The Moon in the Houses
The Moon | The Moon in the Signs
The Moon in the houses can reveal where and how we go about seeking emotional satisfaction.
Important clues to the reason for perpetual emotional unrest can be found through the study of the house position of the Moon, and these take the form of constant changes or ups and downs in the areas of life ruled by the house. It is in these areas that we should aim to make deep attachments rather than superficial and temporary emotional thrills if we are seeking out a true feeling of belonging and emotional fulfillment.
Moon in the 1st House
Your feelings are right out there for everyone to see, and you can come across as emotional and impatient, or nurturing and caring (or both). Your first reaction is emotional, especially if the Moon is in close proximity (within ten degrees) of the Ascendant degree. You need emotional stimulation, movement, and freedom to express yourself in order to feel happy and fulfilled.
Your moods are very changeable, and this can be quite obvious to others. Because of your emotional sensitivity, you might often take things too personally, and react too quickly. Developing an awareness that others’ emotions are just as important, even if they are not as overt and immediate as yours, will be important.
*You have a soft exterior and tend to relate very personally and sympathetically to other people. However, you sometimes let your emotions overpower your reasoning and logic, and consequently, you are sometimes biased in your opinions. You are impressionable and rather gentle, or at least that is the way you appear. Your feelings are on the surface and you can not hide your emotions.
Moon in the 2nd House
When it comes to money, you can be generous and frivolous in your spending habits one day, and frugal the next. You can be quite afraid of being in debt, and you need to feel that the bills are paid in order to feel secure and safe. This is likely also true of savings, as you fear being without.
Still, there are times when you can spend impulsively, on a whim, and this is likely when you are feeling emotionally frustrated. You might also hold onto people quite tightly. Vanity can be an issue. You are often looking for admiration, and you can be quite dependent on others for positive feedback until you learn to develop your own feelings of self-worth. You’re not as emotionally responsive as most people. You tend to hold back and wait before expressing yourself, and when you do it is with deliberation.
*You are likely to be a great collector of things – a real pack rat in fact – for your belongings give you a sense of security and continuity with the past, which is important to you. Antiques or things with sentimental value from your past are especially dear to you.
You may also cling rather tightly to both money and possessions, keeping them “in the family” rather than sharing freely with those outside of your immediate circle.
Moon in the 3rd House
You are very responsive, communicative, and curious. You can have a talent for imitating others and/or for picking up languages. It may be you either intellectualize your emotions rather than truly feel them and deal with them, or communicate with excessive emotion. Some of you may do both at different times, and as you mature and develop, you learn to find a balance.
Your opinions and ideas change often, and you might find that sometimes you adopt others’ points of view and express their ideas as if they were your own. This is not necessarily because you are a copy-cat, but because you sometimes fail to own your own thoughts, and you are so very sensitive to others’ opinions. You might be quite nervous and restless, requiring frequent changes of scenery, even if the movement or travel takes place locally.
*You often make decisions solely for emotional or personal reasons, because something “feels right” or because you’ve always done it a certain way and you are uncomfortable changing it. Even when you think you’re being rational, your prejudices, intuitions, and feelings influence your thoughts a great deal. You are comfortable talking about feelings and personal subjects, and sharing confidences, which enables others to express their own inner feelings with you as well. You have good psychological insight into others.
Moon in the 4th House
You long for a sense of true belonging, but you may be quite restless in your search. You might change residence frequently, or simply feel the need to make many changes in your home.
Moving frequently may be a healthy thing if it keeps you emotionally stimulated, but if you find that you do so on whims and later regret the changes, you might want to treat it as a symptom of emotional unrest–as a sign that you are in a constant search for the perfect mood and setting, when in fact a feeling of belonging should be worked on from the inside out, not the outside in! Some of you might remain rather immature on an emotional level, never wanting to truly grow up and take care of yourself. Attachments to your past, traditions, and family are strong.
