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Introduction:
Astrology uses symbolic language to translate the map into representations of personality or character. Each personality has an ideal form that is indicated by the positions of the planets. Each astrological symbol represents a spectrum of possibilities; each natal chart contains the roots. How each person response to their chart can’t be known in advance but it does give us the tools we have available and how best to use them.
Your choices and your destiny are in your own hands; no birth chart preordains a specific fate. Astrology is a tool for self-knowledge. Astrology does not change people; people change themselves. Back to Index
Signs, houses, planets; Astrology’s holy trinity. Each serves a distinct purpose and answers a distinct set of questions.
Signs and houses are related. Signs provide our symbolic identity, psychological framework, needs, fears, attitudes and biases. Houses indicate the problems and issues; the area of life we will confront the challenges we face.
With signs, the processes are taking place within our consciousness, our minds. Houses are more concrete. They are what the mind observes. One set symbolizes our broad social/cultural environment and the role we play there, another symbolizes our relationships and a third, material circumstances. Some houses are less outwardly active but they all symbolize something outside our personality.
Planets represent the structure of consciousness; a particular psychological function: intellect, emotions, and reactions. Put them together and you have a developmental map of the human psyche. Each planet operates in the context of a sign and house.
To sum up: The three sets of symbols answer what, how and why and where. We always look first to the planet which is the what- what part of the mind are we considering. The sign gives us the what the planet wants and the methods that might best achieve it (the why and how). The house gives us the where;; the department of life the activity is taking place in.
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The natal chart is a tool and to use it you must learn to read symbols. Symbol reading is an art, creating a birth chart is a science. But, it’s the interpretation that is the heart of astrology. Being able to weave the symbols together into a meaningful whole.
A good astrologer should not just be able to analyze the bits of data, but needs to grasp the whole. And that whole is complex, just as our minds are complex.
A birth chart is an intricate arrangement of multi-dimensional symbols, a glyph of glyphs. In learning to interpret a chart, you are learning a different language. And the best way is emersion, not a phrase book. Each birth chart is a unique arrangement of astrology’s primary triad of symbols: signs, houses and planets. Lets look at them.
Example:
The glyphs spread throughout represent the sun, moon and planets: They are:
The horizontal line that runs across the middle is the local horizon. Everything above it was the visible half of the sky when this person was born. Everything below was hidden, beneath the Earth.
The left end of the line represents East and right end is West and yes, it is opposite of what you’d expect.
The 12 pie-slices are the houses, the inner circle of numbers tells you what house your looking at. All the other numbers have to do with signs, the numbers and symbols around the outer rim show where the signs were at the moment of birth. Like planets, each sign has a glyph. The number is the degree of the sign. Each sign has 30 degrees. The other numbers tell us where the signs were in relation to the house.
All signs are 30 degrees in size or 1/12 of a 360-degree circle. The houses are another story. They vary in width. Occasionally a house happens to be wider than 30 degrees and a sign will be completely sandwiched in a house. This is called interception.
Each planet falls into both a sign and a house. The time of birth is a critical factor in astrology. While the date alone is enough to establish the relationship of signs to planets the time is what allows us to calculate the houses.
While most of us now use computers to calculate a chart, it is most worthwhile to learn how to do it yourself before moving on to a software program. In order use the software (and the good one’s are expensive) you should know what you’re asking the software to do.
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Cycles and seasons.
The circle of year and the rotation of the earth on its axis are at the heart of astrology. The first motion produces houses and the second gives us the symbols of the signs. Where does a circle begin? We start with the interplay of the amount of light and darkness and seasons. At the outset of each season is an astronomical marker. There are four of them. To an astrologer the visible markers of the constellations symbolize seasons. This is different from an astronomer, when he talks about “Aries” he’s talking about a constellation, a group of stars. To an astrologer, ‘Aries’ is something totally different. We are referring to a certain phase in the earth’s orbit around the sun. Seasonal changes are at the heart of sign symbolism. It is through the variations of light and dark that we mark four critical points in the circle of existence and the sky that help us divide the circle. Infinity is broken down into four finite quadrants or phases, each with its own distinctive characteristics we call Elements.
Elements
Elements are images from antiquity before the language of physics was devised. They are templates of physical and metaphysical processes and they are connected with seasons.
The first element grows out of the equilibrium of light and dark, but when light has the momentum and is increasing. This is the vernal equinox, the first day of spring and is symbolized by the element of fire.
Fire: the principal of action, energy moving outward. Signs related to fire are Aries, Leo and Sagittarius.
The winter solstice, the point where darkness reaches maximum power, the dead of winter gives rise to the element of Earth, enduring, hard, practical, the sustainer of form, crystallizing. Signs related to earth are Taurus, Virgo and Capricorn.
The autumnal equinox, fall is another point of equilibrium in the cycle. Night gets ready to overwhelm the day and there is death in the air. Our senses become heightened and we become alert, seeking, perceiving, curiosity… mental functions. Gemini, Libra and Aquarius are related to Air.
When light attains its maximum power we have the element of Water and the summer solstice. Life emerges from the womb, nurtured in warmth, inward, and imaginative, our feeling functions. Cancer, Scorpio and Pisces are related to the water element.
We all embody each one of these. They interact within us. To be born under the predominate influence of fire, is to be involved with developing will and courage. A person conditioned by Earth will be learning responsibility, patience, the right uses of material things; by Air, alertness and clarity of perception and information transmission and reception, and by Water, unconditional love and nurture, vulnerability, the right use of a response to feelings and emotions.
The Modes:
Elements are abstract; they are like vowels and consonants in our astrological vocabulary. Now we must put them into words.
The cycle of birth, maturity, death.
Cardinal: refers to birth, beginning the cycle, out of nothing something is born and pushes outward. It is motivation and initiation, the creative push.
Fixed: Maturity, sustainment and continuity. This is the ripening process, power and strength, stubborn and resistant to change.
Mutable: The ripe fruit falls from the tree and decays. The end of a life cycle, dissolution, adaptability and change. In the mutable signs, we learn about endings. But we also learn about new beginnings because it’s a circle and one ending, mutates into a new beginning and the cycle begins again.
| Sign | Symbol | Keyword | Time of Year* |
| Aries |
 |
I am | 21 March-21 April |
| Taurus |
 |
I have | 22 April-22 May |
| Gemini |
 |
I think | 22 May - 22 June |
| Cancer |
 |
I feel | 22 June - 22 July |
| Leo |
 |
I will | 22 July - 22 August |
| Virgo |
 |
I perfect | 22 August- 22 September |
| Libra |
 |
I balance | 22 September-22 October |
| Scorpio |
 |
I desire | 22 October - 22 November |
| Sagittarius |
 |
I perceive | 22 November - 22 December |
| Capricorn |
 |
I use | 22 December - 22 January |
| Aquarius |
 |
I know | 22 January - 22 February |
| Pisces |
 |
I believe | 22 February - 21 March |
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