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Tuesday 12pm - 6:30pm Wednesday 12pm - 6:30pm Thursday 12pm - 6:30pm Friday 12pm - 6:30pm Saturday 12pm - 6:30pm

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René Aceves Tarot and Astrology

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Seattle, WA
René Aceves Tarot and Astrology

I am an astrologer and tarot card reader with 30 years of professional experience. Please feel free to make an appointment or drop in.

My approach is intuitive, while informed by research, and experience with my clientele of over 800 people. I employ an intuitive, yet well-researched approach. I read tarot
with the Universal Waite deck, but have studied all the major traditions.I essentially use modern western astrology, informed by the classical tradition. My down-to-earth insights are accessible and specific. HOURS AND LOCATION

You can find me Tuesday through Saturday at Gargoyles Statuary on the Ave (near 47th St.) in Seattle's University District. I get in at noon, take a break somewhere around 2:30, and leave at 6:30 or 7:00. If the above hours don't fit with your schedule, an appointment can be made for as early as 11:00 am, or on one of my days off. PRICES
During regular hours at Gargoyles:
Tarot readings:

20 minutes $20
half an hour $30
I charge $10 for every additional fifteen minutes on top of that. Astrology readings:

half hour $30
45 minutes $45
hour $60
hour and a half $80

I accept cash, checks and (with a small charge) plastic. Readings over the phone, or at my house cost $40 for half an hour, and $80 for an hour. I am also available to do readings at parties and events for $100 an hour

07/10/2021

WHAT TO ASK WHEN GETTING A TAROT READING

Last month a guy and his dad came by for a card reading appointment they’d scheduled weeks before. I asked the son for him and his dad to think of questions or topics to ask about. “Oh definitely, we will” he assured me eagerly. When the day of the reading arrived I asked each man in turn to state any questions or areas of inquiry they’d like guidance with. You’d think I’d asked them what the circumferance of the moon was in centimeters. Big shrugs, followed by “what do people usually ask about?” I suggested some possible topics that people generally ask about, and they ended up getting a lot out of their respective readings.

With astrology, it’s strictly optional for clients to come equipped with specific areas of concern. Some people barely say anything while I read for them, others have a laundry list of questions. The horoscope (the chart, not the newspaper column) is so multi-faceted that it can reveal information regarding just about anything. Tarot is different. A given layout of the cards by necessity yields a helpful, but limited amount of information If you want to cover more than one topic then there’s going to be more than one shuffle of the deck. I’ve heard of some readers dealing out all 78 cards in the course of one reading. Whatever works, but to me, what’s missing from the layout speaks volumes.

Here’s the thing: just about all the cards are open-ended enough so that the context affects their meaning.

If a client wants to know about their job, a card like The Lovers will have a different meaning than if relationships is the topic being discussed. At work The Lovers could indicate an ally or perhaps some particularly harmonious collaboration or teamwork.

Here’s a sampling of the types of queries I get:

“I’m at a crossroads in my life and I don’t know which direction I’ll end up going in. Whatever it is, will it make me happy?”

“When will I be happy again?”

“When will things stabilize, and how?”

“Is my boyfriend thinking about cheating on me?”

“What’s happening between me and my friend? Things have felt weird between us lately.”

“Should I move out of state, or is there a good reason for me to stay?”

“Stay at my job or try to find something better?”

When people ask about their health I always remind them that I’m not a doctor, and then ask if they’ve been feeling basically fine or not so much. The extent of what I can tell them is fairly limited: will their health stabilize or is the worst yet to come? If their present condition restricts their mobility or activity, will they regain full capacity, and how soon roughly? Will they be able to enjoy the things that gave them pleasure again? How soon can they go back to work? Should they get a second opinion from a different doctor? Is their immediate environment making things worse?

When a client asks whether or not they should stay in a relationship, I avoid automatically assuming that the absent person is at fault. After all, they aren’t there to defend themselves. If I see really bad cards, that’s obviously not a positive indication, but it’s important to ask how strong or flimsy the relationship is to begin with. If positions indicating the past contain excellent cards, maybe the foundation is good and, therefore, maybe there’s hope. Less so if they’ve been together only a few months or weeks. One bad future card isn’t enough to make me give up on them. It can be complicated, but so is love and life.

