Enthusiasm over perfection

and a dose of honesty

Jan 16, 2026

The moon is new in Capricorn (28°) on Sunday, January 18, 2026.

Self-help, personal growth, personal improvement - pick your favorite term and consider what it means to you. I have a long history of trying to improve myself, and it has meant different things at different points in my life. True story: when I was twelve years old, I remember following a slim book entitled “Thin Thighs in Thirty Days”. I likely weighed all of 95 pounds. And I was twelve! A child. When I began having children at 22, I read “What to Expect When You’re Expecting”, which was really about what you should and should not do if you didn’t want to be a terrible baby incubator and mother.

a stack of books — Photo by Seema Miah on Unsplash

These days, I tend to target specific zones of my life for improvement. I am currently in Week 3 of a Peloton strength program and Week 2 of a journaling class to help me appreciate my home and practice the craft of writing. These past and present endeavors are each externally designed and driven. Yes, I have to provide the self-discipline and time, but none of these things originated within me.

I am examining the way I do life lately for a lot of reasons, and I was surprised that a little change I came up with all by myself is having a major impact. Before I tell you what it is, know that this way of thinking - generating from within what will improve things without - is aligned with the upcoming astrology. This New Moon gives us a head start into the upcoming cardinal fire Aries energy, via the line up of planets in achievement-oriented Capricorn and future-thinking Aquarius.

Saturn in Aries (from 2/13/26 - 2028) will prompt us to be our own teacher, while Neptune in Aries (from 1/26/26 - 2038) will prompt us to find the fire in our spirit. Together, the two planets drive us to determine what is meaningful to us and how, given our individual bullshit, we can go get it or do it or be it. That individual bullshit piece is not a personal criticism, but is the reason so many New Year’s resolutions or personal improvement programs do not stick. We ignore our individual tendencies. We think we are too tired to do anything but sit on the couch after work, but really we are tired because we sit on the couch after work.

Aries will bring directness following a long stretch in Pisces, where we could easily slip out of the grasp of truth into the realm of delusion. This is what I mean by our own bullshit, and as Pisces fades over the next two months, the truth will be staring us in the face.

Aries does not require perfection, but it does demand honesty and an enthusiastic first step.

person wearing orange and gray Nike shoes walking on gray concrete stairs — Photo by Bruno Nascimento on Unsplash

Back to the little change I made with big impact. I literally buried the lead! I have had to face that I will never be the type to issue commands and see my companion Rei (an American Akita) immediately agree. It is just not the way our relationship exists on this plane (on other planes, she would do anything for me and I for her!). I recently switched to a hands-free leash that joins my waist to her, and it has not only eliminated a dynamic I didn’t love (she would often pull me), but it is helping me troubleshoot bouts of energy sickness. It turns out that my psychic healing energy was wandering, kind of like Rei, abruptly leaving my body to investigate other people’s issues and causing nausea and headaches. I now have a visual of remaining centered in my core rather than allowing my energy to wander off when I am with other people.

So why not leverage the practical Capricorn energy of this New Moon to identify some small step you can take within your own daily routine that just may open the door to something big?