Astrology, Plain & Simple: The Only Book You'll Ever Need - Cass Jackson, Janie Jackson (2016)

Chapter 8. The Aspects

“Aspect” is the term used for the angular relationship between the planets, as positioned on a birth chart. Each planet exerts an influence on the other planets. Whether the planets are adjacent or opposite, near or far, the energy of one planet will affect the energy of another—the influence can be weak or strong, harmonious or conflicting. The aspect that two planets make to each other is a matter of geometry: within the 360 degrees of the birth chart, the distance between planets is measured by degree.

The following describes the most important aspects:

Conjunction

Planets are in conjunction (close) when they are within 10 degrees of each other. A conjunction is usually a harmonious aspect because the planets that form a conjunction are energies that are blended. Sun conjunct Mercury blends the energies of each together. However, it is possible that conjunction might also be difficult depending on the planets that are involved—Pluto conjunct Saturn can indicate a massive life challenge.

Sextile

Planets are two signs apart ,or around 60 degrees apart. This is a harmonious aspect. It symbolizes the potential to make connections, and indicates natural attunement and skill.

Square

Planets are three signs or around 90 degrees apart. This is usually an inharmonious aspect since it involves planets with divergent energies. A square aspect usually indicates that energy must be expended—something needs to be torn down so that something new can be built.

Trine

Planets are four signs or 120 degrees apart. This is a harmonious aspect and indicates balance among the planets' energies; these planets generally complement one another.

Opposition

Planets are six signs or 180 degrees apart, therefore, opposite each other. This is often thought of as an inharmonious aspect because the planets are “opposing” each other. But in truth, an opposition often represents opportunity—two opposing planets create tension, but sometimes this tension can have positive results.

There are many lesser aspects, but these are the main ones, and that is plenty for a beginner to consider.

When inspecting a chart it should be noted that a certain tolerance or leeway is allowed in the accuracy of the angles measured. This is known as the orb of influence and this varies according to the aspect.

These orbs of influence are as follows:

for a conjunction—10 degrees

for a sextile—6 degrees

for a square—6 degrees

for a trine—6 degrees

for an opposition—8 degrees

To sum up:

· Harmonious aspects: Trines and sextiles are harmonious, soft, or easy aspects that usually have a beneficial effect.

· Inharmonious aspects: Squares and oppositions are the inharmonious, dynamic, or hard aspects that may present difficulties, but should be seen in a positive manner as challenges.

· Conjunctions are often fortunate or difficult depending upon the energy of the planets that are involved.

ASPECTS OF THE SUN

Planets aspected by the Sun will always be important in a chart, as they will contribute in no small manner to your life and character.

Sun to Moon

Harmonious aspects

You are a balanced and well-adjusted personality who will enjoy a highly successful relationship with your family, friends, and partner. You are equally at home with members of either sex. Harmony in your emotional life and success in all your business activities is indicated. A highly creative person with a wealth of ideas is usually found here.

Inharmonious aspects

Any aspects here will emphasize your Sun sign attributes. You may encounter emotional complications that lead to frustration and restlessness. Your challenge here is to avoid stress. You need to focus on being objective and avoiding extreme mood swings.

Sun to Mercury

Mercury is the closest planet to the Sun, and as such, it's position in the birth chart can never be more than 28 degrees away from the Sun. Therefore, only the conjunction is possible. If you have Sun conjunct Mercury you will almost certainly be strong-willed, with a high intellect. You may find that you are unable to form unbiased opinions, as all your judgments tend to be subjective. This is compounded by the fact that you hate to admit that you are in the wrong and you may find it difficult to change your mind.

Sun to Venus

Another planet whose orbit is close to the Sun. Since the Sun can never be more than 48 degrees from Venus in the birth chart, the only strong aspect will be the conjunction. If your Sun is conjunct Venus you will possess all the charm that is usually associated with this planet. You will be optimistic, friendly, and have a charismatic personality. Although others are unaware of it, your nature is influenced by the fact that you have a desperate need to be loved. You may show some creative, artistic, or musical talent.

Sun to Mars

Harmonious aspects

Although these aspects are soft and beneficial, the influence of Mars means that they will always be challenging. However, you enjoy a challenge, in all its competitive aspects, whether it is in sports, your emotional life, or in business. You always feel that you are up to this challenge, ready to take on more than your share of the work that is involved and see it through to completion.

