April Astrology Forecast 2026

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 gonna be doing a deep dive into the astrology of April 2026. Hey Austin, welcome back. AUSTIN COPPOCK: Hey Chris.

April 2026. Hey Austin, welcome back. AUSTIN COPPOCK: Hey Chris.

CB: Hey. All right, so we’re back for another month. A lot of stuff has happened, of course, in the past month since our last forecast episode. So we’re gonna spend the first hour of this episode catching up on news and events in the world since our last recording and talking about the astrology behind the news stories. Then in the second hour of this recording, we’re going to do

a deep dive into the astrology of April. So as always, there’ll be timestamps if you wanna jump ahead to the forecast section, but otherwise let’s get into it. And before we do the news, let’s do a quick overview of the astrology of April. All right, so here is the planetary alignments calendar that shows the major alignments in April. Right at the top of the month on April 1st,

we have a Full Moon in the sign of Libra. Then Venus squares Pluto on the 3rd. The Sun squares Jupiter on the 5th. Mars ingresses into Aries on the 9th and begins the build-up to a conjunction with Neptune, which it completes on the 13th. Then Mercury goes into Aries on the 14th.

Mercury then conjoins Neptune immediately on the 16th. We get our second lunation of the month, which is a New Moon in the sign of Aries on the 17th. Then our biggest aspect of the month is a Mars-Saturn conjunction that looks pretty tough around the 19th of April, the same day the Sun moves into Taurus. And then the following day, Mercury catches up and also conjoins both Mars

and Saturn on the 20th. Then Venus conjoins Uranus on the 23rd. Venus moves into Gemini on the 24th.

And then the next day, we get our second biggest and most notable astrological alignment of the month, which is that the planet Uranus finally moves into Gemini permanently on the 25th of April, which is a huge shift that we’ll talk about in this episode.

And then finally, Mercury squares Jupiter on the 26th, and that brings us to the end of the month.

All right. So yeah, welcome back Austin. Thanks for joining me again. It’s been a crazy month; so much has happened. We’re gonna talk about some of the news and events, primarily talking about the war in Iran but also some other things. But yeah, thanks for joining me again.

AC: Yeah, my pleasure. I mean, sort of. CB: Yeah. Yeah, so all right - so let’s start from the top. I will say a lot of heavy stuff happened this month, obviously, and there’s too much honestly to cover comprehensively. So we’re gonna focus on the Iran war and a few

other stories, but even just doing a handful of those it’s gonna be hard to even do those justice because there’s just so much that’s been going on. And we’re only gonna focus on the stories where we have something astrological to say or some specific astrological angle to the story.

So right at the top, the war with Iran began on February 28th when the United States and Israel launched a coordinated surprise attack that killed the Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and targeted key military infrastructure, igniting a devastating and ongoing regional

war as Tehran responded with massive retaliatory strikes across the Middle East.

So the war began just barely the day after our last forecast episode was released, right on the Mars-Uranus square as we predicted, so that it ended up lining up just stunningly well in terms of the astrology and in terms of some of the repetitions involved. And to give

you - you know, we mentioned all of these on the last forecast, because we were anticipating this would be happening for the past few months. But to list some of the major repetitions, there’s the Saturn-Neptune conjunction that just took place in February, and that was a repetition of 1953 when

there was a Saturn-Neptune conjunction and a US coup overthrew the leader of Iran. Then in 1973, there was a lunar eclipse in Virgo, and that’s when the current government of Iran was created, and then there was a repetition of a eclipse in Virgo on March 3rd of 2026. In 1989, there was a

Saturn-Neptune conjunction, and the Supreme Leader of Iran died at that time, and that was the last time there was a Saturn-Neptune conjunction compared to today. And then in 2025 in June, the 12-day war when the US and Israel first struck Iran was the last Mars-Uranus square that

we had before this one. So then both of these two surprise attacks occurred on a Mars-Uranus square.

So — AC: Yeah.

CB: Pretty crazy astrology. AC: Yeah, pretty crazy. And

there were a couple other things that made this one just that much more significant, because not only was Mars nearly perfectly square Uranus during when the US launched this attack, but Mars was also in the degree of the solar eclipse which had just occurred about less

than two weeks before. And so we were still in the wake of that eclipse, and then Mars, while squaring Uranus, moved into the degree of that eclipse. And then just because big things like this are really layered and there are often many, many different proofs of them, you can also see in the United States’ Declaration of Independence chart, the United States has the

Moon at 27 Aquarius, like, less than a degree from where Mars was. So we have the Mars on the United States’ Moon; we have Mars in the degree of the most recent solar eclipse; and Mars-Uranus during this time period - this Saturn-Neptune time period - where

we see tons of Iran stuff as well as US-Iran stuff. So it’s really over-determined. Like, there

are too many fingers pointing in this direction. CB: Yeah, that’s a really stunning point about especially the Mars at 28 Aquarius hitting the degree of the Aquarius eclipse which had just happened a week or two before that. AC: Yeah. It got me really thinking about

traditional eclipse theory, which maintains - and we talk about this, too, but it got me rereading older sources, which maintain that eclipses mark a portion of the zodiac and they mark the places in which they occur for some time, sometimes for a significant amount of time

after they occur. And when something comes to this place that’s overshadowed, shall we say, or across which the shadow has fallen, you get repercussions of the eclipse that did not unfold immediately. Although in this case, we only had to wait less than two weeks, so! So yeah,

unfold immediately. Although in this case, we only had to wait less than two weeks, so! So yeah,

but it speaks to that theory that the eclipses are almost like target painting in a way where they like, the shadow falls, but the hammer may not fall for a while. When we saw this just - what was

it - a month and a half ago with - or yeah, we saw this not very long ago with Trump’s statements and actions around Greenland, which an eclipse had fallen upon the year before in perfect coincidence

with Vice President Vance’s visit there. So we get the shadow and then sometimes we get action when other planets move into that place. CB: Yeah. Or even, you know, the eclipses now in retrospect that will in history books foreshadow Trump’s presidency. First the one back

when he first came into office in 2017 that was visible across the United States, and then shortly before he was reelected in 2024, I believe, there was another eclipse across America that then in retrospect now will have foreshadowed him. And of course, Trump himself was born the day of

an eclipse, as were all of the leaders involved in the current war, which I'll get into in a second. But before we - yeah, so but to close out one of the Mars-Uranus pieces, because the

second. But before we - yeah, so but to close out one of the Mars-Uranus pieces, because the Mars-Uranus - and we’ve commonly associated that, because we’ve seen over the past several years sudden sometimes unexpected acts of violence being a major signature of that. And it turns out that

this Mars-Uranus conjunction, it wasn’t the only repetition. But another repetition I noticed was right at the opening of this war when the US started bombing Iran, one of the things that happened right at the beginning was a girls’ elementary school was hit with a missile strike,

and 175 people were killed with over a hundred of them reported to be schoolchildren. And

investigations conducted by the New York Times, the CBC, NPR, BBC and others concluded that the US was likely responsible for the strike. And this happening the day of the Mars-Uranus conjunction, I went back and looked and it turned out July 3rd, 1988, there was also a Mars-Uranus square.

And at that time, that was when the US shot down Iran Airflight 655, which I guess the US thought it was like, a combat plane, but they ended up accidentally shooting down a civilian airliner that killed 290 civilians. And at that time, Mars was at 25 Pisces squaring Uranus at 28 degrees of

Sagittarius. So in terms of other repetitions and tragic repetitions of Mars square Uranus,

Sagittarius. So in terms of other repetitions and tragic repetitions of Mars square Uranus, that was another one. AC: Yeah, that’s awful.

Another one that just occurred to me that also happened in the opening days of the war was the US planes that were accidentally shot down by an ally during the first couple days when Mars-Uranus was still active. Like, the misidentification and then accidental destruction.

CB: Right. Yeah. So that was the Mars-Uranus aspect, which was a more limited one in terms of being active for a few days before and after, but it aligned very closely.

And the other thing that really stood out and was really crazy astrologically, probably one of the most stunning astrological correlations of this war, was that it turned out that all three of the leaders involved in the war were born the exact day of an eclipse. So for example,

Donald Trump was born June 14th, 1946, and this was the day of a lunar eclipse, whereas Netanyahu was born October 21st, 1949, and this was the day of a solar eclipse in Libra. And then

Ali Khamenei was born April 19th, 1939, and he was born the exact day of a solar eclipse in Aries.

So it’s like, all three leaders are born the very day of an eclipse, which itself is just like, wildly statistically improbable. But then the war itself starts during eclipse season shortly after there had just been a solar eclipse in Aquarius and just days before a lunar eclipse in Virgo

would take place. And then so that ends up also meaning that not only is the war initiated, but also that Ali Khamenei was born on an eclipse but then he died just days before that Virgo eclipse took place. And then also on the Virgo eclipse, we started seeing news stories where a new leader of

took place. And then also on the Virgo eclipse, we started seeing news stories where a new leader of Iran emerged at that time who was the son of Ali Khamenei, the Ayatollah who was just killed. And

I was remarking to myself one night just about the stunning statistically unlikeliness of the three leaders being born on eclipses, and I'm like, thinking to myself, I'm like, of course, you know, that’s gonna be the end of that, though, or that’s not gonna continue surely with the next leader of Iran. And then the news came out the very next day that the son had been selected or

may have been selected, and it turns out he was born just three days before a solar eclipse in Virgo. So he was born September 8th, 1969, and there was a solar eclipse in Virgo that took place on September 11th, 1969. So that means he was born on a Virgo eclipse, and then he became the leader of Iran on a Virgo eclipse, although also at the same time,

of course, his father was killed, his wife was killed, his sister was killed, and other family members all at the same time. AC: Yeah, that’s wild. Just like,

napkin math. The likelihood of the three leaders of the three primary countries involved all being born on the day of an eclipse is about one in 750,000, right? So you would need 750,000 wars, right, to have that happen once if we’re just doing random without bringing in the

successor who was born just before an eclipse. CB: Yeah. That’s just absolutely insane. Like,

I don’t - that’s one of the best - and I put that out on social media to some extent just because like, I can’t think of a more striking - because everybody knows what an eclipse is. And especially

every - I think about all the astronomers who know what eclipses are and follow eclipses and stuff like that, and yet don’t realize that some of the ancient astrological lore about eclipses is true, that they can indicate the birth obviously in this instance of power and prominent people. They can

sometimes indicate the death or the downfall of powerful and prominent people. And they can also sometimes indicate the start of really important events in world history - in this instance, a major war that’s impacting the entire world. AC: Yeah. Absolutely. And it’s worth pointing

out that the Israel-Palestine conflict was initiated by a solar eclipse, and then went into full swing during the lunar eclipse that followed that two weeks later.

CB: Yeah. Right. And that’s one of the things we’ll talk about in a little bit, that that’s...

You know, and looking back on all of this, I've been thinking recently that - because I was also studying, I was doing a work-up on astrology and how it was suppressed by the Nazis during World War II and how they sent a bunch of astrologers to concentration camps. And I was looking at the parallels where, you know, World War II is usually dated as started when Uranus

was moving through Taurus, and Hitler invades Poland in 1939. But then the US doesn’t enter the war until a few years later in 1941 and 1942 around the time that Uranus is going into Gemini.

And similarly, there will probably be like, three things that historians will date what we’ve been predicting will be World War III that’s starting now in retrospect, which is one, Russia invading Ukraine in 2022, which was with Uranus in Taurus, and that was like, the biggest

ground war beginning in Europe since World War II. And then the second one was the war in Israel and Palestine that started during that eclipse season in October of 2023, including - like you just said - Israel invading Gaza the day of the Taurus lunar eclipse that month. And then the

next one now is the US and Israel starting the war with Iran in February of 2026 right during eclipse season, but also on the Saturn-Neptune conjunction and the Mars-Uranus square.

AC: Yeah. And if you look at the chart for the moment hostilities began in this newest Iran war, you see that the Saturn-Neptune conjunction is in the first house of the chart; it has just risen,

and the Ascendant is ruled by that Mars which is at 28 degrees Aquarius in the degree of the eclipse just off the United States’s natal Moon and tightly square Uranus. Right? And so like, the initiatory chart - the chart were true hostilities begin - literally is ruled by

that Mars which we were talking about and has the Saturn-Neptune right there in the first.

Which is a nice — CB: Right.

AC: — confirmation of those signatures, right? Like, who is responsible here?

Oh, it’s that Mars and Uranus and the Saturn-Neptune. Like, those are the planets that are either in or ruling the Ascendant. CB: Right. So the report you were reading was saying that the first attack opened on February 28th, 2026,

at about 8:45 AM around Tehran’s time zone. AC: Yeah, and that’s the time released by US Central Command when they said they began the attack.

CB: Got it. So we’re looking at a chart with about 28 Aries rising and Mars is at 28 Aquarius. And

yeah, we see Mars squaring Uranus there at 27 degrees of Taurus just barely coming off of that square — AC: Less than half a degree.

CB: Less than half a degree. And the Saturn-Neptune conjunction, which had just recently gone exact, still being only about half a degree away with Neptune at one degree of Aries and Saturn at one degree and 37 minutes of Aries. AC: Yeah. Just right there.

CB: Yeah. And then of course this is also just days before the March 3rd Virgo eclipse that things were still heading into, because we were still right in the middle of eclipse season.

So yeah, and this was the eclipse season graph; we had just had the solar eclipse at 28 degrees of Aquarius on February 17th, and then we were heading into the lunar eclipse on March 3rd at 12 Virgo. But of course, as we’ve established over the past several years since we’ve been really

12 Virgo. But of course, as we’ve established over the past several years since we’ve been really tracking eclipses ever since basically since October of 2023, they have that two-week ramping up window before each eclipse and then a two-week window afterwards when things are the most

intense. And that was certainly the case here. AC: Yeah, and where the war began right between

intense. And that was certainly the case here. AC: Yeah, and where the war began right between them. Slightly - like, closer to the lunar, but in that shadowed valley you can see on the graph.

them. Slightly - like, closer to the lunar, but in that shadowed valley you can see on the graph.

CB: Yeah. All right. Okay, so that was happening. One of the major things that happened was - that was very prominent this month was the Mercury retrograde in Pisces conjunct Mars, because when Mercury was stationing direct or heading towards stationing direct, it formed a

conjunction with Mars. And one of the major things that happened as a result of the war was that Iran shut down the Strait of Hormuz to all shipping traffic, especially for oil shipping and natural gas and other things, through the strait, and was also targeting oil and gas in other countries in

the region. And as a result of that, like, the entire global economy is being thrown as

the region. And as a result of that, like, the entire global economy is being thrown as a result of the energy sector getting hit really hard since something like 20 percent of a lot of oil comes directly out of that strait, and all of the shipping just ground to a halt during

the course of that Mercury retrograde conjunct Mars, which is pretty stunning symbolically.

