The Cowardly Lion – Birth Chart

Remember this one: 

My lovely birth chart, which means absolutely zero to me right now, but together we’re going to untangle this mess. I had planned to start out with the numbers that are placed around the inner circle, but the universe had other ideas because the book I have ordered for some more research on the basic lay-out of the chart still has not arrived. So we’re going to pick a different starting point. Maybe the universe intervened because it’s better to start out with something a little more within the ‘general knowledge’. Let’s dive into The Big Three. 

The Big Three in astrology are your Sun, Moon, and Rising sign. Especially in mainstream media these three seem to be more known when it comes to astrology. But what do they mean exactly? 

To find your Sun, Moon, and Rising sign you need to check the symbols in the birthchart (or a quick google for a sign calculator, they work quite well. 

The Sun sign symbolises the core of our personality, the conscious ego, the self. It reflects the qualities that we express most openly. To me it always felt like this was the sign that we wanted to show others and what we wanted others to see.
This might make it sound like there are only 12 different types of people in the world as we only have 12 different signs in the western calendar. But, luckily humans have a tendency to make everything more complicated, and the sun sign isn’t the only thing that makes up our personality. 
I like the way Joanna Watters puts it in ‘Be your own Astrologer’: “The key characteristics of your sign will be modified to a greater or lesser extent depending on the position of the sun in your horoscope and how it is connected to the other planets.” (p.12)

Now, I’ve always greatly related to my Sun sign; Leo. Regal, proud, charismatic. Known for loving attention and being at the centre of it. Seeking out that spotlight and expressing themselves in all their creativity. Basking in their own glory, and sunlight like the lions they are. The Sun is at home in Leo, this also might explain why Leos like being the centre of their own universe. 
With a Sun sign like that is it really any shock that I wanted nothing more than to be a theatre actress when I was younger (and still do, to be honest)? But not every actor is a Leo, and not every Leo is an actor. I for one found out that I might be much too soft and sensitive, and surprisingly I also ended up being quite introverted. 

To explain this, we can look at the Moon sign. 

The Moon signsymbolises our emotions, our intuition, instincts and subconscious reactions. It reflects our private self and how we handle things on an emotional level. I kind of see this as a reflection of our inner workings, the things we might not want to share with the world, but what we need to truly understand ourselves and possibly others.

Once I learned this, and that my Moon sign is Cancer, a lot started to make sense. 

Much like the Sun is at home in Leo, the Moon is at home in Cancer. As our Moon sign rules our emotions and subconscious reactions, that basically makes me a big ball of emotions. I struggled with this a lot when I was younger, it felt like a weakness to experience everything as deeply as I seemed to do. I wanted to be my Sun sign, the big strong lion, but on the inside I felt like a hermit crab that just wanted a cosy home. Knowing more about this now, not just from an astrology point of view but also just growing up and getting to know myself better, I know that these two aspects can be in harmony with each other. Both things can be true at the same time. 

When we put our Sun and Moon sign together a picture already starts to form, but it’s just the tip of the iceberg. There’s one more aspect of the Big Three we’re going to look at: the Rising sign, also known as the Ascendant, placed on the eastern horizon at the time of birth. 

The Rising sign symbolises the way we present ourselves to the world and how others perceive us. It’s the first impression, the cover of the book, an indication of how we come across, the energy we project to the world. The planet tied to your rising sign is seen as your chart ruler. 

Now, this is where I always start to get a little fuzzy. Because as someone who has been told several times throughout her life that she seems like such a Leo, how can that be the case when my rising is in Libra? 

So let’s look at my Libra Rising. Libra risings seek balance and harmony (the symbol is the scales after all), a strong sense of fairness and justice. Ruled by Venus, (named for the Roman goddess of beauty and love) we have a keen eye for aesthetics. Libra Rising have tendencies to be people pleasers, because the need for harmony might make it so that we put other people’s needs above our own. Libra rising can find it difficult to make decisions at times, holding back our true feelings to keep the harmony. And I have to admit, this is quite the mirror I’m staring at.

As I think back to the people who have said that I am a loud representation of a Leo, this was never after a first impression. 

In my online travels I found a description that I liked, the sun sign is our what, the moon is our why, and the rising is our how. So with our rising sign in mind, we can find the behaviours that suit us to get to our what, and honour our why. 

After all this I feel like this was barely the tip of the ice berg, and even that surface has barely been scratched. There are so many more layers to explore before we get to the core of the onion.

Hope you join me for the peeling.