The Astrology of 2025
Happy 2025, everyone!
I couldn’t start this year without providing astrological guidance for your year ahead. The biggest headline? We’re currently in the middle of a Mars retrograde. Mars governs drive, action, and ambition—so if you’ve been unmotivated during these first few days of the year, don’t be too hard on yourself. We’ll have to navigate this energy for a few more weeks.
I’m leaning into it! I don’t like the pressure that often comes with the start of a new year. I am very ambitious and driven, so I like to remind myself that it’s okay to just be. I don’t always have to have a plan. A slow start means more time to reflect and dream about what I want my year to look like. Now is not the time to plant new seeds. Hold off until February, when the energy picks up again.
This year, I asked Celeste Brooks to give us the full lowdown on 2025’s astrology. Celeste is a predictive astrologer, intuitive, and life coach. She specializes in mundane astrology, which examines how planetary transits influence politics, current events, natural disasters, and more. She also has a weekly podcast, Celestial Insights, discussing current transits. She first caught my attention in early 2024 with her spot-on predictions—including one about a certain royal, which we discuss later in the interview. Below, she breaks down when 2025 will regain momentum, the year’s most significant planetary shifts, insights into Luigi Mangione’s birth chart, more upcoming political upheaval, and whether TikTok will be banned.
*A quick reminder for my astrology newbies: as you read this, it’s helpful to have your birth chart handy. You can find yours on apps like Chani or Time Passages, or on websites like astro-seek.com. When a planet is mentioned in a specific sign—for example, Mars retrograde is now in the sign of Cancer—look at which house in your chart is ruled by Cancer. That’s the area of your life that will be most influenced.
Chrissy: Welcome, Celeste. Tell me, what were you like as a child?
Celeste: I was a bookworm. I always had my face in a book. My godmother gave me this huge bag of Harlequin romance novels she loved. I loved Stephen King, Dean Koontz, and Judy Bloom. As I got older, Toni Morrison. I've always loved history; Greek mythology has been a passion of mine. I was very studious. I was a little straight-A student.
When did your interest in astrology enter the picture?
Celeste: Well, I always knew I was a Taurus and resonated with that. I would read my horoscopes, but I came into astrology later in life. It felt like it was a fluke—but it was in line with my chart. I love to go to the spa at Rancho La Puerto in Tecate, Mexico. It's like a camp for adults where you have activities and exercises all day. There were presenters at night, and one was an astrologer. It just took me by storm. I was so fascinated by it, and I was in my mid-forties. Eventually, I started studying it, and it just took over my whole life.
You start with yourself, and you're learning all this stuff about yourself, and it gives you the words to explain things that you knew but didn't understand. Why am I this way? Or why is this person that way? It really unlocks the mysteries of people's personalities. So, that took over my life, and then I started to watch how it showed up on the world stage. I love mundane astrology, looking at the patterns, seeing how things repeat, and anticipating what's coming.
So, what were you doing prior to becoming an astrologer?
Celeste: I worked in sales marketing and business development for Fortune 500 companies. My degree is in biology from UC Berkeley. Originally, I was going to be a physician, but I didn’t want to be around death all the time. So, I went into the life sciences, companies making research tools, and manufacturing biological drugs for cancer and autoimmune diseases.
Wow, so this was a 180 for you.
Celeste: I had this very successful, comfortable lifestyle, but when Uranus, the planet of awakenings and sudden events, went into the sign of Taurus in 2018, it started as this voice in my head: Is this what you’re going to do for the rest of your life? Aren't you tired of this? I did that career for almost 28 years. Uranus awakens us to things that can be different. In 2021, I quit my corporate job to become a full-time astrologer.
Wow. How did you tell them? What was their reaction?
Celeste: I thought people were just going to think I was insane, which I'm sure a lot of people did, but the thing that surprised me was that people were like, oh my God, I'm so jealous. They wished they had the courage to leave that soul-sucking life behind. Corporate careers have changed so much since I started where you left the office and had a life outside, maybe not lawyers and certain people, but for the average person in corporate, you could turn it off. Then we got computers, the home computer, cell phones, and this and that. It's non-stop. The realm between work and life has become so narrow. They talk about work-life balance, but that's meaningless. When you get to a certain level, there's this expectation that you will jump at any time. There's a need for the corporation to be put in front of everything, and I'd had enough of that.
