Welcome to Ghost of a Podcast. I'm your host, Jessica Lanyadoo. I'm an astrologer, psychic medium, and animal communicator, and I'm going to give you your weekly horoscope and no-bullshit mystical advice for living your very best life.

Welcome back to Ghost of a Podcast. This week, we are looking at the astrology of August 30th through September the 5th of 2026. And there's a lot that we're going to talk about in this week's forecast, but before we get into the details, I just want to affirm that the second of two Eclipses is over, and that's absolutely lovely. But we're still technically in Eclipse Season. This is the waning part of Eclipse Season.

So emotions are still tender. You may be still feeling some exhaustion, some burnout, a little extra emotional or sensitive—this is all very normal. We will still be in the waning part of Eclipse Season until the next lunation, which is to say the next New Moon. And that's not this week. So, this week, a little tender, a little emo, and that's totally normal.

I also want to give you a quick little heads-up that on the 1st of every month, I drop a bonus episode of Ghost of a Podcast. And you can purchase that over on my Patreon as a one-off, or you can join the conversation over there, or you can find the bonus episode wherever you listen to podcasts and make that as a purchase. So, if you're interested in the astrology of September 2026, giddy on up. It is out on the 1st of every month.

But let's just dive into this week's forecast, okay? Our first exact transit happens on August 31st at exactly 3:17 p.m. Pacific Time. And at this time, Jupiter, the planet of growth and expansion, the planet that is really about direct experience and is a little associated with impulsivity, will be at 13 degrees of Leo and 41 minutes. And it'll be forming an exact trine to Saturn, the planet of structure, rigidity, long-term planning, mastery, wisdom, humility. Saturn will be at exactly 13 degrees and 41 minutes of Aries.

So these two planets are doing something really fucking lovely, okay? Jupiter trine Saturn is a great transit. If you have been thinking, "Oh shit. I need to tend to long-term plans. It's time for me to envision how to build a part of my life or a part of my internal structure so that it is not just more secure but is more free," then this is the transit for you. I know a lot of people, for very good reason, are considering what's in their go bag and how to prepare for emergencies like loss of power. This is actually a great transit for supporting you in not collapsing in overwhelm over such a daunting project but just learning from people who've already got this shit together and chopping wood, carrying water—just getting it done step after step.

This is the thing. Jupiter is so much about growth. It's so much about excitement. And Saturn is necessary for us to create sustainable structures so that your growth has a container to it. And you might think, "Oh shit, who needs a container for growth?" The answer is literally everybody. And some people need smaller containers or bigger containers, but we all need some sort of boundary so that we can protect what we care about, what we believe in, what we want to see expand.

And then, just like with gardening, you might up-pot a thing. You might change up the structure so that it holds more space for more growth. But containers are really necessary, and Saturn teaches us that. With a Jupiter trine to Saturn, you can strengthen your container, or you can expand what you put inside of it. This is a great time for long-term planning. It's a great time for envisioning what's possible within the realistic constraints of your nature, your circumstance, your resources—whatever is relevant to you.

Jupiter is associated with many things, including education, and higher learning specifically. And so, if there is something that you've been trying to learn, whether it's a topic that you've been trying to learn or a whole field of study, if you've been trying to be more open to different concepts, ideas, cultures—whatever it is—this transit is so good for bringing your attention and energy in a focused way to a topic.

This is a particularly excellent time for plan making, which means it's great for engaging in any kind of projects, really envisioning what comes next and what steps are needed. So this is the thing. Jupiter likes to just swoop in, and Saturn is all about step after step after step after step. And so, when we have this wonderful configuration of Jupiter trine to Saturn, what we have is the energy and vision for the big picture without losing track of the steps needed to get there.

If you've taken my class on manifestation, you know that I am a big believer in the steps. In order to have the energy and the resources—all levels of resources—needed to call things in, we need to have competency at each step so we can then build from that competency a foundation that brings us higher and higher, as it were.

