Earth ... Fire ... Air ... Water: The Elements

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Earth ... Fire ... Air ... Water: The Elements

Every astrologer hears the question: What signs am I compatible with? The person asking wants a list of three or four answers they can count on ... often to solve problems much larger than just a cluster of incompatible associates. Some of the misapplications of astrology suggest there are such lists ... and easy answers. There aren't. In astrology, as in life, broad categories and generalizations ... may not be worth much. Also, a lot depends on what you want ... what "compatible" means to you.

True, there are signs who tend to think and act alike, whose orientation and values toward life share common ground, whose personalities support and sympathize with one another. This can indeed give you a head start on a satisfying relationship -- but there are no guarantees. Intellectually, as an educated astrologer, I can sit here and tell you that all signs are crucially important, all signs are wonderfully unique, all people are composed of many different elements -- and categories can be dangerous.

As a practical matter and in the experience of my real life, though, I have to admit there is one sign I simply cannot get along with -- although Lord knows I've tried!! (No, I will not say what it is.) On the other hand, every serious romantic partner I've ever had has been a Leo. Could there possibly be any relationship between the fact that Leo is a Fire sign ... and I have my Sun, Moon, and Ascendant all in Fire signs? I'm going to chicken out on that answer and let you be the judge.

But in this article, I'll talk about the Zodiac groupings that are assigned to the four components of physical reality -- Fire, Earth, Air, and Water. I'll tell you the basic qualities of each group and the differences in the signs they contain ... and leave you to decide which ones sound interesting and compatible to you.

To an astrologer, Fire, Earth, Air, and Water are called the Elements or Triplicities -- as each contains three signs of the Zodiac. Traditionally, members of the same triplicity tend to get along well with one another. (There are also the Qualities ... or the Quadruplicities: Cardinal, Fixed, and Mutable ... whose members tend to have "problems" with one another. But that's the subject of a future article.)

The Fire signs are Aries, Leo, and Sagittarius. The Earth signs are Taurus, Virgo, and Capricorn. The Air signs are Gemini, Libra, and Aquarius. The Water signs are Cancer, Scorpio, and Pisces.

Fire signs and Air signs are considered masculine, positive, assertive, active, outgoing, and motivating. They tend to do things, stir things up, take action, go after what they want, make things happen, initiate situations ... rather than waiting for opportunity to find them and start banging on the door. These signs -- in their uncorrupted form -- are self-motivating, even aggressive in their approach to life.

Earth signs and Water signs are considered feminine, passive, reactive, receptive, introverted, and enduring. They attract experiences and "take advantage of opportunities" rather than creating circumstances independently. Though capable of acting forcefully, they often prefer to "wait and see what happens" before making any moves.

They prefer to work with and build on the raw materials at hand rather than exploring new horizons or conquering new situations. Their strength often lies in their ability to sustain themselves -- rather than promote themselves, or call on their alliances -- and they prefer passive aggression and passive resistance to the conflict and direct confrontation preferred by the Fire and Air signs.

The Fire Signs: Aries, Leo, and Sagittarius represent energy that is directly involved with action, leadership, personal charisma, and self-expression. These signs are self-confident, dramatic, self-promoting, exuberant, vivacious, and captivating.

They get things done, motivate themselves and others, provide direction and strategy, and sometimes kick up a ruckus. They are irrepressible, goal-oriented, and concerned with the here-and-now and the immediate future.

If they don't have what they want, they find it -- or create it. They are enthusiastic, inspirational, independent, and invested with a positive outlook on life and their ability to maneuver in it successfully. They can be forceful, impulsive, blunt, aggressive, and bold.

They are looking to "show off" personally, in ways that attract attention, that put their personality and character onstage. They can be quite spontaneous and intense when it comes to this. Being noticed and appreciated for "who they are" really excites them -- and keeps them coming back for more.

They also can be quite generous with their time, energy, and resources. They are restless, adventurous, captivated by novelty -- in things, people, and situations, and interested in having an impact, making a difference in helping others achieve success and be "themselves" in life.

Under stress, the Fire signs can become inconsiderate, bombastic, over-confident, self-centered, narcissistic, and fanatical.