Now, let's move into the overview of what 2025 will look like. Starting the early days of January, we’re in a Mars retrograde, right?
Celeste: One of the big things about 2025 is we start the year off very slowly with Mars, the planet of action, drive, and assertion, in retrograde. Well, slowly may not be the right word. There's no energy for ease, flow, or forward momentum. There is a lot of intensity starting out. It can be a perfect time to go inward and analyze how that planet’s energy works with us. It went retrograde December 6th, 2024, through February 23rd, 2025. So, for people who think they're going to charge out of the gate with all of these plans and to-do lists, there will be a lot of disappointment because with retrogrades come reversals, delays, conflicts, and potentially the collapse of anything contemplated.
So you think you'll climb Mount Everest, but your plane is grounded because of a bad storm. You could be furious and apoplectic about that or understand that this is the energy. One of the things I’ve been recommending lately is that whenever you travel anywhere, you have traveler’s insurance because 2025 will be a year of storms and strikes, as well as potential illness. Health and wellbeing will be a big focus, as will the supply chain issue. If you're getting married, like this summer, I want you to be really mindful and stay on top of your wedding planner, especially if they're doing a lot of stuff around March or April with Venus, the planet that rules marriage, retrograde. The year starts really slow and doesn't really pick up speed until April. I'm taking it as a gift to us.
Depending on your belief system, there are different starts to the year. It can be January 1st, but for astrologers, the beginning of Aries season is the beginning of the new year. So, I think this takes a little bit of pressure off of January—most people are like, oh, got to get back in the gym, rebrand myself, and start fresh. You actually don't need to do that, and maybe you take those first couple of weeks of the year to review your plans and think about how you're going to take off when the energy supports it.
Celeste: Right, I love that. We will be turning from outward to inward because there's a big change with the lunar nodes. This is the karmic collective call about what we're working on. Since July of 2023, they've been in Aries/ Libra. The North Node in Aries amplified courage, conflict, and taking risks. The South node in Libra was a drain on diplomacy and ease in relationships. On January 11th, the North Node moves backward into Pisces until July 26th, 2026. This is going to be jarring for people. From that initiating energy to this energy of Aries to introspection and reflection—there’s a real lack of energy and tiredness when the north node moves into Pisces. Just lay down is what I'm getting.
That's my preferred energy. I'm literally in bed as I'm doing this interview. I do all my best work in bed.
Celeste: The North Node is going through the mutable watery sign of Pisces. For you, this is great. What is going to happen when that North Node hits your Venus? Are you deeply in love with someone?
No, I'm single. So I'm excited for this year.
Celeste: I love that. Big things are coming for you. Now, one thing we can’t forget, we are so excited to see North Node going through Pisces, but don't forget that South Node is going through Virgo. When you meet this great new love or whatever, whether it's a person, a thing, or an opportunity, it could bring up anxiety, perfectionism, all of those Virgo things. It's a good time to think about how we're releasing Virgo things, anxiety, or overworking. It is just going to lead to serious burnout. This came to me the other day, there may be a potential government shutdown or a lot of chaos around March. So that's something to be aware of as well. Accountability will be a hot topic with the South Node in Virgo. Accountability goes away as Elon Musk starts taking away our social security and Medicaid to fund his various projects.
I wrote some themes: question all, believe nothing, amplification of Neptunian things: fate, conspiracy, confusion, escapism. All these drones are giving us a taste of all of that. Potential for illnesses to spread. Take care of your health. If you are run down, stay home and don't go to the party.
The North Node's going to meet Neptune. The North Node is an amplifier, and with Neptune in Pisces, it's at home there. It can just spread whatever it is. Neptune rules oil. And I said there was going to be an oil story for the last eclipse in Pisces, and Sean Puffy Combs had a thousand bottles of baby oil [laughs]. I did not realize that that was going to be how it would show up. But oil's going to be a theme again in 2025.
Should we talk about the Venus retrograde?
