Either way, don’t expect the first version of your itinerary to be the one you follow. Mercury will retrograde in your travel and education sector from August 5 to 14, which may potentially scramble some of your existing plans and/or inspire you to comb through some old academic notes. If there’s one day this month that may be pretty nice for reconnecting with old acquaintances in a faraway land or bonding over a preexisting philosophical quandary, it’ll be around the Mercury-Venus conjunction on August 7.

Otherwise, the big issue that’ll probably throw a wrench in the works (and demand most of your attention this month) is whatever is being described by the Mars-Saturn square on August 16. A stalemate at work, an overextended calendar, and the outsized pressure of having way too much to do might run you ragged in August, so try to mind your burnout. If anything, this is going to be a time when those daily practices you’ve been cultivating are going to come into handy the most. When life is most stressful and chaotic is precisely when you need to double down on the discipline of doing your morning pages, maintaining your meditation habit, getting your daily steps in, or whatever it is you need to stay balanced.

Aquarius Rising

In the midst of all of your efforts to keep your boat afloat, you’re about to have some big, and potentially startling, realizations about what it’s going to take to live your truth. It’s easy to downplay some of your existential concerns when there’s the more pressing question of paying your rent or mortgage on time, but this might be a month that asks you to move beyond that sense of survival mode, which is actually distracting you from the difficult questions you’ve been avoiding.

To be fair, there might be more of these kinds of financial stresses than usual this August. Venus and Saturn will be opposing each other in your money houses, and Mercury will retrograde through your houses of shared resources and relationships from August 5 to 28. If you owe back taxes, child support, or have been putting off settling your Splitwise debt, paying people back will likely figure into this story. Bigger questions may arise in this context, too, like whether you’re still on the same page with your significant others, travel companions, and business partners. It’s possible that you’ll spend this retrograde renegotiating the terms of an important contract, too. The sense here is that it won’t be easy to come up with an arrangement that everyone likes. Someone may get the short end of the stick.

August 18 and 19 is when stuff gets really pivotal for you: there’s an Aquarius Full Moon on the 19th that coincides with a Mercury cazimi and a square to Uranus. There will be big realizations flooding in on these days—the kind that might inspire you to radically shake up your life or make some changes, particularly when it comes to a key partnership. This also comes on the heels of a Mars-Saturn square on August 16, a frustrating, yet revealing, signature of what isn’t working and what can’t continue, especially when it comes to “what you can actually afford right now.” Even if money is the straw that breaks the camel’s back, it’s ultimately you who’s in the driver’s seat. What happens when you’re awake behind the wheel?

Pisces Rising

For whatever reason, you’re either not able, or not willing, to meet others halfway right now. And that might be the source of considerable tension in your relationships this month (we’re looking at you, group travelers), or a breakdown of trust and/or intimacy that occurs while you’re preoccupied with the demands of home or family matters.