AC: Yeah. As much as I am not glad that that is happening, I did feel gratified because I was obsessed with how wretched Mercury’s situation was. Because conjunct Mars - a malefic - while in the sign of its fall - Pisces - while retrograde, also spending a lot of time with

the North Node or the head of the dragon - the eclipse point, right - which is not helpful for clarity in any matters, functionally a malefic in many senses, and Mercury was the ruler of the eclipse in Virgo. Right? So it takes on additional responsibility for distributing

what malign influence that Blood Moon spoke of. And so it’s almost as bad as possible as you can have a situation for Mercury, and then we got this - from an astrological point of view, not a human point of view - as like, delightfully perfect a circumstances. Like, Mercury rules trade - that’s

the “mer” in merchant, in mercantile, et cetera, et cetera is derived from Mercury. It’s trade;

it’s travel back and forth - goods moving from here to there and being exchanged for coins.

And so we had a massive disruption of one of Mercury’s primary domains, and then furthermore this was Mercury being horribly disrupted in a water sign, and it all comes down to an area of

water - a strait - that was embattled and too dangerous to move shipping through. So it was, you know, it was astrology perfect. Again, it’s not humanity perfect, but it was a more exact circumstance to match the planets, I could not imagine.

CB: Yeah, absolutely. And it reminded me of there was some other shipping thing a few years ago, I think during the Mars-Saturn conjunction in Pisces, where one of the straits for shipping was shut down. And I can’t remember the details right now, but yeah, sometimes things are strikingly literal and in this instance, that was an incredibly literal

manifestation of that - having shipping shut down. And at the same time, as you said, it’s like, Mercury - I was looking at Vettius Valens again recently where he talks about associating Mercury with the markets. And of course — AC: Yeah.

CB: — this is also completely throwing off the global economic markets, because of all of the things that are downwind of oil and energy, and a lot of economists are saying will probably trigger a global recession soon that’s in the process of starting to happen.

And one of the things I noticed in terms of that that I've been talking about for months is just that this Mercury-Mars conjunction was the fourth in a series of five Mercury-Mars conjunctions, and that only happens every 15 to 17 years. And one of the most notable times that happened was

in late 2008 through early 2009, there was also a series of five Mercury-Mars conjunctions in quick succession. And this coincided with the start of the Great Recession or the global recession

succession. And this coincided with the start of the Great Recession or the global recession at that time. And that in and of itself was a 79-year Mars repetition of when the same thing happened with five Mercury-Mars conjunctions in late 1929 through early 1930, which was

the great stock market crash of 1929 that was followed by and kicked off the Great Depression.

So seeing these Mercury-Mars conjunctions happen again like this, obviously there’s a backdrop of a lot of other astrological signatures that we’ve been talking about - like, Saturn conjunct Neptune and things like that - but it’s a surprisingly - it’s interesting how it’s a global recession that’s being kicked off by like, a Mercury-Mars conjunction that

coincided with interruption of global shipping. AC: Yeah, like things - the goods can’t move, right? Like, the transportation and exchange are two of Mercury’s primary significations,

right? Like, the transportation and exchange are two of Mercury’s primary significations, and that’s exactly what has been afflicted. And it’s worth noting that the 5th of the five Mercury-Mars conjunctions in this cycle is one of the more dramatic points in April that we’ll be

talking about. And then one further thing, looking at the longer Mars cycles - right, you mentioned

talking about. And then one further thing, looking at the longer Mars cycles - right, you mentioned the 79-year repetition. The 47-year repetition, which we’ve also been talking about a lot, because it was 1979, and things were happening in Iran then, and one of the things that happened in 1979

is that, if you compared beginning of the year prices of oil with end of the year prices of oil, they went up - they quadrupled. Right? So we have a quadrupling of oil in the most recent Mars cycle precedent. CB: Right.

AC: Quadrupling of the price, not the supply. CB: Yeah. That Mars has already - those repetitions have already been so stunning from 47 years ago when Mars was in the exact same place, you know, starting in January of this year compared to January of 1979. So seeing

that and projecting that out to the rest of this year in terms of what happened in 1979 continuing to echo in some way in 2026 is not a great indication, certainly in terms of oil prices, but also other things. AC: Yeah.

The prices of both some industrial metals but also all the precious metals got completely out of control in 1979 as well. But you know, some good things - pointing at self - came out of 1979! CB: Yeah, some Austin things! Well, I'll

always think of you. When I think of you, I usually think of like, the Iranian Revolution and then Austin Coppock. AC: Yeah. I was born about three weeks before this incarnation of Iran. CB: Nice. Yeah, well, and one other thing worth mentioning, though - in late 1979, because in the year ahead forecast, we talked about how there’s

gonna be a Mars retrograde in Virgo and Leo later this year. And that’s a repetition of the same Mars retrograde in Virgo and Leo that happened in late 1979. But one of the things that kicked off during that time was the Iran hostage crisis where a bunch of US citizens were taken hostage

by Iranians, and it caused this huge drama and like, crisis that played out over the course of the next several months. AC: Yeah. So we have that to look forward to during the Mars retrograde! CB: Yeah. If the oil thing is repeating again, then that’s not a good sign for that in the future later this year. So we’ll see how that goes.

One last point in this section I wanted to mention was, you know, last year we talked about the Aries ingress a lot. That was something you put a lot of focus on because of how a year ago, you pointed out months ahead of when it actually happened, and it was part of the basis for some of our predictions that there would be a war with Iran and the US coming up soon that we started

making back in the fall of, what was it, 2024, predicting that for 2025 and beyond and 2026 was you had noticed in the solar return chart - in the Aries ingress chart - that Mars was exactly on the Ascendant in that chart that would last from March of 2025 in Iran all the way until March of 2026,

which was stunning, and it was a stunning part of your prediction that stayed true all the way through the initiation of this war. And that was what we said last June once that initial war happened and then stopped unexpectedly. But then we also got a new Aries ingress chart then that just kicked in, which just baked that Mercury-Mars conjunction in Pisces into the

Aries ingress chart for Iran for the next year. AC: Yeah. Last year, I was really struck by the Mars being right on the Ascendant when you looked at the Aries ingress moment from Tehran.

And I'd looked back at the one other big war that modern Iran had been part of, which started in 1980. And the Aries ingress chart for that year also had Mars conjoin the Ascendant.

In that case it was with the North Node of the Moon. And so that was - like, in theory, Mars on the Ascendant should be indicating war, and the one precedent that I had also, you know, of a big war - the Iran-Iraq war, which was devastating and lasted for nearly a decade - also had Mars on the

Ascendant. And so unfortunately, that technique seems to work. And again, it was - Chris, as you

Ascendant. And so unfortunately, that technique seems to work. And again, it was - Chris, as you said - it was relevant up until the Sun’s ingress into Aries about a week ago. So still active for the initiation of hostilities this go around. CB: Right. And what’s crazy about that is that’s

a technique that originated with astrologers probably in Iran over a thousand years ago in like, the 5th and 6th and 7th and 8th centuries where we first start to see that technique of like, Aries ingresses really come into play, and to have it speak to the current war so strikingly

is just really astrologically compelling. So here’s the chart for March 20th, 2025 - the moment the Sun went into Aries at the start of the astrological year and the spring equinox in the northern hemisphere, and set for Tehran, for the capital of Iran. And the Ascendant was exactly at

20 degrees of Cancer, and Mars at that time was at 20 degrees of Cancer conjunct the Ascendant.

And that Aries ingress chart then lasted for the entirety from March 20th of 2025 all the way until exactly one year later when the new Aries ingress chart just kicked in, which looks like... Looks like this. So this is the new Aries ingress chart for Tehran for March

20th, 2026. The Sun at zero degrees of Aries. The Ascendant has just moved into zero Libra.

20th, 2026. The Sun at zero degrees of Aries. The Ascendant has just moved into zero Libra.

So the Sun has technically just set, but it’s still very bright out, so I would treat this as a day chart. And we see Mercury is stationing direct at eight degrees of Pisces in the 6th house conjunct the North Node, but also still conjunct Mars in a day chart at 14 degrees of Pisces.

So that’s kind of tricky then, because it bakes that Mercury-Mars conjunction into the Aries ingress chart, especially in Tehran but really for a lot of the Aries ingress charts for the world for this year. AC: Yeah, absolutely. And it’s worth noting that all those planets in Aries, we have Moon, Venus, Saturn, Neptune, and the Sun all in Aries at the

moment of Aries ingress. All those are ruled by that Mars, which is with Mercury and the head of the dragon. And so that Mars-Mercury conjunction, or Mars-Mercury-North-Node conjunction is

the dragon. And so that Mars-Mercury conjunction, or Mars-Mercury-North-Node conjunction is tremendously influential. CB: Yeah. Absolutely.

tremendously influential. CB: Yeah. Absolutely.

All right, so in terms of upcoming stuff, a lot of our statements from the last forecast episode as well as our year ahead forecast are still gonna be true and prescient in different ways.

So you can go back and check those out. But to reiterate some of them and to anticipate where things are headed in the near future, it seems like the Mars-Saturn conjunction that’s coming up to go exact in mid-April is looking like it’s gonna coincide with the US putting boots on the ground and sending ground forces, which there's a contingent of

ground forces that are already on their way supposedly to the Middle East it’s being reported right now, and so it’s widely expected that Trump in some wa is about to put boots on the ground sometime, which looks like it’s gonna line up with the Mars-Saturn conjunction.

It’s striking that Trump’s 9th house of course is Aries, so the Saturn-Neptune conjunction is in his 9th house, but also especially this Mars-Saturn conjunction that’s about to happen in mid-April will be in Trump’s 9th house of foreign countries, foreign places, and foreign people.

Interestingly, the chart for Iran also has Leo rising with the ruler of the Ascendant being the Sun in Aries in the 9th house. So Aries is also the 9th house of the current government of Iran, and that means that the Mars-Saturn conjunction is also taking place in their 9th house of

foreign countries and other people. AC: Yeah. And it’s worth noting - and so we’ve been noting it for months, but that Mars-Saturn conjunction which is the most dramatic feature of April occurs almost exactly on top of the Sun

in Iran’s chart, which is a devastating transit. CB: Yeah. It’s not a good transit. Here’s the

chart for Iran set for April 1st, 1979, at three PM in Tehran. And mid-Leo is rising, and the Sun is at 11 degrees of Aries. So that is pretty close to where that Mars-Saturn conjunction is gonna be taking place this month. And then also in the 9th house of like, foreign countries.

And then I don’t have it up at the moment, but of course Trump also famously has Leo rising, so Aries is also his 9th house and has just, you know, initiated and is getting the US embroiled in a war with a foreign country. AC: Yeah.

CB: So — AC: Yeah, and that 9th house indicates someone from far away or doing something far away. Like, a regional conflict would be 3rd house, but the 9th house is like, oh, you’ve gotta go all the way across the world to find the adversary,

which is true in both cases as indicated by both charts. Also I noticed in that 2025 Aries ingress, the 7th house - which is like, relationships with other countries - was ruled by a malefic, it was ruled by Saturn, which was with the eclipse point - the North Node - in the 9th house. Like,

describing the most important relationship that was augured in that earlier chart, which was valid up until about a week ago was a malefic with another malefic in the 9th house. Right? So like,

the 9th house malefic thing just keeps coming up. CB: Right. Yeah. That makes sense. So also in terms of the long-term, you know, the other big thing that happens this month as we’ll get into shortly besides the Mars-Saturn conjunction,which is the big short-term aspect in the middle of April. But by the end of April, Uranus goes into Gemini finally, and we’re finally at the point

April. But by the end of April, Uranus goes into Gemini finally, and we’re finally at the point of Uranus in Gemini. And the recurring theme that we’ve been talking about on The Astrology Podcast as far back as 2013 is that every time Uranus goes into Gemini, the US gets embroiled in a major,

major war, including the - it’s only happened three times, but the three times Uranus has been in Gemini were the Revolutionary War, during the Civil War, and then during World War II. And now

it’s coming back into Gemini this month, and it’s gonna stay in that sign for the next seven years.

So all of the predictions that we’ve been making certainly in the past two year ahead forecasts where we’ve been making predictions about that and predicting a major war was about to take place are all now coming true and coming to fruition. And so if the question is like, will this get better

or will this get worse, practically speaking the astrological answer and the implication of this is that this is gonna spiral out of control and get worse and probably worse than many of the people who initiated it anticipated and turning into a much bigger conflict than anybody can even anticipate at this stage. AC: Yeah, from an astrological point

of view, things are just getting started. CB: Right. And it’s like, what does that - so it’s like, we’ve been talking about this for the past couple of years just in the short-term.

But just thinking about what that means from our current vantage point in terms of the different - you know, because it’s so interesting seeing the Economist talking about this and being like, well, oil’s at a hundred dollars a barrel now, but if this gets wrapped up in the next couple of weeks, then that’ll go back down and it’ll take a little bit to repair things but things will

get better. But it’s like, I just keep watching all this stuff and thinking about this from the

get better. But it’s like, I just keep watching all this stuff and thinking about this from the perspective of knowing that Uranus is about to go into Gemini, and that implies the US is gonna be embroiled in a large war for quite some time, what that means, and what the full implications

of that are are obviously really very sobering. AC: Yeah. And there’s nothing about 2026 that looks peaceful from here on out. Right? Like, it’s not like - sometimes you have a year where

first quarter is obscene and murderous, but then things chill out. Like, there are a lot of further significations of hardship and violence and general craziness that are in store for the rest of the year. And they’re different - they’re not all the same, but

this is not 2026 just having a hard fucked-up start but then chilling out. And we have, you know, as we talked about on the yearly and I've been talking about for the last months, we expected things to get really crazy in February, and that to continue into March,

and that to continue and perhaps even be ratcheted up during April. And May and maybe a small respite during June, but then for things to get wild again in July. Like, this is a crazy ride. And so

as dispiriting as it may be to let go of the hope that this will be over soon, you know, adapting to the fact that this ride goes for a while and to try to adjust to that and to try to make do as best you can is gonna get better results than hoping that it’s gonna be over.

CB: Yeah. And I think that’s important in terms of like, what we’re doing here and the point of sharing this. Because I think - I did get a lot of comments this month by people that were like,

sharing this. Because I think - I did get a lot of comments this month by people that were like, saying through watching some of the monthly and year-ahead forecasts they were actually more prepared for some of this than they might have been otherwise. And I think that’s one of the reasons why we talk so candidly about some of these things in order to give people a head’s

up ahead of time not to just freak people out needlessly or other things like that, and obviously neither of us is excited about any of this happening. Like, all of this is terrible and tragic and largely unnecessary. But speaking about it candidly is important in order to

hopefully give people a little bit of head’s up so that they can do what they can to try to protect themselves and get through it as well as possible. AC: Yeah. I mean, none of us has the power to control history, but we do have some - in many cases, many - decisions that we can make about

how we navigate a period of history. And even though like, this period of conflict does not, to us, look like it’s going to end any time soon, that doesn’t mean that it goes forever.

