Polarities — Overview

In astrology, each zodiac sign has a polarity: yin or yang.

You’ll also hear these called receptive and active, feminine and masculine, or negative and positive signs—but ignore the moral overtones. We’re not talking good vs. bad. This is about energy flow.

• Yin signs (receptive) tend to turn inward, reflect, feel, and respond.

• Yang signs (active) tend to push outward, initiate, express, and assert.

YANG

• Aries

• Gemini

• Leo

• Libra

• Sagittarius

• Aquarius

YIN

• Taurus

• Cancer

• Virgo

• Scorpio

• Capricorn

• Pisces

That means if you’ve got placements in Aries, Leo, and Sagittarius, your energy might naturally move outward. You respond by doing, speaking, moving, acting.

If you’ve got more Cancer, Scorpio, and Pisces? You probably take things in first. You feel it before you name it. You might stew a little.

So What Does This Mean for You?

It’s one more way to understand how your chart behaves.

Maybe you have a Taurus Sun and Virgo Moon—both yin. But you’ve got a bunch of yang placements in the rest of your chart (Mercury in Gemini, Mars in Aries, Venus in Libra). That might explain why you seem more outgoing or action-oriented than your Sun and Moon suggest.

Or maybe your chart leans yin overall—even if you’ve got an assertive Aries Rising. That might explain why people expect you to come in hot, but you prefer to hang back and observe first.

Polarities aren’t the most dramatic part of astrology—but they’re a useful layer. Especially when you’re trying to figure out why you hesitate, push, absorb, speak, retreat, or react the way you do.

As a personal example, I’ve got an Aries Sun (Yang), but I’m a major introvert. A big part of this is because my rising and most of my personal planets are all Yin!