Everyone’s chart makes different aspects with our own chart and, contrary to popular opinion, squares and oppositions aren’t all bad when it comes to synastry. However, in terms of dating, not everyone’s capacity for love aligns with our own. What is necessary and comforting to one person may be triggering to another person.

Everyone you meet will help you grow in some way, but you also don’t have to date all of them (or any of them).

Of course, feel free to break these rules. Going by one or two synastry aspects is never going to tell the whole story about your relationship. You can have the worst synastry with someone and, because you are both people willing to put the work into a relationship, have the best relationship. You can also have the best synastry aspects with someone and end up in a toxic relationship if you don’t actively work on communication.

Here are a couple of synastry aspects to watch out for because they may flag a relationship that needs a lot more work.

People whose sun signs are in signs immediately adjacent to your moon sign

Aries moon: don’t date Taurus or Pisces sun
Taurus moon: don’t date Gemini or Aries sun
Gemini moon: don’t date Cancer or Taurus sun
Cancer moon: don’t date Leo or Gemini sun
Leo moon: don’t date Virgo or Cancer sun
Virgo moon: don’t date Libra or Leo sun
Libra moon: don’t date Virgo or Scorpio sun
Scorpio moon: don’t date Libra or Sagittarius sun
Sagittarius moon: don’t date Scorpio or Capricorn sun
Capricorn moon: don’t date Sagittarius or Aquarius sun
Aquarius moon: don’t date Capricorn or Pisces sun
Pisces moon: don’t date Aquarius or Aries sun

The reason for this is, because you are so close together on the zodiac wheel, you’re working on very similar issues but in completely different ways. Signs that are directly next to one another on the zodiac wheel don’t share modality and they’re in incompatible elements. That can make finding a way to communicate very difficult.

When someone’s sun sign is in the sign that comes after your moon, they can feel like you’re too much for them and that they need to set you straight all the time. When they’re sun sign is in the sign after your moon sign, they may feel hard to be themselves around you.

The same thing will apply the other way. Someone whose moon sign is directly adjacent to your sun sign can feel like they’re stifling your natural ways of being without even meaning to.

For example, someone whose sun is in Capricorn and enjoys finding ways for groups of people to work together can feel frustrating for a Sagittarius moon, who prefers to drift off elsewhere. Capricorn sun may see Sagittarius moon and think that they need a little work but not realize that their advice isn’t exactly welcome. Pisces sun people can flabbergast an Aquarius moon person.

People whose sun signs are adjacent to the sign that is opposite of your moon sign, unless you share a planetary ruler by domicile or exaltation

Aries moon: don’t date Virgo sun
Taurus moon: don’t date Sagittarius
Gemini moon: don’t date Capricorn or Scorpio sun
Cancer moon: don’t date Aquarius
Leo moon: don’t date Pisces or Capricorn sun
Virgo moon: don’t date Aries or Aquarius sun
Libra moon: don’t date Pisces
Scorpio moon: don’t date Gemini sun
Sagittarius moon: don’t date Taurus or Cancer sun
Capricorn moon: don’t date Gemini or Leo sun
Aquarius moon: don’t date Cancer or Virgo sun
Pisces moon: don’t date Leo

Modern astrology calls this aspect the inconjunct aspect. Signs that are inconjunct to one another, similar to the adjacent signs, don’t share modality and are not in compatible elements. The reason why this frustrating aspect can be mediated if you share a planetary ruler or if their planetary ruler is exalted in your moon sign is because, when that happens, there is an avenue of communication.

For example, someone whose moon is in Cancer will have a hard time with someone whose sun is in Aquarius because they just don’t express emotions the same way. Moon in Cancer wants to be understood completely while Aquarius sun doesn’t want to be known. This may lead to a relationship in which Cancer moon feels constantly insecure and Aquarius sun feels constantly smothered. Sagittarius sun and Cancer moon can have the same issues but, since Sagittarius’s ruler Jupiter is also exalted in Cancer, they might both feel inspiration in similar ways and this can be an avenue towards mutual understanding.