Right? There are still endings to things, even things that last for years. And so — CB: Yeah. AC: — the question is how to navigate this period,

CB: Yeah. AC: — the question is how to navigate this period, right? Which is daunting, but still finite. CB: Yeah. And navigate things as best as possible,

right? Which is daunting, but still finite. CB: Yeah. And navigate things as best as possible, and that’s part of the purpose of astrology. And that’s always been part of the purpose of astrology and that is the insight and the advantage that we have by following it is getting a little head’s up about things like this sometimes ahead of time.

So speaking of that, though, still in terms of things coming up, unfortunately this makes the Mars-Uranus conjunction in Gemini in July look even more ominous now, because then it means that the start of this war on the Mars-Uranus square was somehow the precursor event

that will feed into that Mars-Uranus conjunction in July. And we talked a lot about that in the year ahead forecast as one of the most difficult alignments of the year, and I also did a whole episode about those in history with Nick Dagan Best in December because we found that every time there’s a Mars-Uranus conjunction in Gemini, the first one or the first

two usually coincides with the start of the major war that the US gets involved in at that time.

And one of the things is that implies that there’s still additional escalations that we haven’t seen yet, that we haven’t gotten to, that are on the horizon, especially around that conjunction in July and then the next conjunction that will take place two years after that, also in the summer of, what, 2028. And you know, in thinking about that, I found one, because one of the missing pieces

what, 2028. And you know, in thinking about that, I found one, because one of the missing pieces that we’ve talked about is just the increasing tensions between the US and China and the military footing that each country had been taking against each other. And I was doing some research this month, and I came across a really important piece that may be connected with some of that,

which is I found that during World War II, in 1943, the US and China had a diplomatic meeting.

And in that meeting, the US promised that China would get Taiwan basically after World War II.

And this agreement took place around the time of a Mars retrograde in Gemini conjunct Uranus.

So this was a little startling to me, because then it sets up a Mars-Uranus signature for the relationship potentially between China and Taiwan, which then is gonna be important because those conjunctions are gonna start recurring first this July, and then in two-year increments

for the next several years after that. AC: Yeah. So that’s a stunning find.

Did you happen to look for when the US reneged on that commitment, and was it on the next Mars-Uranus conjunction in Gemini during that period of time?

Because that would further reinforce the signature. Because there would have been one again two years later in ‘45. CB: Yeah. I don't know the answer to that, but that’s definitely worth researching, and that’s something I've been shifting towards is wanting to study more about Chinese history at this point. Because we’ve identified a lot of the cycles in US history that are important and active now, especially that Uranus in Gemini. But now,

you know, one of the questions is what are the cycles in Chinese history that are active now, and do those provide any insight into some of the things that are currently developing?

AC: Yeah. CB: Yeah. So okay. So

that was an important signature. We’ve mentioned the Iran hostage crisis which coincided with the Mars retrograde that’ll again repeat later this year. There’s also the Venus retrograde in Scorpio that happened in late 1978 that coincided with mass political unrest in Iran and put fuel on the fire of the Iranian Revolution; that’s gonna repeat later this year in October and November.

So there’ll be again some sort of repetition of that to pay attention to later this year.

Let’s see - we’ve mentioned a lot of other things. The only other thing is, you know, you and I had mentioned, you know, speaking of China, that we had anticipated the Saturn-Neptune conjunction would be really important turning point for both Russia and China because both of the leaders were born under the 1953 conjunction of Saturn and Neptune. And it was interesting how this was

the one singular event that both immediately impacted both of those countries in different ways. In some instances, in ways that were like, visible and obvious currently, but in other ways that I think are not clear now but will become clear in retrospect. AC: Yeah. I will be pretty surprised if there’s

not something bigger than what we’ve already seen for Russia based on the history. It’s not that Russia is in a super cool and chill and prosperous piece of its history, but the Saturn-Neptune

conjunctions have been for hundreds of years for Russia even more dramatic than this. And so

not that, you know, again - not that things aren’t dramatic, but I will be surprised if there is not something more significant that’s not very far away. And I wanted to add one more piece about China’s relationship to this ongoing Saturn-Neptune conjunction, and that is that

modern Communist China has in its natal chart, its initiation chart, a number of planets all in early Libra, which are in the process of being opposed by the Saturn-Neptune conjunction and will be joined in that opposition in April by Mars. CB: Okay. Yeah. Well, and the other

thing - there’s a lot of different alliances that are suddenly coming into play in different ways in different countries, and that’s the other thing that’s starting to look like World War II is how all these different alliances kicked in and came into play during the course of that war.

And you know, there’s reports of like, Russia giving intelligence to Iran right now. There’s

ways in which Iran exported drones to Russia and their relationship in terms of drone warfare.

There is the way in which a lot of oil from Iran normally goes to China, and that’s getting cut off right now or has been interrupted through this war. And then one other like, concerning thing I noticed this month that I didn’t notice before was I'd always seen like, on Reddit over

the years like, periodically people will post some of those old file footage of the US military when in the 1950s they were recording doing all these nuclear tests in like, Nevada and other places.

But I saw somebody post one that I'd seen years ago, and I decided to look up the date on it.

But it’s a test where in the early 1950s, the US was testing out tactical nuclear weapons.

And one of the tests they did was to put one in like, a cannon, and then like, shoot the cannon.

And then it shot out a nuclear bomb that then exploded out of a cannon. And

I looked up the date, and this test happened in 1953 almost exactly on the Saturn-Neptune conjunction when Saturn and Neptune were exact to the degree. And that was really startling, because up to this point, we’d been paying attention to - and I'd been talking about for the past couple of years - my concern about nuclear weapons coming up again and being involved in this war because of

the only other time that they were invented and used in war was last time when Uranus was in Gemini, and when Mars conjoined Uranus in Gemini. But then this kind of clued me in that there might be a Saturn-Neptune signature that’s important for the specific form of tactical nuclear weapons.

And it’s been startling seeing people actually discussing seriously that in the news - like, discussions about the possible use of nuclear weapons actually increasing and ramping up in the news over the course of the past several weeks. AC: Yeah. And there have been periodic

spikes in concern about specifically tactical nukes throughout the Russia-Ukraine conflict.

And there were a few points where very large munitions were used, and time had to be taken to ascertain whether or not it was in fact a tactical nuke, which has been no so far, but it’s like, specifically the concern has been about the tactical nukes rather than the like,

giant intercontinental death clouds. CB: Yeah. Well, and one of the concerns is that right now is that if the US or Israel deployed a nuclear weapon on Iran, aside from just the immediacy of that and what the implications of that would be and the civilian

deaths that that would cause, is also that it would sort of unseal the envelope on that, which then could indicate their use in other areas - like between Russia and Ukraine, for example.

AC: Yeah. And other conflicts that may be started over the next year or two that we can’t see right now. Like, part of this war weather - we’re looking at the largest players, but there’s also been an uptick in smaller conflicts. We have not necessarily that small,

but we have tensions between Pakistan and India also ramping up and up with more and more flare-ups across the border. And yeah, like, these are the big ones we’re talking about, but there will probably also be other conflicts, and maybe they stay separate or maybe they get drawn

into this sort of vortex of war we seem to be in. CB: Yeah. So yeah, that’s kind of where we leave that at in terms of the news, in terms of where everything is currently at the moment, and we’ll certainly see things continue to unfold really rapidly in the next few weeks

as we’ll get into when we get into the forecast. So I wanted to note a few other news stories.

We’re almost at an hour, so we’ll go through maybe just a few quickly. It almost feels like dumb doing other news stories at this point, given the gravity of everything we just talked about.

But there’s a few major ones I wanna touch on. One of them I talked about and emphasized in the last forecast episode and now is turning into increasingly a real thing, which is what’s happening in Cuba where - like I said last month, there’s an oil blockade. Ever since the

US took over Venezuela, it’s been imposing an oil blockade and an energy blockade on Cuba. And this

has plunged the island into a severe energy and humanitarian crisis where the Cuban government is currently kind of desperately engaged in a tense diplomatic negotiations with the United States to restore vital fuel shipments. But President Trump is publicly floating the idea and saying

quite blatantly at this point that he’s about to try to take over the country. And this is causing the fuel shortage, a deepening humanitarian crisis where hospitals are struggling to maintain basic emergency services. It’s postponing thousands of surgeries and forcing rationing of life-saving

emergency services. It’s postponing thousands of surgeries and forcing rationing of life-saving care due to a critical lack of power and medical supplies. And in recent days, Trump has made some statements like, “I do believe that I'll have the honor of taking Cuba. That would be a good honor;

it’s a big honor. I mean, whether I free it or I take it, I think I can do anything I want with it.

If you wanna know the truth, they’re a very weakened nation right now.” Or he said I think just a few days ago, “I built this great military. I said you’ll never have to use it, but sometimes you have to use it, and Cuba is next, by the way. But pretend I didn’t say that. Pretend I didn’t.”

So in the last month’s forecast, I pointed out that Cuba was gonna be one of the next major news stories because I noticed that Cuba dates their revolution to 1953 when the initial wave of the revolution began. And it’s usually celebrated as that’s the start of the revolution is 1953.

revolution began. And it’s usually celebrated as that’s the start of the revolution is 1953.

And of course, that was a Saturn-Neptune conjunction. And those conjunctions only occur every 36 years, and now we’re in a repetition of one now, which implied to me that this would be an important historic turning point in the history of Cuba. And now it’s evolving into this.

Yeah. What do you think, Austin? AC: My internal monologue was, “Oh boy.” I mean, that’s significant. That’s a good call with the Saturn-Neptune revolution. Something that we’ve

that’s significant. That’s a good call with the Saturn-Neptune revolution. Something that we’ve pointed out before but that’s worth noting again is the 1953 revolution was a Communist revolution,

and we literally had the biggest Communist revolution, which was the 1917 Russian Revolution, on a Saturn-Neptune conjunction. The publication of the most important works of Marx were also on

Saturn-Neptune conjunctions. Like, Saturn-Neptune connects to these countries, but also connects to

Saturn-Neptune conjunctions. Like, Saturn-Neptune connects to these countries, but also connects to that particular ideological thread. And the one precedent that I found for Mars conjoining

Saturn-Neptune in Aries, which was from the early 1700s, coincided with the destruction of a Caribbean port city by fire. And considering we have that Mars-Saturn-Neptune in Aries this coming month, I rather hope that that’s not directly parallel to this go-around.

CB: Right. And you’re referring though to Iran and like, Kharg Island?

AC: Well, there’s - so the parallel was the destruction of - so Mars-Saturn-Neptune in Aries last time was the destruction of Port Royal in was it 1703 or 1701? I need to look at the thing. But

it was the near annihilation of that port by fire, and that’s as part of a larger conflict that often gets referred to as World War Zero by the way. That’s a pretty interesting precedent for

Neptune in Aries. And the destruction of a port city by fire in Port Royal, of course, was in the Caribbean, and so there’s a parallel to Cuba which is unsettling. But then also that

same instance also resonates very strongly with the talk about invading and taking over port...

The straits of Hormuz, as that is coming up - that Mars-Saturn-Neptune is coming up next month, you know, the firebombing and destruction of a port city on an island is looking more resonant with what is next. CB: Right. Yeah. When we talked about this in the pre-show planning meeting, you were talking about in the context of Iran and like, Kharg Island and

in terms of the potential for the destruction there versus, yeah, then the current context of talking about Cuba. And hopefully, you know, we’ll see how that goes, but hopefully that’s not the precedent there. AC: Yeah. It’s worryingly resonant

would be the way I might put it. CB: Okay. Yeah. I mean, one of the other precedents that I had mentioned in previous episodes but is worth reiterating is we’ve focused a lot on the repetition of the last two Saturn-Neptune conjunctions in Iran and how

the 1953 one was the US doing a coup and overthrowing the leader, and then 1989 was the leader of Iran dying. But the one before those two was 1917, and what happened then is there was a major famine that occurred in Iran as a result of World War I and different things that were happening as a result of the war. And it caused the death of a lot of people.

So that was one - both in Iran, but also in a few other countries at that time - and that’s one of the things that I'm thinking about now as well in terms of how the fuel and the war cutting off the fuel is also cutting off fertilizer. And we’ll have a bunch of downwind effects in terms of impacting food supplies and other things like that as well.

AC: Yeah. CB:

Yeah. All right. Moving onto other news stories just to hit a few really quick - March 13th, the US released the design for a new dime, which on the design of it, it removed - it usually had like, an eagle holding in one hand like, arrows symbolizing war and in the other hand holding an

olive branch symbolizing peace. And the government now - the Trump administration - has had them drop the olive branch so that now the bird will symbolically just carry arrows. And this happened like, right under the Mercury retrograde conjunct Mars. So symbolically I thought that was a

notable thing that happened astrologically. AC: Yeah. And also the same Mars cycle that we had last time in 1979, when you trace it all the way back to the founding of the US Treasury

always marks significant changes in the way that the United States issues money.

Like, you have differences in coinage; you have dropping silver as legal tender; you have adjusting the value of gold versus the dollar during the gold standard. You have

just like, a change in coins issued, which is part of why this Mars cycle tracks with the value of metals relative to the US dollar, but it also tracks very significantly with the form in which money is issued. And so that’s very consistent with this. And of course,

we have that Mercury retrograde conjunct Mars, which is not only warlike, but is specifically in the cycle under which the US Treasury was created and has this very consistent history with the coinage and the legal tender of all sorts. CB: Nice. Let’s see, other news stories. I

keep seeing people in the news and in headlines that are making references to this being like, a “Berlin Wall moment.” Obviously in particular, they are frequently referring to it in terms of what’s happening with Iran and saying this is Iran’s Berlin Wall moment, or that this is Berlin

Wall moment in terms of the Middle East. But then I'm also seeing people applying that phrase and saying that’s what is happening in Cuba right now or what this moment is about to be in terms of Cuba. But then I've also seen commentators like, applying it to the US and saying that this is

Cuba. But then I've also seen commentators like, applying it to the US and saying that this is like Russia exhausting itself in the Afghanistan wars in the 1980s, which then eventually leads to the Berlin Wall falling and leading to the dissolution of the Soviet Union, partially

due to the economic exhaustion of the 1980s and overextending itself or getting wrapped up in wars. So I was just really struck by that, because of course the very last Saturn-Neptune conjunction

wars. So I was just really struck by that, because of course the very last Saturn-Neptune conjunction 36, 37 years ago was the fall of the Berlin Wall most notably. And to see that language used just by non-astrologers right now is pretty stunning. AC: Yeah, making that connection. And it’s worth

noting that in the former Soviet - or what would become the former Soviet territories, even though that was the beginning of political independence for many of them, it was also the beginning of like, a very difficult and chaotic and in many cases disastrous decade. It was not

a period of prosperity. It was a period of great uncertainty and difficulty.