09/24/2020

3D geocentric view of yesterday's equinox using the Cosmic Watch app on my iPad. The faint horizontal circle is the celestial equator. The slightly tilted one is the ecliptic, the apparent path of the Sun's orbit. Even more tilted is the horizon for Seattle. That bright blur over Australia is the Sun at the intersection of the celestial equator and ecliptic (the definition of an equinox) and almost right at the horizon because of the closeness to sunset.

03/19/2020

A HORARY CHART FOR THE VIRUS

Last Friday my wife Jessica walked over to the bakery/cafe to get some coffee and something to eat. The barista there asked her “so has your husband been able to get any insight into how long we’ll be affected by the corona virus here?” When Jessica conveyed the question to me I was at first surprised that my reputation had spread as far as two blocks away, and then protested that mundane (world events) astrology wasn’t my forte. What the hell, though, why not do a horary chart for the question.

What is a horary chart? Horary is a time honored tradition involving a chart for the exact time the astrologer gets word of a question. The question could be about a lost item, whether or not to take decisive action, how anything of concern will turn out, etc. Usually it involves personal, rather than topical matters, but there are standout examples of using horary to resolve inquiries of worldly import.

Included here is the chart for the question. I decided it would apply only to Seattle, not the whole country. Also, I want to make what should be the obvious disclaimer that I am not an epidemiologist or any sort of health professional, nor am I one of the top horary practitioners in the world today. All I can do is humbly see if things pan out in the way I interpret the chart.

To start with, the person asking the question is shown by the first house which has Leo rising on the cusp. The sun rules Leo so it represents the seeker elsewhere in the horoscope. It’s in the ninth house. Being the house of higher education this could mean the barista is, in the back of her mind, concerned about the suspension of classes at UW or some other local college. We don’t care about that, though, since the query is posed on behalf of all of us in the area. Next, I look at the sixth house, under which falls all diseases. It’s loaded with all the “bad” planets: Mars, Saturn and Pluto in Capricorn, indicating the seriousness of the epidemic. Jupiter, a benefic, is there but it’s outgunned by the other three, and unhappy in Capricorn to boot. Capricorn being on the sixth house cusp, Saturn is the ruler and fortified in the last degree of its own sign. Saturn is happy, but we’re miserable.

So, how long will this last for us in the hard-hit Seattle area? That’s where the moon, at the time in Scorpio, comes in. Because it moves the fastest of the “planets” it plays the role of timer of events. Therefore we look to its next aspect. That happens to be a trine (120 degrees) to the sun, which represents the collective “I” asking the question. Also worth mentioning is the fact that the sun symbolizes vitality and the life force. An aspect that divides the circle of the zodiac by three (trine) or six (sextile) is considered harmonious. So therefore, we can see the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel. How long depends on how many degrees the moon has to travel to be exactly trine the sun, in this case one and a half degrees. Are we talking days, weeks, months? I say months, because the moon is in a fixed sign, Scorpio. The fixed signs have the greatest amount of inertia, therefore a longer unit of time: one and a half months. Hopefully that means the worst of this is behind us by at the end of April.

I could talk about a bunch of other things in this chart. Such as: the sun’s next aspect is a sextile to Pluto, and, Chiron is ninety degrees away from the axis of the lunar nodes. Unlike with natal astrology, though, with horary you have to screen out anything that doesn’t provide an answer to the question, with as little padding as possible.

03/14/2020

To any customers who were thinking of coming into Gargoyles to get a reading: I'm getting over a cold, so I'll be staying warm at home for today (Saturday) at least. Plus, I don't want to catch the dreaded corona virus. I apologize if this causes any inconvenience, but know that astrology (and even tarot) readings are easily done over the phone or FaceTime. If you're a regular who sees me at Gargoyles I'll still charge the normal cheap rate you would pay in the store. I can take plastic or PayPal. 206-979-2457

01/11/2020

THE LUNAR ECLIPSE OF FRIDAY, JANUARY 10th

Eclipses come and go. Generally, an average of four happen each year. The ones that are visible from where you live get the most attention. If they are total, all the more so. The one happening at 11:21 this morning was neither total or visible from just about anywhere in the Western Hemisphere. So, at face value, this wouldn’t be worth getting too worked up about.

