The Sun!

The Sun in our birth charts is the most widely known sign that people know, even those who know nothing about astrology! The use of the personal horoscopes has made this common knowledge, although it often misrepresents astrology to the common masses. The Sun travels through each Zodiac sign in one of our calendar years. Since Aries starts off the spring, and what most pagans considered the new year, lets take a look at what dates these sign fall on throughout the year, and what it means to you.

Aries- March 20-April 19

Taurus- April 20-May 20

Gemini- May 21- June 20

Cancer- June 21-July 22
Leo- July 23-August 22

Virgo- August 23- September 22

Libra- September 23-October 22

Scorpio- October 23- November 22

Sagittarius- November 23- December 21

Capricorn- December 22- January 20

Aquarius- January 21- February 19

Pisces- February 20- March 19

Your Sun sign is based on what sign your Sun was in when you were born. So how does this affect you?

Your Sun shows where your ego investment lies, how you express yourself creatively, where your self-esteem lies, and your basic identity. Based on which house it is in your chart, this shows which area of your life you shine and thrive. The sun in your chart is shown by this glyph:

Many people will find that they don't completely agree with their sign when they look up its descriptions online, or may find it odd that everyone born during the same time period are going to experience the exact same things, on the same day.

There are a couple reasons I can think of that might help explain why others experience their sign differently:

1. Which House their Sun sign is in- A Capricorn with a Sun in their 6th House (House of Daily Work), is going to behave differently than a Capricorn with a Sun in their 3rd House (House of Thinking and Communication) (see THIS POST to learn how to figure out which house your Sun is in). 
2. What their Rising Sign is- The Rising Sign is the mask that we wear to the world, and how you present yourself to others. For example, I have a Taurus sun with a Rising Sign in Scorpio. (The Rising Sign in your chart is always the ruling sign of your 1st House). So my Taurus Sun is more what drives me, and what people that get past my rising sign see. My Taurus sun brings me a love for comfort, and things, and a need for security. What people see on the outside though, is my Scorpio traits, which include observing, digging for the truth whether in research, or people, and intensity. I have had people assume that I am a Scorpio Sun Sign, just because of my intense eyes! 
3. Which decanate your Sun falls in within your Zodiac sign- A decanate is divided by each 10 degrees of the sign (a sign being a total of 30 degrees). Each decanate represents each sign of the same element. Lets look a Pisces. A Pisces that is within 0-10 degrees of the sign will behave more true to Pisces, than someone that is with 11-20 degrees Pisces. This second decante of 11-20 degrees brings a Cancer twist to them, since Cancer is the next following sign in the zodiac of the same element. And if the Pisces was born 21-30 degrees of the sign, then this adds a Scorpio twist to them, as it is the final sign of that element within the Zodiac. So firstly, figure out with decanate your Sun falls in- 1, 2, or 3, then for the second and third decanate, count that many signs of the same element counterclockwise from your sun sign. A working example of this is here: I am a Taurus, born at 2 degrees, so I tend to function in typical Taurus fashion. I prefer to be surrounded by my things, and eat lots of sweets! My boyfriend is also a Taurus, but he was born at 25 degrees Taurus. So him being in the 3rd Decanate, I counted to two signs over from Taurus that were also earth elements, and landed in Capricorn. This shows that he is a Taurus with a Capricorn twist. He has a hyperdrive focus on his reputation within his career, and that influences his identity, while my first decanate Taurus doesn't really mind so much about my career, reputation, etc.
4. How the Sun is aspected in your chart- When I say aspected, I mean the angles that makes with other planets. There are easy aspects, such as trine (120 degrees) and sextile (60), and hard aspects like Opposite (180 degrees) and Squares (90 degrees). Any conjunction (planets right next to each other) can be easy or hard, depending on the planets involved. We will get more in to aspects later.
5. Whether the Sun sign is in a complimentary sign- Each planet has 4 signs which show where they work best, or fail at manifesting. For Sun, the Dignified sign that it can easily express itself in is Leo. This is because they Zodiac sign is very similar to what the Sun tries to accomplish in a chart. The second best sign (also known as the Exalted sign) is Aries. The most difficult sign the Sun could be in is Libra (also known as the Fall; this is because Libra people have a difficulty expressing themselves, because they can see things from everyone's point of view) and the second most difficult sign is Aquarius (Detriment; Aquarius people are searching for the best for humanity, versus the best for themselves). 

