Using Your Birth Chart to Unlock Your Creativity

Remember when you were a kid and you didn’t question your creativity?

You drew on everything, made up stories and invented entire worlds out of nothing. Not because you were “creative,” but because it was your right to dream.

For many people, somewhere along the way things got busy, the “I shoulds” of life creeped in, and something changed. Creativity became something you either had or didn’t. Something reserved for artists and creatives. Something you needed time for, talent for, and permission for.

In the words of creativity expert Julia Cameron, “We are, ourselves, creations. And we, in turn, are meant to continue creativity by being creative.” At a certain point in your self-discovery journey, you realize you’re not just living your life, you’re actively shaping it. And the quality of what you create is directly tied to how connected you are to that creative part of yourself.

Tapping into your creativity, even in small ways, can help open up your world to new possibilities. The more you connect with the artist within (whatever that might mean to you), somehow, life starts to become the creation of your dreams.

And here’s where it gets interesting. Your creativity isn’t random. It has a blueprint.

Your birth chart maps how you naturally express, imagine, build, and bring things into the world. Not in a vague, inspirational way, but in a way that’s actually usable if you understand the framework.

Let’s break it down ✨

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P.S. We just started a 12-week run of The Artist’s Way with the Lora community, and it’s already opening something up. We’re meeting weekly to reconnect with our creative instincts, challenge old patterns, and see what happens when we actually make space for this part of ourselves again.

Week 2 is this Thursday at 6pm EST. It’s free to join if you want in.

Understanding Your Creative Strengths Using Your Birth Chart

By expert astrologer, Michelle Grodnick

So what does this have to do with astrology?

If you’ve ever felt creatively blocked, scattered, or unsure where to put your energy, your birth chart can show you why.

Your chart is the map of the sky at the moment you were born, but more importantly, it’s a map of how you naturally move through the world. Including you create.

Your birth chart lays out where your creativity is naturally seamless, but of course, it’s up to you to take the leap. Let’s see where you land.

First, I want you to find three things in your chart:

• your 5th house

• your 9th house

• your Venus

(If you don’t have your chart in the wheel format below, you can get it here for free).

Above, I’ve highlighted the houses and inserted the symbol for Venus.

Let’s talk houses. You want to identify the house cusps of the 5th and 9th houses. In the blank chart above, I highlighted these houses in yellow and marked the house cusps in red. Look at the signs the house cusps are in. This is the sign that “rules the house.”

Among other things, the 5th and 9th houses rule your creativity and curiosity, respectively.

• 5th house = your creative powerhouse, and represents what you want to create —pleasure, hobbies, and your artistic self live here.

• 9th house = your house of higher learning, and shows you the topics that pique your curiosity. Don’t you love that feeling when you’re just obsessed with a new topic? That’s your 9th house talking.

If the 5th house is what you create, the 9th house is what feeds it. For the most part, the 5th and 9th houses will be ruled by the same element.

For houses ruled by Fire (Aries, Leo, Sagittarius:)

Your creativity needs energy, risk, and visibility. You come alive when you’re doing, performing, or pushing yourself into new experiences.

Think:

• Performance: acting, improv, karaoke

• Movement: dance, fitness, anything physical

• Competition: sports, races, group challenges

• Travel and doing things for the story

• Big perspective shifts: philosophy, debate, culture

For houses ruled by Earth (Taurus, Virgo, Capricorn):

Your creativity is grounded in the physical world. You build, refine, and create through what you can touch and shape.

Think:

• Nature: gardening, hiking, working with plants

• Food: cooking, experimenting, hosting

• Spaces: interior design, creating environments

• Beauty: fashion, skincare, tactile aesthetics

• Turning hobbies into something tangible or even a business

For houses ruled by Air (Gemini, Libra, Aquarius):

Your creativity lives in ideas and connection. You create through thinking, sharing, and bringing people together.

Think:

• Writing, storytelling, podcasting

• Connecting people and building communities

• Learning constantly for the sake of it

• Analyzing culture, trends, media

• Working in spaces that involve communication or collective thinking

For houses ruled by Water (Cancer, Scorpio, Pisces):

Your creativity runs through emotion, intuition, and depth. You’re pulled toward what’s felt, not just what’s seen.

