It’s retrograde season and eclipse season yet again.

This month, you are an egg—a bulbous, smooth headed egg. Eggs are self protective and self regulating. They are not stable states but things that are ready for transformation. Egg yolks are single cells (the protein and blood around them supplementing this single ovum).

I like to eat eggs almost raw. You wash the outside and heat up the pan so that, once the whites have solidified, you can peel the whole thing off runny and tender intact. There’s an Ursula le Guin essay about the pleasure of eating a soft boiled egg. In it, she writes about how there’s no experience quite like taking a little spoon and stirring yellow and white together with just a little salt and pepper.

There’s so much pleasure in egg eating. There’s so much richness tucked away in just one little cell.

The Japanese voice actress Toromi is asked about how she defines moé: “It’s related to shyness. Moé is a feeling that you want to hide, an embarrassing feeling. Sometimes, on the inside, like the filling in a chocolate or the yolk in an egg cooked sunny-side up. You want to savor it, and you don’t want to show it or share it with others.”

It’s retrograde season and eclipse season yet again. It’s slow moving midsummer xiazhi days and purification time yet again. It’s time to lay out against the sun and recline like you’re an egg frying in a pan.

Everything seems to happen around the solstice this year. Mercury goes direct while its father, Jupiter, stations retrograde. There’s a full moon right after the longest day of the year. Venus, traveling out of bound earlier in June, slips into Leo just a few days after.

What makes you feel like an egg? What makes you feel so tender and shy that you can’t possibly fathom sharing yourself with anyone else? What makes you so pleased and embarrassed to be pleased that your toes curl up? What makes you so wrecked that you have to confess to the state of wanting something so private that you barely have words to name such a thing?

For me, shyness was a privilege. I had to get over my shyness pretty fast—shyness is cultivated by the privilege of private space. Whenever I feel shy there’s a harder side of me that critiques shyness. Shyness is about being afraid of people, of. Shyness is something to get over except that shyness also reveals our softest, most vulnerable, insides.

Gemini

The reason why shyness puts you off is because it seems to make it ever so blatant to other people the things that you crave control over. And control is bad, isn’t it? Isn’t it so bad to want to have control over things? Isn’t it so bad to want to keep some things for yourself?

You’re not a performance piece and not everything you have is meant to fall under scrutiny. You deserve control the same way you deserve embarrassment and shyness. This is not punishment but about you allowing yourself some moments to look askew and close up before you are able to voice what it is you feel.

Cancer

How was your own shyness treated when you were a little kid? Were you cherished for it or were you punished for it? Does it irritate you? Does it make you clench up? Does it make you think of risky things that you could be doing and planning escape routes? Does it make you seek out familiarity?

Somewhere, in some way, you are still that shy little kid who didn’t want to initiate conversations with strangers or play in unknown places. Somewhere, in some way, you are still a stranger in your environment and your body knows this and wants you to respect this. Somewhere, in some way, you are still tender enough to know fear.

Leo

What you need is to be teased for your shyness. Have you ever experienced that kind of pleasure? The pleasure of being poked and prodded just a little by a dear, loved one for showing your hiding skills a little clearer than you meant to? That relief of not having to be strong because there is someone willing to embrace you for your flimsiness?

Find the people willing to make fun of your shyness in just the ways you like. Curl up in a ball and nuzzle your cheeks against their legs. Acts bashful because you are. Squeal when you are excited to feel seen. Cry if you want, even if it’s just a little.

Virgo

Aren’t you much shyer than you were a year ago before the pandemic? Don’t you feel as though you have become a bit smaller and as though everything else is just too strong? Aren’t you afraid of being judged for not being the person you were in 2019?

You are not the same person. The people you know are not the same people they were either. You have found some tender parts of yourself inside of your shell that you are aghast to have not noticed before. This means that you might be grumpy or even angry that these pieces were overlooked before. Allow yourself your feelings and remember that emotions are simple when they are decipherable.

