Working With the Cycles of the Planets for More Alignment with Katie MacLachlan

Jan 31

There's a tool that leaders, elites, and tastemakers have secretly used for YEARS.

And if you're into cyclical living, and aligning with the moon cycle, the cycles in nature, and your own body's cycle...

this tool can ALSO help you work with the cycles of the planets.

You know what I'm talking about... astrology.

It gets a bad rap for "predicting your destiny in a way that you can't control" -- but my guest today is here to tell you that if that's what you think astrology is, then you might need to talk to an astrologer.

BE PREPARED TO LEARN:

How to use astrology to pinpoint cycles of planting, cultivating, harvesting and resting;
How to work with the energy in each of the days of the week (because each one is ruled by a planet!); and
Which aspects of your chart speak most to your business, work life, and aspirations.

Plus, listen in for the holisti-somatic history lesson on the Cherry Quartz 🍒

helpful links:

Learn more about practical astrology for self-discovery at begoodguide.com.

Follow Katie on instagram here.

Are you a healer or soul-driven coach that needs to get some solid, non-generic contracts in place? Learn more about The Legal Apothecary here.

listen to THE EPISODE ↓

Meet Katie MacLachlan, a former product design executive turned astrologer and self-discovery guide. After two decades in corporate life, Katie followed her passion for understanding human behavior by integrating astrology with modern psychological principles.
Her approach is refreshingly down-to-earth, merging astrological insights with methods rooted in practicality to help people come home to themselves. Katie's mission is to make astrology accessible and useful for personal growth in everyday life.

episode transcript:

