You Were Born for This
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Ruled by Mars, Aries is a sign that wants to demonstrate its ability to battle. If your Sun is in Aries, you must confront the stuff of life that is most important to you, head on. As a cardinal fire sign, Aries initiates, takes action, and brings heat to any planet that resides within its domain.
Aries’s symbol is the ram. Rams represent renewal, in part because when their fleece is shorn, it grows back. This gives Aries an unstoppable kind of feel. Up against any obstacle, Aries doesn’t back down. It needs a little stress to make things interesting.
If you have the Sun in Aries, you are more than likely driven to prove yourself through acts of courage, bravery, and decisiveness. But that drive can easily become self-serving when the emphasis is on proving yourself right. Not every interaction is a duel, but to your Sun in Aries the conflict is sometimes too tempting to ignore. When distorted, your Sun in Aries tends toward a pushy, forceful, aggressive, arrogant, and inflammatory persona. If you have this placement, you can always benefit from the kind of self-reflection that makes a thoughtful response possible.
Affirmations
I honor my energy and its power by working at what makes me feel free.
I am not in this alone. I remember to connect with my friends, teachers, elders, support systems, and an energy greater than myself when I need help.
Reflection Questions
What are you doing when you feel most energized?
What are the battles that are important for you to engage in?
How do you see your ability to courageously interact with the world as tied to your life’s purpose? Remember that you don’t have to understand exactly how this is occurring in your life at this moment, but is there a consistent desire in you to do so?
SUN IN TAURUS
The Sun in the fixed earth sign of Taurus shines when it stabilizes, steadies, and builds with the resources that it has. Taurus takes the rushing, exuberant, and unrefined energy of life and makes use of it. Molds it into a masterpiece. Cultivates the fields of its potential with its uncanny ability to manifest.
Taurus’s magic might be slow, but it is also stubbornly strong. Taurus cannot be pushed, forced, or hurried. Nature doesn’t rush, and neither does this bull.
The horns of the bull, the symbol for Taurus, represent fertility. In part due to the bull’s domestication and use for agriculture, the horns of this magnificent beast have often been associated with the crescent Moon, the symbol of Goddess, creatrix, and giver of life. Generally, horns have been associated with the fallopian tubes, but beyond anatomy, Taurus energy is generative. Ruled by Venus, the Goddess of love and connection, Taurus has a natural fecundity.
As a fixed earth sign, Taurus is the hub. Gathering all those in need around it, if you have the Sun in Taurus, you’ll most likely be energized by being generous, resourceful, and relaxed.
No one knows how to chill like a bull.
Appreciative of all things tasty, comfortable, luxurious, and sensually pleasing, your Sun in Taurus knows how to enjoy the physical realm. Your Sun in Taurus is here to build and fully enjoy a life of pleasure and productivity.
When distorted, this energy can become controlling, possessive, stubborn, and overly fixated on stability. Your Sun in Taurus may use certainty as a defense mechanism and tend toward inflexibility, bossiness, and belligerence. Because your Sun’s mission is to stabilize, taking risks, changing course, or leaving halfway through a bad movie can feel like too much of a deviation from your generally consistent rhythm. You may, therefore, get stuck in your ways, ruts, and ideas about life. Your Sun in Taurus will be challenged to learn how to balance your desire for consistency with the need to take the necessary risks to support your personal growth.
Affirmations
I am allowed to change my mind.
I am just as worthy of love and support as those to whom I offer it.
Reflection Questions
In what part of your life do you feel you are good at building, stabilizing, and creating?
In what part of your life do you tend to get inflexible?
How do you see your ability to build something solid or monumental as tied to your life’s purpose? If you don’t feel you’ve developed the ability to do so yet, does it sound like something that would give you satisfaction and joy?
SUN IN GEMINI
In this mutable air sign that disperses information and disseminates its knowledge by way of intellectual exchange, the Sun in Gemini is never lacking something of note to contribute.
Mutable signs are naturally diverse in their interests, and Gemini, an air sign ruled by Mercury the Messenger, is intellectually so. Inquisitive to no end, your Sun in Gemini is most likely constantly searching for interesting topics of conversation to pontificate on. Contradictions, duality, and paradoxes are natural states of being for your Sun in Gemini. You need to see all sides of a theory, situation, or fact. Not exactly loyal to any one idea, Gemini roams around as many thoughts as it possibly can to get a better grasp of a subject.
The symbol for Gemini is the twins, highlighting the sign’s dual nature and need for change. Like winds blowing in different directions, you can appear to be everywhere and nowhere at once. Your Sun will always need to move in ways that appear to defy the laws of gravity, time, and space. Inward and outward, reflective and responsive, introverted and extroverted, Gemini contains contradictions.
Just as its ruler, Mercury, is associated with the archetype of the magician, Gemini is a sign that appears in many different forms. If you are skilled at showing your social self, your inner twin might be revealed only to those whom you truly trust, and vice versa. Having the Sun in Gemini can mean that you become so adept at shape-shifting, you lose touch with who you are at your core.
