Your attentiveness is a knife.

In July, two astrological events stand out to me: Mercury retrograde in Cancer and Jupiter in Leo. Since Leo season starts in July and both Saturn and Neptune are in Aries, it's worth it to note that July will also be the month when Saturn and Neptune go retrograde.

The last time Jupiter was in Leo was 2014, around the time when people started to talk about the attention economy in a political way. That was the year when Trump, then still just a reality TV show star back then, announced his campaign. Before that, people talked about how the Obama campaign used Facebook, but not in a sophisticated or analytical way. The internet was just seen as another way to share videos from mainstream media but with one important ingredient: with your own opinion attached.

I won't go into this too much because I already wrote an essay about the attention economy in the Jupiter in Leo zine I made for The Astro-Kats. The gist of the essay was about how the attention economy has extracted from our real attentiveness. Here's a quote:

"I actually think that attentiveness is one of the most powerful forces in the world. It's a pity that the performance economy tries to monetize it. Attentiveness is care and love. It's how humans learn—by attentive observation. I believe that human beings have the special skill of giving attentive care to other beings. The people, the animals, the plants, and the ideas that humans give attention to usually come alive and grow. I think that attentiveness is important because it's one of the most necessary ingredients in that thing that some animals, which happen to include human beings, do. That thing is play and participation. I don't think that the fundamental desire that we had back in 2014, to give attention and nurture to everyone regardless of status or institutional affiliation, was bad, wrong, was even misguided. I think that our attentiveness has been extracted."

Your attentiveness is a knife. It is the fixed fire of your focus, your determination, and the way that you watch the people who are most important to you with care and patience. Jupiter is the planet of growth. Jupiter in Leo shows us something crucial: things that we give attention to grow in importance in our lives.

And I know. There's all kinds of reasons why we feel like we can't give attention to what is most important. We feel like it's bad to be self important. We fear the trappings of hubris or we are seduced by the illusion of safety in being small and unimportant. Some of us haved lived whole lives being told that we are supplementary, unimportant, and should focus on being helpful rather than aggrandizing.

That neglect of what is important—that might be the most distracting thing of all.

The second astrological event that I think is important in July 2026 is Mercury's retrograde in Cancer. Mercury starts to retrograde on the last day of June and continues to do so into July. As Mercury retrogrades, Mars stays in a Mercurial sign and Venus enters one.

I think that Mercury's retrograde through Cancer will have to do with taking a look at what we have accumulated. That includes Venus stuff like choices and Mars stuff like grudges. I wonder what options you have left open to yourself out of loyalty to a self that no longer feels true rather than present day curiosity. I wonder what grievances you've hung onto way past when those conflicts were generative or meaningful.

Sometimes, you don't need so many options. They hold you back because they distract you from the opportunity available to you now. The old options that don't make sense are relics that belong to a version of yourself that hadn't learned what you've learned. These options take energy to keep open.

Sometimes, you don't need your some of your old defenses. The old defenses keep you from learning how to protect yourself for real because they have you rehearsing how to take back what you have already grieved. That doesn't mean that we have to get over it before it's time. That means that we respect the present by knowing its difference with the past.

Is there anything that you have accumulated from the past that keeps you from moving as freely as you'd like in the present?

Cancer July 2026 Horoscope

When it comes to the art of discerning what is most important, you have one very useful tool. You have your need for and your relationship to food. Food is vitality, life, energy. Food is also nutrition and nurture. Your relationship to food shows you what you need and depend on.

In July, give attention to the people who you eat with when you eat together. You'll notice that the most important conversations you have in life happen over shared food. You'll notice that the most important household decisions are about the preparation of food.

Jupiter in Leo over the course of the next year is really about growing your sense of security by appreciating and celebrating the resources that support you. The most basic measure of support in your life is caloric.

Feeling secure about food is not about controlling what you eat or eating more. Feeling secure about food is about trusting that the food you eat is going to nourish you. Feeling secure about your resources is the same—trusting the the resources, the money and the options, that you have are going to help you make more possible.

Questions for Cancer for July 2026:
What helps you trust the food that you eat?
What helps you trust the support that you get?
What helps you trust the education that you absorb?

Leo July 2026 Horoscope

For the past six years, you've been learning how to navigate new situations, new environments, new people, and new ways of doing things. You've had to really stretch your imagination on who you thought you needed to be to test out roles that you didn't think you could play. You had to stretch your skills. This has helped you learn and to trust what other people can teach you.

For the next six years, you will learning how to trust your own internal psyche. You will find that the world within is just as big and mysterious as the world outside.

The next six years are about understanding your own reflexes. I'm talking about your fastest reactions, about the patterns that shape your behavior so deeply that you don't realize they are there. The next six years are about realizing that your oldest habits have just as much to teach you as new experiments.

In July, you might return back to an old comfort—a book that you liked as a teenager, a route that you used to take, or an old friend who knows you well. You are trying to discern what has remained trustworthy in you throughout the years.

Questions for Leo for July 2026:
What is one old comfort that you'd like to return back to?
What does this old comfort show you about the habits that you still trust?
What does this old comfort show you about what has remained true in you?

