone after reading the above.

I looked at this arrangement and just kind of chuckled to myself. I’m ever astounded by astrology’s elegance and perfect timing.

The father of the zodiac, Cronus—otherwise known as Saturn—is squaring this highly emotional Cancer New Moon. Saturn is limitation. Restriction. Boundaries. Constriction. The father.

Squares are the internal realm. They’re the places we ourselves have to grapple with. So Saturn squaring the emotional mother of the zodiac feels... kind of wild.

Mercury is right there too, in Cancer and retrograde. Mercury in Cancer has a hard time finding words, yet feels everything so deeply. When retrograde? We get to revisit, re-evaluate, and reimagine what came before.

If you’re feeling incredibly self-reflective under this New Moon, don’t be surprised.

To me, this feels like sharing the emotions that Saturn once taught us to suppress. Breaking through the limits of the overbearing father. Finding words for memories that perhaps never had language before.

Without even knowing it, I suppose this is what inspired my above share.

T-Square - Jupiter in Leo (welcome, Jupiter) opposite Pluto in Aquarius, both squaring Chiron

Big, transformational wounds. Deep shifts in our relationship to the shadow.

Pluto, lord of the underworld, doesn’t let us off the hook easily. He can be pretty brutal. But if you’re willing to hang out in the shadow for a while, if you’re willing to shine light into the places you’d rather avoid, especially with the expansive support of Jupiter in Leo, this feels like an opportunity to make real movement with wounds that have otherwise felt stuck in the mud. (Chiron in Taurus.)

Seeing this placement, I couldn’t help but think about my own chart. Years ago someone looked at my Pluto and Saturn placements and told me they spoke of being trapped by the masculine. Put into a box. Caged.

Looking at this sky—and then looking back at the writing that poured out of me this month—I feel like Jupiter came at just the right time.

Not to erase the wound.

Not to avoid it with false joy.

But to allow it to be incorporated. Integrated. To arrive at a newfound place of resolution.

T-squares often need a release valve—a place for all that pressure to go. If you’re carrying Scorpio in the early degrees, you may be feeling this one deeply. Get into some water if you can. Let the element Cancer knows so well help carry what no longer needs to stay inside.

Lilith Trine South Node conjunct Venus in Virgo (literally transiting my own Venus in Virgo)… Sextiling the North Node in Pisces

The feminine in complete independence. Self-assured. Standing strong on her own two feet. Not asking for pity, rather demanding she be seen for the fierce force she truly is.

Damn, Lilith.

Thanks, sister.

Supporting sweet Venus in Virgo.

Now, that’s a configuration I can get behind.

To me, this feels like stepping into receptivity. Moving away from the work, the effort, the proving of oneself—and into the gift of what it means to be a container for life as a woman in this world.

What is meant for you comes to you. Surrender and Spirit will provide.

Uranus conjunction Mars in Gemini (Another T-Square, this time with the Nodal Axis)

Hot. Electric. And so incredibly verbose.

These two together can be sheer and utter chaos. Split-second decisions. Warrior-esque energy backing a not-so-well-thought-out plan. Acting too quickly on one piece of information before allowing Gemini curiosity to fully percolate.

As the nodes finish their journey through the Virgo–Pisces axis, whatever remains unresolved from the last eighteen months may reveal itself rather chaotically.

If that’s you... don’t panic.

Maybe it’s simply the invitation to step away for a bit. Travel. Breathe. Get your head back on straight. Then let Mercury retrograde help you re-evaluate where you’re finding yourself.

Breathe deeply through this.

Fire and air together are a recipe for rapid ignition. Before reacting, ground. Better yet... find some water.

Bath anyone?

Barbault’s basket

If you’ve been in the astrology sphere lately, you’ve probably heard a lot of astrologers talking about this rather ominous time in the sky.

Here’s why.

Some of the biggest players in astrology—Neptune, Pluto, Uranus, and now Jupiter—are all beginning to talk to one another in direct aspect. It’s a configuration that is incredibly rare. To me, it feels like they’ve all shown up to the same table saying, “Hey... the way things have been going lately? It’s not working.”

And instead of yelling at one another, they’re largely meeting through trines and sextiles—aspects that say, “Let’s work together. Let’s shift the current trajectory.”

From inventive thinking for humanity, to higher love with a sprinkling of disillusionment, to a shake-up of our systems with deeply transformative yet expansive vision... it feels like the beginning of a massive restructuring.

Predictive astrology isn’t my jam. Reflection is. I genuinely believe in free will and our ability to participate in creating the future we want.

This configuration is merely the beginning. These planets move slowly. This energy has already arrived, and it’s going to linger.

So if you, like me, are in the midst of making a big decision... maybe let the dust settle before making any sudden moves.

It’s time for us, collectively, to re-envision our future. To pull ourselves out of the darkness and bring back a little more light.

How do you want this shake-up to look?

See it in your mind’s eye.

Then send your ask to Spirit.

“What is meant for you will be. What is not has already passed.”

One last gift before you go...

The old country music in that Lyft was the thread that wove its way through this entire newsletter. It only felt right to leave you with one in return.

The Gambler by Kenny Rogers. A sensitive Cancer Moon who somehow managed to teach some of life’s greatest lessons through the quiet wisdom of storytelling.

Some of life’s greatest lessons arrive quietly rather than dramatically.

May you find peace in your heart this month.

What a question. One that reminds me of a time in my life where I was stuck between the rock of my past and the hard place of desire. In that moment, my Virgo friend (love you, KP) looked at me and said “What would your 90 year old self do?”

That question, though from a Virgo, is very Gemini in nature (they are both ruled by Mercury - don’t worry, we’ll get there). Asking the questions that make you think, make you ponder, move you to a place of wondering yourself “what is my answer?” That. That is the brilliance of Gemini.

I once dated a man with a Gemini moon. Our conversations were epic, to say the least. His emotional curiosity had us swapping stories like we had just joined back together at the hip after lifetimes apart. Our connection was near instant, though our time together was relatively short. 367 days after meeting him, he passed away. We had a lifetime of adventures together in that short period.

He was an exceptional storyteller and his persistent line of questioning allowed me the space to share mine as well.

I knew, just days after meeting him - that whatever was to unfold - our time together would be finite - yet, I still jumped in.

Did it hurt like hell when he died? You fucking bet it did. It was a brutal grief process. Yet, when I reflect to my 90 year old self? She’s proud.

I never saw that experience as a “brave choice.” Shit, it didn’t feel like a choice at all. To me? I was merely following my heart and trusting the journey.

Looking back? It was one of the bravest things I’ve done. And, I don’t regret it.

Gemini is ruled by Mercury and Mercury is such a fascinating planet. It’s the planet closest to the Sun, so when you look at an astrology chart (which is merely a map of the sky at the exact time you were born with the location you were born in smack dab in the center of that map), Mercury is rarely that far from the Sun. They dance through the sky together. A single day on the planet Mercury, from sunrise to sunrise, is approximately 176 days on earth. That. Is. Wild! And - it means one part of the planet is hot like fire from the sun, while the other side, awaiting its turn, is cold and dark.

Mercury is a planet that is mostly its iron core. Where we here on earth are approximately 75% water, Mercury is 75% iron. Astrology never ceases to amaze me. Why?

In Greek mythology, Mercury was represented by Hermes, the messenger of the gods. He could move between all the worlds - from Mount Olympus with the gods, to earth, to the underworld. The only god capable of traversing all these levels. And he did it to communicate. For us humans to communicate, we need to be breathing. And for us to breathe? We need oxygen. The only way oxygen makes its way through our body? Iron. Iron grabs the oxygen we inhale, and delivers it to the different parts of our body to allow each and every one of ours cells enjoyment of that delicious fuel.

Communication is made possible with iron. And Mercury, the planet in the sky that governs our ability to think, to integrate, to share our wildest thoughts and visions - is full of iron.

