Spirituality Guide

As I mentioned yesterday, you can tune more personally into your sign by narrowing down what element you are born under and whether that element is yin or yang. In this post I’ll briefly touch on what the elements and yin and yang mean in your Chinese zodiac.

When you think of the Chinese elements of the zodiac, you must think about what they are literally. Often the characteristics carry over into the personas of the people born under those elements.

People born under the wood element are expansive and seek growth. They can often get lost in the anonymity of being one more tree in the forest of millions.

Fire element people are dynamic and natural leaders. This inner spark has to be cultivated carefully, though, so the fiery personalities don’t lead others down dark paths.

Earthly people are deeply rooted in their morals and sometimes even in their physical environments. They often have wisdom beyond their years due to observation, but because of this, they aren’t always keen on spontaneity.

People born under metal can be quite demanding and want it all. Still, they are those we can rely on and those we look to with a bit of awe.

Water babies are adaptable, mostly quiet, and can be quite strong. They need to relish in the power of freedom instead of letting others set the directions and dams.

Each of the elements plays part in a circular cycle, keeping balance in all the elements with both helping qualities and power qualities.

Generating: Wood feeds Fire; Fire creates Earth (ash); Earth bears Metal; Metal collects Water; Water nourishes Wood.

Overcoming: Wood parts Earth; Earth absorbs Water; Water quenches Fire; Fire melts Metal; Metal chops Wood.

Each of these elements can be narrowed down further into terms of whether the element is yin or yang in the given year.

Yin qualities are soft, slowness, substantial, water, cold, conserving, tranquil, gentle, and corresponds to the night.

Yang qualities are hot, fire, restless, hard, dry, excitement, non-substantial, rapidity, and corresponds to the day.

More to come on the animal signs…

Unlike Western astrology, there aren’t coordinating constellations to go with the zodiac. However, there are still elements and twelve signs, named after the twelve original animals. Instead of a twelve month cycle, the Chinese zodiac is based off a twelve year cycle.

While it’s debatable whether the year versus month cycle makes it more or less accurate, it still makes things interesting.

You have to be a little careful when it comes to what year you were born in on the Chinese calendar because the Chinese calendar differs to the Western calendar. So if you were born in the beginning of the year, be sure to check what sign you are because you might be mistaken!

There are five elements in Chinese astrology: Metal , wood, water, fire and earth.

These elements come in two forms: yin and yang (earth and heaven).

And of course you can forget the twelve animal signs: the rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, sheep (ram or goat), monkey, rooster, dog, and boar .

Like with Western astrology, each sign and element (in addition to the yin and yang qualities) has its own qualities and characteristics, which I will take a more in depth look at in future posts. Think of these three categories as an upside down pyramid. The broadest (and most well known) signs are the animal sings. That is made more personal by what element you are in. That is made even more personal again by whether the element is yin or yang.

There is more to come! Enjoy your explorations.

I have been talking a lot about Western astrology, but that certainly isn’t the only astrology out there. You have already learned a little bit (or more if you have gone on to do your own research) about tropical astrology and sidereal astrology.

There is also Indian astrology or Hindu astrology. It has been and also is known by Vedic astrology (which is the term I will use here for simplicity’s sake).

Vedic astrology has three branches [source]:

• Siddhanta: Indian astronomy.
• Samhita: Mundane astrology, predicting important events based on analysis of astrological dynamics in a country’s horoscope or general transit events such as war, earth quakes, political events, financial positions, electional astrology; house and construction related matters (Vāstu Shāstra), animals, portents, omens etc.
• Hora: Predictive astrology based on analysis of natal horoscopes and the moment a query is made.

It is also divided up into signs, houses and planets like Western astrology. And just like Western astrology, it can get a lot more complicated with ascendants, aspects, planetary combinations.

Unlike in Western astrology, “Astrology remains an important facet in the lives of many Hindus. In Hindu culture, newborns are traditionally named based on their jyotish charts, and jyotish concepts are pervasive in the organization of the calendar and holidays as well as in many areas of life, such as in making decisions made about marriage, opening a new business, and moving into a new home.”

This is the absolute barest of an introduction, so I encourage you to do your own research and find out more. Here is a good place to start.