Libra

What is the difference between shyness and the performance of tenderness? It’s when you feel really soft towards something that, often, people see the shell of you rather than the insides. It’s when you feel really tender that people see you as overly stoic, cold, or aloof.

When you’re a kid, you’re easy to read and your shyness is evident. Not, not so much. Your shyness has not gone away but it has become more complex in an effort to adapt. Sometimes, shyness is missed emails and, other times, shyness is desperate phone calls. All your shyness wants it to be acknowledged by your very own eyes.

Scorpio

The reason why you appear to move so slow, almost meanderingly, is because you seek to integrate the risk of heartbreak into how you imagine collective power. That, in itself, is acknowledgement of tenderness. You’re much more shy than you seem and you believe in the power of shyness also.

The reason why some people are scared of you is because you wear your shyness loudly. You communicate that you are ready to see other people’s shyness and this is terrifying. Never stop being terrifying. Create more holes instead.

Sagittarius

If you feel like you were one of those people who had to earn your softness, then that’s just more reason for you to sit down and enjoy it a little bit more. Enjoy your softness slowly and luxuriate in it. This includes that feeling of disorienting embarrassment when you confess that you might have wanted something that you never wanted to want.

Embarrassment is so precious. Never try to push against it or punish yourself for it. Embarrassment wears thin and becomes jaded very quickly. It’s always possible to wear it out. It’s much more rare to hold space for it and to keep a piece just for yourself.

Capricorn

I’m sorry that people think that you’re scary when you are just shy. It’s not so easy for you to break character when there’s supposedly people depending on you to be just the way you are is it? But can we rethink this for a second? Are there really so many people who expect you to carry them as you think there is or is this just a strategy for avoiding your own softness?

You’re a big, old tree and your most tender pieces are the pieces of you that have never been the places where they have been before. It’s okay to feel shy about trying new things and about not having answers. Your fucking up will not fuck up the world or your life.

Aquarius

I’m sure that somewhere in your mind, you hold a heavy list of things that you did not do that you should have done. Maybe it was calling your mom on a certain night. Maybe it’s calling the insurance company for your family, or texting a friend who moved away back in time, or responding to a work email in just the right tone. Maybe you greeted an acquaintance in a bad tone and didn’t feel ready to acknowledge it at the moment.

Everyone in the world has lists like this. You may feel embarrassed about these moments. That’s fine. There are some problems that you cannot solve, at least not yet, and, when they show up, you’re allowed to feel as shy and grumpy as a little kid about them as long as you tease yourself as lovingly as kids tease themselves.

Pisces

It’s not fun to play unless you feel a little shy about what game you’re playing. Sex is best when it is a little embarrassing. You’re a whole person when you play—not just the adult version of you or the child version of you but a whole thing, with criticality and vulnerability intact.

Just enjoy your summer horiness on your own terms this month. Wear clothes that make you feel hot and be around people who you want to show yourself off to. Don’t feel like you have to play in any specific way or with anyone you don’t wanna play with. Enjoy being barefoot and eat fresh fruit.

Aries

What you like to do, Aries, is to enjoy your shyness under repetitive scenes of masochism. You like to feel a little bruised and tender, as long as you are in control. Sometimes, it feels safer to cling onto familiar softness in familiar settings.

But you don’t lose tenderness when you change. Your shyness is not a phase that you got over at some young age that you never have to deal with again but something that grows and changes with you because it reminds you of you. Cherish your shyness by allowing it to change. You don’t have to feel soft about the same things in order to keep your softness.

Taurus

You don’t have to leave your house just because it’s summer. Summer is a scary season when everybody seems to be on display and the excuses for coming out to play fall away. You are allowed to retreat just because you are shy. You are allowed to choose when you would like your shyness challenged because you are in control of your life.

Turn on a fan and go to bed early whenever you want. Hang out naked in your own room. Have people over if you enjoy their company and not because you feel like you are supposed to see them. Spend as much time not working as possible.