CB: Yeah, which makes sense in terms of Saturn-Neptune that sometimes it’s what happens when the structure of society that you’ve been relying on just completely collapses all of a sudden, and then there’s this question of like, how to rebuild. Or especially when society had an ideological or belief-based or philosophy or spiritual component up to that

point, like, how do you rebuild coming out of that? And that’s been one of their interesting recurring themes that you and I keep talking about with Saturn-Neptune is a lot of the different Saturn-Neptune - the countries that have Saturn-Neptune prominent oftentimes there’s like, sometimes there’s a political or ideological component, like with

Cuba and the Communist Revolution. There’s Iran with the Saturn-Neptune, and you have like, the Islamic Revolution and the religious component that gets tied in with the government as a theocracy, or other Saturn-Neptune themes. AC: Yeah. Absolutely. And it’s worth noting

in terms of when Mars visits a Saturn-Neptune conjunction, which happens usually once per Saturn-Neptune conjunction - the last time that happened was January 29th, 1990 until March 11th, 1990, and it was during that period on February 7th, 1990, that the Communist Party of the

Soviet Union voted to end its monopoly on power. Right? Which is the end - like, one of the most decisive single moments in the dissolution of what was then the USSR. CB: Wow. Okay. Yeah. So all of that’s big. In other unexpected but interesting news,

CB: Wow. Okay. Yeah. So all of that’s big. In other unexpected but interesting news, AI video and virtual reality hit a wall this month that was interesting not long after the Saturn-Neptune conjunction where on March 18th, Meta or Facebook, now known as Meta, announced

that they’ll be shutting down the Metaverse after pouring something like 80 billion dollars into the project or something like that - their whole virtual reality thing they’re pulling back on.

And then similarly, just days later on March 24th, the day of the Sun-Saturn conjunction, OpenAI announced that it’s closing down Sora, which was one of the biggest AI video generators over the course of the past few years. So it was interesting both in terms of like, Mercury

retrograde stationing direct in Pisces conjunct Mars and a cutting or a cessation of something, but also seeing the Saturn-Neptune now moved fully out of Pisces into Aries and some of the things that were happening under Saturn in Pisces suddenly hitting a wall or being called off in some ways. AC: Yeah.

So I don't know if you emember this, but for a while when we were talking about - especially it was Pluto earlier in Aquarius, and we were talking about AI stuff. And in being a little contrarian, I was talking about how like, yes, there are all these things that are gonna happen, but we need to also look forward to the failures. Like, the attempts to build a future that end up

being disastrous and looked upon with scorn. And I chose the Metaverse as sort of the symbol of like, these would-be futures that would be looked upon as hilarious failures.

And so it’s pretty gratifying to see that project officially described as a failure just right after the perfect Saturn-Neptune conjunction. And as you point out, like, the more precise timing - Mercury stationing direct with that Mars and that North Node, et cetera, et cetera. And so yeah,

I'm gonna stick with that as a symbol and yeah, as the clickable desktop icon for like, incredibly expensive projects that promise a big future but that end up just being a gigantic waste of money, time, and hope. Because there will be more of those,

which doesn’t mean everything fails. But you know, we’re in a time of great failure, Chris, as well as great danger and big history. CB: Yeah. Good call. Good call on that. I mean,

yeah, it is surprising that on the one hand, some of that technology was perfected pretty close to the Saturn-Neptune conjunction on the one hand where we saw another company - there was a Chinese company - I think it was ByteDance’s company releasing a model that was just like, crazy impressive in terms of AI-generated video a month ago, and how now people are able to

generate stuff like that on their computers, versus on the other hand some of that stuff hitting the wall and some of this probably being a reflection of the AI bubble that we know that we’ve been in for the past few years and have been waiting to see if that would pop. And it’s like,

some of these companies are cutting things out because they’re getting ready for an IPO and to go public and stuff like that, but also that’s one of the things that’s gonna be interesting to see with this current economic pullback is how the AI bubble impacts some of that if we have a pullback of some of those things at the same time. AC: Yeah. It makes me think of like,

Neptune-Saturn as a very weird gate. It’s like, what survive - like, what collapses, what pops, and then what doesn’t? Right? What is actually like - because Saturn has that confirming through ordeal quality, right? Like, Saturn is associated primarily with longevity, and something that has longevity is something that makes it through things over and over again.

But Saturn is also the one that points out what doesn’t - Saturn also, in tending that gate, allows some things through and confirms their longevity, but also reaps those things whose time has come. And sometimes that time is very early. And so like, the Saturn-Neptune is a weird

bubble-gate. Like, what survives the pop-pop-pop? CB: Yeah. And back when Mars was squaring

bubble-gate. Like, what survives the pop-pop-pop? CB: Yeah. And back when Mars was squaring Saturn and Neptune a few months ago late last year, we were seeing a lot of talk about bubbles popping and the AI bubble popping. And so we should probably keep that in mind as a major

keyword this month now that Mars is getting to the Saturn-Neptune conjunction, which is the bubble, is Mars is always that sharp object. And in ancient Egyptian astrology, they used a knife to represent the symbol for Mars. And so we’re gonna see Mars come in and pop some bubbles this month during the course of April. AC: Yeah, that’s a really important reminder.

CB: Yeah. All right. Other things to wrap up - I'm gonna skip this. I’m gonna skip...

There was like, celebrity stuff, but it seems like, really sort of trivial to talk about at this point, so I'll skip over some of that stuff. I will say Astro-Seek went down this month, the website for chart calculation. And this is a pretty big deal; I was surprised at the number of astrologers that were impacted by this. I didn’t realize how widely

Astro-Seek was used in the community at this point. Like, I use it a ton, but I thought I was like, one of the only people that was using it to its fullest extent. But evidently a lot of astrologers use Astro-Seek, and I talked to the owner, the founder of it, who’s an awesome astrologer named Petr, and he said he thought it was AI bots at first because he’s seen a surge

of these in recent months. But now he suspects it may be a human actor who’s actually trying to keep the site down. And he’s been doing what he can to try to fix it, but it was closed for weeks to unregistered users and a lot of astrologers were upset by it. It was a rough like,

Mercury retrograde thing that was really intensely focused especially during the retrograde period.

AC: Makes sense. This was - yeah, like, this Mercury was as bad as it gets.

I hope he’s able to recover and stay recovered. CB: Yeah. Absolutely. And actually, let me go back, because I actually don’t wanna accidentally not highlight one, but the Oscars happened, and one of the things that happened was Michael B. Jordan won for best actor. And I didn’t have a lot astrologically to say about it, but the one thing I did say I thought was funny is that he has Virgo

rising. We know his birth time. So his 10th house is actually Gemini, and what was funny is he won

rising. We know his birth time. So his 10th house is actually Gemini, and what was funny is he won for playing in the movie Sinners where he played twins. So that’s a really basic observation to make, but it was just like, funny that the Best Actor this year won for playing two twins in a movie, and he had Gemini - the sign of the twins - on the Midheaven.

AC: Yeah, that’s pretty on-the-nose. CB: Pretty good — AC: I heard Sinners was good; I haven’t - did you see it?

CB: Yeah, I really liked it. It was really good — AC: I haven’t seen it.

Yeah, I hear only good things. CB: It’s more of like, a horror movie, which was interesting in terms of that winning for Best Picture. But it was actually really good on a number of different levels, so. And Michael B. Jordan is awesome and has had this really great career, so seeing him get to this point was actually really cool.

AC: Nice. CB: Interestingly, at the same time, somebody that did not do as well was Timothee Chalamet, who in promoting - doing an Oscar campaign this year, he made some derogatory statements about ballet in the lead-up to it that caused like, a huge amount of pushback. And I thought this was interesting, because when Nick and I did the Saturn-Neptune

of pushback. And I thought this was interesting, because when Nick and I did the Saturn-Neptune episode in history a year ago, one of the things we noted at the time which we thought was interesting and a little weird was that ballet like, came up a couple of times at really important points in its history on Saturn-Neptune conjunctions, especially at two points when two

of the biggest ballet schools in Russia were founded were on Saturn-Neptune conjunctions exactly 36 years apart. And so one side thing that was a weird Saturn-Neptune manifestation was suddenly everybody was talking about ballet again very near the Saturn-Neptune conjunction, which I thought was a funny correlation. AC: That is interesting. And I suppose it

makes sense - like, ballet is so Saturnian. Like, there’s so much structure and so much rigorous body skeletal training that has to take place, but from what I hear - I have never attended a live ballet performance - the actual, like, the content of a lot of ballets is very fantastical

or phantasmal. Like, ballet stories are not like, hard-nosed, grounded realism, right? Like,

or phantasmal. Like, ballet stories are not like, hard-nosed, grounded realism, right? Like,

it’s a very Neptunian, phantasmagoric story or spectacle, but requiring an excruciatingly Saturnian level of control and training. CB: Yeah. And that was what we said at the time in recognizing it. I think it was cool in seeing that come up in the 1700s or whenever it was that

we found around those conjunctions, just because it was like, that super controlled movement is the Saturn piece, but also a fluidity of form. And we thought that was a perfect blend of that too, but it was a really good lesson for me that when you do historical research on astrological cycles that sometimes you have to note things even if it doesn’t seem like that should be relevant in

any way again when that cycle recurs. Sometimes it will be for ways that you can’t anticipate, and over and over again we’ve seen - especially with the Saturn-Neptune conjunction this year - how things from the past come back into the present in sometimes very surprising ways.

AC: Yeah. CB: Yeah. All right.

So the last news story I wanted to mention is just last week, the astrologer Lee Lehman passed away.

And Lee was one of my teachers at Kepler College. I wrote like, a little note - obituary - like, the day she died, so I wanted to read part of that in terms of just what I wrote. So Lee was one of the pioneers in the early revival of traditional astrology from the mid-1980s forward. She was

particularly well-known for her work on horary astrology, which she helped to repopularize in the United States. I first learned horary from Lee at Kepler College where she was deeply involved as a

United States. I first learned horary from Lee at Kepler College where she was deeply involved as a Dean and an instructor in their degree program. That’s why the main episode I did on horary, which is episode 116 of The Astrology Podcast, was with Lee. So her 2002 book, The Martial Art of Horary Astrology, is still a particularly brilliant work on Renaissance style horary.

Lee had a long list of accolades in our community, such as winning a Regulus award, being the first horary astrologer to win the Marc Edmund Jones award, and being involved in a leadership capacity in a number of different organizations. It’s also notable that Lee was one of the few openly gay astrologers in a time in the community where it was not yet as easy or accepted to be

in the 1980s. So her work was characterized by her rigorous and academic approach to traditional astrology, and her unapologetic attitude towards following her heart and her interests even when it set her apart helped to shape the astrological community into what it is today.

So I wanted to — AC: Hear hear!

CB: — yeah, I wanted to recognize Lee for her contributions and just, yeah, as being part of - I remember graduating from Kepler in 2012. Like, I came back and did a late graduation after taking a few years off before they closed down their degree program. And I just remember

having this moment with her afterwards where I said I was like, I said, you know, “I’m in your lineage now,” and then we had a moment and hugged. And it had me thinking about that idea recently of lineage, especially as I was researching the midpoint episode with all the German astrologers in the early 20th century and how that created so many lineages that are still alive to this day,

and how important that is in terms of different people’s teachers and recognizing being part of something that’s bigger than you and who taught you and recognizing them for what they did in your life. AC: Yeah. And for astrology in general. You know,

lineage... Well, astrology is a different and better place because Lee spent so much time in it.

And I did not - Lee was not one of my teachers, but I had the honor of working as Lee’s editor for an essay that I solicited from her for an astrological magic anthology

back in the twenty-teens - that was The Celestial Art. And Lee and I had a good working relationship and both shared an enthusiasm for martial arts, and I actually have - Lee put her

collection of martial arts journals and books into my keeping some years ago. So I still have those in the corner of my office over there, actually. CB: That’s really cool. I love that.

AC: It’s pretty nice to get a martial legacy from someone whose legacy was in part quite martial. Like, being fierce and independent and uncompromising and straightforward.

martial. Like, being fierce and independent and uncompromising and straightforward.

CB: Yeah. She had — AC: Cutting rigor.

CB: She had Mars on the Ascendant. And that’s funny, that’s a funny bit about The Martial Art of Horary Astrology that has like, a martial arts person on the cover is that that was actually part of her interests. So that’s part of why she was like, modeling those or blending those metaphors. But especially she uses that metaphor in the book just to talk about how,

those metaphors. But especially she uses that metaphor in the book just to talk about how, just like with martial arts when you’re doing horary or other forms of astrology, doing those stances and doing the repetition of certain moves over and over again eventually becomes second nature until eventually it’s something you can do without even thinking

about it - just reflexively as part of a fluid movement that becomes part of you, reading astrological charts. AC: Yeah. And she also described the - part of the reason she used the martial art analogy for horary is that it is a two-player game. Like,

you are dealing with the questions as they are incoming, and you have to be able to handle what is thrown at you. Not only do you need moves, but you need to be able to move with the other person.

CB: Yeah. That’s brilliant. So yeah, so check out - like I said, if you go to TheAstrologyPodcast.com/Episodes, go to episode 116 and there’s a brilliant episode I did with Lee on horary astrology and also I did one with her on medical astrology as well, which is another subject that she excelled in and wrote a book about. So

yeah, it was a big loss for the community today.

All right. All right, my friend. Let’s take a little break.

AC: All right. CB: I wanted to give a shoutout to our sponsor, which is the Northwest Astrological Conference, which is happening in Seattle May 21st through the 25th, 2026. So you can join the conference either in person in Seattle, or you can attend online from anywhere with their affordable virtual streaming options.

NORWAC is one of the longest running astrology conferences in the world, and the 2026 conference is gonna be a bit more of an intimate gathering designed for you to easily connect with speakers and make new friends in a welcoming, inclusive, and community-focused environment.

Hear from over 30 leading astrologers and choose from a wide range of lectures and workshops covering both modern and ancient techniques. To learn more, sign up, or visit NORWAC.net.