In Astrology total eclipses and paths of maximum visibility certainly get extra points, but other factors can have significant bearing. Any planets within a few degrees of longitude will color the nature of the eclipse. In this case Mercury is sitting tightly conjunct the Sun within justa few minutes of a degree. Since Mercury transmits and gives voice to whatever it contacts, a bunch of scenarios come to mind. Mercury relates to information, documents, and who said what to who when. Therefore, you can imagine that our country’s Senate might have a hard time sweeping the impeachment under the carpet. Witnesses will speak, and what they have to say will not be so easily dismissed, Mitch McConnell’s intentions notwithstanding. Mercury is nothing if not vocal, so we can expect even more than the usual amount of rhetoric to get thrown about.

Adding to the sense of alarm, a conjunction of Saturn and Pluto is less than three degrees away from Mercury and the Sun. Major hard aspects between Saturn and Pluto, be they 0, 90 or 180 degrees, always increase the level of antagonistic polarization in society. The last time we had one of these was during late 2009 and much of 2010, a period marked by the rise of the extreme right wing Tea Party and raving accusations that Obamacare would create “death panels” and, therefore, should be stopped. Taken separately, both planets have a severing and purging influence. Saturn always forces us to have a good reality check. Pluto dredges up that which we have suppressed or are ignorant of. The combination of these two with an eclipse sounds like the proverbial wake-up call. It also sounds apocalyptic, speaking of which, their conjunction is rising at the exact moment of today’s eclipse in the parts of New South Wales and Victoria (Australia) where raging fires are causing untold tragedy for humans and animals. In the AstroCartoGraphy map included here this is shown by the two dark lines closest to the country’s east coast. Obviously, the fires didn’t start today, but eclipses have a weird way of looking both backwards and forwards time-wise. One can only hope that firefighting efforts are more successful in the eclipse’s wake.

Based on all I’ve read on the subject, important undertakings are destined to go either very badly or unpredictably (probably both) if initiated in the weeks before an eclipse. By the same token, they can go spectacularly well if they happen in the weeks after, as long as you sit out the first 24 hours. Doesn’t sound like such good timing for Trump’s drone assassination of Iran’s second in command, Major General Suleimani. On the other hand, Nancy Pelosi’s delayed sending of the articles of impeachment to the Senate until next week makes sense. Who knows? Maybe she has an astrologer.

11/19/2019

TOOLS OF THE TRADE

Summer of 1982 in San Francisco, during my Saturn return at age 28, I dropped everything I was doing to make way for a sudden fascination with astrology and Tarot cards. The catalyst for this was my first chart reading, done by one Thor Christensen at his flat in Noe Valley. In more ways than one, it was an epiphany for me. About the most unexpected thing I heard during that session was that I possessed unmistakable talent as a psychic or astrologer. He encouraged me to pursue this avenue a few times over the course of the reading. A week or so later I asked him just how I should undertake such a thing, to which he replied something to the effect of “I’m not going to show you, but I can tell you some books you need to buy.” He also introduced me to his small circle of astrologer friends, all gay men who couldn’t have been more friendly and helpful. One of them owned a computer with an astrology program.

