← The Astrology Podcast
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- [00:00]
Austin Coppock
Chris.
- [00:00]
Chris Brennan
Hey, my name is Chris Brennan, and you're listening to the Astrology Podcast. Joining me today is astrologer Austin Coppock. And we're going to be looking at the year ahead astrology forecast for 2026, and giving you an overview of the entire year's transits over the next 12 months. So, hey, Austin, welcome. Thanks for joining me.
- [00:18]
Austin Coppock
Hey, Chris. I am happy to be here.
- [00:22]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, we are doing it. We are back again for another year ahead forecast. We've been doing these for many, many years now, and it's always something. Something we prepare a lot for. But we have got a lot to talk about because there's so many transits this year. This is going to be an incredibly pivotal year in world history, and I could not think of a better astrologer to talk about that with than you. So thanks a lot for joining me.
- [00:44]
Austin Coppock
Thank you. That's very kind. I feel the same way. We've got so much to discuss.
- [00:52]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, well, luckily we've got a lot of practice at this point doing these. And that was something you and I were talking about is we got a lot of experience doing the yearlies and the monthlies at this point, which is really gonna come in handy this year because there's so many distinct astrological transits going on that any one of them could be the important transit. We would talk about this year as the biggest one, but instead there's like five or six or seven of those, I think.
- [01:16]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, it's pretty jam packed. It's definitely a year that's. Maybe they talk about weeks worth a decade. There's some very insightful quote about that. I don't know if we have a whole. I don't know if we have 52 weeks, each of which is worth a dec. But this year is definitely punching above its weight in terms of drama.
- [01:37]
Chris Brennan
Absolutely. All right, so here's our structure today. Our goal is we're gonna spend about an hour in the first part of this episode doing an overview of the biggest transits of the year and talking about the major, especially outer planet transits and other things like that. Then in the next part of the episode, we're gonna transition into a month by month breakdown where we go through and talk about a little bit more of the micro details of the major astrological transits happening in each individual month. And we're gonna go through that quarter by quarter until we get to the end of the year. So big picture first and then zooming in in the second half of this episode, as always, there'll be timestamps if you wanna jump ahead to any different parts of the episode. But otherwise, why don't we just go ahead and jump right into it with the overview of the astrology of 2026?
- [02:27]
Austin Coppock
Let's do it.
- [02:28]
Chris Brennan
All right, let's do it. So here first I wanna share the planetary planetary movements calendar that was designed for us by Paula Belluomini, who designed our monthly and yearly calendar to show where the planets will start at the beginning of the year and how far through the signs of the zodiac they'll get by the end of the year, including some of the different retrogrades and eclipses that are going to take place during the course of this year, as well as some of the major conjunctions such as that Saturn Neptune conjunction right there in Aries. So here are the major transits this year that we're going to focus on in this overview that are the biggest impact transits and the major astrological alignments during the course of 2026. So for the audio listeners, I'll just read off some of them quickly and then we'll talk about each of them in detail. The first one is that right off the bat, at the beginning of the year, Neptune departs from Pisces, completing a more than decade long transit and moves into the sign of Aries where it's going to stay for 13 years. And simultaneously Satur leaves Pisces and moves into the sign of Aries where it's going to stay for two years. And then immediately in February, the two planets form a conjunction in the sky which only happens every like 36 or 40 years or something like that. And this is one of the most important alignments that's finally taking place at the beginning of the year. Then in February and March we also have our first eclipse season with an eclipse in the sign of Aquarius and Virgo. After that, Uranus departs from Taurus and enters into Gemini, where it will stay for seven years right in the middle of April. And then a couple months after that we get our first of four Mars Uranus conjunctions on July 4th starting the first of those will start taking place every two years from 2026 forward until 2032. Jupiter's gonna transit through cancer in the first half of the year, but then it's gonna go into Leo in the second half of the year for a one year long transit. Then we get our second eclipse season in August, bleeding over a little bit into early September, which is going to take place in Leo in Pisces. Then we get a Venus retrograde later in the year in Scorpio and Libra. That's really centered on October through November when Venus starts moving backwards through the sky from our vantage point. And then finally, by the end of the year, as things are closing down, Mars is slowing down and getting ready to station retrograde. And it's already entered through its shadow period and the signs that it's going to retrograde in from late September through December before eventually stationing retrograde in Virgo on basically the very first week of January of 2027. So that's kind of the setup at the very end of this year. That leaves us on a cliffhanger, as we'll talk about here in just a little bit. So those are the major alignments that we're going to be talking about here. Do you want to start with some big picture statements or should we jump right into Saturn and Neptune?
- [05:25]
Austin Coppock
I think Saturn, Neptune is pretty big picture.
- [05:29]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. We have been talking about that transit for a while. And one of the things that's wild about that is how. Let me show actually a diagram. I'll show a couple diagrams that were designed by Paige Herbert to help illustrate some of the astrology of this year. And this one primarily illustrates the. The conjunction of Saturn and Neptune where we saw Saturn and Neptune get within one degree of a conjunction last summer, especially around the July timeframe when they first dipped into Aries. But then they retrograded out and went back into Pisces. But now by February, they're both fully into Aries, and we get the first and only exact conjunction between those two planets. And just prior to that, Neptune departs from its long transit through Pisces and moves into Aries on January 26, whereas Saturn departs from Pisces and moves into Aries on February 13. One of the things about that that you and I talked about in the last forecast episode for December is how all of the outer planets this year are finally changing signs. They've been doing this weird thing of going back and forth for a few years, and we've clearly been on the cusp of a new era for several years now, especially since Pluto first started dipping into Aquarius in 2023. But now everything fully shifts into the new signs that they're gonna be in for a long time. And it's the end of one era and the beginning of a new era, and there's just no going back is like the keyword I was talking about last month.
- [07:08]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And no going back is absolutely right. The astrology divides this decade Very neatly in terms of the outer planet positions where Uranus, Neptune and Pluto are. And 2025, which we're in the final days of now, was the first year where we saw where Uranus, Neptune, Pluto are going to be for the rest of the decade. But unlike no going back, they all went back except for Pluto. So we got a taste of Neptune in Aries, we got a taste of Uranus in Gemini, but only a little sizzle reel. And since September and then November for Neptune and Uranus, they've been back where they were in 2018 even. And so our Saturn Neptune conjunction coming up early this year is, how should we say it is, a return to the future. It's back to what's actually, what's actually unfolding and will continue to unfold for the rest of the decade. 2025 was our last, our, our last moment with the first half of the decade. And I hope it was more bittersweet, touching and pleasant for most people than it was for me. It seemed like kind of a, kind of a bad ending. Like it might have left a negative review online for how all those planets left it.
- [08:43]
Chris Brennan
Sure, yeah, definitely. There's a touch of that for sure. Especially with the Saturn transit through Pisces. I know a lot of people are excited to be done with. So some of my keywords for this year was like this is the point of no return. But it's also the year that stuff gets real, where we've seen a glimmer of some of that stuff over the past couple of years of what's to come. But this is the year in which a lot of that I think will finally fully start to manifest. And nowhere is that gonna be more clear than the Saturn Neptune conjunction because we've been experiencing the co presence ever since Saturn went into Pisces and joined Neptune by sign. And that sign based conjunction starting in March of 2023 and they've been slowly building up to this conjunction. And we could see one of my primary keywords for that conjunction, which is the creation of this reality distortion field getting more and more intense over the past three years as that conjunction grew closer, peaking last summer when it got the closest. But now we're finally getting the only exact conjunction in February. And that's going to be intense. The completion of something that we've been feeling for so long, but also having it move into a new sign marking the beginning of a brand new era.
- [10:03]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, it's a little confusing because in one sense it is the peak of that configuration. Right. It is the Only moment when the two will be in exactly the same minute of the same degree, and yet they will continue to be in the same sign until the middle of 2028. And so it's very much a climax, but it's not a climax that leads, that leads to a conclusion quickly. We've got more than two more years of Saturn Neptune after this peak point.
- [10:44]
Chris Brennan
Right, That's a really good point.
- [10:46]
Austin Coppock
And as you were saying, it's been interesting that we've had the two together, close together. It's doing all of their confusing reality modeling, ontological crisis inducing work in one sign, but the actual moment where they make contact is in another sign entirely. And at 0 degrees of Aries, which is a rather significant point. Many people would say that the zodiac begins there, certainly where the sun is on the vernal equinox in the northern hemisphere. It's an important point.
- [11:25]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, absolutely. And we've been seeing that. I mean, one of the things that this is obviously coinciding with is in terms of the reality distortion field is the peak of AI generated video being perfected so that it's now going to hit a point, I think by February, where it's going to be hard to tell the difference between what's real and what's not. And we're already there, but there's still an awful lot of tells oftentimes where you can kind of tell the difference. But I think we're hitting the turning point where it's going to be hard to do that anymore just as this conjunction is going exact. And it's been amazing seeing the buildup to that point over the past few years. But that's just one technological example of a broader phenomenon of this difference between telling what's true and what's not or telling what's lies versus what's truth essentially in many different areas of society and in our lives in general.
- [12:26]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And I would add to that what's reality and what's imagination? Well, which can be tricky because you can imagine real things and sometimes if enough people believe, what is imagined becomes real. And so it's hence the reality distortion, the ontological crisis. It makes deciding what is clearly true and real much trickier than normal. Which, you know, it's never the easiest thing. That's why the discipline of philosophy still exists with unanswered questions. The what is real is not an easy question under ideal conditions. And Saturn, Neptune, conjunctions are the opposite thereof.
- [13:14]
Chris Brennan
Right, yeah. So we have that and then we also have structures like the dissolving of Structures that are kind of breaking down at this time, which is a really classic Saturn Neptune thing that happens. Like the last conjunction, for example, was the fall of the Berlin Wall and the dissolution of the Soviet Union at that time. So we're seeing similar sort of dissolving of structures in different places, both personally as well as in the world in general. Like with the US Government, there's so many different structures that are being dissolved over the past year really rapidly that it's been startling to watch how literal that is in some instances.
- [13:56]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And those just like with the, the, the dissolution of the USSR during the last cycle, there's often something shockingly quick and non violent. Not that there aren't some critical consequences, but it's. You expect a structure to put up more of a fight, but it just kind of gets booped and then falls apart. Rather than like the walls don't need to. Under Saturn Neptune, the walls don't need to be sieged for months. It's not like the result of some loud structural attack. It's a little shocking in how quickly a thing will fold.
- [14:40]
Chris Brennan
Yeah.
- [14:41]
Austin Coppock
And which makes you ask, was it ever real? Right. If it fell apart like that, then maybe my ideas about its density and its reality beforehand were off.
- [14:53]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. I had the image recently of a cardboard box, which normally are structurally pretty sound if you can ship packages in them and stuff can go around the world in a cardboard box if it's sturdy enough. But if you place a cardboard box in a pool of water, it very quickly loses structural integrity and can just collapse on its own in that context because the water is just so antithetical to the, the makeup of the cardboard. And that's one image I have right now for some of the structures that are hitting that folding point right now. Yeah.
- [15:30]
Austin Coppock
Folding. Yeah. That's a great image.
- [15:34]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. So those are major things, other Saturn Neptune things that we need to mention. I mean, there are positive things I will mention because one of the things about this Saturn Neptune conjunction that's important is it's gonna be a recurrence transit for anybody born during the previous Saturn Neptune conjunctions over the past century, especially the one that happened around 1989 in Capricorn and then the one that happened before that around 1953 in Libra. For anybody born around those conjunctions that have that as a signature, this conjunction is going to represent a pivotal turning point in your life. Because it's like the same music is playing over again that was playing when you were born. And sometimes a spotlight gets shown on those People that have that conjunction, Natalie, at this time. And one of the things I noticed in the recurrence transit episode is that even people that had it like several degrees away, let's say like 10 degrees away natally, when the exact aspect forms, sometimes that's when the most pivotal event happens in their life. So I think for a lot of those people, it's going to be that February timeframe becoming really crucial.
- [16:45]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, I think that's right. And it's interesting that the last two were also in cardinal signs, the 89 and 90. The Saturn Neptune was in Capricorn, and then in 51 to 53 it was in Libra. And so for the people who were born in the early 50s, it's Saturn Neptune opposite where Saturn Neptune was Natally. So it's very configured. It's on the same axis of houses.
- [17:17]
Chris Brennan
Right. So one thing I'll say about that that is positive, though, that I saw a lot in the Saturn return stories of the 1989 people is that there were these attempts to manifest a utopian ideal in the world and to bring form to that. And that's something we see a lot during Saturn Neptune conjunctions, is people that have a higher philosophical or religious or spiritual notions about the world trying to bring that into manifestation somehow, sometimes by creating a religious community. I noticed in the Saturn Neptune episode in history that I did with Nick that there was a lot of religious communities founded around Saturn Neptune conjunctions. So we'll probably have some things like that happening in small beginnings at this time, but also just other people that have social ideas for social or political causes, trying to bring some of their structures from their ideals and their philosophy into concrete form at this time.
- [18:16]
Austin Coppock
Right. Trying to create a Saturnian structural container for the imagined or believed or dreamt thing.
- [18:26]
Chris Brennan
Right. And so for some, you know, that might be a good thing. If we're talking like humanitarian ideals and ideals that are sparked by, say, like sympathy or empathy or other things like that, that can be good neptunian things. But then of course, there'll be others that might be not as good, depending on different ideologies and other things that are involved.
- [18:48]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, I mean, I can't imagine that possibly going wrong. Yeah, Utopian movements pretty much always succeed is what history teaches us, which is why things are so good now.
- [19:01]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, clearly. All right, so Saturn Neptune. Part of the context, though, with Saturn Neptune, we should set briefly also though, is Neptune's departure from Pisces and entry into Aries, and then Saturn's similar departure from Pisces and entry into Aries. And one of the things we talked about last year a lot that I've continued to try to learn more about and sort of marvel about was the last time Neptune left Pisces and moved into Aries was in the middle of the 1800s and it happened to coincide with the start of the Civil War in the US And I was just watching this old Ken Burns documentary on the Civil War from 1990, and at the very beginning of it, the first couple episodes, they just kept emphasizing how everybody had this really over idealized view about what the war would be like and a lot of illusions surrounding war because there hadn't been a major major war for a generation. So a lot of these younger guys were growing up not having fought in a total war and not really knowing what that would look like, but also that the technology had changed so rapidly in the intervening years that they didn't realize that the carnage was gonna be much higher than what they were expecting. So that people were going to the first Civil War battles and setting up picnics as spectators to watch this little thing. And everybody thought it would be a short affair. And there's something about that that's reminiscent of this time because over the past year we've seen a lot of ideas about this idealization surrounding the warrior ethos, for example, is something that's been discussed a lot recently.
- [20:51]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, absolutely. Just to add to the Civil War bit, neither side had any trouble filling its ranks with soldiers during the early years, and that changed dramatically just a few years in. And it was in fact because of the shortage of soldiers later into the conflict that conscription became U.S. law. And, and interestingly enough, the Neptune in aries before that one, so 160 some years earlier was the first time that Great Britain made conscription mandatory, passed conscription acts. Right. Making people become soldiers. But yeah, that idealization. Neptune is always dreaming and trying to dream the ideal of the sign that it's in. And Neptune in Pisces was. It was a dream of. I guess it still is for another 28 days. A dream of boundless compassion. Right. Like of, of. Of deep acceptance. You know, Neptune. Neptune allows in. Right. And that's one of the reasons Neptune is considered so strong in Pisces, is Pisces is very good at allowing in and allowing beings to be in reality to be vast. And so there's that watery, dare I say, passive or accepting ideal, the ability to accept and imagine the world being, excuse me, vaster and to have good relationship to that world. Right. I think a Big part of it. And that's so different from Aries, especially the first part of Aries. I'm sorry, it's one of the, I think more dramatic cusps in astrology is the difference between, between the vast acceptance and fluidity of Pisces and the often hyper individuality of Aries. And that hyper individuality, the capacity to assert the power of the individual in a fantasy setting against all odds, as opposed to the individual being able to accept living in a vast universe with powers far beyond one. In Aries we're trying to assert ourselves. And so that same vastness which maybe we tried to accept in Pisces, sort of becomes the dragon or a potential foe or danger in Aries. And so the power of the individual to stand against becomes part of the ideal. And as you were saying, the warrior ideal, the individual strength. And it's still Neptune. And Neptune does like sacrifice. So that ideal of heroic sacrifice I think we've seen growing and will continue to permeate and percolate throughout culture.
- [24:24]
Chris Brennan
Right? Yeah. Well, that was one of the Civil War things. All the young guys at the beginning were imagining running into battle and having hand to hand combat. But the technology had changed so that the gun ranges extended much further than the previous war. So they were all just getting shot down in great numbers. And the heroicism immediately was cut out of it after a few major battles. And then what set in was disillusionment, which is that classic Neptune dichotomy where it's like it starts with this over idealized, not clear picture of something, but then by the end there's this sense of disillusionment when the reality sets in. And that's one of the tensions that's gonna be happening, especially in the next couple years as Saturn is transiting through that sign at the same time. And we're sort of going back and forth between these extremes of idealization versus overly being focused on the cold hard reality and in some instance like brutality of the situation.
- [25:25]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, it's Neptune in a Mars ruled sign. Right. It's sad when a dream of compassion proves unrealistic. It's often much worse if a dream of, how should we say, a dream of struggle turns out just to be brutality and violence.
- [25:47]
Chris Brennan
Right? Yeah. I mean, you making that contrast also with Pisces and what we're moving out of is making me think of how even in this new era, it's like we're starting off this era, coming into it with recently some of these idealized things about hyper masculinity and things like that. And a lot of young boys coming up listening to podcasts and stuff where that weird, somewhat distorted image of masculinity is being sold to them. But then at some point during the course of this, the disillusionment with some of that, when the reality of some of the shortcomings of those things becomes probably clear.
- [26:28]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, definitely. If you look at male sort of images, it's out and about in the world, especially what's been sort of increasing over the last year. It's starting to look like the 80s again. Right. Like the action hero is sort of the last cinematic reference we have for this sort of Neptune in a fire sign which got going during Neptune in Sagittarius, which didn't move out until 84. You also see in, and some of the, you also see on the Internet, the Neptune side, there's increasing talk about and often transparency, for what it's worth, about people taking massive amounts of drugs and synthetic hormones to become, to look like the action heroes and the very real health risks to that. There's also a rapid rise in. I don't know how to put this. Dudes getting dude surgery to look dudelier, which is also neptunian. Right. It's like creating, shaping the image. Right. And so yeah, we have like a moving towards conformance with this sort of resurgent hyper masculine ideal. And I think we both expect that to be very much a part of Neptune in Aries for some time.
- [28:15]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. The interesting part though will be interesting with Saturn going into Aries at the same time and putting the brakes on certain things or creating this tension between the slow heavy nature of Saturn and the incendiary nature of Mars as part of the characteristic next couple of years that we're gonna be experiencing of Saturn going through that sign and all the Saturn in Aries, people that were born in the 90s hitting their first Saturn return and sometimes being slowed down or being forced to have restrained action, encountering limitations on different areas where you expect freedom of movement as being primary keywords during that time.
- [28:58]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. It's really interesting, it's going to be really interesting to see to what degree is the Neptune in Aries current, this valorization of the individual action hero, is it slowed down for a little bit by the co presence of Saturn? Probably. But is it also, how should we say, made very real. Given Saturn's ability to concretize things, it's very strange to start a 14 year Neptune period with a conjunction to Saturn because Saturn is much more our planet.
- [29:39]
Chris Brennan
Of.
- [29:42]
Austin Coppock
Slowing down unto death, approaching the end of things, the last leg of the journey. But we're starting with that. Like the planet of endings and legacies and slow accumulated structure.
- [29:57]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, well, let's talk about that. Let's talk about Saturn in Aries, maybe on its own for a minute just to get some clear keywords out. When I think about that placement, I think about carrying an acute irritation or a burden over an extended period of time and having to develop an endurance of stamina, basically. Because one of the people I think about with that placement who I know about is Saturn retrograde turn is Mr. Beast, who's the biggest YouTuber. But most of his YouTube videos are about these challenges. Where at first it was him challenging himself to do something that was irritating or unbearable for an extended amount of time, but now it's like he's turned that into game shows where a bunch of people have to do that over a period of time. One of his videos was being chained to your ex partner for 30 days or something like that. And can you survive that 30 day irritation or stamina challenge and different things like that?
- [30:55]
Austin Coppock
Right, yeah. The creation of ordeals where it's something that you have to endure for X amount of time. Which is definitely how I feel about Saturn in Aries going into it and based on last summer.
- [31:11]
Chris Brennan
Right, yeah. Because it's something that you would rather not do. But then there's a goal or there's a pot of cash basically at the end of it. Dilemma is if you can put up with this irritation and if you can expend a huge amount of energy and stamina to keep yourself in one place, even though you'd like to be moving somewhere else, then you will get this reward at the end of that long period. And I think that's going to be one of the keywords for all of us as we're experiencing this Saturn in Aries transit over the next two years in different parts of our life and as it's going through different houses in each of our charts.
- [31:48]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. Hopefully there are rewards. There will certainly be enduring irritation.
- [31:56]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. Well, the flip side of that, of course, is sometimes there can be extreme frustration and extreme burnout and feeling like hitting a brick wall with that as well, which can be the downside, especially when you combine it with Neptune, which can bring some feelings of fatigue and exhaustion.
- [32:14]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, absolutely. And that's part of the unusual nature of Saturn in Aries. Saturn is in its fall in Aries. Right. It's in its depression. It's a very difficult place. For Saturn to communicate its core nature, which is slow, cold, glacial, inexorable. You know, it may be crushing in its weight and coldness, but it's certainly not fast and irritating. Right? Whereas that is the nature of Aries. Aries is fast and irritating. It's a Mars ruled sign. It's pokey, it likes to move quick. And so we have, you know, we have this, how should we say, built in contrast between, like, young and fast and old and slow, between hot and cold, and between, how should we say, authoritative and frivolous. That often makes Saturn in Aries as a transit more challenging to endure because it's not just playing by Saturn's rules. It's not just enduring the slow and the heavy, and it's not just moving fast. It's a very awkward combination which in the past has been exemplified. One of my favorite examples of this was the last emperor of China in 1908, during a Saturn in Aries period, who was a toddler. And so you had to obey the toddler, but the toddler wasn't really in control, but kind of was in control. And so, yeah, there's this weird contrast between authority and inexperience and youthfulness. And that also speaks to Saturn. Aries is often in that it is in the place of the exaltation of the Sun. The sun is at its best and brightest in Aries. And with Saturn there, we often have a trouble. We often either one, see trouble for those in authority, whether they deserve it or not. And then we also often see leaders who do not represent the solar ideal of the Sun's exaltation, such as the toddler emperor. The last time that Saturn was in Aries was during Bill Clinton's second term. Right. Which was largely paralyzed due to the sex scandal. And so that sort of scandal for leaders or inappropriate leaders being a point of contention is very common historically for Saturn in Aries.
- [35:12]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And setting up authority conflicts. And, you know, last summer when the Saturn Neptune conjunction was coming so close for the first time, there was all the explosion of different things that were being, like, covered up. And there was like, widespread realizations about different things that were being hidden or things that were thought to be conspiracy theories, like suddenly becoming real or becoming validated, and the continual, I'm sure, continual stories related to that as Saturn, Neptune grows even closer.