How we think, how we engage, how we interact with one another here on this planet, but also elsewhere - in the other worldly dimensions - Mercury is a major player in how that happens. We talk so much about these other planets and rarely give Mercury its time to shine. We hear about it when it retrogrades, we blame it when our computers crash, our phones glitch, or we say the stupidest thing and ruminate on it for weeks, possibly years. But truthfully? Mercury is our breath. It’s how we share our inner world with another human being. It’s how we ask the question, tell the story, make the call, say “I love you,” or “I’m sorry.” I think that’s incredibly beautiful.

The night he died, I was woken up by the feeling of a light turning on in my home. I lived alone with my sweet old dog Tucker and he didn’t stir at all. I shot up in bed and looked around in the darkness. “What the hell was that?” I thought. As I contemplated what I was going to do if I found someone in my house… A string of lights, white Christmas lights I had around a side wall - turned on. To turn these lights on, they needed to be physically plugged into the wall. I leaned over and saw the forks of the plug just barely in the socket. I pulled them out entirely and went back to sleep. That morning I woke to a voicemail from dear friends letting me know - he was gone.

Remember Hermes? He communicated between worlds. Call me crazy, but after getting the voicemail he had passed, I knew in my heart he was trying to communicate with me. To this day, I can’t explain that string of lights any other way. Whether you call it coincidence, grief, mystery, or communication between worlds - it was meaningful enough that I’ve never forgotten it.

After this sweet, feisty, fiery soul crossed over - I went into a deep grief period. My heart was broken, and my only choice was to grieve and let that experience do what it was meant to do - transform me. When someone dies, it’s final. There’s no “Will he call? Will we run into each other in the future and finally say what was left unsaid? Will there ever be another chance for conversation?” - none of that. It’s a quiet understanding that, there is no changing anything from that moment forward in regard to that person.

Three months later, the holidays were in full swing and I couldn’t stop thinking about his mom. I’d met her in the hospital approximately one month before he passed. I knew I needed to reach out to her, to let her know she wasn’t alone in her grief, but doing it felt huge. Immense. More than I as one person could hold. Yet, I knew I needed to do it. Knew I needed to communicate.

I reached out to friends asking for her address. A written letter was what I had in mind. Yet, all they had was her phone number. A phone call was not at all what I felt ready for. Calling a grieving mother to say, “Hi, I just wanted to check on you. Reintroduce myself. Say, I too am grieving. Maybe we can share stories?” Felt… bigger than I can express with words. I held onto her number for a few days longer, working up the courage to give her a ring.

Then, it came. The day I decided it was time to call his mom. I didn’t know what I was going to say, I didn’t know that I had any words to share with her just how difficult the past months had been for me, realizing all too deeply, her months were those of a mother who had lost her son - incomparable. But the thread that we shared, was losing a human we both loved deeply.

I dialed her number, it rang and rang then went to voicemail. I breathed a sigh of relief. I left her a short voicemail letting her know it was me, that I didn’t know what to say, but knew the holidays were on the horizon and I just wanted her to know - her son meant a lot to me and I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about her heading into this time of the year without his vibrant presence. I thanked her for bringing him to the planet, kept it at that, and hung up.

Hours later - her name appeared on my phone. She was calling me back! I took a deep breath and answered.

“Hi!” (I said her name)

“I knew it was you. The second I saw the area code and that it was coming from Oregon, I just knew it was you. I’ve been waiting for you to call.”

She’d been waiting for me to call? I remembered reflecting that to her. To which she said, “yes!”

She wanted to know everything - wanted to know how we met, who this woman was her son went on and on about (he went on and on about me?). She wanted all the details of his last year of life. I laughed and shared our story, telling her that just days after meeting and being challenged into jestful conversation by his playful mind, he grabbed both of my hands, looked me straight in the eyes and said,

“You are the total package.”

(I know ladies, you can all swoon. I think it’s a once-in-a-lifetime thing a woman experiences and I was so grateful to have had that experience with this human. Was I awkward as all get out? You bet. I thanked him and promptly walked away. I made my way to the Airbnb I was staying at with friends, closed the door behind me, leaned against it, and silently mouthed “OMG” while trying to regain my composure before going upstairs.)

She and I talked for hours. And at the end, she thanked me for finally calling her. In our sharing of stories, she was astounded at how well I knew her son. She shared that it made her feel like he was alive again, if only for a conversation.

That statement has stayed with me for years.

It made me realize something about immortality. We spend so much time trying to outrun death, fearing it, bargaining with it, wishing it wasn’t there. Yet, every human being who has ever lived eventually reaches the same limitation. The body leaves.

But stories don’t.

Memories don’t.

The way someone changed us doesn’t.

For a few hours, through nothing more than breath, words, and shared memory, her son was present in the room with us again. Not physically. But undeniably.

We used the power of our breath to share. That conversation? That felt like the bravest thing I’d ever done in my life at that point. And it taught me, if you can be brave enough to step into vulnerability and allow how you think/communicate to be experienced by others - you have no idea the impact it may make. We still pop in and out of each other’s lives. I sent her a happy mother’s day this year and she told me, it has been the first year she has been able to look at his picture and smile, rather than weep. Time truly does heal.

The older I get, the more I realize courage rarely feels courageous in the moment.

And looking back, the phone call wasn’t brave because I knew what would happen. It was brave because I had absolutely no idea what would happen.

Vulnerability is curiosity uninhibited by fear.

Curiosity of self. Who are you really? What do you really want? Another great question from a Gemini friend. She constantly challenges me with her seemingly simple, yet deeply difficult questions. This beautiful Gemini (JC - you already know I love and adore you) always leaves me with questions to ponder. I’m never let off a simple hook. When life slams me down, she pokes around with her curious mind and then leaves me with many things to consider and find clarity within my own self about. Good friends like that are true blessings in this life.

So the lesson of Gemini here is - be curious. First with yourself, then with those around you. Never assume you know what someone else is going through, what they’re thinking, or what they may want or desire. The only way to truly know? Is to ask. When you assume you have it all figured out, you may be shocked to find - the answer on the other side is different than what you’ve built in your head.

If Gemini season can teach us anything, it’s to be curious. To be vulnerable. To ask the question. To pick up the phone and make the call you’ve been terrified to make. To risk hearing an answer different from the one you’ve created in your own mind.

Because the truth is, none of us know how much time we have. That is the limitation of mortality. The future is never promised, and there may come a day when the question can no longer be asked, the story can no longer be shared, or the conversation can no longer happen.

So ask.

Be curious enough to learn.

Be vulnerable enough to listen.

And, perhaps most importantly, practice discernment. Not every unanswered question is yours to chase. Sometimes courage looks like making the call. Other times, it looks like respecting where someone is and allowing them the space to make the next move. Wisdom is knowing which is being asked of you.

And if you are ever unsure what to do, perhaps ask yourself the same question my Virgo friend once asked me:

“What would your 90-year-old self do?”

Answer it. Then, do it.

Big hug to you, star fam.

Dr. Piper

PS: The Astrology

Black Moon Lilith — The Courage to Be Yourself

The Sun and Moon are together in the later degrees of Gemini - with the only aspect (of the ones I read) being an opposition to Black Moon Lilith - a mathematical point of the moon’s oval orbit, where it is farthest from the earth. Black Moon Lilith often represents stepping into your true power, independence, and refusing to shrink who you are for the comfort of another. There is big medicine with this moon. Take some time to turn inward and ask yourself, where have you bent or folded to try and appease another? As me, myself, and I? Too many places. It’s old patterning I’m working on correcting, and will likely continue to work through in my years. Giving more than I receive is a huge place of self-sacrifice that needs some serious adjustment.

Saturn Square Mercury — The Courage to Speak

Saturn is in Aries, a very direct, boundaried energy squaring the societal Mercury - putting limitations on what we say, how we say it, and whether we say it. That’s hard with all that was communicated above - when you form the question to ask and you want the answer - action is how you get there. Saturn may stall this. Even though he’s in the very active sign of Aries, his cold core, his need to be measured in his response - may halt the direct nature of Aries. My advice? Don’t let it. Your voice deserves to be heard, don’t let the overly demanding father stop you from taking the action needed to move forward in your life.

