23 AUGUST 2025
This is a copy of a mailing that went out yesterday. If you’d like to receive these FREE NEWSLETTERS straight to inbox just add yourself to the mailing list – subscribe here
In this newsletter you’ll find –
- The latest flight prices for Summer School
- All about Virgo as a Sun sign
- The Astrology for this weekend, including a 0 degrees Virgo New Moon
- How Astrology shows for the Universal (the world) and the Particular (the individual)
- The New Moon & Gaza
- Horoscope for Greta Thunberg
- Preview of next week’s Astrology, incl Mercury coming Out of Shadow
SUMMER SCHOOL
Two more courses coming up, the last few places available on either week, groups are a maximum of 10 people. Package holidays now thin on the ground but flight prices still coming down. These are the prices on Skyscanner this morning –
TAROT & ASTROLOGY – with Joanna
- Wednesday 3 September – return flights from £198.00
DISCOVERING ASTROLOGY – with Sally Kirkman
- Wednesday 10 September – return flights from £226. 00
https://joannawatters.com/course/discovering-astrology-course/
ACCOMMODATION
Single person occupancy seafront rooms from about 60 Euros a night. You can reply to this newsletter if you’d like to receive the FAQs document, ask a specific question or arrange a WhatsApp call with either myself or Sally to discuss your needs.
Weather is gorgeous – about 30 degrees, blue skies and a warm sea, and staying that way according to the 14 days ahead forecasts.
NIDRI BEACH
INTO THE VIRGO TIME OF YEAR
This is an intense start to Virgo season. Before looking at how this is playing out in the world right now, along with the current Mercury activity and what we can expect to see at a personal level, here’s the lowdown on this sign as a personality type.
The write up is from my book Essential Astrology. Note that the general description of the Sun signs also provides the celestial “backdrop” for the sensitive themes of each month.
- Ruling Planet – Mercury
- Element & Mode – Mutable Earth
- Key Phrase – I serve
SPOT THE VIRGO
Virgos have a reputation for perfectionism and this often shows in their physical appearance. Designer labels or off the peg, look for the individual who is immaculately put together and who is a triumph of cleanliness and perfect grooming. A typical Virgo wouldn’t dream of leaving the house in a hurry, wearing anything stained or in need of repair.
The men tend to have square, rugged yet slightly boyish faces, and can be noticeably dapper. The women tend to go to the extremes of immaculate makeup and accessories, or the fresh barefaced look that simply radiates good health. Even if there is scant attention to fashion or adornment there is a distinct neatness, crispness or minimalism to the Virgo look.
Everything may be slightly understated but don’t be fooled. It can take ages to look this good. Virgos are also the worriers of the zodiac so look for the pensive expression or the frown.
THE VIRGO NATURE
Many people naturally associate Mercury, planet of language and the mind, with his better known masculine sign, communicative livewire Gemini. Virgo is Mercury’s feminine sign which is expressed through brain power of a more subtle and exacting kind.
Virgo’s primary task is to evaluate and analyze. Information, feelings and decisions are all fed through some kind of mental sieve, separating fact from fiction and isolating essential details. If they ask you a question, which they generally love to do, they’ll pick apart your answer to find out exactly and precisely what you mean.
This sign is not given to extravagance or lavishness. Virgo is economical with all resources and can be frugal to the point of extreme self denial. They can be fanatically tidy and fussy, with a place for everything and everything in its place. However, the goody two shoes image is frequently a cover for inner turmoil and a wonderfully whacky streak which most certainly does not tally with the somewhat dry and boring image often ascribed to this sign.
LOVE & RELATIONSHIPS
There are probably more myths to debunk with this sign than any other. All Virgos are prim and prudish, right? Wrong. In public they may come across as demure but behind closed doors they are perfectly capable of raunchiness. This is an earth sign after all.
Are they really critical fusspots? It’s true that an insecure Virgo excels at nagging and nit-picking but usually they would be the first to admit it. Their line of defence is along the lines of wanting the best out of their relationship, wanting their partner to be the best that they can be and wanting to feel safe so that they can relax.
Note that this generally does not work the other way around. Virgos are positively allergic to criticism. They will bristle with indignation and feel wounded to the quick. They have a lot invested in their hardworking, perfection seeking approach and beliefs.
