Whether you are a beginner or an advanced student you are probably guilty of making at least one of the following 7 mistakes.

While mistakes are a necessary part of any learning journey, some mistakes can slow down your progress and make the study of astrology more difficult.

Mistake #1 – You believe Astrology is all about Sun signs

According to statistics, more than one-third of people in the US read horoscope columns – which probably includes some of your friends and colleagues who say that astrology is nonsense (ha!).

No matter where you are on your astrology journey, your first encounter with astrology was probably your Sun sign. And that’s fine. The only problem is, that you may stop here and believe that this is all that astrology is about.

Astrology is so much more complex, and the Sun signs are only a tiny part of the bigger picture of your chart.

Did you know that horoscopes were practically “invented” in 1920 as a mass-marketing scheme? And did you know that the horoscope newspaper columns are rarely written by astrologers?

Not only are Sun-sign horoscopes a tiny bit of what astrology is about… but they also give astrology a bad name.

Astrology looks not only at 1.) signs (Aries, Taurus, etc.), but also, 2.) planets (Sun, Venus, etc.), 3.) houses (1st house, 2nd house, etc.), and 4.) aspects (conjunctions, squares, etc.), planetary cycles and much more!

Let’s take an example: let’s say you are a Leo Rising and your chart ruler, 1.) Sun is in 2.) Libra, in 3.) the 7th house, and 4.) conjunct Pluto. If we do the math the chances to have this particular combination is 1 to 7200! And this is only for one of the placements in your chart.

If we look at all of the variables of the chart, we have thousands, even millions, of combinations. The universe manifests itself uniquely every time. That’s why every birth chart is different, and that’s why there is no “one size fits all” astrology reading.

And while astrology is complex, it doesn’t have to be complicated – IF you get the fundamentals right.

Mistake #2 – You “jumped” learning stages

You are at the opposite spectrum of Mistake #1. You already know that astrology is more complex than the 12 signs. But you jump steps and try to learn astrology too quickly.

When you advance your astrology skills it’s easy to get excited, to read 346 blog posts about what Venus square Saturn means, then to try every tool, aspect, or asteroid out there.

Is not that asteroids or minor planets are not relevant, but putting too much focus on them before you master the astrology fundamentals is not only going to distract you, but will also lead you down the wrong path.

Asteroids, for example, can bring extra insight into interpretation, but they by no means shed light on the central themes of your chart.

So, especially if you are in your first years of studying astrology, I would like to encourage you to focus on the main pillars of astrology. Later, when you deepen your knowledge, you can start experimenting with asteroids, minor aspects, or other niche techniques.

Mistake #3 – You believe there are “bad planets“ and “good planets”

If you think Jupiter is the “good guy” and Saturn the “bad guy”, you may be the victim of 16th-century astrology thinking.

Not that there isn’t any truth in this. Yes, Jupiter has the quality of expansion, and Saturn the quality of contraction – so we are much more likely to “feel good” when we have a Jupiter transit.

During a Saturn transit, you may not feel that good – no one likes hard work and discipline, we are NOT biologically wired to like it – however, when you truly make friends with Saturn, the feeling of accomplishment that Saturn brings doesn’t compare to anything else. Each planet has a particular role in the structure of our psyche – and has unique things to teach us!

Astrology, like everything else, is evolving. Since the discovery of transpersonal planets (which started with the discovery of Uranus in 1781) new portals of awareness have opened.

Mars, for example, has a very raw, “me-first” action-oriented energy. In the past, when our consciousness levels were not that developed, we would easily “give in” to Mars’ primal energy and take reckless action that we would regret later. That’s why Mars has traditionally been associated with war.

However, nowadays most of us don’t respond to Mars in the same way – instead, a Mars transit becomes an opportunity to take initiative and assert ourselves in a healthier way.

Nothing is black and white, every “good” has its “bad”, and every “bad” is there to teach us something new so that we can rise to the “next level” of awareness.

Mistake #4 – You get stuck in analysis/paralysis

You know the theory. You know the aspects. But when it comes to putting things together and reading charts… you freeze.

There are two reasons for this: one can be traced back to Mistake #2 – you jumped stages and didn’t get a solid foundation.

The 2nd reason is that no one has taught you the actual process of reading a chart. There are thousands of astrology books about aspects, but almost nothing out there on how to approach a chart reading.

There is one set of skills you need when you start learning astrology… and a completely different set of skills once you start reading charts. If at the beginning you need to put your Mercury hat on and learn the “astrology language”, later, you need to put your Jupiter hat on, and apply synthesis to the chart reading process.

Mistake #5 – You believe astrology is purely deterministic

You believe too much in fate. This can take the form of “if it’s meant to be, it will be”, “Mercury is retrograde – I will hide in my bedroom”, “I have Saturn in the 7th house so I will never get married”.

Some philosophers – who supported the theory of determination and fate – went as far as to say that “if one’s actions are not determined by character, then a person cannot be responsible for what they are doing”.

When we believe too much in fate, we don’t take responsibility for our life and blame everything that goes wrong on “destiny” or outside circumstances. But if life was 100% predetermined, it wouldn’t make any sense to be born.

We are given the chance to come into this life, exactly because there is something intrinsic to human design – to help us outgrow our destiny.

When you believe astrology is purely deterministic, you’re missing the incredible potential for awareness and self-transformation astrology has to offer.

Mistake #6 – You think you have complete free will

As opposed to Mistake #5, you can be on the other extreme, and think that there is no such thing as a “difficult Pluto transit” because you are a self-actualized human being.

No one has 100% free will. Some transits are tough. This is especially true before we have our first Saturn return or Pluto square when we are not yet equipped to deal with the energy of difficult transits.

Although it’s true that the more we raise our consciousness the more we “master” the planets and our “fate” – we can never fully master everything. We are all students of life and we keep on learning from every experience.

Life is half fate and half free will – we are half nature, half spirit, half Yin, half Yang, and our life is a mystery waiting to happen. It is in the uncertainty of the 50 / 50 split where growth happens.

The most important astrology mistake I believe we are all guilty of, is to use astrology as a tool to “predict” and “control” your life.

This is a tricky one – because of course, we are drawn to astrology especially because we want to gain some sort of control over our lives when we learn about our natal chart or check our transits.

However, none of us can “outsmart” the stars – we can only learn astrology from a place of curiosity and humbleness. We cannot “control” the stars, neither force an event to happen through elections nor waiting for the right transit.

Don’t try to use astrology to “gain” something. Don’t be afraid of bad transits. Astrology is a gift from the Universe – and when we learn astrology from a place of curiosity and humbleness we automatically get in sync with the Universe, and do the “right thing” according to our initial human design, and the co-creation opportunities we have at any given moment.

# 7 You stop learning

Perhaps you never got beyond Sun signs because in your heart you still believe astrology is entertainment and cannot be taken seriously…

OR you may have gotten stuck because the astrology terminology seems to be too complicated.

OR because, while you know the Astro-jargon, actually reading charts seems like a guru-level thing that only “enlightened” astrologers can do.

Whatever your reason is, YOU CAN learn astrology. Anyone can learn astrology when presented with clear, straightforward tools and frameworks. But of course, it all starts with you wanting to take your astrology knowledge and experience to the next level.

In conclusion…

Whether or not you make any or all the mistakes above, you are great! The fact that you read through this list means that you are an introspective person and want to improve yourself – and ultimately, this is the most important prerequisite to learning astrology or becoming an astrologer.

• Astrology transits