Libra Traits & Personalities
(September 23 – October 22)
DUALITY: Masculine
TRIPLICITY (ELEMENT): Air
QUADRUPLICITY (QUALITY): Cardinal
Libra is active, artistic, easygoing, peaceable, prizes beauty and harmony, is diplomatic, polished, and very socially inclined.
RULING PLANET: Venus – Goddess of love and beauty. In astrology, Venus rules pleasure, social pursuits, art, and adornment. Its influence also inclines toward self-indulgence and love of luxury.
SYMBOL: The Scales – Signifying balance, equilibrium, order, and justice.
GLYPH (WRITTEN SYMBOL): ♎ The pictograph represents the Scale, which is in perfect equilibrium. This was the ancient Egyptian symbol for the setting sun, which was regarded as the doorway between two worlds. In symbolic terms, the glyph is a crescent moon connected to two straight lines resting above a third line. This represents emotion bounded on either side by reason; the line below symbolizes partnership.
DOMINANT KEYWORD: I BALANCE.
POLARITY: Aries
Libra is the sign of partnership and marriage. Its natives are happiest functioning within a union, and often lose their equilibrium and positive outlook when forced to be alone. Aries, Libra’s opposite sign, is the sign of ego, personality, and self. Aries people tend to put themselves first, and selfishness is one of their negative traits.
PART OF THE BODY RULED BY LIBRA: The lower back and buttocks, and the kidneys: Librans suffer from lower back strain and problems in the lumbar region. They are also subject to kidney infections.
LUCKY DAY: Friday
LUCKY NUMBERS: 6 and 9
MAGICAL BIRTHSTONE: Opal – Brings financial success, frees its wearer from jealousy and greed, and imparts clear insight.
SPECIAL COLORS: Blue and Lavender: The colors of romance, harmony, and refinement.
CITIES: Vienna, Copenhagen, Charleston, Lisbon
COUNTRIES: Burma, China, Tibet, Argentina, Japan
FLOWERS: Rose, Cosmos, and Hydrangea
TREES: Almond, Cypress, and Ash
METAL: Copper
ANIMALS RULED BY LIBRA: Snakes and lizards
DANGER: Libra people tend to stir up ill feelings from others in situations having to do with love. Because they are indecisive and sometimes make a declaration of love too easily, Librans both anger and disappoint lovers. They also have a tendency to be fickle and faithless.
All About Libra
Librans are easy to like, for you have a captivating charm, possess elegant taste, and are usually beautiful to look at. In addition, you have the gift of making others feel important, for you are a superb listener and instinctively know how to draw out another person. You’re famous for how effortlessly you smooth ruffled feathers, bring out smiles, and make others think they’re the most wonderful people in the world. You’re a born charmer.
Ruled by Venus, goddess of love and beauty, you admire loveliness in all its forms, in music, art, decoration, and people. Your home will always have a touch of elegance, and you love to entertain in style. Flowers, champagne, lovely jewelry and clothes, beautiful (and expensive) objects, luxurious surroundings—these are the ornaments of life to you. You enjoy all the things that money can buy.
A narcissist at heart, you expect admiration. You wish to be the jewel in the center of any setting, and you have a computer memory for any compliment ever paid to you. You tend to judge others by outward appearances. If someone has a charming facade, you won’t look any deeper. As a result you may become easy prey for a sophisticated schemer with an affable manner.
Libra is the zodiacal sign of Partnerships—in psychological terms the sign is outer-directed. Your energies are focused on melding and combining with other people; you are at your best in personal relationships. Your real energy, however, goes into people. Whether they be partners, lovers, mates, family, friends, business associates, or even guests at your party—relationships are your core. You’re simply not a loner. Instinctively, you try to magnetize and pull others toward you. However, your main interest is on yourself within the relationship. You deal intuitively with other people’s emotions, and no one is better at understanding and taking into consideration another person’s point of view. Yet all too soon that outside viewpoint will be lost or subsumed within your own subtly self-centered concerns.
