Why look at the asteroids in your chart? Asteroids can bring to light skills you may not have been aware you had, others you think you may have but aren’t quite sure, and still others that reflect your personality in deeply insightful ways.

In natal charts, I frequently see asteroids reflecting interests, overall orientation to the world, career choices, and even potentials we may not have previously considered. I believe they do this in every natal chart—why they’re worth looking into. I also find them an insightful way to connect with mythology as well as the larger universe, if you’re into that idea.

Zodiac symbols and Air France lines superimposed on a celestial map, ca. 1939.

In relationship charts, synastry and composites, they can also be remarkable (see my recent post on George and Amal Clooney). But they’re significant in every chart: see Alex Miller’s take on Donald Trump’s 2018 solar return, for example—in which, he points out, the Sun and Moon are opposing asteroids Lie and Mueller.

I’ve quoted my mentor Dawn Bogrodi on the asteroids:

The one thing that has revealed itself to me very clearly over the past five years or so is that the asteroids definitely give pinpoint definition to a chart (particularly through progressions). They can be quite shocking when exact. … I’ve been working with a number of specific asteroids, but the rules seem to apply to all of them.

Some folks I work with ask: “Are the asteroids in everyone’s chart?” Indeed, they certainly are. But asteroids do have orbits, just like planets—meaning that as they move, they’re aspecting varying locations in every single chart.

Here’s how to quickly find asteroids in your charts.

1. Go to Astro.com. If you don’t know it, Astrodienst is a wonderful resource—one of the very best on the web.
2. Plug in your birth data and create an account if you’d like.
3. Next, navigate to “Free Horoscopes” at the top menu bar. Beneath “Charts & Calculations,” choose “Extended Chart Selection” at the far right. A new screen will open which should, if you have just entered your own birth data, list your birth chart at the pull-down menu at the top. If not, click “Add a new person” at the right and add your birth data, after which you’ll automatically return to the extended chart options.
4. Next, scroll down and fill in the following: for chart type, choose “Natal Chart Wheel.” For chart drawing style, I use Astrodienst with asteroids (this will display the major asteroids)—or pick what you like.
5. Now scroll to “Additional objects” at the bottom of the page. You’ll see a list at the far left. I like to add the Vertex, Mean Node, Descending Node, and Part of Fortune. In the middle column, you’ll find “Asteroid name/number list” and “List of fixed stars.”
6. Click on “Asteroid name/number list,” and an alphabet arrives. Click on any letter to browse through the named asteroids beginning with that letter. For example, maybe you’d like to search for your mother’s name—say it’s Joan. Click on the letter J. After a brief moment, the full list of asteroids starting with the letter J will appear. In my Chrome browser, I’ll then tap control-F (“find”), and type in the first few letters of what I’m searching for. The asteroid list will automagically advance to, in fact, Joan—number 2677.
7. Click on the check box at left in the list to select “Joan” or your own asteroid of choice, which will add it to the box in the far-right column. You can also look up asteroid numbers and add them to the manual entry box, separated by commas.
8. Tap “Click here to show the chart.”  Astrodienst can show up to 10 additional points in a chart at a time. To look at more, click on “Back to the chart selection” at the top of your newly displayed chart—that way, your previous selections will be retained and you won’t have to enter them again.

I’ll explore specific asteroids in future posts, but a great place to start is with the names or closest approximation of the names of family, partners, good friends—even exes, if you’d like possible insight into why it didn’t work.

Happy asteroid hunting. Share your discoveries in the comments!