Playing with Fire Signs

Resisting the ram

Have you ever had someone make a comment about you that catches you completely off guard? Something meant as an innocuous observation like “you’re so put-together” or “you’re a real oddball,” but which you hear instead as “this is what I’ve noticed about you, which means either I’m an inherently bad judge of character, or the person the world thinks you are is deeply disassociated with the true self you feel you are on the inside.”

If you haven’t, consider this a taste of the personal baggage I’ve been dragging around since childhood after having been declared an Aries.

Born on March 27, one solid week into the sign’s reign, there’s no denying I’m a ram. But as much as I liked the fact that we usually came first on the “horoscope” page at the back of preteen fashion magazines, I took serious issue with constantly being called stubborn, competitive, and obsessed with getting my own way.

I wasn’t fiery, I insisted. I was just passionate about things that were important to me. Why should that be attributed to the feisty nature of a fire sign, rather than to the practicality of earth or the sentimentality of water? I cared about my loved ones, and hated that an Aries was always shown as combative rather than compassionate. Even if my compassion sometimes boiled over into a stream of pointed language spat in the face of a friend’s schoolyard bully.

I was tired of being cast as a villain. And maybe that’s because, as a young female Aries flipping through those pages, the last things I thought I ought to be were determined, direct, and daring. Why wasn’t I allowed to have the sweet, easygoing nature of a Libra? Why were fashion horoscopes recommending me red pleather miniskirts and combat boots when a Cancer would look so much more demure in her tie-dye peasant blouses?

Typecasting like this led me to eventually reject the astrological system altogether. How could I trust something that got the essential nature of my spirit so wrong?

Charting a return

Sometime in my twenties, I started warming back up to the idea of astrology. The resurgence of zodiac talk on social media led me to see there was more written in the stars than a sentence or two buried behind the boy-band tell-all of the month. The more I read about it, the more nuanced I realized the description of any single sign could be. Was my Arieshood in line for a redemption arc?

The real game changer came when I realized a person had more than just a sun sign, and that most people online seemed to define themselves by their top three, rather than their one and only. Finally, I thought, this was the balance I’d been looking for. With a moon sign to represent my inner emotional reality and a rising sign to define the outward persona I projected into the world, I could finally see myself as a well-rounded astrological being. These signs would house my romantic nature, my emotional rawness, my logical practicality, and all the other personality traits I treasured. Even if my sun sign remained an undeniable fireball, these other signs could soothe and ground me from their complementary placements.

I looked them up. My moon is in Leo, another fire sign. Possibly the only one I was preconditioned to dislike more than Aries. If Aries’ flames were fuelled by destructive determination, Leo was a self-involved, over-the-top fireworks show, living for the spotlight and shamelessly snatching it at every opportunity. Was this the true landscape of my inner moon – craters of conceit surrounding a sea of grandiosity?

At least others wouldn’t see what lurked in my emotional depths, since my rising sign would surely balance out this problematic duo and declare that, outwardly, I could pass myself off as an emotionally regulated person rather than a stick of dynamite waiting for a match.

Except, of course, my rising sign is also Leo.

Balance be damned

So, a fire sign triple threat rises from the ashes of my search for answers. Strangely, this information did not send me into the combustive rage I expected. Instead, something about having my worst fears confirmed actually grounded me in my signs. Without any dreamy air or solid earth gifted from the heavens, I'd need to find ways for my flammable nature to forge its own brand of softness or structure. And powered by all the obstinance my chart ascribed to me, was anything really about to stop me from making that happen?

In some ways, my hot-blooded trio – a headstrong ram flanked by two fearless lions – served as the support system I needed to finally accept their traits as my own. There’s no denying it anymore. I am at my best when I hold the upper hand. I say things others might be hesitant to declare. I have a tendency to demand respect and command attention. And frankly, why shouldn’t I?

I stopped seeking perspective and started leaning into the things I was being told were my strengths – it turns out, they are. I can still be compassionate, caring, and considerate. Everyone can, from the most meticulous Capricorn to the dreamiest Pisces. But I also have the ability to set that compassion on fire, burn down the systems that aren’t working, and grab the megaphone when it’s time to ignite a force for good.

Your zodiac sign isn’t your morality. It isn’t even your personality. It’s just a compass guided by the stars, and we can each decide how closely to follow ours. Mine, it seems, was always trying to lead me to a brighter, bolder future than I could ever have imagined back when I was a girl rolling her eyes at horoscope pages of Flare Magazine.

And if you’re curious, like I was, whether she might have found any solace in my birth year’s assignment according to the Chinese Zodiac instead, I was born in the Year of the Dragon.