Inharmonious aspects

Here the influence of Mars will make you more insistent and forceful. Your challenge here is to avoid appearing stubborn and tactless.

Sun to Jupiter

Harmonious aspects

“Easy” is the appropriate word here. You'll do anything for the easy life and motivate yourself only when you can see no means of escape. This is exactly the attitude to be expected from someone who is as optimistic as you are. You are serious about life and the direction that you wish to take, but this somber façade is balanced by a good sense of humor.

Inharmonious aspects

Here your easy-going nature may be carried to excess, to the point where you tend to be smug and self-satisfied. Your challenge here is to rise above this and apply your innate good business sense.

Sun to Saturn

Harmonious aspects

Saturn will stabilize your emotions and lead you to form friendships with those who are older than you are. Although you are competent in all that you do, you move steadily and your watchword through life is “caution,” since you prefer to remain in the background. However, you don't allow this prudence to stand in the way of your ambition to succeed. You will receive support from others.

Inharmonious aspects

The danger here is that you may be so over-cautious that you become inhibited, and then you achieve nothing. Your challenge here is to overcome these limitations.

Sun to Uranus

Harmonious aspects

Uranus softly aspecting the Sun indicates a life of diversity and change. You will be forever seeking new experiences and—metaphorically—new mountains to climb because you enjoy the challenge. You are by nature a good teacher who delights in sharing knowledge with others in a logical and easily understood manner.

Inharmonious aspects

You are capable of strong self-expression but your challenge here is to avoid revealing your rebelliousness. Additionally, you should guard against making drastic changes in the heat of the moment.

Sun to Neptune

Harmonious aspects

You are one of the fortunate people who never opens your mouth and puts your foot in it. You have an extremely sensitive nature, which may make you somewhat impractical. To compensate, you will show strong artistic ability and are conscious of your own talent in this direction. You find it difficult to cope with rejection and any form of criticism wounds you deeply.

Inharmonious aspects

Your tendency to undervalue yourself can lead to dishonesty or evasion as a means of escape from your problems. Your challenge here is to avoid this trap.

Sun to Pluto

Harmonious aspects

With the Sun in easy aspect to Pluto, everything you do you will involve great intensity and honesty. You don't suffer fools gladly. You are confident that you can achieve anything you want and, if you do encounter setbacks, you will bounce back quickly. Your natural talents will enable you to excel at any task, occupation, or profession that you decide is the one for you. However, something in your background lingers and leaves you full of some kind of underlying resentment. You may suffer love/hate relationships with family members.

Inharmonious aspects

Your obsessive nature can become such that other people find you difficult to deal with. Your challenge here is to be aware of this trait and compensate for it by being less stubborn. Resentment and hidden hurt from the past never really leave you.

Sun to Ascendant

Harmonious aspects

Harmony and balance are essential to you. You are also very sure of yourself and you know what is right for you. This self-confidence can irritate your superiors. Quite rightly, they fear for their own positions when you keep coming up with such original ideas. You aim for the top simply because you cannot bear the idea of being subservient to others less talented than you are. Your kind-hearted and selfless nature ensures that all your friendships and partnerships will flourish and prosper.

Inharmonious aspects

Guard against giving the impression of insincerity in your dealings. You hate criticism and your challenge here is to learn how to cope with it.

ASPECTS OF THE MOON

Lunar aspects affect your inner nature and your feelings.

Moon to Mercury

Harmonious aspects

If your Moon is well aspected to Mercury, you are sure to be endowed with more than the average amount of common sense. Success comes through using your practical creative talents. Your perfect partner will be someone who is your intellectual equal and who is equally goal oriented. You're a great one for networking and this will result in many social contacts. You are not one to stand aside and allow others to make decisions for you.

Inharmonious aspects

Practical you may be, but on the emotional level, you have much to learn. Your challenge is not to allow your heart to rule your head.

Moon to Venus

Harmonious aspects

Your friendly and affectionate nature ensures your popularity with both sexes. You're considerate and kindly, the sort of person that others seek when they need a shoulder to cry on. You are quite capable of handling your finances and do not like it when someone else tries to interfere. You feel that you have arranged an uncomplicated life for yourself and strongly object to outside intervention.