There were three principle metaphysical bookstores in the city at that time: The Philosopher’s Stone in Noe Valley, Field’s on Polk Street which had been around for some time (sadly gone now), and Metaphysical Town Hall on Mason Street downtown. The latter was truly old school, owned by a lady named Fritzi Armstrong. Her assistant was a bald man named Micky who wore a drab beige dust coat while on the job. The books I needed to purchase were, per Thor’s instructions: a) an ephemeris, or table of planetary positions, for the years or year required, b) table of houses, so one could determine the ascendant (rising sign degree) and other house cusps and, c) a copy of The Horoscope, The Road and The Traveler, by Alan Oken, which had the correct instructions for calculating a chart with the aid of (a) and (b). The most available ephemeris (ephemerides is the plural) at the time was Raphael’s which you could buy for individual years. Eventually I bought the more up-to-date American Ephemeris for 1931-1980. That way I didn’t have to go down to Field’s or Metaphysical Town Hall to get a Raphael’s for a year I didn’t already have. The companion volume was The American Table of Houses, which also contained excellent chart calculation instruction that were pretty much identical to the ones in the Oken book.

To get to square one I would have to find out the latitude and longitude of a given person’s birthplace. Thor told me to just call up the library. This is what I did for a while. The reference librarian at the Haight-Ashbury branch would give me said information without question or comment. Within a year I bought Time Changes in the USA, then later Time Changes in Canada and Mexico and Time Changes in the World, by Doris Chase Doane, a name which is probably a blast from the past to astrologers of my generation and older. It’s been ages since I’ve seen any copies of these. This set of books had all the information then available on time zones and the dates of changes to and from standard and daylight savings. They were more necessary than you might think. For instance, there used to be a Yukon Time Zone up until 1983, until part of it went to Alaska Standard and the other part to Pacific Time. Much of the area around the Great Lakes was (maybe still is) a hopelessly confusing hodgepodge of Eastern and Central, almost in a checker board pattern in northern Indiana and Ohio, with some counties observing daylight savings and others not. The switch from the Julian to the Gregorian calendar, which happened in Catholic countries of Europe in the late Renaissance, didn’t occur in the Soviet Union until 1918, Greece in 1923, and Turkey in 1926, at which point they had to drop back 13 days. In the mid to late eighties I bought the American Atlas, and then the International Atlas, thick hard bound volumes that contained all these time changes, plus longitudes and latitudes for even the tiniest of towns.

Throughout the rest of the eighties desktop and laptop computers became increasingly widespread. Astrology software was available very early on, but I was always too strapped for cash to buy software, let alone a computer. Finally, in 1992 my dad gave me money to buy my first Mac since I’d taken a handful of computer classes at the local community college. The astrology program I bought for it was extremely un-user friendly (and un-Mac like), making me wonder if I should just keep doing the manual calculations. By this time, though, I was doing math-intensive solar and lunar return forecasting so there was no going back. After a couple of years a client let me use their copy of Io, which was much more intuitive. In 1999 I used part of a bike accident settlement to buy Solar Fire and Solar Maps, which I continue to use to this day in my practice. Solar Fire (Maps is now included within) is a Windows program which I run using Parallels on my iMac at work and MacBook Pro at home. It’s just as fast and almost as seamless as having Windows on a PC. It would be nice if astrology software makers weren’t so Windows-centric, as if it were still the nineties when people assumed Apple was about to declare Chapter 11. Go figure.

I love my Macs and astrology software (most of it, at least). As the photo indicates, though, I still hold on to the books required to do the hand calculations. Why? Maybe as souvenirs, or because part of me wonders if the electrical grid could fail for some reason. Whatever the case, I don’t regret spending close to ten years doing “slow astrology”. A computer screen or printout of a chart gives you everything all at once, whereas the old way revealed each planetary position and house cusp gradually, allowing me time to think about and absorb each feature of the chart in turn.

10/24/2019

RENE ACEVES, LIBRA

Last month I wrote a little post about my astrologer friend Roy and how he embodies many salient Virgo qualities. A year or so ago I wrote a portrait of my Leo friend Jimmy, and last December, one about my Sagittarian friend Tony. I have fun writing these astrological mini bios about people I know personally, especially the one from two and a half years ago about my then recently passed Ta**us father. This October I have been wondering who I could pick as a Libra subject. Turns out, the best candidate happens to be me. I’m not even going to bother to be totally objective about this. I will try to be fair, though.