Hey, I'm Maria Spear Ollis, and I hate rushing. It never yields good things to rush. Whether it's rushing to finish a client project, or rushing to put on eyeliner. But when we have 10, 000 things on our minds at any given moment, it's hard not to fall into that habit. I've had a lot of very specific, technical training in my life — Hello, music school. school and law school — but none of that training prepared me for being a business owner, a lawyer, a wife, a mom, or really just a functional adult woman with a huge to do list. I'm no guru, but I created Don't Rush Me as a way to talk more about the slow, simple tools you can start using today to make your life and business life a little easier.
So whether you're a healer, a coach, or a business owner or professional craving that slow down, come with me as we learn about the Small, easy things that can make a huge difference in your mind, body, or business. So, if you're listening to this podcast, there's a chance that you are pretty interested in astrology or in some kind of method for, you know, tapping into yourself, whether it's through astrology or human design, Akashic records, some kind of modality, right. And I don't know about you, but I was obsessed with astrology as a kid, especially as like a young teenager slash teenager. My cousin used to have this book. We would look at where the planets were in our charts.
And then somehow, you know, adulthood got in the way of really enjoying astrology and this kind of. Hatefulness, not hatefulness, but this kind of disregard for astrology. And how can the planets. That I have nothing to do with dictate my life and what's going to happen to me. Well, as I said in the intro using astrology. Not as a way to predict your destiny, but as a tool can help you hone in on your authentic self and maybe how some of these energies might affect you in some way, depending on your planet placement, depending on what's going on in the cosmos journey during any specific point in time. And that is where my guest today.
Katie McLaughlin comes in. Katie is a former product design executive turn astrologer and self discovery guide. After two decades in corporate life, Katie followed her passion for understanding human behavior. By integrating astrology with modern psychological principles, her approach is refreshingly down to earth.
It merges astrological insights with methods rooted in practicality to help people come home to themselves. Katie's mission is to make astrology accessible and useful for personal growth and everyday life. And I think you're really going to enjoy this episode and just learning more about. Astrology aside from, you know, your sun sign, your moon sign and your rising sign. But before we get into my conversation with Katie here is your holistic somatic history lesson on cherry quartz. 📍 Cherry courts is actually a human made stone. It can be blushing red or pink and color. And that's from cinnabar, a form of mercury sulfide. Yep. That mercury the neurotoxin. Handling Ross and a bar can actually be really dangerous to your health and real cheery courts is one of the only safe quote unquote safe ways to be in contact with mercury. The people who create cherry Cortes, kind of alchemize mercury into the courts in a way that makes it safe to work with. It is actual mercury activated and said to enhance communication. And embodies love and vitality. Hope you enjoyed that history lesson.
Now enjoy my conversation with Katie McLachlin. I love Katie and I know you will too.
Hi Katie. I'm so happy to have you on the podcast today. Thank you. I'm so excited to be here. Katie and I are secretly working on something, but I'm not even going to talk, talk about it yet. We'll tease, we'll tease it in the future for sure. Well tell us how we know that you are an astrologer and I know that you're an astrologer cause we just did a reading recently, but tell, tell the listeners kind of the work that you do and how you got to doing this kind of work.
Yeah. , so I've been practicing as an astrologer for myself and close friends and everything for, , like six years around that time, but I only recently turned it into an actual business at the beginning. Of 2023 I just had to check myself. I was like, I'm thinking so much about 2024. So we're still in 2023.
, so I would say, , back like right around, , when I turned 30. So, so my, , Saturn return, , I was like very deeper in corporate America, very deep in hustle culture. I was, I had a nine to five. , I. Would like rack up different LLCs. I had a bunch of different, , side hustles going on. Crush It Harder.
Was one ? Mm-Hmm. . Yep. I had a, a networking series, an Airbnb, a bar. I mean the, the range is, is there ? . It was not very focused. , and that was all like really amazing as far as learning different industries. And, , I always liked to do a lot of different things, but I felt like I was lacking in that.
Fulfillment. So ultimately everything started. With me just asking myself questions on like, what helps me feel fulfilled? What gives me purpose? , and then starting to look at what I was doing in those side hustles in corporate America. , and figuring out where it lacked. And so what I realized is that I really loved, , systems and different.
, ways of looking at things. So bringing different things together. , when I was working at Hearst magazines, I was looking at how do we manage, you know, 50 different sites with all different brands, but have the same underlying patterns that we could use. So a lot of like identifying and distilling down.
And so I loved that. What I did not love, I wasn't particularly obsessed with. Magazines never really never was, , , or like the, the media industry or anything like that. And so, , as I got deeper into my own self discovery and really started getting interested In astrology and tarot cards and human design and, , listening to just a lot of different psychology podcasts, different, , like human experience podcasts.