Venus Opposite Pluto — The Courage to Love

Venus opposite Pluto is a planet in a sign that wants to be seen and absolutely adored, being challenged by a planet that demands deep transformation. In this energy know - love cannot be possessed, only chosen. And chosen love? Ooh honey, it’s the heartbeat of so many R&B songs. Many written by the infamous Jimmy Jams and Terry Lewis - a Gemini and a Sagittarius duo who bring together the axis of information and meaning, into deeply sentimental lyrics that have spanned the foundation of so many artists’ success.

Boyz II Men is one of these lucky bands to be blessed by the lyrical genius of these two men. A beautiful song that has always struck my heartstrings at the deepest level is “Can you Stand the Rain” - it’s an a cappella track by these beautiful men, that questions whether love can endure the tough times, written primarily by Jimmy Jams (a Gemini writing lyrics, makes a lot of sense after the above, yeah?) — When we first are enchanted by another, everything seems to be perfect - then? Life hits. We are challenged with the dark aspects of this embodiment, together. In those moments, when the storms come - it asks the question - “Can you stand the rain?” Can you continue to walk with me when life is hard? Can you stay when things feel overwhelming? Can you open your heart in a way that it encompasses all aspects of life - from the bright to the very dark, with the spectrum between?” It’s also the last song I chose to sing for my voice coach. Singing a cappella as a single woman trying to hit the insane range of four separate men was a bit intimidating, but it’s a song I go back to so often in my life. Learning to sing it — helps when I’m in my feels.

This Venus-Pluto opposition asks you to look at the love in your life and inquire - can this love endure the depths, can we, together, overcome the difficulties? In a chosen love, in one that truly wants nothing more than to grow together (real love, in my humble opinion) — this is absolutely possible. And, it’s what can lead to the type of love that traverses time, space, and location. Unconditional. I hope for you - you find that.

Jupiter Conjunct Venus — The Blessing of an Open Heart

Oh Cancers, you lucky asshats (said with so much loving compassion, and some thick sarcasm). Last week many astrologers were blowing up social media talking about how lucky this Jupiter-Venus conjunction in Cancer was. And to be fair, putting Venus and Jupiter together is usually a beautiful thing. Venus is the planet of love, beauty, aesthetic, intuition, inner knowing, and the unsaid. Jupiter expands whatever it touches. On paper? It sounds like a recipe for epic love stories, deep connection, and all things warm and fuzzy.

But here’s where things get a little more nuanced.

Before we talk about this Venus-Jupiter conjunction, let's zoom out for a second. Jupiter entered Cancer one year ago, on June 9th, and was immediately challenged by a square from Saturn and Neptune in Aries. And when you mix expansion with Saturn’s constriction and Neptune’s tendency to blur the lines between reality and fantasy, things can get complicated rather quickly.

Fast forward a year later, Venus and Jupiter met in Cancer. Beautiful? Absolutely. But this too, wasn’t happening in a vacuum. A square to Chiron was also involved, exposing relationship wounds and vulnerabilities that may have been sitting quietly beneath the surface. Or perhaps not so quietly.

So if your week wasn’t as lucky as the internet made it out to be, don’t assume you missed the magic.

Maybe the gift wasn't the outcome you were hoping for.

Maybe the gift was seeing the wound.

Maybe the blessing was finally becoming aware of the places where your heart still needs healing.

And perhaps that’s where Gemini comes back into the story. Because healing often begins with curiosity. Getting honest about your patterns. Your fears. Your shadow. The places where you protect yourself, abandon yourself, or keep repeating the same story over and over again.

Awareness is rarely as glamorous as luck. But in my experience? It’s often far more valuable.

Chiron in Transition — The Courage to Heal

And the last asteroid-comet hybrid I’d like to discuss is Chiron.

Aries… Y’all have had him in your sign since 2018! This summer, he’ll pop out for a brief breath of fresh air, only to return in a retrograde that won’t fully allow him to exit until end of April next year. But remember - that glimpse of release, that period where he’s gone - should give you the hope you’ve been looking for in the area of the chart he’s been lingering. He’ll enter Taurus briefly from June 19th to September 17th. Allow yourself to breathe more deeply during this short period of time. Your wounded healer is about to make his grand finale exit, but this period gives you some release on that pressure valve he’s been holding. Taurus… You just had Uranus exit and it felt so good, but what’s about to enter is another opportunity for growth and transformation. You can do this.

Chiron is the wounded healer. And we have many of those in this world. But what is so beautiful about Chiron was his ability to take the wound of abandonment from his mother, and turn the dark into light. He learned from some of the greatest Greek gods the gifts of healing - and instead of falling into the saying “hurt people, hurt people” - he transmuted his pain to healing. After his physical injury - he found the immortality of his half-immortal side - to be the most painful of his wounds. Having no exit from this life was difficult to swallow as you witness those you love in the mortal realm come and go… you realize just how lonely life can be. Sweet Chiron. He’s been a major part of my life process and one I just may speak to more next month. But know he’s moving sign. And our opportunities to look at the mirrors we have in our lives - those mirrors will reflect a different energy. Will you have the gusto to receive the insights and do something about it? Or continue to hide behind your wound?

For a newsletter subtitled Immortality’s Limitations, it feels fitting to end with Chiron. A being who discovered that living forever was not the gift he thought it would be. Sometimes our wounds teach us that life is precious precisely because it ends. That our conversations matter because they are finite. That our courage matters because opportunities eventually pass.

Which brings us right back to Gemini.

Ask the question.

Make the call.

Tell the story.

Do it, while you still can.

We are living in some wild times, friends. I’m unsure how to put the current day into words. As I work through my own internal processing, I find myself peeping briefly at the events around us and reminding myself that the chaos does not fill my soul. It does not provide comfort, nor a feeling of safety; two characteristics that are highly valued by the Taurean archetype. An archetype that has held me from my earliest of years.

Loyalty & The Taurus Archetype

As a Taurus rising, this sign has been one I’ve come to truly respect, appreciate, and at times cringe over when I can feel the stubborn loyalty it brings in my day to day life. Loyal to a fault, that’s what Taurus can mean for some. And I can already hear the waves of dispute - “oh, but loyalty is such a beautiful trait” - yeah, it can be, until you betray yourself in loyalty to others. Woof. What a life lesson that has been for me.

Ya see, my Taurus rising has been one of my greatest educators, especially in the last nine months of my life. A rising sign is said to be how you present yourself to the outside world. For me, that can mean I appear - resilient, steadfast, comforting, stable, Venutian in my ways (the natal chart is ruled by the planet that rules your rising sign. For me and my Taurus rising? This planet is Venus, the sign of love, beauty, aesthetic, and creativity).

In my university years, I was in a class where we all had to sit in a circle and admit to one another what our first impressions were of each other. The word that came through for me was “intimidating” - someone who appears to have their shit together can be, just that. I was told to wear more purple as it helps soften the intimidation factor. Luckily, that’s my favorite nail polish color - but sadly, the other side of Taurus is – but isn’t nail polish basically a toxic layer you add to your nail beds that eventually absorbs into your bloodstream and potentially creates greater toxic load in your internal system?

Did I mention Taurus is an earth sign? Yeah… us Taurean types are “el naturel” for lack of a better expression. We like to build cozy, stable homes that are aesthetically pleasing… which may explain my recent obsession with buying land and building a geodesic dome to support a nourishing, healing, loving home for me and my future dog (wherever they may be).

But something big has been happening to your Taurus friends - those with Sun, Moon, or Rising have been feeling it, feeling it significantly. We’ve had Uranus, the planet of revolution, disruption, electric change floating through the sign for the past seven years. It wasn’t until the end of last month that he decided to make his final venture into Gemini. His grand finale across the late degree of Taurus began with his forward motion over in July, his regression back across it in early November, then his final farewell at the end of April. A moment in my life - come and gone.

The Tower

Uranus is often tied to the tower card in tarot, which is routinely seen as destruction and demise. But we forget that when something is destroyed, the rebuild on the other side can be so incredibly beautiful. And as a Taurus rising, that is the aim. To find the beauty in picking up the pieces and moving forward. Figuring out what home looks like now, what stability will come, and how my life will create the rooted structure I so desperately crave.

