This will be your defining moment. So much of what you’ve accomplished over the past years is now leading to a seminal moment where you will begin to see yourself and your future in new terms. Over the past years, you’ve been so busy doing that you haven’t noticed – or given yourself credit – for the changes that have been taking place within you. This is catch-up time, where you will look in the mirror and see the evolved you, more mature, seasoned, and with a greater confidence and sense of authority and purpose. This month may be the start of an entirely new chapter for you, for fresh opportunities are about to emerge.

The reason for my cheery outlook is that the eclipses are back, and you are the star of the show. They will fall this month in the new family of signs, Leo and Aquarius, highlighting both you and your closest relationship in love or business. It’s not been since 2008 that you have had a series of eclipses in your sign and complementary sign of Aquarius. Both of the eclipses coming this month are unusually friendly, so look forward to what comes up. That point is well worth reiterating – these eclipses are friendly.

I have to add that I cannot see all that is in your chart, so I will say if you find you are hearing news you don’t like one bit, know that the universe is readying you for a bigger role, one where you will need to be stronger and more decisive than ever. If you don’t like the changes that are happening now, you can make new ones down the road.

The first eclipse will arrive as a new moon solar eclipse on August 7, in Aquarius, 15 degrees. It is time to decide what you want to do about a close partner. Will you stay and commit, or leave without regret? If you are in love, you may now get engaged or married in the first part of August, and that may be sooner than you had planned, but outside events appear to be pushing you both on fast forward. If you are in talks with a proposed business partner, agent, publicist, advertising agency, or other one-on-one collaborator for your business, then it will be time to decide whether to formalize the relationship or pull back. Full moons bring closure.

The reason I am excited about this eclipse is that it will be conjunct Mars, so you will be motivated to act possibly immediately, in a strong way. Jupiter is also in an ideal position while touring Libra, an air sign that blends beautifully with your fire-sign Leo. Being in the third house of communication, you will have all the right words this month to dazzle others in all parts of your life.

You may sell a screenplay or a book proposal, see your book published this month, write a cover story for a prestigious magazine, or debut your own TV show, podcast, or radio show. You may unveil your new blog or newly designed website. Your book may be optioned for a movie, or if you are an actor, you may be given the role of a lifetime. You may be chosen to edit an important manuscript or translate an important document. In short, the greater your skill in the communication arts, the greater your success will be. This is a full moon lunar eclipse, so you get a final answer at this time. It looks like you need a partner, agent, or other intermediary to help you so that you can take full advantage of this eclipse.

It seems likely you will travel, but not too far afield. You will be in the mood for luxury – after all, this is birthday time of the year. If you do take a little trip, one of the sweetest weekends will be when Mars and Jupiter trade signals, and the moon tours Leo. That would be a perfect weekend to go, August 19-20.

The third house, which is brought into the conversation by good fortune Jupiter, also rules your siblings. Your sister or brother may play a prominent role in your life in August or September, and be quite helpful this month in the way they work to further your dream.

In your personal life, you have enormous edge. Mars in your sign will give you presence and a dramatic ability to gain other’s attention. You have not had Mars in Leo for two years, since August – September 2015, and now that you do, you have a large edge in any negotiation. You will know your own mind now, as the eclipses will bring you a floodlight of clarity, along with information you did not have before.

Of course, with a lunar eclipse, it may mean that a woman in your life is “eclipsed out” – a person you won’t see anymore, say, if the client announces a departure, or personally if you or your partner break up the relationship. This can happen because of the sudden nature of eclipses.

    At the powerful total solar eclipse, a new moon in Leo August 21, good fortune Jupiter will be present to shower you with luck, so your chances are excellent for getting a surprising, unexpected lucky break.

All eclipses rapidly bring news from left field and they often require some adjustment. You may need to move up your timetable and reshuffle your priorities. Often they also ask that you give up something so that you can receive something else. Sometimes that sacrifice is small and sometimes it is large, but you will adjust, and when the universe sees that space is created, something better and more relevant to your future growth will come in to take its place. That will happen fairly soon, within six months or much sooner. The universe does not tolerate a vacuum – it rushes to fill it. I want to reiterate that the August 7 eclipse is a friendly one, so I am not expecting any adverse, sudden news.