*You have strong attachments to your past, the place where you grew up, your heritage, and family traditions. In fact, you may be unable to step out of the habits and roles you learned as a child. Your tie to your mother is very strong and you also seek mothering and protection from your spouse and other family members as well.
Moon in the 5th House
You love to share emotional experiences with loved ones and have a flair for the dramatic. Love affairs are magnetic and intense, and you don’t take them lightly by any means, although you may go through much change with regard to your romances. You are attached to children, whether they’re your own or not. Your creative hobbies are subject to relatively frequent changes, and you have innate artistic talent. You have a vivid imagination and are given to daydreaming often. There is a sense that you are always in touch, or trying to get in touch, with your inner child.
If the Moon is challenged, you may have problems with impulsive shopping or gambling, or with frequent love affairs that never fully satisfy you. In any of these cases, you are more attached to the game than the player, and this is something to work on if you are looking to find true fulfillment. You might take risks just for the fun of it, but in the process, you are being irresponsible to others and to yourself.
*You are emotionally expressive and often dramatize your feelings, acting them out or blowing them out of proportion. You can not hide your instinctive emotional reactions to people or situations, and you don’t make any pretenses about your personal sympathies or antipathies.
You have a childlike openness and playfulness which is very appealing to others, but which sometimes gets you into trouble, as you take risks on impulse or whim.
Moon in the 6th House
You have an emotional need to be useful, to work productively, to be organized and on top of things, and to lead a healthy life. If these matters are chaotic in your life, it’s a symptom of emotional unrest. You need a lot of variety on the job–to be stimulated and engaged in order to feel happy. Some of you might seem to change jobs often, forever in search of the “perfect fit” job. Acceptance that any job requires some level of routine is hard for you.
You are very sensitive, and especially aware of minor health annoyances or body aches and pains. Some of you have hypochondriac symptoms. Some attempt to get out of things they don’t want to do by emphasizing health problems or even exaggerate illnesses in order to gain sympathy. At your best, however, you’re a person who always helps out and shows your affection for others in practical ways in order to help them solve problems and improve their lives.
*You have a sympathetic nature and instinctively reach out to people in need of help. You also have a deeply ingrained tendency to want to improve or “fix” other people’s lives, which can be annoying to the person who has no desire to be changed or “helped” in this way. For you, affection and caring must be expressed in tangible acts or service of some kind.
Moon in the 7th House
You are drawn to partnerships and prefer to have a companion for emotional support. You are not a person who would happily take in a movie by yourself, or dine alone, for example. A partner awakens feelings in you that you may never know you had, and you seem to need a partner to learn about your own needs and feelings.
You seek emotional fulfillment through relationships, but you may have many relationships one after another, each time believing that this is “the one.” Taking time between relationships is something that is hard for you to do, but quite necessary, as you tend to jump into relationships out of fear of being alone.
You are very adaptable to others’ needs, and usually quite likeable as a result. Be careful that you don’t become overly dependent on a partner, or assume that a partner is going to treat you the same way as you do them.
*You depend a great deal upon other people for emotional support and you have a large “family” of friends that care about you and treat you as kin. The women in your life are particularly important to you, and your relationship with them powerfully influences your sense of security and happiness. You may be overly dependent and unsure of yourself without a close partner.
Moon in the 8th House
While you have a strong need for emotional security, you are also a person who is drawn to pushing your own limits, and many lifestyle changes can be the result of this need to challenge, or reinvent, yourself emotionally. You are always fascinated with how people work, taboos, secrets, and all that is forbidden or hidden. Sexual unrest, or an apparent need to constantly change sexual partners or to challenge yourself sexually, may be a symptom of emotional insecurity.
Connecting with another person intimately is an emotional need, but your changeable emotions might often get in the way of your goal. Jealousy and possessiveness might also be qualities you struggle with. At your best, however, you are a person who is intimate, deep, and intensely loyal to a partner.