Celeste: Yes, Venus, the planet of love, beauty, harmony, and diplomacy, is going retrograde in the sign of her detriment, Aries, from March 1st through April 12th. When a planet is in detriment, it's as far away from home as it can be. Venus likes to be at home in Libra, an air sign. Air signs are about communication and connection. Libra is about one-on-one relationships, and let's have win-win solutions, fairness, and equity. Whereas Aries is like, oh, I want to put myself first in this relationship energy. This is a beautiful opportunity to go inward and evaluate how you are in relationships. Do you go along to get along? How do you assert your needs? We're going to be seeing things in the collective about relationship breakdowns. You will see things related to transits on the day they start, like you might walk into a coffee shop on March 1st, and a couple is screaming at each other. Maybe even something with fashion is going to take on an edge of defiance, maybe people are shaving their heads. Luigi Mangione's haircut—our little Perseus. I'm calling him Perseus because Perseus is who slayed Medusa and then used her head as a weapon.
I wish we had his natal chart.
Celeste: Well, we know his sun is at 15 degrees of Taurus. 15 degrees of fixed signs are world points that allow us to be well-known about something. His sun is opposite Chiron in the sign of Scorpio. He had some kind of back surgery.
He's got his sun-conjunct Mars in Taurus, where it's in detriment. When he killed the CEO, Mars was about to go retrograde in Leo, which rules the lower back, and he had problems with his lower back. Then he projected outside of himself that Chiron in Scorpio about these healthcare companies that are Scorpionic. Just hoarding. The shadow of Scorpio can be this accumulation of big wealth and sitting on it. He was ready to take action. There was a new moon on his Pluto.
We need that birthtime. I’m surprised that we haven't seen anything from his parents.
Celeste: That might be coming up. Notice the transit when his parents say something. Maybe January 6th, when Mars retrograde goes back into Cancer. Talking about the impact of this on their family or saying something about their son.
What do you think about people meeting someone new during Venus retrograde?
Celeste: Only good if you meet them at the tail end. So, if you meet someone closer to April 12th, that's likely better. What can happen with retrogrades is that there can be reversals. So you meet someone early while Venus is retrograde, and then Mercury goes retrograde from March 15th through April 7th. With the North Node conjunct Neptune, you get yourself caught in this fantasy of illusion about how great they are, and then Venus goes direct, and you may not realize it for a while, maybe not even until the next eclipse in the fall. Perhaps they’re Aries, and they're very selfish. They put themselves first. They have a short temper. They have three other boos on the side. That's the kind of thing that could come up. There's an illusion, or it could be that this relationship is never going to yield fruit like children. Maybe you both decide neither of you wants kids, and that's just fine. So that could be how it shows up in a better way, but it is typically not the best for the long-term survival of a healthy, harmonious relationship to meet when Venus, the planet that rules relationships, is in the sign of her detriment where she's likely to act in extreme and ineffective ways as well as retrograde, which is the greatest affliction a planet can have.
When are we free of all the retrogrades?
Celeste: After April 12th, the personal planets will all be direct for a while, and the year is going to shoot out of a cannon because we have major planets changing signs, which they don't do very often.
Which planets?
Celeste: The outer planets: Neptune going into Aries. It's been in Pisces, where it's at home and able to do what it does easily, for almost 14 years. It will be a big reset because zero degrees of the cardinal signs (Aries, Cancer, Capricorn, Libra) are world points where events will have the significance of a higher nature, so they'll get attention. Neptune goes into Aries, and what an easy way to think of that could be like an oil spill and it's on fire. That's not necessarily going to happen, but that could be visually what we see. Luigi is a Neptune in Aries figure, so his trial, I predicted, is going to captivate. Before we even knew who he was or anything, two days after he killed the CEO, I started talking about what this could be because Saturn and Neptune will go into Aries, this mythological spiritual warrior who has been elevated to this status. His trial is coming in relationship to these upcoming transits. Will it be March 30th when Neptune goes into Aries? Or May 24th, when Saturn goes into Aries, and they'll be traveling closely. We will be seeing stuff in Russia because when the Berlin Wall came down, that was the last time Saturn and Neptune met in Capricorn.