You are a fixed sign, so change does not always come easily to you, but even you will say at the end that August brought plenty of unexpected news and most of it was good. It will be a fluid month when opportunity will come up, and the person who can adapt the fastest will come home with the prize. Sometimes an eclipse, with its propensity to create a glaring floodlight of truth, will expose a situation that has to be stopped or cleaned out, and that, too, could happen.

If you have a birthday that falls on August 7, plus or minus four days, you will feel the power of this eclipse directly. The same is true if you have Leo or Aquarius rising 16 degrees or the natal moon in Leo or Aquarius at 16 degrees, in all cases plus or minus four degrees.

The big event of the month for you will be the August 21 total eclipse of the Sun, a new moon in Leo, 29 degrees. This eclipse is even more powerful, and because an eclipse opens a path, new opportunities and situations should come up. Again good fortune Jupiter will be present to shower you with luck, so I believe you will get an unexpected break. New moons open new doors, ones that were previously locked, so that can happen to you now.

I love that Uranus has reached the pinnacle point in your chart, very close to the cusp of your tenth house of fame, but by one degree, Uranus is technically based in your ninth house of international relationships, distant travel, study, and legal matters. Being on the cusp, Uranus will absolutely affect both parts of your life, especially bringing change to your career. You are about to get a surprise. On the world stage, a king will leave, for this is a solar eclipse of the Sun in the royal sign of Leo, eclipsing out a royal male or head of state. (The health of that person may be the reason, and because Leo rules the heart, the circulatory system could be the problem.) In your company, it may be one of the top managers who leaves, perhaps when that male gets a new job.

If you work in the entertainment industry, in music, movies, theatre, television, art, poetry, costume design, sculpture, acting, or any other field of artistic expression, you will get a big payoff from this eclipse. The same is true if you work in luxury goods – champagne, yachts, estates, fine jewels, expensive automobiles, for example – you will do just as well. Leo governs these industries.

If your birthday falls on August 21, or near that date, August 16-21, then you, too, will feel this solar eclipse quite directly. The same is true if you have Leo rising 29 degrees, plus or minus five degrees or the natal moon in that sign, Leo, at 29 degrees, with the same tolerance, plus or minus five degrees.

If you are wondering if there is a certain theme that might come up now, think back to August 8, 1998, and August 22, 1998 (one day different for each eclipse than is the case this year). Eclipses repeat every 19 years, so if you are older than 19, you already went through a similar set of eclipses in 1998, in the same sign and degree. Keep in mind that no eclipse ever replicates another exactly because all the other planets continue to change their positions.

Mars will be in Leo, making you want to race forward competitively, a good feeling, but don’t rush too much. Be patient and go slowly – delays will benefit you. Mercury will be retrograde from August 12 to September 5, and it is not wise to sign a contract during eclipse and retrograde periods. Both eclipses will kick up too much dust to clearly see the road ahead. Sometimes we can’t help it. If you are out of work, for example, or desperately need a new apartment, you would have to sign on the dotted line or give your verbal agreement (both are consider the same). Do the best you can.

You can draw up preliminary papers for a new business alliance, but the contract will require negotiation, so many changes will be likely. By all means, send the paperwork first to your lawyer, and plan to sign beyond the Mercury retrograde period, September 5.

Eclipses bring on life events that we long remember, as they often are markers of big life events. They make us aware of the passage of time, so in that respect, an eclipse can make some feel sentimental after the eclipse delivers its news. We feel changed, and we are, but it is the only way to grow. Trust in the wisdom of the universe.

If ever there were a perfect time to read my free essay, “How to Deal with Eclipses,” it’s now. This is especially true because you are starting a series of eclipses that will fall in your sign, Leo, and opposite sign of Aquarius every six months, arriving in pairs, until January 2019. Each eclipse will fall in a different degree, highlighting different birthdays. Find my article on my homepage, lower left corner if you are on a large screen computer. If you would rather read my essay on my premium (paid subscription) app (Susan Miller’s Astrology Zone Daily Horoscope), then go to the app’s menu, look for Life+Love, then go to Susan’s Essays – you will find my article on eclipses there.