*Though you want closeness very much, you often close yourself off and do not really trust others who may wish to get to know you. You are very wholehearted in your feelings and responses to people, and you want all or nothing from the people you care for.
Moon in the 9th House
This is a position that can indicate a deep longing for stimulation above and beyond the everyday, mundane routine. You are a philosophical sort, interested and curious about the world, other people, and perhaps different cultures. You can be extremely restless and discontented if you don’t have a definite goal in mind.
You might find yourself longing to be somewhere else when you are unhappy, imagining that if you were to move or travel, you would be much happier. However, this attitude can only keep you from enjoying and improving upon the situation you are now in, only serving to make you feel more unhappy in the present and with your current circumstances.
Trying to avoid the attitude that “the grass is greener on the other side” will be important, while attending to your needs to get away from time to time will help scratch the seemingly incurable itch for something more.
*You may have done extensive traveling in your early years, or in some way had a background which enables you to understand and identify with many different types of people or cultures.
You have a craving for things which are far away and foreign or for things you have never experienced before. You want to completely immerse yourself in the feelings and tastes of a new place, rather than simply have facts or an intellectual appreciation. Emotionally, too, you are restless and something of a wanderer.
Moon in the 10th House
This position of the Moon indicates an emotional need for recognition, popularity, acknowledgement, and achievement. You can be quite charismatic. You are at your emotional best when you lead a structured and responsible life, but it can take time to get there.
You may change your goals and ambitions, and/or your profession frequently in an attempt to find the perfect fit. You may worry about living up to your image, or the expectations of your family. Decisions may be too emotionally biased, or you might act on emotional whims far too often. Learning to set your own heartfelt goals is the challenge here, as it is unlikely you will find true happiness if you follow or adopt the expectations of others, which you are especially sensitive to.
*You work well with the public and have an instinct for what the public wants and will respond to. Having a “nest” is not especially important to you, and you may invest more of your emotional energy into your career or public life than in your private life. Providing for and caring for others in a professional capacity is very likely.
Moon in the 11th House
This position of the Moon indicates an emotional need for a feeling of belonging with, and support from, friends and associations with groups. You look to acquaintances for support, and offer the same in return. A changeable or unstable social life might be a reflection of inner emotional unrest. Waxing and waning feelings for others can cause problems in your relationships.
You are a person who is filled with many dreams, wishes, and hopes for your future, and most of these are altruistic and good-hearted desires. However, you might change your aspirations frequently, with your changing moods, and have a hard time settling on goals to work towards as a result.
*You get a lot of emotional fulfillment through your involvement in groups, clubs, organizations, community activities, or a network of close friends who support and care for you. You make friends your family, and feel a close kinship with people who share some ideals or beliefs that you hold dear. You need people outside of your physical family to relate to and belong to.
Moon in the 12th House
This position of the Moon indicates an emotional attachment and sensitivity to all that is ethereal, groundless, and eternal. As sensitive as you are, you often have delayed reactions to your own emotional experiences. You need frequent moments of solitude in order to recharge yourself emotionally, and this need, while strong, can also lead to feelings of isolation and of being misunderstood.
While you are a perceptive person, you are often either flooded with emotions that are hard to define, or completely out of touch with what you are feeling. Either extreme keeps you from truly discovering your emotional needs. Negative expressions of this position are avoidance of responsibility, using hypersensitivity as an excuse to oneself (and perhaps to others) for not participating, or emotional immaturity. You are sympathetic to others’ suffering, but not always emotionally available to help.
*Your own feelings and emotions are something of an enigma to you, and it is often difficult for you to share with others what you are feeling. You frequently withdraw from contact with the world, and need a healing, peaceful environment in order to blossom and come out of yourself. You identify with the oppressed, disenfranchised or underdog in any situation and want to help them or care for them in some way.
Written by Annie, unless otherwise noted. Interpretations marked with * are sample interpretations from the Merlin report.
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