Back in the 1980’s when looking for books on astrology, I often found myself in the “Occult” section facing books on haunted houses, exorcism, black magic and some very creepy book covers.

Astrology is really more like marketing analysis where you have lots of bits of data and you try to put them together into a whole. Astrology works with astronomy and geometry analyzing ten “planets” in 12 signs placed in 12 houses and all the geometric relationships that exist in the 360-degree circle that is a horoscope.

For example, if your sun is in 10 degrees of Aries and your moon in 10 degrees of Libra, those two planets are in 180 degree aspect called an opposition. A sun-moon opposition creates a full moon. If your sun is in 10 degrees of Aries and your moon in 10 degrees of Virgo, that’s a 150 degree aspect called the quincunx. An Aries with a Libra moon is quite different than an Aries with a Virgo moon.

Now what if your sun is in 1 degree of Aries and your moon 29 degrees of Virgo? Twenty nine degrees of Virgo is just one degree from 0 Libra which is then more clearly an opposition. One degree of Aries and 29 degrees of Virgo is still considered an opposition, just an out-of-sign opposition. The characteristics of the person will be different than an Aries/Libra opposition.

Get it?

Or are your eyes rolling in your head as you think, “What the heck is she talking about? I’m so bored.”

Astrology is analytical. That’s why I think of astrologers as “the nerds of the New Age Movement.”

To be an astrologer, you must be analytical. You must like to delve through lots of data and detail and make little-bitty parts into a coherent whole.

Pieceing the parts into a whole is what you can’t find in a book on astrology. Astrology books will tell you that your Aries sun is extroverted and your Cancer moon introverted, but won’t describe how this square sun-moon aspect will manifest (An aggressive chef? A pushy mother?)

To be an astrologer, you must enjoy discovery for its own sake because you may sit up all night, losing sleep, obsessing about some topic and researching every chart you can get your hands on only to find that no one cares (in the Western world anyway; many Asian cultures embrace astrology).

If you sit across from a live person doing his/her chart, the astrologer has to learn to stop talking in angular relationships because the questioner rarely cares about those things. He/she simply wants to know, “Will I fall in love?”

What Sign are Astrologers?

As with all questions, there are several aspects.

As mentioned above, there is the data nerd sitting up all night obsessing over data that many consider empty superstition in a solitary quest to know.

This is the Virgo or Aquarius astrologer who is analytical yet willing to look toward non-traditional sources of information for answers. Aquarius, especially, is associated with astrology because Aquarius is willing to go against the crowd in its quest for ideals.

Both Virgo and Aquarius would spend long hours to find a certain piece of information that no other living soul really cares about.

Then there is the astrologer who uses astrology in an occult way to learn others’ secrets. This is the Scorpio astrologer who likes astrological knowledge because it’s taboo.

Scorpio is the detective of the zodiac and detectives look everywhere for information – under rugs, in the dirt and in a horoscope. Nothing is of limits for a Scorpio seeking someone’s motivation.

And lastly, I see Sagittarius and Pisces as lovers of esoteric knowledge, but not necessarily attracted to the detail-driven astrology. Sagittarius is the philosopher and Pisces the mystic. Both like the bigger picture and get bored with the details below. Regardless, if they are interested in astrology, they would be best at seeing the haystack instead of millions of pieces of straw.

Quest to Know

To be an astrologer, you must possess the quest for knowledge. After many moons studying astrology, I now believe that’s it’s not truly the study of our fellow men. Astrology is the study of cycles which affect man, animal and plant.

If I put on a Buddhist hat, I might say that the form created by the mind follows patterns and astrology represents those patterns.

Many start a study astrology from a desire to understand a loved one. Those folks rarely move past sun-sign astrology because the goal is a desired object, not a need to know.

Someone looking for a mate bores easily at talk of sesqui-quadrates, intercepted signs and out-of-sign square aspects.

While many signs are interested in the patterns astrology represents, only lovers of detail and those willing to spend hours with their noses in a book (or on a computer screen) move from sun-sign astrology to the real deal wheel of the natal horoscope.