#progressions

✨ How to read a progressed → natal chart (without crashing out lol) ✨

Progressed-to-natal charts are astrology’s way of whispering, “ Here’s who you’re becoming.” Not the personality you were born with — but the one unfolding slowly, quietly, year by year.

🌙 first: what is a progressed chart?

Secondary progressions move your chart one day after birth = one year of life. So if you’re 30, your progressed chart shows the sky 30 days after you were born.

This creates a symbolic chart of inner development — emotional maturity, mindset shifts, identity evolution.

Think of it as your inner weather, not external events.

🔮 step 1: start with the progressed Moon (ALWAYS!)

The progressed Moon is your emotional headline.

Ask: • What sign is it in? → how you process feelings now • What house is it in? → where life feels emotionally loud • What natal planets is it touching? → what’s being activated

This is often where people say: “I don’t feel like myself anymore.” That’s the point.

☀️ step 2: check the progressed Sun (slow but powerful)

The progressed Sun moves about 1 degree per year, so when it changes signs or aspects, it’s huge.

Look for: • Sign changes → identity shifts • House changes → purpose re-orientation • Conjunctions → life themes coming into focus

This is your becoming, not your reacting.

⚡ step 3: look for tight aspects to natal planets & angles

This is where the story gets personal.

Pay attention to: • Progressed planets conjunct natal Sun, Moon, MC, IC, ASC, DSC • Exact or applying aspects (within 1° is strongest)

These show turning points, awakenings, and “I can’t unsee this now” moments.

Progressed Uranus? Liberation. Progressed Saturn? Maturity. Progressed Venus? Heart shifts.

🧭 step 4: natal chart = HOW, progressed chart = WHEN

This is the biggest mistake people make: Progressions do not replace your natal chart.

Instead: • Natal chart → how you experience life • Progressed chart → when certain themes ripen

Your birth chart is the instrument. Progressions tell you which strings are vibrating.

🕯️ step 5: read it gently

Progressions aren’t loud like transits. They’re subtle. Internal. Emotional.

You may not see changes right away — but you’ll feel them: • shifts in values • changing goals • emotional closure • new long-term desires

This is soul growth, not a race

The progressed Ascendant is an important point, representing your outward personality and the way you present yourself to the world. In the method of secondary progressions, your Ascendant moves through some of the signs over time. This movement reflects shifts in your approach to new situations and your evolving role in life.

Progressed Ascendant in Aries (0-30°)

Personality Shift: A dynamic, assertive, and energetic personality emerges. Focused on personal independence and courage. You'll become more proactive, adventurous, and willing to take the risks.

Appearance/First Impression: You'll appear more outgoing, energetic, or even impulsive. People will see you as a go-getter.

Progressed Ascendant in Taurus (30°-60°)

Personality Shift: You'll develop a more grounded, sensual, and patient approach with a focus on stability, beauty, and material comfort. Your demeanor will become more calm and practical.

Appearance/First Impression: People will view you as more stable, reliable, and earthy, with a love for the finer things in life.

Progressed Ascendant in Gemini (60°-90°)

Personality Shift: Your personality becomes more curious, communicative, and adaptable. You'll likely feel a strong desire for variety and intellectual stimulation. It’s a time for learning, connecting with others, and exploring new ideas. Try learning a new language.

Appearance/First Impression: You'll come across as witty, talkative, and youthful, with a quick mind.

Progressed Ascendant in Cancer (90°-120°)

Personality Shift: A nurturing, emotional, and introspective side becomes more prominent. You'll feel more protective and focused on family, home, and security, you'll be more of an introvert and your approach to life becomes more empathetic.

Appearance/First Impression: People see you as caring, compassionate, and family-oriented, possibly with a softer, more sensitive aura surrounding you.

Progressed Ascendant in Leo (120°-150°)

Personality Shift: You'll feel a greater need for self-expression, creativity, and recognition. There’s a strong drive to shine and to be noticed, which you will be, with an emphasis on leadership and pride. Confidence and charisma are amplified.

Appearance/First Impression: You appear regal, confident, and dramatic, often seeking the spotlight without even realizing it.

Progressed Ascendant in Virgo (150°-180°)

Personality Shift: You'll develop a more analytical, organized, and service-oriented approach to life. Focus is placed on improving yourself and others, with a greater attention to detail and efficiency.

Appearance/First Impression: You could come across as practical, reserved, and precise, perhaps with a preference for simplicity and cleanliness. Try not to be overly critical of others.