A Virgo’s saving grace is that their highest standards are almost certainly their own and a partner who understands just how hard Virgos can be on themselves is a must-have. A partner who pulls their weight is also crucial. Virgos in return need to feel respect and low achievers or idle dreamers need not apply.
VOCATION
Virgo has a dutiful streak a mile wide and is aligned to service, everything from the armed forces serving their country to trades people serving the general public. This is also the sign of skills and crafts, reflecting the Virgo unparalleled talent for precision and keen eye for detail. They adopt the policy that, if something is worth doing, then it is worth doing faultlessly, or not at all.
They have self discipline, a strong work ethic and can easily become workaholics, especially as they find it pretty much impossible to delegate. Who else could they trust to do a task to their own staggeringly high standards? Other people’s inefficiency or slapdash attitude can drive them nuts but they do have to learn when “good enough” is acceptable rather than continually striving for perfection.
However, job satisfaction lies in continually honing their expertise, and in approaching every task with patience and painstaking exactitude. This often springs from being afraid to make mistakes, which are as a result rare and never repeated.
Thorough and systematic this sign rules administrative work of all kinds but a Virgo will excel in any job that demands accuracy. They can also express their mental agility through the written word and often make excellent writers and public speakers.
This sign rules health too so many Virgos are drawn to the medical professions, from nursing through to speech or occupational therapy, or specializing in a particular field.
HEALTH
Part of the Virgo bad press is the tag of hypochondria. More accurately, Virgos are generally health conscious in the extreme if only because their most common ailment is anxiety. They worry about their health, just as they tend to worry about all sorts of things. They can worry for the world. They can worry about not having anything to worry about.
At their most fretful Virgos become cranky, withdrawn – or ill. In the physical body Virgo rules the pancreas and intestines so fear, stress or imbalances are most likely to manifest in intestinal or assimilation problems for this sign. They are prone to food allergies and are usually suited to a diet specifically tailored to their sensitive system.
In a nutshell: fastidious, analytical, diligent, dutiful, quirky, astute.
TEXTBOOK VIRGOS
Agatha Christie, whose ingenious and intricate “whodunits” earned her the accolade of the Queen of crime fiction. Also known for her love of archaeology, especially the painstaking work of excavation.
Actor Colin Firth who became an established pinup after playing the tall, dark and repressed Darcy in Pride and Prejudice, and whose performance in The King’s Speech won him his first Oscar.
Designer Stella McCartney honed her craft through study and internship, and is described as having “a signature style of sharp tailoring and sexy femininity”. As a lifelong vegetarian she uses no leather or fur in her creations.
WHAT’S HAPPENING NOW?
Have a look at this picture, starting with the Sun changing sign last night. With the Moon also then arriving in Virgo this morning that means that we have the New Moon (Sun conjunct Moon) at 0 degrees of this sign.
The Sun changing sign means moving through the “critical degrees” of 29 (endings) and 0 (beginnings). Venus is doing the same, arriving at 29 Cancer on Sunday evening and reaching 0 Leo on Monday.
As all the slow moving planets are currently at the very beginning of their respective signs we see that the Sun at the beginning of Virgo is the signal for a series of five solar aspects that unfold in less than a day and a half (as the Sun’s journey is at the rate of one degree a day). Venus will also make the series of aspects to Saturn, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto throughout the first half of this coming week.
Friday 22 August
- Sun ingress Virgo 21.35
Saturday 23 August
- Moon ingress Virgo 06.25
- New Moon 0 Virgo 07.08
- Sun 0 Virgo quincunx Saturn 0 Aries 12.06
Sunday 24 August
- Jupiter 16 Cancer semi-square Uranus 1 Gemini 00.59
- Sun 1 Virgo square Uranus 0 Gemini 08.15
- Sun 1 Virgo semi-square Jupiter 16 Cancer 09.57
- Sun 1 Virgo quincunx Neptune 1 Aries 11.00
- Sun 1 Virgo quincunx Pluto 1 Aquarius 21.03
Monday 25 August
- Venus ingress Leo 17.28
In last week’s blog I wrote –
Impossible to separate them all out, it’s all a bit bonkers, and am fully expecting this coming weekend to be manic. Given that planets symbolise people as well as things I would also expect scenarios which involve a lot of people, different personalities and maybe a lot of conflicting ideas or opinions.
