With any two signs, there are going to be reasons why those two signs get along and reasons why those two signs do not get along. Those reasons might give you insight into relationships that your placements have with those of other people or they might give you insight into internal dynamics happening within yourself. After all, everyone has all twelve signs in their chart.

Aries and Taurus might get along because they’re both springtime signs who care about emergence and new life. A Sun in Aries and a Sun in Taurus might also get along because they might share some placements in common. Aries and Taurus might not get along because, being so similar, they are also adjacent and this means that the two signs are adverse to or cannot see each other.

So, these are two springtime babies. Aries is the exaltation of the sun and Taurus the exaltation of the Moon. Both Aries and Taurus are extremely passionate signs. They care about what they care about and they both tend to go all the way with their interests. These two signs don’t really care if something gets in their way. They’ll find a way around any obstacle.

I think that people tend to assume that Aries is the more fanatical of the two but Taurus is also a fanatic. Taurus is just as daring and dauntless as Aries is stereotyped to be.

There’s something that is a bit contrarian about both of these signs. They’re obsessed with their own projects and they almost prefer to not see the world around them when they’re focused on that thing they want to get done. It’s not that they become antagonistic. Both Aries and Taurus are just disinterested in superfluous things when they have a focal point. They discard everything except for what matters.

These are the similarities. Do you see how Aries and Taurus might get along? How they might cross one another too?

Aries and Taurus can push each other along when they give each other space for their own interests. This is a partnership where each of the signs must have their own space for an almost selfish quest of exploration.

Take the filming of The Godfather as an example—Marlon Brando was an Aries and Al Pacino is a Taurus. Francis Ford Coppola is an Aries and Eleanor Coppola is a Taurus. Marlon Brando was the one who believed in Pacino’s vision of Micheal Corleone. The studio heads actually didn’t want Pacino for the role but Brando advocated for him and his quiet portrayal of the character. In the end, Pacino was relegated to a supporting role and he didn’t like that very much. When Brando was awarded Best Actor for his acting, Pacino refused to show up to the Oscars in protest. Meanwhile, Brando was actually on the way out from acting and more engaged in social activism.

There was mutual admiration and also competition between Brando and Pacino. They did something really cool together. They portrayed that competition and admiration and created a movie that a lot of people still know and love to this day. If it weren’t for the complication arising from their mutual competition, I don’t think they could have portrayed such a heartfelt father/son dynamic.

There is competition between Aries and Taurus. Both are so passionate and both have high expectations about themselves and about life. The luminaries shine in these two signs and both signs want to shine equally bright. Taurus feels the competition more. There’s often something about Aries that spooks a Taurus a bit, often in a good way.

Taurus is also the one that dictates the relationship dynamic more. This happens because Taurus succeeds Aries and, in doing so, can see more than Aries can. Aries is highly attuned to birth. With an Aries, there’s almost a sense of knowing life from the moment of being born. This means that Aries is always looking for that sense of birth, that feeling of starting something new. Taurus is more consistent and it tries to direct its zest for life more. Taurus makes decisions more consciously.

An Aries asks for something new—can we please do this thing now? Taurus considers it. It answers yes or no. It reminds Aries that we are committed to this old thing. Aries flits around and then it comes back. It gets bored and asks for something else once more. Taurus fixes Aries’s attention to the task at hand.

This dynamic can be very pleasurable. Taurus has so much patience! Aries admires this. Aries has so much excitement. Taurus envies this. This dynamic can be pleasurable if one of two things are true—the Aries values the Taurus and the Taurus actually likes the Aries. There is nothing in astrology that will tell you this information—this question of whether you actually like someone or not.

In the dynamic between Brando and Pacino, they were able to work together because Brando believed in Pacino’s craft and because Pacino respected Brando’s art. In the end, Pacino didn’t want to be liked by other people. He wanted to be valued for his contribution to the project. He wanted something substantial. A Taurus always seeks something substantial—something real. This is different from an Aries who can glow from more simple forms of appreciation.

Vincent Van Gogh, who was an Aries, was once in love with a Taurus. This Taurus was the daughter of his landlady, Eugenie Loyer. This relationship failed because Loyer was not interested in Van Gogh romantically and was secretly engaged to someone else. Nevertheless, he proposed to her and she turned him down. Around the same time, Van Gogh would write to his brother that he can’t live without love and propose to two other women both of whom also turned him down.

It’s Taurus who usually initiates and sets the pace in the relationship. What the relationship looks like and how it might be defined rests in the hands of the Taurus. The Taurus will be sensitive to where the Aries is looking and if the Aries has their attention on other things but it will possess the means to affix the Aries’s attention back to the relationship if it wants to. Taurus will only be willing to do this when it feels valued and when it likes the Aries.

Aries is fire and Taurus is earth. You can’t burn the wet soil. It’s the soil that ultimately shapes the path of the fire. Taurus is also Venus while Aries is Mars. Between Venus and Mars, it’s Venus who usually chooses.

There’s also one other ingredient that makes a relationship between an Aries and Taurus really spark—the Aries must enjoy the ways in which the Taurus shapes and directs its path. This actually means that the Taurus must be impressive in some way to the Aries. An Aries wants to be inspired and will trust someone who can inspire them. An Aries wants someone impressive because Aries is a sign that packs a powerful punch and they usually want an equal. There’s a ton of really fascinating and celebrated Aries/Taurus partnerships. These are partnerships where both signs are able to shine.

But both Taurus and Aries have to feel illuminated by a partnership. This can happen many ways—through collaborative distance, through playful competition, or through loving admiration. Both signs are strong and they want the other to know them in their strength. If either of these two signs feel that their partner is starting to fade, they will use competition to get them to shine.

Competition can bring out the best in one another. There’s probably some Aries and Taurus friends or couples or siblings reading this who know this to be true. Aries and Taurus will both expect a relationship to bring out their best qualities and not their worst. Both of them, being sunny springtime babies who expect the sun to rise and the flowers to grow, will not stand for anything less.