Inharmonious aspects

Your difficulty in expressing your true feelings may result in some unhappy experiences regarding a love affair. Your challenge is to discriminate between true friends and sycophants.

Moon to Mars

Harmonious aspects

Easy aspects between Moon and Mars indicate that you are blessed with good health. Friends regard you as a good judge of character and often ask your opinion on partnership issues. You tend to react to others subjectively and always give them the benefit of the doubt—you are not prone to jumping to conclusions. You tend to be emotionally vulnerable.

Inharmonious aspects

Worry can drain your energies and, because you let your emotions run away with you, your health suffers. Your challenge here is to develop more self-control and avoid quarrels.

Moon to Jupiter

Harmonious aspects

With these aspects, you will almost certainly be endowed with superior judgment, integrity, and honesty. You are a likeable character who will be popular with your many friends. This is partly because, without incontrovertible proof, you will never see the evil in others. On the contrary, you find the potential for honorable qualities in everyone and react as though these were their natural characteristics.

Inharmonious aspects

You tend to be extravagant and careless with money, and the challenge here is to exercise more self-control. If you find this difficult, allow someone else to take charge of your finances.

Moon to Saturn

Harmonious aspects

You have a very practical outlook with a mature sense of responsibility. Always ready to listen to another's viewpoint, you never jump to conclusions. Indeed, you prefer to discuss problems openly in order to reach a solution acceptable to all. A personal relationship will be acceptable to you only if your partner is willing to share your desire for success.

Inharmonious aspects

You lack self-confidence and tend to bottle up your emotions, suffering from anxiety or depression as a result. Your challenge here is to adopt a more balanced attitude where you can live and let live.

Moon to Uranus

Harmonious aspects

You are a determined person with strong ideals. You will strive for success against all odds, though you will always work at your own pace, shunning those who try to hurry you along. Your emotional make-up is such that your choice of partner will be logical, rather than romantic.

Inharmonious aspects

You are never willing to let go of your ideals and other people often regard you as being stubborn. You often go to extremes to get your own way. The challenge here is to channel your energies into being more cooperative and less obstructive.

Moon to Neptune

Harmonious aspects

Both the Moon and Neptune are linked to the emotions, and this aspect may overload you with sentiment. You will be emotionally sensitive and have a vivid imagination. You're so much involved with so many projects, both social and personal, that you are in danger of damaging your health. Make a habit of getting away from time to time, to recharge your batteries. It is essential to your well-being that you should have time to yourself.

Inharmonious aspects

Your strong emotions sometimes get the better of you and your health suffers as a result. Your challenge here is to be more rational and objective, avoiding your escapist tendencies.

Moon to Pluto

Harmonious aspects

When change becomes inevitable, you'll find it relatively easy to make the necessary adjustments to your life. You won't even have to think about them—they'll be instinctive responses. You empathize strongly with young people and enjoy their company. They feel that you understand them and their problems, and they respond by taking you into their confidence.

Inharmonious aspects

You hate change of any kind, particularly change to your lifestyle. Even the thought of having to make alterations can upset you. Your challenge is to accept the inevitable with good grace.

Moon to Ascendant

Harmonious aspects

These aspects herald a happy home life that is colored by your infectious good humor. You find that you have useful talents and are able to put them to good use. You are quite philosophical and are interested in trying to understand what makes you (and other people) tick. In your youth, criticism really upsets you but, as you get older, you are less vulnerable.

Inharmonious aspects

Your difficulty in expressing your emotions is at odds with maintaining any close personal relationship. Your challenge is to find positive ways in which you can build up your self-confidence.

ASPECTS OF MERCURY

Mercury rules the mental functioning, education, communication, siblings, neighbors, short journeys, commuting, magic, and thieves.

Mercury to Venus

Harmonious aspects

The gentle aspect of Mercury with Venus endows you with a tender, agreeable disposition. Others will be charmed by your warm and friendly nature, though they know you are no pushover. They respect your views, which are particularly well expressed in any form of debate. Your communicative ability is not only verbal; you may also be a skillful writer, always able to express yourself clearly.

Inharmonious aspects

Because Mercury and Venus are never more than 76 degrees apart, there are no inharmonious aspects.