Think:

• Emotional expression: poetry, music, storytelling

• Creative escapism: film, photography, daydreaming

• Spiritual & occult exploration: astrology, tarot, human design, mediumship, energy work

• Healing arts: psychology, shadow work, the subconscious, what lies beneath the surface

• Nostalgia & memory: history, scrapbooking, revisiting the past

Once you identify the signs that rule each house, find the ruling planet of the house. The guide below lays out ruling planets:

Aries: Mars

Taurus: Venus

Gemini: Mercury

Cancer: The Moon

Leo: The Sun

Virgo: Mercury

Libra: Venus

Scorpio: Mars and Pluto

Sagittarius: Jupiter

Capricorn: Saturn

Aquarius: Saturn and Uranus

Pisces: Jupiter and Neptune

House by house, take note of each ruling planet’s position by asking yourself the following questions:

• What sign is the ruling planet in?

• What house is the ruling planet in?

• Does the ruling planet make any aspects with other planets?

The information on the ruling planet of the house can uncover more details as to what you are meant to create (5th house), and the natural flow of your creativity (9th house).

Venus is such an important layer of your creative life because Venus is about pleasure, romance, and self-love. And according to Julia Cameron, “The artist brain is the sensory brain: sight and sound, smell and taste, touch. These are the elements of magic, and magic is the elemental stuff of art…[In being creative] think magic. Think delight. Think fun.”

Find Venus in your chart. Note its sign (use the element guide above), its house placement, and if it makes aspects with any other planets. Let’s look at a quick guide for Venus through the houses as it relates to your creative life:

Venus in the 1st house: Pleasure through self-expression, embodiment, and being seen. Think fashion & style choices, beauty experimentation, and physical movement like dance.

Venus in the 2nd house: Pleasure through the senses. Think nature, textiles, physical objects like tchotchkes, and ceramics.

Venus in the 3rd house: Pleasure through words, ideas, and connection. Think writing, journaling, podcasting, and storytelling.

Venus in the 4th house: Pleasure through home, memory, and emotional safety. Think water themes like scrapbooking, nostalgia, and healing arts.

Venus in the 5th house: Pleasure through play, romance, and creative expression. Think performance, artistic hobbies, romanticizing life, and passion projects.

Venus in the 6th house: Pleasure through ritual, routine, and refinement. Think small daily creative acts, food & gardening, and “tending to your craft.”

Venus in the 7th house: Pleasure through partnership and collaboration. Create with friends, in partnership, or in social settings. Your creativity flows when you bring people together.

Venus in the 8th house: Pleasure through depth, intimacy, and transformation. Think the occult, healing arts, and anything that involves deep investigation & truth.

Venus in the 9th house: Pleasure through exploration, meaning, and perspective. Think travel, philosophy, and cross-cultural experiences.

Venus in the 10th house: Pleasure through recognition and building something visible. Your creative joy may become a business, and you are constantly working to improve your craft. Performance is also a plus.

Venus in the 11th house: Pleasure through community, collaboration, and shared vision. Your creativity is innovative and future-focused.

Venus in the 12th house: Pleasure through spirituality, imagination, and dreams. Think water themes like emotional art and creative escapism.

Remember to combine the above themes with the Venus sign as well for a clearer picture of your sense of pleasure & joy.

This exercise is just one way for you to learn more about how to unblock your creativity. Remember– the chart is multidimensional, nuanced, and detailed, so when we are looking at it in a vacuum like this, things might not totally line up because you’re not taking the entire chart into account. When it comes to astrology, always take what resonates and leave the rest (or just tuck it away for later– it might make more sense later in life).

Practitioner Spotlight

At Lora, we spotlight incredible spiritual practitioners every week, and we’re so excited to introduce you to expert Astrologer and career consultant, Jo Spotswood!

Lora: Tell us a bit about you and your practice.

Jo: I’m an ex-corporate girlie turned astrologer, career services provider, composer, and professional ADHDer, thank you very much. I have a music degree, and yet I worked on Wall Street and later at a hedge fund because why not? Within those companies, I worked in talent acquisition and talent development. Now, as a career services provider, I rewrite people’s resumes, LinkedIn profiles, and help them prepare for interviews.

I also offer a service that joins astrology and career services called Cosmic Career Consulting. As an astrologer, I found myself putting on my recruiter hat during readings when career quandaries came up. Many of my resume writing clients have turned into astrology clients. Therefore, I was giving readings to people for whom I was already very aware of their career pivot goals, and weaving career consulting and job search strategy into the reading was natural.

As for my astrology practice, I believe in using astrology to identify individual and ancestral patterns that affect you in this lifetime. I provide birth chart readings in which I walk you through the energetic blueprint of your life. That includes your blessings, blocks, inherited patterns, and clues to working with them.

