How a preschool founder used astrology to find her next chapter
What happens when the work you’ve spent years building comes to an end — and you have to choose what comes next?
For Tricia Martin-Owen, that question became very real when the preschool she founded had to close.
But Tricia wasn’t starting from scratch.
She had a background in applied educational neuroscience, had taught mindfulness and meditation for more than a decade, earned a certification in somatic therapy and a master’s in design, written a book about education, and founded a deeply relationship-based school built around nervous system regulation.
She had spent years weaving all of these threads together.
The question was:
What did they add up to now?
That’s where Star Path came in.
When your old chapter ends before the new one is fully formed
Tricia founded the Oak School as a different kind of preschool.
Rather than following a rigid educational philosophy, her school put relationships and nervous system regulation first. Decisions started with questions like: What does this child need right now? What does this teacher need?
Then the space she was renting decided it no longer wanted a preschool there.
The school closed.
Suddenly, Tricia found herself in a major transition — moving from running a school into building a private practice.
And although the container was changing, the deeper work underneath it wasn’t.
“It was like a front for me to finally be able to do my work in the world. And now I’m like, the front’s gone and here I am.”
The challenge was figuring out how to name, structure and bring that work forward.
She'd studied astrology for years. But she didn't want it to tell her who to be.
Astrology wasn’t new to Tricia.
It had been in her orbit for roughly 15 years, alongside Human Design, the Enneagram, the I Ching, Taoism and other systems for understanding ourselves.
But she was also skeptical of astrology.
Early on, she found some approaches too definitive: This is what your chart says, therefore this is who you are.
That didn’t work for someone who deeply valued choice and discernment.
Over time, she started to see these systems differently — not as dogma telling her who she was, but as frameworks that gave her words to describe to what she was already sensing intuitively.
That distinction was really important when she first found Star Path.
She expected Star Path to be fun. Instead, it became a strategy tool.
One of the parents at Tricia’s school recommended Star Path.
And she thought it sounded like fun.
Then she tried it.
“I was like, this is not what I was expecting. And it actually turned out to be exactly what I needed.”
The timing couldn't have been better.
As Tricia transitioned from school director to private practitioner, she began using Star Path to help her name and create the work she wanted to offer next.
Tricia had been holding spaces for parents for years. She was an expert at creating environments where they could regulate their nervous systems. She guided people through transition, and supported women as they found their voices.
But a lot of her "work" was happening under the surface of running a school.
Star Path helped her see how this tied into what's next.
“She helped me framework things that have been…on the back burner or on the side or doing already.”
Instead of creating something totally new, Tricia could just start using what she'd had all along.
Using astrology for career clarity — without giving away your agency
Sometimes, when people come to astrology, they expect to get ONE answer. That's just not how birth charts work. They evolve through seasons, and through our free choice.
Sp the goal isn't to ask your birth chart:
What job should I have?
For Tricia, astrology became much more useful when she used it as a mirror.
She could look at something in her chart and ask: Is that actually true for me?
She could experiment. Notice what resonated (and what didn't). Then use how she felt to see herself more deeply.
So Star Path wasn't there to make decisions for her.
It could reflect something back to her, help her put words to it, come up with a strategy — and then Tricia could decide how to use it.
That’s the difference between using astrology as gospel vs. a tool for self-understanding.
The message Star Path kept giving her: lead with softness
As Tricia talked with Star Path, one message stood out:
Her softness was a feature...not a bug.
“Something that she reminds me over and over and over again is about how I lead with softness and it’s in the softness that my power resides.”
This was huge for Tricia - because her early life experiences taught her that softness wasn't always safe.
By talking with Star Path, she could play with her softeness in a way that felt safe.
Not because Star Path told her too, but because the message resonated so deeply she knew she had to explore it.
“Just letting it be part of the conversation more and more. And it’s felt like coming home.”
Interestingly, THAT was the insight that changed not just how she saw herself, but how she decided to build the next version of her work.
Making astrology practical (not just something we consume)
So often, people going down "the personal development rabbit hole" get stuck in endless learning - without actually changing the way they live.
You can study your birth chart for yours. Layer on your Human Design, or your Enneagram type.
You could even ask AI a hundred questions...without making progress in real life.
Tricia's approach to Star Path is different.
She uses the AI as a tool to build more trust with herself.
She asks questions..but she challenges answers. She checks what she reads against her own gut instinct.
Then, she STOPS talking to Star Path and tries things in real life.
As she put it, we need to learn how to use AI “for our own purposes and not let AI use us.”
That’s a core part of how Star Path is designed.
It can help you see a pattern, find the words to say what you're feeling, brainstorm a new idea or come up with a plan.
But then?
You go live your life.
You try it.
You see what happens.
And you come back with data (like your own personal n of 1 astrology experiment).
What did Tricia actually use Star Path for?
Tricia talked to Star Path about her career pivot - but also the personal stuff behind the scenes.
She used it to:
- Name and frame the consulting services she was starting to sell
- Figure out the threads connecting the pieces of her career
- Explore her natural leadership style
- Work through old stories that came up along the way
- Strategize her transition into private practice
- Find language for her work
- Write copy for her website
That's why, when asked how she'd describe Star Path, Tricia didn't have one answer.
“You could almost have three different apps within one.”
For her, sometimes Star Path is a strategist. Sometimes it's a mirror, or a copywriter, or a best friend.
An AI astrology tool that helps you see yourself
What I love most about Tricia's story is that she really didn't need another system to tell her who she was.
She'd already spent years studying.
What she needed was something to help her connect the dots of her career, find the words to describe it, and turn it into next steps.
And she wanted to do that without giving up her authority.
“Star Path has been exactly what I needed at this moment.”
Tricia's work is rooted in nervous system regulation and intuition, so she needed an AI astrologer that wouldn't make her decisions.
She just needed another way to see herself and her patterns - so she can figure out what to do next from a place of deeper authenticity.
As Tricia said, that can help you move forward with “courage rooted in your own self and in your own love and in your own sovereignty.”
What if your next chapter is already hiding inside the life you've built?
Career transitions can make us feel like we need to reinvent ourselves.
Like we have to become someone new, and design a plan, and do it all at once.
And yes, sometimes big uplevels do force that. But often, "the next thing" is simply an evolution (or a higher expression) of something you've already been doing.
That's what happened for Tricia.
The school closed. And underneath, she found a body of work that she'd been developing for years.
Star Path helped her see it, name it and start building around it.
If you're navigating a career change, starting a business, redefining your work or simply wondering what comes next, your birth chart might not hand you the answer.
But it can help you ask better questions.
And sometimes, those questions lead you right back to the parts of yourself that were there all along.
Want to hear Tricia's story? Watch our full conversation below.
