If the planets are the actors of a chart, the aspects are the relationships between them — the angles the planets make to one another across the sky. Aspects show how the different drives within you talk: easily, tensely, or intensely. They are what turn a list of placements into a living conversation.
The major aspects are defined by angle. The conjunction (0°) is two planets in the same place, their energies blending and merging, each colouring the other strongly. The sextile (60°) is gentle opportunity and quiet support — a possibility that opens when you make a little effort. The square (90°) is tension and friction, the engine that drives growth. The trine (120°) is harmony, natural flow and inborn talent. The opposition (180°) is two poles facing each other: a balance and a tug-of-war, a place where you come to know yourself through another.
The “hard” aspects, such as the square and opposition, challenge and provoke — the friction that shapes character. The “soft” aspects, the trine and sextile, flow and give, though that very ease can drift into complacency. Neither is good or bad: tension drives growth, while ease offers grace. The conjunction is neutral, intensifying whatever it joins.
To read an aspect, name the two planets first — Venus square Mars, for instance, is the drive to love in friction with the drive of desire — and then add the quality of the angle. A chart is a web of these conversations, and a few tight aspects often define a person more than the signs alone. Orbs, how close the angle is to exact, matter too: the tighter the orb, the stronger the conversation.
Seen this way, aspects are the inner dialogue within you, not a fixed fate. The tension of a square is not a flaw but the friction that tempers you, and the flow of a trine is a gift freely given. As always in FortuneLeaf, this is offered for reflection — a way to hear, a little more clearly, how the many voices inside you harmonize and clash.