The top quality of this New Moon though is, quite simply, newness – it’s the stuff of clean slates, even more so because of falling at 0 degrees. Like The Fool, the first card in the Major Arcana of the tarot being numbered not one but zero, we’re looking at a new lease of life. I’m praying that’s going to be especially true for Gaza and Ukraine.
The other quality is suddenness because of falling in square (the only major aspect in the sequence) to Uranus, planet of the unexpected but also innovation and the collective. A lot could change and happen very quickly, especially if you have any natal planets or Angles at or very close to 0 degrees of any sign, but especially the Virgo – Pisces axis.
The Uranian themes are also underlined by that minor aspect less than 24 hours later between Jupiter and Uranus. It’s a semi-square, literally half a square so half the tension if you like, but the nature of Jupiter the Greater Benefic teaming up with Uranus I feel bodes well. The two planets have a lot in common, starting with things like human rights and liberation. Watch out for those lucky breaks that might come along in strange wrappers.
So the headlines have been all about the humanitarian crisis in Gaza. Cast your mind back to the beginning of June when activist Greta Thunberg was deported by Israel, after taking in a boat carrying a small amount of aid as “a peaceful act of civil resistance” against Israel’s blockade.
There were ridiculous comments about the amount of food not being enough to make any difference, as if she didn’t know that. The point is that it was a symbolic act, that she was alerting the world to what was happening and which has now happened. Israel is saying “there is no famine in Gaza”. The UN have found the opposite to be true. It’s a dire situation that it took a 22 year old to lead the way.
Greta is born on a New Moon in Capricorn, conjunct Chiron, the Wounded Healer –
https://www.astrotheme.com/astrology/Greta_Thunberg
This has reached the headlines on this Virgo New Moon, sign of the harvest – the symbol of Virgo is the maiden in the cornfield. 0 degrees is extremely powerful, as in zero for nothing – no food – and as in back to the beginning of a problem or a challenge.
Under positive skies 0 degrees can be the beginning of something awesome, under difficult skies it can show what’s needed to deal with a crisis, any situation that’s stripped back to bare basics. Maybe this is a combination of these things as world leaders can no longer ignore the fact that Israel has created a famine as a weapon of war, a weapon that is not far off genocide. In the astrology of countries the Moon rules the people. New action is needed to feed a nation.
MERCURY
This all coincides with another major revelatory factor, Mercury coming out of shadow – the truth outs. I’ll be writing more on this point in this week’s blog, and the fact that Mercury will finally finish this epic journey through Leo. This is the stuff of finales.
At full speed Mercury can whizz through a whole sign in just over two weeks, this scenic retrograde route takes over two months. We’re now on the home stretch of this journey that started at the end of June –
- 26 June – ingress Leo
- 30 June – enters shadow 04.15 Leo (starts to slow down)
- 18 July – turned retrograde 15 Leo
- 1 August – Sun conjunct Mercury (cazimi) 9 Leo (midpoint of the backwards loop)
- 11 August – turns direct 4 Leo
- 25 August – comes out of shadow 15 Leo (gets back to full speed)
- 2 September – ingress Virgo
It’s always clear to me how astrology works at the universal and the particular level. The showing for the Gaza situation is clear. For ourselves, what chapters are closing and opening? For many this is the end of summer holidays and it’s all about switching back into work mode and getting children ready for going back to school.
For me the showing of this home stretch is very clear as my students for the tarot & astrology week arrive 3 September, literally as Mercury crosses the critical degrees of 29 Leo to 0 Virgo. This puts Mercury into dignity, the sign of crafts and skills, as I get down to work with a new group. Perfect timing.
And just in case you were wondering the new book hasn’t quietly died! We’ve just come through two months of intense heat when normal life grinds to a halt, impossible to be creative in 40 degrees, and now am prepping for summer school, so I’ll be back to the book in October with a view to getting it finished by the end of the year.
What would you like to achieve by the end of the year? With Mercury coming out of shadow now’s the time to focus on your timelines, practical plans of attack and visualisations. It’s said that successful people are those who are able to envision their ideas as completed achievements, so don’t underestimate the importance of the psychological factors involved.
Until next time, love from Lefkada
Joanna