- [35:49]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, yeah, that's a great point. Yeah. A lot of what's been coming out serves to create scandal for those in authority or reveal the fallen actions and mindset. Right. Like that's very much in line. I wasn't even thinking of that.
- [36:09]
Chris Brennan
Well, it makes me. Before you say the point. Makes me think of the point you made in the last forecast in December, which is just that we've talked about that sometimes the Saturn Neptune conjunctions are imaginary, let's say conspiracy theories, for lack of a better word. Or there's probably a better word for that. But the Salem witch trials, for example, was a Saturn Neptune conjunction, I believe. Or we both looked at the satanic panic in the last Saturn Neptune conjunction in the 80s was one of those things where it was just like there was this belief that there was this widespread thing happening. But then in retrospect, once we got out of it, it turned out that it wasn't as widespread as people feared that things might be happening. And so on the one hand, you have that, which is you have the fears surrounding something that may not actually be happening in reality and that you don't realize until you come out of it. But then on the other side, there's this weird flip side of the coin where it's sometimes the confirmation of bizarre conspiracies and other things like that. The attempt to suppress them that are actually. And cover them up that are actually taking place.
- [37:17]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And being put in a position not to be able to know what the limit of being put in a position where you can't know at the time is very classic. Saturn Neptune. Like, how deep does the rabbit hole go? How deep is the corruption? Is it? You know, I didn't think that was possible, but now I see that my ideas about this were wrong. But, like, where does the thing end? You have like this aerosolized fear from Saturn. And with the moral panics. Right. We had the peak of the satanic panic last Saturn neptune. And the two previous ones were red scare one and two.
- [38:05]
Chris Brennan
Right. Where the fear. And the 1950s was interesting because on the one hand, that's peaking with that Saturn Neptune conjunction. And you have. Who was the politician at the time, who was just. McCarthy. McCarthy. So it was the peak of the McCarthy era, where they're just accusing everyone of being communist, even people that aren't. And then people's lives are being ruined over false charges and conspiracy theories. But then on the other hand, at the same time, you did have legitimate people that were working for the Soviet Union as spies. And that was part of how the nuclear program, for example, there were people inside the Manhattan Project that were leaking secrets to the Soviet Union. And then that became a flashpoint as well. The realization that in some instances, some of those things were actually happening.
- [38:54]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And that was the dawning of a very real and very, at times lethal and consequential rival between the USSR's version of communism in America's version of capitalism. It was a real thing, but it was also a lot of the things that got said about a lot of people were fake, which is why the Neptune, Saturn conjunctions are so hard, especially in the middle of them, to navigate. Because if there was just like, well, there's one lie and one truth and you just have to pick the right one, it'd be much easier, we'd do much better, and we spend less time gnawing at the problem.
- [39:42]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, absolutely. Some last keywords that were coming up for me as I was thinking about Saturn in Aries are things like military discipline, martial arts, channeling one's anger, sometimes positively and sometimes not positively. Military restructuring. We started seeing a lot of that last year when Saturn dipped into Aries over the summer. But also sometimes conflict with authority and authoritarianism as a Saturn in Aries type manifestation as well. When you put Saturn and Mars together.
- [40:16]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. One of the things I think about with Saturn in Aries is in contrast to Saturn's exaltation in Libra, is why is Saturn exalted in library? What's so good about those rules? It's because they're based on fairness. And rules that are based on fairness endure a long time. Right. Whereas with Saturn in Aries, you get the enforcement of rules or the formulation of rules that are just brute force. Right. And brute force is always a. Always has a shortened timeline. Like as soon as people can resist law by brute force force, they will, because there's no consent. Saturn in Libra is always about mutual consent. Those laws last. But if you know. And that goes for governance, it also goes for parenting. Right. If your only answer to your child is because I said so, that's going to run out real quick. You've got to have reason. Yeah. You've gotta have reason behind your laws if they're to have longevity.
- [41:28]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, absolutely. All right. We could keep talking about these three combinations forever. But I wanna move us on to our next major thing in the overview section, which is our first eclipse season, which weirdly actually begins in February, overlapping with the Saturn Neptune conjunction, and then also trails over into March. So let me share the diagram for eclipse season, because this establishes the ranges that I've established over the past few years for eclipses, which is that they begin about a week before the eclipse and it ends A week after the second eclipse. So you end up with a timeframe that looks roughly like this, where our eclipse season is gonna be roughly from about February 9, peaking with the first eclipse on February 17 in Aquarius, which is very close to the Saturn Neptune conjunction. And then there's that intense phase in between the first eclipse until you get to the second eclipse, which is a lunar eclipse in Virgo on March 3rd. And then about a week after that, the eclipse season trails off around March 11 or so. This is interesting and important new eclipse season, because on the one hand, we get the next installment in the Virgo eclipse series, which has been going on for over a year now, going back to 2025, but also we had the first Pisces one in late 2024. But this one's unique because we get the first eclipse in the sign of Aquarius, which is the beginning of a new sequence of eclipses that's going to be happening in Aquarius and Leo over the course of the next year or two. So this is opening up an entirely new story, Especially for each of us personally, in a new part of each of our charts. As the eclipses this year start shifting from the Virgo Pisces axis To the Leo Aquarius axis, With the keyword I always use of being major endings and major beginnings in whatever area of the chart. Eclipses start to fall.
- [43:27]
Austin Coppock
And this one is especially oriented towards new and, how should we say, confusing and potentially monstrous beginnings as it occurs like three days before the one exact Saturn Neptune conjunction and occurring in Aquarius. It is ruled by Saturn, which is very tightly conjunct Neptune. And so this eclipse just so happens to be in a perfect position. To further magnify the now exact Saturn Neptune conjunction in Aries, which is pretty wild. I kind of kept coming back to this because really it happens right at the same time it is ruled by Saturn. And so part of it will be just a wild loudspeaker for all these Saturn Neptune in Aries themes. But of course, it has its own. Its own characteristics and darkness.
- [44:40]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. The other thing I think it's really gonna magnify is the Pluto transit through Aquarius.
- [44:45]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, that too.
- [44:47]
Chris Brennan
So this is our first eclipse in Aquarius, and Pluto's already been moving back and forth Trying to go into aquarius since what, 2023. But now it's fully in Aquarius and now we get our first eclipse there. And to me, whenever an eclipse happens in the same sign as another planet, it will tend to magnify and exacerbate whatever that planet is already doing in that sign. And you can start seeing some of the most important turning points happen when eclipses start hitting there. So so much of what we've seen is as soon as Pluto started going to Aquarius, we had the explosion of all of the AI artificial intelligence stuff, and the artificial intelligence revolution, or whatever you want to call it, really starting to set in. So that at this point, even though we're only two or three years into it, it seems like AI is now integrated into everything. It's in PowerPoint, it's in Photoshop, it's in so many different programs that we all use on a daily basis. Gmail has a whole AI thing. You could just go down the list of all of these different things that we all use on a daily basis that the AI has found its way into at this point. But somehow this year all of that is going to become magnified really rapidly. Not just because of eclipses starting to happen in Aquarius with Pluto, but also because this year we get our first two exact trines from Uranus in Gemini, trining Pluto, which is also going to speed up and quicken the pace of some of that technological development.
- [46:24]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, absolutely. I don't know what's bigger than everywhere. What's more present, omnipresent, Even more omnipresent, more deeply rooted.
- [46:39]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, I mean, that's what we've got to figure out. I mean, how can it go further from here? I mean, one of the ways, since it is coinciding with the Saturn Neptune conjunction, which is bringing the reality distortion and the difficulty telling what's real versus what's fake, is obviously this is the completion of the video thing in terms of not having videos generated. Anybody now can create a video fully manifesting visually an idea or an imagination they have, and to put it into real form or some sort of form in a video. And I know you've been a little skeptical about whether we're at the point where you can tell the difference between what's real and what's not. But I feel like we're going to hit that threshold here in February where even you, my friend, might be surprised at being fooled once or twice.
- [47:33]
Austin Coppock
Oh, yeah, I'm sure I'll get fooled once or twice. I'm skeptical of a lot of things surrounding AI but yeah, we'll see what the ceiling is and we'll see, you know, what it's useful for other than pictures.
- [47:51]
Chris Brennan
Yeah.
- [47:51]
Austin Coppock
About me 1. But so one way that one important way that AI can get bigger or more omnipresent is the social, how should we say, social acceptance and rejection and the like. The permeation of culture, the cultural layer is, is. I think there's much more to come, much more to come. In 2026. You know, we've started to see various forms of embrace as well as reaction against. And I think that will increase, that will continue significantly. And that is, I think that looking at the eclipse cycle moving into the same axis as Pluto. Absolutely will be part of that. I think it will also play into another Pluto in Aquarius theme, which is rising alarm about inequality, which many would argue is competing for, or some would say one of the most important issues issues today. And that rhymes perfectly with the last time Pluto was in Aquarius when we had the French Revolution.
- [49:18]
Chris Brennan
Right, That's a great point. Because it is creating a new social hierarchy in which you have these handfuls of companies that have these ultra powerful AIs that everyone's using and that is informing different people's opinions because people are starting to switch from using search engines to using AIs to search and look up information about everything. But then depending on what AI you're using, it's being slanted based on different political views, it's being slanted based on different geopolitical things. And a relatively small number of people or corporations control those AIs, and that then filters down to everybody else. So it's interesting.
- [50:02]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And in addition, the types of labor that it looks like AI will most easily and effectively be able to replace are the, are the lower point, the, how should we say, the lower rungs on the ladder. Just as an example in law, it's not high, it's not successful attorneys with 30 years of litigation under their belt that will be replaced by AI. It's people getting their first job, it's paralegals, it's, you know, it's the, it's like the bottom third of the, of the hierarchy where people get their start. And so there is growing concern about, about entry level or lower tier positions that then, you know, are the way you get to higher tier positions being disappeared or becoming, becoming much more scarce.
- [51:00]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, that's a great point. I forgot because the robotics side is a whole other piece of that that's gonna become increasingly obvious as a part of this and an outgrowth of Pluto in Aquarius over the next 20 years that we still have before it finishes in 2040. And the combination of humanoid robots becoming more common in society while artificial intelligence is getting better and better. And one of the things I was Realizing that's going to become an issue is humans are trying to create really, a bunch of companies and even governments are pushing to create a new sentient species as fast as they can. But then one of the things is, once they create that sentient species, to whatever extent they're successful, one of the rules is that humans want to make it fully under the control of humans. But there's a tension there because if you actually do successfully create something that's sentient, you're creating a rule on it right from the start that essentially you're going to be enslaving it. Basically like enslaving a sentience. And that's going to create all sorts of social issues and conflicts at some point in the future, as you have different groups of humans coming to different conclusions about whether you can enslave another sentient species or whether that's fundamentally wrong for philosophical and religious purposes, I think is actually gonna become a major thing during the course of some of this.
- [52:35]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. If something resembling sentience can be achieved, that opens that very large can of worms.
- [52:44]
Chris Brennan
Right. Because one of the things is it's going to be a different sentience than what humans have. And some humans, then, because it's different than what we have, will classify it as lesser and therefore not deserving of something. Not deserving of freedom versus others are going to fall down and say, even though it's different because it has sentience, it's deserving of freedom. And this is going to create some social conflict. And in the future.
- [53:13]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And it would be if that. If we get to that place, it'll be interesting to see how the reams of science fiction about that problem match the reality of it. Yeah.
- [53:26]
Chris Brennan
Well, that's like. One of the reasons I was thinking about that a lot recently is because I was studying the Uranus in Gemini period during the Civil War, and especially the Mars Uranus conjunctions during that time. And that became the core argument. And one of the core things that the Civil War was about was about slavery and about a group of people taking away and the deprivation of freedom on a whole class of humans versus the attempt to restore or give freedom to an entire class of humans. And I realized at a certain point that that was happening at that time during those Mars Uranus conjunctions in Gemini in the US Civil War, because that was the signature in the US birth chart, which is a Mars Uranus conjunction in Gemini. And we're always used to thinking of that conjunction as having to do with liberation and freedom and things like that. But I realized at a certain point that Mars in Vettius Valens in the second century, he also says that Mars can be about the taking away of good things or the deprivation of something or the subjugation of somebody. And so the negative side of that sometimes of that Mars Uranus conjunction is the deprivation of freedom or the taking away of liberty, and then the conflict that that sets up when freedom or liberty is being taken away from a class of beings.
- [54:54]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, absolutely. Right. One, why would you have to fight for freedom if there wasn't a contending force?
- [55:02]
Chris Brennan
Right. Yeah, exactly. So it's like one of my questions on the horizon is how could that manifest again in the future? And where will there be classes that are being deprived freedom or in which there's legitimate arguments about the giving or taking away of freedom of some group of people, let's say.
- [55:23]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. So should we use that as a transition into Uranus in Gemini? I think that's a pretty good one.
- [55:30]
Chris Brennan
That is a great one.
- [55:33]
Austin Coppock
Okay, let me just add to that, that Uranus in Gemini does give us basically a history of liberal philosophy, of the idea of governance that prizes individual liberty and freedom. Not just starting with the US Revolution, but in the cycle before that. We had John Locke publishing all of his major works, which were used more or less as a blueprint by that U.S. government. And we've had struggles around and redefinition and further development of those ideas in every Uranus in Gemini since then.
- [56:13]
Chris Brennan
Absolutely. I want to ask you a question about that. Let me show the diagram first, just to set up the baseline. So this is diagram for Uranus in Gemini, which is going to last from 2025 through 2033. And we had our first dip into that last year starting July 7 through November 7 of 2025. But then Uranus retrograded back into Taurus, where it's going to spend the first few months of 2026. But then starting on April 25, 2026, Uranus is going to move fully into Gemini, where it's going to stay. Stay for quite some time until 2032 and 2033. So this is a super important transit we talked about many times in the past, especially because the United States was born when Uranus was in gemini. And every 84 years when Uranus comes back to Gemini. The US has had a major conflict, including the Civil War. Well, the Revolutionary War, then the Civil War, and then World War II. And then it brings us to today. So part of what you're saying, though, is that Uranus in Gemini ideal and period goes back even before the American Revolution.
- [57:23]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, yeah. The idea of governance, which privileges individual freedom, which is not the historical norm, which we get liberal from, not to be confused with sort of current factions, but the grand tradition of liberalism starts one Uranus cycle before the American Revolution. And then every time we get Uranus in Gemini, there's struggle over that idea and ideal of governance, as well as further definition or redefinition. And so, you know, it does seem like we're at a place where like liberal democracy needs to be caught up. Like, you know, there's a little bit of, how should we say, like there's where we were left after World War II and then there's everything that's happened since, but the world has changed quite a bit. Like in that Uranus in Gemini serves as a very dramatic refresh and sort of reincarnation of those ideals into the now current period of history. It sure seems like we're due for that.
- [58:44]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. Well, I was watching that new Ken Burns documentary on the American Revolutionary War that everyone's watching right now. It's amazing. I'd recommend everyone watch it because it provides so much insight into the Uranus in Gemini period from the founding of the United States and what that was all about. But also a lot of things that are very important to us today as we have a recurrence of that transit. But one of the things it was really emphasizing that you're talking about here is how up until that point, the right to rule and lead a country was largely hereditary. It was something like one king inherited from another king. And that's basically rulership. And those are the people that deserve to be in power and are invested in that. But that was one of the things that was so radical about the US at the time was. Yeah, setting up a representative democracy, basically a republic. And the right to rule being partially based on the consent of the people.
- [59:42]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And how should I say. Yep. Valuing the individual within the societies range of actions, like their book, their personal freedom as well as their consent, their ability to choose governance or participate in a choice of governance as well as a choice of life activities was very novel when like the United States was the largest experiment of that kind. Not that there are no other instances in history, but you know, a quite novel experiment that certainly at first in no way lived up to its own ideals, but in many ways has slowly gotten better and worse and better and worse and better and worse at living up to them, but has not completely abandoned them yet.
- [60:46]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, yeah. And there was so Much idealism surrounding a lot of that at the time. But one of the things. Cause we've been focusing on the Uranus return of the United States so much over the past several years. One of my earliest episodes of the astrology podcast was actually about that back in 2013, when Nick and I did an episode about that. And just noting that correlation that astrologers have been noting since the 1800s, which is just every time Uranus comes back to that sign, there's a reassessment of some of that. There's always a major conflict because Mars is conjunct Uranus in the US Birth chart. But sometimes there's a reassessment of some of the ideals that were built into some of the founding documents of the United States, like the Declaration of Independence and that notion of all men are created equal. And other things like that get reassessed sometimes during those times. And nowhere was that more clear than during the Civil War, when that became the focal point of it. But even During World War II, some of those themes were coming up as well. Because I noticed, for example, on the first Mars Uranus conjunction of World War II, Roosevelt signs the documents to set up some of the first Japanese internment camps. So already there's these issues about creating and sometimes subjugating people based on different classes in society and things like that.
- [62:14]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, absolutely right. There's that same. How should I say, the same Mars Uranus, the embattled ideals or freedom being endangered, or people's capacity to choose, being threatened or coerced, and so necessitating a struggle over it. Another thing that happened during The World War II era was the framing of negative rights. That the idea is that a person, in addition to having the freedom to, I don't know, leave your house whenever you want to. Right. As a positive right there. What was something that was added at that time was the idea of negative rights, of being freedom from right. Being free from, you know, harassment, enslavement. To be free from things as well as free, too. And there's a very important document at that time, like the framing of negative rights. But just as an example of the further, like, thinking and development of that. That set of liberal ideals.
- [63:26]
Chris Brennan
Right, yeah. Or free from, like in the Revolutionary War, free from taxation without representation, for example.
- [63:32]
Austin Coppock
Right, right, right, Exactly.
- [63:35]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. So one of the reasons I'm bringing up Mars Uranus, because this year, on July 4th, weirdly, on the birthday of the United States, what's widely recognized as the birthday of the United States and the Declaration of Independence, the signing of it. When there was a Mars Uranus conjunction back in 1776, we get a Mars Uranus conjunction in Gemini Just like it was back in 1776. And this is an incredibly important signature. So much so that I just did a whole episode and research project with Nick Daganbast, where we went back and looked at Mars Uranus conjunctions in Gemini in US History and found that they always represented major turning points during the course of the war or the conflict that was taking place during those times, which were the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, and World War II. And usually the Mars Uranus conjunctions At the beginning of that period, After Uranus had just gone into Gemini, the first or second conjunction Was usually the starting point of that war or that conflict. And then the Mars Uranus conjunctions Towards the end of that period of Mars in Gemini Were sometimes the resolution and the bringing to complete completion of that conflict. So if that pattern holds, then it means that this first conjunction this year and the second conjunction two years from now in 2028, should be the start and the flashpoint of whatever this major conflict is that we're looking at over the course of the next seven years. Whether that's an internal conflict like the Civil War was, or a major external conflict like World War II was. The flashpoints and the most important turning points Are gonna be those Mars uranus conjunctions starting July 4th of 2026. Yeah. How do you feel about Mars Uranus? What do you have to say? What are your keywords for that combination?
- [65:35]
Austin Coppock
It's an explosive combination. It is a precedent shattering and setting combination rules are broken, which then sets. You know, it breaks a norm to set a new norm, which is often quite, how should we say, unnorm. It's a quite violent combination, which. And it. That violence can be enacted by people. But we also see crazy accidents During Mars Uranus conjunctions that do a lot of destruction and may cause loss of life. Again, we have those both on purpose as well as by accident. They set things off. Right. It's very much the quality. One of the things that you see with the history of Mars Uranus conjunctions Is you literally see accidental giant explosions Where a flame gets too close To a gigantic powder keg or the equivalent thereof, and everything goes up in a second. And so you have this latent power, all this latent energy, and then Mars provides the strike of the match With a little bit of flame. And that can be done intentionally, it can be done unintentionally. But yeah, Flashpoint is a great term for that. For what they do.
- [67:08]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, for sure. I mean, the biggest example of that, of course, was the end of World War II in 1945. The Mars Uranus conjunction in Gemini that coincided with the dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki and that huge explosion, but also the huge turning point in humanity technologically that that represented where suddenly humanity could. Could destroy itself for the first time in its history after that point, as it started, basically the Cold War from that point forward. Yeah.
- [67:43]
Austin Coppock
Precedent ending or precedent shattering, but also new world beginning. Right. It's the atomic age.
- [67:52]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. And that's actually one prediction from our last year's forecast that I made that's been aging, unfortunately, very well, which is that I thought Uranus returning to Gemini, where it was when the atomic weapons were first created and used, would bring us back to a period in which those were more prominent again. And unfortunately, in the news over the past several months, we've been inching back towards that, with the US Saying it's going to start testing nuclear weapons again, and other news stories coming up with nuclear weapons with other countries over the course of the past several months in a way that's very unsettling as we are heading into a series of four Mars Uranus conjunctions in Gemini over the next several years.
- [68:37]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, well, I'll say what I said last time, which is I agree. And that I think we will be very lucky to get to the other end of this Uranus in Gemini period with no nuclear weapons being deployed.
- [68:52]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. Yeah, for sure. Okay. So other keywords that are important for Mars Uranus, but also Uranus more broadly, is, you know, revolution and rebellion, secession and separation, like the splitting apart of something. And that was something that was interesting. Learning more about the Revolutionary War is realizing, even though we classify the Civil War itself in the 1800s as a civil war, the Revolutionary War was actually kind of a civil war as well, because the colonists were still part of the British, and they decided to. To break away and secede, essentially, and form their own country. And even within the US Mainland, there was a lot of conflict between Revolutionary forces versus loyalists who wanted to stay part of the British Crown, basically. So that the Revolutionary War was not just an external war with another country, which is how we look at it in retrospect, but it was also in some ways like a civil war and the breaking away or separation or secession of one. One piece of a country from another.
- [69:58]
Austin Coppock
100%. Yeah. Ask King George. That was 100% a civil war. And you see really clearly the basic Gemini symbolism Of division. Right. Of fragmentation, of dividing and division and further subdivision.
- [70:20]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. And. And also rapid technological advancement, especially in communications and transportation, was a huge part of not just World War II, which is the most obvious one, but also the Civil War had a huge, huge amount of that as well. There's a huge amount of things involving communications with the use of telegraphs and telegraph lines in war for the first time. That were delivering battlefield updates nearly in real time to the White House for the first time. But also developments in transportation, such as the use of railroads to help facilitate the war efforts for the first time. Yeah.
- [71:02]
Austin Coppock
It was the first war that used railroads for logistics, and it changed everything.
- [71:09]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. So that's an important precedent. And then, of course, we also had a lot of rapid technological development. Development in both wars with the Mars Uranus conjunctions in weaponry, like guns that could shoot further and more accurately in the Civil War. And then, of course, In World War II, we have the development of the atomic bomb and the deployment of that for the first time. So I'm bringing this up because these are some of the themes that we're going to be experiencing with Uranus in Gemini, and especially the Mars Uranus conjunction junctions over the course of the next seven years, as we have just rapid advancements in technology and communications, even more so than now, because right now everyone could hear that and be like, well, yeah, that's already happening, but we're gonna see an acceleration of that, I think, beyond what we can even fully anticipate at this stage. But also in transportation at the same time. And then finally, also in terms of military technology and the new deployment. Deployment of technology in wars and conflicts in ways that's new and innovative and potentially more destructive than what we've seen up to this point.
