Astrology for the Week Ahead: April 14th to 20th — Mars Leaves Cancer Heading Towards Pluto!

Hey, everyone. This is Adam Elenbaas from Nightlight Astrology [https://nightlightastrology.com/]. Today we are going to take a look at the astrology for the week ahead. That is April 14, Monday through Sunday, April 20.

One of the big pieces of astrological news for this week is Mars leaving the sign of Cancer. So as soon as it leaves the sign of Cancer, it starts engaging with an opposition to Pluto. We're in the midst of quite a significant turning point with respect to the long Mars Retrograde cycle that we experienced in the early part of this year of 2025, so we're going to look at that today.

But there's also, I feel like this is a week where there's a major emphasis on minor things. There's a lot of small things happening this week outside of Mars finally leaving Cancer. We're going to look at some of those things today and tell you what to expect, and I will have some horoscopes for the fixed signs today. Finally, the fixed signs are getting a little love at the weekly overview.

So that is what is in front of us. Before we get into it, remember to like and subscribe. Make this your place of daily meditation. Make this a place that is a part of your daily spiritual routine. We appreciate it. It helps our channel to grow when you like and subscribe.

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All right, so on that note, let's shift our attention to the real-time clock and take a look at what's happening this week. Here we go. Now you'll see that first of all, at the start of the week, here we are on—let me update this a little bit—get to Monday, the 14th. Nothing much is happening today in terms of dynamic aspects in the sky that are forming. It's a little bit later in the week that things really get cooking.

So we start on April 16 with Mercury leaving the sign of Pisces and entering Aries. Now the reason that this is a significant transit this week is because Mercury's dignity improves greatly, and it's getting out of the copresence and the recent conjunction with Saturn. So we're taking Mercury into a place where its dignity is much better.

We're getting it out of the conjunction with Saturn, which can be a little heavy and maybe just a bit more serious. So the mood for Mercury lightens a bit, which we may notice in terms of thoughts, mental and emotional and communicative dynamics that are around us—even things like technology. If you've been dealing with things that are breaking—we had to deal with replacing a water softener while Mercury was retrograde in Pisces and conjoined with Saturn—surprise, surprise.

So if you've been dealing with any heaviness from Mercury, you're going to find that this is a nice shift because things probably get a little bit lighter. Now I say that, but I have to say on the 17th, right away, Mercury does conjoin Neptune in Aries at 0° Aries. I actually like this as a point of great illumination, creativity, imagination, with an emphasis on action and initiating new things—new activities, new ideas, new thoughts.

0° Aries is a tremendously catalytic place. It's a place of birth—so the birthing of new ideas, new technologies, new plans, new something that you need to say or speak, or a new writing project. All of these signatures, to me, are a part of the 0° Aries mark here. Mercury-Neptune can also fill us with maybe a raging imagination.

You think of the fiery and kind of impulsive and perhaps even temperamental or irritable qualities of Mercury and Neptune. And I think of inflammation—mentally or verbally or ideological combustibility, like you're fired up about ideas but maybe going to extremes. I would watch impulsiveness around this transit as the week goes on.

But after this, then certainly as the week goes on past the 17th, we're going to see Mercury gaining some distance from Neptune, fully in Aries as the morning star. It's a lot less gooey than Mercury in Pisces. So we'll think about it that way.

We keep going from here. The next major event of the week, which everyone will—you know, it's like, "Hip hip hooray!"—Mars leaves Cancer. Mars has been in the sign of Cancer for so long, going all the way back to the autumn of 2024 (or the spring if you're in the southern hemisphere). The placement of Mars in Cancer was weighty because that's a place where Mars is in its fall.

So there's really nowhere to go but up from this moment, which is nice. However, as soon as Mars enters the sign of Leo, immediately it's in an opposition with Pluto. That opposition with Pluto will occupy much of our astrological conversation for the next couple of weeks to come.

This week is the week in which Mars changes signs, leaves Cancer. Everyone's pretty excited about that, but look—as soon as it enters Leo, we've got a trine to Neptune, we've got an opposition to Pluto. I mean, it enters the sign of Leo and has a lot to say. And I just wonder how meaningfully we can tie together some of the recent Mars in Cancer periods with this upcoming Mars-Pluto opposition, because the retrograde was so closely tied to the opposition to Pluto back at the beginning of the year.

So that will be a big part of what we do this week and next, starting to prep ourselves. And I'm going to be doing a livestream on April 24 where I do some live birth chart readings and also talk about the Mars-Pluto opposition in greater depth and celebrate the 80,000 subscriber mark that we were trying to get to—being surpassed this last month. So that should be a fun thing.

Mark your calendars for that. You can find announcements for that—I think it's going to be 10 AM Central Time, 11 AM Eastern—or it's 9:30... I can't remember. But anyway, it'll be announced on my Instagram and on the YouTube posts.

So Mars entering Leo—certainly the dignity of Mars picks up. And I think that has to be, for all of us, exciting. Mars in Cancer has this—it's a vulnerable space, emotionally, and it can be a very triggering space, especially for things related to our sense of safety, security, connections to things like home and family.