And I just checked in with the organizer, Lauren; she said there’s still spaces over for the in-person conference. So if you’d like to get a ticket for that or you’re thinking about attending in person, then you might want to do so soon just because tickets are limited because they’re doing more of an intimate gathering this year. So definitely get your

tickets soon if you wanna sign up for that. AC: Yeah, and I'll see you there. I’m doing

both a workshop and a lecture there. After a brief hiatus last year, I'm back to being a piece of furniture you can expect at NORWAC. But like, that said, I'm very happy to be a piece of

furniture at NORWAC; it is an honor. It’s a great conference. It’s always a great conference, and I find it incredibly stimulating. There are always so many ideas, so many people. It’s always fun to

meet new people, especially to discover that the people you kind of know online are actually way better in person. It’s easy to see the worst in people from the distance of the internet, and so it’s always nice to meet people in person and to feel like the world’s a less awful place,

and to benefit from the sort of synergy that comes from gathering so many astrologers together in one place. I’m looking forward to it. CB: Yeah. And to make some new friends and connect with people in person, to learn things and be exposed to things maybe you wouldn’t have been exposed to otherwise. Make new friends. You and I basically met in person at an

astrology conference, Austin. We met online, but we became friends when we got together in person at a conference, and sometimes it can create lifelong friendships that you don’t expect until you go there. So it makes a huge difference. And especially during like, times like these, I feel like getting together is even more important in some ways. You know,

I was looking back the astrologers in Germany in the 1920s and ‘30s, and they were doing astrology conferences as long as they could. And sometimes having a community like that during hard times, I think, can be really important. AC: Yeah, absolutely. And it just underscores how important it is to get together in person, and reminds you that the internet is

not the same. Sometimes we - it’s very easy to feel like you’re in contact with people if you communicate with them regularly over the web, but getting together in person is a strong reminder that it’s different and better. CB: Yeah. Especially regardless of what political

or geopolitical or world events are taking place, just to yeah, share this thing that we have in common, and astrology is one of those things that brings together people from so many different backgrounds and walks of life and like, countries and languages and all sorts of different things by giving people a sense of commonality from having this shared language

feels more important now than ever to remind people of, yeah, the things they share in common rather than the things that are different. AC: Yeah. And I would add to that the range of ages at any astrology conference. Like, there will be people 20 to 80,

and you’re all there for the same thing. And you know, in more day-to-day life, we tend - a lot of people tend to gather with people closer to their own age, which is fine and makes sense. But

it’s also nice to realize that you’re part of a thing that multiple generations are participating in and have been participating in. CB: Absolutely. Yeah. And if you do attend the conference in person, like, do me a favor and go up to different people and introduce yourself, especially if there’s anybody - I think it’s hard sometimes when people first attend a conference.

They may not know anybody, and they may have a harder time if they don’t know anybody yet, whereas a lot of the people that do know people are like, catching up and reconnecting with friends. But yeah, if you see other people, especially if it’s their first time,

with friends. But yeah, if you see other people, especially if it’s their first time, go up and introduce yourself, and sometimes you’ll make really great connections and friendships that’ll last a lifetime. And additionally, for those that are not attending in person, if you can’t attend in person you can attend online, and that’s what I've been doing the past few years.

And yeah, you can still get a lot out of the online streaming option, and it’s really great that NORWAC has been on the leading edge of making that an option for people that can’t attend and integrating more of the online community in a way that feels really good and really inclusive. So I'll be there probably in the audience as well this year.

AC: Nice. CB: Yeah. So check it out at NORWAC.net, and I'll put a link in the description below this episode on YouTube or on the podcast website.

All right, my friend, let’s transition into talking about the astrology of April.

It’s gonna be a big and eventful month for some of the reasons we’ve already mentioned, like, multiple times at this point, but let’s do a deep dive into the astrology and really start talking about what is coming up. So here’s the planetary movements calendar that shows where the planets will start at the beginning of the month and where they’ll end

up by the end of the month. And as you can see by this diagram, all the planets are in a very specific part of the zodiac where they’re practically all moving through the sign of Aries.

At one point, I know you note, Austin, that around the time of the New Moon that takes place in Aries when the Sun and Moon conjoin in that sign, we have practically what is it? Like,

six planets all in the same sign, right? AC: Yeah. We’ve got Sun, Moon, Mercury, Mars, Saturn, and Neptune all in Aries. CB: Crazy. So that’s a huge stellium that reminds me of the huge stellium that happened in Capricorn earlier this year in June - sorry,

in January - especially around the time of the US invading Venezuela. And we have, once again, another huge stellium which is gonna be important for all of the like, recurrence transits that that’s gonna set off and activate in history of different people in the past who either had Aries

stelliums or have specific conjunctions between some of the planets that are, again, gonna conjoin this month like Mars conjunct Saturn or Mars conjunct Neptune, or Mars, Saturn, and Neptune all conjunct, or the quadruple conjunction of like, Mercury-Mars-Saturn-Neptune. There’s a lot

of combinations all coming into focus this month. AC: There sure are. We could say that the action this month is very focused, and it’s very focused in Aries which gives things a fiery, kinetic,

powerful, dynamic - trying to not use dire words for a second - but yeah.

Very kinetic, dynamic, powerful, fiery, explosive, bloody-minded set of combinations.

CB: Yeah. One of the things it reminds me of - especially this Mars-Saturn conjunction that’s gonna peak mid-month - is it reminds me of the stellium that happened in like, March and April of 2020 when the covid lockdowns hit, especially in the US. And that Mars-Saturn

conjunction especially that happened in Capricorn and Aquarius and everything just suddenly like, ground to a halt. And it’s weird, because that’s contradicting energy this month in terms of it’s happening in what is usually a sign - the sign of Aries is a sign of like, movement

and forward momentum and speed and other things like that. But then all of a sudden, Mars is running into this conjunction with Saturn, which usually has this impact of slowing things down, of bringing things to a halt, of things coming to a screeching stop, just like, slamming the brakes

on on your car is like, the common metaphor that you and I have used for years of Mars-Saturn. And

in one way, I mean, that’s gonna be the energy of this month in one way in general. But of course, like, geopolitically, I can already - it’s giving me 2020 vibes, because I'm already seeing pictures in other countries of like, fuel shortages and people running to get gas and gas being rationed and things like that, and realizing that there’s like, these waves of something coming that hasn’t

hit yet, but you can see it on the horizon, and we can see a peak of it coming up here this month with the Mars-Saturn conjunction. AC: Yeah, absolutely. And so that - not just the contradiction, but the friction between pressing the brake and the gas to the floor

at the same time creates a lot of stress, right? Like, that’s good way to destroy a car, because it’s not just that - like, even though the result may be very little motion, the motion is actually contained within the structure and acts to degrade or destroy the structure.

And internally for an individual, a lot of times that feels incredibly frustrating, right, because you’re trying to do something, but there’s so much resistance that it’s difficult. Or we could also

just see it as needing to lift a tremendous weight where the resistance is the raw mass of something, and you’re having to use everything within you to barely budge it. And as we’ve described both

in advance and in retrospect over the last many years, the Mars-Saturn conjunctions on a macro level, on a historical level, are most unfortunate. They describe very difficult periods

of time. We were using them during the covid peak to literally predict when the death tolls

of time. We were using them during the covid peak to literally predict when the death tolls would spike, because they coincided very, very cleanly with when things would get worse. And so — CB: New variants. New variants kept showing up every like, Mars-Saturn

alignment, especially conjunction. AC: Yeah. And so and they’re used throughout the tradition of astrology to time disasters, to time illness. In natal charts, you derive the Lot of Enemies and the Lot of Illness from the relationship of Mars and Saturn,

as well as the Lot of Death. And then the one lot that is derived by their relationship that is not just death, enemies, or illness is actually the Lot of Soldiering and Conscription.

CB: Nice. That makes sense. AC: Which is interesting when we consider that in the past, Neptune in Aries happens to have coincided with periods where conscription was introduced for the first time. Great Britain had conscription

introduced for the very first time under Neptune in Aries, and so did the United States.

But yeah, it’s a frustrating, hard, potentially dangerous, injurious, real pain in the ass of a conjunction. CB: Yeah. It is traditionally the most negative alignment of the two malefic planets in traditional and ancient astrology of Mars that

has the extreme of hot, fiery nature, versus Saturn that has the opposite extreme of this cold, dry nature. And in terms of the alignment itself, here’s a 10-degree orb alignment to give you a picture of like, the broader conjunction that we’re looking at this month for those

watching the video version where by April 4th, they come within 10 degrees of a conjunction while Mars is still in late Pisces. But it really starts ramping up about April 9th, because that’s when Mars is gonna move into the sign of Aries, and then very quickly we’re gonna see that conjunction start coming into focus rapidly before eventually peaking around April 19th when the conjunction

goes exact around seven degrees of Aries. And then after that point, it doesn’t reach being 10 degrees away from Saturn until like, May 4th. But it will continue to be copresent even after that. So even though this is the degree-based peak, that energy is still gonna continue

that. So even though this is the degree-based peak, that energy is still gonna continue to be potent through the early part of May. AC: Yeah. It’s absolutely the center of the show in April. There are a lot of planets in Aries, but in many cases they - the planets’

travel through Aries gain import because they’re visiting this Mars-Saturn conjunction.

And most especially Mercury, but Neptune and we’ll talk about them individually, but the one thing to remember about April is that’s when we have the Mars-Saturn conjunction in Aries, which — CB: Yeah. AC: — as we discussed earlier,

CB: Yeah. AC: — as we discussed earlier, does not augur a cessation of hostilities or difficulties for the world, but instead predicts an intensification of many of the difficulties and the suffering already underway.

CB: Yeah. Absolutely. And I liked your, like, internally it’s often - as you described - like, psychologically can feel like a feeling or there’s circumstances that give you an internal feeling of tension. And we were talking about and often talk about the scenario where you’re wanting to move

tension. And we were talking about and often talk about the scenario where you’re wanting to move forward, but you’re held back. But there can also be scenarios where you’re wanting to hold back and plan things out, but you’re forced to push forward all of a sudden by something that’s like, needling you or by circumstances outside of your control that are pushing you in a certain

direction and forcing you to go in one way rather than another, which also results in this feeling of like, internal tension at the same time. AC: Yeah, it’s that like, grinding your teeth.

And I think you’re dead on in describing the being pushed forward even though it’s not the right time, even though there are a lot of obstacles. Because under the circumstances in which the two conjoin this time, it is in Mars’s sign, and so Mars is decidedly

the stronger of the two in the space of Aries. And so it’s almost like forcing - the engine is stronger than the brakes, and so the car goes forward, but with maximum internal contradiction because the brake is fully pressed. CB: Yeah. And if that wasn’t pleasant enough,

we also just before that have a Mars-Neptune conjunction because of course, Saturn and Neptune are both very close at this point. But Saturn has moved just a little bit past Neptune, so as a result of that, the first major alignment is actually Mars conjoining Neptune, which goes exact around April 12th. And with a three-degree orb, that’s really gonna start ramping up around

April 8th and April 9th, especially once Mars enters Aries. And it’s gonna last with the three-degree orb at least all the way until around the 17th, but peaking on the 12th. So it’s like, that Mars-Neptune peaks on the 12th, and then the Mars-Saturn peaks on the 19th.

But with Mars-Neptune, you know, one of the keywords for that is like, the fog of war where in the past we’ve seen instances where there’s like, a military action that takes place, but sometimes there’s a mistaken target, or like, the wrong person is sometimes literally in people’s personal

lives it can be an instance of like, lashing out at somebody or taking a swing at somebody and hitting somebody as a result of a mistaken understanding of like, who you think you’re hitting or what you think that they did to you can be a common scenario with Mars-Neptune. Because

Mars usually represents acts of war or aggression or fighting, whereas Neptune represents having an illusion or being deceived about something or not having a clear picture about a situation.

AC: Yeah. Or more neutrally but dangerous in this context, just imagination.

Right? Like, we don’t want to combine firearms with imagination. Imagination is

a beautiful thing, but a lot of imagination and loaded firearms are a bad combination.

CB: Right. Yeah. So other keywords - like we said, the fog of war. Mars-Neptune - what’s interesting about Neptune is like, Saturn - all three of these planets, actually, in ancient and modern astrology have different associations with either deception or with lying.

Like, Saturn was one of the ancient planets that had to do with outright deception or concealing one’s deceit is one of the significations Valens gives for Saturn, whereas Mars had to do with the taking away of something or like, thieving or stealing something. And Neptune is like,

the contemporary planet that has to do with things that look real but often aren’t real or are illusory for some reason. So it’s kind of a tricky combination, both obviously in terms of world events and political events that are gonna be taking place that we can already anticipate, but also in terms of whatever house this is transiting through in your personal charts,

just being extremely careful this month because there is a chance for conflicts and for tensions to arise, but also there’s a high likelihood that you may not have a clear picture surrounding what’s actually happening. And there will be an element of either you not understanding what’s going on, or other people that you’re involved with in your life not having a clear

picture of what’s going on and tensions rising and peaking as a result of that.

AC: Yeah. Absolutely. Right? Mars-Saturn is dangerous enough, and then Neptune introduces this lack of clarity or potentially holding the wrong person accountable for a wrong done, or imagining wrongs done that are not real, which just increases the element of danger and confusion

and actions that people will regret later. Right? Avenging a wrong that was never done creates a cycle of distrust and hostility and violence. CB: Yeah, and especially thinking about when Neptune’s tied in, sometimes there’s issues of like, as we were saying

earlier with the Saturn-Neptune conjunction, of like, belief or philosophy or religious beliefs or other things like that that get tied into the picture in some way. Like sometimes, you know, a Mars-Neptune combination can be like, the spiritual warrior or a religious warrior,

which in an extreme sense can be like, you know, a fanatic or fanaticism that becomes militarized.

In other instances, maybe it’s some higher version of that, but the chance for it to be the lower version is probably pretty easy. AC: Yeah. It’s just as good if not better.

And as you brought up during the earlier section, it’s also useful and important to think of this as Mars comes to visit the Saturn-Neptune conjunction. Right? So the things that are in the process of collapse or near collapse or the bubbles that look very fragile

that haven’t quite popped are all visited by Mars, right, which hastens any decline or collapse that’s about to happen or is underway and is there to... Again, as you said, like, literally brings a pokey near the bubbles, right? Like — CB: Yeah.

AC: — those vulnerable bubbles which people are looking at and saying, “That is a bubble, but it has not popped yet,” Mars literally brings the pop-pop-pop right next to the bubble.

CB: Yeah. It’s like if you had a bubble shop and you sell bubbles, and then a customer comes in that sells needles, basically. AC: Right.

CB: And it’s not a great combination. AC: Yeah, or a customer walks in wearing like, cartoonishly evil spiked armor. You’re like, oh — CB: Right.

AC: — get him out of here. CB: Yeah. Or he has like, a mohawk that’s just like, spikes. AC: Yeah. Some like, late ‘70s, early ‘80s punk rock just spikes everywhere. CB: Exactly. So a lot of bubble-popping energy.

