Thoughts about “future plans” have been buzzing around my head like flies. Choices I want and need to make loom imminent and large. Should I sign up for this class that could be inspiring (but what if I do, and I’m bored out of my mind)? Will a book project I’d once shelved rise from the ashes and end up in print? The only feedback I’m receiving right now is my head feels like it’s going to explode, and the futurizing is zapping my good cheer- signs I need a change of approach.

Because the funny thing about the future is it never arrives. It is only, always, now.

And sometimes we block our good while we’re focused on that thing we think we should be doing, instead of doing what we are drawn to discover and enjoy in this moment.

One of my strategies for feeling blocked is to do something else, totally and radically unrelated to my goal. Maybe it’s the Uranian instinct in me, but when life doesn’t flow in the direction I want it to, taking an opposite approach works wonders. When I am “supposed to be” working, heading outside, soaking in the sun and spending time with the chicken inspires my groove again. When a creative work project stymied me last fall, I decided to sign up for a jewelry-making class — my theory being that all muses aren’t operatic divas announcing their selves as “The Next Big Thing”. The true hidden beauties of genius often enter quietly through side doors, roads not taken, through other whimsies, whispers and inspirations.

For us overachiever, type-A people who have a tireless sense of personal mission (and, let’s be real, no small amount of self-importance) this upside-down-is-right-side-up philosophy is often really hard to embrace. But the cost of single-mindedly pursuing “goals” and “future-planning” can turn into it’s own prison. One client, a woman who finished her doctorate by her early 20’s, told me she started working on her resume in junior high. She eventually started a business to literally “help kids find and live their dreams” – only to suffer burnout, and discover she wasn’t enjoying her “dream”! Her beloved dream, her sense of “mission”, everything she had strategised, planned for all those years now imprisoned her. With a strongly teneted tenth and eleventh house, her need to make a contribution is strong, but with Uranus arriving at her Mid-Heaven a season of self-rediscovery is stronger. Her chief concern in seeking me for a reading was: Find joy in my work again. I advised her to do the opposite of work -to play- and gently warned her against turning any enthusiasm into her next calling, mission or life’s work right now. The way back to the True Self can only happen by dropping all the planning and shoulds and committing to re-discovering the joys of today.

So where could you use a joyful shake up? It’s Aquarius Full Moon, we are thinking of the future and our place in it, but a zany, upside-down approach to future goal-setting seems appropriate considering the number of retrogrades in the sky right now – five, including Venus, planet of pleasure, creativity, abundance. Full Moon day she retrogrades back into creative, playful Leo. You might even sleep with your window open on Full Moon night and lay out some fun baubles for her, so the Aquarian idea fairies can find you.

This Moon nurtures our creative genius, our brilliance, our innovation and ability to go against all odds- sometimes with little social support. One thing I regularly hear from Uranian-type folks who want to strike out on their own, break from their corporate job and live their “dream,” is fear. It’s real -and it’s not. For those called to live a life by our own rules, the social infrastructure that helps us feel secure (everything from health insurance to a laid-out career trajectory) is not available. It takes courage, a lot of “searching outside the box” for strategies, to chart this course but for us the cost of not doing so is our very soul. Over time we discover we’re not alone, we have a new tribe of allies (we’re here!). Consider women innovators: Marie Curie, Georgia O’Keefe, Martha Graham, Gloria Steinem, Eleanor Roosevelt…each had no precedent to follow, each blazed an original path. As Saturn changes directions the day after this Full Moon, it’s time to face our fears and move forward. We can re-dedicate our self to following what holds inspiration and weed out what no longer does (Venus).

One final word about our big life plans and dreams: They change. And change can be beautiful.

At this Moon, drop any fearful single-minded version of the way things “ought to be” playing in your head. These are probably blocking you from considering other, potentially better (and more enjoyable) alternatives. The bright ideas available to you now are circulating in left-field, and at first glance may sound/look/seem crazy (every genius idea always has an element of “Noooo… that’s too crazy” in it). But remember, right now, upside down is right side up.

And when in doubt…follow Venus. If up has become down for you, try this experiment: make joy your new center of gravity, your Truest North. Take a page from my book and do the opposite of what you (or others) think you should be doing. Then have fun with it!