4 Zodiacs Who Will Find Their Own Happiness On July 26

AQUARIUS

Sometimes building your own happiness is like improvising in the kitchen, Aquarius. You look around your life the same way you do a pantry, you see what’s there, what’s readily at hand, and start to look at it in a different way. You take the various odds and ends and start to figure out how you can bring them together to make something delicious, a cohesive dish. In the same way, you can look at your friendships, your career, your relationships, your family, your neighborhood, your communities, your hobbies, your mistakes, and your achievements and start to figure out what a cohesive life looks like or means to you. Sometimes happiness is built from the things we already have and appreciate, not from these aspirational signifiers of success. Happiness isn’t the perfect beach body or a million Instagram followers. It’s a cold drink on a hot summer day with some music playing in the background and your favorite people by your side. What we whip up without a recipe is nine times out of 10 going to be comfort food. The happiness we build from the things that are already in our life feels just as reassuring. 

LEO

Building your own happiness, Leo, is saying yes to your inner child and not feeling like you constantly have to parent yourself. It’s learning not to suppress your every whim and desire. Not shutting down your own ideas or denying every craving. It’s driving past a McDonald’s and saying, “Yes, you can go get a hot fudge sundae from the drive thru.” It’s letting yourself buy that well-marketed product on Instagram. It’s taking a longer lunch break, reading a book after work, ordering a pizza and filling up a bubble bath. It is the part of your psyche that feels you are deserving of pleasure and reward, that knows deep down you can incorporate more of the mindset and habits you adopt on a vacation into your everyday life. The more comfortable you become with giving yourself permission to be happy, the more secure you will become in your ability to exert control and moderation. You can go shopping without spending your entire savings. You can go out on the weekends and still get your laundry done. A little frivolity does not negate your hard work and discipline.

ARIES

Sometimes we know what we need to be happy, Aries, and we try to be happy with everything but the thing we know we need. This month, you build your own happiness by finally stopping trying to get around the elephant in the room. It’s like starving and trying to be perfectly content without food, or being madly in love and trying to live a satisfied life without your significant other. You’ll never feel truly content while you know deep down you have an unfulfilled need. So do the thing. Ask the question. Tell the person. Pick up the phone. Do the research. Sign the check. Take the leap and start living your life the way you know better than anyone it is meant to be lived. You can feel it in your bones that anything less will be inauthentic and simply a shell of your true potential. It may be hard, may require you to grow, to find courage you’re not sure you have, to plant your feet in the sand and fight like hell to hold your ground, but however small, that ground will be the thing you call your own. That’s all we can really ask for. 

GEMINI

Gemini, you will build your own happiness because you are tired of waiting for someone else to do it for you. You have been the well-behaved child, the flexible employee, the reliable friend, and on and on and on. In every relationship, you have gone above and beyond to meet the needs of the people around you, but you’re finding that the reward you’ve been expecting to earn is nowhere in sight. Your efforts can go unthanked, unrecognized, and unappreciated, so it’s finally time to stop looking for validation from others and take control of your emotions. When happiness is built by you, using your own expectations and criteria, there is no one who can let you down, no one who can ignore what you bring to the table. You appreciate you. You evaluate yourself. You know your own heart and conscience better than anyone. It may seem silly at first to pat your own back at the end of a hard day’s work, but you deserve it nonetheless. Your happiness is built embodying the words of Destiny’s Child: “I depend on me”.