- [72:20]
Austin Coppock
Absolutely. Some people are already calling this the dawn of a revolution in military affairs, that think armies are going to look very different on the other side of this. And yeah, as you were saying, I don't think many people realize how technologically revolutionary the Civil War was in the United States. I was reading recently and just stumbled across some of the. Across a thing that was talking about how all of the European powers were fascinated with the American Civil War, not because of the moral issues so much, but because it was in many ways the first. The first modern war. Because it was the first time we had repeating rifles. Right. AKA machine. What would become machine guns, submarines, ironclad ships. The first aircraft carrier was for launching observation balloons, which was a new thing, as well as aerial reconnaissance. The telegraph was used in addition to the railroads. There were also with the telegraph. We also had the introduction of new military codes for encrypting messages. It's sort of everything that would come, everything that would inform warfare for the next hundred some years in its infancy. And so. Yeah. And so you see a combination of transportation and communication or information technologies all put to military use. And of course the Civil War is a very important precedent for us, our precedent for our astrological communications, our astrological configurations during this era. Because we had Uranus in Gemini and Neptune in Aries then. And that's what we have this time. We didn't have Neptune in Aries during World War II.
- [74:19]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. And that was the piece that was crucial about all of the idealism of all the young soldiers heading into the war and thinking it was going to be this heroic hand to hand combat thing that would be over in 90 days is they didn't know how much the technology had jumped and leapfrogged and become much more advanced or how much it would even become more advanced during the course of the war. Which just increased the brutality and the carnage, the sheer amount of casualties and deaths in the war way beyond what anybody on either side was expecting. And that was one of the things that then led to that arc of illusions and over idealization of war in the early part of Neptune in Aries. But then disillusionment once the sheer scale of it became clear.
- [75:11]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And it really frames that Neptune in Aries hope or ideal like the. The dream of an honorable but hard fought duel which will decide things. Right. As opposed to a grinding conflict that degrades all those involved.
- [75:33]
Chris Brennan
Right. Yeah. Yeah. And the introduction of Gatling guns and things like that that are just mowing people down. So, so much of this. Obviously the obvious parallel that we can already see developing, that has been developing the past few years is drone warfare and just what that looks like and the brutality of that as a new form of warfare that we can already see being deployed most notably in Ukraine, the war between Russia and Ukraine. But just how much that changes the nature of war in the modern period.
- [76:10]
Austin Coppock
And that's such an interesting and perfect combination of the transportation and communication or informational technologies because they're, they're fast moving. There are a lot of them and they can be, you know, there's some AI or like pre programmed drones. There's obviously the remote control and it's just changed every operation in warfare. It hasn't replaced anything, it's changed everything. Right. Trenches are still useful, but you have to be able to Defend against drones that can drop grenades directly on top of you. Right. Like, artillery is still useful, but now, and maybe more so because you can use drones to spot for you and scout. And so drones have just sort of become part. Become part of all of these things that have been warfare in the modern era. But now everything's different and needs drones, and it keeps changing and new things get discovered every season, right?
- [77:19]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, yeah. And all of this is important because with Uranus going back into Gemini again, I believe we're on the cusp of a major war. So we have to talk about some of those things being on the cusp of this. But then also, obviously, there's gonna be other more positive manifestations of this as well. One of them I noticed recently that's a blend between Uranus in Gemini and the Sun, Saturn, Neptune, conjunction is I posted my video horoscopes that Leisa Schaim and I did this year for each rising sign, and I posted clips of them on Instagram. And on Instagram, there's an option to translate them automatically. And it had the ability to translate them into three different languages, into Spanish and Portuguese and Hindi, where it dubbed the audio. And it mimicked my voice and did a pretty good mimic of my voice, dubbing it into each of those languages. But then it also used AI video to change my mouth so that my mouth matched the words that were being spoken in that language. And so I was just struck by how Uranus in Gemini at this very early stage is like the breaking down of all borders between communication and that being one of our keywords over the next seven years, where functionally, the barriers between different humans that were naturally there as a result of language are suddenly being erased to some extent in a significant way. And how that's going to impact society and the world if all of us have these automatic translators.
- [78:51]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, that's a great point. How many works of entertainment and fiction and culture where you just not exposed to. Because, you know, there is never there. There's never an English version. Right. And yeah, it's. It's the. It's like. Yeah, like the potential for all of that to change culture and to impact culture is pretty extraordinary. And it's not that. I don't know, like, it doesn't have to be perfect to have a massive impact. It's just like lowering the friction to crossing linguistic barriers.
- [79:33]
Chris Brennan
Absolutely. And how much that will also impact society and people's perceptions, including people's prejudices. Because so often it's like humans sometimes are able to other People if they don't speak the same language. And therefore there's an assumption of a difference or a foreignness or an alien ness to different groups. But if all of a sudden you can understand an entire other country or group of people and you can see that they're just speaking normally and they're normal humans and you don't have those illusions of separateness or otherness, how that will impact things in terms of people's perceptions and prejudices, seems like it would be a very positive development to me when it comes to that.
- [80:19]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, yeah, totally. In addition to that, we can. You can also see the potential for further fragmentation in the sense that, you know, you know, I should say, if. So back when I, when I was a boy, 74 years ago, everybody kind of either saw the same movies or didn't see those movies, but there was, you know, it's, it's. There were three channels on television and you were either for or against what was on the tv. But there was very meaningfully a mainstream culture. And that has cultures become what is, we say the, yeah, the, the culture that is available has become much more, much more wildly varied since we got to Internet. But that, like the potential for erasing or at least minimizing language barriers means that the amount of potential culture that any one person is exposed to, you know, is quadrupled, quintupled, et cetera, et cetera. And so, you know, like, the chances of. Oh, did you see that thing? That. The chances of a water cooler moment when everybody has all of the culture in the entire world at their disposal. Right. Like the, the ability to find yourself in a niche that nobody, you know, knows anything about increases by whatever factor which isn't necessarily a bad or good thing, but it's a thing that's incredible.
- [82:01]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. That reminds me, during the last Uranus in Gemini period, the United nations was founded. And so you have that image of all of the representatives from the different countries there that are each wearing their earpiece where the other people's language is being automatically translated by a translator in their ear. It's like we have a version of that happening now over the past seven years, but for everybody. And that's a beautiful image to me of what you were saying where somebody could create a viral clip in Spain that all of a sudden is automatically translated into every language. And everybody around the world is knowing about that viral clip. It really is breaking down borders a lot more than at any other time.
- [82:46]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And I think a lot of people will probably be very surprised to Find out what other people were thinking. I had no idea that half a billion people were thinking about this like this. Nobody in the Anglosphere says that about this thing. And vice versa, Right?
- [83:06]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. That's brilliant. Okay. And then the last thing of course is obvious, but bears repeating is just with the transportation revolution that's coming with Uranus in Gemini over the next seven years, this is probably going to be the widespread adoption of self driving cars. And having that in place much more than we might even expect by the end of this Transit in the mid-2030s. And electric vehicles also taking over during this time as well are two really obvious ones that I can see. But there will probably be other things involving drones and different delivery drones.
- [83:44]
Austin Coppock
Delivery drones gotta be right around the corner.
- [83:47]
Chris Brennan
Delivery drones. And then also a year or two ago I was talking about the drone taxi cabs also starting to become a thing as well, right? Yeah. So that's a major thing. Okay, so that's Uranus in Gemini and that's the Mars Uranus conjunctions. There's more there. But it might be good time to take a break. What do you think?
- [84:12]
Austin Coppock
My bladder agrees.
- [84:14]
Chris Brennan
Okay, the bladder has spoken. We take a little break. Our forecast today is sponsored by the astrology software program Astro Theoros, which is a modern cloud based astrology charting platform that's thoughtfully designed, powerful and genuinely enjoyable to use. Astrotheoros works seamlessly across all your devices. You can install it on your laptop, phone or tablet and access it from any web browser, all under a single account. Wherever you log in, you'll get the same clean, consistent interface with all of your charts instantly available. It's built on the Swiss Ephemeris and the ECS Atlas, so the calculations are accurate and reliable. One of the things astrologers really appreciate about Astro Theoros is how intuitive it is to explore charts. There's a smooth time roving dial, a chart lock feature that keeps the chart steady while the planets move the planet, isolation controls that make it easy to focus on exactly what you want to study. These tools are especially helpful for working with transits and long term forecasting. Just like we're doing here today with the year ahead forecast episode. Astro Theoris also includes an interactive Zodiac releasing module, solar returns, secondary progressions, declinations, major asteroids, and a range of thoughtful usability features like dark mode, light mode, left handed mode, and one tap saving of transit charts. For astrologers who work with clients, there's also a live session feature that lets you share a clean version of the chart without exposing private data, which is a big improvement over the traditional stream screen sharing that we all do through Zoom. One cool thing about Astro Theoros is that as a cloud based program it's continuously updating and since it's subscription based, new features are delivered automatically and seamlessly. In the past month alone, astrotheoros has already added lunar return charts, planetary station indicators, additional minor aspects, a new glyph sizing option for larger screens, and a quick toggle bi wheel isolation button that makes the focused analysis faster than ever. Astrothuros currently supports Tropical Astrology with ongoing development and future editions being guided directly by the astrologers who are using the software and providing feedback. So you can get a free month of the program by signing up with the promo code astrologypod before January 15th. To start your free month, check it out and visit Astro Theoros and I'll put a link to that in the description below this video or on the podcast website. So shout out to them for sponsoring this episode.
- [86:46]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, it looks great. Honestly, being able to have the same access, the same thing on multiple devices is pretty useful because I have a laptop, a phone and a desktop and they certainly can all run the same software and it sounds like they are, how should we say, Very thought. It seems like there's a lot of nice quality of life stuff like oh that's nice. So you can just put it in privacy mode rather than having to remake the chart or take the chart image and export it and then edit it. I'm excited to see what features come next. There's a voracious evolution zerg like happening.
- [87:30]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, I love the dark mode. I love the Zodiac releasing module. And like you were saying, I love how you can get your your charts basically across any device because I cannot tell you how many times I've wanted to pull up a chart, but it's like stuck on my desktop at home and I don't have access to that chart file like on my phone or my tablet.
- [87:48]
Austin Coppock
It's pretty nice. And I like dark mode. You know, I kind of artificially create dark mode whenever I write things. I always write with white text on a black background for 20 years.
- [88:03]
Chris Brennan
Nice, nice. Yeah, I'm going to be trying it out soon on some of the forecast episodes. I'm going to experiment with it and see if we can alternate from the blazing sun of the solar fire white chart design that I usually use and see if I can give people's eye a break here in some future episodes.
- [88:18]
Austin Coppock
I'm here for it. Literally and figuratively. Awesome.
- [88:23]
Chris Brennan
All right, well let's get back into the overview section of this forecast, which is going longer of course than we expected. But that's all right because we've got so many big weighty things to talk about. But the next thing I want to talk about is Jupiter this year, which is spending the first six months of the year still moving through Cancer, through the sign of its exaltation. But then starting at the end of June, Jupiter's gonna move into the sign of LEO for the next year where it's gonna be joining up with eventually the South Node and then Mars, as well as an eclipse that's gonna take place in August in the sign of leo. So that's the start of actually a bunch of Leo activity this year.
- [89:01]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, it sure is. So Jupiter spends the first half of the year in Cancer, which is its exaltation and in pretty good shape. And one of the things that Jupiter does is it keeps things from falling apart. We often look to Jupiter for new good things and, and Jupiter does bring opportunities, it potentiates growth, et cetera, et cetera. But that's the positive half. The other half that Jupiter performs, which is in natal charts and in the skies, is protecting us from worst case scenarios, providing remedy where there's injury or holding things together. And how should we say. I shudder to think how much Jupiter is holding together right now in Cancer, as Jupiter is literally full strength in Cancer. This is as much high quality Jupiter juice as we're going to get. And Jupiter in Leo of course has its own excellences, but is overall less capable of holding things together. And so that's one of the things, that's one of the differences in Jupiter moving from Cancer to Leo. We get less ability for Jupiter to kind of keep everything together for just a little while longer. And it's worth noting that Jupiter in Cancer is in the same sign it was when the, the Declaration of Independence was declared. And that the United States in that chart has Mercury, Sun, Venus and Jupiter in Cancer. And it is a Jupiter ruled chart. And so again, one shudders to think that what we see before us here in December of 2025 is the United States with a lot of support that will go away halfway through the year. In fact, it'll go away about a week before our first Mars Uranus conjunction. Just in time.
- [91:18]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, that's a great point. Well, what's funny is we had a really tangible example of that protective function that you're talking about literally over the past few days because you got sick a few days ago, right before this forecast with a cold. And my heart sank the moment you told me that, because that's always our worst case scenario. One of us gets sick and can't do the big forecast that we been preparing a month for. But you, my friend, somehow already fought it off and are in amazing shape today. And I realized that's part of that. You actually have Jupiter exalted in cancer in your birth chart in the first house in the place of the body. And Jupiter's serving that protective function. Sometimes I feel like when it comes to your health and ability to either fight stuff off or recuperate pretty quickly.
- [92:05]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, 100%. It's definitely an area where I have received blessings is the. To restore what has been depleted or to protect from what would harm. Yeah, because it was just. We had a. We had a very quiet Christmas, just Kate and Lucien and I, and they were both dog sick. And so I was just cuddling with my two beloved booger piles for days on it. The viral load was very intense, but it didn't. It got in a little bit and then I bounced back and.
- [92:41]
Chris Brennan
Nice.
- [92:41]
Austin Coppock
You know, bouncing is a pretty Jupiter thing, right? It's that, like, you know, when people talk about, like a soft landing or, you know, what, what cushions and impact, like the ability to bounce off of things or like, you know, if you have a fall instead of just splatting, like bouncing, that capacity to retain elevation, to deal with impacts in a way that doesn't interfere with or doesn't damage the structural integrity of the thing. I think bounciness might be a bit of a Jupiter core signification. What do you think?
- [93:20]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, absolutely. Especially bouncing back because speaking of that, one of the things Jupiter was helping all of us with in the past, what, just like six months now since it moved into Cancer, it's been cleaning up the mess that the Mars retrograde in cancer left at the beginning of 2025 and late 2024, where Mars, for many of us at least, was wrecking a certain part of our life based on what house it went retrograded in cancer. But then luckily, we've had Jupiter come in in the second half of 2025 to clean up some of the mess. But while that's helped a lot, Jupiter still has a lot of work to do. And luckily we've got like six more months for Jupiter to really get things going. And especially around the time of Jupiter's direct station in Cancer. I'm looking forward to Jupiter being fully empowered so it can do some of its best work there, strengthening the cancer sectors of each of our charts.
- [94:19]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, absolutely. There are multiple configurations during the first half of 2026 that I would have no hope at all for, except for the Jupiter intervention, which is present in all of them. And again, Jupiter won't always prevent negative things from happening, but a lot of times it prevents the worst case scenario or it offers the potential for repair or restoration of relationship. And that's of course, in addition to the positive things that Jupiter still has to offer people this year in that cancer area of their life, which is the capacity to grow or develop in a new area, to obtain new knowledge, et cetera, et cetera. So we like Jupiter in cancer. We like that. We've got another six months of it.
- [95:18]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, to grow and to develop, to nurture something new and to allow it to grow and flourish. But also because it's a planet in its exaltation that often represents doing the best or the highest version of whatever it is that you're trying to do. So I think each of us can really take advantage of that this year and by thinking about what house Jupiter is transiting through in our chart and thinking about what's a way that we could improve that sector of our life if we really planned it out and thought about it ahead of time, not in a haphazard way, but in a way of like what is the best version of this that I could be doing in my life and then executing on that plan.
- [95:59]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And one thing that I've noticed about Jupiter's exaltation in cancer is that it's often, it often comes off as how do we put this? Humble in aspiration or slow moving. But the results are really extraordinary over time. It doesn't look as exciting as like Jupiter in Pisces or Jupiter in Sagittarius. But you look at, for example, the only investor who's been among the richest people in the world is Warren Buffet, who's a Jupiter in Cancer, who just. If you listen to him and look at what he's done, he just invests in companies that he believes in, but has done that for 60 years. And so a lot of times there's something almost confusingly humble about the approach of Jupiter and cancer, but then the results are anything but humble. And so like slow but steady. Right. Like everything starts, every plant at least starts as a seed. Right. You don't try to take the giant oak and transplant it. Like, you know, you nurture the acorns and then before you know it, you've got something oaken and huge and extraordinary.
- [97:24]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, well, and Jupiter in cancer also just excels at taking care of people. And we've Talked about the ACA being passed 12 years ago and being instituted under that transit in terms of Americans getting healthcare at that time. And then the challenges to some of that that are coming up at this time where it's just barely been hanging on by a thread. But that's a good example also of taking care of large groups of people by providing healthcare of the sort of energy that Jupiter in cancer can bring of how can you help large groups of people with that sort of energy during the first six months?
- [98:07]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, and care. Care is such a good keyword for anything cancer, but especially a beneficant cancer like Jupiter.
- [98:15]
Chris Brennan
Right. So this kind of peaks, this energy peaks and is the most positive to me around early June, because around that time Venus moves into cancer and forms this very auspicious conjunction with Jupiter in early June. That just looks super nice. And I'm really looking forward to as one of the most positive alignments of the year in early June. And one of the things in the electional astrology report that Leisa and I just released is I kind of mentioned how I remembered how last summer the Taylor Swift marriage announcement, the proposal announcement happened. The proposal happened around the Venus Jupiter conjunction in cancer. So in the report I kind of speculated that we'd probably see a big celebrity wedding like Taylor Swift around that time of that conjunction in early June.
- [99:07]
Austin Coppock
I actually just got invited to a wedding in early June.
- [99:10]
Chris Brennan
Did you? Okay.
- [99:12]
Austin Coppock
By non astrologers.
- [99:13]
Chris Brennan
Is it Taylor Swift? Did you get invited to Taylor Swift wedding?
- [99:16]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, she found out that we have the same Venus and we're besties now.
- [99:20]
Chris Brennan
That does make sense actually. Well, I actually just saw on the tabloids, tabloids are saying that she's getting married in early June. So I'm actually calling that as an accurate prediction on my part because that was what I was thinking. If she got proposed to, if the proposal happened under the conjunction, it would make so much sense for the actual marriage to happen on the recurrence of that in June. So we'll see if that actually happens, if that gets validated sometime soon in the larger press. But it's a nice little sweet spot in the year. Despite all of the challenging stuff we've been talking about and some of the really difficult aspects like the Mars Uranus conjunction in July. There are at least these sweet spots at different points, like that Venus Jupiter conjunction at the beginning of June.
- [100:02]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, and I'm gonna restrain myself from talking about the other Sweet fruits available the orchard of that time of year. But yeah, that's right smack in the middle of my favorite portion of the year to come. I believe Kelly would refer to that conjunction as Juicy.
- [100:21]
Chris Brennan
Juicy. Yeah. Well, that is the. If our famous prediction about March of 2020 was that was like the no hugging time of the year, then that will be the hugging time of the year in early June, I think we could say.
- [100:35]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, yeah. Hugs all round.
- [100:39]
Chris Brennan
Hugs. All right. So speaking of that, actually, after what.
- [100:42]
Austin Coppock
Comes before that, a lot of us are gonna need a hug.
- [100:45]
Chris Brennan
Yes, definitely. So, speaking of that, actually, Leisa and I just released our 2026 electional astrology report, which is a guide to the most fortunate dates in 2026. And that's how I first found that Venus Jupiter conjunction. Because what we do in the report is we pick the most auspicious date dates for starting things next year, which you can use for business love or pretty much any major life event. And we went through each of the next 12 months and we picked out the two best dates and the two best astrological charts with times that you can use to do things next year during the course of 2026. And we released this as a report that people can purchase through our website. So we have 28 auspicious charts because we experience expanded it to two charts this year per month rather than just one. And the report includes a video report, an audio report, plus an extensive written report as a PDF. And it includes a monthly forecast with not just the dates to do things that are good, but we also tell you what dates to avoid, because sometimes electional astrology is just as much about knowing which dates to avoid doing things than it is knowing which dates are really good. So we're doing a launch sale right now where the report is on sale for $49.95, but only until January 7th. And then the price is going to jump up to the regular price of $75. So you can get the report now at theastrologypodcast.com 2026report.
- [102:14]
Austin Coppock
Excellent. And it's so much work and it's so nice to have somebody else do it for you.
- [102:20]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, because it's a lot of work to find good dates to do things like marriages or launch a business or something else. But we actually did that ourselves and then put it in a report. And what's funny is we're doing this work for ourselves as well, because you'll see us using these same dates all throughout next year. A lot of my major podcast episodes will launch on these dates or will be recorded product launches and other things like that. Because I actually use these as the best dates. I happened to also make a report to share them with everyone else.
- [102:50]
Austin Coppock
That's nice. And it's consistently entertaining. How often we end up with either exactly the same idea or a variation on a theme of what the best day of the month is to do a thing.
- [103:07]
Chris Brennan
Right. And we find out in retrospect that we both did the most important thing on the same day and time that month within the same hour. Hour, yeah.
- [103:14]
Austin Coppock
Or like, oh, I picked the same day, but I wanted this rising because of this. But like, it's. So there's. There is. Yeah, there is a. The. It's the same principles and it's. Yeah, it's not just Chris and Lisa's opinion, you know, like, there are a lot of principles that get applied and you get, you know, with rigor, there's a very small divergence between what the best days are and often no divergence at all in opinion.
- [103:47]
Chris Brennan
Definitely. Awesome. Well, yeah, so get the report before the price goes up on January 7th at theastrologypodcast.com 2026report. All right, so let's transition into talking a little bit more about Jupiter in Leo, because we really focused on Jupiter in Cancer, but that's just the first half of the year. And then in late June, we get a major shift where we end the first chapter of this year, basically, and we move into the second chapter when Jupiter goes into Leo, because that's the first of, like I said, at least three, maybe four major Leo transits that just start happening from that point forward.
- [104:24]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. Yeah, it is. So should we talk a little bit about Jupiter and Leo, the nature of the planet and the sign, before we talk about all of the friends that Jupiter will make in Leo?
- [104:38]
Chris Brennan
Yes, please.
- [104:39]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. So, right. Jupiter, although not exalted. Right. Not like this formula for excellence for Jupiter that Cancer is. Leo's a great place for Jupiter when it's not interfered with. Right. Jupiter likes warmth and expansiveness. The solar principle, which is present in Leo, is a welcome alloy to Jupiterian buoyancy. You often see people who are born with a gift of, how should we say, personable and relatable warmth. Jupiter in Leo bestows a gift of confidence and belief in oneself and. Or the capacity to strengthen others through seeing them and believing in their capacities. There can also be a theatrical or performative talent, the ability to appear and to command attention, which is also helpful for people in leadership roles. It's A good Jupiter. It has quite a few. It can do quite a few things. It's no longer the exaltation, but there's a lot to like about Jupiter in Leo.
