I was like some of you once, a skeptic, a non believer. How could one’s birthday dictate their whole personality? It didn’t make sense to me. The traits of each sign seemed too broad and generic to truly resonate with me, and the fact that two people could have the same sign but be so different was perplexing. It didn’t help that I never fully connected with my status as a Libra. “Mercury’s in Gatorade” or “she said she can’t drive because she’s a Caprisun” all of the jokes that we have to endure on social media every other week are annoying but they’re understandable considering the joke that modern, pop, sun sign astrology has become.
Okay, so let’s get down to it. I have a degree in psychology, I’ve always been interested in the human condition, specifically the social aspect of psychology. Learning about different aspects of psychology over the 4 years I was in college was cool. I learned a lot. I’m grateful to have been able to study that science in school, but there were some holes. One of the big ones is personality. There’s really no scientific explanation for why people’s personalities are the way they are. One thing I’ve learned is that humans like to categorize people, our internal biases work overtime to make it easier for our brain to understand the world around us. This is one of the reasons I used to be really into Myers Briggs personality tests, enneagram, and sun sign astrology to a lesser extent a few years ago. Fun ways to learn about yourself and others, while putting people in these neat little boxes.
One issue with these tests though, is that it requires you to answer questions about yourself for it to work. A lot of people either aren’t self aware enough to answer the questions or don’t answer 100% truthfully, which skews the results of the test. It’s kind of a lot of pressure if you think about it, taking a test that’s meant to tell you who you are. It makes sense that people over/underestimate traits that they display in that kind of scenario. Then there’s the fact that some things that might’ve been true about you at one point, aren’t anymore. Naturally people change overtime as they mature. I’ve taken the test several times and have gotten a couple of different results over the years. It’s no surprise that the Myers Briggs test was shown to be invalid.
Another issue I have with these tests (really the biggest issue) is how broad they are. There are 12 signs in the zodiac, there are 16 different possible Myers Briggs combinations, there are 9 enneagram types (18 if you count wings). Trying to narrow down the entire human population into these limited number of slots is kind of crazy if you think about it. There’s no way to get into specifics. I remember comparing myself to other Libras like “am I really like Kim Kardashian?” Then there’s the astrology meme accounts, the Twitter discourse about which sign is the most toxic or the best in bed, Justin Laboy asking “what sign is this” and showing the most generic message you’ve ever seen, I understand those things are kind of like a gateway to what astrology actually is, but it’s damaging to the perception of astrology to people who are on the outside. It makes it look like something to not be taken seriously. I’m not trying to say that I think astrology is some religion that should rule your life, but I feel it should be respected and treated as something that’s legitimate.
Let me clarify what I mean when I say “sun sign astrology”. The sun is the planet that’s the easiest to figure out, which is why pop astrology always uses this placement for their memes, it’s just based on whenever your birthday is. For example my birthday is September 25th, so I have a Libra sun. There’s more to actual astrology than that though. The easiest way to describe it is to think of your birth chart as a football team. The sun sign may be the QB, but there are other important positions too. When I first saw my full birth chart, I still didn’t know what to make of it. I kind of just put it to the side, and continued thinking of myself as a Libra, still not really buying into it. One day I randomly stumbled on a screenshot saying I have a Scorpio ascendant which then made me want to find out what that is, which then made me look at the rest of the placements in my chart, and from that point on I was hooked. What I love most about astrology is how deep it goes. I’ve been studying it for years now and I still feel like I’ve only scratched the surface. Personality tests and sun sign astrology are broad, simplified, watered down in order to maximize mainstream appeal. Actual astrology, on the other hand, is deep and complex, just like how humans are deep and complex. There’s the signs, the planets, the houses, the aspects, the transits, synastry, and on and on forever basically. Your birth chart is based on the position the planets/stars were in when you were born. You have to know the exact time and place you were born because a few minutes difference can make your chart look vastly different (which is why twins can appear so different even though they were born at almost the exact same time). There’s seemingly an infinite number of possible combinations in your chart. Ironically learning more about astrology has made me appreciate the uniqueness of people instead of trying to categorize them, although it’s funny to see similar placements in people close to you. I’ve found that a lot of my friends have a couple similarities in their chart, the same goes for women that I find myself being attracted to. It’s cool seeing the similarities, but it’s cool seeing the differences too, and how they mix and manifest in their personality. Astrology really shows you that people are a mix of different influences, which is why sun sign astrology is ultimately ineffective. The complexity of astrology is why I think it’s ridiculous seeing people say they could never date a certain sign. It completely discounts the complexities and uniqueness of people. This is also why I don’t think of myself as one sign, and I never ask anyone what their sign is, because it doesn’t really tell you a lot (fellas if you want to impress her/him/them, ask them what their big 3 is).
I think astrology is a really cool way to learn about yourself and others if you’re willing to dive deep into it. The co-star app is really popular, but it’s pretty terrible honestly. It’s not run by actual astrologers, the charts are sometimes wrong, and the way they measure compatibility is kind of wrong too. They also have these weird, random, daily messages that I think they try to pass off as horoscopes which I find funny. There are some sites and apps that are helpful and can teach you a lot like:
- TimePassages (App)
- Astro.com
- Cafeastrology.com
- The Pattern (App good for synastry)
Just some guy on the internet 