So this is the thing about a transit like this. It helps you to do that. Now, you might still want to skip steps. I respect you. You do your thing. But this is a great transit for getting clear about what steps are necessary in order for you to get where you want to go, build what you want to build, collaborate what you want to collaborate on or whatever the case may be.

The only downside of this transit is much like the downsides of the other benefic transits we've been seeing from the outer planets. When Jupiter forms a trine to Saturn, existing structures—that's Saturn—and existing hierarchies and folks with power—Saturn, right—get a boost. And so, because we are living in a time with so much fucking corruption at the top, because our systems are so brutal and broken and not working for the bulk of humanity, when we see something like a Jupiter trine to Saturn, there is a risk that they will somehow be boosted. And how are they boosted? I mean, it depends on what systems we're talking about, what people thought we were talking about. But that is a downside risk.

And the way to work around it—it's look for your agency. There is something important to you about self-help. There is something important to you within your relationships. There is something important to you in the projects or work you're engaged in. And if there is something important to you in the world, this is an important time for you to slow down, explore what you care about, and identify, what are the next best steps that you can take to actively participate in building the you, the relationships, the projects, or the world that you want to be living in?

It's easy to point at other people and talk about what they're doing right or wrong. This is a great time to notice what you are or aren't doing. And hey, no shame if you find, "Oh shit. I'm not doing things that actually reflect what I care about." Just adapt. Adapt. This transit is really helpful not just adapting but adapting in ways that are sustainable for your nature and your circumstances. And life is a dance between these two things—would you say? Would you say? So really helpful transit. Love to see it. Lean into it, okay?

Now, that brings us to the next and last day of exact transits for this particular week. And these occur on Tuesday, September the 1st. We have a Mars square to Saturn, which is exact at 1:55 a.m. with Mars at 13 degrees of Cancer and 39 minutes square to Saturn at the same degrees of Aries. Mars square Saturn is an authentic pain in your ass. I'm going to tell you more about it in a second. But at 6:21 a.m. Pacific Time, Mercury forms an exact sextile to Mars as well. So this is a lovely transit, not pain for butts. So, hopefully, this will be a little bit supportive.

We are still very much feeling that Jupiter trine to Saturn. So Mars square Saturn is challenging. Mars is your ego. Mars is "me first" planet. It's the part of you that's like, "Yeah, I deserve that. Yeah, I'm going to do that. Yeah, I can beat you. Yeah, I can do better, or I can do better than you." Mars is related to your body, your meat suit. So it is very much about embodiment, and it's about how you feel physically. You know how you get fire in the belly or how you get excited or your body gets really just kind of tapped and slows down, not just based on your physical health but based on how you're feeling in your skin or in a situation?

Saturn—again, rigidity, stability, but also scarcity, consequences. Saturn is all about consequences. And so, when Mars forms a 90-degree angle to Saturn—and 90-degree angles are also called squares—what also ends up happening is it's frustrating. You get frustrated. I get frustrated. You are frustrating. I am frustrating, see?

This transit will often kick up frustrating dynamics and situations where you feel like you can't get shit done that you need or really want to get done. You may feel that circumstances—Saturn—or people with power—Saturn—are blocking you from doing the shit you really want to do—Mars.

The tension between these two planets can technically help you to really figure out what you want, the best way to approach things. It can help you to navigate your anger issues. And I want to just take a second to say you might hear me say "your anger issues" and think, "Oh, my anger issues are bad." No. Anger's not bad. Anger's not bad. Anger is a normal human emotion, and it's fucking necessary. If you're not mad, what are you doing? What are you paying attention to? Anger is not low vibration. Anger is not unhealthy.

Anger is simply a human emotion. And it's not like other animals don't get angry, but I'm talking about human people's. So anger is simply a human emotion that you and I need to cultivate a healthier relationship to. That's all. Experiencing anger helps you to recognize, "Oh shit. Something's wrong. Maybe a boundary has been crossed. Maybe I'm doing something that I have resentments towards, and I need to figure out what the fuck is happening."

