What is a Trine in Astrology?- How can I Interpret a Trine in Astrology? (Aspects for Absolute Beginners)

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Preface

This post is all about a trine formed on your birth chart between two planets that are about 120 degrees apart. A trine is a special angle formed on a birth chart and is an aspect in astrology. I will be explaining what these two terms mean but you may want to first refer to What’s a Birth Chart and / or “What are aspects in Astrology”. In this article I will go over quite a few things:

1. Trine Explanation
2. Explanation of a birth chart and planet placement
3. How to interpret a trine with examples!
   1. Planets in Astrology
   2. Zodiac Signs in Astrology
   3. Houses in Astrology

What does a trine mean on your birth chart? Short Answer: A trine means harmony between the two planets involved. These two areas of your life will work to your advantage!

What does a Trine Represent in Astrology?

A trine in astrology represents harmony & easy flow between the planets involved. It is a very fortunate aspect to have in your chart! It shows you an area for potential creative expression. The planets involved work together in a very satisfying matter! This is said to be where natural talents and gifts lie! This aspect improves other adverse aspects that may be present in the birth chart like oppositions. The planets stimulate one another to increase activity and success! Trines reveal themselves as gifts, talents, & natal advantages!

For example, if you have a trine in your chart, that means you have a connection that made is made between two planets! Let’s say that Venus is connected with Neptune because they are 120 degrees apart. What this means in astrology, is that the meaning behind these planets will be at peace and harmonious. So that would make balance between, Venus which is the planet of love, and Neptune which is the planet of creativity and imagination. If they are connected in a trine that means your love and creativity work well with each other, they create harmony in your life. (More Information on interpreting your trine below)

A trine is considered a “soft aspect” this is because, you do have to work on your trines. For example, you could be an amazing world class singer, but choose to do nothing with your talent, or you may not even know what a good vocalist you are!. The same can be similar to a trine. The planets compliment each other well and will flow with ease, if chosen to

What is a Birth Chart?

Gandhi’s Birth Chart

Because some of you may not know, the photo above is a birth chart! Every person’s birth chart varies, to look up your’s click here and fill the information on the page. It shows where the planets (and other celestial beings like the sun, moon and more) were on your date of birth and exact time of birth! Do not let this information overwhelm you, I promise it is not as scary as it looks! This chart has an awful lot of shapes in the middle of it! The shapes in the chart are made by “connecting the planets” that are a certain number of degrees apart from each other. The planet symbols are around the outside of the birth chart. They are in these positions on your chart because this is where the planets were on the day and time of your birth!

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The photo below demonstrates how birth charts connect planets. Venus is connected to the moon (The pink symbol is Venus and the moon symbol is the moon.) This is because Venus is about 180 degrees from the moon on this birth chart. 180 degress can also be counted as 6 signs away from each planet. This aspect an opposition. If you can see on the birth chart there are little “ticks” on the inner outside circle. These mark degrees, if you were to count them all they would equal 360 degrees. each zodiac sign has 30 degrees because 360 dived by 12 is 30!

 This photo below will give you an idea of how the planets all connect to each other to make the entire birth chart! Venus is connected to the moon, and Mercury (on the left) is connected to Saturn (on the right). Mercury and Saturn and linked because they are about 120 degrees from each other. You would call this aspect in astrology a trine! Which is what this article is mainly about !

For each planet, (I usually refer to them as planets but keep in mind to look for all celestial bodies), when trying to find the aspects, you are looking for other planets that are 0, 30, 60, 90, 120, 150, or 180 degrees apart from each other. Each of these relationships means something different. Don’t worry, we’re only going over one ‘degree seperation’ (or aspect) in this post. We are going to be talking about the trine named so because a triangle has 120 degrees and trines are 120 degrees apart.

There are other aspects in astrology; including squares, oppositions, conjunctions, etc these will be explained in later posts. Each of these influence your chart in different ways, and these aspects influence our personalities and life. These concepts in astrology can become complicated because you mostly need to have a firm grasp of the meaning and representation of zodiac signs in astrology, the houses in astrology, and the ruling planets of each, not to mention you should also be familiar with your own birth chart. However, I will be explaining what a trine is as simply as possible!

What is a Trine?

Literally speaking, a trine is a special angle created by your birth chart, where planets and other astrological points are about 120° apart in the circle. If you were to have three connecting trines (hard to have on a birth chart but possible!) then this would form a triangle when looked at on a chart! All trines are spaced about 4 signs apart.

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Notice the birth chart is a calendared wheel that contains the 12 zodiac symbols. In these birth charts, all of the other shapes are gone just to show you this shape. There are many many layers to these astrological charts. The points where the straight lines connect are the objects that make this triangle or trine! The two photos bellow show trines!

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How to Interpret Trines! With Examples

The birth chart above shows three trines of this person’s chart that happen to form a triangle, we will be looking at these aspects separate. (as you have seen above in the first photo, many shapes overlap each other making many different aspects in a chart). The points where the triangle’s straight lines connect are the objects that make this triangle or trine! When these planets connect we refer to it as, or we call it  “Planet” trines “Planet”.  For example, Neptune trines Venus.

