Reference

Astro Dictionary

A glossary of the astrology terms you'll encounter in your journal — from planets and houses to aspects and retrogrades.

The Big Three

Sun Sign: The zodiac sign the Sun occupied at the moment of your birth. It represents your core identity, ego, and the qualities you are growing into throughout your life.
Moon Sign: The zodiac sign the Moon occupied at birth. It governs your emotional nature, inner world, instincts, and what you need to feel safe and nourished.
Rising Sign (Ascendant): The zodiac sign that was rising on the eastern horizon at your exact time and place of birth. It shapes your outward personality, first impressions, and physical appearance.

Mercury: Governs communication, thinking style, learning, and how you process and share information.
Venus: Rules love, beauty, pleasure, values, and how you attract and relate to others in romance and friendship.
Mars: Drives ambition, desire, energy, courage, and how you assert yourself and pursue what you want.
Jupiter: Planet of expansion, luck, growth, wisdom, and abundance. Shows where life tends to open doors for you.
Saturn: Planet of discipline, structure, responsibility, and hard-won mastery. Shows where life demands patience and maturity.
Uranus: Planet of rebellion, innovation, sudden change, and individuality. Shows where you break from convention.
Neptune: Planet of dreams, intuition, spirituality, and illusion. Shows where you seek transcendence — and where boundaries dissolve.
Pluto: Planet of transformation, power, death and rebirth. Shows where you experience profound, irreversible change.
Chiron: Known as the "wounded healer." Represents your deepest wound and, through working with it, your greatest capacity to heal others.

Zodiac Sign: One of twelve 30-degree segments of the ecliptic, each associated with specific traits and energies. The signs are Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo, Libra, Scorpio, Sagittarius, Capricorn, Aquarius, and Pisces.
Element: Each sign belongs to one of four elements — Fire (passion, action), Earth (stability, practicality), Air (intellect, communication), or Water (emotion, intuition).
Modality: Each sign has a modality that describes its energy style — Cardinal (initiating), Fixed (sustaining), or Mutable (adapting).
Tropical Zodiac: The zodiac system used in Western astrology, based on the seasons and the vernal equinox rather than the physical constellations.
Sidereal Zodiac: The zodiac system used in Vedic (Jyotish) astrology, aligned with the actual positions of the constellations. Differs from tropical by roughly 24 degrees.

House: One of twelve sections of the birth chart, each governing a specific area of life — from identity (1st) to the unconscious (12th). The houses are determined by your birth time and location.
1st House (Self): Your identity, appearance, and how you present yourself to the world. The cusp of the 1st house is your Ascendant.
4th House (Home): Your roots, family, home environment, and emotional foundation. The cusp is the IC (Imum Coeli).
7th House (Partnerships): Committed relationships, marriage, business partnerships, and how you relate one-on-one with others.
10th House (Career): Your public reputation, career, legacy, and life direction. The cusp is the Midheaven (MC).
Midheaven (MC): The highest point of your chart. Represents your public image, career path, and what you are known for in the world.
IC (Imum Coeli): The lowest point of your chart, opposite the Midheaven. Represents your private self, family roots, and innermost emotional foundation.
Placidus: The most commonly used house system in Western astrology. It divides the chart based on the time it takes each degree of the ecliptic to rise from the IC to the Ascendant.

Aspect: An angular relationship between two planets in a chart. Aspects describe how planetary energies interact — whether they flow easily or create tension.
Conjunction (0°): Two planets at the same degree. Their energies merge and intensify, for better or worse depending on the planets involved.
Opposition (180°): Two planets directly across the chart from each other. Creates awareness through tension, polarity, and the need to balance opposing forces.
Trine (120°): A harmonious aspect between planets in signs of the same element. Energy flows naturally and easily — a gift that can also be taken for granted.
Square (90°): A challenging aspect that creates friction and internal conflict. Squares demand growth and are often the source of your greatest drive.
Sextile (60°): A gentle, supportive aspect between compatible signs. Represents opportunities that require some effort to activate.
Orb: The margin of degrees allowed for an aspect to still be considered active. A tight orb (1–2°) is more powerful than a wide one (7–8°).

Natal Chart (Birth Chart): A map of the sky at the exact moment and location of your birth. It shows the positions of all planets, the houses, and the aspects between them.
Transit: The current position of a planet in the sky relative to your natal chart. Transits activate different areas of your chart over time.
Retrograde: When a planet appears to move backward through the zodiac from Earth’s perspective. Associated with review, revision, and turning inward in that planet’s domain.
Dignity: A planet’s strength based on its sign placement. A planet in domicile (its home sign) or exaltation operates with ease; in detriment or fall, it faces extra challenges.
North Node: The point where the Moon’s orbit crosses the ecliptic heading north. Represents your soul’s growth direction — the qualities you are learning to embody in this lifetime.
South Node: Opposite the North Node. Represents past-life gifts and comfort zones — patterns that once served you but may now hold you back from growth.
Moon Phase: The phase of the Moon (new, waxing, full, waning) at any given time. In astrology, each phase carries a different energy for intention-setting, action, reflection, and release.
Ecliptic: The apparent path the Sun traces across the sky over the course of a year. All zodiac signs and planetary positions are measured along this plane.