That's been a transit that has brought up a lot for people. I've seen it in my practice, with my students, stories that you have all sent in—so interesting. Now, the thing that happens on the 19th is the Sun will leave the sign of Aries on the 19th and enter Taurus.

Now, you know, I don't usually track the Sun's change of signs too closely unless, as soon as the Sun changes signs, there's an immediate major aspect. And in this case, there is. So as soon as the Sun enters the sign of Taurus, it's immediately in a square with Mars, with reception—Mars is in the Sun's sign—and it's in an engagement with Pluto.

So this little T-square between the Sun, Mars, and Pluto is a very powerful story in the total arc of 2025. This is one of the transit periods that I've highlighted as one of the most significant of the year. And the simple reason for that is that Mars-Pluto oppositions are always significant.

Add into that an aspect from the Sun with reception to Mars, another square to Pluto, and the history of this Mars opposition coming through in direct motion, then retrograde motion, and then direct motion again—as well as the fact that that opposition to Pluto has happened across Capricorn and Aquarius as Pluto changed signs—you get the feeling that this transit that's coming up is really one of the event periods in which you can start to feel the change of eras astrologically that's taking place mid-decade.

Which, you know, all of us astrologers are talking about, right? You've got Pluto changing signs, Jupiter changing signs, Uranus changing signs, Saturn changing signs, Neptune changing signs—that usually will track, in collective terms, historical terms, with really significant changes of the psychic and collective weather.

So this period is one of those—there's several—that really seems to mark the changing of the times. We're going to start experiencing that by the end of this week on Saturday, because the Sun immediately starts interacting with Mars and Pluto in these squares within 3°. So I would say that, you know, the weekend is much more intense than this week is.

This week, we get Mercury into Aries. The Mercury conjunction with Neptune is not nothing. Mars leaving Cancer is not nothing. But late in the week, as those changes happen, and then the Sun enters Taurus, that's when you really start to feel, "Okay, something's really cooking now," and that feeling of something alchemical starting to take place.

We're really going to feel that the next two weeks, and you'll see a lot of focus on that with my content anyway. So this becomes an important moment. On Saturday, you'll feel the shift. And then on the 19th, the other thing that's happening that very same day, of course, is Mars is trining Neptune.

Now, in the most encouraging light, Mars trining Neptune gives us a kind of creative courage and the motivation or incentive, or the vision, to start acting in a new way—to start working towards some kind of transformative event, or to start pushing in a direction, let's say.

The reason I say this is because as soon as Mars trines Neptune, it moves right into the opposition with Pluto. So it's as though Mars is gathering a vision, a plan, an idea. Now, is that plan grounded in truth and light, in virtue, in the values of our higher self? You know, that's the hope, right? Because then the encounter with Pluto can be about bringing forth a kind of transformation rooted in a new vision or a new idea of what is possible.

And also maybe some vision of where we need to grow, or what is required for us to continue evolving right now. Personally, we kind of pick that visionary, spiritual sense of how we must act from the Mars-Neptune trine, and then it immediately offers the potential for catharsis, change in action when Mars opposes Pluto.

So I think that the Mars-Neptune—again, in the most positive sense—is about gaining a vision and a sense of momentum, and almost like a call—a call to action, a vision and a call to do now. Then it works into Pluto, and then the alchemy of what we have to do, what is required to make the change that we're excited about—that's the next part of it, I think.

Now, on the other hand, this Mars-Neptune trine in the hands of people or forces whose visions are delusional, violent, aggressive, domineering, selfish—you know, cloaked in shadow—this is going to be about tyrannical forces gaining power and momentum, and then pressing an agenda with great Plutonian darkness behind it. So we want to watch out for that.

On the personal level within ourselves—it's not that I don't think any of us listening to this are bad people—but we all have within us the potential to be seduced by vices and voices that don't have our best interest in mind. So I think this weekend starts providing us with a sense of, "Where is the path forward in the highest light for my spiritual evolution? How can I take that forward?" And then immediately we might face some kind of oppositional tension or crisis, but we'll know what we need to do and where we're going.

So we're going to be visiting that later this week for sure. The Mars-Neptune trine will be something that we spend a lot more time with on the 20th—last day of the week, which is Easter in the United States. Anyway, this is our Easter—I think, like, a church calendar thing where it's this same day observed all over the world. I'm pretty sure it is. Anyway, that's probably so ignorant about that. But anyway.

Venus will, on the 20th, be making a little sextile to Uranus. I like this connection with Uranus in Venus's sign. This is something that we've recently seen through Venus's retrograde motion. So freeing up some space—I think this is helpful, because Venus is about to, next week, conjoin Saturn again in direct motion.

This will be once in direct motion, once in retrograde motion, now once again in direct motion. The encounters with Saturn have been about the maturation of love and relationships, and ideally with Saturn and Uranus sextiling one another, we're looking at freeing up more space or creating breakthroughs and some meaningful creative revolutions in the realm of things like art, beauty, friendship, love, intimacy, sexuality.

I like that Venus is hitting Uranus again while Uranus and Saturn are aligned in a sextile, because it really does suggest that whatever wall Venus is running up against with Saturn in final direct motion next week, there's an impulse to create more space and change and freedom that is a part of that meeting. And I think that's a good thing.