Finally, I’m based in NYC. I’m gay. A lot of my clients are gay or trans, and I love looking at birth charts through a queer lens.

Lora: What moment or realization made astrology “click” for you in a real, lived way?

Jo: I got my first birth chart reading when I was 18 from the astrologer who later became my teacher, Sarah Barab. During that reading, Sarah asked me what happened around a specific date because it looked very accident-prone and dangerous. I told her that I crashed my car on the specific date she mentioned, and she looked unsurprised! How did she know that?! 8 years later, I started taking astrology classes with her to eventually figure out what she saw.

Then, last spring (2025), Sarah gave me a forecast reading. (Yes, astrologers still get readings from other astrologers!) During that forecast reading, she told me dates to be extra careful of my physical body. She told me it would be a great time to go on a retreat and basically not go anywhere. I didn’t like hearing this, even though I saw what she saw in my transit chart.

I marked my calendar for when to be extra careful, and I spent most of that period in a forced creative retreat at home... because I– wait for it– BROKE MY FOOT at an event 2 days into the time period for which she told me to be extra careful and basically not go anywhere.

I know these aren’t fun examples, but they’re viscerally accurate, and why I wanted to study with my teacher in the first place.

Lora: Tell us your thoughts on the astrology of 2026 and how it’s likely showing up in people’s everyday lives right now.

Jo: Dissolving of boundaries, structures, in some ways constraints. Everyone getting gayer (woohoo!) with Uranus entering Gemini (I say that tongue in cheek). Revolution toward personal authenticity with Pluto in Aquarius. Struggles with pacing yourself -- too fast or too slow -- with Saturn in Aries. Delusions, illusions, romanticization, and disillusionment about war and masculinity with Neptune in Aries.

Lora: What’s a recurring life theme you see in your readings right now (love, career pivots, endings, rebirth, boundaries), and how do you help people work with it instead of resisting it?

Jo: Saturn transits. Accepting that something is going to suck for a little bit and that’s just part of the process. I provide the space for them to process their discontent and to feel validated about the struggle that they’re currently going through, reflecting back to them that both the stars and I agree that their struggle is very real.

And that it’s going to amount to that person becoming very good at the things they’re struggling with, in time. And eventually, that’ll be one of their superpowers, and it’ll all make sense in retrospect. You’re just too close to the threads now to see how it fits into the tapestry of your life.

Oh, and career pivots. More on that later!

Reflection Practice from Jo: Journal about it right when you’re done with the natal chart reading. Write down what resonated, and please, please, please don’t carry with you the things that did not feel helpful. If you feel like an interpretation of a certain aspect of your chart didn’t serve you, please disregard it instead of having it sit in the back of your mind.

Upcoming Events

Lora hosts free wellness, spirituality, and “woo woo” events in NYC and virtually. Here’s a roundup of some upcoming events!

Tomorrow, 4/22: In this virtual event, we will dive into Reiki and the power it holds for manifesting. Hosted by expert Reiki practitioner, Ishita Argawal, this workshop will help you learn more about Reiki, manifestation, and its power on the human body and mind! RSVP now to reserve your spot for this week!

May 6th: We’re hosting an exciting career panel with three incredible panelists (including this week’s spotlighted practitioner, Jo, on Wednesday, 5/6, in Flatiron in NYC. If you’re looking for career clarity (which, aren’t we all), we’ll be diving in on how to best uncover it! There’s also a virtual livestream, so even if you’re not in NYC, RSVP below!

The Big Build: How We’re Creating Lora

There’s something we keep seeing over and over again as we’ve been building Lora and chatting more with fellow astrology lovers.

People don’t just want to understand themselves through astrology. They want to find themselves in other people.

Not in a surface-level way. In a “you think like me, you feel like me, you move through the world like me, you tick the way I tick” kind of way.

That’s exactly why we built Match Labs inside Lora’s Discord.

Inside our Discord, we match you based on your Big Three, the houses your Sun and Moon live in, your Mercury, and other placements in order to help you connect with others who might share some of these deeper patterns that actually shape how you think, feel, and relate.

If you’ve ever wanted to find your people through astrology - this is where it happens.

Join us in the Discord to meet your matches, and don’t forget to get matched in the Zodiac Match Lab here to meet your big three twins!

And don’t forget, we’re hosting The Artist’s Way workshop weekly on Thursday’s with our Substack community! Fill out the form below if you want to join in!

Thanks for joining us this week in our little center of the cosmos. We’ll see you next week 🪐