Building from the ground up can feel … overwhelming. I know this as I put in my first offer on a plot of land recently. I was promptly denied and in the denial realized just how much fear I had in pursuing stewardship of the land I so desperately wanted. A dear friend of mine shared with me her reflection and told me “who better to steward land than a naturopathic doctor?” She’s not wrong. My whole medical practice is based off an ecological lens of restoration. And that is something my heart deeply desires.

As I walked the property I thought would be mine, I could see the vision for it’s future, could imagine the sweetness of walking the perimeter of my own parcel each morning, in deep communion with the land I love and care for so deeply. That plot? Was not meant to be mine, but I do feel one is close and look forward to the day we find one another.

Prior to Uranus crossing my rising back and forth — remember the car that hit me, reversed over me, then decided to speed back through? — putting in an offer was not something I was ready for. I needed my world destroyed in order to realize my own vision of what I want moving forward. To respect and love the next steps that are calling me.

I’m also, painfully patient about it - do not try and move a Taurus any faster than she would like to be moved. There is no rushing, no “hurry, hurry!” – at some moment, the land meant for me will see me, and I it - and we will mutually agree - this is the place. And in my patience, I’ll continue to work on enjoying being exactly where I am.

The Mandala

I’ve worn a mandala necklace around my neck for five years now. I found this piece of jewelry when I was at a thrift store in my hometown visiting my mom for mother’s day… I saw it and something about it drew me to it. I looked, put it back, but something about it kept calling me and as I circled the store, I knew - it was coming home with me.

It sat with me through my first medicine ceremonies and has held me as I’ve embarked on my next apprenticeship… one that will take me years to complete. But what I love most about this necklace? Is the deeper meaning mandalas bring.

I was asked once why that necklace… at the time my mind was grappling with an inner feeling of inconsistency I was experiencing that I could not find the words to express - why. I’ve thought about that question a lot and sat with this piece of jewelry to best understand - what exactly is it about this necklace that makes me feel safe, protected, and more myself than I could express?

It’s the concept of a mandala in general. Ever-changing, incomplete pieces of art. From the inner circle to the outer structure, a mandala has the potential for constant growth, change, development… yet, within the inner circles, the inner creation - we integrate the patterns and structures that have held us and brought us to our next level of expression.

Life can be a real bitch sometimes. It can throw us through loops we were not asking for, it can lead us in directions we thought would mean one thing, but turn out to be something entirely different - yet - our core is still present. It’s our outer edges that are being chiseled, refined, grown. Almost like the concentric circles of a tree. We grow into our next layer - being held always by the core.

We don’t get to just “let go” of the things that got us to where we are. Even if that feels like it would be the “easy way out” – nah, we integrate. We bring into us the experiences that have severed parts of our being, shattered our hearts, stripped us down to the rawest portions of self - just to say - hey, it’s ok to hurt, it’s ok to feel the pains of the world - and - as you move through those moments, as you integrate the things that downright suck - you get to rebuild who you truly are.

Grief

I had a patient recently, a teen who had lost a grandparent. It was their first big loss in life and all the pain of the finality of death had left their sweet heart not wanting to be here. As anger entered the intimate space of our interview, I asked for more, “what else is there?” Grief. Pain. Hurt. Their tower was demolished.

And when you’re young, shit - even when you’re in your late 30s - rebuild can feel… like the biggest mountain you’ve had to climb. For them? This surely was theirs.

As we talked about truly being and sitting with the grief, not “positive thinking” it away, but truly finding presence with the pain - and allowing the honoring of their grandparent through the grief to unravel - we found a beautiful space to share the thread that binds us all. We all enter grief, we all eventually get slammed down - it’s finding presence in that pain that allows us to build the next layer, to stand more firmly in who we are without bypassing and avoiding the hurt that felt so unbearable – but truly swimming in it, feeling it, processing it to its entirety. Then? Integrating that experience into our outmost layer as we build the next.

As a Taurus rising, I can often appear put together, but those who have seen me break, they’re painfully aware that all of us - even those with the strongest of walls or facades they present to the world - we all have suffered our fair share of pain. It’s what you do with the pain that determines your next steps in this world. Will you build your next beautiful layer or stay lost so far in the pain of the past that addressing it stunts your ability to build forward?

Life has thrown me many curve balls… and - each time, the resilience of my Taurus has allowed me to get back up and find the next big adventure. If land ends up being part of that, may the geodesic dome follow.

I hope your tower, the place in your chart where Taurus has been inhabited by a shake down - that you are now seeing the light on the other side that is inviting you to dream a new reality, to stubbornly put down roots in a structured, comfortable, soft, linen-esque manner that says “I choose to steward this beautiful land, this beautiful mother who holds us.”

Mother

This past weekend was mother’s day weekend and I would be remiss not to share a short blurb about the beautiful mama I have. We spent the weekend enjoying my sweet niece’s fourth birthday party, taking down some window awnings that simply had to go (not aesthetically pleasing in the slightest), and sharing our love of plants.

We’ve been spending time doing puzzles together lately and I recently told this sweet Capricorn mother of mine that only a Capricorn would pull her puzzle pieces out and organize them in lined piles by color. Through laughter and jestful defense she said, “hey! someday I’m going to be gone and you’re going to miss this!” And all I could think was - I already know that. I already treasure these moments together more than she may realize.

Laughing with her is one of my favorite pastimes and though she didn’t teach me the grief part of life (it’s not really her specialty, and life itself hs had no problem throwing those lessons my way to help me earn my stripes) – she has taught me how to find joy in the simplest of pleasures, to laugh at myself when I get too serious, and how to deliver punch lines that only she may laugh at, but make me feel like I’m a true born comedian.

I’m grateful for my mama and lucky to get to have someone who accepts me in all my interests and layers.

May your Taurus season be filled with natural fibers, beautiful plants, sunnier days, and time in communion with our earth mama - the mother of all mothers. Let her hold you in this sweet season, and don’t let anything rush you. If it’s not the time, it’s just damn right not the time!

Big hug to you star fam.
Dr. Piper

And now… the skies themselves.

Ok - the part you probably were all waiting for - what about this new moon already? It’s a big one, for sure.

The moon itself is conjunct Mercury in the late degrees of Taurus. Writing your thoughts this New Moon, putting words to all the things that have shifted and fallen apart is a way to acknowledge for your inner spirit that - you do indeed recognize these things have changed. Write. Put pen to physical paper and just - write.

When you’ve gotten out your deepest of feels - read them out loud and burn them. Send the smoke up to your higher self and allow spirit to handle the rest. It’s a great moon to communicate with - but remember, New Moons are more internal than the outward expression of the Full Moon, so let yourself really settle into what matters most for you.

The Grand Cross

The grand cross (the purple square in the middle of the chart above) for this new moon chart is between Uranus at 1 degree Gemini, Lilith at 8 degrees Sagittarius, and the Nodal Axis with the North Node in Pisces, South Node in Virgo, both at 5 degrees. This is an interesting configuration in the sky.

The nodes are often driving us to where we are going – Virgo asking us to integrate that inner core of precision, data, intellect, control, into the Piscean world of surrender. Surrender to something greater than us, to the reality of what is, while also holding hope for what could be.

There is a beautiful song I discovered early this year that deeply describes the energy Pisces is asking of all of us currently - and that Pisces is asking of me in my larger existence here in life (It’s my natal chart North Node - I don’t simply get 18 months with it like more of you, I have a lifetime to figure out this piece called surrender). It’s called Water by Aisha Badru and I highly recommend you take a listen if you want to truly feeeeeel what a Pisces North Node asks of you.

There is obvious tension here in these two polar opposites. But don’t forget, opposites have similarities too - they just appear differently and we have to work harder to see where the common thread is. But don’t let life fool you - if you look hard enough, you can almost always find the common thread.

What creates the cross is Uranus in Gemini - disruption of communication as we know it (data centers, anyone?) - in opposition to Black Moon Lilith in Sagittarius - the fierce independent feminine, traveling to her greater philosophical realm of teacher to step in at this New Moon in Taurus and say - hell no, I will not stand for this.