Upon first reading about the supposed qualities of my sun sign I had a difficult time relating. This was probably in Derek and Julia Parker’s The Compleat Astrologer. According to them, I was somewhat superficial, had a face with no striking features; was charming, pleasant and fair minded, overly concerned with the way I dressed (maybe a little in the last 12 years), and pastels were my preferred colors. The shallow Madame Bovary was depicted as the archetypal Libran literary character. Saint-Saens was the archetypal classical composer of the sign because his music was said to be heavy on pretty melodies but deficient in depth or meaning.

Scorpios, Virgos and Capricorns are always complaining about their signs being unjustly portrayed. Really, though, is there any worse sign description than the above one for Libra? I ran across the same sort of blithe character assassination in other books. Even the at-the-time (1982) highly revered Jungian astrologer Liz Greene engaged in some gross misunderstanding, declaring that the scales are the only inanimate object in the zodiac. Therefore Libran individuals exhibit a certain cold lack of humanity. Wow, thanks a fu***ng lot. She also used her expert psychological insight to pin me and my fellow sign-mates with this one (wait for it): “the iron fist in the velvet glove.” I wish! I’d have a lot more to show for myself if that were true.

So what is true about me and Libra? Am I balanced? Not that often, but I do strive for serenity. At home I surround myself with my records and CDs (carefully curated over the years), stereo, books, guitars, lamps with tinted glass shades, framed photos and artwork and walls painted to induce the desired mood (not a pastel in sight). I’m not one of those naturally gifted Seattle gardeners, but I try my best to create a little bit of Eden in the yard. If I buy a kitchen implement or garden tool it has to be an ideal combination of form and function. I’m easily offended by tastelessness, whether it be bad music, godawful clothing, stupid looking cars, dehumanizing architecture, etc., so I avoid those things whenever possible unless they’re bad enough to be funny. That’s how I try to maintain harmony in my world.

According to popular astrology Libras are lazy. I don’t know if that’s true about me, but I can definitely say that I don’t thrive on a lot of pressure or being overly busy. Back when I used to work regular jobs I thought it was absurd that when we got caught up with our work we still had to make a lot of busy work for ourselves. In a just world we should have been allowed to read or goof off. Fortunately, I get to do exactly that since I’ve been self-employed. What else? My waking up ritual is drinking black tea and reading in bed for an hour as a way of easing into the day. I do my fare share of hanging out in coffeehouses, though I could never be one of those people who do so for hours on end.

My wife says that I do, in fact, possess that stereotypical Libran talent for diplomacy. This, despite the badly timed bluntness of my Sagittarius ascendant and my sarcastic Mercury in Scorpio. As usual, she’s right. Five years ago I had a nasty falling out with a friend which ended with a series of back and forth emails. The friend in question wrote some extremely vehement and toxic things about me. In my responses I thought I had thrown it all back in his face. My wife, after reading some of this exchange said “you were very tactful and diplomatic”. And here I thought I had sounded so tough. For all that, I haven’t talked to him in five years.

Libras are correctly known to be artistic. In my case, I happened to gravitate to a very typical creative outlet for the sign: songwriting. That’s something I know I can do well. I like to play guitar and work on my chops daily. Much as I would have loved to be a really good player, though, it was never meant to be. This is true of so many well known tunesmiths of the sign. We’re pretty good at our instruments, but rarely virtuosos. What we do have is eloquence and an ear for shaping compelling melodies and chord changes.

The vaunted Libran sociability tends to be oversimplified. We are friendly, are genuinely interested in people, and like gatherings but large parties tend to overwhelm us.

Much has been said about Libra’s romantic search for an idealized partner. Speaking for myself, that’s true, but not in the sense of pursuing only conventionally attractive prospects. I had relationships earlier in life but none of them could be said to have worked out spectacularly. Things changed dramatically when I got together with the woman who became my wife. I suppose it’s that way for most people regardless of sign. The only way that I can describe it is that a missing piece of the puzzle fell into place. I know I could never be in a relationship where the romance and passion evaporate after a couple of years. Fortunately, I am blessed in this marriage that I waited so long for.

