I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard a variation of the title of today’s blog post. I mean, seriously, there are really only 12 kinds of people?
I’m not an Astrology apologist. If anybody asks me, I tell them the truth: I believe in everything and nothing at the exact same time. I’m a total open-minded seeker of insight and knowledge and a snarky raging skeptic at the same time. Total Gemini!!!! (haha, see what I did there?) I believe in a Higher Power that I choose to call God, I believe that everything is energy and certain energies have a dominating frequency that can affect other energies, I believe that there is life on other planets, I believe that the sun will rise tomorrow, I believe that the Jets will someday win a Superbowl again — nobody has to agree with me, and I respect everybody’s beliefs. Unless you’re a Scientologist, and in that case I say private message me, let me get you some help to get out of that crackpot cult.
I have been studying astrology for at least 30 years – and if you want to believe one of my genuinely psychic friends, multiple lifetimes — and the more charts I read the more “coincidences” I run into. If you have Saturn in the 4th house, you have Daddy issues. If your Sun in 6th house, you’re a plant whisperer. If you have Mars in Pisces, you have a very hard time expressing your anger and tend to turn it inwards or end up raging out for the endorphin rush.
Here’s the deal: I don’t know if anything is true. I have no absolute certainty about anything that can’t be proven by science, and this includes scientific THEORY – theories aren’t facts. The only way one can have FAITH is if they have DOUBT. If you know for sure about anything beyond the proven physical world, then good for you, I admire your conviction but I’ll be over here like:
I believe that my body will die and my spirit lives on and I’ll see the ones I love again in the afterlife and heck, my soul might even come back down here in a different form and I’ll run into YOU again in a different form. But I don’t know if that’s true and it don’t care that I don’t really know. I’ll find out if I was wrong when I’m dead, and if then, so what? My faith has kept me sober for almost 20 years and has brought great comfort and peace to me in the worst of times, and if I find out I was praying to nothing, it won’t matter, because IT WORKED ANYWAY.
I DIGRESS. Back to Astrology. People have been using Astrology since 2,000 BC on different sides of the planet before they even knew the other side of the planet even existed. The Mayans, Babylonians, Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, Chinese and India and Persia all used it to search for meaning, determine their calendars, diagnose and prescribe for physical/mental illnesses, decide when to plant or reap, predict the weather, or predict when it was best to travel (how do you think the Wise Men knew when to look for and find the baby Jesus?) . Astrologers were theorists, researchers, and social engineers, as well as counselors to both kings and commoners.
It was after Rome fell and the rise of Christianity that astrology began to be shoved underground only secretly show up on tarot cards and later to flourish again in the Renaissance. The Age of Enlightenment was when Astronomy and Astrology were split into two different disciplines for the first time and anything remotely mystical was disdained and discarded. Astrology became popular again in the 19th century during the rise of Spiritualism and then New Age. It’s unfortunate that astrology is painted with the brush dipped in “WOO WOO” but it was good enough for Pythagoras, Issac Newton, Queen Elizabeth I, The Founding Fathers (that’s right! Washington, Jefferson AND Franklin all used astrology), Albert Einstein, J.P. Morgan, Teddy Roosevelt, Louis Pasteur, Carl Jung, Henry Miller, T. S. Eliot, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Margaret Thatcher, and Ronald Reagan, then it’s good enough for me.
Thank you, Willie Wonka, don’t mind if I do!!!!!
There is SO MUCH MORE to your Natal Chart and your personality than just your Sun Sign. Your Natal or Birth Chart is created based upon the position of the planets the heavens in relation to the time of day and place where you were born. A Chart looks like a pizza with 12 slices, and those are the different Houses, and the planets are spread throughout the houses in the signs they fall under that day from the angle of your birthplace. This is how you, Eminem, Barbara Walters, and Gandhi can all be Libras yet have very different personalities. I can’t get into the entire thing or this post will go on forever, but here is a very brief overview of the Planets and what they mean in relation to your personality. These fall under “Personal Planets” – the planets that directly affect the personality:
Ascendant or Rising Sign: Your outer persona, the first impression you give, and your first instinctive reaction to situations. Or as I like to say, your candy coating!