What I love about this grand cross isn’t necessarily the tension it inherently brings to all of us - with all the squares and oppositions and the immense energy of discomfort it could create. I see now the beauty of the destruction a fierce feminine can bring, especially in the realm of Taurus New Moon energy. It’s a portal of protection, a philosophical surrender to the destruction that is inevitable - while also realizing - what comes next? Will be what it will be, trust it’s in your best and highest good.

Ground into yourself, find the things that make your heart sing, pray, plant, grow the wildest of flowers and create beauty in your immediate environment. And know the more light you pour into the world around you? The greater that light can ripple through your friends, your community, those you meet in passing… be the change you want to see in the world, yeah?

We got this, star fam. Big hug to you all. Keep your heads up. Life will continue onward whether we’re ready for it or not. But we have big work to do and I personally don’t want to be the leader in the group project who ends up doing the whole damn thing - I want to believe we all have goodness to bring to this project. And I look forward to seeing how we all come together after this cycle of madness.

Fire — the first of the elements in the western zodiac, the first form we encounter. The spark. That early flicker, searching until something finally takes hold.

This is Aries, the ram. And right now, with seven planets moving through this same flickering, spark-like energy, that early spring fire is being fully fueled.

There is a depth to fire we rarely speak of.

Fire is dynamic warmth, intensity that then may smolder when fuel becomes sparse… when the energy wanes. Air can ignite it, or end its flame. Water can change state in it, or put it out. Earth though… earth holds it, becomes penetrated by it, grounds it. And when necessary, earth too can douse a flame.

But above all else? Fire is passion. It’s spirit. It’s how we transmute material matter into smoke — feeding the essence of spirit. My Lakota teacher used to always tell me to bring tobacco smoke into my mouth (never my lungs), hold it to infuse it with the intention of my prayers, then send that prayer to Spirit. Fire is what allows smoke to be possible.

Aries is ruled by Mars — the warrior planet. The energy of initiative, decisiveness, forward movement, action. The one who draws the sword and forges a boundary.

And I understand this a bit too well.

My Mars is in Aries — in my 11th house, where what ignites me, what fuels my forward movement, my drive to fight… is my community.

And maybe that’s the thing about this energy — it doesn’t stay contained. It moves. It spreads. It catches.

Similar to spring — that spark of life that begins to grow, the first sprout pushing its way through — a welcomed shift from where we’ve been.

Life starts now. The early dandelions dance, the sun is on his rise, claiming more time in the sky to remind us… the light is baaaaaaack, bitches!

And that’s the frequency Aries often tunes into.

My Aries humans — thank you for your fearless audacity, for the heat you bring, and the warmth you remind us is just around the corner.

Aries often gets labeled as aggressive… and yes, sometimes that’s true. But I think we forget this other part. Aries warms you to the point you begin your unfolding. Sometimes it happens so fast it shocks the system. But really? They’re just reminding you there is virtue in cracking the seed’s shell and welcoming what’s inside to unfold.

I have a dear friend who gave birth this Aries season, safely, at home, like the primal badass she is! — I joked with her that with all this fire energy, I hope he doesn’t burn the house down. Because, well, he has so much Aries in his chart… which can be a bit intimidating. Hot, forward moving, rapid fire can be a lot (especially for a parent). We’ve all seen the meme of the child pointing the firework at the camera-holding parent and that’s where the video ends. That visual is not entirely incorrect in regard to Aries.

But what we forget is that fire doesn’t exist alone. It moves with the other elements. It listens, it responds, it grounds when it’s supported.

And that’s the power message here.
Be abrupt. Be forward moving. Stay passionate as all get out.
And… stay long enough to ground into it.

Breathe in the air that ignites you. Let water transform through your presence. Let earth actually hold what you’ve started.

Because when Aries learns that? It’s not just a spark anymore — it becomes something that sustains.

I love walking — it’s my contemplative space. I can think, feel, emotionally digest. And when the sun comes back around… not only does it provide the light that makes a walk more achievable, but it gives that glimpse of what’s to come. Though it sprinkled snow today where I am — by evening the sun was back out again, reminding me… nature is waking up, and she will continue to unfold in profound beauty.

I notice how much joy I get from the smallest things this time of year — hearing the birds outside my office, filling the bird feeder, tilling the soil in anticipation of what to plant, while watching the ecosystem around me start to wake back up.

It’s subtle. But it matters.

And maybe that’s part of why this current energy feels so… layered.

Because we’ve got this Aries energy — this push, this ignition — but we also have this planetary traffic jam that’s not exactly straightforward. I’m going to break it up into two sections because — it’s a lot of planets, and half-ish are in the early degrees, while the other half are in the late degrees. And that? Actually makes a difference. But throughout — it’s spit-fire sparky, so… let’s see how well we can move through this.

Neptune at 2°, Mercury at 3°, Mars at 5°, Saturn at 7°… all in early degrees of Aries.

I’m not going to lie — that’s a strange mix.

Neptune dissolves. Blurs. Merges.
Mercury wants to talk, process, understand.
Mars wants to go, to fight, to forge the sword.
Saturn says — slow down, define it, commit.

So what we get is this strange kind of forward motion —
Mars pushing ahead, Mercury trying to make sense of it in real time, Saturn attempting to ground it into something defined… and yet none of it fully landing on where we’re actually going.

And that’s where Neptune comes in. Neptune always stops me.

Because it’s not clear. It’s not direct. It’s… slippery.

What looks like confidence can be a mask. What feels like direction can actually just be ungrounded momentum — something moving, but not truly anchored.

And lately I’ve been sitting with that a lot.

Because everything feels like it’s speeding up. Life is moving fast — faster than I think a lot of our systems (internal and external) are actually able to keep up with.

And it makes me ask —
what is the chase?
what are we actually moving toward?
and why does it feel like we can’t slow it down?

I’ve been watching conversations pop up in different places — about water usage, land use, pesticide exposure, the way development is pressing into spaces that used to feel… protected.

And maybe this is just my algorithm — the things I care about rising to the surface.

But they matter.

Because what’s happening isn’t always loud or obvious — it’s a gradual shift in how land is used, accessed, and prioritized.
Leases. Development rights. Resource extraction.
Water being redirected.
Ecosystems slowly degraded.

Spaces that once felt untouched now being… negotiated.

And sometimes, it’s not even that subtle.

The Senate just passed a vote advancing efforts to open the Boundary Waters to copper mining — a place that has long been fought for, protected, and still continues to be challenged.

It’s not one clean decision. It’s years of back and forth — protections put in place, then rolled back, then contested again.

Because it’s not always a single moment of loss —
it’s the steady erosion of something that once felt held.

Because it’s not loud. It’s not always obvious.
But it’s constant.

And it starts to feel like we’re moving things forward quickly without actually being grounded in why we’re moving them at all.

Like the fight used to be about protecting these spaces…
and now it feels like the conversation keeps drifting toward what they can provide, what they can support, what can be extracted from them.

And that’s where I keep coming back to Neptune in Aries.

Because Neptune holds both redemption and illusion — it can inspire vision, or blur reality entirely.

So what we get is movement without direction.
Momentum without grounding.
A kind of forward push that isn’t fully connected to what actually sustains us.

And I feel that. Deeply.

I love watching the natural world evolve — each season holds such beautiful reminders for me. It feels like watching astrology in real time — extremes met, cycles unfolding, yet always returning to balance.

Lately, I find myself wondering…
what will those cycles look like if the foundation underneath them changes?

Are we moving forward so quickly that we’ve lost connection to what actually sustains us?

Because in my darkest moments, nature has been the place I go to merge. To soften. To remember.

And Aries energy can forget the need for the other —
the way fire needs earth.

We all need something that holds us.

These planets are also sextile Pluto in Aquarius — transformation in the name of progress.

And I think that’s where some of the tension comes in.

Because progress, right now, doesn’t always feel aligned.

It feels fast. It feels necessary in some ways. But it also feels like it’s asking us to give something up.

And I struggle with that. Not because I can’t let go — believe me, if life has taught me anything, sometimes the things, the people, the places you love the most, you have to let go of. For so many different reasons. And as heartbreaking as it is — we let go. Sometimes it’s respect for another’s wishes, other times, it’s respect for our own value.