In the professional world you’re a superb team player. You’re able to meld many disparate egos into one smooth working union. Your friendships and associations bring opportunities, and your best luck comes when you pool your creative talents and intelligence with powerful individuals who open doors for you.
Born under the sign of the Scales, you strive for balance and harmony and are happiest when your environment is ordered and serene. Peace is worth any price to you and usually you will go a long way out of your way to avoid friction and dissension. Because you see clearly every side of an argument, every possibility of a given course, you have the tact and ability to smooth over disputes. You are a born diplomat. In order to avoid an unpleasant scene, you will even stifle your own true feelings. In fact, far too often you are not sure what your true feelings are. Because you try to be all things to all people, there is a general impression that you are indecisive. You appear to be constantly poised on an edge, seemingly unable to move one way or another, balancing pro with con, advantage with disadvantage, risk with gain. Underneath your genial, calm surface, you have to struggle in order to make decisions.
The problem is that at Libra’s center is someone who does not feel complete in himself or herself. Beneath your brilliance and charm, you feel a psychic lack, something missing—whether this something is a perfect lover, a fulfilling career, a wonderful project that shows off your talents, etc. And so you spend a lot of time feeling you’re not “real,” that you’ve conned others into thinking you’re smart and successful, but very soon they’ll find out you’re a fraud. One of Libra’s best-hidden secrets is how shaky your self-confidence is—and certainly your sense of not being whole and creating a false front is at the core of your insecurity.
Although you have superb instincts, you don’t trust them enough. You are likely to be an underachiever because of your easygoing attitude. For the most part, you don’t want anything badly enough to fight for it. The exception is when you’re denied a privilege to which you feel entitled. That ruffles your fur. Librans have a reputation for stubbornness, but that’s because you are sticklers for fairness. You resent being treated unfairly and become upset at inequity in the world at large. In general, it seems your strength is only brought out by crisis. This is when you’re at your most courageous.
You get along harmoniously with people who are even-tempered, particularly those who can laugh in the face of difficulties. You are particularly appreciative of talent in any field, whether art, literature, or music, and if you lack talent yourself you often indulge in artistic hobbies. Often people are surprised at the wide range of your interests because you hide your superior intellect under an agreeable, easygoing exterior. Libra is a cardinal sign, which means you’re an initiator. You love new projects, unusual people, different ideas, and you’ll travel anywhere. Gifted with imagination, flair, and enthusiasm, you have an open, independent mind that tries to evaluate the world dispassionately and rationally. You also have a good head for money (though your great weakness is a love of luxury).
Indeed, money has a way of slipping through your fingers because it isn’t money you love, it is the things money can buy. Essentially frivolous, people born under this sign dislike hard work—unless someone else is doing it. A love for beauty leads many natives of this sign to careers in art, decorating, the theater, and composing, but the approach often remains that of a dilettante who enjoys the reward but avoids the effort needed to attain it.
You are an incorrigible idealist and quintessential romantic. Affectionate, warmhearted, sentimental, naturally optimistic, you do everything in your power to please. Your stock-in-trade is charm.
The Inner Libra
You work hard trying to please others and as a result, they find you captivating. However, beneath your friendly exterior, you desperately long for love and approval. You have trouble saying no to others’ requests and you take on too many jobs or commitments—and then to prove how nice you are, you keep smiling through the strain while you hide a lot of resentment. It might be more useful to spend time building up your self-esteem rather than looking to others to give it to you. Basically, you give away your power. You hate anything unpleasant and avoid conflict, vulgarity, or strife. If life were a play, you’d always insist on a happy ending. The problem with trying to have constant peace and harmony is that you have trouble making decisions. At times you fear that any move you make will bring something terrible crashing down around you. If you could just lighten up and not be so hard on yourself, you’d be much more satisfied with what you do achieve. You have every ingredient for happiness!
How Others See You
People feel important when they’re with you because you always seem to understand their point of view. You are considered warm and outgoing because you know how to draw people out, and you’re thought of as someone with an unparalleled ability to deal with the public. However, because you want others’ approval, you tend to go along with what they want—and this sometimes makes you look wimpy. To some people, you also appear vain and overly concerned with your appearance.