Progressed Ascendant in Libra (180°-210°)

Personality Shift: Harmony, balance, and relationships. You may become more diplomatic, charming, and cooperative. There’s a stronger need for social connection and a desire for peace. Libra rising is the most physically attractive placement (along with Libra sun and Taurus sun and rising).

Appearance/First Impression: You'll appear more attractive than before, balanced, and refined, with an emphasis on pleasing others.

Progressed Ascendant in Scorpio (210°-240°)

Personality Shift: Your personality becomes more intense, secretive, and transformative. You might realize that you’re drawn to deeper emotional experiences and power dynamics. A desire for privacy and personal control might emerge.

Appearance/First Impression: People may see you as magnetic, intense, and mysterious, often with a penetrating gaze. Your sex appeal is very high.

Progressed Ascendant in Sagittarius (240°-270°)

Personality Shift: Freedom, exploration, and optimism becomes central. Your outlook will become more expansive, philosophical, and adventurous. You might feel a desire to break out of limitations and explore new territories or learn a new language. Learning comes easy for you.

Appearance/First Impression: You'll appear open-minded, enthusiastic, and full of energy, often with a sense of humor and excitement. Always looking for new adventures.

Progressed Ascendant in Capricorn (270°-300°)

Personality Shift: You'll become more focused on responsibility, ambition, and structure. You'll definitely feel an increased desire for long-term goals, career success, and personal achievement.

Appearance/First Impression: People will see you as more serious, reserved, and disciplined, with a more professional or authoritative demeanor. Your facial expressions tend to look more serious.

Progressed Ascendant in Aquarius (300°-330°)

Personality Shift: is about individuality, innovation, and a progressive approach to life. You'll appear way more detached, with a forward-thinking attitude, and your personal expression becomes more unconventional.

Appearance/First Impression: You'll come across as eccentric, unconventional, or ahead of your time, with an interest in unique ideas and causes, and you're very stubborn about it.

Progressed Ascendant in Pisces (330°-360°)

Personality Shift: You'll become more sensitive, intuitive, and dreamy. You'll feel more connected to the emotional, spiritual, and artistic sides of life. A desire to escape from the harsh realities of life could become prominent.

I have a class coming up on secondary progressions and solar arcs, and let me tell you why I love them! 💫

When I was laid off from my job, I was low-key/high-key spiraling. I'd been there for almost ten years, and it was such a part of my identity. THANKFULLY, I had secondary progressions and solar arcs in my astrological toolkit to help me put everything into perspective and take a look at when my flop era might flip to fantastic.

Here's what I discovered when looking at my chart: 📊

Mars rules my 10th house, and the moon is in my 10th. I noticed I was having a progressed new moon in my chart, with my progressed moon hitting my natal sun. This can be an awesome transit, but it can also coincide with major shifts in identity—even a dark night of the soul.

With the moon natally located in my 10th house and square my natal Mars, it seemed appropriate that I was being cut off (Mars) from my career (10th house) safety net (moon) and having to reckon with who I am now (the sun).

So when might it improve? 🤔

The progressed moon finished its exact square to my progressed Mars and moved out of orb from the conjunction with my natal sun in May. This was just about when I relaunched my Substack and realized I wanted to include dreamwork in my career moving forward—in addition to all the fun astrology stuff I already do!

Dreamwork is so important to me, but I wouldn't have found space for it if I still had my old job. I never would have leveled up my lucid dreaming practice without everything that happened during my progressed new moon period.

Want to learn how to look at a chart the way I did? ✨

Are you ready to add powerful timing techniques to your astrology toolkit? I'll teach you everything I know in my upcoming workshop!

Join me for an intimate workshop on progressions—one of astrology's juiciest forecasting methods! Whether you're curious about solar arcs or secondary progressions, this hands-on session will give you practical skills for answering those crucial timing questions.

Workshop Highlights: ✨

Master solar arcs and secondary progressions

Learn forecasting techniques for real-world questions

Practice with common client inquiries: marriage, career changes, relocations

Small group setting (limited to 20 participants for personalized attention)

Session Structure: 📚

First 30 minutes: Essential theory and foundations

Remaining 90 minutes: Hands-on practice and application

Bonus: If you attend live, we can use your chart as an example (if you'd like)!

Workshop Details: 

📅Date: September 28, 2024

Time: 4:00 PM Eastern Time

Duration: 2 hours (120 minutes)

Investment: $100

Format: Live online (recording provided for all registrants)

This workshop is perfect whether you're new to progressions or looking to deepen your existing knowledge. Can't attend live? No problem—you'll receive access to the full recording!