But this? This feels different than the letting go after heartache. I think about my nieces. My friends’ babies. The young life around me… and the world they’re stepping into. I don’t feel clear on what that world is going to look like.

Which leads me directly into the energy of the later degrees of this zodiacal maze.

Chiron — sitting right there at 26°, with this New Moon at 27° Aries feels important. Possibly the grief that underwrites this entire reflection.

Because Chiron doesn’t ignore pain. He sees it. He feels it. He understands it — he lives with it, every. single. day.

And this moment feels a little like that…
like we’re aware something is shifting, but not quite sure what to do with that awareness yet.

Some people move forward like nothing’s happening.
Some people numb out.
And some of us… just feel it.

I wish I had something more uplifting to say here.

But if I’m being honest — my heart has been grieving a bit.

Not because everything is gone. But because something sacred feels like it’s starting to shift, with little regard for the long-term impact.

And I don’t think we’re meant to be disconnected from the land like this.

My Mars is in Aries — and when something feels threatened, I can feel that instinct rise in me immediately. Not just for people… but for the land I’ve been in relationship with.

And yes, my human community, though small, is quite sweet.

But the greater community I’ve been in relationship with —
the trees, the rivers, the land I’ve had the privilege to walk on —

that’s irreplaceable. And more than worth fighting for as it’s the root, the core of what I do in medical practice.

I’m a naturopathic doctor. I practice naturopathy.

Natura — in Latin is nature. The inherent intelligence of living systems.
Pathy — in Greek is feeling, suffering, experiencing. A system or method of treating disease.

Put these together? The treatment of disease through the healing power of nature.

Nature has literally taught me the foundational roots of how I approach each and every patient within my clinical and astrological practices.

And the way we discard land as if it’s dispensable.
The way national forests are on the chopping block as an opportunity to make that ROI, to invest at large scale — to… PROFIT.

It’s breaking my heart. And it’s making me wonder what nature looks like in the decades to come.

I don’t have some big, perfect solution here. Just… open heartache to share with you all. (You can thank Chiron for this love letter to mama earth. Maybe you’re feeling it too?)

But I do know this —
nature has been my greatest healer.

She holds me when I can’t hold myself.
She carries me when things feel too heavy.

And I’m not willing to just… disconnect from her. Or disregard her.

So maybe the invitation here isn’t panic.

Maybe it’s relationship.

I’ve had to learn that with my own Mars in Aries — in my 11th house — that the fight isn’t just for me. It’s for the beings around me.

Aries can often hold such a “me” mentality — the birthing place of the zodiac, the infant that knows nothing more than its needs being met. It knows self.

But every sign has an opposite. Aries sits across from Libra — together, these two encompass the relational axis. Self and other.

And when we lean too far in one direction — like when we have a seven-planet stellium driving forward motion — we can forget the other side entirely.

So my words of advice for us all?

Pay attention to the land around you.
Stay aware of what’s happening locally.
Care about the places that have held you.

Because Neptune may want to dissolve back into something safe…
or pretend it’s easier to just go with the flow — to dissolve in, without standing out…

but we’re here.

And this world is asking something of us.

I would give up a lot to ensure I can always walk through a protected forest.
To run my hands along the bark of ponderosa pines.
To hug the magnificent redwoods.
To hike alpine lakes on Mount Hood.
To explore the Boundary Waters.

These places matter.

And I don’t think we’re meant to forget that.

And maybe that’s the deeper truth of Aries fire — we think it’s merely a spark, a beginning.

But sometimes…

it’s the thing that reminds us
the fight has to start somewhere…

so we don’t forget
what’s actually worth protecting.

Until next New Moon sweet peas…

Dr. Piper

For those who just need that little extra? Here are a few additional planetary notes to keep in mind — because this stellium really stole the show this week.

Uranus. Mother****ing Uranus.

The planet of disruption. Revolution. Sudden change. Electrical charge. Forward movement whether we’re ready or not.

In mythology, Uranus is the primordial sky god — father of Saturn (Cronus), who ultimately overthrows him. And in that overthrow, through his castration, Venus is born from the sea. Creation… through destruction. Beauty… through rupture.

And this wildly epic archetype has been dancing around my rising since last summer.

Sweeping disruption across how I am, how I present myself, what I thought to be real — a complete tower moment. A full dismantling of identity, asking — no, demanding — a rebuild.

The structure I once knew to be me has been taken apart piece by piece. And it’s been a really wild journey. One that has taken me deeply inward, into spaces I wasn’t quite ready to face… but didn’t have a choice but to stand in and see clearly.

And while this has been deeply personal — collectively, Uranus is doing something much bigger.

The last time Uranus moved from Taurus into Gemini, we were in the lead-up to World War II. Uranus entered Gemini in the early 1940s — and shortly after, the United States was pulled into the war.

Before that, Uranus moved through this same Taurus–Gemini space during the Civil War.

So when we talk about Uranus shifting signs — especially into Gemini — we’re often talking about disruption to systems, but also a revolution in thought. A shift in how we think, communicate, and understand what’s happening beyond our immediate field of view.

And here we are again.

In a world that, in many ways, is still at war.

The ways history echoes… it’s hard not to feel it.

And if I’m being honest — it makes me angry. It makes me shake my head.

How are we still here?

Innocent people dying every single day, at the hands of power structures that feel so far removed from the rest of us. And as a millennial — my generation has grown up inside this constant backdrop of war. At times, it almost becomes normalized.

When does it stop?

I want to believe — maybe — that as Uranus moves into Gemini, it sparks something different. Curiosity. Awareness. A shift in collective thinking that actually changes the trajectory.

Is that hopeful? Probably.
Is it guaranteed? No.

But I have to hold onto something.

Because if all we do is consume the darkness — things start to feel pretty bleak.

So be the light.

Let it move through you.
Let it touch the people around you.

Because that’s how we make it through moments like this.

And remember — this too will pass. It always does.

We will rebuild.

Hopefully in ways that honor what sustains us — not at the expense of it.

Venus?

She’s in Taurus — her favorite place to be.

There’s softness here. Even if everything else feels intense, there is still access to beauty, to pleasure, to grounding.

She reminds us to slow down.
To root into what nourishes us.
To tend to the small, quiet things that actually sustain life.

And she’s close enough to Uranus to soften some of the edges he’s been bringing.

Approaching her father — not in fear, but in presence.

Like a quiet offering.
Like beauty sitting beside disruption.

A reminder that even in the dismantling…
there is still something worth tending.

This past weekend I spent some time on the Oregon coast with a dear friend as I witnessed her marriage. The morning before the ceremony, the atmospheric river had finally passed and I was able to take a long stroll on the beach with all the bright blue jelly fish who had washed up (rest in peace).

Standing in the presence of Mama Ocean had me feeling all the feels. She always seems to welcome emotion with the immensely boundless container she holds. Something about being in the magnitude of her presence was cleansing.

As my feet turned red, then completely numb from walking in the water of the Northern Pacific, I found myself in a quiet commune with Spirit. Asking for support. For guidance. For clarity regarding my direction and greater purpose.

That might feel surprising to some. I have my career, my passions… but there is a part of me that knows I’m not quite there. Something else seems to be knocking, calling, and as I work to heed that call, I catch myself trying to figure it out.

A pattern I’ve been asked to simply bring awareness to - just how often I am in my mind.

Very Virgo South Node of me.

This pull toward having a contemplated, figured-out answer is an ingrained survival instinct. It’s part of my soul’s original blueprint for navigating this journey.

So moving away from it requires something different. Not more thinking… but recognizing when I’m there, and gently shifting into my felt sense away from my logic.

As I was bringing this into awareness, settling my energy into my heart… there it was.

The light.

The sun was accompanying me along my path, dancing across the wet sand beside me as the tide rolled in and out. There was something about walking beside the light that struck a chord.

In the work I’ve been doing over the past few years, and more recently with my Nodal return (Pisces North Node, IYKYK) I’ve come to understand something about clarity: it often arrives through the process of clearing the mind. Letting go of expectation or fantasy. Releasing the mental garb that clouds our connection to something greater. And learning to trust what remains when all of that falls away.