Sun Sign: The way you think, believe, respond to life, and the filter through which you view the world – and it is influenced by the other personal planets.
Moon Sign: Your emotional side, how you express your emotions, what you need emotionally, your subconscious.
Mercury: How you communicate.
Venus: Creativity, where you seek happiness, Romantic side of love.
Mars: “The Action Planet” Athletic ability, how you express anger/agression, the sexual side of l0ve.
Jupiter: “The Expansive Planet” This is what brings you luck, what comes easy to you, whatever sign or house Jupiter is in is magnified in your chart.
Saturn: “The Karma Planet” Saturn indicates the life lesson you are here to learn, the “cross you bear”, any kind restrictions, limitations or an area where you will be forced to overcome a struggle.
The “Outer Planets” orbit around the sun much longer than the others and are considered “generational” planets that have more to do with how they interact with the other planets in your chart rather than influencing your personality directly. For example, most people my age have Pluto in Virgo. Generation X has had to work harder for less payoff than the Boomers or seemingly the Millenials. However, Pluto in Virgo won’t mess with someone with a Sun Sign in an Earth sign as it would with say, someone with a Mutable Sign as their Sun Sign: Pisces, Gemini, or Sagittarius: those are considered “hard” aspects and it causes inner conflict, especially since Pluto is a planet that represents personal power and subconscious desires.
Uranus: Transformation, innovation, discovery, lightning-bolt insight – where you are quirky (planet) or areas of your life where things happen “out of the blue” (house).
Neptune: Spirituality (or lack thereof), Dreams, Intuition, Fantasies, any addictive or escapist tendencies
Pluto: Secrets, your Shadow side, “The Underground” stuff you are drawn to, attitude towards death, any kind of psychic abilities or attractions to the occult, personal power.
You can have a Fire sign as your Sun Sign, but if the rest of your chart is all Water and Earth signs, or a ton of Fixed signs, you’re going to be LESS impulsive, LESS driven, less outgoing and more persevering than the average Fire sign.
Let’s take a look at David Bowie. Does he LOOK like a Capricorn?
He’s got a funky Aquarius rising – innovative, quirky dresser (at least he was), unconventional. Despite his wild rock star lifestyle, he was married to Angie for 10 years and now to Iman for the last 23 years — why get married at all, if you’re David Bowie? Because SECRETLY (12th house Sun, 12th house Mars) deep inside, despite the crazy sex, drugs, and rock ‘n’ roll, there’s a traditional man who wants a wife and family even if part of him struggles with intimacy. (His 7th house is loaded, which is another story). LOOK AT ALL THOSE FIRE & AIR SIGNS — 3 planets in Leo (including Saturn, which explains his need for attention/total desire for privacy) Neptune in Libra, Uranus in Gemini, Venus in Sagittarius. Without even delving deep into this, we can see that he’s not the “typical” Capricorn while having some definite Capricorn traits: the man did put himself up on the stock market.
He’s great blend of Cardinal, Mutable, and Fixed signs, he also has a relatively balanced amount of Air, Fire and Earth — but homeboy has barely ANY water signs. The impression I get is that he’s not the most emotionally supportive guy around, but is “solution focused” — he wants to push up his shirtsleeves and get in there and fix stuff, but probably doesn’t have much patience to listen to someone vent their feelings. He doesn’t dwell too much on his own, he’s too busy using them as fuel. If I were to make him a piece of jewelry, it would be heavy on Water Energy stones.
There are all kinds of places to get free birth charts online. A site I like a lot is called Cafe Astrology — they give you a free natal chart and report to go with it. I don’t always trust algorithms to see the cool synchronicities and connections a competent astrologer can see, but it’s a start if you’re interested.
**previously published in 2015 over at my old blog