Virgo 2026 July Horoscope

Do you ever get super frustrated when people don't do the things that they said they would do? When they fall short of expectations or when they stop showing up? Do you ever wonder if you will ever be able to trust another person's competency the way they can lean on yours?

If you do feel these things, then it's probably time to take a break. You might be overperforming or taking on so much responsibility that the groups that you are a part of have become too reliant on your function.

From this summer to next summer, fatigue will be your teacher. Your fatigue will teach you your limitations and boundaries and about the hubris of trying to plan more than what you are capable of. Fatigue will teach you what you trust because you can only fall asleep and rest well when you trust something, someone, or someplace. Fatigue will teach you about good enough—about enough in general, about when you no longer have to go above and beyond because you have done enough.

In July, you can make a list of things that you are tired of. Get as precise as you can. Tiredness is not lack of interest or rejection—tiredness just shows you when you have done enough.

Questions for Virgo for July 2026:
What are you tired of?
How do you recognize your fatigue?
How does fatigue tell you when you have done enough?

Libra July 2026 Horoscope

In July, let generosity relax you and become your motivation.

You have to be generous to teach. You can't just be stingy and save all of your ideas and knowledge for yourself. You have to share your mind with generosity, not controlling how other people might use or share what you teach them. This is part of why teaching earns you honor.

Over the course of the next year into next summer, you will be learning how to move with intellectual authority. You will teach. Keep in mind that teaching is not about pretending to know everything. Teaching is just about sharing and building an environment where people feel important enough to share.

If you currently wrestle emotionally with friends who inspire you, if you feel any envy for people who look like they're living the life that you might have liked to live, then you might be feeling a real need to teach or for recognition inside of you. You don't actually want to be someone else. You just need recognition for being precisely who you already are because you know that you have something important to share.

Questions for Libra for June 2026:
Who was your favorite teacher when you were growing up?
What do you remember about how that person taught?
What do you want to teach and receive recognition for?

Scorpio July 2026 Horoscope

You have been learning how to read and trust the actions of other people for the last six years. You've been letting other people shape you because you found some good ones, because people are really smart and interesting and you enjoy collaboration as a mode of creative education. You've found that letting other people support you feels good and that you know a thing or two about teamwork. You have also been contributing to your society, figuring out how to help other people.

For the next six years, you will be learning how to trust your sense of direction.

The thing is, you don't always walk in a group. There's certain things that you have to do on your own and you require your own sense of direction to suss them out and to get them done. You learn when you are by yourself too. You learn skills that other people might not have to because they're simply not interested in the same things as you.

For the next six years, you will be learning how to trust your independence. This is a shift. You may not be as available to other people the way that you have been. You might need more time for private contemplation.

Questions for Scorpio for July 2026:
What do you want more time for doing just for yourself and on your own?
What helps you make decisions on your own?
How do you know when it's time to depart from a group project?

Sagittarius July 2026 Horoscope

This year is actually about accomplishing something that you have used the last two years to plan for and prepare for. I'm not sure what you've been cooking up or what the timeline of your pursuits are looking like these days but I know that Jupiter in Leo, trine to your Sun, is a precipice.

If you have long terms plans at all, then try something big this year. Go for it. Just do it and try. This year, Jupiter in Leo and Sun in Sagittarius exchange gifts. You're not in a planning or preparation phase anymore. You're like a tiger who is about to pounce. Tigers use all of their reserve strength in a single pounce.

This year, as you are embued with Jupiter's grace, it's helpful to keep in mind that Jupiter has a shadow side. As the planet of big ideas, big visions, and big dreams, Jupiter can be paranoid. Jupiter tends to assign too much meaning to every single little accident or incident. Not everything that has meaning is that important.

This year, because you are feeling Jupiter much more than the rest of us, try to take risks on things that you have already planned and made preparations for. Don't be randomly reckless because you think that it will be a fun story or a weird experience. Not everything needs to have meaning. You can be intentional here and decide what is important to you.

Questions for Sagittarius for July 2026:
What do you want to accomplish this year?
What have you been practicing that you're ready to do?
What is the motivation that is driving you and what does your motivation tell you about what is important?

Capricorn July 2026 Horoscope

For the next year, from this summer to next summer, you're going to be studying some kind of deep subject that you usually don't make time to study. This is not a time of seeking out the kind of education that will earn you external recognition. This is going to be a year where you learn something that's worth learning to you just because you want to know it and not because you're looking for flowers.

To start, you have to give a good and honest answer to the following question: what is something that you do not know that you'd like to know?

I think that this is a much more vulnerable question that it looks. It's not that easy to admit that we don't know something that we'd like to know. You're not asking yourself this question to fuck with your own confidence or anything. You're asking because you're trying to understand the limits of your own mind.

My advice: start by learning something that you're angry about not being taught. This might be something basic like geography or math. It could also be an ancestral language or a way of cooking. Use your anger to give you energy—anger can help you move through reluctance or fear.

Questions for Capricorn for July 2026:
How do you know when you don't know something?
How do you know when you want to know something?
What supports you in making time to learn?