In that moment, I settled into my breath, back into my body—and in the stillness that followed, something deeper revealed itself. A knowing I didn’t have to think my way into:

Continue to seek the light, daughter.

That morning shifted something in me. The old poem about footprints in the sand came to mind—the one where Jesus walks beside you, and when the prints go from two sets to one, it means he carried you.

Yet, here? The light wasn’t carrying me.

It was beside me. Steady and unwavering.

Gliding across the wet sand as I moved through the pulsing waters, not lifting me out of it, merely witnessing me within it.

And somehow, that felt more loving. A quiet reminder moved through me: I am not alone in any of this. And neither are you.

As small as I felt in the presence of her vastness, my heart broke open, softening in places I didn’t know were still braced. The ocean wrapped her cold waters around my feet and lower legs, then slipped away, only to return again.

She did not cling to the shore, nor try to hold what could not be held.
She moved.

As if to say, I’ve got you, my child.

Not by keeping me still, but by reminding me to flow and follow the light.

The significance of that moment settles beautifully into the energy of this New Moon in Pisces.

Because Pisces asks us to surrender. To something greater than ourselves. To remember that we are not separate from the currents of this world, we are part of them.

On some level, we are all here, swimming in the same ocean, feeling the same energies. Not separate, but one – Unified in our ocean of differences.

This New Moon occurs at 28° Pisces, the late degrees of the zodiac’s final sign. We are at the end of something.

Pisces is the great ocean of the astrological wheel—where the boundaries between self and spirit soften and logic begins to loosen its grip. It’s the place where we stop trying to force clarity or understanding and begin to feel our way through.

It’s not just the Sun and Moon here. Mars is moving through Pisces, stirring the waters. The North Node too, asking us to grow into something we don’t fully understand yet. And just days after this New Moon, Mercury will station direct, maintaining its contact with the North Node a little longer. (More on this toward the end, for those who want to dive deeper.)

There’s a lot happening in these waters, and it doesn’t necessarily feel easy.

We are being asked to release and feel… to trust, even when we don’t know where it’s all leading.

Which makes sense when you consider the Virgo–Pisces nodal axis we’ve been moving through. This has been a larger theme since January 2025—and this New Moon feels like one final knock on the door from the luminaries, asking: are you ready to get out of your head and feel?

From analysis into surrender. From control into trust. From figuring it out into feeling it through.

We won’t be here forever. The Nodes will move on. But for now, this New Moon is here—illuminating this energy.

This moon is a window—a moment where the lesson is clear, even if it’s not easy. Learn how to lean. Learn how to turn toward the light. Learn how to let something move through you rather than trying to control every step.

The mind won’t always have the answer. But in its quieting, something else can come through, something we’ve been yearning for. It just may not come in the way we are expecting, or used to receiving.

And if the world feels chaotic right now… if things feel like they are unraveling or not quite making sense… you are not wrong.

There are larger cycles stirring things on a collective level. Things may get messier before they get clearer.

But this moment is not asking us to solve the mess.
It’s asking us to orient within it.

To find the light. Walk beside it. And when you can, let it move through you.

This New Moon isn’t asking you to control the tide.
It’s asking you to remember that you are part of the tide.

If your emotions feel close to the surface, let them move. If your intuition is whispering something you can’t quite explain, quiet your mind and feel.

Because the most profound shifts don’t begin with certainty.
They begin with the quiet sense that something is changing.

And somewhere beside you, whether you notice it or not, the light is there.

Continue to seek it.

Sending you my love, sweet peas.

Dr. Piper

If you’re feeling into the deeper layers of this lunation, here are a few of the currents moving beneath the surface…

Deeper Currents

Mercury stations direct two days after this New Moon, in direct conjunction with the North Node in Pisces. And while that may bring clarity, it likely won’t be the kind the Virgoan mind prefers.

It may not be clean or linear. It may come through a feeling, a quiet knowing, a subtle shift you can’t quite explain. Because the North Node is asking us to grow into something unfamiliar—and in Pisces, that growth doesn’t come from figuring it out, but from trusting what is felt.

From trusting the light, even when the path ahead isn’t fully illuminated.

At the same time, this New Moon is supported by Uranus, in its final degrees of Taurus, bringing moments of sudden clarity. Flashes of insight. Small but meaningful steps become visible.

Not the whole path, but just enough to move forward.

Allow it.

Mars moving through Pisces, forms a grand water trine with Jupiter in Cancer and Black Moon Lilith in Scorpio, means there is a lot of emotion moving right now.

This can feel like compassion and connection. It can also feel like waves, big ones.

If you’ve been more sensitive, more aware of the emotional undercurrent around you, more impacted by what’s happening in the world… you’re not imagining it.

There is a lot moving. And the invitation is not to shut it down or numb out—but to let it move without letting it take you under.

Because when things feel chaotic, this is where the work comes in.

Find the light.
Connect with it.
Let it move through you.

Not in a bypassing way, but in a grounded, embodied way where you recognize that yes, there is darkness here… and you don’t need to add to it.

You don’t need to become it.

You can feel deeply, witness what’s happening, and still choose to orient toward the light.

And yes, there are larger shifts happening.

Saturn and Neptune have moved into Aries. The last time Neptune was in Aries, we as a country, were in the Civil War. Neptune made its move around the last New Moon, and in the last month? We’ve seen the use of force, of power, of war - that has left many uncertain. This is the “messy” I was eluding to above.

Pluto is working his way through Aquarius. He’s not going anywhere anytime soon. We’ll touch on him often over the next 19 years, but today he’s in an out of sign sextile to this moon which brings transformation to this New Moon in a very unique, out of the box thinking kind of way.

Two power-packed punches of planetary energy lighting up this intuitive moon ultimately mean…

The world is changing, and at times it can feel intimidating… even overwhelming.

But all we can do is walk in the light.

Periods of instability often precede innovation.

There’s also tension between Venus in Aries and Jupiter in Cancer—a pull between what we want and what feels safe.

And instead of resolving that immediately, this moment is asking us to simply notice it. To sit with the places where those two things aren’t aligned.

Not to fix. Not to force.

Simply to notice… and feel.

Let the light guide you and you’ll find your way.

Today’s New Moon in Aquarius is the mood I’m writing from — and it isn’t just a New Moon. It’s eclipse energy, which means we’re not in “set intentions and light a candle” territory. We’re in “the Universe is editing the timeline” territory.

Translation? Karma, bitches.

This lunation lands late in Aquarius and close enough to the Pisces–Virgo nodal axis to carry that astrological eclipse signature, the kind that feels like a pressure point in time. (As all astronomers roll their eyes…)

Eclipses don’t whisper. They interrupt, re-route, and bring openings or endings that rarely ask permission first. It’s almost like something bigger than your conscious plan is at work. Expect the unexpected isn’t a slogan here; it’s the tone.

The Pisces North Node is especially near and dear to me, because I’m wrapping up my second nodal return through Pisces–Virgo. It’s been heartbreaking yet illuminating, and it has taught me surrender whether I was ready to learn it or not.

Virgo wants to refine, fix, optimize, and control. Pisces asks something else entirely: release, trust, and allow Spirit to lead.

This nodal return has shown me where my spiritual body needed realignment and where my expanded consciousness requires I let go completely. Not just of what hurts, but of what I once adored: certain visions, dreams, idealizations, aspirations, things I thought were “the path.”

Not because they were wrong, necessarily… but because they belonged to an older version of me that I inadvertently (or maybe advertently) outgrew.

And with Venus sitting conjunct the Pisces North Node right now, it feels like part of the karmic invitation is to return to the feminine. The feminine as an inner frequency: feeling, softness, compassion, receptivity, the willingness to stay human in a world that keeps trying to turn us into mind-numbed machines. Venus on the North Node is a reminder that love is not naive. It’s a discipline, a path, a form of surrender that is far from weak. In fact, vulnerability is a gahdamn superpower in today’s day and age.

This is especially important under an Aquarius lunation, because Aquarius can default to emotional avoidance — not because it doesn’t care, but because it cares so much it tries to survive by thinking instead of feeling (more on this below). Venus is the counterbalance. She asks us to come back into the body, back into the heart, and back into the messy, sacred truth that emotions are not problems to solve, but experiences to move through.