While you are on a computer, with a large screen, next to the article “How to Deal with Eclipses” on the home page, you will find two tables, one a list of all eclipses, lunar and solar together, that have appeared since 1994 and that will continue until 2030. You can see where the coming eclipses in your sign and Aquarius will fall, and when. I have another table that will tell you all past and upcoming Mercury retrograde periods too, 1994 to 2030. These tables are not on my app. To print out easily from my website while you are on the computer, look for the little printer icon on the top left margin, fifth icon down.

Before I go, I want to add that on August 27 we will have a marvelous interplay of Jupiter and Saturn, a rare and very comforting communication. Jupiter expands and brings joy and happiness to whatever it touches, and Saturn adds longevity to what you put into place. You don’t have to get to August 27 to feel this beautiful vibration. These planets inch along deep space so slowly that they will be what astrologers call being within orb all month. You will feel their gifts. Be optimistic, dear Leo! So much good is coming to you, and your life will change in an exciting way.

Eclipse season is back, and that means you will have a chance to reconsider how life has been proceeding, and to make adjustments that you might feel are necessary. The eclipses this month are directed to you, for the first, August 7, a lunar full moon eclipse, will fall on in your opposite sign of Aquarius, emphasizing your relationship to a partner you have committed to, or want to commit to, soon. This person may be someone from your business world or love life. You will be anxious to get things finalized, but you will have to slow down. Mercury will be retrograde August 12 to September 5, not a time to sign key papers or to make any dramatic announcements.

If you want to leave a relationship now, you can, and it would be your decision. How things play out will depend on how things have been going all along, up to this full moon August 7, which will bring a culmination to those conditions. Saturn will be nicely angled to this eclipse, so long-range results are almost guaranteed from your efforts. If you are happy as a couple, and hope to get engaged or wed, or at work, if you want to firm up a business relationship in an official way, such as by signing papers, the eclipse will get you moving. Eclipses are known to move schedules up on fast forward, nearly instantly, often due to outside events operating on you at the same time, but having nothing to do with anything you did or planned to do. Those outside events cause a chain of events that comes straight to you.

Almost all Leos will benefit from the August 7 eclipse by using their talents in one area of the communication arts, for Jupiter, the giver of gifts and luck, will conjoin the eclipse. You might be writing, editing, speaking, or using this energy in a new way, by being involved in social media or new technology. Photography is writing with light, and is included here. You may be working on an important manuscript, or giving a landmark speech. Or, you may be bringing a new app to market, unveiling a redesigned website, or innovating by employing artificial intelligence for your business.

A rare and outstandingly positive new moon solar eclipse August 21 will come next, visible over the US (where daylight will disappear for as long as two minutes in the area of totality) as it moves diagonally from Oregon to South Carolina. You don’t have to live anywhere near the eclipse to feel it, though – I see it in your chart.

It will be one of the most positive eclipses in recent memory. This one will form a golden triangle in the sky with points of the triangle linking Uranus (surprise), Saturn (stability) to the Sun (authority of the total solar eclipse), and new moon (opportunity). Jupiter will be perfectly positioned again, too, so you may travel spontaneously and enjoy the trip wholeheartedly. You may decide to have a baby and start the process, or see a child you have now do very well, making you proud. You are ruled by the Sun, so a solar eclipse will always be more important to you than any other aspect (just as a lunar eclipse is more important for Cancer).

At work, your creativity will be so high that you will dazzle your clients. Present your ideas and start the process to get projects approved and funded. This eclipse will open a road that has been previously blocked. Beyond all these stellar developments, the most important will be to show you how far you’ve come. At times, you have been so wrapped up in what you have been doing that you haven’t had the time to step back to see how much you’ve achieved and how you’ve grown as a person. You have built on past experience, and in the process, shaped a new and wise perspective. As a result of important changes going on within you, by next month, when Venus is in Leo (starting August 26 and continuing nearly four weeks), your appearance may change. Or you may change your name to reflect changes going on inside you.

This solar eclipse will tug at you to pursue your most deeply held dreams and values, and help you take that vital, courageous step toward a goal you hold dear. You may have been hesitant in the past, but now the door will open, and a hand will be extended as you walk through. Think big and be brave.