This is a lot to take in, and I think meditating on these aspects in your chart will allow you to realize why you express yourself in certain areas of your life, and are not able to in others. How your Sun plays off of your thinking, relationships, money, career can really lead to self-empowerment, knowing your strengths and your weaknesses. Just take it one thing as a time, and piece it together, like a puzzle, leading to the whole of you.

Jessica

So...What Is a Leo?

Dates: July 21-August 22 

Quality: Fixed

Element: Fire

Symbol: The Lion

Body Area: Heart

Key Phrase: "I Create"

Natural House: 5th

Ruling Planet: Sun

Just as the Sun is the center of the Universe, so are the Leo personalities. Most often your actors, the do everything dramatically. Although sometimes they can seem self-centered, Leo's are also often generous and warm-hearted. 

Leo represents the ego. This is a sign that likes to have their ego stroked (more so than other signs), and depending on how okay they are with their own view of themselves, negative criticism can completely devastate. They prefer to be center stage, and can have a hard time sharing that glory with others. However, many of the limelight aspirations are well-deserved, as they are quite creative, whether that medium be acting or other artistic endeavors. 

With the fixed quality, and the element of fire, they make great leaders, that can see projects through to the end. Sometimes, Leo can take this too far, and tries to be a leader, when team players are needed more. This steady fire is also seen as a passion and determination to those observing a Leo.

The symbol of the Lion also brings an almost "royalty" atmosphere to native Leo's. Leo's are surrounded with family and friends that are really helpful with anything the Leo needs, and Leo is more than happy to let them do the work. 

Whichever house is ruled by Leo, is the one where you might feel the most creative, and have the strongest ability to create. It is where you need to have your ego stroked more than other realms of your life, and what area of your life really makes you passionate. Being associated with the 5th House naturally, this sign in your chart can also give insight in to how you prefer to spend your leisure time, any relationship you might have with children, or non-serious relationships.

To see how you might be able to utilize these energies for the upcoming Dark Moon in Leo, go see my friend Tenko's blog post about it, and the lunar mansion HERE.

How Do You Figure Out Your House Rulers?

Thinking about my post yesterday, I realized not everyone might be able to figure out which sign rules their house, or what is significant about that, so I will be occasionally adding these little tidbits of information, and compiling them for an easy reference.

So here is my birth chart. If you would like to get your birth chart to go along with this little tutorial, you can go to astro.com, or alabe.com. All you need is your date of birth, location of birth, and time. If you don't know the time, try noon. It won't be exact, but its what typically astrologers use when the time is unknown. 

The Zodiac Signs:

Aries- ♈

Taurus- ♉

Gemini- ♊

Cancer- ♋

Leo- ♌

Virgo- ♍

Libra- ♎

Scorpio- ♏

Sagittarius- ♐

Capricorn- ♑

Aquarius- ♒

Pisces- ♓

You will find these symbols surrounding your chart, in the outer wheel. Everyone has all of these energies in their chart, it just depends on how much each one is concentrated in your chart, but we will get to that later. Now that we have the reference list, lets get in to the houses. The houses are the sections which look like pieces of pie in the chart. They vary in size in this chart due to the chart system used. In some chart systems, they are the same size, 30 degrees. In my chart, you see the bold line that is on the left side, directly horizontal? This is the line which tells us the ruler of this house, otherwise known as the house cusp. You will see in my chart that it is intersecting the sign Scorpio in my chart. The first house starts at this cusp, and continues to the next intersecting line counter-clockwise. You will see this line intersects Sagittarius. This begins the second house, and the second house is said to ruled by Sagittarius. This house continues to the next intersecting line. The third intersecting line is on Capricorn, and this rules my third house. 

Now, you will see that the next line skips an entire sign! This can get confusing in some charts, but not to fret, its very easy to figure out. You just skip this sign ruling a house, and continue on. So my fourth house is not ruled by Aquarius, it is Pisces (barely). Now, carrying on to the next intersecting line, we get to the 5th House. This is the one I mentioned in my post yesterday. You will see that my line hits Aries. Then, that house is very small, and my 6th House line also hits Aries (because we had skipped a sign earlier, remember?) Continue around your chart in this fashion, always just looking at the line that hits the sign to determine the ruler.