Which brings me to the next signature of this chart.

Uranus is freshly direct, and it’s making its final stamp on Taurus before it re-enters Gemini later this spring where it will stay for the next eight-ish years (we’ll talk more about that when it makes its Gemini entrance in late April). Simply stated, Uranus is the archetype of sudden change, revolt, shock, and awakening.

Uranus is a beast of an archetype. I can’t deny that. And I’m trying hard not to shed hate on the planet that has fully shook me in its final stretch of Taurus.

It’s kind of been like a car running you over (mid-July). You get up and tell yourself, “I’m fine.” Then it reverses at high speed and hits you again (early November), and you’re knocked down a lot longer.

And now I can see it speeding toward me for a third pass, and I’m just standing here like… what in the actual hell is this next hit going to feel like? Could it really be worse than the reverse at high speed? Or have I finally had enough time to get out of the way of the moving vehicle?

Who fucking knows.

But as Uranus comes back around one more time before it truly commits to Gemini… all I ask is this: gentle. Please. Just… be gentle.

Uranus squares this New Moon and a square in astrology tends to reveal the inner work we need to take responsibility for, personally. For each of us, that pressure point will land somewhere different depending on your personal chart.

In my chart, Aquarius sits at my Midheaven — career, visibility, outer world presence — while Uranus in Taurus has been moving through my 12th house, the deep interior. Teaching me how to balance the inner shifts, changes, and uprooting of this past year with the outer, more visible sphere of my life. So help me, God.

And… as if Uranus wasn’t enough? Neptune and Saturn are now both in Aries, two heavyweight planets entering the sign of action, heat, initiation, and “do it or don’t.”

Not only are they in Aries — they’re at 0 degrees. The Aries Point. The starting line. The first breath of the zodiac. The cosmic spark.

Neptune is Spirit, longing, devotion, and illusion. Aries is straight ignition, “it’s go time” energy. Neptune in Aries is the end of passive spirituality, of outsourcing your faith, of waiting for someone else to lead you.

Neptune in Aries says: if you want to believe in something? Become it.

Saturn is structure, responsibility, consequence, time, and karmic pressure. Aries wants to act immediately. But Saturn in Aries is not impulsive fire — it’s controlled fire. It’s discipline. It’s courage that can sustain itself.

Saturn in Aries says: no more half-commitments. No more false starts. No more identity built on potential. If you’re going to become who you say you are? Do it AND prove it - through action.

Together, Saturn and Neptune at 0° Aries signal the beginning of an era where the dream is no longer allowed to float. It must be shaped, built, and made real. The structures we’ve lived under can no longer exist without Spirit, without meaning, or without integrity.

Build something that has a soul. And live that something with a spine.

All of this is unfolding while Pluto settles deeper into Aquarius for the next two decades. If you’re wondering why the collective feels like it’s being rearranged from the inside out — that’s part of it. Pluto doesn’t do “surface-level.” Pluto transforms the future by dragging the shadow into the light. It holds up that mirror and says “look at it! And now, what are you going to do with that information?”

During sabbatical, I picked up a book I didn’t expect to crack me open: Healing the Soul: Pluto, Uranus and the Lunar Nodes by Mark Jones. I chose it to better understand my nodal transit, but I was surprised to find some of the most potent material tied to Aquarius and Uranus.

Do you ever feel books find you at the right time? This one did. I’d put it down at night and shake my head in disbelief at just how timely it was.

Jones discusses Uranus and Aquarius almost interchangeably, and he frames Uranus as something far more intimate than most astrology memes, or even my own eight-year (still novice) understanding, ever allowed. He writes:

“the archetype of Uranus corresponds to that part of the core self that holds memory, the subtle mental nature, and this subtle mind or memory can hold traces of trauma which can cause constriction, the formation of patterns within the subtle mind that can then manifest as difficult mental and emotional states, even physical circumstances within a person’s life.”

That tracked more than I had anticipated.

Because Aquarius is often described as detached, logical, unbothered, cool, and unemotional. But what if that isn’t the truth? What if Aquarius isn’t detached because it doesn’t feel — but because it feels too much, too early, too deeply… and the nervous system discovers intellect as a way to survive it?

Aquarius is the constellation/glyph of the water-bearer after all. And when we think of water as the element of emotion… this sign sure holds immense amounts of it. This made my brain spin, as is common in this mentally elevated air sign.

Aquarius, ruled by Uranus, can hold trauma so deeply buried it becomes difficult to consciously conceive. Sometimes it’s ancestral. Sometimes it’s karmic. Sometimes it’s simply: I don’t know why I feel like this, but I’ve always felt like this.

And because Aquarius already carries the archetype of the outsider, that pain can reinforce separation — not just from others, but from the self.

Aquarius can rationalize emotions instead of feeling them. Suffering becomes intellectualized instead of integrated. Pain becomes an equation — solved, filed, and placed neatly on a shelf.

But.

That’s not how emotions work! Emotions are messy. They’re sticky. They grip you and shake the system through all its fluid pathways — if you allow them to be felt, integrated, healed.

When the mind is forced to play the role of the heart, it becomes a quiet form of self-abandonment. Aquarians can be brilliant, visionary, razor-sharp in their ability to see the systems beneath the systems… and still feel isolated in a way that’s hard to describe to anyone who hasn’t lived it.

Prometheus: Uranus in Myth Form

Jones goes even deeper into the Uranian archetype through the myth of Prometheus — and once you see the connection, it’s hard to unsee.

In Greek myth, Prometheus is the Titan who defies the gods by stealing fire from Olympus and giving it to humans. The fire wasn’t just warmth or survival. It was civilization, consciousness, technology, and choice. The ability to build a life outside the will of the gods.

Prometheus gave it to mortals and, well, let’s just say - the gods were not amused.

As punishment, Prometheus was chained to a mountain, where an eagle came each day to eat his liver. Each night, his liver regenerated. So the pain repeated — again, and again, and again.

The symbolism is not subtle: liberation has consequences.

Prometheus is one of the clearest mythic mirrors of Uranus; the rebel who brings awakening to humanity and pays a brutal price for it.

Thinking for yourself. Liberating from the status quo. Refusing collective hypnosis. Choosing truth over comfort. Choosing growth over belonging. Choosing the path that makes you more you may cost you your old life.

There is a solitude that can come with that. A pain or loneliness that is almost indescribable. Not because you’re unlovable or broken, but because the pool of humans you can tolerate, or merely desire to interact with, often shrinks.

This is a lot to digest. But it’s also deeply human. Uranus seeks liberation. So does Aquarius. And guess what? We all have this planet and sign in our chart - it’s just more lit up for some than it is for others.

The part I tell my Aquarian clients who come sit in my virtual office with me is this: the outsider archetype is real. It doesn’t mean you are bad. It doesn’t mean you can’t be intertwined into society. It doesn’t mean you’re destined to be alone.

But if you don’t allow the emotional liberation you need, the pain of staying stuck in the chamber of logic becomes an inner turmoil akin to being snacked on daily.

That is the Uranian choice.

Liberation has a cost, for sure. But so does stagnation. And the price of stagnation may actually be more costly.

The loneliness that can come with liberation can only be soothed by grace, by remembering that Spirit holds us close, and with more depth than we will ever understand until we’re brought to our knees and allow ourselves to feel the essence of the unseen infuse us.

Many have walked this path and have walked it successfully. Now? It’s our turn.

So yes — surrender. Surrender. Surrender.

And you can also say, or scream, “FUCK!” a few times to help with the process.

Surrender isn’t pretty. It’s not aesthetic. It’s a holy dismantling, a nervous system recalibration. It’s the moment you stop bargaining with the Universe and let yourself be moved.

If you’re feeling tender right now; raw, disoriented, emotionally porous, or like your system has been on a cosmic treadmill? You’re not imagining it.

This is not the time to force clarity. This is not the time to demand certainty. This is the time to listen, soften, and let the timeline reorganize itself.

Because something in you already knows: The old version of the dream cannot come with you.

And the New Moon in Aquarius, eclipse and all, isn’t here to punish you.

It’s here to free you.

Until next month, sweet peas.