Aries initiates, gets things going, acts courageously and independently, represents pure Warrior spirit, and is known for showing leadership and initiative. It can be better at starting things than finishing them, is scrappy and assertive, impatient and insistent, pushy and bossy. It is not afraid of confrontation and is known for "starting things" in that sense as well.
Leo organizes, stabilizes, manages, and can provide the central figure around which groups or associations form. It is playful, romantic, generous, proud, and inspiring. It is known for being dramatic, exhibitionistic, "showing off," and "hogging center stage." It provides strength, charisma, and creativity, but it can be self-indulgent, self-centered, and vain.
Sagittarius extends, disseminates, disperses, and teaches. It carries philosophy, academic knowledge, ethical principles, and society's "rules for living" out into the greater world ... and brings back the viewpoints of others for consideration, refinement, and eventual incorporation into a greater, more global structure. It educates, legislates, and trades in "truth" and spiritual wisdom, but it can be zealous, hypocritical, and prone to over-extending itself and promising more than it can deliver.

The Earth Signs: Taurus, Virgo, and Capricorn represent energy that is directly concerned with practical issues, physical substance, financial matters, and the "business" of living. This energy supports, nourishes, stabilizes, and promotes growth -- especially growth on investments. These signs are conservative, solid, pragmatic, constructive, and interested in administering "real circumstances" in the material world.

They themselves are physical and sensation-oriented. They make things solid, secure, and grounded in reality. They are sensible, logical, business-like, and matter-of-fact. They are committed to living well in a material and physical sense. Money and luxuries appeal to them for the sensation, comfort, and security these provide.

They are also dedicated to earning what they get through work, skill, and enterprise. They can, in fairness, be considered materialistic, but they are also productive, stable, realistic, organized, methodical, patient, and discriminating with regard to where they invest themselves and their energy.

They are looking to refine, increase, organize, use ... and enjoy the pleasures and finer things they have in life. They are business people, salt-of-the-earth, pillars of the community, managers and administrators ... concerned with security now and into the future. They can be exacting, critical, detail-oriented, hedonistic, persistent, dependable, and enduring. They are survivors -- with tangible accomplishments and contributions they can point to with pride ... and do!!

Under stress, Earth signs can be extravagant, wasteful, impractical, unproductive, inflexible, critical, and lazy.

Taurus stabilizes, promotes the growth of new physical life, deals patiently and routinely with the practical business of living, and likes to accumulate money and possessions. It can be involved with "things" as status symbols, is known for being loyal and kind, is placid and "laid-back," and likes to conserve energy -- especially its own. It can also be stubborn and hard to motivate -- especially with ideas that are not its own.
Virgo refines and perfects, applies its ideas and learned skills in work -- mostly for the benefit of others. It looks to use knowledge productively, analytically, logically. It is detail-conscious, practical, efficient, and discriminating. It is concerned with effective use of physical resources, including the body, and so is health-conscious and maintenance-oriented. It works hard at routine matters -- but can be workaholic, critical, fussy, picky, and "never satisfied."
Capricorn consolidates, incorporates, creates hierarchy and structure, and works for large-scale, tangible results that will "justify its existence" and help it achieve social position. It is concerned with professional accomplishments and community standing. It assumes responsibility, acts with persistence, claims authority, establishes order, administers its concerns in a practical and business-like manner, and builds itself a solid reputation -- often amounting to fame. It manages life on a broad scale and for the long-term, but it can be intransigent, unsympathetic, status-conscious, and concerned only with "the bottom line."

The Air Signs: Gemini, Libra, and Aquarius represent energy that is directly concerned with ideas, information, intellect, opinions, facts, perspectives and communications skills. They relate to others intellectually, share thoughts and experiences, listen to feedback, and combine information into new ideas and possibilities.

They value curiosity, provide intellectual stimulation, and love to play with communications media -- reading, writing, telephone, computer, etc. They love technology, new advancements, toys, gadgets, and "the latest" applications for personal expression. They can be distinctly inventive and experimental in their use of concepts, theories, and tools.

They pride themselves on being objective, innovative, clever, ingenious, and concerned with education and the good of the social order. They are adaptable -- at least in the sense of taking other people or other minds and viewpoints into account. In that sense, sociability, the existence of "society," and the advantages of group effort are more important to them than to the other signs.

They observe, ask questions, conceptualize, combine pieces of knowledge into new forms of expression, synthesize, evaluate, and "broadcast" the results. They can be extraordinarily verbal when dealing with their areas of special interest -- and want to be appreciated for their intellectual expertise.

They can also be paradoxically both detached and cooperative -- by turns and simultaneously. Collectively, they represent the human mind's capacity to learn by acting independently and by working through group effort.

Under stress, the Air signs can become scattered, high-strung, illogical, "tunnel-visioned," and erratic.