I think the first one I really dug my teeth into was Mark Groves, which then quickly spiraled off into a lot of other different readings. He interviews different guests all the time and anyone that I was inspired by, I'd go down that rabbit hole. , And I realized that like through my own sort of like deep programming from that hustle culture and corporate America that, , that's what I was really passionate about all these things that I was doing to help myself come home to who I am and like live in a way that feels more in sync with how I operate.
, I was like, I'm obsessed with this. I need to. Like help other people with this. Cause I was seeing a lot of friends going through the same thing. They're like, I'm, you know, really crushing it in this job, but like, where, what's the meaning of life or like the paycheck's great, but like, why don't I feel happy?
Yeah. So yes. So what was I'm going to put you on the spot. It's okay if you can't think of something, but like when you were going into this, this, when you were looking more deeply, I guess, into astrology, what was like your biggest, Oh, for yourself? I think the, , the biggest thing I, cause I had started working with tarot cards.
But before astrology, and I actually had a friend introduced me to them and we would joke because I would always pull the tower card and I would always, which is like tearing down, , fundamental truths that you feel about yourself and like starting a new, it's like, take, take where you are and burn it to the ground.
And we would always joke like, that's very much how I live my life. I'm like, I'm going to do this for a minute. No, that's not it. Tear it down. Start again. And, , I had had my. Chart read like once before, but in a very like minimal way. It was like a mini session. , and so I decided to have Someone else read my chart and I I booked a reading with the modern astrologer This was probably 2020, 2020, 2021, maybe.
So it took me a minute to sort of get to be like, okay, I'm going to have someone like a practitioner work with us on me, , or work on this with me. And, , she pointed out that I have a particular placement, , that I have Saturn and Uranus conjunct in Sagittarius in the. And so what all that means is basically that's a direct reflection of the tower card in my daily life.
I like to build up structures and then when it feels like it's no longer serving me, which to the outside world can feel very abrupt. I'm like, no, we're done with this. We're tearing it down. We're moving it on. We're moving on. And every time I do that, I'm making like another. shift forward in learning or another sort of like up level or step towards some other piece of the puzzle that I'm collecting into this like new, more authentic life.
And so that was like a huge, I was like, wow, that is specifically reflected in my chart and feels very unique to the way that I operate. , so as I got deeper, I would say like into the complexities of like how the chart. Brings together your whole personality. Like that's where I got really, , much more interested than just looking at like luminaries, , which I resonate with, but it didn't tell the whole picture, right?
Right. And so many that when, when so many people, when they think of astrology, they think that there's some sun, is it sun placement, sun placement. Yeah. Yeah. There's some 📍 sign. Really quickly. I want it to take a quick second to tell you about something that I created. And I'm so proud of called the legal apothecary library. Now, if you are a healer, a soul driven coach or business owner, and you need some contracts in place, I hope you'll head to the legal apothecary.com/library. And that will tell you all about the legal apothecary library, which is my contract template library that I created specifically for you. Again, that's the legal apothecary.com/library. 📍 And so what can you tell folks who are just like, Oh, I'm a Scorpio. , what's the next thing that they should look at? Think about or, or that that kind of affects our everyday lives and kind of, you know, if you, if you feel like you're pushing through each day, like what's the next thing other than knowing your sun sign, what's the next helpful thing that you can help to start breaking, breaking it down.
Yeah, I mean, I think that, , you can do a lot with your sun sign, but you're limited as far as, like, as detailed as you can go with just a sun sign. So I always recommend if people can find their birth time, you need your specific birth time to get your rising time. So, . If you can find your particular birth time on a birth certificate, or I've known people who even called the hospital to see if they had a record, , if you can locate your birth time, you can, there's tons of free, , chart creation services online.
And then once you know, your sun, moon and rising, like you can do so much with just those three things. , so there's sort of three levels that I like to look at when I'm just looking at like. The cycles of the week, the month, the year, that kind of thing. So the first thing that I'll look at is the, where the moon is at the moon seems to change the signs every two and a half days.
So whatever the moon is in. Right now it's in cancer, which I'm a cancer rising. So it feels very good that we're doing a podcast where I'm like, just talking about myself, like emotionally connected to who I am. Like that feels amazing. And so if you know what the moon is in, you can a look at like, is this a sign that I.
Have in my chart as a big three, it'll generally feel more activated or heavy. So if the moon was in Scorpio and you're a Scorpio sun, you might feel like just more sort of like spotlight. Like there might be some more attention on who you are, what you're doing or some sort of core identity. There's a lot of other things that can influence like what flavor that comes out as, but just knowing sort of like what.
