“I ought to go upright and vital, and speak the rude truth in all ways.”
–Ralph Waldo Emerson
Aries is the first sign of the zodiac and kicks off the solar year with a burst of energy in spring. The first day of Aries is the day of the equinox, when days and nights are of equal length. There is a sense of rebirth after the cold, dark winter. The lands have gone fallow and are waking up again from their sleep. The animals (including human animals) wake up too. From here the light increases, and there is a feeling of warmth and expansion, as the days grow longer into summer. Living things respond with mating and energy is high. Baby mammals are born, stretch their legs and bravely begin to explore the world.
Have you noticed how your energy rises in springtime? Have you noticed that no matter how depressed you feel in winter, spring wakes you up and gets your blood moving? Do you suddenly feel a little crazy, prone to falling in love and other rash behavior? Do you notice that your body just wants to move? That’s you responding to the natural cycle of the year, to the force of Aries, which will not be ignored, and which runs in your veins like fire.
This sign is the very essence of beginnings and fills you with drive and force. Now is the time to begin things. Those things will be tested soon enough by life, but for now, the initial burst is needed and life is calling it out of you. Aries contains the force necessary to overcome inertia, to begin something from nothing. What have you been wanting to do, start or create? Aries is ready for the risk, excited by it, thrilled by it. Aries makes you feel fully alive. This energy comes only once a year and will only be here for a month—grasp it now and move! Take the leap. Risk and courage are the stuff Aries is made of. They are available in spring, in abundance.
Imagine the qualities of early spring captured in a human personality. That is what it is to be an Aries type. Ask yourself: what would that be like? What traits would it show? What would it look like to other people? What would it feel like to the Aries individual to be that?
To embody spring is to embody birth and newness. The Aries individual will always have a streak of the ingénue about them, no matter how old they get. Aries is hope; Aries is open to trying; Aries does not give up or acknowledge defeat. There is no sign more capable of starting over than Aries. This sign symbolizes birth, not from the mother’s point of view, but from the infant’s. Birth is an awe-inspiring adventure and it’s one of those life-passages that, if humans knew what they were really getting into, would make us run screaming from the room (as we do from death). Aries, fortunately, is innocent of all knowledge of what it is getting into and therefore tosses itself headlong into the unknown. Aries represents our very capacity to do that. This ability is inherent in all of us, because we all contain at least a smidgen of Aries, no matter how small. Any human being can reach for such courage, even if they have only a bit of Aries in their chart.
To be the first sign of the year conveys a certain preoccupation with. . . being first. If you are driving along the freeway and you have red Aries blood pumping through your veins, you cannot tolerate having anyone in front of you. Despite the fact that it’s not a race, that there’s no shared goal, and that you are not in competition with the other drivers around you, still you must be first. You feel compelled to pass others, to exceed the speed limit and to be driving faster than anyone near you. Of course, when you get stopped by a police officer, you are affronted because you were just expressing your true nature.
Being newborn, Aries is guileless. If you are Aries and you have learned guile, rest assured it’s not the Aries part that learned it. If you’re a strong Aries type, you’d rather speak the truth at all times, simply because it’s easier. You don’t want to have to pretend, gloss over or white-lie. You prefer to be yourself all the time and let the chips fall where they may. This is generally harder for Aries women than men, because there is so much social conditioning for women to be nice. Aries doesn’t want to bother with nice—there’s too much to do that’s truly interesting to bother with niceness. Niceness only slows you down.
The spring is a time of intense sexual heat. Hormones are on the rise. Aries is sexual; there is no doubt about it. The mating instinct is captured in this sign. Aries women often become impatient and pounce on potential partners without waiting for them to initiate. Aries men radiate testosterone and are prone to boastfulness, leaving you in no doubt of their bedroom prowess. Lions are not the only creatures that roar!
It takes tremendous force to be born, to propel oneself into the world. The “birth” quality of spring is a form of fierceness. Aries is very active, driven, directed and forceful. Aries is like fire-in-motion: a rocket, a bullet, a speeding train. Aries is pure momentum, however it works in short bursts and is not strong on continuity. Thus Aries is full of bluster but does not always follow through (that’s what Taurus, coming close behind Aries, is for). This sign is consummately about courage, faith and action. When Anais Nin wrote: “And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom,” she was talking about spring and renewal. She was talking about Aries.
What is there in you that requires courage? What would you start today, if you believed in yourself? What would you do if you could not be stopped? Draw on your Aries courage and take the first step now.
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