Personality and the Dark Side of the Moon

Most people are pretty familiar with the zodiac sun signs. When someone says they are a Sagittarius, it's a pretty good bet that they love to travel and they have enough curiosity for ten cats. The sun sign part of a person's personality is the easy part.

The part that's harder to fathom is the hidden side of the personality, the darker side, the side that is defined by a person's moon phase.

Moon Phases and the People Who Wrote About Them
William Butler Yeats wrote a lot about moon phases, as did Richard Elizabeth. It is said by both that people who are in harmony with their moon phase are happy and well-adjusted people. People out of harmony with their moon phases are neurotic, aggressive, depressed, or variously unhappy with their lives.

The problem is that most people are unaware of their moon phase, which makes them unable to determine whether they are "in-phase" (in harmony with their moon phase) or "out of phase," meaning not fulfilling the destiny of their moon phase.

Luckily, it is possible to calculate your own moon phase. The best resource for that is the book "Phases of the Moon" by Richard Elizabeth. In his book he gives a formula for calculating your own moon phase. Yeats' work on moon phases is far more esoteric, and less likely to be understood by the modern generation.

What Your Moon Phase Will Tell You about You
Your moon phase explains all those things that you can't explain about yourself. It often brings to light the reason for inexplicable desires, afflictions, fears, habits, and behaviors. One's moon phase can also explain the role one plays in one's family or in relationships.

For instance, my wife's sun sign is Aquarius. The obvious qualities of Aquarians are loyalty, humanitarianism, free-thinking, intelligence, and highly inventive. They can also be rebellious, changeable, and possessed of extraordinarily long memories. No problems there. She fits all of those characteristics.

Moon Phases Explain Extremes of Personality
However, she can also take rebelliousness to an art form at times. She has been known to go where angels fear to tread when it comes to cultural and family issues, and her personality goes far beyond changeable. It's very often downright turbulent. And she's got ambition to spare. That's where her moon phase comes in.

She is Phase 10, also known as "the image breaker." This phase is one of the most turbulent of all 28 phases of the moon, so it's no surprise that my wife has a turbulent personality. She has been known to scare people even when she's smiling cheerfully.

In addition, Phase 10 is one of the most ambitious phases when it comes to self-growth and spiritual evolution. Finally, Phase 10 is all about being "a purging force to destroy and replace obsolete forms of every conceivable variety-from outdated laws to old buildings to antiquated traditions," to quote Richard Elizabeth. No wonder she charges in to break up old cultural archetypes when others would run.

My own moon phase, the Fool, is equally enlightening. You will probably find yours to be as well. Note that your moon phase, as referred to in this article, is different from that calculated by most "moon phase calculators" online. I wish I could find an accurate online resource for this, but Richard Elizabeth's book or "A Vision" by William Butler Yeats are the best sources I have found for this.

If you're interested in discovering more about the darker, less rational, yet no less powerful side of your personality, it might be time to explore your moon phase.

Enjoy!

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Whose Personality Are You Wearing?

As you grow older and hopefully wiser do you ever shock yourself when you realize that you sound just like your parents? If you've ever caught yourself looking at the world just like your parents do-a point of view that you no doubt used to find hopelessly old-fashioned and out of date-you might suddenly feel old or, worse, unoriginal. Here you've spent years rebelling and trying to break the familial mode just to find yourself parroting your folks!

If you've ever found yourself in this spot just take a deep breath and relax! Things are not as bad as you think. From a human development point of view it's actually quite normal for us to look and sound like our parents when we reach a certain age. The question is why.

Think about this scenario: when you were a child your parents were probably in their 30s, 40s or 50s. As a child you are very impressionable and you observe and absorb the personalities of the people around you. In animals this process is called "imprinting."

What you're really absorbing from your elders is a blueprint for how people think and behave when they reach a certain age-say 35. It's only natural that when you reach age 35 you automatically assume the mannerisms and personality traits of the people you observed as a child. You've been programmed to do so.

But don't give up hope! Just because it's natural for you to act and sound like your parents doesn't mean you're doomed to live their script the rest of your life. It's never too late to change your imprinting-that's what role models are all about.

By consciously searching for and identifying personalities that you admire and desire you can change the way you think and feel.
Here's a simple way to start that process:

1. Find someone who has personality traits you would like to have in your life. This person can be a real person, TV character, or book character.

2. Identify a few mannerisms, modes of dress, or behaviors that are unique to that person.

3. Begin integrating those unique traits into your daily life. It can be as simple as using a hand gesture or wearing a particular article of jewelry. Even wearing the same type of cologne or perfume is often enough to bring the entire set of personality traits into your life.

