Introduction
Hello, and welcome to my Astrology Foundations Series! In this series, we’ll be discussing some fundamentals that will break down the larger concepts & ideas of traditional astrology into a workable system that will help us build a process for interpreting astrological charts. In this series, you can expect to:
- Define astrology & gain an overview of the overall history
- Grasp an understanding of the importance of the elements
- Learn about the planets & their functions
- Dive into the Zodiac Signs & their corresponding Seasons (Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter)
- Talk about the houses of an astrological chart
- Identify how aspects affect the nature of a planet
Meet Your Astro Guide!
My name is Courtney! I’m an Aries Sun, Aquarius Moon, & Sagittarius Rising, and I’ll be your guide along this Astrology Fundamentals Series!
I’ve always been very introspective & reflective, with a deep urge to understand the “why” & “how” behind things. I often find myself trying to find the root cause of different events and people’s behavior, asking myself questions like, “What can I learn from this?”, “What caused this to play out this way?”, and “How do I relate to others in this situation?”.
As a kid, this manifested as a very observant & inquisitive personality – I read lots of books, kept a dictionary/thesaurus on my hip, & eventually used search engines as my 6th sense. I also loved taking quizzes & reading articles that would tell me more about myself, my family & friends – I’ve taken more personality tests than I can count!
Once I discovered horoscopes in the magazines & newspapers, I sunk my teeth in – I wanted to know everything there was to know about being an Aries! With the power of Google by my side as I got older, this naturally developed into me looking up Sun signs with friends & family to see how they related (or didn’t relate) to the information I found. [I wouldn’t be real if I didn’t tell you I was looking up the signs & checking the compatibility of my crushes, too.]
What's Your Big 3?
With the rise in astrology’s popularity in the mid-to-late 2010s & the help of Twitter, Tumblr, and YouTube, “What’s your sign” transformed into “What’s your big 3?” and of course, I had to download my chart & begin making sense of this new language that had been presented to me.
In 2018, I discovered the world of natal astrology & learned that I have more than just an Aries Sun; I have a sign for all of the planets & even something called a birth/natal chart – an astrological map of the sky for the moment I was born. I learned that I have a Moon sign that describes my emotional responses, a Rising/Ascendant sign that describes my perspective of life & how people may view my appearance, a Mercury sign that describes my thinking & communication styles – and so much more!
Since I’d always had an interest in self-discovery & personal development, I felt like natal astrology would fit right in as a tool to help me learn more about myself & how/where I fit into the world, how I relate to others & vice versa, and why I experience certain challenges & what those challenges are trying to teach me. By helping me learn how to heal & better understand myself, studying astrology quickly became a passion of mine that I love to discuss & learn more about.
Equipped with this new tool, I downloaded countless infographics that I set as my phone wallpapers & saved into special photo albums to help with easy studying, read lots of books, articles & blog posts, and downloaded apps that would allow me to check out my chart on-the-go. Through Twitter, I also found astrologers like iJaadee & MindBodyBronx/TarotbyBronx, joined their YouTube & Patreon communities, and discovered other communities & individuals that were discussing astrology.
During these years of study, I began using what I’d been learning to talk to my friends, family & strangers about their own charts & showed them that they had more than a Sun Sign too. I helped them understand that astrology can be a tool of empowerment for people who are willing to leave skepticism & popular generalizations at the door. By studying the planetary patterns & their correlation with events on Earth, a person can gain deeper insight into their lives, make more informed & aligned decisions, and relate to others better.
As you come along on this journey, you’ll discover that natal astrology just barely scratches the surface of what astrology has to offer! There’s transit astrology that can help people understand current events & themes, electional astrology to help people find the best time to do or to avoid certain things, horary astrology to answer questions & find lost items, synastry & composite astrology to discover relationship insights, locational astrology to find the best places to live, and even astrology for things like business & politics!
What's Next?
In the next part of this series, I’ll share my transition from modern to traditional astrology, and after that, we’ll touch on a brief history of astrology, an overview of the branches & types of astrology, and astrology’s geocentric perspective.
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