- [106:08]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. It has this buoyant radiant energy which I think about sometimes like a prominent Jupiter in Leo. There's some people where that idea of visualizing or trying to manifest the future and not just faking it until you're making it, but literally manifesting things in your life through a sheer optimism and belief that you deserve and can accomplish something and then just creating that in your life out of that. That I often think about when it comes to Jupiter and Leo and especially people that have Jupiter and Leo in the first house kind of exude when I think about their natal placements. That's what I think of.
- [106:56]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. It really. It turns the often trite stuff about believing in yourself into something realistic and actually kind of enviable. You're like, oh that actually that's when you, you, you say that but you've acted on that and you've demonstrated that that's not, that's not trash. There actually is something to that. Yeah. And again there's just like a ninth. There's a nice warmth and sort of embracing quality off the top of my head. Like Will Ferrell is a Jupiter in Leo who's just like darn likable fella. There's just like an accessibility that Jupiter in Leo gives that I think is rather nice. And for those of us with solar issues who flee at the coming of the light, Jupiter and Leo can be medicinal as a way of seeing how not all as a way of proving that the sun does more than give you skin cancer. Right.
- [108:08]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. I'm looking through my list really quickly of people that have Jupiter in Leo and you have sometimes great creatives like George Lucas who created Star wars or a more recent example we've got Bill Burr the comedian. We've got Bo Burnham is a great contemporary creative example. And just his ability to create things truly as a creative in some sense but also a performer.
- [108:38]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. One Bobernum has an ability to take what is very self involved material, very Leo me, me, me. But make it all like wide reaching and all embracing. Right. It extends that that personal me, me, me to actually it's me but that's me is just one instance of us and so it becomes interesting and relatable.
- [109:03]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. I mean speaking of using that is making me see another one in my list which is Joe Rogan and just the him as a central Figure becoming a podcasting empire, but through this centralization of just him as a personality and his conversations with other people is what made his podcast take off originally.
- [109:25]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, obviously a person that a lot of people can relate to.
- [109:33]
Chris Brennan
Right? Yeah. Or as like the Everyman or something like that. Early on at least that was the attraction. Okay. But also other people that just genuinely effuse good energy, like our friend Kelly Surtees, for example, is a Venus Jupiter in Leo. That's a good one, 100%. Let's see. Judith Butler. Anthony Bourdain is again another one. The everyday man that people can relate to that just exudes this kind of buoyant but positive energy in some way that's very much on their sleeve.
- [110:12]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And another instance of someone whose work is very much about their experience, but their experience is big enough that it doesn't feel self centered.
- [110:23]
Chris Brennan
Absolutely, absolutely. All right. I'm seeing others because I'm trying to pick out, for example, some different women. But like Eleanor Roosevelt was a really famous Jupiter in Leo as well. Angela Davis, Pamela Anderson. It's like you sort of start seeing a pattern here, going through some of these different names. But that's the energy. And we're only gonna get that energy for a little bit though, at least in its pure, I don't wanna say unadulterated form. Cause it gets adulterated pretty quickly, unmolested. I'm not gonna go there either. But I will say Jupiter in Leo is there. Well, really? Yeah. No, it's not unadulterated because as soon as it goes into Leo, it opposes Pluto. And then in August we get the first Leo eclipse. So then there's a second magnification of the Leo energy. In July we have the nodes changing signs and the south node goes into Leo. And then at the end of the year, starting in September, Mars goes into Leo and it starts building up to a retrograde in Virgo and Leo that's gonna extend far into 2027. So it's like when Leisa and I were doing the horoscopes this year for every sign, we were just realizing that whatever the Leo sector of your chart is, whatever house that coincides with is really gonna be getting the most activity this year in some ways, because especially in the second half of the year, it just starts getting pinged by all the major transits.
- [111:59]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. I'm sure you had a similar experience as I did, where I would look at it and be like, oh, and so Jupiter's gonna move into your blank house. And that's Gonna be great. But I guess it opposes Pluto and it's gonna be co present with the south node for 11 of the 12 months. And oh, is that Mars? Oh, and Mars is going to be there for five of those months. So it's a lot of Leo and there's a lot for Jupiter to reconcile, overcome, equilibriate, deal with in Leo. And that's another difference between Jupiter's time in Cancer and Jupiter's time in Leo. Jupiter, once we get to mid February, we'll be dealing with the whole sign but not exact square from Saturn and Neptune, which certainly affects does some limiting of how much pure Jupiter in Cancer excellence we can get and how much it's Jupiter in Cancer offsetting or trying to mitigate the Saturn in Aries stuff. But there are no exact aspects. Jupiter's got a lot of free time to do its own thing, whereas Jupiter will be extremely busy dealing with the dragon's lashing tail as well as Mars in and out of Leo.
- [113:28]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, and one of the things Jupiter's gonna do is it's gonna aggrandize all of the people that have prominent Leo placements, whether that's their sun sign or their rising sign or 10th house or what have you. We're gonna see all the Leo people coming and being thrust more into the forefront of headlines and other things like that from late June and early July onwards. And that's only gonna accelerate in August when we get that Leo eclipse.
- [114:00]
Austin Coppock
I think aggrandize is a really good term.
- [114:03]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And there's some parts of that that are gonna be good things for some of those Leos, subjectively during the early parts of that, the aggrandizement. But then later in the year when Mars gets involved, things become more troubling and there's more drawbacks and conflict that starts coming up in that area with the people that have that placement prominent.
- [114:28]
Austin Coppock
Absolutely. I would say that the trouble starts as soon as that first eclipse in Leo lands and that Mars adds to that.
- [114:38]
Chris Brennan
Let me just show that eclipse then, since we're really getting into it here. So our second eclipse season is taking place in August with the first eclipse being this solar eclipse that occurs in Leo at 20 degrees of Leo on August 12th. So the eclipse season officially begins about a week before that. By around August 5th or so, it peaks with that first eclipse in Leo. And then we get that it's always the most intense in between the two weeks that follow the first eclipse. And then we get the second eclipse as a lunar eclipse in Pisces on August 27th. Which then means that eclipse season doesn't end. Until sometime in the first week of September. Around the 4th or so. Part of what this brings up that I mentioned earlier. Is how this partially represents us wrapping up or heading towards wrapping up the Virgo Pisces eclipse season, or eclipse series. I should say that's been happening since 2024. When we had our first lunar eclipse in Pisces in September of 2024. And then our first lunar eclipse in Virgo in March of 2025. So we're gonna get, in 2026. This lunar eclipse in Pisces. But then the last eclipse of that series happens in February of 2027 in Virgo. And then we're all finished with that. So what we're seeing then is the later parts of a sequence of eclipses. That were representing a series of major beginnings. And major endings. In the Virgo and Pisces sectors of our charts. That should be headed towards completion. And headed towards wrapping up whatever that unfolding of a sequence of events has been over the past year or two. That these eclipses represent. So that's one part of that. And then the other part of that is that this also represents the beginning of the new sequence of eclipses in Aquarius and Leo. Which are started in February of 2026 with the first eclipse in Aquarius. And then we get the second half of that in August with the first eclipse in Leo. But then we're gonna have eclipses bouncing back and forth between those two signs. Going all the way until 2028. So this is truly opening up a new chapter. Where we're gonna have, in the Leo and Aquarius sectors of our charts. Some things coming to a major ending. And some closures of major things. That have been happening in that area of our life for years up to this point. But then also, as a result of those closures. We're gonna see new beginnings. And the humble origins of new trends. That are gonna emerge over the course of the next two years.
- [117:34]
Austin Coppock
Boy, will we.
- [117:36]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, so that's super important. And then that's one of the reasons why the ingress of Jupiter into Leo is important. Cause we've got a double activation of Leo going on between those two. Basically from July into August. What else is going on? We're gonna get into that more in the monthly breakdown. But I'm not super stoked, though, that Jupiter opposes Pluto. As soon as it goes into Leo. Because one of my references for that is. I remember the flip side of that. Which Was the Jupiter pluto conjunction in 2020, where we had three of those. And the two primary things, if you go back and listen to the forecast episodes I was noting at the time, as those conjunctions were happening is near each conjunction we were seeing a proliferation of sometimes conspiracy theories, for lack of a better word, where sometimes the truth was being manipulated by people in power in order to get the masses to do things by misleading them was one of the archetypal things I was noticing about that. But that was also during the period in which with COVID some of the highest death numbers were happening when those two planets came together. Exactly. So those are two of my takeaways back in 2020.
- [118:56]
Austin Coppock
I would just add to that moment in 2020, or those series of moments is Jupiter Pluto is found in a conscious, conspicuously large number of not just billionaire, but like mega billionaire charts. And we had people in the top 1% of the 1% of the 1% doing extremely well financially during those same Jupiter Pluto conjunctions in 2020.
- [119:27]
Chris Brennan
Right. Although it was because they were taking advantage of a catastrophic crash where the market took a nosedive basically during COVID But the ones that had enough money and were smart, they immediately jumped in and invested during those times and then came out of it making huge amounts of money.
- [119:47]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. So here's a hopeful thing for this Jupiter Pluto opposition. So in that we've seen Pluto Pluto in Aquarius very consistently measuring the march of AI If Jupiter's opposing that in this warm and rather humane sign of Leo, perhaps that is the formation of some meaningful cultural resistance to the potential excesses or negative impacts that AI everywhere and everything can have. The founding of the human resistance from the Terminator franchise.
- [120:33]
Chris Brennan
Sure. Or like the centering of, I don't know, individual consciousness as opposed to the collective consciousness which the AI sort of represents. Or the creativity of the individual, let's say, as opposed to the creativity of the collective, which all of the AI stuff is just drawing on people's individual creations and then is just like creating something new, an artificial based on that. But maybe there'll be a counter trend.
- [121:00]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. With Jupiter and Leo. And with Leo in general, you get a lot of auteur type figures where it's like the writer, director, and hey, it's actually really nice when one person is primarily responsible and it's a coherent vision rather than a committee design. And again, we see a lot of famous auteurs have big piles in Leo. And that idea of auteur cinema and authorship in general extended outward into culture in general as it is being juxtaposed by the AI Creations are exactly the opposite of auteur theory.
- [121:43]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And where the creative output and success is often centered on the personality and the Persona of the individual in a distinct way.
- [121:57]
Austin Coppock
Right, right. Well, it's sort of. I don't know. There's a famous written piece from many decades ago called the Death of the Author. And so the people have debated the death of the author for a very long time. This seems like another very important round of debate about whether the author is or is not dead. The Schrodinger's authority. Yeah.
- [122:22]
Chris Brennan
All right, so that's kind of Jupiter in Leo. We'll talk more about that later. That's kind of also Eclipse season two. We don't have anything more to say about that. Right?
- [122:32]
Austin Coppock
No, I mean, really? Yeah, it connects with the Jupiter themes. It may negate some, it may hyper inflate others. And then the other one, the one in Pisces, is a continuation, just as you said, of what we've been doing and won't be done with until early 2027.
- [122:58]
Chris Brennan
Right, right. Okay. So, yeah, but people should just prepare for the major endings, the major beginnings that have been happening in the Virgo and Pisces houses of your chart. That energy starting to shift dramatically towards the Leo and Aquarius houses of your chart of major endings and major beginnings.
- [123:17]
Austin Coppock
Right. So that'll be the end of August is the very last eclipse in Pisces. There's one more in Virgo to go, but that's basically the wrap up for the Pisces side.
- [123:28]
Chris Brennan
That's crazy, because then that's also just wrapping up this whole experience of Saturn and Neptune in Pisces that's been going on since March of 2023. And already a lot of the fatigue that people have had in Saturn going through that sector of their chart, a lot of the added responsibility and the weightiness of that. And while Saturn has departed already earlier in the year, having that final eclipse in Pisces at this time in August is really gonna put a capstone on what that entire experience has been about over the past three years.
- [124:03]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And as I mentioned in a previous update episode, there's been at least one outer planet in Pisces, either Uranus OR Neptune, since 2003.
- [124:16]
Chris Brennan
Since 2003. Yeah, you're right.
- [124:18]
Austin Coppock
Uranus went into Pisces and then Uranus leaves Pisces. Excuse me. And then within a month, Neptune's in Pisces in 2011.
- [124:33]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. So 2011 was the big shift of Neptune into Pisces, and that's the other thing that's ending this year. Okay, so I think that's good. I want to move on to the last two major transits that start happening in the last quarter of the year. And the first one is we get a Venus retrograde that takes place in the signs of Libra and Scorpio in October and November, when Venus slows down in the sky and then turns around and starts moving backwards in the order of the signs of the Zodiac for a period of about 40 days and 40 nights. Here's a diagram that Paige made that shows the Venus retrograde, which is in the middle where Venus stations retrograde at 8 degrees of Scorpio on October 3, and then it retrogrades back into Libra before stationing directly on November 13th at 22 degrees of Libra. But one of the things we learned about Venus retrogrades in the last Venus retrograde that occurred in Aries and Pisces at the beginning of 2025 was that part of what happens when Venus goes retrograde in a couple of signs is it's not just the retrograde itself, but it's also Venus spending an extended period of time in two signs of the Zodiac and basically in two sectors of our chart over a several month period. And when you look at it from that standpoint, the broader period that's relevant, related to this starts to build up on August 6th when Venus first moves into the sign of Libra, which is the sign it will retrograde back to. And then Venus enters its shadow degree, which is the degree it will later retro. Retrograde back to at 22 degrees of Libra on August 31st. And then after that, after Venus stations direct in mid November, it doesn't exit its shadow degree at 8 degrees of Scorpio until December 15th. And then it doesn't completely depart from the signs that it went retrograde in until January 7th. So what we're gonna see here is the unfolding of a sequence of events between early August and early January that are very much centered on the retrograde in October and November, but are connected to a broader series of events that we'll all be experiencing in the later part of this year. Yeah, so Venus retrograde keywords. One of the things about Venus retrograde, of course, is it has this backwards looking orientation where there's people from your past, sometimes that comes back. There's situations from the past that sometimes become relevant again to the present. And there's a sense of having to sometimes Visit and redo the past and decide whether you want to take something from the past and bring it back into your future and take it with you, or whether you're going to revisit the past, but decide that what was in the past is best to stay there, basically, and then you move forward without it. That's one of the core themes that come up during Venus retrogrades.
- [127:44]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, definitely. The Venus retrogrades are similar in action to Mercury retrogrades. But the types of connections that are made or unmade are not so blithely or easily cast aside or reconnected. Because it's not just informational with Venus. It's like, do we retie. Do I retether myself to this person, to this thing, to this endeavor, to this place? And so the questions about like whether to reconnect or stay connected or disconnect are all are, we say, have an emotional. An emotional and life weight to them. They're substantial. It's much more in the realm of living tissue rather than abstracted numbers and letters. And so lots of relational questions. And so this one happens during fall in the northern hemisphere every eight years. So 2018, 2010, 2002. And as I was thinking through these, Chris, I have a perfect memory of Venus retrograde in Scorpio from 2002. So scorpionic themes. Venus is in detriment or exile in Scorpio because many of the things that we find in Scorpio are not easy to love. They're not easy to enjoy. One of the themes that we might see in Scorpio is decaying, as it is in the Northern Hemisphere, often a quite moist time of year where things are happy to rot. And in the fall of 2002, I found myself recently graduated from college, working in a Radio Shack, which was a rotting business soon to go, soon to go out of business across the land in a dying mall. Right? You remember malls in a dying mall in a dying Rust belt town in Ohio where I grew up. And during that time my college girlfriend was like, yeah, we live in different places, we should probably just be done. And I was like, that's reasonable. But you know, I found myself newly single, so alone and then surrounded in like a three layer, a like three layer concentric rot onion. I was like, that's such good Venus retrograde and Scorpio content.
- [130:25]
Chris Brennan
I love that. That's perfect.
- [130:27]
Austin Coppock
And everything was fine. I saved up a bunch of money and then I got the fuck out of there. But I had to do that like retrograde season in the Abyss. I hung on the meat hook alone in Mansfield, at the public mall, in the Radio Shack. You could come and throw things at me while I rested upon the meat hook shilling cell phones.
- [130:50]
Chris Brennan
Oh man, I wish I could have been there to see that. That's good. Yeah. So the repetitions of Venus retrograde are very strong because of that eight year repetition. That's something we saw very vividly earlier this year in early 2025, when we had the retrograde in Aries. And then all of these events and circumstances and scenarios from previous Venus retrogrades started coming back up again, not just in people's individual lives, but also in terms of world events. So I actually created a slide here to give people all of the Venus retrogrades in Scorpio that have occurred over the past century. That will call back not just events in people's personal lives, but also situations in world events. So the full Venus retrograde in Scorpio list is 2026-2018-2010-2002, 1994-1986-1978-1970, 1962-1954-1946-1938, 1930, 1922, 1914, and 1906. So we're gonna see the Venus retrograde was always later in the fourth quarter of each of those years. So especially things that happened in the fourth quarter of those years, we're gonna see come back again as repeating circumstances and scenarios in our time. Like I said, in both personal events and mundane events.
- [132:24]
Austin Coppock
You know, what just occurred to me is that, boy, the fourth quarter of a lot of those years includes a ton of really decisive midterm elections in the United States.
- [132:39]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, that is going to be certainly the focal point of things happening in the US as the US midterms will be taking place in early November of 2026.
- [132:51]
Austin Coppock
But yeah, you can go back, I don't know, for most of the last, I don't know, at least 24 years. And those are all pretty significant midterms.
- [133:00]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, I'm sure this one will be. I mean, one of the things that sucks though is this Venus retrograde. You know, there's some Venus retrogrades that maybe are a little bit more pleasant than others because of the aspects to how it starts. This one truly does not look good at the beginning because when Venus stations retrograde in Scorpio in early October. October, it has some really rough aspects to Pluto and Mars because there's a Mars Pluto opposition going exact at the almost exact same time as Venus is stationing retrograde. And it's also Happening in Scorpio. And I was hoping for a, I don't know, more pleasant looking Venus retrograde station than what we're looking at here.
- [133:44]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, it's pretty max. It's misery maxing. And in addition, we also get a Mercury retrograde in Scorpio nestled inside the Venus retrograde. So it's definitely every eight years, Q4 Venus retrograde in Scorpio, but on Max difficulty. It's more upsetting, it's more dramatic. You know, the changes wrought may be more impactful and permanent in good ways too. But the ordeal quality that Venus retrogrades always have will certainly be present. It'll be less of the, like off the beaten. It'll be less the unorthodox fun side of Venus retrogrades, which is a side of Venus retrogrades, and more the Inanna's ordeal, which we learn things from and is significant and may be better for us in the long run than the unorthodox fun side, but certainly more difficult to experience.
- [134:59]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, I think we're gonna see more of the scandal and provocative things side of Venus retrograde taking place. Some of the either breakups or getting involved with an ex type things are gonna be much more tumultuous than they would have been in other Venus retrogrades where it might have been more pleasant.
- [135:20]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, this one has a really raw look to the first portion.
- [135:25]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, it does get a little bit better once Venus stations direct. I'm glad you mentioned the descent of Inanna, which is often one of our core myths that goes back the furthest. The ancient Babylonian period from 3,000 years ago, maybe even 4,000 years ago in terms of that mythology where Inanna is like this queen who takes this descent to the underworld and has to give up all of her power and possessions and clothing and everything else and gets stuck in the underworld, but then eventually emerges and comes back on the other side of it a changed woman. I think we're gonna see that theme much more vividly this time than even previous Venus retrogrades because it starts off so difficultly. But then when Venus does emerge and eventually stations direct it. Stations direct in Venus's home sign of Libra and Mercury. Stations direct the exact same day in November, on November 13th.
- [136:27]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. Yeah, this one's definitely front loaded as far as difficulty goes.
- [136:33]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. So there'll be some surprise comebacks like returning from a period of obscurity.
- [136:41]
Austin Coppock
Or.
- [136:42]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, emerging with a more authentic Persona after going through like a dark night of the soul type period will probably be pretty common during that, yeah, there'll.
- [136:52]
Austin Coppock
Probably be a lot of really loud and bloody crash outs at the beginning and then a disappearance and people returned with their shit actually back together.
- [137:04]
Chris Brennan
Right. See, other keywords for that that we learned this year with Venus retrograde are like severing alliances, breaking of diplomatic ties, leaving groups that no longer align with your values and different things like that. Messy breakups, I think is going to be a good keyword.
- [137:25]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. Or alliances and membership in groups or. Yeah, like those sort of things thrown into question. Because sometimes the Venus retrogrades will throw things into question. It'll look like, you know, like there's a falling out, but then it's restored. But maybe not. But like throwing into serious question where it's. You cannot be certain that the United States and Canada will not. Will not be at war. I'm just joking about that. But like, you just, you know, it's something that you take for granted that there will be peaceful relationships between. To entities or countries and that being thrown up into the air as a question mark. Okay. And some of them. Some of them being alliances that are broken then, and some of them merely being thrown into question, but that being a meaningful characterization of that period where there's uncertainty around relationships between individuals and entities.
- [138:25]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, definitely. One of the things about Venus going retrograde in Scorpio is it's the sign of Venus's detriment or antithesis or exile. And one of the keywords I wrote down for that is the outsider becomes the insider. Where sometimes in Venus retrogrades in general, but maybe especially this one, we have marginalized voices or especially marginalized aesthetics suddenly becoming the center of attention or the center of fashion. And I think that's even more the case here because we have Venus retrograde in Scorpio. And just thinking of. Of sometimes like a Venus in Scorpio is like a gothic type of aesthetic or a darker aesthetic in general, and is often outside of the mainstream, but for some reason it becoming more prominent as part of the mainstream at this time.
- [139:12]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, yeah, yeah. The gothic or sort of funereal. Yeah. It would be interesting to see if dark colors end up on, like, on the palette consistently with this one every eight years.
- [139:29]
Chris Brennan
Yeah.
- [139:30]
Austin Coppock
Which is what I'll just say is in real contrast to the Jupiter and Leo vibes, because Jupiter's in Leo for a year and Jupiter Leo is sunny. It's bright. It's loud. Yeah, Bright, loud. It's not dark and brooding. Whereas this is Venus setting a very dark and brooding tone.
- [139:54]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, dark and brooding. But Beautiful and strangely magnetic. Even though it's initially doing something that seems weird or seems so not normal, not normative, basically, that it stands out and rubs people the wrong way at first, but then eventually by the end of it, like lots of people start doing that thing. It becomes trendy.
- [140:19]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. Something that seems anti aesthetic but then gets appreciated or incorporated.
- [140:26]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. And that brings up one of the core keywords that I sort of came to in the episode I did with Ellie Higgins earlier this year where we're looking at Venus retrograde in Aries and queer history. But there became this recurring theme with Venus retrograde of normative versus non normative. And the tensions that arise during all Venus retrogrades about traditional values and modern expressions of identity versus ones that are non normative, whether it's gender or sexuality or relationship structures becoming more prominent at this time. When the non normative basically becomes more prominent.
- [141:05]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, right. Yeah, that's the normative. And non normative is a good way to put it. I was thinking, like, I use the term unorthodox. I think normative is probably better than.
- [141:16]
Chris Brennan
Orthodox, but yeah, I like, I like, I like that. That's good. Unorthodox versus orthodox. Okay.