When distorted, your Sun in Gemini can become inconsistent, distracted, gossipy, and glib. Air signs left unchecked will circulate rumors at a rate unparalleled by any other. Gemini needs to always balance its desire for a constant flow of information with discretion and integrity. When you feel too far from your base, you may need time to ground, center, and situate yourself in relationships with others who aren’t charmed, fooled, or overly fascinated by your ability to weave a fantastic tale.
Affirmations
I don’t have, nor do I need, all the answers to get where I am going.
I trust that the information I need will reach me when I need it.
Reflection Questions
What kind of information do you find great joy in sharing?
Where in your life are you a teacher? Where in your life are you a student?
Where in your life does exchanging ideas feel like a part of your life’s purpose?
SUN IN CANCER
In this cardinal water sign that initiates us into the feeling realm, the Sun is an unassumingly potent emotional force. True to its mascot, the crab, Cancer scuttles sideways, away from confrontation. Moody as the tides it rides, however, a crab backed into a corner will come out snapping, and hold on to whatever it can.
Your Sun in Cancer holds all memory. Cancer is the primordial waters of creation, the womb of humanity that carries with it our entire human story and every feeling we’ve had about it. If you have the Sun in Cancer, your waters run deep. Cancer is known to be the most caring, nurturing sign of the zodiac. When you love someone, they’ll know it.
Your Sun shines when forming emotional bonds with others. Water signs are reflective. Ruled by the Moon, Cancer’s job is to mirror the light of others. Like a parent or caregiver, you are always sensing what others need to hear, know, or receive as support. Your Sun in Cancer wants to create spaces where bonding can occur. Unafraid of intense emotional experiences, your Sun in this water sign may need you to purify yourself from the impact of the emotional residue you unassumingly soak up. Old resentments poison your waters. A regular therapeutic flushing out of the psychological system helps you feel more vital and alive.
Your Sun in Cancer is exceptionally good at intuiting and meeting the needs
of others. A natural caretaker, your Sun in Cancer might hold on to an emotional slight, but it will also remember your loved ones’ favorite restaurant, movie, or teacher from high school.
Cancer is as changeable as the Moon that rules it. When distorted, your Sun in Cancer can become a personality that is known for its moody, melancholy ways. Morbidly defensive and attached to the past, your Sun in Cancer can easily swing between martyrdom and irritability when too much care goes out and not enough comes in.
As a crab, you can develop too hard a shell, a good defense for your tender underbelly but one that can lead to isolation. With this placement you’ll need to find ways to honor the strength of your vulnerability while developing the healthy boundaries necessary for living a life connected to other messy, loving, and changeable humans.
Affirmations
Care is my greatest currency.
Feelings are not facts, but they carry within them kernels of truth that I am dedicated to uncovering.
Reflection Questions
Where do you feel that your emotional power is most appreciated and put to good use?
Who do you let take care of you?
Is developing emotional bonds or initiating others into feeling their emotions tied to your life’s purpose? If not, are you known as someone who is attuned to the feeling realm, and is that a central part of your identity? How does that influence others around you?
SUN IN LEO
In the Northern Hemisphere, where this astrological system originated, the Sun is the strongest in late July and August. The Sun was therefore given dominion over the sign where it produced the most heat. The Sun rules Leo. This is its home, its throne, its place of majesty.
The Sun in Leo has access to all its resources, all its talents, and all its glory. Having the Sun in Leo means that you are meant to burn bright. Confidence, eminence, and heart are some of the positive attributes of the Sun in this fixed fire sign. Here your Sun shines without shame. Gloriously, lavishly, and unabashedly exclaiming itself as the central giver of heat and light, your Sun in Leo needs to celebrate and be celebrated.
Royal in your style, your Sun in Leo needs to rule something. Though not everyone born while the Sun is traveling through Leo will be driven to lead, at the very least your central mission in life is to find a way to give of your life force and get applauded for it.
A Leo unloved can be a dangerous creature.
Humans are attracted to light, and Leo takes that knowledge and runs with it. Leo is the archetypal performer, the clown who steals our heart with warmth and charisma. Passion, love, drama, playfulness, nobility, courage, romance, and exhibitionism are all traits of your Sun in Leo.
When this placement is distorted, it can become egomaniacal, domineering, and self-obsessed. Without the right stage, your Sun can become a bitter, graceless, heartbroken creature whose playfulness gets overshadowed by entitlement. Your Sun in Leo needs to find the most appropriate uses of its charisma and charm so that self-righteousness gets cut off before it can take root. Using your personality as a vehicle for doing the work that is yours to do in the world is where your Sun in Leo will lead you toward great fulfillment.
Affirmations
I am allowed to love the applause I receive.
I honor my energy by finding ways to joyfully express it on the stages that are most appreciative of it.
Reflection Questions
Where in your life do you feel applauded, appreciated, and recognized for your gifts?