Mercury to Mars

Harmonious aspects

You possess a great deal of common sense, honesty, and imagination. These traits are fed by your insatiable curiosity; you are never afraid to ask questions. You are fair and just but you will not suffer fools gladly. Your truthfulness is plain for all to see—and sometimes you're too candid for your own good.

Inharmonious aspects

You have a tremendous amount of energy and sometimes find that energy difficult to control. Your challenge is to find ways in which you can channel your energies constructively and effectively to the advantage of yourself and others.

Mercury to Jupiter

Harmonious aspects

Your organizational abilities and your flair for words combine with your good sense of humor to make you a natural and popular leader. You are mentally a live wire, leaving others reeling as you drive ever onwards. You're extremely shrewd and nobody can fool you. Once they've encountered your rapier-like tongue they don't try again.

Inharmonious aspects

You have a tendency here to be over-optimistic and for this reason, you are prone to exaggeration. Analytical opinion is not one of your strengths. Your challenge here is to develop a more constructive approach to life.

Mercury to Saturn

Harmonious aspects

You're a highly ambitious person, and you will work long and hard to achieve your goals. This characteristic can make your friends regard you as too serious, but they learn differently as they get to know you better. Your studious nature does mean that you tend to lead a solitary life; you're certainly not a social butterfly. Your studies involve a lot of writing and yet you may relax by writing for pleasure.

Inharmonious aspects

You expect too much of yourself and tend to withdraw from society if you don't achieve your ambitions. Your challenge is to learn to be more tolerant of people who don't understand you.

Mercury to Uranus

Harmonious aspects

Your main interest will be in original and unusual subjects that you pursue with an enquiring mind. You are also broad-minded and a progressive thinker with a predisposition to helping other knowledge-seekers. You would excel in the teaching profession. If you are to avoid nervous exhaustion, you must learn to pace yourself.

Inharmonious aspects

Persistence is often lacking here and you may give up too easily, forever looking for something new and different to investigate. Your challenge is to be less abrupt and tactless when dealing with those less gifted than you are.

Mercury to Neptune

Harmonious aspects

There is an indication here of some psychic abilities that you will want to explore. Allied to this are your highly developed intuition and the fantastic imagination that seem to pervade your everyday life. These skills need to be channeled, and some form of further education will show you the way.

Inharmonious aspects

Although you are extremely perceptive, you can also be naïve. Emotionally, too, you are ultra-sensitive. This can lead to self-deception, and you may not be above deceiving others. Your challenge is to stop worrying about your natural sensitivity and learn to control it.

Mercury to Pluto

Harmonious aspects

You are the flag bearer for honesty and fairness, being unable to tolerate any injustice in the world. However, you are also practical and down to earth. You are highly intuitive and you are well aware of this. Use your abilities to provide yourself with the answers to your own everyday problems as well as the problems of others.

Inharmonious aspects

You tend to be too intense, prone to jumping to conclusions without sufficient thought beforehand. Your challenge in life is to learn self-discipline, especially in your dealings with others.

Mercury to Ascendant

Harmonious aspects

You take pleasure in learning for its own sake, and enjoy discussion and debate. One reason for this is that you have the ability to express yourself easily and clearly. You have great creative potential, particularly in practical matters, and are never short of ideas for what to make next. Be aware that your ideas are so good that others may try to steal them.

Inharmonious aspects

For some reason, other people find it difficult to understand you. As a result, they tend to disregard what you say. Your challenge is to develop your own creative potential regardless of discouragement and criticism.

ASPECTS OF VENUS

Venus rules affection, what one values in others, personal possessions, personal money, beauty, sex, the feminine factor, women, mirrors, luxury, and having a good time.

Venus to Mars

Harmonious aspects

Your strong sex appeal is linked to an equally strong sexual drive, and you hate to be frustrated. Without an intimate relationship, you will be miserable and difficult. When you do find the perfect partner, you will both enjoy a harmonious relationship and indulge yourselves with luxuries, even though you may not be able to afford them.

Inharmonious aspects

Here your sexual drive becomes obsessive to the extent that you become impossible to live with. Your challenge here is to learn that cooperation and consideration is necessary in all spheres of life.

Venus to Jupiter

Harmonious aspects

There's nothing you like better than to help others. Therefore, you may find full-time employment in some aspect of caring service. This affection for others also translates to any partnerships, personal or professional, that you form, for they will be long and successful. You will never be truly happy until you have a comfortable home and enjoyable surroundings with good friends and a loyal partner.

