The Element Encyclopedia of Birthdays

Copyright

Thorsons

An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers

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London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published as The Element Encyclopedia of Birthdays by HarperCollinsPublishers 2007

This revised and updated edition published 2020

SECOND EDITION

© Theresa Cheung 2007, 2020

Cover layout design © HarperCollinsPublishers 2020

Cover illustrations © Kathleen Edwards and Shutterstock.com (stars)

Text illustrations by Andrew Paciorek

A catalogue record of this book is available from the British Library

Theresa Cheung asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

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Source ISBN: 9780008393519

Ebook Edition © November 2020 ISBN: 9780007357093

Version 2021-01-19

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Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Note to Readers

Welcome to a Whole New World of Birthdays!

Introduction: The Life-changing Power of the Day You Were Born

Heed Your Signs

366 Birthday Profiles: Your Cosmic Yearbook

January

AQUARIUS: The Water Carrier

(January 20–February 18)

February

PISCES: The Fishes

(February 19–March 20)

March

ARIES: The Ram

(March 21–April 19)

April

TAURUS: The Bull

(April 20–May 20)

May

GEMINI: The Twins

(May 21–June 20)

June

CANCER: The Crab

(June 21–July 22)

July

LEO: The Lion

(July 23–August 22)

August

VIRGO: The Virgin

(August 23–September 22)

September

LIBRA: The Scales

(September 23–October 22)

October

SCORPIO: The Scorpion

(October 23–November 21)

November

SAGITTARIUS: The Archer

(November 22–December 21)

December

CAPRICORN: The Goat

(December 22–January 19)

The Best and Worst of Days

Reach for Your Stars

Acknowledgments

About the Author

About the Publisher

Welcome to a Whole New World of Birthdays!

“No wise man ever wished to be younger.”

Jonathan Swift

The day you were born and the day you find out why are often said to be the two most important days of your life! You already know how special your birthday is. But do you know what your purpose is?

Finding meaning in life can prove to be elusive, especially today as the world struggles to reset following the grief, pain and confusion caused by the coronavirus pandemic and the much-needed exposure of global inequality and injustice. Not to mention the relentless rise of materialism, narcissism and fake news. It’s not surprising many of us feel directionless and are searching for guidance and comfort in ancient wisdom and New Age insights. That’s why I’m over the moon that The Encyclopedia of Birthdays has earned itself a much-needed reissue to speak loud and clear to modern times. It will show you that the two most important days of your life are powerfully linked. Harnessing the mystical potential of the day you were born can help you find your meaning and feel like you are born again.

And for those who are skeptical that there is a mystical power associated with the day of your birth, and everything in the cosmos might be linked, I’d like to offer some pause for thought. One of the greatest scientific minds of our generation, physicist Stephen Hawking, died on March 14, which just so happens to be the birthday of another scientific genius, Albert Einstein. And if that poetic synchronicity were not enough, Hawking was born on January 8, the day that another scientific mover and shaker, Galileo, died.

To return the spotlight to actual date of birth: legendary singers Elvis Presley and Shirley Bassey share the same birthday, as do Elton John and Aretha Franklin. Footballers Ronaldo and Neymar, actors Emma Thompson and Emma Watson, comedians Spike Milligan and Charlie Chaplin, Stephen Merchant and Billy Connolly, and politicians Margaret Thatcher and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez are just a few of the countless shared birthdays this book will showcase. Sometimes the personality similarities or driving forces are so strong for people born on the same day of the year it is impossible to dismiss their shared date of birth as just “coincidence.” Of course, the expression of a birthday’s cosmic potential will be utterly unique to each individual’s free choice but, more often than not, when you start to research influential people born on the same day certain common themes, challenges and blessings can be identified. This book will attempt to outline those commonalities in the hope that it will inspire everyone to fulfill their own infinite potential for making a positive impact on the world.

When this book was first published as a weighty hardback in 2007, and a slimmed-down paperback version a few years later, New Age practices were not enjoying the popularity they have today. Despite this, the book struck a familiar chord and over time started to gather a following. I had no idea how cherished it would eventually become but over the years I have received countless messages from people all over the world saying that understanding their birth date potential has helped them understand themselves and their lives better. Some have told me that knowing their profile positively transformed their lives, careers and relationships. As an author there can be nothing more humbling and rewarding to hear from your readers than that the insights you have shared have changed their lives for the better.

Being given the opportunity to update this book close to fifteen years after it was first written, so that it can speak clearly to what is current in our lives today, ensures its relevance. It is also a personal dream come true. I hope this fully updated version will remain a life-changing classic for many, many more birthdays to come.

New Birthday Revelations

This birthday encyclopedia is a resource and guide to personality and finding purpose for people born on each of the 366 days of the year. Simply by knowing birth dates you can discover insightful and accurate, luck-making information about yourself—your strengths, weaknesses, health, relationships, destiny, career and life goals—as well as about your loved ones, family, friends, colleagues, and even people you have just met. Be aware that the emphasis for each profile is on learning. From a spiritual perspective the purpose of life is to evolve. So even if you feel directionless or are going through a tough time, as long as you are learning about yourself you are evolving and living a life of meaning.