Gemini gathers knowledge through a variety of experiences. It may know a little bit about an amazing variety of subjects -- but not much in depth about any one in particular. It loves to learn and discover -- and it loves to talk and tell what it knows. It combines ideas and information into new patterns and solutions. It is known for being innovative and clever, both with its hands and with its words, but it can get so busy telling a story or arguing multiple sides of an issue that it winds up being two-faced and inconsistent.
Libra shares viewpoints and information with partners and arrives at consensus. It is the most "partnership" oriented of the signs, greatly preferring teamwork and cooperation over independent action. It is known for its diplomatic skills, its love of fairness and justice, and its ability to weigh and balance data in order to make comparisons and promote compromise. It can take multiple view points into account, but it may place too high a value on harmony, appearances, group unity, and "keeping its options open."
Aquarius applies acquired knowledge to achieve progress in the larger social order. It works through inspiration, ingenuity, experimentation, and independent effort done for the "good of humanity." It is idealistic, intensely future-oriented, able to network disparate elements and talents together to support a common cause, and often shows an intuitive grasp of universal principles. It usually sports a far-reaching network of friends, social acquaintances, and professional contacts, but it can be eccentric, willful, and defiantly rebellious in doing things "its own way."

The Water Signs: Cancer, Scorpio, and Pisces represent emotional, instinctive, and subconscious energy that is nurturing, healing, and transformative. They are feeling, sensitive, intuitive, responsive, protective, and passionate.

They are often extraordinarily creative in artistic efforts that rely on symbolism and metaphor to carry the message of the work. They have a rich inner life, profound abilities in fantasy and visualization, and are capable of tremendous empathy.

They support, improve, and restore others with whom they are involved, even when doing so is costly to their own personal resources. They are reflective, responsive, and fertile -- mysterious, secretive, and complex. They can be sentimental ... and involved with memories of the past more than other signs. And they can be intense and passionate ... involved with authentic visions of the future and unmanifested potentials.

Each is literally looking for emotional union with their significant partners -- in ways some signs would find intrusive and smothering. Furthermore, they tend to act out of feelings and instincts rather than logic, and can have trouble maintaining proper boundaries in their dealings with others.

Under stress, the Water signs can become moody, withdrawn, self-pitying, unstable, and overwrought.

Cancer nurtures, "mothers," protects, and provides for the security of home and family. It is concerned with the past, tradition, memories, and kinship connections. It can be nostalgic, tenacious, and deeply involved in its private life and domestic situation, but also moody, withdrawn, shy, and reluctant to venture regularly into the outer world.
Scorpio transforms, improves, recycles, destroys and builds again, and joins its abilities with those of other contributors to fashion advantages and offerings that wouldn't be possible without this alliance of various special abilities. It can be powerful, resourceful, dynamic, and controlling -- interested in permanent, sweeping changes. It has an instinctive feel for its own immortality and ability to handle crisis, but it can also be quite active in instigating chaos and upheaval -- to make things better by rebuilding from the ground up.
Pisces heals injury and illness in body, mind, and spirit. It is concerned with experiencing and offering inspiration, compassion, and spiritual wisdom on an almost super-human level. It can be deeply intuitive, psychic, empathetic, mystical and artistic. It is strongly influenced by visions and urges from the subconscious mind, and is the most talented of the signs in merging itself into the emotions and experiences of others with great understanding, but it can be impractical, reclusive, unrealistic, and too easily exploited in the name of "love."

As you can see, there is a vast variety of qualities and personal gifts available for partnership within the human family. So, when it comes to relationships, it depends on what you're looking for and what youconsider compatible, desirable, or admirable. You may do well with a partner who fills in areas where you are lacking, whose personal interests and strengths add greater dimension to your life, or who teaches you something different about how to work with and exist in the world.

Or you may prefer a partner whose habits and outlooks are automatically similar to or supportive of yours. Thus in addition to compatibility of signs within each triplicity -- fire signs with fire signs, earth signs with earth signs, and so on, there is obvious potential for successful alliances between fire signs and air signs ... and between earth signs and water signs.

But this is a very generic statement ... and concept, and the complexity and uniqueness of each person -- and the horoscope that describes him (or her) -- is so great that only someone well versed in astrology can judge the components on a case by case basis.

I admit I keep these classifications in mind -- and Leos have an automatic edge -- knowing (or believing) I may have to "go the extra mile" with some signs more than others. But I think it's wise as well as fun to keep an open mind, enjoy the diversity, delight in watching each sign "display" itself -- and not rule anything out.

Life is a journey. Enjoy the ride!!