So, let's stay on Neptune in Aries. Can you talk about what Neptune is and how its energy will change once it moves into Aries? Neptune is kind of a confusing planet.
Celeste: That's Neptune! It’s the planet of confusion, illusions, and delusions. Sometimes, it just doesn't make sense. It's ephemeral. It's the mist. It's the fog. It's Vaseline on the mirror. Now, it's also the planet of spirituality. It's about what we believe and what we can't see. One of the things I'm saying for 2025 is that a lot of people are going to have to walk by faith, Neptune is faith, not by sight. We're likely to see conflicts based on idealism, like people really getting into their belief systems, leading them to take some initiating action that can be aggressive. In Aries, we'll be seeing wildfires decimating. Climate change will be one of the biggest stories of the new year, and the United States has elected a president who does not believe in climate change.
So, now Saturn will also be moving from Pisces into Aries for a little bit.
Celeste: Yes, we're going to get a taste of Saturn in Aries starting May 25, 2025, where it's in the sign of its fall actually. There will be a lot of talk about personal accountability with the Luigi Mangione trial. Yeah, personal accountability for him. But what about these insurance companies that deny? Saturn is rejection. Excluding healthcare and aid to people. So that will be part of that conversation. Accountability for who?
This is energy of huge change because the zero degrees of a sign is the seed where we're initiating new energy. But 29 degrees of the previous sign is the anorectic degree of crisis and decay. When a planet changes signs, we'll see crisis and decay related to Saturn in Pisces, which is hardships related to water of all kinds. Also, what we're seeing in Gaza with this horrific suffering of people—we’re going to be seeing stuff like that or people left homeless after a big storm. We will see all of this and Saturn moving into Aries. It can be a crisis of survival for some people, or it can feel like there's a crisis of survival where it's hard work to get your basic needs met.
When checking the transits against your own chart, use this wheel to see what the meaning of each house is in your chart.
This also aligns with the fact that we have Donald Trump coming back into the presidency and the demographic of people in the US who voted for him because they thought he would make their lives easier and more affordable. But what is going to be the actual reality of that?
Celeste: You know what, he's talking about taking back the Panama Canal. We should buy Greenland. I’m wondering if he's planning to tank the economy before taking office with crazy talk.
So Saturn is in Aries from May 24th of 2025 through September 1st, and then again from February 13th, 2026 to April 13th, 2028. I think the Sean Combs trial will be a big part of that Saturn transit. Well, Neptune will be in Aries when his trial starts right around when Pluto goes retrograde, which retrogrades also peel back the layer so you can see what's underneath. We will see Pluto in Aquarius, which is related to the music industry. Neptune and PIuto are associated with music and violence, control, domination, and humiliation. These are going to be what people are talking about, and probably many witnesses will be interviewed while Venus is retrograde and Mercury is retrograde.
Shall we talk about Jupiter? My favorite…
Celeste: Yes. Jupiter, the planet of abundance and prosperity, the cosmic Santa Claus. You lean in a little bit, and you get nice things, but it can also be too much of a good thing. It also rules overindulgence, laziness, or just wanting to be handed things. Jupiter is a benefactor, and it moves into the sign of its exaltation, Cancer, where it is lifted up. It's given extra support to do what it does with ease. You can think about Jupiter in Cancer as a billionaire decides to donate money to a children's orphanage or a hospital. June 8th is when Jupiter enters the sign of Cancer.
How can people best harness this energy?
Celeste: Cancer rules home, family, and foundation. It also speaks about our intuition. This is a great time to do anything to deepen your psychic abilities. Generosity begins at home. Spending more time with family. Making your home a place where you really, really want to stay and nest. People are going to be wanting to stay home more. You may even want to have a vacation at home next summer because travel could be hairy at some point. It is beautiful energy, but just remember too much of a good thing can also come with Jupiter. So watch your expenditures. Wherever you have Cancer in your chart, this is where there's going to be some abundance potentially available to you coming in if you lean in a little bit. It won't be as easy as normal because the first thing Jupiter does when it goes into Cancer is squares Saturn in Aries. So there's going to be this tension between the growth. Jupiter grows, Saturn constricts. It's going to be really interesting to see how this shows up, but Cancer nurtures; it’s a healer. This again speaks to what's going on around healthcare, and maybe Luigi's trial will be associated with this transit.
