Fortune Cookies
Every planet in your chart has a sign, and every sign has an element (Fire, Water, Earth, or Air) and a modality (cardinal, fixed, or mutable). Count which elements and modalities you have most of, and which are missing, and you can see the broad outlines of your character before looking at a single planet in detail.
What does the balance of elements tell you?
The 10 planets are distributed among the 12 signs and, through them, the four elements. If four or five of those planets are in signs of the same element, that element dominates and sets the tone for your whole chart. If an element is missing entirely, you have to develop its qualities consciously and make up for their absence in other ways. Almost no one has a perfectly even spread, and that's normal. The unevenness is exactly what gives your character its recognizable shape.
The four elements
The three modalities
An element describes the nature of the energy. A modality describes its way of acting: starting, sustaining, or adapting. Read more about the three modalities →
What to Read Next
Marta Winter · Astrologer
Birth chart interpretations and explanations of planets, houses, aspects, and rising signs by Marta Winter.
Put it together in your birth chart
Find your planets, houses, rising sign, and aspects using your birth date, time, and city.