The Soul's Journey Through the Houses: 
A Deeper Understanding of the Houses in Astrology...

To really understand the nature of each house of the zodiac, it is useful to view them as a gradual maturation process. Each house represents a certain age, time period or a particular level of development. The first house is symbolic of infancy, the second toddlerhood, and the sixth is adulthood. The ninth house is the time period of college. The eleventh is your old age and retirement. The twelfth is death and also creation. Each builds upon the one before it, so that the natal chart represents one complete lifetime from the womb to death. They are in an order of expanding awareness that grows from one to the next. 

Look at your chart, and take away the signs and planets leaving only the empty houses. Like a board game ready to be played, the houses each represent ages, time periods and stages of development. Imagine assigning signs to each house to color the houses with certain attitudes or personalities. Next, as though the planets were playing pieces, take each planet and place it in a particular house to show where you will spend most of your time and put forth most of your effort to develop yourself. If you are developing your drive to achieve in a career, then put the playing piece of your sun in the tenth house. If you are always embroiled in security issues in intimate relationships, your moon would be in the eighth house. If it is your self-image you are developing, your sun would be in the first house. You live the entirety of your chart, but your focus is on development in the houses containing planets.

The Houses Follow a Story Line...

Like the story of an imaginary person growing and maturing through life, the houses move through each phase of development. The houses of the zodiac tell the story of a gradual maturation process from your existence in the womb to your ascension back into the spirit world, and every point in between. The first four houses represent self-development on an individual level. In these houses, we develop our ability to maneuver through our environment. The second four represent self-development through relationships. In these house, we develop our social skills. The last four represent existential struggles in our interaction with society. When you see the houses in this light, their meaning becomes understandable on a deeper level. You begin to see the real lesson of each house and how having planets in certain houses are reflected in the events or your life. ​
Each house represents an area of life where you are sentenced to the pains of growth and understanding of that particular house in order to conquer the lessons of each house. Even with a beneficial planet like Jupiter in a house, there will be times when it is a struggle. This is how looking at the houses as an evolutionary process of growth makes them more understandable. We are less likely to find fault with a sign, planet or house when we understand its place in our overall development.

Click to Read about each House...

The Houses by Element...

Fire Houses...
   New Birth and Inspiration
Earth Houses...
   Building Structure and Stability
Air Houses...
   Understanding through Ideas
Water Houses...
   Death in Preparation for New Birth
In understanding the story line of the houses, it's beneficial to see the pattern formed by the elements and to understand how they repeat in order around the chart. The houses are divided into three groups, each representing a phase of development. The first phase is of personal self-development, in which we interact directly with our environment on a primal level. The second phase is of self-development through relationships, and the third phase is of universal and existential understanding of our place in the world. Each phase contains a fire, earth, air and water house. Each phase is ignited with the inspirational spark of fire. Then, it is stabilized and put into concrete form with earth. Next, it is thought through and analyzed in air. Last, it is experienced through emotion in water. In water, it also dies so that it can begin the cycle again in the next fire house, making the water houses quite powerful!

The Personal Houses of Self-Development...

The 1st House...

  • Symbolic Phase: Infancy
  • Fire House
  • Statement: I Will
  • Primal and Instinctual House of Direct Experience with the World.
  • Personal House of Self-Development
From the womb of the twelfth house, you travel to the first point of the first house, the ascendant, and you are born. The ascendant represents your actual, physical birth into the world. It is your first glimpse of the world, when the light hits your eyes and sound enters your ears. You literally encounter the world for the first time...(Click to read article)

The 2nd House...

  • Symbolic Phase: Toddlerhood 
  • Earth House
  • Statement: I Want
  • Primal and Instinctual House of Direct Experience with the World.
  • Personal House of Self-Development
Once you establish who you are by developing your self-image in the first house, you notice the amazing array of things around you. You realize that you can not only affect things, you can also own them and enjoy them. This house of Taurus symbolizes toddlerhood. You move from feeding at your mother's breast, to eating real food. Here, you discover the textures, tastes and smells of food...(Click to read article)

The 3rd House...

  • Symbolic Phase: Early Childhood
  • Air House
  • Statement: I Think
  • Primal and Instinctual House of Direct Experience with the World.
  • Personal House of Self-Development
As you move into the symbolic house of early childhood, you discover the wonders of the mind. It begins at home where you learn to speak and communicate. Then, you make your first venture into the outside world when you start school. In school, you learn to read, write and gather information. With all of these newly formed skills, you realize there is an entire world beyond your own body and physical objects...(Click to read article)

The 4th House...

