What do you do when you find out that one of your favourite Astrologers is coming to your city? You plan a city guide and then see if they have time to bestow mystical wisdom on you. Triple Capricorn Jessica Lanyadoo is she! Here’s why you should follow her. She writes very relatable horoscopes for OysterMag.com, Chatelaine and The Hood Witch, which is easily one of my top ten Instagram accounts to follow if you like witchy things. We met up for a chat, and I got the lowdown on why she couldn’t see herself working anywhere else.
How did you get interested in Astrology?
I started talking about astrology when I didn’t even know what it was. I remember distinctly being 6 or 7 years old and standing on the block that I lived on, and someone was talking about wisdom teeth, and I remember distinctly having the thought, I’m a Capricorn, I’m going to keep all of my wisdom teeth. So I never didn’t have an interest in astrology, and [at] 42, I still got em!
So I’ve always had that interest. When I went to CEGEP [Collège d’enseignement général et professionnel] in Montreal, I went to an alternative CEGEP, there was a Jungian psychologist who was also an astrologer there, and so he taught introduction to astrology class, and I had been studying somewhat independently, but this was before the internet so the books that I had access to were shitty. As soon as I took the first week, first semester, I was like, OK. This is what’ I’m supposed to do with my life. He taught an intermediate class the second semester, but the beginning of the second semester I decided to move to San Francisco to be an astrologer. I never really questioned it, and I never looked back. I set astrological goals for myself, and I’ve achieved them along the way.
Who are some astrologers that inspire you?
I don’t really read horoscopes anymore; I can’t, because it interrupts my mojo for writing.
Karen Hammaker Zondag* is THE astrologer that if I met her in real life, I would act like how most people act around Kim Kardashian, I would lose my mind. I would embarrass myself, 100% for sure. She’s been the most influential astrology writer that I’ve read.
*Note, Jessica recommended that anyone who wants to start with a solid astrology education read her book, Aspects and Personality.
But of course, Annabel Gat writes amazing horoscopes; she’s my girl.
And you have a Youtube series with her, Astrology for Days! How long have you been working on that together?
We just put up our 99th episode! Doing that video series has really been a super fun extension of our friendship and has also been us wanting to do something that’s not horoscopes, but still gives people something to work with. I love doing Astrology for Days; it’s really fun. It’s also really fun to not have someone else producing it, we’re both literally just chilling, often in our PJS.
Take me through your day as an astrologer, how do you start?
I start off with coffee, because all good things begin with coffee. And cats, coffee and cats! Then I do a bunch of Admin, I manage social media, I respond to emails, and then I have a really adorable, if I may say so, studio, which is where I shoot, Astrology for Days. I meet with clients; my first client starts at 10:30 AM, I see five clients a day, three days a week [ four x 1 hour long sessions]. The way that I work with clients – when they come into my studio, is I sit at a desk, it’s very cute, it’s a vintage chess playing desk. There are drawers on both sides. The intention for me sitting at a desk with people is I want them to record; I want them to take notes, ask questions, I want people to be really actively engaged with the information so that they get more value out of the content.
I also meet with people on video chat or phone, but I hope that they’re doing the same. In my readings, I often don’t talk about astrology terribly much. My interest is primarily in helping people identify what’s happening and then assess tools that they can use, validating their perspective. Like being able to be like, “You’re trying to be a doctor, but you don’t want to be a doctor, so that’s not going to work.” I like to be able to validate shit that is hard for people to trust in themselves. That is a big part of what I do, I’m also a psychic medium, I do animal communications, so there’s a lot of different ways, a lot of different tools that I have to help people.
Jessica’s crystals, via her Instagram, @Jessica_Lanyadoo
Could you see yourself doing anything else?
Hmmmm no. The job that I did before that I loved before becoming full time as an astrologer, I worked with developmentally disabled children, seniors, and adults, I really did love that work, but I don’t think I could do it full time anymore. This is the work!
Where do you see Astrology going in the future? Do you ever seeing it become totally normal – or still kind of a fringe interest?
I have a hard time gauging that. I think that these things have always ebbed and flowed in terms of public interest. I have a really hard time saying because we’re at a really pivotal time in human history, where we’re so connected, and potentially on the brink of really rough humanitarian issues, and if things go in a really dark direction, there will probably be a crackdown on this kind of stuff, in favour of organized religion, hierarchies, and power struggles. The thing about all this metaphysical stuff, I do think what it does is it encourages people to rely on their own experience of the divine, and it encourages people to rely on their own resources, and to self-evaluate, and I think that interrupts a lot of power structures. It’s really hard to say the future of it, but it’s still gaining momentum and becoming a lot more interesting, and some of that is because it’s great click bait for websites. But the reason that it’s click bait is because people really want to understand themselves and they want to have a sense of, there is a reason why I keep on walking into a wall. I don’t want to just walk into a wall and be like, because life is stupid. I want it to be because there is a Moon in Pisces, and everyone is walking into a wall (it feels better). For as long as it engages people, and the internet functions as it does, we will see continued horoscope growth.