What those patterns look like as I've. I started to pay attention to the moon cycles. I'll notice that on days where the moon is in Gemini, I'm like very scattered. Gemini already is about like lots of ideas and communication and networking and exchange of information, but for me, Gemini is in my 12th house, which is all about subconscious beliefs and like everything hidden.
And so When the moon's in Gemini, I feel like I'm traversing from like the tactical, what's going on during that day into like. Oh, here's a realization about how this limiting belief prevented me from doing that six months ago, like I'm going like existential crisis, like ping ponging around. So I know, then I can say, okay, when the moon's in Gemini, that's great for like scheduling therapy or doing journaling or creative writing or things like that, but I know that that's not going to be a day.
That I'm going to like power through admin work. Like that's just, it's just not, it's not going to be helpful. So moon moon is great to track another thing. That's great. Probably the easiest one is just looking at the days of the week and what. Planet rules them. Oh, yeah. Tell us about that. Because you don't really need to know anything about your chart to tap into that.
So each day of the week is ruled by a planet. And then that comes with sort of what the energy is. So Monday is ruled by the moon. So that's generally More about sort of like easing into the week or feeling into your emotions or doing things that are like emotionally fulfilling It can be very More like things in the home Family oriented things more like insular not necessarily like a like a very social day Tuesday is ruled by Mars, and Mars is all about starter energy, so like, initiating things, after you've rested for Monday, then it's like, let's get things going.
Wednesday is Mercury, so that's communication, networking, it's like, let me, like, talk about what I just started yesterday, or you know, work through, maybe announce something on social media, go to a networking event learn something new. It's very much about that sort of exchange of information.
Thursday is ruled by Jupiter. So that is very expansive opportunities, very like abundant. So a really good day to just lean into whatever lights you up. Or like whatever you're drawn to expanding. Friday is Venus. So anything beauty, love, Friday night date night makes sense. Like it just does.
Doing anything like going to museum do like any sort of Artistic hobby craft, something like that. Something that gets you in touch with that, like beauty and aesthetic and love and romance. Saturday is Saturn. So Saturday morning is like amazing to get through any any admin stuff, any, like, I need to go grocery shopping.
I need to, it's the day of dis Yeah, it's discipline day. So it's like, okay, let's get everything that maybe didn't happen during the week. Get it done like it. There's that motivation and energy on Saturday to help you sort of like move through those tasks quickly. And then Sunday's ruled by the sun.
So it's all about like, just exuding who you are and being around other people who allow that or embrace that and Yeah, really, really getting into that. So just the days of the week, like you can start sort of recognizing like what days you're more attached to just because Mars is an initiator day.
It doesn't mean that everyone's going to feel like they can start things the best on Mars. It really when it ties into your chart, each planet is attached to a sign. So for Scorpio and traditional astrology, Mars and Scorpio. Marginal Scorpio. So like a Tuesday for a Scorpio sun would be like a maze, like double down on that.
Like Mars. I love, I love my Tuesdays, like, it's interesting when you start to look at like, Oh, I'm a Pisces sun. I love Thursdays. Like it's, it's, it starts to connect the dots of like, Oh, why do I feel like I'm getting so much done on those days? Or And there's, you can go many layers deeper. So that's the very specific, like, weekly planning that I'll look at.
So if I'm, if I'm going into a week, I'll be like, okay what's the moon in? And then what days of the week? I always go, like, plan heavier days of productivity on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. They're just, That feels good. Every time I plan something on a Monday, I'm like, no, but I need to be like resting and reflecting.
I, the one thing that stuck, stuck out to me in my mind, as you were going through the days of the week is that I had an online workshop, a couple. Month about a month ago, and I remember researching what's the best day of the week for to give a workshop and Thursday is the best day of the week. And that totally aligns with what you just said in terms of abundance and just like having having a workshop on a Thursday just completely makes sense.
Yeah, yeah. Workshops or like, and something like launching a webinar, like you could, that could be a Wednesday or a Thursday thing, right? Like it's communication, but are you looking at it? You can sort of play with it. So if I was doing maybe a standard webinar that I do once a month or something like a recurring thing, maybe I would do that on a Wednesday.
Because it's more focused on community and the network that I already have, or like exchanging ideas. But if I'm launching a new webinar, or something where I'm trying to, you know, generate leads from it, or create additional opportunities, like, maybe that's a Thursday idea. Or a Tuesday. Depending on whether maybe you're just like wanting to test it out.
You don't want it to blow up yet. Like do it on the initiation day Tuesday, but not on the, like bring abundance and opportunities Thursday. Yeah. Oh, so fascinating. So I love, I love the days of the week. That's something that everyone can kind of do and track and, and helps, helps reframe in your mind.
Okay. Like not every day has to be a harvest day, right? Yes. And planning out those days of rest, which sounds like Sunday, Monday is kind of it kind of comes more naturally during those days. And Friday too, to a certain extent Fridays because Venus, it's more of like the play, like it's not necessarily rest, but it's like play experience, beauty, romance.