- [141:25]
Austin Coppock
Makes it sound. Makes it sound a little. Little churchy. But I'm glad that, that I was communicating because it really is about like.
- [141:33]
Chris Brennan
Yeah.
- [141:33]
Austin Coppock
Aesthetic and relational pattern and.
- [141:37]
Chris Brennan
Yeah.
- [141:37]
Austin Coppock
And the choices and patterns that are normative and unorthodox at a given period of time. And the continued mutation and back and forth of what's normal as it changes.
- [141:52]
Chris Brennan
Absolutely. All right. The last major transit we've got to talk about in this overview before we do a monthly breakdown is the Mars retrograde that's building up in Virgo and Leo towards the end of the year as 2026 is Wrapp up. So Mars isn't gonna actually station retrograde until January 10th of 2027, more than a year from now. It's gonna go retrograde at 10 degrees of Virgo and it's gonna retrograde back into Leo before it stations direct at 20 LEO on April 1, 2027. So that's actually the core nucleus of the retrograde. But again, because a retrograde also represents a planet spending an extended period of time in one or two signs. When we look at it from that perspective, we realize that Mars already goes into the sign it will retrograde back to, which is LEO on September 27, and then it enters its shadow degree at 20 degrees of LEO on November 5. So we're already building up to the retrograde and there's already starting to be the unfolding of the sequence of events that will become the most intense during the retrograde itself in the build up to it in the last quarter of this year, especially let's say October, November, December of 2026, then we have the retrograde and then it's not until July 15th of 2027 that Mars will finally depart from Virgo, the retrograde sign. So it means that this is really an extreme extended period that goes from late September and early October of 2026 all the way until the middle of 2027 that we're starting to build up to as 2026 ends. And in that way, it's kind of gonna leave us on this huge cliffhanger with that Mars retrograde just getting going at the end of 2026.
- [143:47]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, we'll be within one week of the station on New Year's Eve of 2026 when you can really start feeling the ground tremble in anticipation. So, yeah, I hope you like Mars in Leo. Hope you like Mars in virgo. There's like 5ish months of each on the way. And I really hope you like Mars in Leo, because half of our last Mars retrograde gave us, I think four, no, five months of Mars in Leo. So we've been getting a lot more Mars in Leo than any other flavor for the last while. And yeah, so just think about what Mars challenges are like in those parts of your chart because you're not gonna be able to sleep through it. It's not like, well, it's an annoying month, but then it'll be over. There's no ignoring Mars during the retrogrades and especially the extended wings of the retrograde. And it's worth noting that the Leo part, as we said earlier, is part of the Jupiter in Leo story and part of the eclipses are now in Leo story. And so we have this intersection of what Mars is doing on and off for 10 months as well as what the south node or yeah, the south node's doing for a year and a half as well as what Jupiter's doing for a year, all in Leo, and most particularly in the third decade or the last portion of Leo. And so planets in the end of Leo in particular are going to get an awful lot of attention. And they're pretty different influences. The, the eclipse energy and the Jupiter and the Mars, they don't all sing the same song, but they are going to do. What's the three person version of a duet, a Truette triet?
- [146:00]
Chris Brennan
I'm not sure but yeah, you say that the three person song. Well, and that's the problem is like when Jupiter goes into Leo, it's, it's singing a much more growth and expansion oriented and affirming type song in Leo. And we get that energy and then we get the eclipse in August in Leo, which is adding some weight to it. Of this is a monumental and pivotal turning point where you're starting some major endings and major beginnings in the Leo area of your life. But then in late September, Mars joins and it brings this, this more discordant energy to that area of our chart where the feelings of severing and separation are gonna be much more prominent as well as this feeling of irritation or a burning type sensation, metaphorically is the other thing that we saw very prominently with Mars retrograde in Leo just in the past year.
- [147:00]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, Mars brings contest and struggle and dispute. Right. It's like, oh, Jupiter says, oh, I believe in my. You know, you gain confidence and then somebody attacks that and then you get in a fight with them. Mars, Jupiter together, especially in Leo, is very confident, but in a way that often gets people into fights like Jupiter, Mars together are very confident about coming out on top and about being able to, to benefit from victory, whether through glory or spoils. And then again, the tale of the dragon is kind of haunting. All of that suggesting in addition to the retrograde of Mars yet to come, that there are deeper, more lasting, and potentially more upsetting and permanent consequences to those intersections than there might first seem.
- [148:01]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, absolutely.
- [148:02]
Austin Coppock
And if you're in a country that has, I don't know, like a president with their rising and Mars in that last decade of Leo, you'd probably want to pay attention to that.
- [148:14]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. With actually the top two leaders of the country having their risings in that late part of leo. So that both are gonna get.
- [148:23]
Austin Coppock
I didn't realize that. Okay.
- [148:25]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, that's the thing. And so much of the past year, we've also seen how that ancient notion of how the leader of the country, their birth chart becomes kind of like the birth chart for the country for the period in which they're in power. And so we're thinking of all three of these LEO transits going into the rising sign of the president with Jupiter in Leo and the aggrandizing with the eclipse in Leo bringing to greater prominence, actually just like the eclipse in LEO Back in 2017 when Trump first became president. But then you bring in the Mars element as well on top of that, which brings in a much more militant combative sort of warlike energy.
- [149:14]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, absolutely. It's worth noting that this is the sort of reverse companion set of eclipses to the 2017 ones that we're entering, where we had the head or rahu in Leo then, and now we have the tail there. So dragons in the same position but facing the opposite direction. And eclipses exaggerate and create rises, but they also create sudden falls and disappearances. They provide a dramatic roller coaster.
- [149:52]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, I'm reminded of, like, in Valens in the second century. He talks a lot about Mars and Jupiter, representing military generals and, like, the heads of, like, war and things like that. And having that combination come into greater prominence makes me nervous about that. Of a more militaristic setting of things.
- [150:13]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, absolutely. It's such a. Like Mars. Jupiter is such a military parade, glorious commander on the horse, sort of. What's the word you used earlier? Aggrandizement of military might. Oh, and something about Leo. And even sweet Jupiter. And Leo is that same self affirmation also very easily becomes rah, rah nationalism. The like. Like, just as one. Just as it can be like, oh, I affirm myself. It's a nation's affirming themselves. You get a strengthening, sometimes an expansion or strengthening, sometimes even a cancerous expansion of national identity. It's. It's. It doesn't make nations less likely to go to war to take offense, especially with the combination of Mars. But even just Jupiter and it's a.
- [151:17]
Chris Brennan
Weird combination because Jupiter, as we talked about, has this protective function. But then Mars has the opposite, where it has this more danger function that it brings into things. And that's part of the contrasting energy that we're gonna be seeing between those two placements hanging out in Leo roughly at the same time, from late 2026 through the first half of 2027.
- [151:40]
Austin Coppock
Mm. I'm gonna not say more because we're going to do a walkthrough.
- [151:48]
Chris Brennan
Okay. All right, let me give just some final keywords. Cause I was trying to go back and summarize general principles that I learned from the Mars retrograde earlier this year that we did at least like, three episodes about. And the severing function was huge. The act of cutting ties in people's personal lives. And whatever area Mars was going retrograde at, whatever house. This included ending contracts, removing people or things from your life, and the finality of making a clean break after a period of tension. So sometimes that's like a singular event. But oftentimes, even a separation from somebody is a sequence of events. And that's what this nine month Mars retrograde period will represent for some people. Some of the listeners in the live of recap episodes where I interviewed people talked about quitting jobs, firing employees in I think at least one or two instances ending long term friendships or relationships during the Mars retrograde. So I wanted to mention some of those things because it's weird how this Mars retrograde kind of gets kicked off by the Venus retrograde that happens first just as Mars retrograde is building up. So there's some of the tensions that the Venus retrograde starts, especially in October when it stations retrograde in a difficult square with Mars and Pluto will kick off a series of events that Mars will then take the baton and carry forward.
- [153:15]
Austin Coppock
Indeed. And I would just add to that. You also see during Mars retrogrades that Mars works like Mars projects that are governed by Mars in your life houses whose affairs are guided by Mars. A lot of times, in addition to the social frictions and potential tensions and separations, you also just see the general retrograde thing of things taking much longer to get going and to cross the finish line than usual. You have the same gotta do it three times from a Mercury retrograde, but spread out over months and months and months. And so often things are frustratingly slow in those areas. There are problems that emerge that take a long time to get resolved.
- [154:16]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, absolutely. And there can be this internal. The slowness itself can have this internal heat where it manifests as this frustration with how slow things are going, this feeling of sometimes simmering resentment over it, or even an inflammation, either metaphorically or in some instances very literally literal inflammations.
- [154:41]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, I definitely see people struggling with inflammatory conditions getting aroused by Mars retrogrades that are hitting their stuff. Yeah, and you also have the sort of happy medium of martial effort is harder to find. You see a lot of people either unable to summon motivation down in the heart of the retrograde, or flying at things with a sort of unsustainable berserker rage sort of pacing. Neither of which is particularly fruitful, right?
- [155:17]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, absolutely. We used the analogy that turned out to be really good with the spicy pepper analogy that Mars retrograde is eating the hottest pepper, like a ghost pepper, where you eat it and you think it's done, but it just stays in your mouth for this extended period of time. And there's little that you can do but just to wait it out and bide your time time until that period of heat and inflammation is over. But let's say those are all challenging things. So let me just Try to give a positive spin. There were a lot of instances I saw of people standing up for themselves and doing the thing that was hard, but that it was the right thing to do for them. And sometimes that process of ending a relationship is realizing that. That, let's say, your boundaries are being pushed or realizing you're in a situation that doesn't accord with where you want to be and who you are in life and deciding to set out on your own, even if it means having to cut something out of your life. And sometimes that can be challenging or unpleasant, but sometimes it can be necessary. And sometimes when you get to the other end of that, you can find your life in a better shape than it was when you went into it because you made the hard decision to do what was right for you.
- [156:37]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. Or you cut out the shitty toxic person right now. They're not here anymore. Yeah. Another thing that I see consistently that's fruitful is the sort of getting a sense of what the challenges in your life, the martial challenges actually are during this period. Not what, where they are, not what they were, but what they are now or what they are becoming. And then realizing that you need to change like one, change your expectations and think about how to rise in order to meet those challenges that are here now or the demands, the performance demands that are there for this part of your life. And a lot of times that necessitates like a difference in training. And how are you cultivating yourself to be capable of meeting the demands present. This was very clear to me last time because the last Mars retrograde went over my ascendant three times. And that was the first year of being a parent for me. Right. So it was like, okay, like different totally new set of challenges and needing to. Yeah, like needing to prepare for those differently as well as coming to understand what they were. And by the end of it, like pretty good. Pretty good at parenting and at least very oriented towards being good at parenting rather than like, what the fuck is happening? And yeah. And bemoaning how the person who came into being a parent was unprepared to being a person that knows how to prepare as well as being aware of what the challenges are like rising. Because there's rising to me to challenge, which is like just sort of motivation. But there's most of Mars's arenas. Most of the Mars parts of life involve preparation and training and thinking and strategizing about how you're going to deal with or overcome or do well at the thing. And it takes a long time to Kind of reconfigure all the. That.
- [158:49]
Chris Brennan
Right, I like that. Yeah. There's this period of reconfiguring after the initial setback basically is a very common Mars retrograde theme. Other themes we found in history with Mars retrogrades I'll just list off quickly are things like military and tactical fiascos where there were invasions and aggressive actions that were poorly planned and executed, executed at the wrong time. And the result was like an embarrassing retreat. The Bay of pigs in 1961 was one of the examples of that. Where there's like the failure of an initial special operation that gets bogged down there can be. Taking the axe to a structure was something we saw majorly during the Mars retrograde in Cancer earlier this year. Which is like the indiscriminate cutting or firing or dismantling of agencies or structures or institutions or systems where you see somebody just taking a hatchet to established orders.
- [159:51]
Austin Coppock
Right. The willy nilly chainsaw, the chainsaw.
- [159:54]
Chris Brennan
We saw that image of Musk holding a chainsaw earlier this year. And that was the enduring image of Mars retrograde in Cancer to me earlier this year. Because also part of what. In that instance, it was taking the chainsaw two as like social systems. So this is gonna be a different context in Virgo and Leo, but I think we'll see prominent chainsaw cutting, knife, hatchet symbolism coming up during this retrograde as well. There's also civil unrest and radicalization. Sometimes anger boiling over in the streets or events that radicalize specific groups of people. We saw some stuff like the Waco siege in 93 during that retrograde. The Tulsa race massacre in 1921. The Watts riots in 1965.
- [160:45]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, the anger boiling over and then with Mars retrograde like shit getting out of control. Like Mars stuff getting out of control, which is always a danger with Mars stuff. But there's very much a. A boiling over quality in the heart of the retrograde. Because it's actually during the heart of the retrograde that Mars is the closest to the Earth and super bright and visible all night long. It's like the full moon for Mars.
- [161:17]
Chris Brennan
Right. That actually brings up. I wanted to share a slide because one of the things I got really into in the past couple of years was looking at long term planetary repetitions. And the most powerful one I found for Mars is the 79 year cycle where the same Mars retrograde between Virgo and Leo will repeat during the same part of the year every 79 years. It's almost exact. It's really brilliant. So the Repetitions that this Mars retrograde are going to be connected to and will bring up some similar themes to.
- [161:53]
Austin Coppock
Are.
- [161:55]
Chris Brennan
Late 1947 through early 1948, late 1868 through 1869, and late 1789 through 1790. And that last one was the most important and interesting one for me in a number of ways because of some of the things that were going on back in that timeframe around the Civil War sort of timeframe or not Civil War, sorry, like American Revolutionary timeframe.
- [162:25]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, that's really interesting. I literally just wrote those numbers down so that I can zoom in on them later.
- [162:33]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, I'm just trying to find my notes really quickly. There's other repetitions as well of like a 47 year Mars retrograde thing. That was really important as well. But it was a lot of challenging stuff. So maybe I'll save some of that for later when we get to that in the full breakdown.
- [162:56]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, we'll have. Yeah, and we're gonna have a lot of months of Mars is in the shadow. Mars is deeper in the shadow. Mars is really deep in the shadow. We'll be narrating it step by step next year.
- [163:11]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. One of them I did want to mention though, is just early in the Revolutionary War, basically Lexington and Concord happened around one of these from Mars to Leo retrogrades. And also the lead up to Lexington and Concord, there were a bunch of false starts basically to the Revolutionary War where the tensions were boiling and they were getting to that point. But then it wasn't until after Mars stationed direct and started moving through Leo in Virgo. Then it kicked off and Lexington and Concord happened. But there were precursor events that led into it, and that's one of the important parallels I think today.
- [163:55]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, that makes sense.
- [163:57]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. All right, my friend. Well, that's our broad overview of 2026. Why don't we take a little break and then we'll come right back to do the monthly breakdown.
- [164:07]
Austin Coppock
Okay.
- [164:08]
Chris Brennan
I also wanted to give a shout out to our sponsor for this episode, which is the Chani app. One of the main reasons I wanted to highlight the Chani app this year is that we're seeing a huge wave of new astrology apps that are relying entirely on AI chatbots and ChatGPT to generate their interpretations. And the Cheni app is different because it's one of the only major apps that uses zero AI. As astrologers, we know that reading a choice chart requires a level of nuance, context and intuition that you really just cannot get from an algorithm. So when you use the Chani app, you're getting personalized information that's actually written by a real trained human astrologer. So the app is packed with features like daily horoscopes, moon phase updates, and weekly rituals. But since we're focusing on the future today, I specifically wanted to recommend checking out their transits feature, which gives you a hyper personalized look at how the planets are interacting with your unique birth chart every day. They also have a full 2026 Astro reading available now, which breaks down the main themes of the year for your month by month, along with journal prompts and guided meditations to help you navigate it. The Chani app is free to download on the Apple App Store and Google Play, so if you want to make sure your daily astrology is coming from a human source, definitely check them out. All right. So, yeah, it's crazy. In the past few years since ChatGPT and everything came out, how many people are turning to that to get delineations of their birth chart or transits, but how bad it still is and how much it still messes up and hallucinates or just says stuff that isn't true or isn't right. And it's one of the real dangers that people don't realize, I think, that if they're just now getting into the field.
- [165:54]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And when it does get things right, it's because real human astrologers got things right and wrote it down. And the AI scraped that content without attribution or payment and is regurgitating it. And yeah, even if it was great, it would still be stolen, but the AI astrology content both sucks and. And is stolen. And so as a real trained human astrologer, and as part of the human resistance, I support the Chani app's decision to go only with real trained human astrologers and not thieving machines that are bad at astrology.
- [166:40]
Chris Brennan
Right? Yeah. I really like that Chani spent the time necessary to write those delineations and to think about it from a real practicing astrologer standpoint, like what a transit means, both in sometimes literal interpretations, but also psychological interpretations. And I have the Chani app on my phone because one of the things I love is it just tells you, every time a transit is going exact or when there's an astrological alignment going exact, it gives you a push notification. So it's one of the things that kind of keeps me up to date on what's happening in the moment, especially sometimes if I forget that a transit's going exact a certain day and some event starts happening. In my life, all of a sudden I get a notification that the transit just went exact in the sky. And then I'm like, oh, it was that. That makes sense.
- [167:26]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, that's really helpful. I think I have that app installed in my brain because I get push notifications in my brain when these things happen. But occasionally I too forget. No, it's really helpful. And especially as you're getting to know what the configurations mean against the background of your chart, having it front and center so you can have that aha moment. Why was I feeling cranky all today? Oh yeah. Mars is on my moon by 60th of a degree. That makes sense.
- [168:07]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, exactly. So, yeah, everyone should check out the Chani app. It's free to download on the Apple App Store or on Google Play. And I'll put a link to Chani's website in the description below this video as well as on the podcast website entry for this episode. But definitely support them. And support. Yeah. Human astrologers giving delineations to humans. All right, my friend, it's time to get into the monthly breakdown. We did our big overview of the major transits for the year and those were somewhat arranged in a sequence. But one of the things that you always feel is important and emphasizes you feel like we need to actually look at each month and talk about things and do a little bit more zoomed in view of a month by month breakdown. Right.
- [168:52]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. I think it's really nice to tour the year, to just do a walkthrough, get a sense of like the different flavor of each month and how it feels and how it becomes the next thing.
- [169:09]
Chris Brennan
Absolutely, absolutely.
- [169:10]
Austin Coppock
Because there is space between some of these big things and those spaces are filled unequally. And they're also because of the nature of history, it's usually the nice moments that get left out of the overviews. Because nice moments don't get written down in the history books. Right. It's the. The catastrophic, the confusing and etc. Etc. And so, yeah, I think a little, little a jaunty stroll is called for.
- [169:44]
Chris Brennan
I like that. That sounds good. All right.
- [169:47]
Austin Coppock
Stroll we shall stroll we shall arm in arm.
- [169:51]
Chris Brennan
Get an essence of of the month. All right, so let me share the planetary alignments calendar for January, which is actually from our wall calendar, which is now available on the podcast website@theastrologypodcast.com 2026posters where you can get a version of this that shows the entire year, but this shows the major alignments happening this month in January of 2026. And some of the major high highlights happening this month are we've got this triple conjunction of the Sun, Venus and Mars January 5th through the 9th. Mars Jupiter opposition January 10th, Mercury, Mars conjunction January 18th, Neptune entering Aries on the 26th. Mars, Pluto conjunction in Aquarius on January 27th. And finally a nice sweet little Venus mercury conjunction on January 29th.
- [170:44]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, and to me the overwhelming theme of the month is that Mars and Venus are invisible to the naked eye. They're with the sun and Mercury joins them for the second half of the month. But we have the cazimi or the perfect conjunction of both the sun and Venus, and the sun and Mars and a little later, sun and Mercury, all in a very close timeframe. And so that those conjunctions end the Sun, Mercury, or excuse me, end the cycle. End and begin a cycle for both Venus and Mars. And so they both begin again in this place in Capricorn. And so there's a lot of quiet but consequential deliberation happening because we're ending cycles and beginning them. And we always do that with planets conjoined the sun, which means we can't see them. Right. And so it's stuff behind closed doors, behind the veil of our eyes where important things are being sorted out and new cycles are being begun, but you can't necessarily see that much on the surface. And Mars and Venus both stay with the sun and stay invisible for all of January. And shortly, about two weeks after their conjunction, the Mars, Venus, sun conjunctions in Capricorn, those three as well as Mercury all conjoined Pluto over about a week we get Sun, Mercury, Venus and Mars conjoining Pluto from I believe the 19th until the 27th. And so that's a lot of planets all invisible, mind you, we're not gonna see anything but the Sun. But that's four planets conjoining Pluto within a week. And it's within that same week that Neptune sneaks back into Aquarius, or excuse me, Neptune sneaks back into Aries. So all of this, so much happening here, but again, all hidden, all hidden behind the Sun. And so my one sentence phrase for January is like quiet but very consequential.
- [173:07]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, there's a lot happening behind the scenes. Yeah, doing elections this month was hard because it's sandwiched between this peace shattering Mars Jupiter opposition early in the month and then the somewhat violent Mars Pluto conjunction late in the month in Aquarius with this really provocative Sun Venus, Mars conjunction in Capricorn happening around the middle. And a really verbally combative Mercury, Mars conjunction happening around the same time. So the Venus Mars conjunction reminds me of so much of what we've seen over the past year or two is things coming up involving gender, but also sex and sexuality and sometimes negative things coming coming up with sex and sexuality. For example, Epstein, it turned out, had a Venus Mars conjunction in his birth chart. And that ended up being relevant when the Pisces eclipse happened, I think last September or something like that. And then a big dump of those files came out sort of showing some of the things that were happening there.
- [174:14]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, and I wonder how much that happens in these assemblies. These like behind closed doors. Closed door assemblies in January we find out about later because these are really consequential and kind of dramatic conjunctions. Another thing that I wonder about with Mars and Venus being conjoined is that it was under a Mars Venus conjunction in Capricorn that Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022. And so this is the same two planets under different circumstances, but reunited in almost exactly the same part of the same sign. And I don't know what that means, but it seems like there should be some meaningful development there. Again, one we might not see in January, but find out later was initiated then or decided then.
- [175:14]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, it would make sense for there to be a significant turning point with the Ukraine, Russia war, especially because the Saturn Neptune conjunction going exact in January and February. Those Saturn Neptune conjunctions are always super important in both Russian history as well as Ukrainian history. And one of the tricky things that Leisa pointed out to me recently was that Pluto's going to conjoin Zelenskyy's sun early in the year, which is kind of a challenging transit to be having. And then of course, we mentioned earlier that people born in 1953, 1954, under that Saturn Neptune conjunction are having an important recurrence transit when this conjunction goes exact between Saturn and Neptune in February. And one of the world leaders we know that was born then was Putin.
- [176:02]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And Xi Jinping of China. And so, yeah, January, there's all this latent energy, all this stuff being decided, all these conjunctions. And then immediately after, in February, like mid February, Saturn moves back into Aries. We've got the Saturn Neptune conjunction. We have that big ol eclipse in Aquarius only two days off from the exact Saturn Neptune conjunction. I think things go from charged, intense and whispering in back rooms to very loud once we get to mid February. I don't think there will be that same sense of behind closed doors. I think Saturn Neptune in Aries, I think we can count on to be though confusing, neither subtle nor quiet.