Do you admonish yourself for needing applause and appreciation from others? If so, why?
Do you feel that your self-expression, creative energy, and ability to shine are tied to your life’s purpose? You may still be figuring out the specific way in which you shine, but does the thought of utilizing your creative energy in the world feel important and central to your life’s purpose?
SUN IN VIRGO
In this mutable earth sign that is forever assimilating the knowledge it is receiving, your Sun in Virgo shines through a personality that prides itself on never stopping at “good enough.”
You most likely feel invigorated when you’ve spent time, energy, and effort developing and perfecting the skills you want to apply to your life’s work. Never resting on your laurels, your Sun in Virgo will forever be busy refining some aspect of your offering.
Serious in nature, your Sun in Virgo has a job to do and cannot be distracted from it. Varying astrological factors can impact this trait but, in general, you will always feel a greater sense of ease when working efficiently on something that is meaningful to you. Earth signs shine when getting things done that have a tangible result and a practical use. At the very least, anxiety is quieted when distracted with work that bears good results.
Virgo’s exacting nature is always attuned to the inner critic. Your Sun in Virgo can learn to dissuade the inner demons of perfectionism if you refocus your awareness on being of service to something you feel is sacred. Being ruled by Mercury means that the mind is forever moving from one topic to the next, and in Virgo’s case that can become about searching out one flaw after another.
Not everyone with the Sun in Virgo is an introvert, but this sign pulls awareness toward its own energetic storehouses. Understanding the reserves that you have access to, the reserves that need to be doled out sparingly, and the reserves that are instantly replenished is Virgo’s job. Your Sun in Virgo’s frayed nerves can often be soothed by cleaning, clearing, and cleansing. These daily or mundane rituals can become mini rites of passage for you. Putting things in order helps mental, physical, and emotional energy flow.
Virgo’s symbol is the virgin, the archetype of individuals who belongs to themselves. Virgo is the priestess, and here the Sun has a talent for understanding the ways of natural healing. Since Virgo is so adept at understanding systems, here your Sun needs you to apply your energy toward what clarifies, specifies, and pinpoints both the problem and the remedy.
When your Sun in Virgo is distorted, you may spend all your energy being hypercritical, micromanaging, and tearing your best efforts to shreds for lack of correctness. Virgo can miss the mountain for the molehill, the love for the flaw in delivery, and the moment for how it thinks it should be. Your Sun in Virgo needs you to find all possible avenues to pour your energy, expertise, and effort into helping yourself feel affirmed by way of being useful.
Affirmations
I forgive myself. I love myself for being human.
The most perfect thing I can achieve is my devotion to my process.
Reflection Questions
How does your inner critic impede you from being able to take action, create, build with others, or be present in your life?
What are you driven to get perfect? When does that serve you? When does it derail your ability to complete a project?
Do you feel that your ability to be exacting is tied to your life’s purpose? Where in your life does your discernment serve you best? Where in your life does your ability to understand systems of healing help you to understand something about your calling?
SUN IN LIBRA
In this cardinal air sign that initiates relationships, the Sun in Libra strives to find balance between self and other. Between shapes and sounds. Between textures and tones. The Sun in Libra is the Lovable Artist. Relator. Peacemaker. Personable Problem Solver. Diplomat. Activist. As a cardinal sign ruled by Venus, Libra is here to initiate relationships and aesthetic partnerships.
Your Sun in Libra shines by being fair, measured, and willing to meet halfway, always weighing how the other person is feeling, what they are needing, or when they are even the slightest bit off. You shine by being relatable, extending your goodwill, and making life easy for others in times of difficulty. Your Sun in Libra helps soothe any discomfort by addressing the imbalance almost instinctually.
In Libra, the Sun is in its fall, meaning it is in a place that is opposite to where it is applauded and noticed for its courage, strength, and bravery (Aries). Having
the Sun in Libra means that you are here to demonstrate that you are a diplomat, fair and even-tempered, and open to all sides of the story, but Libra’s dependence on being the receiver of others’ affections runs counter to the job that your Sun has set out to do. The Sun is supposed to express itself no matter the consequences.
When the Sun is in a sign that is overly concerned with how others feel, what they might think about you, or how you might find peaceful relations with them, your ability to be boldly yourself, shining as you see fit (the job of the Sun), may be impeded.
Your Sun in Libra will feel every injustice, every slight, every unfair setup—which can sometimes leave you without your own needs met. In pursuit of making a situation seemingly more equitable, do you often lose?
Your Sun in Libra makes you relatable because that is in many ways your job. You attract others through your easygoing nature that most find soothing, if not enticing, to be around. When distorted, your Sun in Libra can be indecisive, people-pleasing, vain, and have a hard time being transparent for fear of having to deal with someone else’s upset.
The Sun in Libra offers incredible gifts of balance, harmony, and justice, but you’ll need to learn that it is okay to center your own needs in your own life.
Affirmations