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In the photo above Venus (pink symbol) trines Saturn (red symbol) these two planets make a trine! Jupiter (blue symbol) trines Saturn connecting them makes another trine .Venus also trines Jupiter (blue symbol), which makes up the third trine!

There are 3 steps to fully interpreting what your trine means:

Step one is to identify and define your planet (Venus the planet of love),

Step two is to identify what sign that planet is in (Leo the Lion) we find this out by looking to see where venus is located on the chart,

Step three is find what house it is affecting (III Communication) we find this by counting the defined 12 triangles that make up the chart separating each sign. I will fully explain how to do this below!

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1. The First Step to interpret what your trine means is to find the planets involved. 

Just like I explained above, there are many aspects to interpreting your trines. The first step is to understand what each planet means in astrology. Here is a quick simplistic list of the planets and other objects on a chart.

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Quick Reference to Planet Meanings in Astrology

This means that if these planets trine, you can know what is complementing each other. For example, Mercury trines Venus, this would mean that your communication and thought process is harmonious in the way you love! Maybe your communication makes you more lovable, or you are able to communicate your love in a peaceful way! You can mix all of the planets that trine on your chart and you will know that they work well together!

2. The Second Step to interpret what your trine means is to find the signs that your planets are in!

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If you are familiar with astrology, then you probably know this concept. (Your Moon in Libra, Venus in Virgo, Ascendant in Aries etc.) But for those who do not know, on your birth chart, each planet has a sign based on where it was on the sky, when you were born.

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In this particular photo the Venus is in Pisces (the pink symbol represents the planet Venus and is in the Pisces placement on the wheel) the Jupiter in Cancer (the blue symbol represents Jupiter and is in the Cancer placement on the wheel) and the Saturn in Scorpio make a triangle on the chart. Which means that they are three separate trines. These three planets, Venus, Jupiter, and Saturn are all 120 degrees apart from each other, forming three trines.

Here is how to interpret the trines above, we’ll focus on one first, Venus trines Juptier. We know from the chart above that Venus is in Pisces. If you research Venus in Pisces then you will know that their love is unconditional when in this placement. We also know from the chart that Jupiter is in Cancer. If you research Jupiter in Cancer then you will know that their luck is abundant when in this placement. So finally, this Venus trines Jupiter, means their unconditional love will stimulate and work smoothly with their abundance of luck!

The zodiac signs are a bit more complicated to create a quick chart, if you just google the placement, you can find short descriptions! (Posts Coming Soon!)

3. The Third Step to completely finding what your trine means is to find what Astrological ‘House’ this is happening.

This concept confused me for a long time, and I intend to explain it well to not confuse you! Here are two birth charts placed next to each other

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Notice the inner tics of the inner circle. It starts with AS (your ascendant), then II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, IIX, IX, MH (Midheaven), XI, XII. These tics and sections represent the “houses” in your birth chart. Only focus on these tics for now!

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These sections are called the houses of astrology! Each house has their own meaning. (Short meanings below). Each birth chart will have different signs in their houses. Houses are always 30 degrees apart. In the photos above, Venus and Mercury are in the eighth house. Saturn is in the second house. Pluto is in the ninth house etc. We know this because the planets are in that signs domain during your birth. The placement of these columns never change, the houses will always be in that position, the thing that changes is the turning of the zodiac signs on the wheel.

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Notice above that the symbols are all in different places on each chart. Aquarius is near the 1st house on the first photo, on the second it is in the 12th house, on the third photo is is in the 4th house.

Quick Reference to House Meanings in Astrology

Now, to finally put all that we have gathered together, we know that we have a trine. We have found two planets that are 120 degrees apart. We’ve also found the signs for each planet. Now let’s add the extra dimension of knowing what it means in the house it is in.

Let’s look at a new example and start from the beginning!

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Let’s say from the charts above the two connecting planets are Mars and Venus. We know from the chart above that there is one connection that create this trine.

Step one, find the planets, we know that Mars is the planet of passion and aggression, and also that Venus is the planet of love. Step two, find the signs, Mars is in Libra and Venus is in Gemini. So far, we have researched that this Mars in Libra means this person is fair and balanced, and that this Venus in Gemini means this person is giving in love. Step three is to find out what area of life this is happening in! (What house). Mars is in the 10th house, the house of career; Venus is in the 6th house, the house of health. 

To summarize, Mars trines Venus in this chart means, their passion (mars) for peace (libra) is associated with their career (10th house), is in harmony with their compassionate (gemini) in love (venus) which is mainly affecting their health (6th house).

For example, because they are so giving in their passions, they feel that they are healthy, their love may be in harmony with this practicality and help their understanding of letting things go in relationships.  

I hope I’ve given you some understanding of what a trine is in astrology!

Feel free to leave a comment if you have any thoughts or questions!

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