09/13/2019

MY FRIEND ROY, VIRGO ASTROLOGER EXTRAORDINAIRE

I first met Roy in September of 1990. We were both showing up for our first day of work at a new business called The Psychic Source. Along with us were about 20 others hired to answer phones as tarot readers, psychics and astrologers. Each new hiree introduced themselves in turn. Roy got the most attention. He dressed immaculately, had a shaved head, spoke eloquently with enthusiasm and, at 42 years old, was older than the rest of us. Right off the bat, it was obvious that he was in another league in terms of astrological proficiency, experience and knowledge. He exemplifies his Sun sign, Virgo, in some the most positive ways I’ve ever come across. Let me enumerate some of these traits, as Roy lives them out.

First of all, he’s a power talker like many of his sign-mates. Virgo is ruled by Mercury, planet of the written and spoken word. I used to try to keep up with him in conversation. Over time, though, I’ve learned to just listen for long stretches. The thing is, everything that comes out of his mouth is either entertaining or informative, or both. I can’t remember one single time when he droned on about something boring. Never happened; not gonna happen. The man is encyclopedic on more topics than you can shake a stick at: jazz and classical music, marshal arts, geography, food and drink, computers, plus a bunch of other stuff.

Virgo is known as a helpful, service-oriented sign. Speaking for myself, he helped me make a quantum leap as an astrologer. I often refer to myself as self-taught in this area, but that’s strictly true only up to the point I met Roy. With me, as with other Psychic Source workers he selflessly and patiently gave us the benefit of his years of experience and expertise. The more difficult the technique or concept, the longer he would spend getting us to wrap our minds around it.

Don’t ever let anybody tell you that Virgos are boring. They’re characters. Part of it has to do with their wiry nervous energy. Part of it also has to do with the fact that they are relatively self-contained and happy being on their own. Maybe that makes them more immune to the creeping forces of uniformity. Whatever the reason, they stand out in a crowd without trying to attract attention. Roy, for instance, has never held a conventional job that I know of. Even when he came closest to having one, he was working from home a long distance away. If anything he’s overqualified for most employment, what with his facility with computer programming and the unbelievable speed with which he learns unfamiliar tasks. Most people of his age and ability would have been heading a team at one of the big tech companies.

Roy epitomizes Virgo’s preoccupation with health, diet, alternative medicine, etc. During the early years of our friendship he was a strict vegetarian and abstainer from intoxicants. I’ve never known a better cook of hearty, satisfying vegetarian meals. He has always been a font of information where it comes to herbs, homeopathy, Chinese medicine, dietary supplements, etc. He now enjoys a good beer, scotch or glass of red wine, alongside having an appreciation of fine food. That said, his cabinet of homeopathic remedies still gets plenty of use.

Unlike the other earth signs (Capricorn and Ta**us), Virgo has an insatiable appetite for change and variety due it being mutable and mercurial. In person, he is animated. Even when sitting down he gives the impression of being constantly in motion. Roy has done his share of relocating geographically. Buying a house or co-op to settle down in has never been a priority for him. Mentally, his restless, inquisitive mind has delved thoroughly into every single branch of astrology: modern Western, Cosmobiology, Western sidereal, horary, Vedic, Chinese, Medieval and Hellenistic. To have become an in-depth practitioner in all these areas is unheard of in our profession.

If Roy could be said to have a glaring fault, it would be a stereotypically Virgonian one: overwork. As with many astrologers, retirement is a non-starter. You’d think, though, that in his early seventies he could reduce the work load a tad and take it easy. Oh no, not him. Activity is his natural state, even if necessity is also a driving factor. In September of 2015 we arranged to be in Stockholm, Sweden for the same four days. The photo above is of him holding a map of spots featured in the Millenium novels and movies (Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, etc.) which we explored one afternoon. He’s shown pointing to the apartment of co-protagonist Mikael Blomqvist. That evening we stayed out late at a Sodermalm bar joking and shooting the breeze with some local regulars. When it was time to head back to our respective hotels it was almost midnight, at which point he offhandedly said: “I’ve got to get some work done on the computer for a couple of hours or so.” The life of a Virgo, I suppose.