Chinese astrology is a third major form of astrology and one which I will be getting more into soon…

When I first started this section on astrology, I mentioned that there is a slight problem with today’s zodiac. Some people fit their sun sign while more and more others are drifting slightly away from their sign and identify more with other signs.

Why is that? The universe we live in is a moving thing. The moon moves around the earth, which moves around the sun, which effects the rotation of the other planets. Galaxies effect other galaxies, so on and so forth. Even though we don’t feel it, we on this planet are constantly in motion through space.

However, that certainly doesn’t mean that we stay on a steady course forever and ever. We have ‘blips’ on the radar and other things that change the relationships of positions.

As you can see from the picture (you can find a bigger version here) the star positions in the sky have shifted over the centuries. The precession of the equinoxes has sparked the debate between those tropical astrologers and sidereal astrologers.

The tropical zodiac is the zodiac most popularly used by astrologers today. They are the signs and sign dates you know and read about in magazines and newspapers.

The sidereal zodiac takes into account the precession of the equinoxes. Because of that, sidereal astrology might show that you really were following the wrong sign all along.

I wasn’t quite sure how I felt about sidereal astrology and found that I identified more with the sign I was born under according to sidereal astrology than I did with the sign I was born under. I then sent the sign descriptions of both signs (without the names of the signs) and asked the person who knows me best and he picked in favor of the sidereal sign.

Use the links in this post to do some research and find out if maybe you have been following the wrong sign…

Image source

Sagittarius (23 November-22 December) - Element: Fire, Quality: Mutable, Ruler: Jupiter

Freedom loving, direct in speech, optimistic, likes to help others out, gallant, faith in positive outcomes, aware of ethics, trusting, seeks adventures, can be Pollyanna.

Like their Leo sibling, Sagittarius is a bright, optimistic soul. Sagittarius like to go above and beyond ‘everyday life’ to make the world and living life an almost magical experience. ‘Life is an adventure’ is the motto of the Sagittarius and everything is going to turn out to be okay, no matter what the adventure.

Adventures come in many shapes and ways, be them through pursuit of further education or actual travel around the world. But that adventure comes with a price because those who seek such endless adventure often get bored and even look down on the beauty of daily life. This can be taken as snobbery or egotism by those around the Sagittarius who are proud of painting their house or finally cleaning the bathroom.

Ideally, the Sagittarius mate would be more than happy to send you off adventuring to the far reaches of the earth while s/he stays at home taking care of things there. That’s not likely to happen, though, so Sagittarius would be good to find a true love s/he enjoys coming home to. Someone s/he gets excited about sharing things with and someone who is excited to receive this information.

There is no need to be someone you aren’t, but there is also the need to put others before yourself occasionally to have a happy, successful home life.

Sources:
JanSpiller.com
Zodiac Signs
Wikipedia

Scorpio (24 October-22 November) - Element: Water, Quality: Fixed, Rulers: Mars Pluto

Investigative, aware of the needs and motives of others, sees the “underbelly” of life, aware of humankind’s negative emotions, loyal, strong, passionate, disciplined, seeks deep, bonded relationships, can be vindictive.

Need a comic book hero? Start looking at your Scorpio friends. Ever looking past all the fake, shiny, illusions of so-called ‘reality’ to the real grit of what’s going on, Scorpios know about the negatives of life. You’ll be hard pressed to find a Scorpio involved in the superficial pursuits of this world. No, the Scorpio seeks in-depth, emotional, involving groups and places.

For all the insight into negative aspects of humanity, Scorpio can be a victim of them as well. Scorpio can be possessive and jealous and will find him/herself lonely if s/he keeps giving into these feelings. Also, the ability to see the faults and lacks of others doesn’t stop at the general humanity level.

Scorpios need to, for lack of a better phrase, use their powers for good, not evil. Being able to see the faults in humanity and in others can be a gift if you use it to encourage people to be all they can be instead of beating them down for their faults. Besides, you have faults, too. How would you feel?

The Scorpio lover should feel passionately about things just like Scorpio does. However, the Scorpio lover will be better off if s/he lets Scorpio be in charge and uses his/her abilities to help their Scorpio partner relax and enjoy life at least a little.

Sources:
JanSpiller.com
Zodiac Signs
Wikipedia