Women who say astrology them has helped climb the career ladder
Some deride it as hokum.Yet ever more starry-eyed professionals are relying on consultants or even apps to make decisions based on their birth sign...
You have rising Virgo, so it makes sense that your CV is simple and monochrome with a clean font,’ astrologer Francesca oddie tells me authoritatively, scanning my CV.
‘But you have your career line in Gemini, which means you’re very versatile. So you need to stress that more. It says you’re a journalist and author, but it also needs to say you do TV appearances and mentoring and that you’re fluent in Spanish. Don’t be afraid to highlight your successes.’
It’s fairly common for ambitious young professionals like me to seek extra help in putting together an appealing CV. But, until recently, I’d never have dreamed of turning to an astrologer for this sort of advice.
Nonetheless, here I am, having an expert in star signs tell me how to boost my career. I have to say, her suggestions feel spot on.
using my birth chart — a map showing where all the planets and stars were at the exact moment you were born — she is helping me understand how to get ahead in my career, starting with the way I write my CV.
‘Rising Virgo’ means that I’m intelligent and matter-of-fact — your ‘rising sign’ is the planetary influence that was on the eastern horizon during your birth. Having my midheaven, or ‘career line’, in Gemini (like oprah, apparently) means it’s my mission in life to do as many things as possible.
This type of service is part of a surprising renaissance of belief in astrology. often derided as pseudo-science or simply light entertainment, the practice has attracted the attention of growing numbers of professional women who use it to make serious decisions — from which interviewee to hire, to whether they’re in the right career at all.
I never imagined I would be a convert. As a down-to-earth journalist (and a Taurus, the stubborn, practical star sign), I was sceptical of anything not strictly scientific. It was beyond me how balls of gas more than 100 million miles away could influence our behaviour.
But, last year, after noticing astrology cropping up all over social media, I decided to give it a shot and booked a £190, 90minute reading with Francesca.
At 34, with her love of stylish maxi dresses and heels — and her handy astrology iPad app that creates birth charts from the exact date, location and time of a client’s birth — she is nothing like the mystic with a crystal ball I’d been dreading.
What’s more, I was shocked as she used the stars to describe perfectly my contradictory personality, from my craving for stability to my love of travel.
By the time she mentioned my weakness for artistic men, I was officially convinced.
Today, a Google search for ‘astrology’ brings up more than 163 million results, while the number of times people have searched for ‘star sign’ has almost doubled in five years.
APPS such as The Pattern, which provide users with free, personalised readings and allow them to check their compatibility with friends and partners, are so popular the servers crash every time the likes of actor Channing Tatum mention them on social media.
Meanwhile, dating apps such as Match.com and Hinge ask users to state their star sign, and Bumble even allows subscribers to search for their next date via their star sign.
While looking for a compatible star sign in romance isn’t new, astrology has even started to be used in a work context.
Astrologers such as Francesca, who regularly runs career workshops and CV readings at places like trendy members’ club Soho House, are noticing more clients using astrology to climb the
career ladder. ‘People can really see their personalities and lives reflected in astrology so it’s being taken to the next level now,’ says Francesca, whose no-nonsense book, Astrology IRL (meaning ‘In Real Life’), promises you can ‘manage your friends, housemates and boss by their signs’.
‘You can use astrology with your personal or corporate branding,’ she adds, ‘in terms of working with what you understand the energy of the sign to be. So, if you’re Sagittarius or Leo, I’d say use bright colours on your branding, to express your vibrant character.
‘What I do is use people’s charts to help them identify their key skills, then look at how they can transmit them to other people, whether it’s via a CV, website or social media.’
It might seem strange to mix mysticism and professional life, but women including Alicia Kite, an image consultant and fashion academy owner, credit their success to the stars.
Alicia, 56, a mother of two married to a sales director in Nottingham, has believed in astrology since she was 11, when a fortune-teller predicted she’d work in the fashion industry.
A decade later, she was running a chain of fashion shops turning over millions. Since then, she’s read her horoscope in the Mail’s Cainer column and often has focused readings to help make career decisions.
‘Astrology is a way of finding out more about who you are,’ explains Alicia. ‘It’s made me realise my strengths — and my weaknesses. As a Capricorn, I’m hard-working, with a classic, timeless style, but the Moon was in the fire sign Aries when I was born, which means I’m better at working on my own.’
one of her most powerful readings came three years ago — when Alicia was unsure on whether to carry on working with a friend on their online styling business or go back to working freelance and focus on training fashion stylists.
‘As I got older, I kept thinking: “I’ve been doing this for so long, should I be looking for something else?”
‘But my reading restored my confidence. It talked about how I’m strong, with self-belief, and love helping people — and that I work better alone.
‘It inspired me to go back to doing just that and continue with my academy, which is continually growing. Everything I’ve learned from my stars has got me to where I am today.’
Alicia says that astrology has shown her she is prone to taking things too personally, whether during conversations at home with her family or with friends.