Inharmonious aspects

You are too easy-going, and love the good life to the detriment of everything else. Your challenge is to control your extravagance.

Venus to Saturn

Harmonious aspects

These aspects are beneficial for all types of businesses, including partnerships. You are completely loyal to your many friends, though you may have difficulty forming and maintaining a closer, personal relationship. This is something that seems to elude you and you find it most frustrating, as you are accustomed to getting what you want.

Inharmonious aspects

Your relationships may become so difficult that you end up being friendless and lonely. Your challenge here must be to allow the free and full flow of your emotions.

Venus to Uranus

Harmonious aspects

You have a sensitive nature and are attracted to the finer things in life such as painting, music, poetry, and the performing arts. You have a feeling for humanitarian projects. Others see you as straightforward, genuine, and completely trustworthy. Your gregarious nature brings you many close friends.

Inharmonious relationships

You have problems forming relationships, often choosing unsuitable partners and, as a result, being easily led astray. Your challenge is to try to reduce your obsession with personal freedom.

Venus to Neptune

Harmonious aspects

Your ultra-sensitive nature leads you to delight in mystical, arcane, and esoteric studies and you will tend to look to them for inspiration. This may result in a conviction that a highly spiritual life is the only path that will lead you to enlightenment.

Inharmonious aspects

You may be confused emotionally, and possibly fantasize about an ideal love. This can only lead to disappointment. Your challenge must be to recognize your own delusions and plant your feet more firmly on the ground.

Venus to Pluto

Harmonious aspects

You have a passion for life and all that it has to offer, but you also need a trustworthy partner on whom to lavish your affection. You are very much aware of those members of society who are under-privileged and you will campaign long and hard on their behalf.

Inharmonious aspects

A tempestuous love life could be indicated here and social problems may arise as the result of traumatic relationships. Your challenge is to channel your passions into more tranquil and creative outlets.

Venus to Ascendant

Harmonious aspects

A happy domestic life is indicated here, which could be linked with a career partner. Your warm and enthusiastic qualities bring you friends and make you very popular. You are naturally outgoing and you try to be friendly with everyone you meet, never being judgmental or unkind. You are the archetypal diplomat and you would do well in a diplomatic profession.

Inharmonious aspects

Your preoccupation with pleasure may have a detrimental effect on your love life. Your challenge here is to learn how to express your emotions and to demonstrate your affection more clearly.

ASPECTS OF MARS

Mars rules drive, action, fighting for a cause, fighting for any reason, the way one attacks a problem or goes about a job, and stick-to-itiveness.

Mars to Jupiter

Harmonious aspects

You have the dual benefit of a freedom-loving nature and the capacity to live life to the full. This makes you a high-spirited person who puts a great deal of energy into all that you do. As a result, you usually achieve your objectives in life, even though they may seem highly ambitious by the standards of others.

Inharmonious aspects

You allow your enthusiasm to carry you away and are far too rash when important decisions need to be made. Your challenge in life is to recognize your extremist tendencies and learn to temper them.

Mars to Saturn

Harmonious aspects

You like a challenge, the bigger and more physical the better. You also have great organizational abilities and a strong practical streak. You are not the sort of person to pass up any worthwhile opportunities that come your way. Outside your professional life, you may become a master of some practical craft, which will serve you well in later years.

Inharmonious aspects

Your initial enthusiasm for projects is apt to wane so that you drift aimlessly from one scheme to another, achieving nothing. Your challenge is to learn to finish what you start.

Mars to Uranus

Harmonious aspects

You are full of initiative and drive that is revealed in practical and creative ways. Physical skills come easily to you. You are adept at anything that requires the use of your hands, from auto mechanics to plumbing to playing the flute. However, your intellectual approach and wide-ranging interests may draw you to fields of research and development, where you would also feel at home and do well.

Inharmonious aspects

You tend to let your ideas run away with you, becoming eccentric and irritable. Your challenge is to release your tension and learn to relax through physical activity.

Mars to Neptune

Harmonious aspects

These aspects are very favorable, increasing both your personal magnetism and your executive ability. Your natural warmth is sometimes hidden behind an apparent shyness, although this is merely a mask used to hide your deep feelings. You see only the best in others. In your private life, you are happy to ignore any failings in your partner in return for a peaceful life.