  • Symbolic Phase: Later Childhood
  • Water House
  • Statement: I Feel
  • Primal and Instinctual House of Direct Experience with the World.
  • Personal House of Self-Development
After venturing into the airy, intangible world of your mind, you float back to earth in the fourth house of Cancer, and you land right in the middle of your home and family. It's much more serious here than it was in the third house. Here, it isn't so easy to escape the physical world and detach into your thoughts. There's no duality....(Click to read article)

The Relationship Houses of Self-Development...

The 5th House...

  • Symbolic Phase: The Teenager
  • Fire House
  • Statement: I Relate
  • House of Discovering how you Relate with Others
  • Relationship House of Self-Development through Other People
As the second fire house, you re-visit the issue of self-expression. However, unlike the self-expression of the first house of Aries, your self-expression in the fifth house is in relation to other people. You have now graduated from the personal houses, and you have entered the set of houses known as the relationship houses. Now, you prefer to experience yourself and the world through relationships with other people...(Click to read article)

The 6th House...

  • Symbolic Phase: Adulthood
  • Earth House
  • Statement: I Help
  • House of Discovering how you Relate with Others
  • Relationship House of Self-Development through Other People
You are now an adult and have entered the second earth house. This the relationship earth house. You are now mature enough to do real work. Work that not only benefits you, but other people and the world in general. It is different from the second house of Taurus where you interact directly with your environment by learning to enjoy your physical senses and deciding...(Click to read article)

The 7th House...

  • Symbolic Phase: Partnerships
  • Air House
  • Statement: I Compromise
  • House of Discovering how you Relate with Others
  • Relationship House of Self-Development through Other People
Having learned how to work with people in a physical sense in the sixth house to accomplish goals, and care for people's physical needs, you now enter the second air house, and again detach from the physical world. In the seventh house, you learn the subtle intricacies of the mental aspect of relationships. There is nothing physical about this house. It's about...(Click to read article)

The 8th House...

  • Symbolic Phase: Intimate Relationships
  • Water House
  • Statement: I Merge
  • House of Discovering how you Relate with Others
  • Relationship House of Self-Development through Other People
As you reach another water house, you again deal with a symbolic death. In the eighth house it's the death of your ego. This is the house of intimate relationships, relationships so deep that you must be willing to symbolically give up your own sense of individuality in order to completely merge with another person. As the last of the relationship houses, the eighth house represents the ultimate...(Click to read article)

The Universal Houses of Existential Understanding...

The 9th House...

  • Symbolic Phase: College & Higher Learning
  • Fire House
  • Statement: I Judge
  • House of Understanding your Place in the World
  • Universal House of Existential Understanding
You enter college in the ninth house. You have finally completed your self-development, and you are ready to learn about how you relate to the world at large. You now examine your place in our infinite universe. You feel inspired by this fire house, which starts the phase of houses known as the universal houses, to begin expressing your opinion...(Click to read article)

The 10th House...

  • Symbolic Phase: Career and Public Status
  • Earth House
  • Statement: I Achieve
  • House of Understanding your Place in the World
  • Universal House of Existential Understanding
As you enter the tenth house, you are finally finished learning. You have graduated from the college experience of the ninth house, and you are ready for your career. It's time to be a fully-functioning adult in the public world. In the tenth house, you need to earn a living and climb the ladder of success. Here, you want to succeed at something that gives you public recognition...(Click to read article)

The 11th House...

  • Symbolic Phase: Old age & Retirement
  • Air House
  • Statement: I Understand
  • House of Understanding your Place in the World
  • Universal House of Existential Understanding
You have come a long way by the time you reach the eleventh house. By this time, you are symbolically at retirement age. After achieving success in the world and gaining the elevated social status it endows in the tenth house, your focus turns to understanding how you function as one gear in the machine of the world...(Click to read article)

The 12th House...

  • Symbolic Phase: The Transition Between Life & Death
  • Water House
  • Statement: I Dissolve
  • House of Understanding your Place in the World
  • Universal House of Existential Understanding
You have now reached the point where your life is, for all intents and purposes, complete. It is time for you to come to terms with death. This transition from life to death is symbolic of the twelfth house, but in broader terms, this house also represents the transition from death into life. It is symbolic of the development in the womb and your preparation for being...(Click to read article)