For someone whose moon is in Scorpio and needs to be able to dig deep in all aspects of an intimate relationship, the way that someone whose sun is in Gemini communicates can feel irresponsible. For Gemini sun, Scorpio moon can feel insecure because they simply need to know that you will be there through thick and thin. Though Scorpio and Aries are also inconjunct, they share the ruler Mars and can understand the ways they defend themselves and work out their disagreements.

People whose sun is in your twelve house

Okay, so we all date people whose sun is in our twelve houses, especially when we’re younger. For some reason, those people just seem so mysterious and unknowable and otherworldly to us. We’re attracted to them and we can’t really help it.

However, these are also the people who tend to bring up something within us that relate to an older issue that isn’t actually relevant to the specific relationship. We end up projecting onto these people a lot. It’s hard to talk to them without feeling like we’re talking to our mothers and saying things that we would never say to her.

On top of that, we might feel like we constantly don’t understand the person, no matter how hard we try. For example, a Leo rising dating a Cancer sun might feel like they just don’t know how to react when Cancer sun expresses emotions. They might feel manipulated but have a hard time putting into words why they feel that way. They might be spellbound by what they feel to be manipulation.

Similarly, a person who has sun in Scorpio dating a Sagittarius rising might bring up issues of control within their partner but not realize why or when they’re doing it. A Virgo sun dating a Libra rising feels confused because the ways they process relationships isn’t getting received.

People whose sun is in your sixth house

I see this one happen a lot more when a person who has just gotten over a break up looks for a second relationship in order to feel less alone AKA in the rebound relationship.

Someone whose sun is in our sixth house is often someone who we feel, for some reason or another, that we can find a use for. This isn’t always bad! In a collaborative working environment, you might be just the person to point out all of this person’s talents and skills. You might be able to teach them new ways of working that they missed when they were just on their own.

However, in an intimate relationship and particularly if you’re going for a rebound, this can result in some fairly toxic behavior. A person who has Pisces rising might look to a Leo sun for validation when they’re feeling distraught but, at the end of the day, have trouble finding a reason to stick around. A Leo rising might gravitate towards a Capricorn sun’s integrity but they might find that, after a while, that they feel love very differently.

More on inconjuncts that share domicile or exaltation lords

Specifically, I’m talking about Aries and Scorpio or Taurus and Libra (who share the domicile lords of Mars and Venus) and Cancer and Sagittarius or Libra and Pisces (Jupiter is exalted in Cancer and Venus is exalted in Pisces).

With Cancer/Sagittarius or Libra/Pisces whether that is the sun or moon, I’ve seen people gravitate towards one another. And this makes sense. Both Libra and Pisces seem to share a love of poetics and lowkey glamor. Both Cancer and Sagittarius seem to both love dramatics and nonsense. Both are funny.

However, I still feel like these relationships are hit or miss a lot of the time. With Libra and Pisces, because Libra’s ruler exalts Pisces, Libra can feel like they need to help the Pisces person a lot more than the Pisces is ready for or willing to accept. Pisces may not feel like they need Libra’s brand of help because they need to have their own things going on. They may feel judged.

With Cancer and Sagittarius, Sagittarius’ ruler exalts or honors Cancer. Sagittarius might imagine great things for Cancer but Cancer might feel like Sag is making fun of them or feel that the way they compliment them to be inauthentic. They want someone to just stay with them more than someone who will gas them up.

Aries/Scorpio and Taurus/Libra tend to work a lot better as long as both parties have their own things going on outside of the relationship itself. Neither of these relationships will be or can be codependent since these signs may be competing for defining their planetary ruler. For Aries and Scorpio, that means that both signs might feel like they want to be an assertive partner. For Taurus and Libra, both parties may want to define what acceptance means in the relationship.

Pluto square Pluto

This one is a big duh. There’s a big power struggle happening in the relationship because, if your Plutos are square, then you’re from generations that have a parent-child relationship. You’re either a Baby Boomer with Pluto in Leo trying to date a Millennial with Pluto in Scorpio or you’re a Gen X with Pluto in Virgo trying to date a Gen Z with Pluto in Sagittarius. These relationships are dangerous with they’re romantic or sexual. I won’t say don’t do it to everyone out there but, if you do this, you’re going to have to be real about the power dynamics involved.