You can also use this book for guidance and inspiration every single day of the year. Indeed, this reissue aims to become a wider resource than one for simply looking up your own birthday profile and those of people you know. It is a handbook for daily cosmic guidance. Understanding and harnessing the unique energies and themes associated with each day of the year can maximize your chances of success and happiness on that particular day. This yearbook approach is also beneficial for those who, for some reason or another, are not sure what day of the year their birthday is. If this is the case for you, let this book help you seize your own destiny in your hands. As you review each day of the year, find the profile that speaks most to your personality and declare that day your special birthday.

The Profiles

It is important to point out from the onset that the power of your birthday is determined not just by your sun sign but by a number of other invisible influences and patterns in place the day you were born. This book reaches infinitely beyond popular sun-sign astrology, looking at influences and patterns through the lens of both Western and Chinese astrology, as well as incorporating numerology, Tarot, color theory, characteristics of influential people born on a specific day and, last but by no means least, the very real science linking personality and month of birth that is out there.

To help you understand how your birthday profile and the unique insight into your personality that it offers have been compiled, you’ll find the basic principles of these ancient and modern arts, and how they have put their stamp on you, explained in the Introduction. But if you want to dive straight into a specific birth profile, whether yours or one of somebody you know, you can always return here another time. Whichever way you decide to read this birthday encyclopedia, be sure to take a moment first to digest the information below about how you can make the very best use of this book. Also, be sure to remember that every person is born unique and bursting with potential, just as each new day is also unique and bursting with potential.

How to Use This Book

The Encyclopedia of Birthdays is organized as a yearbook, starting on 1 January and ending on 31 December, but it is also arranged in parts: the Introduction, Heed Your Signs, 366 Birthday Profiles and Reach for Your Stars.

I have updated the Introduction to take into account Chinese astrology, research into personality influenced by month of birth and other influences. It also explains how I compiled each of the 366 birthday personality profiles. You’ll see that they are a unique combination of ancient and modern, spiritual and psychological perspectives. You’ll also discover how putting all these influences together can help you become an expert on yourself and others. You are strongly advised to read the Introduction before reading your individual birthday profile. The information and advice there will inform and enrich what you read in your profile.

Then, after you’ve read the Introduction, the next step is to refer to Heed Your Signs. There, to get you thinking along the right lines about your birthday profile, you will find listed the pages relevant to generic personality traits for your sun sign and its Chinese equivalent. This is helpful information as, whether you feel true to your sun sign or not, the sun is a symbol of your hidden potential and the life lessons you need to learn.

Be sure also to check out Reach for the Stars, the final section of this book, too—preferably before you jump to your individual birthday profile. This will encourage you to see the book not just as a single profile for your birthday or a group of profiles for people you know, but as a daily cosmic planner you can dip into every single day of the year for guidance and inspiration. Indeed, you are strongly advised to use this book in this way because, from a spiritual perspective, every night when we gently fade away to the land of sleep, we “die” and are “reborn” again the next morning, therefore making every new day a special “birthday.”

The 366 Birthday Profiles are, of course, the main body of the book. They have all been updated to speak to modern times. I could write an entire manuscript on each day of the year because of the wealth of information I could potentially include. But due to space restrictions, I have instead focused on the key information and the most important themes. If you want more insight or want to know more about how to interpret and make the most of your birthday potential, you are welcome to contact me.

How to Contact Me

You can message me via my trusty reader email: [e-mail]. But in keeping with this book I have moved with the times and you can now contact me via my Facebook, Instagram and Twitter author pages. You can also message me via: www.theresacheung.com. Do subscribe to my newsletter if you visit my website. It’s a way for me to share the latest research and to update you about birthdays and other New Age topics.

Feel free to get in touch if you have any questions, insights or stories you want to share with me and potentially with a wider audience. I endeavor to reply to everyone who reaches out to me. But please bear in mind that sometimes it can take a while to reply if life is superbusy, or I need to take a little time out to celebrate a birthday or two.

And now, without further ado, welcome to a whole new world of birthdays!

Step-by-step guide to getting the best out of this book

1 1. Read the Introduction.

2 2. Read the pages relevant to you in Heed Your Signs.

3 3. Read the closing sections of the book.

4 4. Read and reflect deeply on your individual birthday profile.

5 5. Read and reflect on the profiles of loved ones and friends, and anyone you care to understand better.

6 6. Use this book every day as a cosmic yearbook, reading and reflecting on a profile a day to guide and inspire you, and align you with the invisible influences and hidden potential that shapes each day of the year.

Introduction: The Life-changing Power of the Day You Were Born

“There was a star danced, and under that I was born.”

William Shakespeare

What exactly is a birthday profile? In short, it’s the rebirth of ancient arts—astrology, Chinese astrology, numerology, Tarot, and color theory or chromotherapy—threaded together by a modern psychological interpretation. Every profile also takes into account studies into how the month of a person’s birth shapes their personality, along with research into what personality traits highly influential people born on a specific day have in common. This unique combination results in a blend of cosmic and earthly, ancient and modern influences that can significantly affect your personality and destiny, providing you with invaluable insight into yourself as well as the lives, feelings, hopes and fears of loved ones, family, friends, colleagues and everyone else who crosses your path in life.

