Welcome to another post from the monthly neurodivergent tips series! In this series, I offer quick tips for each astrological season, geared at neurodivergent folks and written from my own perspective as an AuDHD astrologer and neuroemergence guide. These are some recommended focuses to work with the energy of the season, not a to-do list or something to feel guilty about if you don’t get to it. All our neurotypes are different, so take what feels right for you and release what doesn’t!
When I say “season” here, I’m talking primarily about the time the sun spends in a sign, shining a spotlight on the sign’s energy. At the same time or close to it, Mercury and Venus will pass through the sign, and a New Moon also occurs in that sign, so its energy is amplified. But you can expect these seasons to also be flavored by the positions of other planets in the sky and in your chart, so they don’t feel the same to everyone or happen in the same way every year.
Happy (okay, slightly belated) Fall Equinox! Libra is the cardinal air sign that kicks off the autumn season in the northern hemisphere, and it’s ruled by Venus. In Virgo season, I wrote a little bit about our environments and how Virgo energy can help us to tangibly improve them and make them more useful for our needs as neurodivergent folks. Libra gives us a great follow-on to that theme, as we move from making things efficient to making them beautiful—form that serves function.
Of the two Venus-ruled signs, I find that Libra has the most to do with design and aesthetic in the sense of balance and visual harmony. Libra supports the kind of soothing design choices that make you sigh “ahhh,” even when you can’t necessarily explain why a design feels that way. It’s the subtle choices of graphic design, color theory, or decorative arts that may be highly technical for those who understand them, but ultimately are imperceptible as most of us just delight in the final effect. Think of those Pinterest boards full of things organized by type and color that so many neurodivergent folks love to stare at, or a musical composition that brings you brain tingles.
Libra, for me, blurs the lines between work and play. I think, for example, about the art of spreadsheet design. Most people look at creating a spreadsheet as a chore, but my specific neurotype pings with delight when I get to play with structured data, and I truly find a well-functioning spreadsheet to be a beautiful thing. Well-designed user experience on a website is another example, where the beauty is in how things flow, how intuitive it is to get to what you need. Neurodivergent folks, I find, often delight in such detail-oriented pursuits that may seem hopelessly nit-picky and boring to most people—but they often appreciate the end result, whether or not they’re aware of it!
Libra also revels in this kind of detail and nuance in a social situation. Libra types are the ones figuring out the seating chart that’s going to best support the flow of conversation, designing a really well-thought out meeting agenda that’s going to ultimately get the participants to mutual understanding, and then facilitating that meeting so that any conflict is quickly mediated and addressed. While Libra energy can be calculating in service of the greater good, and thus sometimes frustrates individuals who just want their specific emotional truth to be heard, there’s also a beauty in being able to get large groups to a point of balance and functional cooperation.
At a smaller scale, Libra is simply about communication, and particularly communication that recognizes how relationships are about give and take, finding shared language and a relational truth that is an entirely third thing beyond the truth of each individual. This dance is often tricky for neurodivergent folks, because our communication style might not match what those around us expect. Coming to a point of harmony and shared language, particularly with a neurotypical person, might require more Libra skills of searching for that common point of understanding, finding ways to translate. As a cardinal air sign, Libra is the energy to create connection, to create communication, often from a starting point of divergent thinking, lack of relationship, or lack of communication.
I also see Libra as being about values. If we’re trying to reach a point of harmony, communication, or relationship, we need to negotiate from a place of shared values and principles. The question then comes up—at what cost are we pursuing harmony? Is the middle point of our values, or the final point of negotiation among divergent values, something we all accept? On its own, as a Venus sign, Libra is all about unifying and finding that point of relationship, but I like to think of the Aries-Libra axis as a whole—there’s also the Mars side of intentionally separating, recognizing the individual Aries passion that might not always be willing to blend in with the group.
I don’t see that as a rejection of Libra, but more as a way of applying the Libra principle intentionally—where do we want to have connection, harmony, and balance? Where can we apply the Libra principle to a mutually beneficial result? Sometimes a Libran approach helps us to see shared values and common ground, or to form a coalition where it’s uncomfortable but necessary. Other times, as we attempt to negotiate we decide that our divergence is healthy and imbalance is actually serving something, so we lean more into that Aries side of proudly proclaiming our difference and forging a new trail.
What’s kind of fun, though, is that even when we make a seemingly “Aries decision”—to unmask and say “fuck it” to the expectations of mainstream society, for example, proudly being our loud and whacky neurodivergent selves—we sometimes come right back to Libra. We may unmask and then find that we naturally gravitate to neurodivergent friend groups, where we’re still negotiating a bunch of different needs and communication styles and searching for balance and harmony, but doing that from a place of shared values such as neurodiversity, accessibility, and harm reduction. It’s actually from a place of not feeling the Libra principle (being excluded rather than included, feeling that there’s an imbalance where neurodivergent ways of communicating are not recognized) that we leave the larger group, rather than a rejection of it altogether. So I find that an important part of Libra in relational context is recognizing that there are alternative ways to find unity, that unity doesn’t have to mean rejecting ourselves in the process.
This Libra season, you might want to consider the following practices:
- Is there part of your space that you’d like to make more beautiful, or visually soothing to your eye? Allow yourself to get finnicky—break out the tape measure to hang a gallery wall of pleasing art, organize your pen collection by color, figure out the exact number of things per section you would need to make a drawer look balanced. (Math is art too, and that’s totally Libra.)
- What would a beautiful workflow look like in some part of your life? If you identified something tangible to improve during Virgo season, is there a way to not only make that process function better but also bring in a Venusian sense of ease or joy? For example, maybe you want to rearrange your kitchen to eliminate current annoyances, or structure your calendar with a more intentional balance between work, rest, and play.
- If any of your special interests involve design, artistic expression, beauty, fashion, musical composition, graphic arts, or similar, this is a great time to dig in!
- This is a great time to look for ways to collaborate and cooperate, whether you’re putting your heads together with someone new or addressing challenges in an existing relationship or group. Use the spirit of Libra season to investigate together where you might find more harmony in relationship, but remember that balance doesn’t always look like exact equality! For example, if you have particular needs based on your neurotype, maybe you can trade off responsibilities with someone else so that you’re both playing into your strengths and minimizing weaknesses? I also recommend learning about Non-Violent Communication as one strategy to make these conversations easier.
- Do you spend time in meetings or events where things tend to be a little all over the place? Neurodivergent folks can be awesome facilitators—we tend to notice needs that aren’t being met, and be good at taking an objective, Libran view on how to resolve conflict and keep a conversation moving. Consider volunteering to facilitate or moderate a conversation if you see a need for that kind of support.
- Consider your goals for relationship and community, and your personal boundaries. You might want to try teasing out some of your own values, and what’s important to share if you’re to be in relationship with someone. At what point is it time to go separate ways, and where are you willing to compromise? Have you noticed that you tend to fall into the same patterns in relationship with others, and are starting to get frustrated? Working with a therapist who’s skilled at supporting neurodivergent clients could be a great move this season.
Looking for an astrology reading this Libra season? I’d love to read for you, and I have several astrology reading options that are specifically designed for neurodivergent folks!