The Fifth House In Your Natal Chart- How you Create and Express Yourself

With the Sun in Leo now, I wanted to talk a little bit about how to find in your chart how you express yourself creatively. In the perfect chart, Leo would rule the 5th House, and the Sun would reside there. However, it is probably close to impossible for anyone to have this setup in their own natal charts. For the sake of this post, I am posting up my natal chart.

The 5th House in my chart is ruled by Aries. Aries likes to start things. As a Cardinal Fire sign, and symbolized by the Ram, the influence of this sign in the 5th house might suggest someone who starts a lot of projects, has the desire to create, but may not always finish those projects.

This caused me to think about my past attempts at expressing myself creatively. When I was a child, I used to write stories. Story after story after story left my imaginative space through the tip of my pencil, and I really kept this up until about 4th or 5th grade. At this time, that's when it really stopped. Whether it was school commitments and sports getting in the way, either way, I no longer was able to express myself through this medium. Now keep in mind, that sports filling my leisure time also fell in to this realm of Aries, that competitive Mars spirit influencing this house. However, now, whenever I try to write, I come up with story lines, but I am no longer able to finish any story. No matter how hard I try, I always end up falling off the wagon, placing the story on the back burner. 

Meditating on this aspect of my chart, I realize that I can attack creative projects with such an energy that I get burnt out. I also get competitive and the fact that I realize that my projects are not perfect, causes me to quit. Developing patience and an appreciation for the journey of creating, not the destination, I think might help me to express myself more easily. I am going to work on allowing writing to fill up more of my time, and to be more compassionate, instead of critical, on my writing skills. 

What sign rules your 5th house? How do you find it affecting your ability to create? What can you do to change that? Utilize this Sun in Leo energy to make the progress you desire in this area of your life. 

Sun in Leo!

Today we welcome the Sun in to Leo, the zodiac sign symbolized by the Lion. Today I will be making my Leo Candle, to help me as I work through the energies that this period will bring. Along with a friend, I am journeying through Christopher Penczak's Living Temple of Witchcraft, Volume 2, which explores the Sun travelling through each Zodiac sign. The wisdom of this sign that I will be embracing is creativity and taking charge of the things in my life that need sovereignty. The Sun gives us life. Simple as that. As it is the center of our Universe, so is Leo energy center stage. These people are creators and sometimes, they live only under that persona of the actor. Another part of my working this month will to figure out what parts of myself I am "playing", and discarding those to allow my true self shine through.

With the creativity aspect of Sun in Leo, I realize that the creation of this blog has come at no better time. However, with whatever we create, it is important to remember that we are not what we create. I think it is easy to get stuck in describing yourself as the things you do, the things you think, and the things that you feel. These identities give us purpose in our life, however, they can overcome. I think back to a time when I was in college and was playing volleyball. I had been a volleyball star all through high school, making Most Valuable Player, and even setting high school records! I was on top of the world. I was getting to go play volleyball in college, nothing could go wrong. Except that it did. A month in to my first season, I tore my Anterior Cruciate Ligament (ACL) and was benched for the rest of the season, and didn't play again after that, at fear of injuring myself again. I was devastated. I no longer knew who I was. At the time, I was Mormon, and tried to seek comfort in the religion, but it never came. I realize now that it was because I had associated myself entirely with this volleyball image, that I no longer knew who I was when it was gone. I still mourn the loss of that passion, but I realize it was a necessary loss to get to where I am now, as it triggered a series of events turning my life completely 180 degrees. So this month, I will work on creating, to EXPRESS myself, not to MAKE myself. What will you do to utilize this Leo energy?

An Introduction of Sorts

Hello, welcome to Spiders Astrology! I am a blogger from Alabama, with a passion for astrology and anything related to the occult. I was introduced to astrology earlier this year, and have really taken to it, and cannot stop studying! What I hope to accomplish with this blog is to write about planets as they transit my chart, perhaps delving in to my progressions, etc. Occasionally I might post about aspects I am studying or really any other matter that I am studying about. This will be a blog of exploration through the planets, and magickal practices. I hope that it can become a space where we can all gather and maybe bounce ideas off of each other about our own birth charts, transits, etc. I look forward to meeting you!

Jessica