It certainly adds a lightness and a sense of inspired possibilities, not just the kind of melancholic heaviness that Venus-Saturn might otherwise entail. On the 20th, Mercury will also briefly sextile Pluto. So it's a sneaky, powerful day where, like I said, we're majoring in minor things this week.

You know, Mercury-Pluto sextile from Aries to Aquarius, to me, feels like—again, clearing the fog of Neptune a little bit—might be about the ideas that are forming and shaping, which goes along with the Neptune trine to Mars in fire signs. There's a lot of fiery energy that wants to move forward and carry new plans forward.

There's a lot of new things happening, and then there's immediate feedback and the need to adapt to new information. It's like, as soon as you start doing new things, fueled by new energy and new inspiration, you get new feedback that you have to work with rapidly when a lot of things are happening in quick succession.

So I see this as a time of immediate, sort of Plutonian feedback. There's something deeper going on than we saw. There's an unconscious dimension that is becoming visible to us. Somehow we go, "Oh, okay, I see something I didn't see." And that has to be a part of how I calibrate this process in front of me, signified by Mars approaching the opposition to Pluto.

So a lot of—you know, the force of evolutionary necessity is very much at hand in the next couple of weeks. You're really going to feel it coming in over the weekend. Again, Mars and the Sun will square on Sunday as well. That Sun-Mars square, to me, is about leadership and action and the appropriate use of force and will.

And those themes are going to be heightening as Mars and Pluto get together, because the dark side of that transit is really an abuse of power, or the shadows of power and will and strength and things like that. So that comes right in on the heels. And it also may—this whole transit, by the way, with the Sun so powerfully configured both through the sign of Leo and the Sun entering the square to Mars and Pluto—may bring up issues around things like leaders, presidents, people in power, CEOs, women or men, fathers, father figures.

So wouldn't be surprising to see us sort of working with some of that karma in our personal lives. So anyway, like I said, it's an interesting week because there's a lot of minor things that add up to a major feeling, you might say, and especially at the end of the week—the latter part of the week, like Thursday through Sunday—you're gonna really start feeling, "Oh, okay. Now we're moving into a Mars-Pluto period. Everything starts cooking."

So we will break these things down as the week goes on. But what I want to do right now, to close us, is give you just a few thoughts for the fixed rising signs. The reason I say this is because the fixed rising signs are going to be getting into the Mars-Pluto opposition as soon as Mars enters Leo.

So we're going to be visiting these horoscopes for everybody, but just to prepare you—if you're... we're going to start with Taurus. You're a Taurus rising—the Mars-Pluto opposition is happening across your 10th and 4th. So watch for tensions between your public-facing self and the private, internal, family sphere—the public-facing self and maybe things like domestic life, family karma, your living environment.

The public and private dimensions of your psyche are coming into a more critical form of dialog, and that the tension there is part of an evolutionary necessity—again, to use that phrase—that's presenting itself right now. If we go forward to Leos, the Mars-Pluto opposition is going to start forming across the 1st and 7th.

So we're really thinking about selfhood, individuality, individuation, and the consequences that those developments in ourselves carry into relationships—or changes in relationships, or changes happening in the lives of partners that feed back and create the need for personal reflection or change within ourselves. So the self-other axis is being strongly highlighted for Leos this week and in the next couple of weeks ahead.

And then we go to Scorpio rising. And again, we get the 10th and the 4th. With the 10th and the 4th now, it's the same tension for Scorpios between public-facing self and private self. The public-facing self—you may feel the impetus to act or lead or challenge or implement something new.

You may also feel forces of the unconscious pulling from the realm of home, family, the private sphere of life, your sense of what provides stability or security internally or at home. And those two places are going to be in a pretty intense dialog over the next couple of weeks.

Finally, for our Aquarius risings, we've got the self-other axis again, and Pluto in the 1st is that evolutionary impulse to personally evolve. "I am changing my identity, my very character, my nature, my body, my physique, my health—needs to be recreated somehow," and that is going to come into a powerful dialog with forces of change and a kind of provocation, maybe on a spiritual or psychological level, from within the realm of relationships or interactions that you have with other people in any kind of meaningful interpersonal dynamic or partnering.

So the conversation about personal identity and growth and evolution alongside of the challenges or changes happening in relationships. So you can see how the self-other and the personal, private versus public sphere are in a pretty intense dialog for all of the fixed signs in those different ways.

Again, we'll be doing some horoscopes on Mars-Pluto for everybody, so don't worry if you're curious to know how it will be affecting you personally. We will be taking a look for everyone in short time. So that is it for now. I am going to sign off, and after this video—after I'm signing off—stick around to hear more about the upcoming Year One program, Ancient Astrology for the Modern Mystic.

It's a fantastic one-year course in ancient Hellenistic astrology with an infusion of archetypal and psychological astrology, which is really a part of everything I do. So I hope you'll stick around to learn more about that. And if you have any questions, you can always email us: info@nightlightastrology.com.

All right, that's it. Take care. Bye.