- [176:58]
Chris Brennan
Yes. Let me show the calendar for February since we've moved on to that month. And here's the planetary alignments calendar for February where as you've pointed out, the Saturn, Uranus, Saturn Neptune conjunction is the highlight. But we also get on February 3, Uranus making its final direct station in Taurus. And Leisa noted that not only is Uranus stationing there, but it's also all of the planets that go through Aquarius. Start squaring that and pinging that for most of February. So we need to touch base on that. But then just to give the date breakdown, February 13, Saturn entering Aries is huge. February 17 we get our first eclipse of the year, which is that solar eclipse in Aquarius which happens to be Square Uranus. The 20th of February is the Saturn Neptune conjunction. The 22nd is actually a very nice Venus Jupiter Trine the 25th, Mercury stations retrograde in Pisces for our first Mercury retrograde of the year. And then there's a Mars Uranus square on the 27th with some unexpected disruptions and probably violence. And then the same day Mercury which is retrograde, conjoins Venus while the two are in Pisces on February 27th.
- [178:11]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And so between Saturn moving back into Aries, the eclipse, Saturn, Neptune together and all of the squares with Uranus like loud, jagged, the action starts in an inarguable way. The year is off to a very loud and jagged start by the time we get to mid February. The one saving grace I think for February, because there's a lot of hold onto your seat, is that Venus is actually in pretty nice condition for a lot of February. I don't love Venus being present with the eclipse point in Pisces, but Venus is in its exaltation and in a trine with Jupiter, which is also in its exaltation, which rules Pisces. And so there's a lot of, there's craziness, but with a side order of high end benefics off to the side, which I'll take.
- [179:20]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, I do appreciate the Venus, Jupiter, Trine that goes exact with reception there. It seems like a very lovely aspect, but it's just happening in the middle of this crazy eclipse season where we always see prominent people either falling from a height or sometimes people who were previously obscure being thrust into the spotlight. And we're gonna see a lot of that during this eclipse season, especially people that have Saturn and Neptune hard aspects, especially the conjunction natally, because that eclipse basically is magnifying the Importance of the Saturn Neptune conjunction at the time, but also just this is the final hit of Uranus in Taurus and whatever that transit has been about since 2018. We're getting one last very loud blast of that transit here this month with all of these planets in Aquarius squaring Uranus and Uranus stationing direct there for the last time, Putting an exclamation mark next to it. And that's going to have a very personal impact on all of us realizing how much that sector of our chart has changed Based on whatever house Uranus has been going through in Taurus since 2018, 2019, but also in terms of world events. Some of the things we've seen there is the rapid growth and expansion of digital currencies and cryptocurrencies like bitcoin and things like that becoming more popular. And some final important turning point with respect to that taking place at this time. I think with this final station.
- [180:47]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, absolutely, we've got the station. And just as we had the 1234 planets all conjoining Pluto, we have 1, 2, 3, 4 planets not in quite the same tight sequence, but still tight enough, all squaring Uranus right after that station. And our big eclipse in Aquarius is also square that Uranus. So it really is Uranus taking a bow for its performance, for the many earthquakes that it caused in the pasture lands of Taurus.
- [181:28]
Chris Brennan
Go ahead and throwing one last curveball. Frankly, this seems like a very something coming out of left field that's not anticipated, but throwing a wrench in things that's unexpected. And other uranium keywords like disruptive, electric.
- [181:45]
Austin Coppock
Shocking.
- [181:46]
Chris Brennan
Shocking.
- [181:47]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, right. And at the same time as Saturn, Neptune is basically perfect. And right at the time, like, literally aspecting the eclipse. The second half of February is extremely disruptive and confusing, but again, with this weird side order of delicacy level benefics. The Jupiter and the Venus look great. They just don't. They're off to the side doing their own thing. While Uranus and the eclipse and Saturn Neptune are all wreaking a very confusing chaos. And yeah, setting the seas a boil.
- [182:34]
Chris Brennan
Absolutely. So the eclipse season opens on February 9th. It peaks with the first half of it on February 17th, but then the most intense phase of the next two weeks after that, until we hit the second eclipse on March 3rd. And then we get eclipse season continuing for seven more days at least after that. So that takes us into the month of March.
- [182:57]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And Mercury has gone retrograde Just before we get into March. And the Mercury retrograde is A big player in March. So we have the lunar eclipse. And it's not the last lunar eclipse in Virgo. We'll have one more in February of 2027. So we have the lunar eclipse at 12 degrees Virgo on March 3rd, which is opposite Mercury. And Mercury is the ruler of this eclipse. And it is actually the day before the eclipse that Mars goes into Pisces. And so we have the eclipse in Virgo is opposite this Mercury retrograde and Mars combination that we have in Pisces. And we have Mercury retrograde and direct in Pisces for pretty much the whole month. It is basically as difficult a position as you could put Mercury in retrograde. In the sign of its fall, as the ruler of the eclipse conjoined one of the eclipse points and conjoined Mars. And so just as we spoke earlier about how the Venus retrograde in the fourth quarter is a particularly difficult version of a Venus retrograde. This is a pretty disastrous, potentially disastrous Mercury retrograde as it's connected to all these other things and in a maximally difficult position.
- [184:40]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, the part about the Mercury retrograde I like the least is that when it stations direct near the direct station, it has this conjunction with Mars around the middle of the month while it's retrograde. And that really harkens back to some of the Mercury Mars conjunctions that we saw over the past several months. And some of the fights that erupted. A lot of the tensions and verbal combativeness, but also the technological snafus and other things like that. Although there was also people that were born with Mercury Mars conjunctions coming into prominence at that time.
- [185:14]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. Again, with Mercury being the ruler of that eclipse, I think it's gonna carry a little extra power, a little extra potency, a little extra shadow. I think it's going to be more confused, confusing and distorting. And again, I worry with Mercury, that connected to Mars. Right. Because it suggests that the consequences of misunderstanding or miscommunication or bad information may be not merely mistakes, but may lead to disputes, fights, severance, you know, wars at various levels. The saving grace. Yeah, we're probably gonna say the same thing that trine to Jupiter, though.
- [186:07]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. I mean, the one positive thing that I really wanna highlight this month is Jupiter stationing, directing cancer. Jupiter gathers together like a huge amount of positive power to impact things and to offset things for the better by stationing direct in the sign of its exaltation, around 15 degrees of cancer around the middle of the month. And that is helping to offset some of the Pisces Transits like Mercury and Mars, because it has a trine to those.
- [186:39]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, I think there's gonna be the equivalent of some lost at sea and surrounded by sharks, but miraculously discovered before anything goes wrong.
- [186:51]
Chris Brennan
Right.
- [186:51]
Austin Coppock
Like some really, really rough circumstances where people are saved or the worst is avoided through, you know, tremendous grace or divine intervention or. A sudden insight. Because it's a lot for Jupiter to hold back. But there is, there's certainly the potential and there will be the reality of it seems really awful and maybe it gets pretty bad, but then there's a way out or what was lost was found, et cetera, et cetera. Nonetheless, it's definitely a watch your ass Mercury retrograde.
- [187:36]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, I'm thinking that a lot of the good things that Jupiter has promised and has almost been able to fix as it's been transiting through cancer starting in the second half of 2025, that Jupiter's finally able to fully deliver at this point in March of 2026 and forward, because it's finally direct in that sign and able to manifest the remainder of whatever benefits and rectifications and affirmations that it has to provide in each of our charts in that area. So that's a good thing to be looking forward to I think, from that point forward.
- [188:11]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, Jupiter's gonna be doing maximum work again from this point in mid March until its exit from the sign at the end of June. And it's a really good time for Jupiter to wake up. Cause there's quite a bit amiss at this point in time.
- [188:28]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, it's got stuff to do. Okay, so let's move on to the month of April. Here's the planetary alignments calendar for April and the primary things of April. Oh yeah, April is like one of the busiest months where we've got April 9th, Mars enters Aries and builds up to a Mars Saturn conjunction. April 12, there's a Mars Neptune conjunction in Aries. April 13, Venus, Jupiter sextile is one of the positive aspects this month. April 14, Mercury enters Aries. April 16, Mercury Neptune conjunction. April 19, Mars Saturn conjunction, which is really the focal point of this entire month. And then April 20, Mercury joins them the very next day and conjoins Mars and Saturn at the same time. And then if that wasn't enough, Uranus enters Gemini on April 25, ending its 7ish year transit through Taurus and beginning the rest of its six to seven year transit through Gemini.
- [189:23]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, so at the beginning of April, the March madness is beginning to fade. Venus has just moved into Taurus Because Venus has been co present in Aries with Saturn and Neptune, which is not the easiest place to be. By the end of March, Venus is in Taurus, applying to a sextile with Jupiter in Cancer. Again, we have these nice side dishes of benefic stuff at the same time as we have of historically wild and potentially dangerous configurations. And so the big story is absolutely that Mars entering into aries on the.
- [190:11]
Chris Brennan
10Th, I think Venus will provide a light distraction, but it's very light. And the focal point. Yeah. Is this conjunction that peaks right here between Mars and Saturn, which is gonna call back to the Saturn Neptune, Neptune conjunction. And that's one of the weird things delineating some of this is like we get a very important world history turning point in February at the exact conjunction. But then when Mars and Mercury come in here and reactivate that conjunction, it brings it all back into focus again.
- [190:42]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. So one example, right, so we have Saturn Neptune, which have their exact conjunctions and have like a meaningful co presence. Because almost all of the big circumstances, stuff that happens doesn't happen in a day, even if we can point to, we can point to pivotal days in that. And so Mars speeds things up, inflames them, it gets things moving, especially in Aries. And the Mars Saturn in and of itself is potentially it's our most destructive two planet combination. And so just as an example, in 1917 when we had the Saturn Neptune in Leo, Mars moved into Leo to join Saturn and Neptune in September and then was there until early November. And so the difficulties that the I believe there was the empire of Russia was having at this time exploded into what's called the October Revolution, where there was very widespread chaos and destruction of humans and property and was the initiating event for what would become the Russian Civil War, which would eventually years later, give us the ussr. And so, you know, like Mars takes that wood which has been stacked, right. And sets it aflame. And we have a similar pattern during a lot of Saturn Neptune conjunctions, where almost always at one point during the co presence of those two, Mars will enter the same sign.
- [192:35]
Chris Brennan
Okay, right, yeah, yeah. I mean, Mars Saturn conjunctions also in traditional and ancient astrology, are traditionally associated with the outbreak of plagues and pestilences and things like that. And we certainly saw that in 2020 where there was that big stellium pileup in Capricorn, that the lockdowns ended up peaking on the Mars Saturn conjunction around that time.
- [192:58]
Austin Coppock
Yeah.
- [193:00]
Chris Brennan
And Saturn Neptune conjunctions themselves we saw in the Saturn Neptune episode earlier this year, sometimes associated with different types of plagues and things like that breaking out. So that's not great. I'm not liking that aspect in terms of things, in terms of our traditional worst planets and then even just Mars moving in there to such a fiery sign and conjoining Neptune is gonna create some confusion surrounding conflicts. And in previous years, like what was it like maybe 12 years ago or something? No, it was like 2010, 2011. I remember famously the Mars Jupiter conjunction in Aries coincided with the assassination of Osama Bin Laden, basically when the US finally found bin Laden. This conjunction here gives me militaristic vibes. But there's something confusing about it where the causes or the actions are either not clear to the public or where there's a mistake of some sort. I remember there was a Mars Neptune hard aspect a few years ago when Biden was in office and the US launched a strike in Afghanistan. But they ended up targeting the wrong people and just massacring basically civilians who were not evidently the intended target. And sometimes that mistaken attack military wise can be a result of Mars Neptune.
- [194:29]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, absolutely right. And so Mars Saturn is always dangerous, capable of unleashing plagues, battles. Again I think we're both in agreement that this looks more like attacks and battles than it does plagues. But they're capable of all sorts of destructive things. And the presence of Neptune introduces that potential for confusion, deception, et cetera, et cetera, which becomes quite dangerous when we're, when we're looking at potent, when we're looking at lethal significations. Right. The lethal mistake is infinitely more impactful than the, the oopsie without lethal force. It's very confusing. And it peaks right around April 20th when we have Mercury conjoined. But it's quite strong leading up to that. And the co presence will continue where both the Mars and Saturn and Neptune will be in Aries until just past the first half of May. And so I definitely see, how should we say there are alerts, there are hazard lights over this period of time, especially if you keep any of your important planets in a cardinal sign.
- [195:58]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, and I don't like Mercury is involved as well because Mercury conjunct Mars is gonna incline people towards fighting and anger and angry words. But Mercury conjunct Neptune is gonna incline, incline it towards confusion and sometimes making a mistake, communicating. And when you put those together, it's like mental or communication mistakes that lead to conflict essentially. And then Mars on top of Saturn Neptune brings more of the structural collapse type sides of Saturn Neptune much more to the forefront.
- [196:33]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, Absolutely. It's very much the hammer to the rotten pumpkin. Right.
- [196:39]
Chris Brennan
All right.
- [196:41]
Austin Coppock
And so right after that, that configuration peaks still in April. Then we get Uranus. Right. Uranus moves back into Gemini four keeps. Right.
- [196:54]
Chris Brennan
Huge, huge, monumental shift. Let me put up a Uranus diagram one more time just to let people know what a major shift this is in terms of the long term. This is Uranus going into Gemini on April 25th. And then it's gonna be there until it starts moving into cancer in 2032 and 2033. So we're really talking about a major long term chapter in world events changing at this time. Both in world events as well as in our personal lives at the same time. Since this is also Uranus moving from one whole sign house and moving into another for the next seven years.
- [197:34]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And so think back to between July and early November of 2025. That's when you got your preview of Uranus in Gemini. Think about the Gemini house in the chart. What changed there? What was going on there? Good, bad, and or other.
- [197:56]
Chris Brennan
Yeah.
- [197:58]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. Uranus is gonna move in. It's gonna be your new roommate there for most of the decade.
- [198:07]
Chris Brennan
I just remember we need to take a little break.
- [198:10]
Austin Coppock
Right, sure.
- [198:12]
Chris Brennan
Okay. So we're about to transition to May. I want to take a little break. Cause I meant to ask you what you have going on and what you have coming up this year.
- [198:19]
Austin Coppock
Okay. Well, I'm going to be teaching my astrology program, my Fundamentals of Astrology program. It is three years long. It's great. I will be doing an enrollment for the program on January 14th is the next one. You need to sign up for the mailing list to be alerted. I don't spam people or put it out publicly. So if you're interested in enrolling, there's information on my website first. Enrollment is the 14th. We'll do another one in early April before Mars moves into Aries, and then try to do one per quarter. And in addition to that, I will. A number of the things that I elected and participating to various degrees in the creation of for sphere and sundry will be coming out. We made a bunch of stuff in 2025. So we just put out this Jupiter series, this Jupiter in Cancer series. And I realized, Chris, that we have now done at least one series for every planet in both signs that it rules and its exaltation, except for Saturn's exaltation, which we won't have a chance to do for another 14 years. But other than that, we have all the good Mercury, all the good sun, all the good moon, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn in both Capricorn, Aquarius. But Savarian Sundry was not open for business in 2010 and 2011. So no Saturn in Libra yet. We've got almost everything and we have all four Royal Stars and a couple other good ones as well. So, yeah, come on, come on down to Spirit, Sandra. We've got got bottled planets, we've got bottled stars, the. The finest vintages, not just bottled right there. There are incenses and oils and a great variety of other products. I like the salps, personally. I like being able to smear myself with Venus in Taurus, my recent favorite, for calming the fuck down in the evening.
- [200:49]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, I like the oils and the bath salts for that are pretty nice. And I like that you're capturing some of these planetary elections and keeping some of that energy bottled up so that people can kind of use it at different points when they need to, to bring a little bit of that time and essence back into their present life.
- [201:07]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, I think people are gonna miss Jupiter in cancer when it's gone. You know, I think Jupiter is associated with gratitude and teaches gratitude because it's so easy to take Jupiter for granted. It's just bad stuff that you don't have to experience or things that end up just fine. And then when that influence is gone or waning, you appreciate being protected and maybe even coddle a little bit.
- [201:40]
Chris Brennan
Excellent. So tell me, what are your websites where people can find out more information?
- [201:44]
Austin Coppock
Okay, so my website for classes and I have a great variety of recorded lectures and workshops that I've given is austincopoc.com a USTN c o P-P-O-C-K.com and then sphere and Sundry, where we have the seed bank of auspicious planetary positions is sphereandsundry.com S P H E R E A N-S U N-R-Y.com Awesome.
- [202:20]
Chris Brennan
Perfect. And I'll put links to those in the description below this video or on the podcast website for those that want to check out your websites.
- [202:27]
Austin Coppock
Cool.
- [202:27]
Chris Brennan
All right, let's transition to talking about the astrology of May. Here's the planetary alignments calendar and the main things that I highlighted it in May is that it opens with this explosive Mars Jupiter Square on May 4. Then Pluto stations retrograde in Aquarius on May 6. Venus ingresses into Cancer, which is actually pretty positive on May 18th because it's building up to the Venus Jupiter conjunction. May 22nd. We get a second the First Sun Uranus conjunction in Gemini, which is an important synodic cycle, reset. And then finally, May 25, we get a Mars square Pluto, which is a very unpleasant aspect just before we move into the pleasant part of June.
- [203:06]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, for me, the big division for May is the 16th, 17th, 18th, because 16th we get a new moon. And then 17th Mercury enters Gemini. 18th, Mars enters Taurus and Venus enters Cancer. So we get three planetary switcheroos on the 17th and 18th, and then have a new Moon to just kind of restart things the day before. And so I am very excited about Mars. Not because I love Mars in Taurus, and I'm so excited to see it square Pluto, but I think we will definitely need a break from Mars, Saturn, Neptune, and Aries. And so that ends that period of really intense fiery co presence. And so I love that. Who doesn't love Mercury in Gemini? Well, probably some people. I love Mercury in Gemini. Mercury loves being in Gemini. And we get the beginning of Venus's co presence with Jupiter in Cancer. It is not unopposed. Saturn is going to square Venus for a while, but it's the beginning of both benefics together in Cancer. Very wholesome, very sweet, very restorative. It's three quick changes all in two days. That begins the month and a half. Ish. Let's say five weeks, five or six weeks that I would consider the best stretch of the year. It's not without flaw, but I think it's the nicest portion of the year. Or begins the nicest portion of the year.
- [204:50]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, early June is absolutely. We have to get through this Mars Pluto square first, which is annoying because it kind of interrupts the early part of Venus in Cancer, where Pluto's station early in the month is as far into Aquarius as it's gotten at this point where it's getting to like, 5, 6 degrees of Aquarius, and then it stations for retrograde. So there's this loud exclamation mark next to Pluto and some of the technological leaps and bounds that it's making over the past few years coming to a critical turning point. But we start to see some of the downsides of that technology, I think, as part of what we see here when Mars squares Pluto. And I don't like that aspect because it's not coincided with great stuff over the past few years. And I was just watching, like I said, the Civil War documentary and two of the biggest, early, bloodiest battles of the Civil War where people were like, okay, this is bad. This is not gonna be easy happened on Mars. Pluto squares with some of the biggest carnage and things like that. And I thought that was really striking noticing that as I'm looking at charts, watching this Civil War documentary.
- [205:59]
Austin Coppock
Interesting. And we also get as a wild card we have, as you mentioned, the Sun's first conjunction with Uranus in Gemini. And shortly before that we had Mercury's first conjunction with Uranus in Gemini. Right. So we get to see a bunch of Mercury or excuse me, a bunch of Uranus in Gemini. Not all of which is bad, some of which is going to be quite clever and fun and innovative while we've got this Venus Jupiter thing forming up. And again, I don't like Mars square Pluto, but I think I'll take it over the co presence with Saturn in Aries. And especially once Mars clears that square with Saturn. It's a significantly de escalated Mars compared to the whole time in Aries. And honestly in Pisces being on the same axis as the second eclipse and caught up in that Mercury retrograde, that was probably pretty Marsy as well. So I'll take this Mars in Taurus, especially once we clear this square with Pluto.
- [207:15]
Chris Brennan
Okay, we'll see when it comes time for that. All right, so let's move into June. I think that's good for May because now we get into my favorite part of the year at the beginning of June, when things seem the nicest and the calmest compared to other parts of this year which are so pivotal and decisive and everything else. And the highlights of June include the Venus Jupiter conjunction which goes exact in cancer on June 9. But then later in the month things start to change all at once and there's this huge shift when on June 28, Mars ingresses into Gemini. On the 29th, Mercury retrogrades in Cancer. And then also on the 29th, Jupiter enters Leo. So we'll talk about those separately. But let's talk about the good part first. All right?
- [208:06]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. Cause the Joker esque prank is not until the end. Right, so we've got all the nice things that we talked about with the end of May, Mars has cleared that square with Pluto. Venus draws closer two and then conjoins Jupiter. Mercury has joined the party in Cancer. And the rule with Mercury is Mercury is friendly when Mercury hangs out with friendly planets and is an asshole when hangs out with malefics. And so we had Mercury with both malefics during April. Now we have Mercury with both benefics for a little bit. And so Saturn gets to kind of boo and limit the perfect joy that is otherwise available in Cancer. But it's a lot of good stuff all in one place.
- [209:06]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, I think this is just about the confirmation of good things and the affirmation of romantic unions such as through marriage and long term partnership, the reconciliation of people that have previously fallen apart or been severed for some reason having them come back together. This is also because Jupiter's moving super fast at this point, so it's on its way out of cancer. But it has this one last really positive aspect which I think is going to help to smooth over any remaining issues from the Mars retrograde that was happening happening in the early part of 2025 will finally get smoothed over at this time before Jupiter departs from that sign. And like I said, I'm expecting some notable celebrity weddings or proposals around this time and it'll be interesting to see how that goes since last summer the biggest one was like the Taylor Swift proposal was all over the news and went viral.
- [210:06]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, yeah. No, it's kind of just as Mars, Saturn can, can give you all things that are hard, the Venus, Jupiter, especially in a sweet caring place like Cancer, has a picnic basket full of a wide medley of pleasant, healing, restorative, reinforcing, affirmative, maybe things are going to be all right sort of things.
- [210:38]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, nurturing. So some of the best electional charts of the year are in this timeframe in early June. So yeah, I'll save that for the electional astrology report, but just to give people a preview. That's a really good aspect. So take advantage of it or check out the report if you want to find some specific dates that we would recommend.
- [210:57]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And I will just add that there really aren't very many pastoral moments in 2026. This is as good as it gets. And so if you want to do something really nice or if you have something that really needs a good chart, it's going to be difficult to do better than this first couple weeks of June.
- [211:23]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. So you can find out more about the elections that we recommend, the specific dates and times@theastrologypodcast.com 2026report. All right, so later in the month things change though. There's like a shift and we get it. It comes at the end of June, but it's basically taking us into July.
- [211:47]
Austin Coppock
It's such an evil twist.