Aquarius July 2026 Horoscope

For the past six years, you've been learning how to trust what you already know. You've been learning how to keep your super long term friendships, how to recognize and adapt the knowledge that you already have, and how to build out structures that you already started. You've been learning how to trust your own discernment which tells you things based on your experience.

For the next six years, you will be learning how to trust what you do not know.

These next six years might feel similar to the six years between 2014-2020 with one important caveat: you are about a decade older now then you were then. For these next six years, you're going to be going outside more to see what's out there. You will seek out education, teachers, and try what you haven't tried before. You will interact with strangers and find that you are a lot less predictable than you thought you had to be.

For the past six years, you've realized that the world inside you is far larger and deeper than you realized previously. Now, you will realize that the world around you is bigger than you think. Your job in July is to let yourself be surprised.

Questions for Aquarius for July 2026:
What have you learned about stability these last six years?
Where do you want to go in the next six years?
Is there something that you've never tried before that you'd like to try?

Pisces July 2026 Horoscope

This next year, from this summer into next summer, will be about thinking long term about your job. Is this a place where you'd like to stay at for long? Based on what you do, are there any parts of your body that are being worn down by your everyday tasks? What is the long term impact of your labor—both on your community and on your body?

If you do manual labor, think about your joints and back. If you work at night, think about your memory and brain health. If you work at a computer, think about your veins and eyes.

Think about the long term impact of your daily work. Do you help sick people find care? Do you help young people mature? Do you make a hard to navigate system easier for people who need help or do you provide a bit of rest and grace for the weary?

Your work, the everyday discipline of it, is shaping you into becoming a very specific person with specific skills and vulnerabilities. Your work reveals the type of healthcare that you will need as you age. Your work also reveals the expertise that you will have when you are old. You do the work that you do because something about it is important enough to sustain.

Questions for Pisces for July 2026:
What is the long term impact of your work on your community or society?
What is the long term impact of your work on your body?
What do your answers to the two questions above tell you about what makes your work important to you?

Aries July 2026 Horoscope

For the last year, you've been learning about your family and where you came from. This next year, you will be learning about how you shape and impact your family by being yourself.

You have one very important tool for changing your expectations and habits around intmacy: that tool is love. You accept new family members by loving them. You learn who is familiar to you and who is not by understanding how love works for you.

In July, ask yourself what makes you feel important to the people who you love. You have some great people in your life who will make you a priority in theirs. Over the course of the next year, from this current summer into the next, you will have less patience for people who say that they love you but neglect you otherwise. You will have even less patience for those who want to love you only because they want you to be someone who you are not for them. You will have all the time in the world for people who want you as yourself.

You might fall in love with someone or something very deeply this year. This is because you are getting more clear about how you love and how you desire to be loved.

Questions for Aries for July 2026:
Which lovers, family members, or friends make you feel like a priority?
Which people want you as yourself?
What specifically do they do that make you feel loved as yourself?

Taurus July 2026 Horoscope

For the last six years, you've been learning how to go your own way. You've kept your head clear and above the clouds, never comparing yourself to other people because you know that everyone has an unique place in this world. You have learned from making decisions on your own that other people did not have the right experience or desires to help you discern. You've learned by just going and trying it, not asking for feedback before the time is right or for advice, but by simple doing.

Now, for the next six years, you will be learning how to trust your collaborations. You will learn how to trust the actions of others.

One thing you will notice: your projects will move slower but start to look bigger. More becomes possible when you are more than one person. You will learn how to identify your need for support and how to ask for help. You will learn how to give help when you are asked and not before.

The past six years has taught you how to initiate. You're learned about what you want and what motivates you. The next six years will help you learn what other people want and how to make those desires fit alongside yours when they look different.

Questions for Taurus for July 2026:
How did you play group games as a kid?
What did those games teach you about teamwork?
What projects are growing bigger than just yourself?

Gemini July 2026 Horoscope

This next year, you might want to go on a trip with your friends. I'm not talking about a trip to a tourist destination. I'm talking about moving around in a way that is atypical of how you're used to moving and to a place that pushes your expectations about where you think you're supposed to be.

There's a saying: frog looking out of a well. When a frog sits in a well, it can only see the circle of the sky above the well. It mistakes the walls of the well for the horizon of the world. Only when the frog leaps out from the well, does it realize how big the world really is.

When you stay within the limits of where you are supposed to be, your world is like a well. You assume that certain things are off limits to you. You assume that you can only be the person who you are in the place that you are. You start to feel overcrowded or clustered, like you can predict the same old problems over and over again and you're sick of them. Places get stuck to you in that way or, maybe, you get stuck in them.

This year, leap out of the well. You don't have to even go that far. Sometimes, a simple day trip with friends takes you out of your expectations and your habits. Remember that the frog doesn't need to a thousand meters away. It just needs to jump one foot to get out of that well.

Questions for Gemini for July 2026:
What place feels like elsewhere to you?
What does the way that you define elsewhere tell you about where you currently are?
If you know where you are, then what you do know about where you are headed?