To help you better understand exactly how each birthday profile has been created, I have included the basic principles of these ancient arts and modern practices. You will see that individually each one can shine a light on the person you are but, when blended altogether, they can provide an exciting road map to your infinite potential.

The Basics of Astrology

Astrology regards personality and destiny as being influenced by the state of the cosmos at the exact moment of birth. The sun, the moon and the planets are seen as basic energies or life forces, and these forces take on different expressions depending on their position in relation to the place and time of a person’s birth. A birth or natal chart, also known as a horoscope, records the position of the planets when a person is born. It also looks at how these planets move over the course of their life and the influence such cosmic shifts can potentially have.

Astrology is an ancient practice dating way back in time to Babylonian, Egyptian and Aztec cultures. For centuries in the West, astrology was chiefly used for divination (fortune-telling) purposes by nobles and royalty. It fell out of favor in the seventeenth century and, as science developed, it was dismissed as superstition, but it never completely lost its appeal. In the early twentieth century interest in astrology re-emerged, this time not as a predictive technique but rather as a psychological tool for greater self-knowledge or awareness.

From the 1960s onward the popularity of astrology began to rise, with increasing numbers of people seeking a spiritual perspective on life. Today, astrology is not so much seen as a divination tool but as a self-help or personal-growth aid to finding meaning in life. Another modern development is that astrology is no longer regarded as complicated and requiring professional interpretation. These days anyone can learn about astrology and use its wisdom as a way to help them understand themselves and fulfill their potential.

Most of us know and identify with the characteristics of our sun sign—for example, Aries, Taurus and so on. The sun travels through the 12 signs of the zodiac through the course of the year and so when someone is said to have been born under Pisces, they were born when the sun was passing through the portion of the zodiac named after the constellation of Pisces. Each of the 12 signs has defining personality traits, with the elements of fire, water, earth and air also affecting each sun sign.

The 12 sun or zodiac signs correspond roughly to the 12 months of the year, and each of these sun signs symbolizes archetypes or universal life experiences. In your life you need to journey through the entire zodiac wheel of life and understand the experiences of all the other sun signs, but your sun sign reveals the major personality characteristics you are born to learn and express.

Although two people born under the same sun sign may share general personality traits, the reason they will not be entirely the same personality-wise is that the positions of the other planets will be different, depending on their motion on the day and at the time and place of birth. For example, as the sun travels through the zodiac sign over the course of a month, it passes through three periods of time called decanates, making each decanate approximately ten days long. Each decanate adds the influences of its own associated planet and sign to the basic influences of the sun sign. Therefore, by considering the decanate as well as the sun sign, you can fine-tune the reading for an individual’s birthday. Let’s look at an example. An Aries born sometime in the second decanate (March 31 to April 9) will be under the additional influence of the second decanate sign of Leo and the star associated with Leo, which is the sun. The ancient Egyptian astrologers considered the decanates to be as important as the sun signs themselves.

Progressions are another important consideration, especially for predictive purposes. The sun takes about thirty years to journey (or progress) through each sign of the zodiac and, in a person’s lifetime, it will typically move through three to four zodiac signs, depending on the lifespan of the individual and their date of birth. Each time the sun progresses from one sign to another, this indicates a significant birthday or time in life when there is likely to be a dramatic change in either circumstances or outlook. For example, the progressed sun of a Scorpio born on November 9 will move into Sagittarius at the age of 13, into Capricorn at the age of 43 and then Aquarius at the age of 73. That’s why you’ll notice that in each of the 366 profiles I have made reference to specific ages.

Fixed stars associated with a particular day of the year also exert additional influences, and other astrological factors come into play, but if decanates and progressions sound confusing, don’t worry. You don’t need to have your birth chart drawn up or to consult complicated tables to use this book. I have taken all the calculations and relevant interpretations into account when compiling each birthday profile. All you need to do is read your profile and let it inspire you to reach your full potential.

Sun-sign date variations

You may notice variations in the dates given for your sun sign, depending on which source you consult. This is because the zodiac has 360 degrees, whereas a year has 365 days, or 366 if it is a leap year. In addition, the sun does not enter the various sections of the zodiac on exactly the same date each year. The dates in this book try to take into account sun-sign variations from one year to another, but if you are born within two or three days of the dates given for each sign, your birthday lies on what astrologers call the cusp. If you were born on a cusp this is exciting, as you can read and benefit from the sun-sign insight in the Heed Your Signs section for two signs—the one your birthday falls in and the sign that follows or precedes it. For example, if you were born on April 19, you will share both Aries and Taurus characteristics. If you were born on September 23, you will share both Libra and Virgo traits. Needless to say, I have taken the characteristics of both signs into account when creating all the cusp birthday profiles. And, if you were born a few hours after or a few hours before midnight, you may want to read the profile for the day before or after your birthday too, as those influences will cross over to your birthday.