- [211:50]
Chris Brennan
Right. It's like you get this nice little island of goodness with Venus, Jupiter, but then it's like we're back to important world changing historic events taking place basically as we move into late June and early July.
- [212:04]
Austin Coppock
Right. So if we were looking at Mercury. And we're like, oh, Mercury's going to make a conjunction with Jupiter. Oh, we had a Venus Jupiter conjunction. Now we're going to have a Mercury Jupiter conjunction. But Mercury says nah, and stations retrograde on the 29th right before completing that conjunction. And that is the same calendar day that Mars enters Gemini. And so the Mars entering Gemini means that we're now very close to the perfect Mars Uranus conjunction in Gemini, which we've discussed quite a bit and is extremely disruptive and historical in its disruptiveness. But not only that, but it's Mars Uranus in Gemini, meaning it's ruled by Mercury. So this, this conjunction, this first conjunction is getting set to take place as Mercury is stationing retrograde and declaring chaos, declaring that it will not, in fact conjoin Jupiter. And Jupiter says, no more Cancer, and moves into Leo and begins opposing Pluto. All basically within a day. All this occurs within about 36 hours. And so the thing that we thought was gonna happen, the Mercury, Jupiter doesn't happen. Mercury's retrograde, and Mercury ruled. Mars is now dead set on a conjunction with Uranus. And so what a twist at the end of June.
- [213:28]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, it definitely takes a turn. There's like a heel turn that happens. It's crazy how close Mercury gets because we almost get that Mercury Jupiter conjunction, and then it just gets averted. So let me find the July calendar, since we're already talking about July.
- [213:45]
Austin Coppock
Right. And so that's how we enter July.
- [213:48]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. So here is the calendar for July, which is a crazy month. It's one of the craziest and most active months of the year, which is weird to say in such an otherwise very active year, but July really does stand out. And the things about July that I want to mention as the highlights, it's a very long list, but it's like July 4, Mars Uranus conjunction. July 7, Neptune stations retrograde. July 17, Uranus, Pluto, Trine goes exact for the first time, which is major and monumental. July 20, Jupiter opposes Pluto. July 20, also Jupiter trines Neptune. July 23, Mercury finally stations directing Cancer. July 26, Saturn stations retrograde. July 26, North Node enters Aquarius. And then finally July 29, there's a Sun Jupiter conjunction in Leo.
- [214:42]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, Just to add a little bit to that, we have Jupiter and Pluto and Uranus and Neptune all at 4 degrees of their respective signs for a couple portions for several days in a row in July. So everybody's aspecting perfectly on the 19th through the 23rd. We have four planets on at 4 degrees and then the sun hits 4 degrees of Leo on the 27th. And then on the same day as the Sun Jupiter conjunction, the 29th, we have a full moon at 6 Aquarius, which is real close to that 4. So it's a full Moon basically right on top of Pluto. And aspecting Mars and Uranus and everybody else, everything is connecting to everything. And. The traditional way that July 4th is celebrated with lots of explosions and noise, seems very appropriate, but appropriate all month.
- [215:55]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, especially around that conjunction though. One of the things we always see on these Mars Uranus conjunctions is so much starts happening at once, like a ton of events start happening at once. And this is forming already because Mars Uranus comes within tenderness degrees by June 17th. But really when Mars goes into Gemini on June 28th, that's when there's this distinct turn when it gets within 3 degrees which peaks on the 3rd and the 4th. And then eventually it's not until July 19th that it's like 10 degrees away. But it's still co present for the rest of that time. And historically it's the entire co presence of Mars and Uranus in Gemini that represents the most important turning points in US history history, especially during the Uranus in Gemini periods, which always represent major conflicts or wars. And even just in the past few years. To give you some preview of the Mars Uranus conjunctions in Taurus that have led up to and probably represented some of the precipitating events in 2020, the Mars Uranus conjunction in Taurus was January 6th and Biden's inauguration in 2022, the Mars Uranus conjunction, the primary thing was Trump's home in Mar? A Lago was raided by the FBI. And that was the start of his legal troubles for the FBI cases files. The same time Nancy Pelosi visited Taiwan and it set off this international thing between the US and China that was problematic and probably a precursor. Then two years after that, the next Mars Uranus conjunction happened in July of 2024 during the US presidential election. And at that time there was the assassination attempt that took place in Pennsylvania. Then a few days later, the RNC convention happened and Trump was nominated as the Republican nominee for his party. He also selected an announced Vance the day of the Mars Uranus conjunction. And the FBI case from two years earlier was suddenly dismissed by a federal judge. And then a few days after that, Biden got sick and dropped out of the race. So that was the last Mars Uranus conjunction. And that's what I mean when I say so much happens at once. And it's all very pivotal stuff, especially in US History. And this is the next one. And it's happening on July 4th.
- [218:09]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. If we had to pick one configuration for the United States this year, this is what we'd say pick. Right. Like, most telling moment.
- [218:22]
Chris Brennan
Absolutely. And like the Civil War, Fort Sumter started on a Mars Uranus conjunction in Gemini. To give you some historical perspective as well, there's just major turning points sometimes in US History that start on these conjunctions. And this is gonna be a big one. And it's the first of four that'll happen from this point forward every two years. But this one's important because it's falling right on the nation's birthday. So that means it's going to bake it into the solar return chart for this entire year.
- [218:52]
Austin Coppock
Yep. Yeah. Yeah. And we'll see how much it's describing domestic, how much international, how much both. But it's the birthday party to watch closely.
- [219:13]
Chris Brennan
Absolutely. Absolutely.
- [219:16]
Austin Coppock
And the other stuff. Right. There's just everything is talking to everything. Uranus is aspecting, like, four or five planets, including Mars, pretty much all month. Whatever is set off by the Mars Uranus has plenty of fuel from the rest of the sky. It's not like the Mars Uranus conjunction is isolated off in a corner and not aspecting everything. It's tied into almost everything when it occurs.
- [219:44]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. One of the most important things it's tied into is we get our very first Uranus, Pluto trine this year. And we cannot underestimate, and I cannot understate, how much that's going to accelerate the pace of technological development. And the only thing I can even imagine that could accelerate it from what it's already been doing over the past few years Is if there's some sort of massive leap in terms of some of the artificial intelligence stuff that that represents. And this is the first trine that we'll get this year. But there'll be another one later in the year. I think that goes exact around December.
- [220:20]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, I think you're right. But yeah, it's absolutely cyberpunk fuel. And we'll see what that looks like. It'll probably look like several things, Some of which will only be clear in retrospect. But yeah. Yes. Even though we don't like, for Jupiter's sake, Jupiter opposing Pluto, we also have Jupiter sextiling Uranus and Jupiter aspecting Pluto and Jupiter trining Neptune. The Jupiter also supports that configuration. And the Neptune supports that configuration. They're all moving very fast and supporting each other in that fast fiery Potentially quite unsustainable race forward, right?
- [221:14]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. But also the Saturn Neptune conjunction is getting reactivated this month with both of them stationing retrograde. There's really three times this year that Saturn Neptune gets really activated. It's the conjunction in February, it's this station in July, and then it's another station at the end of the year in December, when I feel like some of the intensity of the reality distortion field we're gonna be reminded of at this point, even as those two start moving away.
- [221:41]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, those are great points. Because they're close together. They station direct and retrograde very close to each other in terms of calendar dates. And so in terms of all of our Saturn Neptune topics, the reality distortion distortion, ontological crisis, moral panic, Russian history, all of those topics that we've only spent a couple hours today talking about, right?
- [222:08]
Chris Brennan
Yeah.
- [222:09]
Austin Coppock
But August is really calm.
- [222:11]
Chris Brennan
Let's take a little break. Okay. All right, shout out to our sponsor, which is the United Astrology Conference, which is happening next year, September 3rd 9th, 2026 in Chicago. So the United Astrology Conference, which is also known as uac, is the biggest astrological conference in the world. And it's typically held every four years since the 1980s. This time it's back for the first time though, after an eight year hiatus, with the last one being in 2018. So join thousands of astrologers for an unforgettable experience of discovery, collaboration and expansion. UAC is the place to be to sharpen yourself skills, connect with other astrologers, deepen your insights, and grow your astrological business. It's the world's biggest astrology conference. And here's some stats. There's gonna be five astrology packed days. They're expecting more than 1,500 people from around the world at all levels of astrological interest. There's gonna be 108 speakers, 270 lectures, plus 20 informal lunchtime lectures, 5015 different tracks running simultaneously, including the essentials of astrology, health and wellness, relationships, finance and economics, Vedic astrology, traditional astrology, mundane astrology, horary astrology, and lots more. There's also gonna be six pre conference workshops and six post conference workshops, plus an opening ceremony keynote by Chani Nicholas herself. It's happening in the vibrant city of Chicago, and there's gonna be nightly entertainment and many other events. So UAC is actually brought together by several sponsoring organizations, including the afa, isar, ncgr, opa, along with the ACVA and aya, and all of these organizations are holding exams and hosting member events during the entire week. So for more information about the conference and accommodations, visit uacastrology.com and I'll put a link to that that in the description below this video on YouTube. So, big conference. The last one was in 2018. I'm very excited about that. That's gonna be great.
- [224:18]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, it's the closest thing in reality to all of the astrology and all of the astrologers in one place, right?
- [224:28]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. People used to tell time with UAC cause they would happen every four years. So it was just like this regular thing where all these astrologers from around the world would gather in the same city. And to have that not Happen now since 2018 has been this huge hole in the community. So I'm really excited that all the organizations have gotten it together again to host another one.
- [224:50]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, and one of the benefits of putting all the astrology and all the astrologers in one place is you get this recoherence, this coming back together. There's, you know, there are, there are so many people that I know that I've just known since uac. Like I've gotten to know the astrology world and I should say like felt a, an actual sense of community as opposed to just people talking about community. Like it really is a special thing that doesn't happen very often. And speaking of that, I think I'm pretty sure Sphere and Sundry is going to vend for the first time at this upcoming uac. I'll be there, I'll be workshopping and lecturing. But yeah, it really is a special thing. I've been to two and I made literally lifelong connections at both of them.
- [225:55]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, absolutely. There's always a lot of unexpected good stuff that comes out of putting that many astrologers in the same room together. There's been translation, projects have been born out of UACs. Lifelong friendships have come out of UACs and partnerships and other things like that. It's always a great event. So check that out and shout out to them@uacastrology.com and then I also want to mention that earlier in the year there's a smaller conference that's taking place in Seattle. If you're not able to attend UAC due to scheduling or what have you. You could also check out the Northwest Astrological Conference, which is happening May 21st through the 25th, 2026 in the city of Seattle. And they've been doing this for over 40 years now. This is a family run conference and you can either attend in person or you can attend virtually from anywhere. Because they have this affordable online streaming option that they've been doing over the past several years. It keeps getting better and better. So Norwalk is one of the longest running astrologers conferences in the world and they're shooting for more of an intimate gathering this year in order to make it easier to connect with speakers and make new friends and to put together kind of a welcoming, inclusive and community focused environment. So there's going to be over 30 leading astrologers and you can choose from a wide range of lectures and workshops covering both traditional and modern techniques. So to learn more, to sign up, visit norwac.net and as always, I'll put a link in the description below this video on YouTube or on the podcast website entry for this episode. So lots of good conference options next year.
- [227:30]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, and Norwac's in that late May space where things are starting to look pretty cheery.
- [227:40]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, you get that Venus Jupiter co presence building conjunction. So hopefully some good vibes coming out of that after the conference as people are getting back from it in early June.
- [227:50]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, and you get maybe some exciting Mercury, Uranus and Gemini vibes. Some exciting new ideas.
- [228:01]
Chris Brennan
Absolutely. All right, my friend, let's move on to talking about the astrology of August, which is when we get our second eclipse season taking place, as well as a number of other other notable things. So here's the planetary alignments calendar for that month and the major things that I wanted to mention about August are really several things because there's actually quite a bit coming off of the transits of July and the craziness of July. But the main breakdown I want to say is August 6th the Venus ingresses into Libra, which is important because that's the sign it's going to retrograde into. Retrograde back to I should say. So we basically have the onset of the pre Venus retrograde period and the onset of a very extended transit of Venus through that sign and that sector of each of our birth charts. So start paying attention to that then. Then August 12th we get the solar eclipse in Leo, which is the first of that new eclipse series. August 17th we get a lovely little Venus Jupiter sextile. August 27th there's a lunar eclipse in Pisces. And then August 31st we have Venus entering its shadow degree at 22 degrees of Libra, which is the degree it will retrograde back to at the end of the Venus retrograde period in November. But then the same day we also get the completion of a Jupiter Saturn trine on August 31, although it's a little bit marred by the fact that the very next day on September 1, Mars also squares Saturn, Saturn at the same time. So we got some trickiness with that.
- [229:36]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, Venus has got a complicated time in Libra this year. Usually it's a bit of a relief when Venus leaves Virgo and goes into Libra. It's a chance to rebalance and re equilibriate emotionally and they'll be so some of that. But there's something a little bit more complicated beneath the surface. One of the things that I'm focused on for August in addition to what you mentioned is Mars ingress into cancer, which will be Mars first time back into cancer since the extended retrograde stay in 2024 and part of 2025. And this time Mars will start spend a lot of it in a square with Saturn. And so we have building, especially during the latter half of the month, a square between Mars and Saturn. Well, both are in the sign of their depression or fall which provides a tense, frictive, potentially nasty little current in the background of things. And although they don't t square Venus. Exactly. It also Mars and Saturn being in cardinal signs while Venus is in the cardinal sign of Libra also serves to complicate Venus's ability to make peace while in the sign of the scales. Yeah, I think you'd agree the big story is the solar eclipse.
- [231:16]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, I mean all this is happening in the context of eclipse season and especially since the first eclipse happens in Leo. You know, all eclipses we always see these prominent figures rise and fall. And I think this is gonna be even more the case here during this eclipse because it's happening in Leo with Jupiter and Mercury also in Leo at the same time. So this focus on public figures of people that are highly visible, but then this energy of that suddenly becoming eclipsed near the south node, which can sometimes signify a decrease or a detraction of things and just the potential for some prominent people to either become obscured. Sometimes we've seen major public downfalls. We also sometimes see major celebrity deaths taking place during that period. But the flip side is there's probably going to be some people with Leo placements that suddenly are thrust into prominence in relatively positive ways, but in during the context of what's otherwise kind of like a chaotic eclipse season, as eclipse seasons often are.
- [232:21]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, we have this coming out of nowhere and then going to nowhere where someone who's bright and prominent disappears or falls and somebody you've never heard of comes out of nowhere. The eclipse portal is a two way Portal. And this is the first really complicating thing that we see. Or this is one of the really complicating things that we discussed in the context of Jupiter's time in Leo. This makes it much more unusual and dramatic than it would otherwise be.
- [232:59]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, exactly. Cause it's like Jupiter. On the one hand, the eclipses are magnifying Jupiter's transit through Leo and making them more weighty, but it's also creating this instability because eclipses are always like pivot points where pivotal events start taking place. And there's this turn, and it's either a turn upwards or it's a turn downwards. But one of the common things is sometimes an eclipse will close one door suddenly and bring to end a series of events or a chapter of your life in the Leo sector of your chart. But then by closing that door, it'll open another door. But at first, usually when that happens, it's not obvious that you're starting out a new thing or a new chapter of your life that's gonna be monumentally important. It's only the fact that an eclipse is coinciding with it that clues you in that some seeds have been planted that are gonna grow and flourish in the future.
- [234:00]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And that's a big part of navigating eclipses, is remembering that the language of obscurity and shadow is the stuff eclipses are made of. And that being able to see things for what they are extremely clearly is often quite difficult. During eclipse season, though, in retrospect, you may see that something, something tremendous began or that the seeds of its destruction were clearly sown during that time. Occasionally you just get a big dramatic thing where it's obvious at the time. But again, the eclipses are literally phenomenons of obscuration. And so sometimes it can be really tricky to tell what's going on. And so this is our first eclipse in Leo. We're gonna have more Leo eclipses. And it's followed by our last eclipse in Pisces.
- [234:59]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, I love that for us. So just to get the dates of eclipse season for the audio listeners, it's like eclipse season starts somewhere around August 5th. It peaks with that first eclipse around August 12th in Leo. Then we get the two week intense period where the most chaotic and monumental events take place until you hit August 27, when the lunar eclipse in Pisces takes place. And then there's a drop off that goes into the first week of September when things will probably wrap up and calm down around September 4, at least in terms of what eclipse Season is signifying. Yeah.
- [235:35]
Austin Coppock
And some other things agree with that timeframe as well.
- [235:40]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, go ahead. Just cause you mentioned it, here's that longer timeline in terms of the eclipse series in Aquarius and Leo that this is kicking off. And so it's gonna start a series of events in February and August of this year that then are gonna keep coming up in six month increments in our life and leading to further beginnings and endings starting from this point, August of 2026. And then you jump to February of 2027, and then August of 2027, and then eventually finally January of 2028, I believe. And then that will be the wrapping up of that entire sequence.
- [236:24]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. So hold on to your Leo and Aquarius placements.
- [236:32]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. And then the last thing was the wrapping up of that series. What was crazy that you and I were surprised to find. I was surprised to find when I was making these graphics with Paige was that there had only been one solar eclipse in the sign of Virgo and Pisces during this entire time.
- [236:54]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, it's all lunar eclipses.
- [236:56]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, it's like we sort of knew that subconsciously, but it wasn't until like putting it on this timeline that you could really see the impact of that and how our first eclipse is a lunar eclipse in Pisces in September of 2024. And all of the rest of them are lunar eclipses in that series between Pisces and Virgo, except for that one crazy solar eclipse that happened in September of 2025. And that was during that crazy month where the Charlie Kirk assassination took place near the Pisces eclipse early in the month and the first Uranus station. And then there was that funeral that happened to fall exactly on the eclipse on the 21st of September. Yeah. So that eclipse series is starting to wind down by this point in August of 2028, with the last eclipse in Pisces, as we said, and then finally the last eclipse six months later in Virgo in February of 2027, which itself actually is gonna be a wild eclipse. The eclipse season at the beginning of 2027. Cause that's the one that happens during the Mars retrograde in Virgo. And the eclipse happens, I think, in Virgo right when Mars has just squared Uranus and that's within 2 degrees.
- [238:15]
Austin Coppock
Do we want to save that as the teaser at the end of December?
- [238:17]
Chris Brennan
Okay. Okay. Yeah, yeah. Don't get ahead. All right. So anything else about August?
- [238:25]
Austin Coppock
No, I think that's good. And as we get into September, on the first day of September That Mars Saturn square actually perfects, which we don't love. But we do like that for the next couple weeks, Mars Saturn square will be weakening. And so that is a peak of a pretty nasty configuration. But then it declines. And so just as some of the eclipse, the power of the eclipses is beginning to wane down. As we get further from the second eclipse, we also start to see the Mars Saturn square declining in power, which is good. One of the things that we're left with is a pretty good looking Mercury in Virgo, which is moving back into visibility. It's Mercury in the place that it knows how to do its thing best. Mercury, while not a benefic, when Mercury's in good condition, it's really good for at least figuring out your way through and around difficult things. It's not a balm of restoration, But Mercury provides a lot of clever fixes and workarounds and ways to make things workable and thinkable. And so we like that period of Mercury in Virgo, which is followed on September 10th by Mercury's Ingress into Libra, which is a somewhat different circumstance. As well as Venus's ingress into Scorpio. Now getting deep into the shadow of that retrograde to come.
- [240:24]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, this is the important part of September for me is that Uranus stations retrograde at 5 degrees of Gemini on September 10th. And the same day Venus ingresses into Scorpio, which is the sign that Venus will go retrograde in. So this Uranus station is really important. It's like the second retrograde station in Gemini. And the first one occurred one year earlier during September of 2025, during that crazy eclipse season where there was the assassination that took place. And then just a huge amount of polarization occurred in the country at that time, as well as crackdowns on free speech and other things like that. So this being the second station is invoking some of that polarization again to me in terms of Uranus stationing there in Gemini and how that's tied in with the Uranus return of the United States. And then at the same time, we're seeing the onset of Venus in Scorpio and the retrograde that's starting to bring events from the past back into the present. But it's initially gonna do that in a way that has some tension and some problems associated with it.
- [241:31]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And I think that it's gonna be that entry of Venus into Scorpio that makes it really clear that there are some things that are gonna need to be sorted out. I think we might Be able to pretend that things are gonna be okay for the earlier part of Venus's shadow in Libra, Especially once it clears the opposition with Saturn. But it's gonna be pretty clear there's something fishy here. There are things to be. They're gonna need to get dredged up before they can get sorted out.
- [242:07]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. And speaking of dredging things up, Venus is not the only planet that moves into its retrograde sign. But by the end of the month, Mars in the final days of September moves into Leo, which is the sign that it will retrograde back into. So functionally, we also start getting Mars starting to look backwards and starting to slow down in the sky when it prepares to station retrograde in January of 2027. But we're already starting the build up to the Mars retrograde Starting by the end of September. So both of those planets, both Venus and Mars, heading into their retrogrades at this point is starting to make us look back to the past. But it's also starting to bring some kind of ghosts from the past coming back into the present.
- [242:53]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And it's the beginning of the Mars Jupiter south node co presence.
- [243:00]
Chris Brennan
Yes.
- [243:03]
Austin Coppock
That co presence occurs. We have that co presence for a lot of the fourth quarter and then we have it again in 2027. But we have an exact conjunction of Mars, Jupiter and the south node, all three in the same degree later on this quarter.
- [243:23]
Chris Brennan
Right.
- [243:26]
Austin Coppock
So September is quickly becoming October, where Venus's station awaits Venus's somewhat dread station.
- [243:36]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. So here's the calendar for October where we can see all this stuff taking place. And October is really one of my least favorite months of 2026 is really rough because of the Venus retrograde and how it's tied in with all of these tough configurations Where Venus is stationing retrograde in Scorpio at the same time that Mercury's squaring Mars and Mars is opposing Pluto and both of those are squaring Venus. So it's like there's some Venus retrogrades that theoretically. Not theoretically, practically start off better and are like a pleasant jaunt down memory lane or something like that. This is not what this one is. This one is more of a rough trip down memory lane.
- [244:16]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And we have Mercury's kind of shadowing or paralleling Venus in a lot of ways throughout this retrograde Because Mercury makes the same square to Pluto and square to Mars that then Venus makes shortly thereafter. And Mercury will station retrograde in square Scorpio Shortly after Venus's station retrograde in Scorpio but the main thing is Venus's retrograde being square Mars, Pluto, which is a tricky thing in and of itself. Even if there weren't a Venus retrograde involved, we would be talking about Mars Pluto, if there's nothing else going on, which is Mars, Pluto gives us sometimes what seem like senseless acts of violence and terror. On a more internal level. It also brings up power dynamics, makes people paranoid, sometimes justifiably, sometimes unjustifiably. It's tense and secretive and sometimes points to, how should we say, controlling or quietly coercive dynamics. And so just that by itself, and then being connected to both Mercury and especially the Venus's retrograde station in first couple weeks going backward makes for a raw and quite upset, potentially quite upsetting set of skies for the first, I don't know, half of October.