There’ll probably be personal bubble-popping in people’s lives as well as the larger bubble poppings. What else do we need to talk about with respect to that? I’m trying to think of

poppings. What else do we need to talk about with respect to that? I’m trying to think of any other big picture things we need to say about Mars-Saturn-Neptune before we go into more of a granular take. Anything else? AC: Just wanted to reiterate the one clear

precedent we have for Mars-Saturn-Neptune in Aries, which was in 1703, and we had the Jamaica town of Port Royal - which was the center of trade in the western hemisphere at that time - was basically annihilated by fire. So that’s pretty Saturn-Neptune Aries

in that we have the fire. We also have a disruption of trade. We also have potential destruction on islands, which again is very resonant with what the near future looks like at this point. And then it was also during that point, Chris, if you’ll remember me banging on

about the 47 ronin incident that occurred that was during a previous Saturn-Neptune conjunction which was a famous incident in Japanese history where a group of 47 ronin avenged their former, I

don't know what the term is, master - their former lord with like, a crazy surprise assassination, and then were arrested and then all were allowed to commit suicide. It’s both a thing that happened as well as a literary thing that involved the Mars-Saturn, because it was a literal killing to

avenge another killing that ended in suicide that ended up echoing in a literary way. The actual

act of assassination which was later punished was during the Mars-Saturn-Neptune conjunction in Aries. So as Port Royal burns, the plot of the 47 ronin to avenge their lord takes place.

in Aries. So as Port Royal burns, the plot of the 47 ronin to avenge their lord takes place.

CB: Oh wow. Okay. AC: Right, it’s literally — CB: Yeah. AC: — crazy samurai murder revenge

CB: Yeah. AC: — crazy samurai murder revenge thing that would echo throughout history occurs during the last Mars-Saturn-Neptune conjunction in Aries. While Port Royal burns. CB: Wow. Okay. Yeah. So that’s going on, and what’s crazy is that it’s not just those three planets. It’s like, we’re emphasizing and

delineating those three, but then Mercury comes in at almost the exact same time and creates not just a triple conjunction but a quadruple conjunction with all four of those planets in early to mid-April. And this is the 5th and final conjunction - like,

spectacular conjunction - between Mercury and Mars. And here’s a diagram that Paige, our graphic designer, one of our graphic designers, made for us, Paige Herbert, showing these five conjunctions. And the first one was way back in October in Scorpio.

Then there was one in November in Sag. Then of course, the one in the middle of January in Capricorn. We just did the retrograde one in Pisces in March. And now on April 20th,

in Capricorn. We just did the retrograde one in Pisces in March. And now on April 20th, just after like, the Mars-Saturn conjunction has gone exact, we get our 5th and final Mercury-Mars conjunction in the sign of Aries at about eight degrees of Aries, very closely aligned with that Saturn-Neptune conjunction which is also conjunct Mars at the same time.

So I forgot to mention earlier that these don’t happen that often; they happen in pairs every 15 to 17 years - there’ll be two of them that are separated by two years.

But there was one that happened back in ‘78 and ‘79. Look at this - there was five Mercury-Mars conjunctions, and it started in like, November of ‘78, then February of ‘79, April 2nd of 1979, and then finally May 6th of 1979 in Aries. So we have that repetition

as well as the one I mentioned earlier in terms of the 2008-2009 depression onset as well as the 1929-1930 depression onset that also coincided with this somewhat unique series that only happens every 15 to 17 years. So yeah. AC: Right? All of which confirm that

basic association, that linkage that we were discussing earlier between Mercury and trade.

CB: Yeah. And the markets. AC: Like, yeah. And well, if there’s no - the markets will reflect trade going poorly. And so just like our last March Mercury-Mars-North-Node disaster coincided with a significant decline in the capacity to trade because the goods couldn’t

move, we have this is our 5th and final and not only is it Mercury-Mars again, but like March, there is another malefic. There is Saturn right there. And so this is another instance of a spectacularly afflicted Mercury - not just the Mars-Mercury, but with another malefic present

by conjunction. And so we would expect mercurial conditions to not improve or to worsen even during

by conjunction. And so we would expect mercurial conditions to not improve or to worsen even during the middle of the month when this is very active. CB: Yeah. And one of the things that Mercury is always said to do in ancient astrology is to exaggerate or emphasize or exacerbate whatever

planets that it’s with and to take on their nature, whether they’re benefic or malefic, but then also to magnify them. And so it’s like, Mercury’s coming in, it’s taking on the nature of like, Mercury-Neptune, which is usually somewhat deceitful alignment, it’s taking on the nature of Mercury-Mars, which is a combative, argumentative

interruptive type of alignment, and then it’s taking in the character of Mercury-Saturn, which usually is a bit more like, restrained and planning things out, but it’s in a very close tension with the other Mars and Neptune aspects. AC: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.

CB: So let me put up the actual chart so that people can see what this looks like, because we’ve been looking at these alignments in isolation, but this is what it looks like when Mercury goes in around the time of that New Moon in Aries, and we get these six planets all at

the same time in the middle of the month in that sign. And then eventually, Mercury catches up to Saturn and Mars just after their conjunction so that all three planets at one point are in the same degree at seven degrees of Aries. AC: Yeah, it’s spectacularly focused.

CB: Yeah. Okay. So let’s go back to the - well, there’s one other big like, picture thing that I should mention, which is the Uranus ingress. AC: Yeah.

CB: In order to hit the big stuff first. So this is our diagram, the one that we’re gonna be using a lot over the course of the next seven years and have already been using a lot over the course of

the past year. So we see Uranus is going into the sign of Gemini April 25th, 2026, and it’s gonna stay there all the way until May 22nd, 2033, when it finally moves into Cancer for the final time.

And then that is the opening point for those four Mars-Uranus conjunctions first starting on the US solar return on July 4th, 2026, at three degrees of Gemini. Then every two years we’ll get another one of those - first in June of 2028, then June of 2030, and finally June of 2032.

So this is a really big shift in terms of outer planets alignments, and we’ve been talking about it for years and anticipating it. Like I said, it was like, episode 10 or something of The Astrology Podcast with Nick was about Uranus in Gemini and what that meant coming up, and Nick in that episode predicted a major war breaking out in

2025 and 2026 when this ingress takes place. And it’s kind of stunning now that we’re there that we’re literally seeing it unfold almost perfectly in terms of that ingress happening this month.

AC: Yep. CB: So other things, though, to personalize it - obviously, changes in technology and transportation, in language are other major themes with Uranus in Gemini. And for people’s personal lives, you probably got a preview of what this transit’s gonna be about between July 7th and November 7th of last year when Uranus

first dipped into Gemini. But now it’s bringing this disruptive, innovative, somewhat exciting energy where for some people, it’s gonna cause - not cause, it’s gonna coincide with - radical changes that are unexpected that you can’t anticipate. It’s something that comes out of

left field that will radically change the Gemini sector of your chart and especially whatever whole sign house Uranus is moving into at this time and preparing you for a period of rapid changes over the course of the next seven years is one of the things I think each person should think about in

terms of how this is gonna impact you personally. AC: Yeah, absolutely. And even though Uranus in Gemini is almost marks a crazy period of history for the United States, it’s not as uniformly

violently disruptive as an individual transit. Like, that’s the US chart - it has Mars with Uranus. Like, most of us don’t have Mars with Uranus in Gemini. We’re not doing that, right?

Uranus. Like, most of us don’t have Mars with Uranus in Gemini. We’re not doing that, right?

Uranus as a transiting influence, especially in Gemini, is just bursting with new ideas, right? Some of them are bad! But it’s bursting with new ideas. It is in every way the enemy

right? Some of them are bad! But it’s bursting with new ideas. It is in every way the enemy or the antidote to stagnation, and you know, I think a lot of people are going to experience a, “Oh, this is the way around that,” or “This is the way to solve that,” or “This is something I can do and I didn’t even know this was an option before.”

You know, Uranus will show a way that nobody even thought of to get from Point A to Point B.

Rather than being stuck with the same old options, Uranus in Gemini literally offers a whole new angle or a whole new approach to a problem. CB: Yeah. And in some ways, it’s gonna be really great, because Uranus going into Gemini in an air sign in some ways is much more complementary

for Uranus, whereas I feel like Uranus going through Taurus was more tricky because Taurus is a fixed sign by nature, whereas Uranus likes to shake things up and disrupt things, whereas Uranus in Gemini are a lot more similar in that way in terms of Gemini is more discursive and

likes doing multiple things or holding multiple ideas at the same time, doing two things at the same time. Whereas Uranus tends to be very like, forward-thinking and looking forward to the future

same time. Whereas Uranus tends to be very like, forward-thinking and looking forward to the future and sometimes pushing things to the future as rapidly as possible so that there’s more of a sort of like, sympathetic way that those energies combine.

AC: Yeah, absolutely. And you know, if we think about one of Uranus’s core significations, which is its connection to the idea of liberty or freedom, Gemini offers a lot more liberty or freedom to say and do a hundred different things, whereas Taurus being an earth sign - so it has

a certain weight to it as well as being fixed - is by nature not as open to experimentation and presents less options. And another positive thing about the history of Uranus in Gemini is that basically the entire - almost all of the important things that have happened in the history

of the larger ideology or philosophy of political liberalism - not like, the current faction that gets called that in the United States, but like, the idea that personal, individual freedom should be significantly prioritized in the formation of any government - right, like,

that, the pro-liberty philosophy which the United States was basically built around, the history both of thought and enactment of that tradition gets a huge installment and usually a

refresh that makes it stronger and healthier during the time that Uranus is in Gemini.

And of course, there is no history of liberalism without also bringing with it democracy.

And so I for one would love to see the ideals and enactment of pro-freedom and democracy like, refreshed. It’s not been looking great recently! And so I hope that this installment

like, refreshed. It’s not been looking great recently! And so I hope that this installment brings with it another - some fresh shoots in that particular strand of political thought.

CB: Yeah, that’s a really great point, and I'm glad you said that. Because yeah,

it does make you think of all those guys like Thomas Paine and people that were like, writing around the time of the American Revolution that were - their writings and the way that they were speaking and communicating, which is kind of like a Gemini type thing, were inspiring revolutionary ideals that did shake up and change the existing structures of society at that point.

And then similarly in the middle of the 1800s in the US, we had similar things happening in terms of emancipation and the end of slavery and other things like that that were also being motivated sometimes by writings or by literature and by discussions that were happening amongst people

that led to actual tangible changes. So that could be one of the brightest parts is - unfortunately sometimes there’s a culmination or things head to some sort of critical junction where things get really bad first — AC: Yeah.

CB: — but it reaches a point where things get really bad, and then that is what forces change eventually as well. AC: Yeah. Right? Like, the United States had to fight a civil war to actually live up to the promise of individual rights for all of the

citizens. Right? Like, looking back, it’s like, oh the result is good, but the - if you were

citizens. Right? Like, looking back, it’s like, oh the result is good, but the - if you were heading into that crisis - and in many ways we are heading into a crisis rather than looking back on it - it looked pretty grim. And it’s also worth noting that the ideals which became part of the

Declaration of Independence were actually written down and widely discussed and disseminated exactly one Uranus cycle earlier than that when John Locke published all of his major works. So this history of this kind of thinking times with Uranus in Gemini well before the American Revolution.

CB: Okay. Yeah. So that’s something we’ll be paying attention to that’ll have an onset with Uranus going into Gemini this month, and it’ll be important for us to note - are there major discussions like that that start to arise? Because whatever discussions - one of the things we can all pay attention to, not just in terms of mundane astrology in terms of news events, but also in our

personal lives is any time a planet - especially an outer planet - moves into a new sign, you’re gonna start seeing changes happening in an area of your life that corresponds with the part of the chart that it just moved into. And you might not think those are gonna be a big deal at first, but in retrospect, you realize that was the start of some major changes

and a new chapter of your life that coincided with the ingress of that planet into that sign.

AC: Yeah, a hundred percent. And yeah, so like, as we get into this - to Uranus back in Gemini, like, at the end of the month and for the next couple of months, like, pause for a second and see if anything from basically last summer comes up that maybe didn’t seem that significant at the time,

but it’s repetition. Like, oh, this idea is back again; this option is back again. Because this

will be the second time that Uranus has gone through those same degrees of early Gemini.

CB: Absolutely. Yeah. Okay, so let’s back up and let’s go look at the charts for the beginning of the month to do more of a granular breakdown of stuff now that we’ve talked about the two - the big overview of the major things. So here is today, and oh yeah! Right

away... This is the chart for the beginning of the month, because we open the month right away with a Full Moon in the sign of Libra and we get our first lunation of the month already as soon as we open, yeah? AC: Yeah. I think it’s pretty clear - I mean, it’s

not April yet; we’re a few days out as we speak, but it’s pretty clear that things will begin pretty full tide, pretty high tide as it were. CB: Yeah. I should note that we’re recording today on March 28th, 2026, earlier in the afternoon. And yeah, so Full Moon in Libra. One of the

things that’s nice is for the first few days of the month, Mercury’s applying to trine Jupiter, and it doesn’t complete that trine until like, it clears it it looks like by April 3rd.

Because like, after that point, even though it’s not close, then Mercury’s just applying to Mars again even though it doesn’t actually fully catch up to it until Aries. But

it’s nice at the very beginning of the month that at least it opens with this somewhat positive Mercury-Jupiter trine where Mercury is trying to resolve and clean up some of the things that it did or that happened during the Mercury retrograde, including you know, we talked about the shipping delays and everything grounding to a halt. In the US, there’s also been

travel delays with the TSA hasn’t been paid and so during the retrograde there’s been huge delays in air travel as a result of people getting stuck trying to go through security for like, five hours at some airports. AC: Yeah. And so not only do we have this Mercury-Jupiter trine, which is - as you put it well - like, is literally going to try to help us

at least remedy or repair or improve some of the difficulties which have been incurred.

But both the Sun and Moon at the time of this Full Moon are applying to an aspect with Jupiter.

Right? Mercury is applying, so is the Sun, and so is the Moon. And so the potential for rebalancing or repair or getting your footing or getting coherent with where you are and what needs to be done as opposed to just kind of being in survival mind while chaos ensues is pretty excellent. Like,

the multiple planets applying to Jupiter don’t fix everything, but they certainly provide the opportunity to improve the situation or to improve our orientation and navigational capacity around whatever situation we’re in. CB: Yeah. And the ruler of the Full Moon in

Libra is Venus, which has just recently moved into her home sign of Taurus. And

she has to get through this tough aspect with Pluto at the beginning of the month that culminates I think on April 3rd when Venus squares Pluto from five Taurus to five Aquarius. But

once she clears that, it’s kind of smooth sailing because then Venus is applying to a sextile with Jupiter all month, which eventually culminates around April 12th. And it’s one of our most positive aspects of the month, which is weird because it completes just as our most negative aspects of the month are starting to ramp up. Because we can see Mars

conjoining Neptune at two degrees of Aries at this time, and then after that it’ll start moving into pretty rapidly that conjunction with Saturn. But Venus in Taurus is a highlight this month once it clears that square with Pluto. AC: Yeah. Venus is one of the only planets that’s

not in Aries for two-thirds of the month. And Venus is not only in great condition in Taurus and completely off-angle, kind of in a position to be unaffected by the craziness

happening in Aries, but then also as you just said, forms this lovely sextile with Jupiter!