Looking forward to seeing you there!

Annabel

In this ep: Meet the parents Hospitality Different forms of intimacy Post The Bear Let's agree to disagree on Carmy, shall we?

Learning astrological techniques is fun, but the magic really happens when you start to put different techniques together to answer big questions about your life. When you learn how to synthesize, astrology becomes like baking. An egg, a cup of flour, some sugar, and a leavening agent or two aren’t much to talk about on their own. Together, they make a cake. 

Recently, I was experimenting with Firdaria and progressed moon phases. Both techniques allow you to divide your life into chapters, and I was curious to see if looking at them side-by-side would illuminate anything for me. 

I created a chart with a chronological timeline in one column, the Firdaria chapters in another column, and my progressed moon phases in a third column. When the chart was put together, I was shocked by how clearly the dialog between them revealed a pattern in my life that I had been unable to see any other way. 

All my life, I’ve been fascinated by binaries. I’m shy saying this because binaries are controversial–and rightfully so. Binaries have traditionally been used to perpetuate stereotypes and lock people into identities and roles that don’t suit them. 

My society has been learning a lot in recent years about the damage the abuse of binaries has done. We are exploring ways of being that are between the extremes of binary or off spectrum line between them entirely. I think that path of exploration is exciting. 

At the same time, I love the contrast of opposites. I love the pleasant way my head hurts when I encounter a contradiction. I love stark contrasts and tension. I love dialectics. I love thesis, antithesis, synthesis. I love playing with these ideas while loving and respecting the ways that ideas and people don’t fit in neat little opposing boxes. 

Until now, I haven’t been able to find anything in my chart that explains my love of opposites. The closest I’ve been able to get to an explanation is my lonely IC in Libra. 

Libra is the sign of the autumn equinox. It is one of the seasons two signs where light and darkness balance on the knife-edge of equality. While Aries (Libra’s opposite) is balance tipping in the direction of light, Libra is the balance tipping in the direction of darkness. It is this relationship between light and dark that gives Libra and Aries their meaning.

It is at night that humans, as diurnal creatures, are most at risk. We are strongly visual creatures, and when our vision fails, we need others to help us navigate the world. This need for the other is the reason Libra is so strongly associated with relationships and compromise. Aries can roll over everything in its path. It is strong and getting stronger. it can charge ahead without considering other points of view or compromising its clarity of vision. When Aries encounters a contradiction, it picks a side and hits the other side with a stick. Libra has to stop and resolve it, and the resolution frequently involves compromises. 

While I’ve been coming around to the idea that the IC is vastly underrated lately, having the IC in Libra didn’t feel like enough to explain my love of opposites. For Libra, resolving tension is the necessary step on the way to peace. Peace is the ultimate goal. I like the heat of negotiation too much for my love of opposites to come from Libra.

When I saw my Firdaria chapters and my progressed lunations together, though, my love of opposites made sense because I was able to see that my love of binaries isn’t just a philosophical oddity. In the story of my life, as told when these two techniques are brought into dialog, the tension of opposites is one of the main themes. 

Firdaria is a very simple system. There are only two ways of dividing up a life. You are either on the moon path or the sun path. Whichever path you’re on determines your lesson plan in life. The progressed moon cycle introduces chaos into the system (as the moon always does), and it is in the moon’s chaos that creates the space for interesting things to happen. In my case, there is a clear relationship of opposites between the progressed lunations I am scheduled to experience and the lesson plan of my Firdaria.

The first time I experienced a progressed New Moon was at the end of my sun chapter. The lesson of the sun chapter is learning how to shine. Just as I was (metaphorically) preparing for my final exam in shining, I entered a dark night of the soul. I experienced depression for the first time, and I learned how to create a convincing smile through tears. 

In my 20s, I experienced my first Full Moon. My progressed moon was in Sagittarius while I was experiencing my Mercury chapter in Firdaria. Sagittarius is ruled by Jupiter. In traditional astrology, Mercury is debilitated there. The reason for this is because Jupiter and Mercury are opposites. Jupiter is the planet of wisdom, and Mercury is the planet of intelligence. 

If you’ve ever played Dungeons and Dragons, you know that wisdom and intelligence are two different ability scores. A person can have the intelligence to launch a rocket without the wisdom of knowing when and where to launch it. While you can be smart and wise at the same time, it is rare, and intelligence and wisdom usually come up with opposing answers to the same question.

Fundamental tensions between my Firdaria chapters and my progressed moon phases are scheduled to happen for the rest of my life. Right now, I’m going through a New Moon in Gemini during my moon chapter, and I’m learning why the heart and the mind have classically been seen as opposed in European philosophy. 

