skycamper:

There is this misconception that water moons are the most emotional, while earth and air moons are much less emotional. But this isn’t true! Everyone has feelings. Everyone has the moon in their chart. It’s not the quantity of emotion that differs but the quality. In other words, it’s the method of processing feeling that is different.

Water moons process emotion by allowing it to flow, moving with the feeling until it stills or passes. It’s hard for them to detach from their feelings because they are so sensitive to external influences, just like how water can’t help but be stirred when you throw a stone into it. Water moons struggle to keep their emotions hidden inside. Water is always searching for a crack to seep out of, and it requires enormous energy to withhold the force of flowing feeling. Scorpio is the most stoic of the water moons but also the most dramatic. I think of moon in Scorpio as like a deep still pool, perfectly self contained until moved by something external. Then the ripples reverberate through the depths, disturbing what has lain hidden beneath the surface.

Earth moons process emotion through physical action. They are known for being stoic, but their lack of communication shouldn’t be taken for a lack of feeling. Earth moons have a practical attitude to emotions and typically won’t express their inner state unless they can see some benefit from doing so. They seek stability and dependability and dislike dramatic displays of emotion. They are the types to resist being influenced by external stimulae by engaging in compulsive behaviour such as comfort eating (Taurus moon) or obsessive cleaning and organising (Virgo and Capricorn). It is important for earth moons to externalise their feelings in some way by making them part of material reality. Activities like exercising, cleaning, and artistic creation can be far more soothing to the troubled earth moon than endless talking about the problem.

Air moons process emotion through rational thought and communication. They have an innate drive to understand and explicate their feelings, and tend to feel unsettled if they do not succeed. Gemini and Libra moons especially need people to talk through their emotional troubles. Gemini talks to find a way to laugh, to soothe their frazzled nerves by seeing their problem through another’s perspective and realising it’s not so big and scary after all. Libra needs to talk about their feelings to feel balanced. It can be very comforting for them to know that other people have felt like this before and can show them ways to cope with it. All air moons have the quality of observing rather than participating in their feelings. They like their emotions neatly packaged in language, which is frequently inadequate for expressing deep, complex feelings. This can leave air moons with a sense of alienation from their feeling nature which can manifest as self-doubt and neuroses about expressing emotion. Aquarius suffers from this the most, since they are simultaneously the most defensive (fixed sign) and have the most inhibited and erratic feeling function (ruled by Saturn/Uranus).

Fire moons process emotion through dramatising or mythologising how they feel. I think the fiery way of feeling is the hardest to explain. More than any other element, fire moons need to feel that they can learn and grow from emotional expression. Not in a productive sense, like earth moons, or an analytical sense, like air moons, but in such a way that feeling is a form of self-development. By experiencing and reacting to various stimulae, fire moons uncover their deepest selves. Think of how fire burns differently depending on what fuel you use. Fire moons are like that; you never know what reaction they will have to a new influence until you try it. Their expressions tend to be larger than life, external, consuming, and illuminating. Like the mythic hero, a despondent fire moon finds their inner light in their darkest hours. It is important for them to feel like their difficult feelings have a purpose, that there is something to learn about themselves from each emotional reaction, and that by expressing this fully they will illuminate their darker aspects and bring them into the light of understanding. The process of mythologising feeling draws on ancient archetypes, and many fire moons may appear or feel like certain archetypal personalities. There is the eternal child (Aries moon) who loves but cannot control himself; the radiant queen (Leo moon) who is the centre of her own world, which shines and darkens with her every moon; and there is the soul wanderer (Sagittarius moon) who picks up emotions like trinkets and treasures along their journey then drops them when they have outlived their use.