And so there’s this weird little pocket of like, joy, leisure, ease, excellence, like, in this one little area of life even though there are firestorms raging not far away. Like, there’s

this beautiful little pocket, this 12th of the zodiac where things actually look pretty - like, not just okay, but like, actively great. CB: Yeah. Especially if you have something around 16 degrees of one of those two signs, let’s say Cancer or Taurus, or one of the

signs that’s closely aspecting that, it could be a positive little thing that happens just before...

Like I was noticing there was somebody that was like, booking a trip, for example, I saw, and they were doing it for this right before things get really heavy just a few days later with the Mars-Saturn. And I could see some people squeezing in some good things there.

That actually brings up that electionally, in terms of the most auspicious election of the month that Leisa Schaim and I found for trying to launch some major things before things get serious, the best chart this month is earlier in the month on April 1st.

So our most auspicious election this month that we recommend takes place on April 1st, 2026, around 12:55 PM local time. In our location, that’s like, late Cancer rising.

So if you cast your chart for your location, try to adjust the chart, set it for your city and then set it for late Cancer rising, and you’ll end up with a chart that looks like this with Cancer rising, and Jupiter is in the first whole sign house in a day chart. It is direct.

It is in pretty good shape there in the first whole sign house. We’re able to catch that Mercury-Jupiter trine while it’s still applying with Mercury having reception in Jupiter’s sign of Pisces and applying to a trine with it. The Moon is in Libra as the ruler of the Ascendant in the 4th whole sign house, so it could be good for 4th house things which are sometimes like,

home or family-related things. But the 4th house is also just things that are more private or sort of like, behind-the-scenes are good 4th house things as well.

Let’s see. This chart would not be good for the most part for 9th house things, just because Mars is in the 9th house in a day chart. So it would not be good for like, a trip to a foreign country, for example, might not be recommended for this chart in terms of 9th house things. But otherwise,

this is our best electional chart for the month just because it allows you to squeeze things in before the most difficult aspects really start to ramp up, especially the Mars-Saturn conjunction.

So Leisa and I found some other charts if you need other dates this month for doing things. Check out

our electional astrology podcast which we just released a few days ago for April where we found I think 10 other charts on 10 other days that you can take advantage of this month for trying to not just launch major things during good times, but also figuring out how to navigate around some of the most difficult dates this month and still, you know, launch things or take actions

and other things like that. AC: Great. And on that note, generally speaking during April, if you can get it done before the 9th, you’re probably gonna be happy you did that. CB: Yeah. So it’s just like, I'm gonna be,

if I can - I mean, usually I take a break at the beginning of the month with the podcast. But I'm

gonna be possibly like, working like a madman trying to get some episodes recorded and released so I can get it out while Mars is still in Pisces before the 10th when it makes that ingress into Aries, because there’s gonna be a huge vibe shift that’s gonna happen in that changeover between the 8th and the 9th when Mars moves into that sign. AC: Yeah. You’ll be able

to hear the boss music start playing. CB: Right. The old Nintendo NES boss music.

AC: Right. The like, obscenely unfair, “you’re gonna die like, 400 times and get really frustrated and throw the controller across the room” music.

CB: Like the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle game type? That’s a deep — AC: Yeah. CB: — deep cut. Okay. So before - one really quick

AC: Yeah. CB: — deep cut. Okay. So before - one really quick one to mention, you know, because Mercury clears the trine with Jupiter on the 2nd and the 3rd, which is too bad. Venus squares Pluto on the 3rd. Can we just mention a keyword for that? Like, sometimes it can be like, manipulation in relationships or issues of

for that? Like, sometimes it can be like, manipulation in relationships or issues of power and control and power dynamics that come up in a relational context.

AC: Yeah. That’s absolutely a thing that Venus square Pluto brings. And then also, the like, the fear of or being haunted by like, wondering whether that’s the case. Like,

“Oh, I'm having a good time, but is this actually secretly fucked up?” Like, because even the thought of maybe there’s something else going on here, maybe there’s nefarious or

shady things happening is corrosive to trust and can ruin or if not ruin, like, corrode what would otherwise be a good time. So both the reality of it, but also even just the shadow of the potential that things are manipulative or deceitful is in and of itself an affliction

to the good times we might otherwise have. CB: Yeah. That’s a great point. Like,

the paranoia sometimes that can come with that. And it’s like, that aspect gets triggered and set off by the Moon going into Scorpio the same day on the 3rd and then squaring Pluto at five Aquarius and opposing Venus. So I think that’s gonna be an intense kind of day in terms of especially relationally in terms of relationships. But then the very next day, April 4th,

by then Venus clears Pluto and it starts moving a degree away, and at the same time the Sun hits about 15 degrees of Aries and starts squaring Jupiter over that day on the 4th and April 5th, which is kind of a positive aspect. And I feel like there’ll be a little bit of

a tension release coming off of the Venus-Pluto square going into the Sun-Jupiter square just in terms of what that’ll feel like in that two or three-day period for some people individually if they’re getting hit by those transits. AC: Yeah. And that Jupiter-Sun aspect is really nice, in part because both planets are in their places of exaltation. We have exalted Jupiter

in configuration with exalted Sun, and by most historical accounts as well as practical ones, Jupiter and the Sun tend to get along. They don’t have a hard time mutually supporting one another, and so there’s a brightness and in this case like, not just a positivity but also

a positivity born of seeing how things could work out for the better, or seeing ways in which like, literally seeing the bright side but also seeing how moving forward things might not be as dire on an individual level as they might have seemed only days ago. And that’s particularly relevant,

because the Sun before making this aspect to Jupiter was bound up in conjunction with Saturn and Neptune. Right? So like, the pessimism and harshness of the conjunction

with Saturn in particular helps us to see the worst ways things could go and to feel less able to rise to the challenge, whereas Jupiter is a supportive and “look at the bright side” influence. And so the contrasting situation of the Sun is nice; it’s nice that it gets this

influence. And so the contrasting situation of the Sun is nice; it’s nice that it gets this little boost, this little support from Jupiter. CB: Yeah. And like, things are being lifted up and elevated, which is really the function of planets in their sign of exaltation.

So that aspect culminates on April 5th. But after that point, the Sun starts separating from Jupiter. And this is when we get into basically the next major aspect after that is

from Jupiter. And this is when we get into basically the next major aspect after that is Mars ingressing into Aries on April 9th. So that is when we get the beginning of that stellium.

We do see that by that point, Venus is at like, 12 degrees of Taurus, so it really is heading into that sextile with Jupiter at 16 degrees of Cancer, so we have to reconcile on the one hand the Aries sectors of our chart is just suddenly getting hammered by this really intense, conflicting energy that’s pulling us in different directions while

some people in this other part of the chart - in the Taurus-Cancer section of the chart - has some positive flowing supportive expansive energy going on that is helping things temporarily, even as this other energy starts to loom very large starting from April 9th forward.

AC: Yeah. And there’s a real contrast there. There’s like, some double benefic excellent pleasant feelings over here, but that isn’t interfered with nor does it fix the growing intensity and urgency of what’s happening over there in Aries.

CB: Yeah. And maybe - it’s like, I keep wanting to emphasize like, there’s a sextile going on this month, guys! But like, maybe I shouldn’t oversell that, because functionally we’re all - as soon as this ingress happens April 9th, we’re all gonna feel that heaviness start to set in in a very significant way. And the next major aspect that happens...

Well, two things. They both culminate on the 12th, which is that Mars conjoins Neptune and then Venus completes that sextile with Jupiter from 16 Taurus to 16 Cancer. So on the one hand, you have - as we talked about before - Mars-Neptune and this idea of wanting to push forward or wanting to

head in a specific direction assertively and aggressively or sometimes even in a militant way. Like, sometimes striking against something, but not having a clear idea of where you’re going or who you’re fighting against, and that energy kind of peaking at that time at the same time that the more positive and supportive Venus-Jupiter aspect completes.

AC: Yeah. And another version of that Mars-Neptune might be having a lot of get-up-and-go, really feeling your fight or your desire to take on a challenge, to try to kick some ass, but being very confused or uncertain about what to actually do with that or where that

should go. Because that’s a really strong Mars, but the Neptune is like, you know, can make it

should go. Because that’s a really strong Mars, but the Neptune is like, you know, can make it confusing as to what do I do with this? CB: Right. Yeah.

So that’s peaking there on the 12th with Mars. And then Venus starts to move away from Jupiter, so it’s like, at the same time that the most positive aspect of the month starts to recede, the most difficult aspect of the month starts to really ramp up here with Mars getting within the three degree range of Saturn, which is when that energy is really gonna start to culminate,

especially by the 15th. And right around that time, we get our second lunation of the month, which is this New Moon towards the end of Aries, which puts us as having like, a six planet stellium temporarily for a few days. AC: Right, because Mercury just snuck into

Aries on the 15th, I think. And so because Mars temporarily left Mercury behind alone in Pisces, but once we get to I believe it’s the 15th, not only is the Moon in Aries getting ready for that New Moon, but Mercury is there. So we’ve go all six planets for about two-and-a-half days.

CB: That’s crazy. There’s gonna be so many - like, we saw so many recurrences in January when I did that whole research episode after the attack on Venezuela happened, and then I saw that like, that stellium of different planets that was in Capricorn at the time was repeating

stelliums that had happened during the history of Greenland, during the history of Venezuela, during the history of NATO, for example. And I'm sure there’s so many other stelliums that have happened in other important base charts and events and natal charts that are gonna be activated at

this time under this conjunction when you have six planets all clustered in the same sign.

AC: Right. It’s recurrence of so many different things. And one really interesting difference between this giant pile-up and the giant pile-ups we had in January is that all these planets are visible. None of them are concealed by the Sun except for the Moon. And so if you wake up early,

visible. None of them are concealed by the Sun except for the Moon. And so if you wake up early, just before dawn, just before it starts getting light out, you could see a Mercury-Mars-Saturn conjunction. And Neptune’s there too, but you won’t see that. But we —

Mercury-Mars-Saturn conjunction. And Neptune’s there too, but you won’t see that. But we — CB: Yeah. AC: — like,

CB: Yeah. AC: — like, it won’t be visible for long before those morning rays start intruding upon the sky, but look to the east just before that light starts, and you should be able to see all three of those. And what

a like - I was thinking about this, Chris - like, from an observational astrology omen perspective, what would you say if you just saw like, a tight, tight, tight Mercury-Mars-Saturn conjunction preceding every day for like, two weeks on end? CB: Right. Or what would like, an ancient

Mesopotamian astrologer see when they - because they would go out and watch these things, and they would just be like, “That’s not good!” AC: Right! Like —

CB: Whatever the cuneiform version of that is. AC: Right! There probably is a - I'm sure that’s happened before, and I'm sure they commented and they were, “Ah! And

many animals died and war was made.” CB: Yeah.

AC: “The king has leprosy.” CB: So that’s a good exercise, though; everyone should go out, especially this day - the day of the New Moon, April 17th - and just watch and look for those three stars just before sunrise. The reddish star of Mars, the sort of brownish star of

Saturn, and then the twinkling star of Mercury. AC: Yeah. Dude, I'll probably see - you know, one of the only positive things about the necessary schedule change of having a toddler is that I'm up before dawn not uncommonly. So I can take a look at the sky before the Sun rises.

CB: Nice. AC: And be like, “Do you see that, buddy? That’s an ill omen!” CB: Right! That’s good to teach

that, buddy? That’s an ill omen!” CB: Right! That’s good to teach early on. Okay, Aries stellium - what is the Aries sector of each of our charts, the Aries

early on. Okay, Aries stellium - what is the Aries sector of each of our charts, the Aries sector of each of our charts is gonna be super activated this month, especially by this New Moon.

I can’t believe like, Mercury is exactly conjunct Neptune and conjunct Mars at the time of this New Moon really imprinting the next lunar month with that signature and especially the next two weeks from this point until the Full Moon. With Mercury especially you get the unclear communication and

sometimes deceptive communication, and with Mars, you get the aggressive communication as well as sometimes severing of communication lines, or we’ve seen a lot of like, technical interruptions coming up over the past six months during the Mercury-Mars conjunctions.

AC: Yeah, for sure. CB: Yeah. Anything

else about the New Moon specifically? AC: Well, just that from the 15th when both the Moon and Mercury join Mars, Saturn, Neptune, and the Sun in Aries, that begins the most intense

week of our Mars-Saturn-Mercury-Neptune thing. Which is going to do big things and little things and 30 other things as well. CB: Yeah. That’s a really good point. So

it’s really - so it’s like, April 14th to 15th, Mercury enters into Aries, and then it activates those other placements. And then the Moon enters at the same time. So we’ve got like, a couple of days lead-up to that. And then it all builds up to April 19th when we see

that Mars reach seven degrees of Aries with Saturn, and then Mercury somehow gets there at the same exact time. AC: Yeah. And so yeah, they’re all in the same degree for a little bit. CB: Wow. Okay. Okay, so that’s the culmination

of that energy of the internal tensions as well as external tensions, as well as the like, the tearing apart energy which sometimes comes with Mars-Saturn of — AC: Yeah. CB: — a structure literally like,

AC: Yeah. CB: — a structure literally like, crumbling or being torn apart at that time. And then sometimes the stress test of that also creating something new, because what survives from that sometimes can end up being stronger if it survives these intense motions of like, forward and backwards movement that

are pulling it in opposite directions. AC: Yeah, that like, shearing intensity.

But yeah. Like, what survives is both sort of ordained by the malefics, right? Like,

it’s strong enough to - it’s durable enough to have survived that. And then also, you know, generally if it’s a company, right, and it’s in a field that gets devastated and it survives that, then not only does it get to continue existing, but its competition is decimated, right?

Like, the situation is improved simply by getting through it, because others will not necessarily.

CB: Yeah. So intense tensions in that area of our life, but then eventually - I mean, the good news is Mars will start to separate from Saturn in the days subsequent to that, so that

there will be - especially once Mars gets within three degrees past Saturn by around April 23rd, a release of tension and somewhat of an exhale. And that’s not - I don’t wanna over-emphasize that, because Mars is gonna be in the same sign for what, like, another few weeks before it gets to

Taurus and completely gets out of the sign-based conjunction with Saturn and Neptune. But at least like, the most intense range is always within one degree, followed by the three-degree range. And

we’ll be paying attention to the events, both worldwide and in terms of our personal lives, that come to head during that time, and then eventually start to ease and start to relax once that combination starts to move away by April 23rd or so.