If I live long enough, I will explore the tension between expansion and contraction (Capricorn Full Moon during a Jupiter chapter), threat vs. safety (Cancer New Moon during a Mars chapter), and the individual and the group (Full Moon in Aquarius during a sun chapter).

With my love of opposites, the lesson plan that is created by this mixing of progressed moon phases and Firdaria seems custom-made for me. I don’t believe that we signed up for everything that happens to us in this life. I’ve seen too many horrible things to believe that is true, but the elegance of this system and how it plays so neatly with my love of opposites is the closest I’ve come to a real challenge to that belief. 

After I charted out the relationship between my progressed moon phases and my Firdaria chapters, I wondered if my results are an oddity of my personal astrology. I shared my findings with the members of the Narrative Astrology Lab on Discord and showed them how to replicate what I had done. 

So far, I’ve only had the opportunity to look at a few examples, but I haven’t seen an example of the progressed moon phase and Firdaria working together as clearly and consistently as they do in my chart. 

I doubt that I’m the only one with a pattern like this, though. So, if you chart out your progressed moon phases and Firdaria, let me know what you find. 

Interested in the experiment but need help looking for patterns? Let’s have tea and chat about it.

I have been learning about secondary progressions and how to read a progressed chart. Astro-seek has a lovely assortment of calculators that make it so easy to access these charts!

Progressed charts show the personal evolution that takes place over your lifetime.  

It’s important to remember: these charts are meant to add a layer on to your NATAL chart, which is the most important chart to have.  

I’ve done a progressed Sun, progressed Moon, ascendant persona and solar return chart for myself and I want to share some of the things that stand out to me.

First of all, the Progressed Sun chart.

☀️ Your Progressed Sun, depending on how old you are and the degree your Sun is in your natal chart, may not show you much YET. Over your lifetime, it’s only going to move about 4 signs. Mine was at 23° Aquarius in the 5th house at birth. It is, as of today, at 0° Aries in my 6th house. That 0° is an important position because it is a critical degree, AND, it happens to be the exact position of my natal moon. Having the progressed sun at a critical cardinal degree suggests a theme of bringing something out into the open, taking charge, initiating a turning point.

☀️ When the Sun enters a new SIGN, we might feel a very distinct change in our energy. Some say it’s a very drastic change that is apparent to others as well as one’s self. New hobbies that seem surprising might arise. One that seems like an obvious one for me is an interest in physical activity and movement. There have been events happening throughout my entire last year or so that have sort of started building a foundation for a better understanding of the benefits of movement. I’ve always been totally averse to exercise. As a kid, I had trouble understanding the rules of organized sports and games. I was teased a lot by older kids, which started my shame complex. I’d sit out of everything and daydream. So... 

☀️ Since 1° equals a year, then my progressed Sun remained in Aquarius for the first 7 years of my life, then slowly transited the entire sign of Pisces. This makes SO much sense. There WAS a big change sometime around 8 years old; I became more reclusive and stuck inside my head. I went through that miserable chunky stage before puberty, my mom gave me a ridiculous series of haircuts that have NEVER been socially acceptable at any time in history, and I became so incredibly sensitive. My first experience with trauma happened around then too. The way I responded to that trauma was excessive, endless crying fits. I would cry myself to sleep every single night, for about 7 months straight at it’s worse. This was the start of my Major Depressive Disorder. During my older childhood years, I was frequently called “gentle” and “caring”. I took on a lot of traits as coping mechanisms that have stayed with me... what’s a little chilling is to consider how Piscean placements are known for disconnecting, disassociating, retreating into addictions when faced with life’s troubles. That was me. That was 100% me from about 8-now. The first “addiction” I had was the actually the crying. I was still the quirky, strange Aquarius I was born- but with a new layer. A new Pisces layer.

☀️ With my progressed Sun finally being done in Pisces and entering the assertive, firey sign of Aries, I could really be at the start of a major transformation RIGHT NOW. Exciting! And scary! In Alan Oken’s The Progressed Sun, it says:

“You have behind you a great deal of gathered information about human nature, now you need to personalize what you know and make it into who you are. Keywords: I seek a direct relationship to my creative center.“ https://www.astrologi.no/images/stories/gh/Guides/alan%20oken%20the%20progressed%20sun.pdf 

I’m doing lots of reading and research about this progressed sun transit from Aquarius into Pisces into Aries. 

I’ll probably post another one about Progressions, looking at the ascendant and aspects, etc.