Like it's not a, like. Produce unless you're an artist, then it's, then that could be a work, right? Productivity. Yes. Yeah. Well, this is so interesting. So we've talked about the days of the week. We've talked about kind of your big three in your chart. I feel like to astrology is a, just a good tool. I, and I'd love for you to talk about, you know, people tapping into it as a tool versus a forecaster.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So I view, I, I put astrology in the category of self discovery and I put it there with any other test or like human design, any agram, Myers Briggs, it's like, it's all, to me, it's all in a similar. Category and maybe on a sliding scale. Some of the things like Myers Briggs, it's, it's self diagnosed.
So you, you create it through a questionnaire. So I do like that astrology and human design are rooted in like the scientific mathematical chart building of where things are in the sky. And I think that a common misconception is that people say, well, like what a planet's going to tell me what to do, which is not really how it works.
So the idea of the chart reflecting things about you or things that are going on, it's that the, the chart is just a mirror. So it's mirroring back things that are happening or things that could happen. So I like to look at astrology as when I'm looking at transits or predictive astrology. It's like, what is the likelihood of something to be happening?
So if you're looking at timing, say you're looking at timing of a year, and you're looking at what planets are changing signs and how that impacts your chart. I would look more at like, okay, I'm getting a lot of activity in. My second house of finances and security. So, okay. That year is going to be more focused on maybe foundational building of a business or or something like that.
And if there's not a lot of activity in other areas of my chart, I'll be like. Maybe this isn't the year that I'm like really focused on romantic relationships, or maybe this isn't the year that I'm focused on like really getting to the root of my belief system, like there's there's, it's like the likelihood so I think of it more like a weather forecast of like, if If there's take today, for example, the moons in cancer, there is a higher likelihood that I will feel more like at home with myself and who I am and more just like solid and grounded because I'm a cancer rising.
And that doesn't mean that every time the moon is in cancer, I'm going to feel like amazing. Sometimes I'll feel more moody sometimes it just like, I know that there's a higher likelihood, just like I said, when there's a the moon's in Gemini, there's a higher likelihood that I will be. Like scattered.
And so one way to look at this especially when you're looking at a year forecasting, another thing to pay attention to is just what Zodiac season it's in. So every person has all 12 signs in their chart. They might not have planets in those signs, but there's, there's, it's activating houses.
There's 12 houses in 12 signs. And so every time the sun moves into a new. Zodiac season. a new house of your chart is being activated. And so that's another way to sort of look at the pacing of the year and understand what the vibe is going to be. So we just moved into, it's November, so we just moved into Sagittarius season.
Which I know when this comes out, it won't be Sagittarius season, but that's an example. Yes. So for me, Sagittarius is in my sixth house. And so sixth house is all like day to day routines, health. I know that during this time. I'm going to be more focused on like, what do I need to change about my day to day routine to make it feel like it's working better for me, or like, what do I need to change in my eating habits, or which I know has always been like more of a conflict for me.
We're in holiday season. It's like, eat all the things, drink all the things. And I am like. But I want to like eat healthier like I'm because it's I'm I have that six out house activated. So shout out to Cancer Risings during vegetarian season. Because there's a little bit of a disconnect, but it can help frame like, what's going to be top of mind.
In that season, and what might be a struggle to kind of like try and accomplish when it just might not feel naturally to you. Exactly, exactly. And they're like, and it can be because everything is cyclical. So we move like if you're if you're in a six house season. You're focused on like day to day routine like how you are operating and then right after that you're moving into seventh house, which is like relationships and how you relate to close people whether it's a partner or a close friendship So things sort of like build in this In this cycle where they're building on each other and then they repeat and then they're building on each other and they repeat so each season Will have That same flavor the same like overall top of mind vibe, but could be very different year after year depending on what else is going on what else in your chart is being activated or just things that are going on personally, so it's not like a It's not like a fortune telling exercise of like, you will have a baby.
You will get married. You will change jobs. It'll be like, well, there's a higher likelihood in this time that maybe that could happen, but it's not a definite. Yeah, yeah, it's a tool to help you, like you said, feel into what might come more naturally or what might be top of mind, not a predictor. Yeah, and I would say like with the timing thing that's been hugely helpful because it can feel like we're supposed to focus and like be Like up leveling on all these different areas, life, all of life all at once.
So like, Oh, you've got to be like moving your career forward and like personal growth plus relationship stuff. And the reality is that, I mean, in, in business and everything, this is the same, same case, like the more things that you try to focus on at once, the less effective you are overall. And so we are meant to more sort of operate in these.