Anger is not bad. Your anger issues are not like some terrible thing about you. Your anger issues are simply some of your fucking issues. And we all have anger issues. Some people never get mad out loud, but they're mad inside, and it eats at them. Some people project their anger out all the damn time, but they project it out on social issues instead of dealing with it in their very personal life and with the people they're close to. Other people pick fights like it's their job.

There are so many ways to engage with anger, to experience anger. And it's important that we don't demonize or moralize around it. Now, I'm of course not talking about being abusive or actively hurting yourself or others. But I am talking about the experience and expression of anger.

Because Saturn governs consequences, how you navigate through your own experience of anger, your irritation, your agitation, your competitiveness, your entitlement, your passions—if you don't have a healthy way of engaging with those different kinds of feelings and impulses, then you're more likely to have a very frustrating time during a Mars square to Saturn.

If you are somebody who deals with these things all the time and you're in an active relationship with yourself, it's not like you're going to suddenly get an easier time. But figuring out how to navigate alignment and acting in integrity is maybe going to be a little easier, at least a little less foreign to you. And that's really the key, is not repressing your anger or overexpressing your anger or expressing it in the wrong places.

It's about being able to sit with your anger to identify what is at the root of it, not at the top layer of expression of your anger, but instead, what is more deeply motivating your irritability, your agitation, even your passions and your goals? What's motivating it? And being able to be accountable to whether or not your motivations are in alignment with your integrity.

For every single one of us, they're not all the time. And sometimes that's kind of conscious, and sometimes that's really unconscious. And because so many of us have such a hard time staying with anger and agitation and irritability—all Mars impulses—we don't really get to know what's underneath them. And that means we end up reacting impulsively, defensively. And honestly, that shit doesn't age well. It's not great.

So it's certainly worth using this transit to lean in and better understand what the fuck is happening and why—not in other people—inside of you. It would be so easy to focus on, "What is he doing? What are they doing? What is she doing?" Eh. What are you doing? How are you holding it? Is the way that you have been behaving consistent with your own integrity, your own goals? If it isn't, can you own that? Can you try to figure out what comes next?

Mars square to Saturn is a hard time to figure out next steps because we're in more of a scarcity-minded or defensive frame of mind. However, we do have the influence of that Jupiter trine to Saturn that is still present. So there's more support. That Mercury sextile to Mars—now, it's kind of supportive, kind of not. So Mercury sextile to Mars speeds up your thinking, which could make you feel less stuck and slightly more inventive. Or it can just make you more reactive, more defensive, and more irritable contextual to our Mars square to Saturn.

This transit tends to also speed up the tempo of your day-to-day, like texting, running into people, socializing, that kind of shit. But that's not necessarily helpful during Mars square to Saturn. Mars square to Saturn—people usually want to kind of hang out on the brakes, and Mercury sextile to Mars is just like, "There's no brakes. We're just going to go, go, go, go, go." Right?

And so the flow of traffic will be swift on this date. And Mars square to Saturn is going to reveal to you how you feel and how you feel like, in your body, in your deep guts kind of reactions, when things are out of control and moving faster than you're comfortable with. Again, this might not land too heavy for you for whatever reason, but that doesn't mean it's not landing for your neighbor or your coworker or your parent or your bestie or one of your partners or whatever.

So what you want to be able to do is recognize that sometimes we experience transits really personally, and it's happening to you and inside of you. And sometimes we experience it in what astrologers call the projected form, which is to say you're not feeling those things, but the people that you're dealing with are.

And so you might say, "Oh, this doesn't land for me at all," but look around you. Is it landing in the people around you? And if that's the case, then you're experiencing the transit in, again, what we call, as astrologers, the projected form. That's just a different way of experiencing energy.