Any other major transits for 2025?
Celeste: Uranus has been in Taurus, where it does not like to be, since 2018. On July 8th, it's going to move into Gemini, a mutable air sign where it can really do what it does with ease, which is liberate, bring upheaval, sudden breaks, and awakenings. It will motivate us to move forward. People will be annoyed about how slow the year starts, but when Uranus goes into Gemini, boom, it'll feel like we're shot out of a cannon. I see Gemini as a humane sign. People marching in the streets, Gemini rules your local transportation, streets. It's a seven-year transit approximately. It will retrograde back to Taurus and then come back into Gemini, but there will be a lot of surprising electrification. I think this is a lot about chatGPT and how we're entering this higher consciousness. Lots of people are going to be studying astrology, a great way to prepare for 2025. I'm going to be having my astrology foundations classes coming back.
One of my favorite things about following you is how much you talk about astrology pertaining to the collective. People don't realize that astrology can speak to what is going on on a larger plane, and because astrology is about cycles, just like history repeats itself, we see these same cycles happening throughout history. Before the news came out about Kate Middleton in early 2024, you predicted that she had cancer.
Celeste: I did. I shouldn't have said that out loud. People were not happy. I had this psychic opening when Saturn, Mercury, and the Sun all met on my North Node in Pisces, and my Uranus was eclipsed, and my moon was eclipsed. I just started getting all these downloads and sharing some of them.
I know you called it what, maybe a week or two before the announcement.
Celeste: I called the announcement date, too, Venus and Saturn in Pisces.
What is your feeling about the overall vibe of 2025? It seems like there's a lot of push and pull, like Jupiter's going to be in a good place, but other planets are not. A lot of retrogrades. So what's your take?
Celeste: A lot is coming apart. The last time Pluto was in Aquarius was the French Revolution. I think Luigi Mangione is an archetypal figure who started what is coming in the US, where the people have had enough of the wealthy and the elite taking all of our resources for themselves. I mean, the fact that big money people have been in politics and influencing things behind the scenes for many years, but Elon Musk just came out and told Congress on Twitter, if you pass this bill, I am going to pay for people to get you out of office. And they're talking about dismantling the government. What they're going to be doing is taking a lot of the money for the group, the people, and putting even more than it already is into the pockets of billionaires.
Eventually, people are going to wake up and rise up. Musk said it's going to be hard. It's going to be difficult before it gets better. We're starting on the next phase of the journey, which is going to be intense and exciting. There are incredible opportunities for people to forge their own paths, make their own way, and be their own heroes. With Neptune in Aries and Uranus in Gemini, we're entering a higher consciousness where our ability to make our way in terms of having our own businesses is going to be easier and more accessible for more people. But there's all this destabilization. There's all this upheaval coming. So, how can we stay grounded, stay on our path, and think about what's important? Be very discerning about what's important, and don’t let yourself get too caught up with the Piscean energy of just thinking about the bad that could happen. It will be really important for people to stay grounded, but we're going to have these big changes that feel as big as 2020 to me.
Yeah. I think even with the election this year, and I know there were a lot of astrologers and people in the spiritual community who really believed that it was going to go to Kamala. We know this was happening as Pluto was literally at 29 degrees Capricorn, and it just really feels like this is actually the way that it was supposed to go because I feel like things really need to fall apart even more than they already have for us to truly be able to birth something new. It's Pluto's death, rebirth, and transformation, but the death part is not done.
Celeste: No, it's not. Yeah, I was being a Pollyanna, and I knew that we could have done Pluto in Aquarius in a very different way. It's going to be hard no matter what, but it could have been a lot easier. But America, we decided we're going to do it the hard way. Pluto at the 29th degree of Capricorn, a crisis and decay electing a billionaire who's never really had to work a day in his life or broke things, continually bankrupted casinos, businesses went up in flames, we're giving this person the keys to the American purse. We got through it in 2016 with just a global pandemic and a kabillion dollars in new debt. But this time, is he really going to burn it down to the ground? That could be Saturn and Neptune meeting in 2026 at zero degrees. Aries conjunct the IC, which is the personal midnight of the United States chart.