So I'm going to talk a little bit about, you know, what I mean by prioritizing one area of life. And then if you can look at, like I said, look at the year ahead or look at the month ahead and be like, Okay, like this month is about. Self growth or this month is about career. It's sort of like takes the pressure off because you're like, okay, I can lean into.
What the vibe is and take advantage of that. And then when it comes to a month, say where it's more relationships focused instead of career, great. Like, then that's the month that I'll be like, Oh, like I should go to more networking events or go get on a dating site or something like you can sort of take advantage instead of trying to make trying to like up level push forward in one area of your life when you're.
Like everything around you is supporting you to move forward in another area of your life. Yes, that makes total sense. I'm curious. So my last question is because this podcast is kind of all about introducing more ease into your life and in your, into your business. So knowing that probably all of the houses can play a role in your business.
Is there a specific house or placement or something that the listeners can. You know, when they download their chart or whatever it is, look and see any particular house or placement that has a direct effect on being a business owner. Yeah, for sure. I mean, the second, sixth, and tenth houses are all the career.
Those are the houses of career. The second one is going to be all about foundations. It's how you view security. And what you need in order to feel secure. So I know that Lacey Phillips of To Be Magnetic talks about this all the time, but there is definitely a, like, Love money connection self worth piece that you can find out a lot about that looking at your second house and what you need both in financially and in relationships to feel secure.
That's also where you naturally. Make money or where like that, where you're naturally building up resources. The sixth house is about the day to day. So we work is very much a part of our day to day. So that is like maybe how you approach day to day working, whether you can look a lot of, into that about, whether remote work or like in office work, there are certain like signs that are earth signs are generally like more in office. I've got a fire sign there, so I like want to be all over the place. So you can look at sort of like both the nature of, of work, but also how you relate to coworkers.
It's like that, just that day to day. Aspect. And then 10th house is really like purpose and like the biggest house for looking at your North Star for vocation. It's also like public image. So if you have any sort of there can be placements there that can indicate more of like an outward. Facing public image based career.
And then the, the mid heaven is often in the 10th house, but it is not always the mid heaven is a chart point. It'll be at the top of the, there's like a crosshair in the chart. There'll be at the very top of the crosshair. It's indicated by an MC and that, really, we'll talk about how you how you're fulfilled, like what your, what your purpose is there's a bunch of other like nuanced things that, that connect to that or like where Mars is, is like where you are an initiator in your life.
So like that can tie into business. So when you get into planets, there's a lot more layered in, but. Yeah, looking at the second, sixth, and tenth houses and just looking at what, like, you can Google, like, Aries Tenth House and, like, read about what that, that that means. It's not gonna be as detailed or specific to you, but because there, it won't take into account aspects or planets or anything in there, but it can give you a good foundation of sort of, like, what seasons are more career activated for you.
So, what, what Zodiac rules your second, sixth, and tenth house, generally there'll be more activity during those times of year. Yeah, interesting. So yeah, that's another way to tap into to sort of like the cycles and, and what's, what's going to be more top of mind career wise. Cool. Well, for someone who is like, I need Katie in my life, tell us where we can find you and how how you're working with folks these days.
Yeah, so I'm on Instagram. I'm gonna, by the time this comes out, I will probably be more active on TikTok. At BeGoodGuide and then I've got BeGoodGuide. com is where you can book a reading. Right now I'm doing individual readings that you can select different types of ones on my website.
And then I am doing like custom group readings, but we'll just chat about like, Email me or send me a, send me a note on my site of what you're looking to do. And then I've been doing a couple of like, sort of like mini chart group readings or Tara readings or other things that aren't necessarily on my site.
I think a group reading would be kind of cool if there's someone listening who has like a mastermind that they're leading a small group of, of, of folks and they want to, they want to bring you in as a guest expert. That would, could be a really cool. Option. Yeah, that would be amazing. Yeah. I also have been doing new moon events, which is kind of similar.
I do like, I talk about like what's going on with the new moon, but then we specifically go into like how that's impacting your chart. So I can, I can scale between sort of like the forecast and then individually with the person. Cool. Thank you so much, Katie. This was so valuable. I can't wait to listen to it again Oh, that was so good. I hope you enjoyed that conversation with Katie. And if you did, I hope you'll rate and review the podcast that helps us so much. It helps these women get a little more visibility and please share it on social media and tag me if you do at Heysel Maria. I hope you enjoyed that glimpse into astrology and maybe made you think about it a little bit differently. Thanks again, and I'll see you next time