Let's, again, avoid moralizing on any of this shit. We want to meet the moment—seriously, meet the moment without so much judgment, without looking for good or bad, to prop up or defend yourself, to minimize yourself or someone else. You don't need to do that shit. Just meet the moment, and do so with empathy and curiosity, and I promise you it will change the course of your life—not immediately. No. No way. Not immediately, but over the course of time. It makes aging dramatically more graceful.

So back to Mars square to Saturn. We've got Mars, which governs military, policing, combat, and Saturn, which is hierarchical structures, societal organizations, anything that has a heavy patriarchal-style hierarchy—classic fucking Saturn shit. And so Mars and Saturn form a square to each other; we may see some very disturbing or restrictive developments in military, policing, or governmental organizations in relationship to these kinds of themes around policing.

If you see some sort of developments in society, in the news, in your community around these themes, resist the urge to catastrophize or to tell yourself or others that we are cooked. I mean, we may be cooked. I don't fucking know. But here's the thing. That Mars square to Saturn can bring up feelings of total frustration and like you're completely blocked and there's no way you'll ever get out of this corner that you are blocked into. And that's not the case. It's rarely the case, anyways.

Your strongest and quickest reactions under a Mars square to Saturn are likely to be frustration. They're likely to be defensive and reactive. So make a plan. Now, you might not be able to make a plan immediately in a moment, but make a plan. Is that plan you need more education? Is that plan you need more collaboration? Is that plan you need to do some small action that doesn't change the world but moves the needle just a little bit, creates momentum just a little bit? I cannot tell you how important momentum is.

We are here speaking woo; are we not? Are we not speaking woo? If we can talk about Eclipse Season, then we can talk about momentum. Momentum is a force of energy and a force of will, and it builds on itself. If you have a habit of sitting around and doomscrolling, that creates a momentum in your life. If you have a habit of tapping into your emotions and spending time really exploring, "What's up? What do I need? What's the healthiest mood for me to make right now?" that, too, creates great momentum in your life over the course of time. And so this is a good time to think about, to reflect on, and to notice in action the momentum active in your life.

And, my friends, that is fucking it. That is it, actually, until not just next week, but next Thursday, the 10th of September, where we have our New Moon in Virgo alongside another really intense transit. And I want to say that, again, what that means is that not only are we really going to be feeling the effects of these three transits I have named for you, but also, the emotions that you are feeling, that you are avoiding, that you are tending to and that you are investing in—or not—are going to take up more space. That's what tends to happen when we don't have planetary transits because we always have Lunar transits.

Now, on this podcast, other than New Moons and Full Moons or Lunar Eclipses and Solar Eclipses, I don't talk about Moon transits because, essentially, they are moods. They move so swiftly. And in order to do a more substantive interpretation of Lunar transits that happen all day long every day, you want to be able to look at them in relationship to your own birth chart. And in fact, I would say that if you are a student of astrology, tracking the Moon's transits and noticing where they land in your birth chart and noticing at the end of every day, "Oh shit. Did it impact my moods? Did it impact the moods of the people around me? How did I experience these Lunar transits?" is a fucking fabulous way to learn astrology, to actually experience astrology.

You know that I have a transit-tracking tool called Astrology for Days. It's a subscription tool without interpretations to junk up your thinking but just tracks the transits and gives you the facts. So you can always subscribe to that over at astrologyfordays.com. But there are also other tools in the world, right? If this Eclipse Season has inspired you to pay more attention to your moves, this might be a great way to do it—again, if you are a student of astrology.

And that is it, my friends. I'm going to give you your quick TL;DR for this week's forecast, and it is build stability, security, and freedom in your life. Watch out for defenses, and don't be too reactive. And explore your drive to get things done. That's it.

As always, I want to thank you for joining me here for Ghost of a Podcast. If you get value from my work, from this show, please consider hitting the Follow or Subscribe button wherever you listen to podcasts. And also please leave a review because it does make a difference to a little DIY show like this one.

I hope that you are taking good care of yourself and others, and I'll talk to you in just a couple of days. Bye.