Inharmonious aspects

Your self-confidence evaporates all too easily when you are faced with difficulties. This, taken to extremes, can lead to health problems. Your challenge is to be aware of your true emotions and rely on them for strength.

Mars to Pluto

Harmonious aspects

With your dynamic attitude to life, you are a formidable opponent, being full of energy and emotion and well able to sell yourself and your ideas to others. You have the added advantage that you are always confident that you will succeed, and as a result, you usually do. You seek a partner who shares your high ideals and regard any physical attraction as being of lesser importance.

Inharmonious aspects

Your need for power may make you ruthless, unable to endure opposition. Your challenge in life is to learn how to establish harmonious relationships with other people.

Mars to Ascendant

Harmonious aspects

You have strong passions and emotions, which you demonstrate in an assertive and positive way. You are self-motivated and tend to act quite independently, ignoring even the best of well-intentioned advice. Nervous energy drives you on. Try to remember that self-discipline can mean restraining yourself rather than keeping your nose to the grindstone.

Inharmonious aspects

Your assertive nature can lead to aggression and you resent any interference, seeing slights—real or imaginary—as personal insults. Your challenge here is to learn to be less defensive and channel your energies creatively.

ASPECTS OF JUPITER

Jupiter rules higher education, belief systems, philosophy, religion, travel, foreigners, foreign places, and the law. Jupiter looks for barriers, and then transcends them.

Jupiter to Saturn

Harmonious aspects

You may think that you've become unglued occasionally, but you'll be extremely fortunate and land back on your feet before any damage is done. You lead a charmed life. To others you are a wealth of information.

Inharmonious aspects

You can't make up your mind whether to be ambitious or lazy. Unfortunately, your lack of enthusiasm often wins. Your challenge is to lower your sights a little and recognize that not everyone can reach the top.

Jupiter to Uranus

Harmonious aspects

You are an original thinker who is optimistic about the future, both on a personal level and for humankind. You are constantly planning new projects, but you are impatient to bring them about, quickly rejecting other people who are unwilling to accept your principles.

Inharmonious aspects

Tactlessness and a lack of self-confidence can lead you into many mistakes. Diplomacy is not your strong point. Your challenge is to hold your impulsive nature in check.

Jupiter to Neptune

Harmonious aspects

You are intensely philanthropic, but you have difficulty with the practicalities. Fortunately, your enthusiasm attracts the help of others to accomplish your charitable aims. You are particularly vulnerable to deception in your public and your private life. Beware of people who seek to use you only for their own ends.

Inharmonious aspects

You're extremely imaginative and apt to be gullible. Others will spot your weakness and prey on you if you allow it. Your challenge is to look before you leap in all areas of life.

Jupiter to Pluto

Harmonious aspects

Your deep moral and ethical convictions may lead you to seek seclusion. Your work for social reform and for less fortunate people makes you particularly suited to protect those who are not capable of defending themselves.

Inharmonious aspects

Any power you seek is intended solely for your own benefit. To this end, you are not above exploiting others or showing a complete lack of respect. Your challenge in life must be to recognize past failings and to reform.

Jupiter to Ascendant

Harmonious aspects

You are naturally philanthropic and generous, both with advice and with practical assistance. You find it almost impossible to refuse to help when it is asked of you, and this can be taken to extremes.

Inharmonious aspects

Over-indulgence is your main weakness. Your challenge is to modify your desires so that you fit into the society that you wish to embrace.

ASPECTS OF SATURN

Saturn rules old age, limitations, chronic sickness, and tribulations. However, it also represents roots, building blocks, structure, working with details and getting things right, respect, authority, and competence.

Saturn aspects are relevant to a group of people who were born during the same year. This is due to the length of time that it takes Saturn to obit the Sun and therefore, to traverse all twelve signs.

Saturn to Uranus

Harmonious aspects

You are a disciplined and patient person who has innovative ideas. You also have the capability to understand complex theories and then to communicate them to others so that they are clearly understood. You will do well in any field of learning, but especially in higher education where your skills will be most appreciated.

Inharmonious aspects

Your greatest difficulty is in making decisions, as you are completely conservative and hate diversification of any kind. Your challenge is to break with your old attachments and look forward, optimistically and positively, to the new.