I know it's funny, as you said, we've always known money to be a factor in our politics, but it's like now it's just so flagrant that these people with all this money are calling the shots, and they're not looking out for people who are less fortunate. They actually don't care at all about making things easier for them. They only care about furthering their own agendas, which put more money in their pockets and money in the pockets of a select view.
Celeste: With Uranus in Gemini, everybody's a revolutionary. We're going to be seeing people popping up all over the place with their own crusades of different kinds. We may all be celebrating Luigi now, but we may not be when somebody decides we are the elite. Right? Because we've got more than they have.
Do you have any predictions about whether TikTok is going to get banned?
Celeste: The ban started when Mercury was retrograde in Aries last year. Donald Trump, at his core, wants to be liked. Is he going to bring TikTok back? Oh, I say it expires the day before he's inaugurated. I think there could be a big fanfare when something happens during a retrograde that suggests there will be a reversal. I would not be surprised if he reverses that and TikTok lives. He's so mercurial, and he can change his mind at any moment.
To wrap this up, let’s go through the eclipses for 2025.
Celeste: Eclipses are new moons and full moons that are x10,000. I love to think of them as you walk through a door, and you turn around—and there's a wall. We both studied with Rebecca [Gordon], she likes to talk about how the channel changes—and you can't get back to the old channel. It's a permanent change. I think we'll see that something is seeded every new moon, and if any events happen over the lunar cycle, you can go back to the new moon to see what was seeded. At the full moon, all is revealed. These lunar eclipses are often internal. Emotional things come up within you that lead you to take action during the solar eclipse. This year, the lunar comes first. So you're feeling some kind of way, and then you do something about it, which is how these will probably be experienced. Now, when it's flipped, when the solar eclipse comes first, it's like something happens, and then, ooh, emotionally, you react and then move forward. And I'm wondering if March 13th is when the government shuts down for the Venus retrograde? Yeah, we'll see.
Okay, March 13th, we have the lunar eclipse at 23 degrees Virgo. March 29th, we have the solar eclipse in Aries. This is the last eclipse in Aries for nine years. Notice we only had solar eclipses in Aries, and we never had a lunar eclipse in Aries. So there's this start of conflict without any resolution that the full moon brings. I know many people are worried, honestly, I think World War III has already started, but the fighting might be more with cyber stuff. Although on the seas, Saturn, Neptune in Aries could be war at sea, maybe in the South Pacific. So that's something to be aware of.
On September 7th, there’s a lunar eclipse in Pisces. September 21st, a solar eclipse at 29 degrees of Virgo–the degree of crisis and decay. Virgo rules health, it rules workers, it rules farmland. So these are the topics that are going to be impacted by that Pisces. We can think about hospitals and illness. Virgos and Pisces, this is a big year for you.
Celeste's Guide to the Luckiest Days of the Year!
February 1st: Venus conjunct Neptune. That could be a beautiful day if you're an artist or a writer or even a couple of days before that. Just give yourself space to create, create, create. This energy is so beautiful potentially. Now, there may be storms, but it's so beautiful.
March 22nd: Venus is reborn. Venus Cazimi. Relationships could have little bumps, but you can remember the love and reignite things like what can happen with Venus retrograde. The things that are hidden come up to the surface in order to be dealt with. You peel the tape back and really see what's going on with your relationships in order to bring in healing and conversations. But they should all start with I, in terms of how you are feeling rather than you, projecting what's going on within you on someone else.
June 24th: Jupiter and the sun meet. This could be a very lucky day for some people.
July 4th: Now, this could go either way, Venus and Uranus are conjunct at 29 degrees Taurus. So there's some kind of collapse and decay around, but for some people, you're just having a great party. I suggest for this, staying away from fireworks and having a July 4th party at your own house.
August 12th: Venus and Jupiter conjunction at 14 degrees cancer. Maybe that's when Diddy finds out his fate. He has Venus and Jupiter conjunct in his natal chart. Get yourself a lotto ticket. Especially if you have Cancer energy. I will, I have a Cancer rising.
