Career improvements: Saturn retrograde ends on November 4

Back on the professional track! On November 4, structured Saturn wakes up from a four-and-a-half month retrograde in Pisces that began on June 17, which throttled or thwarted some of your career plans. Were you overly ambitious? You may have been forced to go back to the drawing board or to scale back to a more realistic rollout. Work may have felt tedious, and your relationship with a stern authority figure could have felt particularly oppressive.

But there was a silver lining to Saturn’s slowdown. It was an opportunity to step back and assess your goals from a more objective distance, trimming any excess or scaling back to something more manageable (and less stressful!). Maybe you had the tough but undeniable realization that this career path wasn’t a fit.

With the ringed taskmaster now marching on-beat, you're ready to get back to business. And since Saturn is here until February 2026, you’d be wise to view this phase of your career as a marathon rather than a sprint. Where are there gaps in your expertise and knowledge? This is a good time to work with a mentor or coach and to pay some dues in the name of establishing yourself.

Maybe you take on a high-profile client pro bono in exchange for a glowing testimonial and referrals. Perhaps you finish up some certifications to put yourself in a new tier of your industry. Think of where you’d like to be a year from now and then reverse-engineer the steps it will take to reach that point.

Beware the November 11 Mars-Uranus opposition

Had enough of a stressful situation? You could reach a breaking point on November 11, when hotheaded Mars and volatile Uranus face off in a tense opposition. You’ll be in a rip-the-bandage-off kind of mood then, ready to take bold action.

Watch that your health, both physical and emotional, doesn’t take a hit. While shaking things up radically might seem like the only solution today, you could end up creating more chaos than you planned if you try to change everything at once.

Not sure where to start trimming back? Begin by looking for the “energy leaks.” That could be a person on Team Gemini who’s been slacking off or draining your resources. Are you tied up in a project that’s made you feel stressed and overwhelmed? Consider bowing out of this commitment, enlisting extra support or creating a more efficient system for managing it.