Be patient with this process. It may take a few days or a few months for all of the traits you desire to show up. You'll be surprised and delighted, though, at how quickly you can achieve very real and substantial results with this process.


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Are You a Deep Magical Genius or a Practical Manifester?

Each of us has a different personality. We know this when it comes to friendship or dating. But did you know that you also have a magical personality? You might be primarily an Air, a big time communicator and thinker, or a Water, a person who interacts with the world through emotions, the language of Spirit. Take the test to find out more.

Which of the Four Elements Is Your Dominant Element?
Once you take the personality test and know your personality according to which of the four elements you are most dominant in, how does this help you? Good question. Each of the four elements has its own characteristics associated with it. By knowing what these characteristics are, you'll be able to identify what your strengths are, how you view the world and how you interact with the world and others. This knowledge can help you find the career you are best suited for, know the type of people you are most compatible with when looking for friends or a mate, and give you an understanding of the best way for you to approach situations in your life. It also makes you aware of your challenges so you will be prepared to encounter resistance or difficult situations with a plan for dealing with them already in place. Once you know which of the magical four elements is dominant in your personality by taking the magical personality test, you not only get a better understanding of yourself, but also start looking at others and any situation you encounter in relation to the elements and how best for you to interact with them.

Real Life Example
My adult daughter is totally dominant in the Water element so I know that she views the world and will generally react from an emotional stand in any situation. I, on the other hand, am most dominant in Earth. As a water personality, my daughter views the world from characteristics such as emotions, feelings, intuition, compassion, empathy, sympathy, knowing, and devotion. She always makes herself available to help others, she has a helping service career, and feels very passionate about community and making things "right" for others. She is able to appreciate beauty in her life as well as the gifts and blessings she has. The problems come for her when she takes on too much feeling for others and absorbs their negative energies or when her water energies become stagnant or too dark which causes depression. As an Earth personality, I am often able to help her anchor and ground out these negative energies when this occurs. Knowing my personality characteristic which include strength, endurance, patience, structure, serenity of beingness, solidity, boundaries, permanence, loyalty, persistence, stubbornness, security, and anchor, and knowing hers, I have insight into the best ways to help her when she goes on emotional overload and calls me in tears of frustration, sadness or from being overwhelmed. I know that she will be most successful in situations that allow her to express who she is and stay true to her values, so any conversation we have needs to start with just letting her talk. As an Earth personality, I am able to patiently wait and listen until she winds down and gets all her emotions verbally spewed out. This in itself offers an anchor and some stability to her. I can then offer magical solutions to help her regain energy such as Rooting or going to the nearby river and putting her feet in the moving water. Once she has her emotions balanced again, it is simple to guide her through looking inside herself to find her own answers for her current problem. My role in this process is to simply be an anchor and a rock for her. This is what I am able to share with her just by having an understanding of my four element personality and hers.

On the other hand, as an Earth personality I can be rigid and yes even stubborn at times. These are characteristics that I am aware of and have to be on my guard against. I often lack the emotional connection in situations and with people in favor of organization, practicality and I can be inflexible at times. Especially when interacting with other people, I have to be aware of these challenges and guard against closing off and showing no empathy for others being convinced that I am right and there is no room for compromise. This is when my daughter's personality can be very helpful to me. As an empathetic Water personality, she is able to translate to me what others might be feeling about a situation and give me insights from an emotions perspective. This helps me shift my Earth stance a bit to be able to look for compromise and consider the other person's view on the situation. By knowing these personality characteristics that we each have, my daughter and I are able to help each other through our challenges by lending the strengths we each possess from our dominant element.

Fire and Air
Since we pretty much covered the characteristics for Water and Earth in the example with myself and my daughter, let's take a quick look at characteristics associated with Fire and Air.

Fire - energy, power, will, desire, anger, pain, motivation, radiance, passion, initiative, aggression, limitation, endeavor, activity, creative, willingness, urge, inspired, excitable, courage, bravado, compulsion, fanaticism, frustration, resentment, rage, freedom

Air - seeing, breathing, speaking, hearing, planning, thinking, believing, memorizing, communicating, learning, teaching, information, ideas, wisdom, understanding, worry, sensation, awareness, opinions, data, memory, mind

Look through the characteristics listed for each of the four elements and see which sounds the most like you. This will give you a good idea of your dominant element. You can get an even better idea by taking the four elements personality test. Then look at the people around you that you get along the best with and those that you don't get along with. Consider what their dominant element might be. This will help you find the people you will be the most successful with and help you be aware of those that you will have a challenging relationship with and help you find ways to deal with them. Beginning to see the world from a perspective of the four elements can open a lot of doors for you and help you be successful in whatever you do. This is the start of living a magical life and seeing life from a viewpoint of magic.

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