Saturn to Neptune

Harmonious aspects

Your abilities seem limitless and you can achieve your high ideals. You have no difficulty in persuading others to give you assistance. You will be quite willing to put your love life on hold until later in life.

Inharmonious aspects

However hard you try, you are frustrated in your attempts to fulfill your dreams and tend to live a fantasy life. Your challenge in life is to keep your feet firmly on the ground.

Saturn to Pluto

Harmonious aspects

You are willing to try anything without fearing failure and you learn from mistakes that you make along the way. You are aware of the need for changes in society and see it as your duty to bring about such change.

Inharmonious aspects

You are a poor loser and are intimidated by anyone in a more powerful position than you. Your challenge is to be cautious in your dealings with others.

Saturn to Ascendant

Harmonious aspects

You tend to be a loner, only forming close relationships later in life. Your partners may be older than you are, as you have always had a great deal of respect for your seniors. You will take great care to avoid choosing the wrong partner, but you are happy to be independent, so you may well be content to go through life unattached.

Inharmonious aspects

You lack drive because you lack confidence, and you underestimate your own abilities. Your challenge is to be less of a perfectionist and more of a realist.

ASPECTS OF URANUS

Uranus is the breakout planet that rules change, revolution, originality, invention, and eccentricity. It also rules sudden and unexpected events. This outer planet takes many years to orbit the Sun, so it stays in each sign for several years. This means that Uranus's influence is a generational one that affects many people.

Uranus to Neptune

Harmonious aspects

You are broad-minded, understanding, and you see it as your duty in life to help others less gifted than yourself. Your attitude to religion or spiritual matters is ambivalent and you resist efforts to rule your thinking. You like to make up your own mind but do this only when you are sure that you have all the facts.

Inharmonious aspects

Your challenge in life is to find a positive outlet for your rebelliousness and avoid joining any organizations that have questionable motives.

Uranus to Pluto

Harmonious aspects

You bubble over with original ideas about the reformation of society, but your ideas change as you get older. You demand greater meaning in your life. The spirit world offers you a new dimension that you might decide to explore.

Inharmonious aspects

Hardships that come one after another seem to dog your life. Most will be outside your control, but your challenge is to make the best of things and to be careful not to allow others to hurt you.

Uranus to Ascendant

Harmonious aspects

Your enthusiasm and charismatic personality mean that you have many friends who willingly follow your intuitive leadership. The ace up our sleeve is your seemingly endless originality. Any disappointments you may have are liable to come from being let down by those you thought you could trust, especially in a personal relationship.

Inharmonious aspects

Your unpredictability makes you your own worst enemy. You are so keen on your own freedom and diversity that you never settle down to anything. Your challenge in life is to find a career in which you can exercise your freedom creatively.

ASPECTS OF NEPTUNE

Neptune rules dreams, vague desires, mysticism, glass (you can see through it as though it isn't there), the sea, water, anglers, film and film stars, fantasy, spiritual work, artistry and artistic work, music to some extent, and beauty. Oddly enough, Neptune can conceal but it can also reveal. This distant planet spends several years in each sign, so its influence is generational rather than personal.

Neptune to Pluto

All aspects

Neptune dissolves and Pluto transforms, so society is bound to change and be challenged when these two planets are in any kind of aspect.

Neptune to Ascendant

All aspects

On a personal level, easy aspects make it easy for you to express your kindness and your creativity. Challenging aspects make it hard for others to understand you. On a generational level, this brings changes in belief systems and sometimes a kind of collective madness.

ASPECTS OF PLUTO

Pluto rules hidden things, such as buried resentment, buried treasure, and mining. It also rules joining and parting, thus marriage, divorce, and the sharing or division of funds that come with these changes. It also rules sex, sexual magnetism, birth, and death—in short, all the big events that bring transformation. Pluto is a distant planet with a long orbit, so it affects a whole generation.

Pluto to Ascendant

Harmonious aspects

There is a powerful desire to transform society or to change the behavior of others—perhaps even whole countries or their religions and beliefs. Whether your generation pulls this off or not is a moot point.

Inharmonious aspects

You have great ideas, but go about implementing them in an unfortunate way. Others see you as being dictatorial and forever trying to dominate them. Your challenge is to direct your aggression toward outlets where competition is welcomed.