‘Now I realise I’m too emotional, so, if that happens, I handle it better. You can’t change yourself, but you can change how you react, and astrology helps me be much more aware of my flaws.
‘It’s also helped me to accept that I love glamour, so I no longer feel guilty about splashing out on nice things for special occasions. It’s part of who I am.’
Devotees such as Alicia swear by the science of astrology, arguing that it has its roots in astronomy and is linked to quantum physics.
one theory even says the movement of atomic particles explains why the energy of distant planets can influence us.
Scientists, however, firmly stress that it cannot be proven and lacks the critical evaluation required of scientific theories. But astrology does have its own logic, dating from the Babylonians some 2,400 years ago and based on where the Sun, Moon and planets were at the time of your birth. Horoscopes — your ‘star sign’ — look only at the position of the Sun, while serious astrologers use complex charts to study the positions of the planets at your birth and their current transits to explore the present and the future.
During my CV reading with Francesca, which takes place in my London flat, she tells me the zodiac is divided into 12 ‘houses’ — each one signifying something different in a person’s life.
The tenth house represents your life’s work. Looking at my birth chart, she says that I have Jupiter in my tenth house, which is considered very fortunate.
Right now, Jupiter is transiting into my fourth house, representing home life, which suggests that a lot of my career progress is happening while I’m at home.
She’s right — as a freelancer, I’m constantly working from my sofa. ‘You’re still expanding,’ she reassures me. ‘Even if it feels like you’re not.’
When I tell her about my latest projects — scriptwriting and finishing a third novel — she’s not surprised: ‘You have uranus and Neptune together. uranus is about unpredictability and change, while Neptune is TV
and media. Your identity is being suddenly energised and you could become prolific or well-known. You just need patience.’
Part of me wonders if she is telling me what I want to hear, but so much rings true that I can’t believe it’s coincidence that I have those planets in those exact positions.
So, when I ask her whether a date I have in my diary for an important meeting is auspicious, I panic at her response: ‘I wouldn’t have elected it, because Mercury is still in retrograde.’
This well-known astrological period happens three or four times a year, when Earth overtakes Mercury in its orbit around the Sun, giving the illusion — to watchers on Earth — of Mercury moving backwards across the sky.
It’s seen as a time of miscommunication, so Francesca urges me to use my Taurean directness to spell out my skills when I meet TV executives about my projects.
Kezia Luckett, 47, has been using astrology to sort out her work calendar since last year.
She’s a psychologist who runs a global movement called Women Of Contribution, which supports women in making a positive impact on the planet, and is the bestselling author of The Pay It Forward Series: Notes To My Younger Self. ‘I use an astrologer to get more guidance from the planets on things such as dates for launches and conferences or big projects,’ says Kezia, a married mother of two from Buckinghamshire.
‘In the same way I have a financial strategist and someone working on development, my astrologer is an integral part of the team. I wouldn’t be without her assistance now, as the accuracy is spot on.’
Kezia had planned to open her new organisation to members on a particular date last summer, but, after running it past her astrologer, Nicola Crawford, she moved it to a month later. ‘She said people were less likely to take action in August because of where the Moon was — but September, building up to the full Harvest Moon, was better.’
A cynic might say August is also when more people are on holiday, but Kezia insists there’s more to her advice than common sense.
In an early session, Kezia felt positive about her many business aspects, but Nicola insisted the stars suggested it was too much.
‘She told me to let go of some of my projects. I said no, because these projects are my babies. Eventually, I realised she was right.’
Kezia uses Nicola several times a quarter, at £65 an hour. They speak via Zoom video conference calls and Nicola responds quickly to her requests for information on dates via email, priced at £45 for 30 minutes of her time.
‘She’s helped me change the way I do things,’ says Kezia. ‘She’s inspired me to step outside of my comfort zone — I’ve started doing conferences and giving talks.’
Anna Butterworth, 32, was a marketing manager for a London tech firm. After meeting Francesca Oddie at a wellness event two years ago, she signed up for a reading.
SHE admits: ‘I felt very lost at the time, so I was willing to try something different. I was no longer feeling fulfilled in my job.
‘During the session, I kept mentioning companies I’d love to work for. But she said: “You’re a natural leader — what are you doing?” So, rather than hunt for jobs working for other people, I thought: “Maybe I can do this on my own.” ’
So Anna set up a brand consultancy agency. She now has several staff working for her, is expanding internationally — and tries to see Francesca bi-annually.
‘I’m still not certain astrology is 100 per cent true,’ says Anna, whose parents are university professors. ‘But having a slightly different prism through which to view your life is really refreshing.’
As for me, Francesca Oddie is now officially ‘my astrologer’ — a phrase I never thought I’d use.
Her advice for my TV meeting meant I was more concise, though I forgot to emphasise my successes enough. While I still don’t know its outcome, I’m starting to trust her predictions about my career.
Astrology might not be for everyone, but for me, it works.
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