Sagittarius: traits, love and work

Almost everything attributed to Sagittarius comes down to a single question: how much room does this person need, and what do they do when they do not get it? In love and at work the same question comes up, only with a different cast.

Three habits they are known by

First, they take contradiction better than agreement that is not agreement. A polite nod with something else behind it drives them up the wall far more reliably than a plain no.

Second, they tell stories. The way to a piece of information runs through an anecdote, and the anecdote often matters more to them than the short cut. Anyone in a hurry finds this hard going; anyone who listens learns more than they asked for.

Third, they need no run-up with strangers. On the train, in a queue, in a waiting room: after ten minutes they know where the person opposite comes from, and that person has felt at ease about it. The familiar flip side, a frankness with no brakes on it, belongs to the same trait.

In love

What tradition advises this sign sounds unromantic and is useful all the same: to look for someone who has a life of their own. Not because Sagittarius cannot bear closeness, but because they cope badly with being the sole content of somebody else's life. Having to account for routes and hours is the shortest road to a quarrel; an open question, by contrast, gets an open answer, and usually a longer one than one would like.

The weak spot lies elsewhere and is rarely named: the difference between freedom and non-commitment. Not every open door is space to move in; some are decisions nobody wanted to take. That may safely be said straight out — this sign takes hints worse than plain speech, and it seldom holds directness against anyone.

One qualification belongs here. What attracts someone and what keeps them is not settled in the birth chart by the sun sign: Venus, Mars and the seventh house answer for that. Two people who both have the Sun in Sagittarius may therefore have almost nothing in common in love.

At work

Lists of jobs by star sign are the most useless part of this literature. They behave as though a choice of career could be derived from a month of birth; in fact the people of one sign spread across every occupation there is, and nobody should pick a training by the calendar. What tradition describes is not professions but conditions — and those can be arranged, better or worse, almost anywhere.

Four of them turn up again and again in the descriptions. Control over the division of one's own time, if only for part of the day. Tasks that are not the same every week. Someone to talk to: explaining, negotiating, teaching, selling. And room to move on the question of how something is done, even when the what has long been settled. If all four are missing, no star sign will help; if three of them are there, this sign copes with remarkably dry work.

One piece of advice turns up in almost every description of this sign: go self-employed. It is too easy. Self-employment brings exactly one of these conditions with it, the division of one's own time, and with it three things that experience shows to be hard here: bookkeeping, chasing customers who do not pay, and getting through weeks when nothing comes in. Employment on a long leash therefore adds up better, for many, than self-employment with a mountain of paperwork.

Which part of the birth chart is in charge of work is not decided by the month of birth in any case, but by the tenth house — and for that the time of birth is needed.

What you do with this

Everything said so far describes a sign and not a person. How much of it shows on the outside in your case depends above all on the time of birth: it determines which zodiac sign was coming up over the eastern horizon at that moment. What this point contributes is set out under ascendant; what sets Sagittarius apart from its eleven neighbours is shown by the overview of the zodiac signs.

In one sentence: love and work set Sagittarius the same task. They have to bear that every decision closes a few doors — and to notice that the doors which have shut cost them less than the things they never finished.