Roy’s ceaseless industriousness and curiosity is our gain. I deeply hope that he publishes a book one of these days. On top of that, it would be nice if he could get out and lecture on the circuit of astrology conventions and workshops. The man has so much to impart from his years of experience and study. For the most part, though, self-promotion has never been a big motivator for him. Maybe it’s the supposed Virgo virtues of modesty and taking pride in craftsmanship. I wish this were true of all of them.

07/26/2019

TEMPERAMENTS

Earlier this week the New York Times had one of those how-philosophy-can-be-useful op-eds (“How Ancient Greek Philosophy Help You Work Smarter and Better?”, with the subtitle “the idea of temperaments or humors has long been debunked, but thinking in terms of broad personality types may actually help you get things done”. The author, one Elizabeth Grace Saunders, reduced the subject to business type scenarios, making the subject easier for modern readers to accept. Inevitably, in the process she also rendered it more one-dimensional.

What were these temperaments and how were they used in antiquity? They were composed of four basic qualities in nature: warm, cool, dry and moist. Each temperament is a different combination of these components. Choleric is warm and dry; sanguine is warm and moist; melacholic is cool and dry; and phlegmatic is cool and moist. By the time of Aristotle they became analogous to the fire, air, earth and water elements, respectively.

Reknowned scholar and speaker on the subject of classical astrology Lee Lehman portrayed the warm versus cool concepts in terms of choleric and sanguine types (both warm) being like Southern Europeans and the cooler melancholic and phlegmatic sorts as Northern Europeans.

The two dry temperament types, choleric and melancholic, are people of action. They build the bridges and move mountains. Also, they tend to burn off fat. Moist sanguine and phlegmatic are better at seeing connections and ambiguity. Generally better at imagining themselves in another person’s shoes, they are also likely to be more open-minded.

Cool phlegmatic and melancholic people are natural providers and stabilizers for a society. They are not risk takers by nature and feel a whole lot better if they have a steady paycheck and benefits. Choleric and sanguine types, on the other hand, live more for the present, figuring that things will work themselves out somehow.

Traditionally, temperament was determined from the rising and moon signs, the signs of their ruling planets, season and even lunar phase. To that, I would have to add the sun’s placement in the zodiac as well. It is possible for an individual to have two main temperaments predominating.

The concept of temperament is central to the rediscovery of a traditional Western alternative medicine, one which was still widely in use up to 350 years ago. As in Chinese medicine and Ayurveda, the temperament system recognizes a mind-body connection and rejects a one-size-fits-all approach. Nobody in their right mind would ever suggest relinquishing the advances of modern medicine. That said, it’s reductionistic to assume that the practice of an earlier era was nothing more than hopelessly primitive and ignorant, with its belief in “nonexistant humors” such as black and yellow bile or use of practices like bloodletting. All it takes is a little investigation to realize that the older terminology refers to “energies”, in a similar way to how, say, the kidney meridian in acupuncture entails much more than just that organ.

I work with a woman who has Aries rising and Leo moon, both fiery placements, making her predominantly choleric. Some years ago she started getting red blotches on her legs from drinking red wine or eating any food seasoned with onions, garlic or vinegar, all of which have a strongly “warming” effect. Red ,the color of the wine and blotches, is a fiery color. Choleric people already have a lot of heat in their systems so an excess in their food and drink is the last thing they need. An alternative Western medicinal practitioner would prescribe intake of cooling, hydrating foods like cucumbers, herbs like cilantro, and drinking green tea.

Speaking for myself, it’s reassuring to know that in “The West” we have a rich tradition of wholistic healing geared to the individual, taking into account the psychological in tandem with the physiological. It tells us that “natural” and “alternative” are universal ideas, not restricted to only certain parts of the world. Interesting, also, is the fact that astrology with its four (five in Chinese) elements is an essential component of it.

For anyone interested in further investigation of this topic, I recommend Temperament: Astrology’s Forgotten Key by Dorian Greenbaum.

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