AC: Yeah. I would liken it to like, slowly loosening a vice, right? Like, the pressure doesn’t suddenly release, but there’s just like, it gets a little

right? Like, the pressure doesn’t suddenly release, but there’s just like, it gets a little bit less intense, a little bit less intense, a little bit less intense, just like, unscrewing the mechanism that’s holding, crushing together and creating so much pressure. Every day is just like, a little bit - another wind of the vice opening. CB: Yeah. And sometimes we’ve talked about in the

past just having to do a huge amount of work and extend a huge amount of energy over an extended period of time, and this just being a very hectic time where people are having to push themselves to their limits. And in some instances, some people might push themself past the limit and have to deal with the consequences of what comes when you’ve pushed yourself too far. But in other

instances, people will find that their limits can be pushed far further than they ever expected, and they’re able to rise to the occasion because in the moment of an emergency they were able to dig down deep and find that power within themselves. AC: Yeah. Yeah, there’s a whole set of

positive experiences and realizations that can come out of the Mars-Saturn pressure, and realizing that you’re capable of thriving or excelling under deeply unfair circumstances. CB: Yeah. And one part - to speak to that also

that I like - is because Jupiter is later, it’s at like, 17 going on 18 degrees here, some of those planets will start running into Jupiter after this that sets up a nice sequence where, for example, Mercury will complete a square with Jupiter around April 25th and 26th. So it’s like, Mercury goes

from the intensity of that conjunction with both of the malefics and the tension and strife and discord associated with that to having a little bit of relief once it hits Mercury-Jupiter at that point. And like, on an individual level, I feel like that will be experienced

as some easing of tensions or resolution of certain things, even though on a mundane level, I am a little nervous because we see like, Uranus has just gone into Gemini at that point, so!

In the world stage, things have ramped up and a new chapter will be dawning. It will be clear to all of us by April 24th, April 25th that we’re all entering into some new stage in world history that is troubling at the same time. AC: Yeah. I agree, and I think that’s

an important differentiation. I think individual circumstances will ease much more significantly than macro global circumstances. CB: Right.

AC: And yeah, and just to follow up on what you said - so Mercury is the first to escape and then get a cold drink of water and maybe a little nap, courtesy of aspect with Jupiter. And Mars will

be moving towards that the rest of the month, which will cool Mars down a little bit. Mars,

once refreshed, may want to go back into conflict, so there’s a difference in personality there.

But more significant is the movement of Uranus into Gemini just as Mercury’s hitting that square to Jupiter. CB: Yeah. It’s like, that Mars-Jupiter alignment will be good for Mars and bad for Jupiter — AC: Right!

CB: — to the extent that Jupiter usually is - like Rhetorius says that like, Mars is war and Jupiter is peace. And Mars will be in the superior aspect here heading into the completion of that square

is peace. And Mars will be in the superior aspect here heading into the completion of that square around May 4th. That’s not setting things up for peaceful things necessarily. But it’s interesting with the Uranus ingress that Venus just happens to conjoin Uranus right before the two of them

move into Gemini so that there’s one final Venus-Uranus conjunction around April 23rd, which can sometimes be kind of like, an exciting aspect relationally of like, doing something new or finding something new that you enjoy, having a connection with a new person that’s exciting and

innovative, or yeah. Just generally good times. AC: Yeah, and also does such a good job of concluding Uranus’s time in Taurus! Because Venus rules Taurus, so it’s a conjunction with the ruler

of the sign that it’s been in since 2018. And so it, I think, will give us some events that will very neatly bookend Uranus’s time in Taurus. Like, it’ll make very clear like, “And that’s what this was about!” in a variety of areas. CB: Right. Which we’ve talked about over the

past seven years that Uranus has been moving into Taurus thinking, talking about it in terms of like, the Taurus as a fixed earth sign having to do with like, substances, with physical things, but also with money and currency and how, for example, that’s really changed things

in terms of digital currencies becoming much more mainstream. And I wonder if it’s not some final thing about that when it comes to like, money and financial things or even a disruption in some sense having that last conjunction happen there. AC: Yeah, like, one final disruption that shows you where - like, what that arc was all about. Yeah, I've thought —

CB: Right. AC: — you know, like,

CB: Right. AC: — you know, like, crypto and Bitcoin were not invented during Uranus in Taurus. But the Uranus in Taurus time has been when they’ve made a giant impact, and it was just like, a niche, cool, interesting thing for some people. And so I've thought for a long time we kind of know - we’d have a good idea

of what that was about by the time Uranus finished up in Taurus. And I imagine we’ll get some sort of punctuation mark that’ll make it clear. I don't know what the sentence says, but I do think that’s where the punctuation lands. CB: Yeah. The interrelationship between that and

like, the global markets and the chaos coming after the Mercury-Mars conjunction as well as the AI bubble and everything else. As well as like, the US and some of the things that are happening economically with like, the treasury market and then also the currency in the US, for example,

being used - currency being used as the standard for oil and other things like that and some of the challenges to that that have been coming up recently. A lot of potential sectors for things.

But all right, so moving on. We get Uranus — AC: Which I'll just say makes sense when you have a gigantic pile-up of planets, right? It’s like, oh, it’s everything - almost everything’s on the table and affecting everything else. Like, that’s what the chart looks like and says.

CB: Right. Yeah. So then Uranus is in Gemini; Venus goes in at the same time.

What else is happening late in the month? AC: The month ends just shy of the Full Moon in Scorpio. And — CB: Right.

in Scorpio. And — CB: Right.

AC: — you know, one super fun cute thing about these two lunations - the New Moon in Aries that we see in the middle of April and then the Full Moon in Scorpio that follows it just barely into May is that both of those lunations are ruled by Mars. We get two in a row.

CB: Okay. Yeah, that’s a good point. AC: Just further emphasizing our buddy, Mars in Aries, who’s probably — CB: Yeah.

AC: — going to have been wrecking house the whole month. Or

the whole month after the ingress on the 9th. CB: Well, and it’s like, as we talked about in the year ahead forecast, I'm looking forward to... We’re headed towards like, June, for example, there’s gonna be that brief period of getting a breather in early June that we talked about in the year ahead forecast. So I'm looking forward to getting past the Mars-Saturn conjunction and

obviously there’ll be a bit of like, picking up the wreckage after that once we move into May.

But we start heading in that direction, I guess, is the point by the end of April of...

It’s still really tense. Like, we’re still in the most intense phase, but the planets are starting to move away from that, so some of the tension is starting to ease. But we’ll — AC: Yeah, for sure. CB: Yeah. We’ll be recording the next forecast around this time! So we’ll be checking in at this time to see how much tension is actually being eased by that point versus how much those planets still being within a few degrees

of each other is still really leading to both the internal tension psychologically within each of us personally as well as the external world tensions. AC: Yeah, absolutely. Well, what I would say is that even though there’s nothing about the end of the month or the beginning of May that puts out

the fire, we’re done just tossing more logs on it by the end of the month. All of the big logs have been - the, you know, petrol-soaked logs - have been tossed on by the time we get to the end of the month. We’ve had the exact Mars-Saturn; we’ve had the exact Mars-Saturn-Uranus; we’ve had Mercury go exact with Mars-Saturn. Like, we’ve had all - we’ve had Uranus’s ingress. Like, all those

cards are on fire and on the table. And so at least we’re at the point of dealing with that for a couple weeks before new cards get pulled out of the deck. And it’s almost the second half of May; it’s like, the last 38 percent of May sees a number of improvements that will make - like,

that are much more workable and some even pleasant, especially as we move into June.

So this period doesn’t last forever, but it’s super intense and it’s definitely not over by the end of the month. CB: Yeah. Good point.

All right. Well, that kind of brings us to the end of the forecast. We keep

leaving it on these cliffhangers, because almost every month is just like that.

AC: Well, we’re not writing the story. We are — CB: Right.

AC: — we’re trying to decipher the script. CB: Yeah. That’s true. We are not the authors of this one. Obviously, like, the writers of this season of world events are kind of amateurs,

this one. Obviously, like, the writers of this season of world events are kind of amateurs, because they - I have to say, they’re writing some things that would sound a little bit unbelievable on paper if you were trying to explain this to somebody like, 10 years ago.

AC: Yeah. There’s some plot holes, a little too on-the-nose. Some of it’s — CB: Yeah. AC: — too on-the-nose.

CB: Yeah. AC: — too on-the-nose.

There are some coincidences - like, really? Everybody’s gonna be born on an eclipse?

CB: Yeah. AC: We’re doing that?

Like, who’s gonna believe that? CB: And then the next leader is also born on an eclipse? Like, that’s not actually plausible. AC: Yeah. Let’s go - let’s do

an eclipse? Like, that’s not actually plausible. AC: Yeah. Let’s go - let’s do another draft of this script. So yeah, it’s not us! We’re just,

again, attempting to decipher it. CB: Yeah. Well, we did a pretty good job of that last month. But we’ll continue doing the same thing and trying to give people a head’s up about what’s coming up, and then we’ll all, yeah, go through it all together collectively and

keep coming back every month and comparing notes and noting how the astrology is lining up with what are turning out to be some really important events in world history and in terms of all of our lives collectively. So thanks for joining me to do this together once again, Austin; I appreciate it. AC: Of course. It’s a burdensome honor

to be talking about all this as it occurs and just before it occurs and just after it occurs. It’s

a complicated but significant thing, and I'm happy to be doing this with you.

CB: Yeah. A burdensome honor. That’s funny that this will be like, the chapter heading of each of our lives about this chapter. Well, and we’re not the only astrologers that did this. Like,

reading back through that there were astrologers living during World War II that were like, writing about the astrology as it was happening, or there was astrologers during the Civil War that were doing the same thing or during the Revolutionary War. You know, we’re doing the same thing that astrologers have been doing for literally 4,000 years now, and just living through the events and

also documenting them at the same time and then passing that information onto future generations.

AC: Yeah, and trying to find a head’s up and share it before things actually happen to people to maneuver a little bit better through troubled waters.

CB: Yeah. And I hope it does give people some ability to maneuver more successfully than they might have otherwise. AC: Yeah.

CB: Speaking of maneuvering, what do you have coming up? What are you working on this month?

AC: Oh, I'm gonna be giving myself a stroke trying to finish 36 Faces two-point-oh. But I'm also doing an enrollment for my three-year Fundamentals of Astrology program, doing a Year One enrollment

on April 4th. The invitations will go out via my newsletter, so subscribe to that so you can get the invite. It’s a limited enrollment, so those are usually done in a couple hours; sometimes

the invite. It’s a limited enrollment, so those are usually done in a couple hours; sometimes they last as long as six. But the seats fill up pretty quick, so if you’d like to be part of that, go to my website - AustinCoppock.com - and say, “Yes, I would like to be on the mailing list.”

And so for Sphere and Sundry, a beautiful fixed star series that I elected and Kait enacted last fall is finally coming out - the Spica series, which is one of the more benefic and like,

widely applicable fixed stars. It gives precision, excellence, creativity, both artistry but also engineering. I’m really happy with the materia that Kait created, and that I believe came out two hours ago. So that’s finally available. We were trying to get

that out at the beginning of the month, but March. And then finally, the epic project that Kait spent years and years completing, which is the Thema Mundi project which involved doing work and creating talismanic materia for each of the planets in the signs which they rule,

and then assembling them in accordance with the first half of the Thema Mundi, the Thema mundi project material is going to finally go general catalog at Sphere and Sundry at some point this month. So if you are interested in the fruits of that long, arduous and excellent project, that will finally be available in a non-limited

format for the first time. CB: Nice. Awesome. Cool!

Well, awesome - I'll put a link to your website in the description page for this episode.

And as for myself, I am trying to decide whether to put together - I did all that research on astrology in World War II, and I was trying to think about putting together an episode about one I mention briefly in the midpoints episode, which was just the day that all of the astrologers in Germany were rounded up and arrested and their books were burned. And

it was probably one of the worst singular days in astrological history for astrologers. And a number of astrologers were sent to concentration camps, and some prominent ones died during that time. And

just because I was getting a real sense that astrology in Germany was like, flourishing and was very vibrant in the astrological community in the 1920s, and then all of a sudden, there was this political figure that rose up with Hitler and took over the government, and the astrologers continued to try to practice and do their thing. But then political events starting happening, and

it interrupted and ended a lot of people’s lives. So documenting some of that history, especially being in a time period like today where we’re seeing similar things happen in terms of wars and world wars forming and things like that, feels a little bit important. So I was thinking about doing that episode; I'm trying to decide. If people would

important. So I was thinking about doing that episode; I'm trying to decide. If people would like to see that, let me know. But otherwise, I'm gonna keep working on the podcast and trying to, yeah, document our history, both current as well as past, and pass that onto future astrologers.

So thanks everyone who supports that work through our page on Patreon, all the patrons.

We had a great group of people that joined us today for the recording of this episode live.

We’ll be back again next month to do the forecast for May. But otherwise,

thanks for joining me today, Austin. AC: Yeah, thanks for having me, Chris.

CB: All right. Thanks everyone for watching or listening to this episode of The Astrology Podcast. And we’ll see you again next time! [END CREDITS]

Podcast. And we’ll see you again next time! [END CREDITS]

If you’re a fan of the podcast and you wanna get access to bonus content, then become a patron through my page on Patreon where you can get early access to new episodes, attend live recordings and webinars, access the monthly electional astrology podcast, The Secret Astrology Podcast that’s only available to patrons, or you can even get your name listed in the credits.

Find out more at Patreon.com/AstrologyPodcast. Special thanks to the patrons on our Producers tier, including patrons Kristi Moe, Ariana Amour, Mandi Rae, Angelic Nambo, Issa Sabah, Jeanne Marie Kaplan, Melissa DeLano, Sonny Bazbaz, Kwatsi Alibaruho, Annie Newman, Ginger Sadlier,

Berlynn West, and Nicki Crawford. If you’re looking for good dates to do things this year, then be sure to check out our 2026 Electional Astrology Report, which is a guide to the most fortunate dates in 2026. You can get it at TheAstrologyPodcast.com/2026Report.

If you’re really looking to take your studies of astrology to the next level, then consider 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 a hundred hours of video lectures, plus live webinars and Q&A sessions each month.

And at the end of the course, you get a certificate of completion saying that you studied with me. Find out more information at TheAstrologySchool.com.

If you’re looking to get an astrological consultation, then check out the new consultations page on the podcast website where I have a list of astrologers I recommend for birth chart readings and other types of consultations. You can find that at TheAstrologyPodcast.com/Consultations.

The astrology software we use and recommend here on the podcast is called Solar Fire for Windows, and you can get a 15% discount on it by using the promo code ‘AP15’ at the website Alabe.com.

For Mac users, we recommend the program called Astro Gold for Mac OS, and you can use the promo code ‘ASTROPODCAST15’ to get a 15% discount at their website, which is AstroGold.io.

And shoutout to our sponsors for this episode, including the Northwest Astrology Conference, which is happening in Seattle and being livestreamed online May 21st through the 25th, 2026. Find out more information at NORWAC.net. As well as the United Astrology Conference,

2026. Find out more information at NORWAC.net. As well as the United Astrology Conference, which is happening in Chicago this year September 3rd through the 9th, 2026. Find out more information about that at UACAstrology.com.

2026. Find out more information about that at UACAstrology.com.