- [246:01]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, Mars and Pluto are both like two of the traditional rulers of the underworld, with Pluto, Hades, for example, being the ruler in Greco Roman mythology. But Mars was connected with the underworld and with death in the Mesopotamian tradition. And we kind of lost that with the Greco Roman tradition that associated with the God of war. But one of the things we saw the last time Mars and Pluto were opposed coming out of the retrograde earlier this year was the death of the Pope. And I think the exact funeral ended up being like the day or very close to the Mars Pluto opposition. And there's all these world leaders that were flying in from around the world to attend this funeral of this world figure.
- [246:44]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, yeah, and that's a good point. They both agree on lethality.
- [246:49]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. And Mars itself, of course, is the planet of war and violence. But when you put it together with Pluto, Pluto amplifies whatever it touches. So you get extreme acts of violence or of whatever Mars is signifying. So that's not great. And then I wanted to correct something I said in the horoscopes, because Leisa made this point, which is a really good point, which is like, usually during a Venus retrograde, people with night charts will sometimes experience. Experience that transit as being like an extended positive transit. And some good things will happen in the first part of this Venus retrograde, though I think that's gonna be a tough transit for a lot of people. And even if some positive things come out of it in the long term, especially at the direct station, we all may experience the opening part of this retrograde in October as being rocky at best. So I did wanna put that as a little addition or correction to some of the horoscope predictions.
- [247:40]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, it's a rough One gonna be a lot of raw feelings. And yeah, it's a rough month. There are a couple I don't need. I'm going to not name other things that are. That add to the difficulty, but it is a rough month. I will say that I think it gets noticeably better once we get Venus's regress into library. Once Venus has cleared the square with Mars and then the square with Pluto, it becomes something closer to a normal ish Venus retrograde rather than the extra hard chaos mode version.
- [248:24]
Chris Brennan
Right? Yeah. So later in October it's like we get the Venus cazimi in Scorpio, which is at 0 degrees of Scorpio, but we also get Mercury stationing retrograde in Scorpio for the beginning of our third and final Mercury retrograde. Which curiously, all of the Mercury retrogrades this year take place entirely in water signs, which is a really interesting little factoid about the Mercury retrogrades this year. And this one for some reason starts working in tandem with the Venus retrograde from late October forward because Mercury will station directly the same day as Venus on November 13th. Yeah. Should we go to November?
- [249:08]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, let's go to November. And so one really nice thing about November is that as Venus is continuing to work backward through Libra, Venus actually gets to make multiple sextiles to Jupiter and Mars, but two aspects with Jupiter, only one with Mars. And so we have Venus having retreated to a place of power, Libra for Venus, and also getting to make a nice supportive aspect from Jupiter. Jupiter's got problems, but Jupiter is nonetheless a benefic and will provide some perspective support a little, little cushion, little bounce, a little something not hard or sharp or cruel, which at this point in the Venus retrograde we'll probably all need. And so the second half ish of the Venus retrograde is not nearly as cruel as the first half.
- [250:21]
Chris Brennan
It's really just astounding how both Venus and Mercury station direct at the same time. And what a huge feeling of forward movement that's gonna be. They'll be slow to get going again. So there'll still be some delays and some slowness coming out of both the Mercury and Venus retrograde. But just to have both of them turn direct on the same day and to make that turn, I think is gonna be felt by all of us as a sudden turn turn in terms of the. We've all been looking backwards and there's something that's been pushing us towards the past for weeks up to this point for like 40 days for Venus and three weeks for Mercury. But then all of a sudden we all start looking forward again to something that's on the horizon at this point by November 13th.
- [251:03]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, yeah, it's really nice. It's really nice to have them both turn the same day. And then intriguingly enough, it's just a few days later that we have the conjunction of Mars and Jupiter and the south node, the mean calculation at least all at 25 Leo. Right. Which is probably going to mean a number of different things to a number of different charts. There's a lot of different things you can get out of that. Some people will get more Mars Jupiter, where it's like, oh, a huge surge of confidence in going forward with something. Some people might get more of the South Node Mars, which can be, how should we say, a martial problem with a mysterious origin and 20 other variants. And what's interesting is that Mars Jupiter Ketu or Mars Jupiter Tail of the Dragon is sort of. I feel like it's promising something in the future from the Mars retrograde that's upcoming. It will probably bring something itself, but it's also, I don't know, I feel like it's very haunted by things to come in 2027.
- [252:23]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. On the positive side, it's like there's a big, bold, enterprising energy to this Mars Jupiter conjunction, which for some people, if it's hitting the trail chart in a nice way, can be about taking bold action and being successful or decisiveness that leads to a good outcome, coming into a commanding position. Like a lot of the ancient delineations of Mars Jupiter are like generals coming to the forefront or rising to the height of a command structure where sometimes being decisive, especially combat context, like a military context especially is really important for a general or something like that. One of the generals in the Civil War did a terrible job because he would never finish the job. He would always wait before taking bold action. And as a result of that, eventually he got fired as a result of never being decisive enough to win the battle or win the war.
- [253:23]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, yeah. Mars Jupiter is excellent for military figures. A number of general famous generals have that combination. I think George Patton actually has a South Node Mars Jupiter conjunction in Virgo, if I'm not mistaken. Anyway, we don't need to talk about Patton.
- [253:48]
Chris Brennan
No, I mean, that's important in the sense that I was gonna say anybody with a Mars Jupiter conjunction, especially in Leo, is gonna come into prominence and have important events happening in their life at this time. But especially if you have a Mars Jupiter South Node conjunction, then that's gonna be Very personally important for you and maybe even more so if it's in the sign of Leo or if it was also close to Mars stationing retrograde in the Virgo Leo series.
- [254:15]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, it's not that common a combination. So I mean, if you've got that and the closer a match to this one, the more of a really significant and activation it'll be.
- [254:25]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, yeah. So those are some of like the good things of that Negative things are sometimes on Mars, Jupiter we see like Mars explosive tendencies being magnified by Jupiter. So there's like a big explosion. There can be the shattering of a peace, since Jupiter usually represents peace and Mars represents war. And it's kind of. It's hard because it's also building into the retrograde. So we know that this is not the last time we're gonna see this conjunction, but it's almost like the opening of a sequence of things.
- [254:58]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. Whereas the Mars south node combination has a lot of things that are not glorious. There are a lot of. As I was doing research on this last month, I found there are a number of assassinations that are Mars south node combinations. Like the, the infamous assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, which kicked off World War I, was a Mars K2. And so yeah, it's a strange combination and it will work differently for different people. But the like big and bold is. We're going to get a lot. There'll be a lot of big and bold. Not everybody gets big and bold, but it'll be on the menu. You. And of course, big and bold can easily be a big pain in the ass if someone is being big and bold at you rather than you were the one bigging and bolding.
- [255:53]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, big and bold and flashy and shock and awe are some of the keywords for that. But after that, later in the month, Mars moves into Virgo. So it moves into the sign. It will retrograde it. And then at the same time, Uranus makes its second exact trine with Pluto. That's happening this year, which again, I'm just still associating with rapid technological advancement in both the Gemini sector, which is like communications and travel, but then also the Aquarius sector, which recently has just been so much about the artificial intelligence explosion over the past past few years. And there's some sort of synergy that starts happening between those two areas that reinforces and accelerates what each is doing at this time. And this is the second major boost of that this year.
- [256:49]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, right. Well, you put AI in drones, right. You have the algorithmically patterned drone swarm or Something like that you can put. Right. You can put the Pluto in the Uranus in Aquarius travel thing, Right.
- [257:09]
Chris Brennan
Or in robots, in like humanoid robots or something like that, right?
- [257:16]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, the thing and the thing.
- [257:18]
Chris Brennan
The thing and the thing. The intelligence in the machine.
- [257:22]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. Or the pseudo intelligence. The thing that's going to fly the thing around and drive it into something stuff in people. And of course, the Uranian part of that is further exacerbated or comes to the fore with Mars ingress into Virgo because that puts Mars in a square with Uranus from November 25 onward for the next week until it's perfect on what, December 4th. December 3rd.
- [257:57]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. That is our opening aspect of December is this Mars uranus conjunction from 3 degrees of Virgo to 3 degrees of Gemini. And that's such a crucial aspect because when I was researching the Civil War in World War II, both of those had a Mars retrograde in Gemini. So that it really exacerbated the Mars Uranus conjunction basically at that time, and that it ended up up being a crucial turning point in each of those wars. In the case of the Revolutionary War or Civil War, it was towards the end of it during the most destructive phase. During the other one, it was during a different period. But what's crucial about this is that this is gonna happen three times. So this is the first of three squares between Mars and Uranus. And the one that happens in early 2027 when Mars is retrograde and then there's an eclipse there in early Virgo is going to be incredibly decisive and important, but potentially destructive turning point. Let me just animate that so you can see. So this is the first Mars Uranus square in early December of 2026. But look at this. I know we're getting into 2027, but it's important context for what we're building up to at the end of 2026. Here's Mars stationing retrograde around January 10th at 10° of Virgo. And then Mars starts moving backwards back towards Uranus for a second square. And then it completes that square around here in February of 2027 from 1 degree of Virgo while retrograde to 1 degree of Gemini. And then look at the Moon. The Moon comes up, hits a full Moon at the beginning of Virgo, but it's next to the nodes, so it's also an eclipse. So there's the last Virgo eclipse takes place at this time, which just magnifies the Mars retrograde, which is squaring Uranus. And that's what all this Mars retrograde buildup and the shadow period is doing at the end of 2027 is, it's leading us up to this really critical event that takes place in early 2027.
- [260:00]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. Both you and I looked at this year and then looked at December and it ends just before this giant thing gets moving. Right. Mars is not quite retrograde. It is so deep in the shadow. It's been doing some very suspicious things with Jupiter and the south node. It squared Uranus and it's about to do all of it again and get spotlighted by an eclipse right at the heart of its retrograde journey. And so 2026 ends with, ends with things about to heat up or heating up to what will be, I don't know, very intense in the first quarter of 2027.
- [261:00]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, absolutely. And this first Mars Uranus square on December 1st is incredibly crucial with respect to that because it's one of those things that'll feel big at the time and it'll seem like a one off event, but then it'll actually be part of a series of events that'll unfold over the next six months. So other things happening in December that are important to mention are Saturn stations direct on December 10th and then two days later, Neptune stations direct on December 12th. So this is that third and final activation of the Saturn Neptune conjunction that we've had at least two others of earlier in the year. First the exact conjunction in February, then we have the stations in July, but at this point when they station direct, they're only 6 degrees away from each other. So we kind of have this re engagement of the Saturn Neptune conjunction and the reality distortion field taking place at this time that's making it hard to tell the difference between what's real versus what's not and what's true versus what's false. What is digitally altered versus what's a hard fact in the world. And some of the things with coverups and different things like that are probably again becoming quite prominent at the start time.
- [262:25]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, cover ups, illusion, all of moral panics, dissolutions and sudden collapses. It's all on the table and also.
- [262:42]
Chris Brennan
Ideological or people aspiring to higher ideals and aspiring to bring that into tangible form for some reason, which can be a positive side of things.
- [262:56]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And so in the middle of December, Venus finally shadow. So Venus has dug her way out of the underworld by the time we get to the year's close, Just in time for Mars to begin his reign as Red King of Midnight.
- [263:25]
Chris Brennan
Right, that's a good point. So Venus exits her shadow at 8 degrees of Scorpio on December 15. But then at the beginning of January, January 7 finally departs from Scorpio and moves into Sagittarius and completes the entire sequence.
- [263:39]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And so we've got this giant Mars story that's a. About to, well, about to get loud just as the year ends. We've gotten pieces of it. We've done basically the first third. Right. Mars has spent time in Leo with Jupiter and the South Node, which it'll do again. It's entered Virgo and squared Uranus, which it'll do it again. We're one third of the way into this Mars story. But the loudest part and the most chaotic part is just over the boundary into 2027.
- [264:18]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, absolutely. So, you know, in world events that's tough because the Venus retrograde almost seems like a breakdown sometimes in, what is it called when countries are like trying to form alliances or have diplomatic negotiations. It's like a break down in diplomatic talks or something like that.
- [264:41]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. Although the two sextiles between Venus and Libra are kind of nice. Venus snuck in another sextile to Jupiter at the very end of November after the direct station. So there is some restoration of relationships towards the end of Venus's retrograde or after Venus's retrograde. But is it enough to offset the Mars configuration after Mars configuration after Mars configuration? Almost certainly not. But better to have some help from the benefics than none at all.
- [265:26]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, yeah. The little light aspects between Venus and Jupiter at different points of the year keep showing up as little helpers even during some of our most difficult aspects of other planets. And it's nice that there will be helpers and healers and sometimes silver linings that are attempting to offset things even during the troubled times.
- [265:52]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, it can be very restorative just to have something go right in the middle of everything else going wrong.
- [266:02]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, absolutely.
- [266:03]
Austin Coppock
Just a little something. Right.
- [266:04]
Chris Brennan
It's like.
- [266:05]
Austin Coppock
But this is actually not only just fine, this is actually going great. It doesn't mean that there aren't those other troubles, but it helps keep the mind in balance and capable of dealing with the challenges afoot.
- [266:23]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. And in terms of personal lives, having Mars and Jupiter there at the same time, even if there's this challenging energy that's happening in the LEO sectors of our charts, there's also that positive expansive energy in the LEO sector with Jupiter that's trying to offset things. And in some instances we'll be successful in doing that. So I like that there are counterbalancing Things so that it's not all just like purely one thing or the other.
- [266:50]
Austin Coppock
No, no, it's not. The Mars, Jupiter South Node thing is so tricky because it's a preview of things that happen again. And so it makes, you know, it makes me a little nervous. I'm like, well, it looks like it could mean this, but I know that that story is more complicated than it looks like at the time. Which doesn't mean complicated, doesn't mean all bad. Right. But it's, it's tricky. It's. It's a configuration I've been staring at for a month and a half now. We'll have to wait until literally this year, or excuse me, this time next year to talk about the Mars story, which still will not have fully gotten moving quite yet. Although Mars will have done a ton of shit in 2026. It's a pretty Mars heavy year. Right. Mars, Pluto, Mars right in the middle, Mars configured to that Virgo eclipse. And with the Mercury retrograde, Mars, Saturn, then Mars Uranus, then Mars, Saturn square, and then Mars, Jupiter, Ketu, and then Mars Uranus.
- [268:06]
Chris Brennan
There are a lot of Saturn in Aries, Neptune in Aries.
- [268:09]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. Even though Mars isn't the once every 36 years Saturn, Neptune, or the once every 84 years Uranus and Gemini, Mars is kind of trying to steal the show or at least, least stir everybody else up.
- [268:29]
Chris Brennan
Right? Yeah. Even Venus retrograde in Scorpio is like a Mars ruled sign. And that's one of the reasons why it's the sign of Venus's antithesis opposite to Taurus.
- [268:42]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. Yeah. And of course Mars is square, Venus at the retrograde station and Venus is in Mars sign. Yeah. There's a lot of, a lot of martial dynamics to navigate this year.
- [268:55]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. But as you said, I can't believe we end the year of 2026 on such a cliffhanger, being on the verge of Mars going retrograde in Virgo so that one year from now we're going to obviously have a much clearer picture and we're going to have seen a lot of the clues of what's leading into this because Mars will have traveled all the way through Leo and gotten part of the way into Virgo so that the scene is gonna be set. But one year from now, we're gonna have to check in again and see what the whole cliffhanger is that we're left hanging on at the end of 2026.
- [269:31]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, my suspicion is that we'll be looking at things at the end of 2026. I mean, really? There's more. This is not the climax. I think it's going to be. Might be a little bit like the end of the second season of House of the Dragon, where, like, they're like, every major faction. It ends with, like, every major faction has, like, armies preparing for war and their dragons getting saddled up. And you're like, oh, my God, it's gonna be an awesome battle. And they're like, see you next season in two years.
- [270:06]
Chris Brennan
Right. Yeah, that's true. Cause there was a big dragon battle that happened at the end of that season. But then it turns out that the biggest battle of the series is supposed to open the next, like, third season or something.
- [270:17]
Austin Coppock
Yeah.
- [270:18]
Chris Brennan
Yeah.
- [270:19]
Austin Coppock
So big, big year. Big year. It'll get remembered. It'll get talked about.
- [270:25]
Chris Brennan
Yeah.
- [270:26]
Austin Coppock
You can do it, everybody. I can do it. Chris can do it. It's. It's not going to be fun at a lot of points, but it's. It's not without its consolations and rewards and victories.
- [270:40]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. I mean, we're all in it together. We're all living in historic times. Everyone's gonna be doing their best. And one of the things about other historic times in either US History, with Uranus in Gemini periods, or other periods of world history is sometimes in moments of crisis, that's when people step up to do what's necessary and find courage and strength within themselves to do what's right or to do what needs to be done in order to help not just themselves, but also other people. And I think we're gonna see a lot of that. And that may be the highest manifestation of some of the heroicism of, let's say, Neptune in Aries, which in certain contexts might be misplaced if it's glorifying war and killing. But on the other hand, there could be acts of heroism and of other things of that nature that could be very positive.
- [271:33]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. To rise to the. Rise to the occasion in ways that you didn't know you were capable of.
- [271:42]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. Especially with Uranus in Gemini. One of the things that keeps coming up in different periods is the urge for freedom and liberation. And the drive for that becomes paramount, especially in US History. These become the periods in which there's struggle, and there's often a great struggle surrounding that concept and surrounding the attempts to suppress the concept of freedom and liberty. But then there's also the push to achieve that at the same time and to sometimes reach new levels of freedom and liberation for different groups that didn't exist prior to that time.
- [272:20]
Austin Coppock
Yeah. And also to preserve what gains have been made in terms of having. Trying to have a democracy, trying to have a place where individual rights are respected regardless of any other criteria. Any and all criteria.
- [272:42]
Chris Brennan
Yeah. Funny thing I forgot to mention in the Mars Uranus episode, but in 2005, there was a Mars Uranus conjunction in Pisces and the third Star wars prequel came out. And that was the one where there was this famous scene at the end of it where Natalie Portman's character is watching the emperor has just started a fake war in order to take over power and get rid of the democracy of the Galactic Republic. And she's watching the entire empire sort of take over and the democracy falls and she says something like, so this is how liberty dies, with thunderous applause or something like that. And that was on a Mars Uranus conjunction, which again, just goes back to that recurring theme during those conjunctions of both the drive for freedom, sometimes in liberty, but also sometimes the attempts to suppress it and the tension between those two polar opposites.
- [273:41]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, the struggle.
- [273:43]
Chris Brennan
The struggle, yeah. All right. Well, speaking of struggles, my friend, I think we have just completed our 2026 Year Ahead astrology forecast.
- [273:56]
Austin Coppock
I think you're right.
- [273:58]
Chris Brennan
Okay. How do you feel? Do you want to just keep going and talk about 2027 at this point or you want to take a little, little breather, maybe like year long break?
- [274:09]
Austin Coppock
Oh, I'm, you know, I don't know, Chris. I'm gonna need to lie down and breathe carefully to figure out that I even have a body, much less what I think I should do. I should probably eat the other half of my burrito. That's about as much as I've got for future actions that are planned.
- [274:32]
Chris Brennan
Awesome. Well, thanks for powering through even though you got sick a few days ago and have been recovering and struggling to get better. But thanks for showing up here today for this Year Ahead forecast. It's always not just a pleasure, but it's an honor to do these forecasts with you each year and to attempt to predict both for individuals as well as world events where things are headed. And I'm glad we've been doing this for as many years as we have and building up all the experience so that we can do our best to give people a little bit of insight into what's coming up.
- [275:02]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, back at you, my friend. Is this our 10th yearly forecast? So we started in 2015. Oh, wow.
- [275:10]
Chris Brennan
Yeah.
- [275:12]
Austin Coppock
Christmas or the end of 2015 would have been number one.
- [275:18]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, you're right. 10 years of doing this. I'm glad because we needed that 10 years of preparation because there were so many callbacks and things that we've seen in different transits over the years that became relevant in this forecast. I'm glad we got as much experience in as we did before world events like the, you know, started getting really, really serious.
- [275:39]
Austin Coppock
Yeah, it would have been nice to get a few more years in of practice before 2020. I think we did all right for 2020, but that's the, the bar got raised significantly in 2020 and it hasn't really, hasn't really calmed down since. But it, we're, we're sort of entering, I guess 2025 was probably the next escalation. This was a pretty wild year. But 2026 is going to do its very best to show 2025 that it ain't shit.
- [276:11]
Chris Brennan
Yeah, absolutely. It's the year that things get real. But we'll be checking it in again every month.
- [276:19]
Austin Coppock
You got a better I was just saying no take backsies, 2026, no take.
- [276:23]
Chris Brennan
Backsies, no going back. All right. We'll be back again next month. Of course, we're going to keep doing the monthly breakdowns where we'll go into each of these things with more detail. I guess we'll do that at the end of January for the month of February. But otherwise I think that's it for this forecast. So people should check out your website, which is what again?
- [276:42]
Austin Coppock
Austincopoch.com Brilliant.
- [276:45]
Chris Brennan
And for mine, you can check out theastrologypodcast.com for information about the electional report or the posters for this year. But otherwise, thanks a lot for watching. Thanks to all the patrons that joined us in the live audience for this recording today. Good luck everybody in 2027 six and we'll see you again next year. If you're a fan of the podcast and you'd like to find a way to help support my research, then consider becoming a patron through my page on patreon.com in exchange, you'll get access to subscriber benefits such as early access to new episodes, the ability to attend live recordings, the monthly Electional Astrology Podcast, an exclusive podcast series called the Secret Astrology Podcast that's only available to at patrons or you can even get your name listed in the credits. For more information, go to patreon.com astrologypodcast Special thanks to patrons on my producers tier, including patrons Kristi Moe, Ariana Amour, Mandi Rae, Angelique Nambo, Issa Sabah, Jeannie Marie Kaplan, Melissa Delano, Sunny Bazbaz Kwatsi Alibarahu, Annie Newman, Ginger Sadlier, Berlin west and Nikki Crawford. People often ask me if I'm available for consultations, but unfortunately I'm not right now because the podcast takes up so much of my time. However, I did create a consultations page on the Astrology Podcast website that has a list of astrologers that I recommend for astrological consultations. You can find that@theastrologypodcast.com consultations the astrology software we use here on the podcast is called Solar Fire for Windows, which is astrology Software. For the PC. You can get a 15% discount by using the promo code AP15 at the website alabe.com for Mac users, I recommend the software Astro Gold for Mac os, which is astrology software for the Mac computer made by the creators of Solar fire. For the PC, you can get a 15% discount with the promo code AstroPodcast15 through their website at AstroGold IO. If you're really looking to deepen your studies of astrology, then I would recommend signing up for my Hellenistic Astrology course, which is an online course in ancient astrology where I take people from basic concepts up through intermediate and advanced techniques for reading birth charts. There's over 100 hours of video lectures plus monthly webinars and Q and A sessions, and then at the end of the course you get a certificate of completion saying that you studied with me. If you pass the final written test. Find out more information@theastrologyschool.com finally, shout out to our sponsor for this episode, which is the United Astrology Conference, which is happening September 3rd through the 9th, 2026 in Chicago. Find out more information at uacastrology.org com.