The Zodiac and Developmental Stages: A Promising Exploratory Framework

This article is my first attempt to map out the stages of child development on the tropical zodiac wheel in a comprehensive way. This first effort is theoretical and preliminary and is based on cursory formal knowledge of child development at this time. I want to share it, however, to mark what feels like a significant breakthrough in a longstanding desire to make these connections. What I share will, of course, evolve as I continue to learn.

While the course I have envisioned will not include this material because it is both preliminary and outside its scope, it is relevant to the larger vision of Pass It On Astrology of innovation and continuing to evolve astrology. Thus, I am sharing it here.

Up until now, I had felt confused about how to map the stages of development to astrological symbolism. While I often talk about developmental correlations to signs, I came across one developmental scheme that focused on the planets.¹ In addition, standard astrology practice makes the connection between planetary transits to our natal charts, particularly planet returns and partial returns (squares, oppositions, etc) and significant moments in our lives. Jupiter, for example, takes twelve years to circle the zodiac. Its return to its natal position when we are twelve corresponds to a significant developmental transition. Finally, I’ve been presenting a developmental view of planetary retrogrades. Thus, the path has already been established as it relates to developmental unfolding and planet cycles and symbolism.

However, as I was reading the first chapter of Jean Piaget’s book Child and Reality and actively contemplating his four stages of cognitive development with the help of feedback from Claude, and as I was thinking about the Luvmour’s four stages of child development, I suddenly realized the stages could be mapped to the modalities (cardinal, fixed, and mutable signs).

Correlating the stages to the signs rather than to the planets flips things around. Rather than the planet representing the stage of development and the signs the terrain in which the development occurs, the signs represent the development and the planets, as rulers of signs, travel through their own or other developmental terrains. Mars, as ruler of Aries, for example, would govern the developmental stage associated with Aries. In traditional astrology, Mars also rules Scorpio, so it may be that it also governs that territory, though Pluto may co-rule it or rule it singly. Details such as these will need to be clarified.

As Mars moves through the other signs, or other developmental territory, we can posit that it carries the development of the sign it governs into each new sign. Thus, it may show us the developmental foundations that are helping us with the current stage or the developmental foundations that we have not yet had the chance to develop. If we are struggling in a given terrain, the latter may provide helpful insight. These ideas are all preliminary, but offer some interesting avenues to explore.

Also, the sign-based scheme that I am introducing, even if it proves valid and helpful, is not meant to negate other astro-developmental frameworks. One of the beautiful things about astrology is its ability to be and show us the very thing or things we most need it to be and show us at a given moment or period in our lives. The innovation I envision is not an innovation that requires a destruction of the old, but an innovation that builds and branches from sound prior foundations.

For transparency, I am violating that vision because I do not have a solid foundation in all aspects of astrology, including traditional astrology. Nor do I have solid foundations in child development. However, it is my realization of these deficits and their impacts that drive my vision for something different. In the meantime, I work with the foundations I have, including astrological and personal experiences with illness and healing.

Tying Development to the Seasons

The tropical zodiac wheel consists of twelve signs organized into four quadrants. These quadrants correlate to the seasons of the year. In the Northern Hemisphere, the correlations are as follows:

• Quadrant 1: Spring

• Quadrant 2: Summer

• Quadrant 3: Autumn

• Quadrant 4: Winter

The seasonal correlations are reversed in the Southern Hemisphere, but the same principle applies. In the Southern Hemisphere, the correlations are as follows:

• Quadrant 1: Autumn

• Quadrant 2: Winter

• Quadrant 3: Spring

• Quadrant 4: Summer

The seasons are relevant to the cycles of human development in that we can see them as fractals of a larger three-fold wave pattern that operates in the universe. This three-fold pattern first arises, then peaks, and then falls away. The hemispheric seasonal differences suggest that modifications for locational, and thus cultural, variations are built into the structure, in turn suggesting some adaptability to cultural variations. Because I am from the Northern Hemisphere and am just starting to flesh out this model, I will be relying on my personal experience of the seasons from my Northern Hemisphere orientation. These symbolic references, however, are not meant to negate a Southern Hemisphere perspective.

On the wheel, the cardinal signs of Aries, Cancer, Libra, and Capricorn, which are the first signs in each quadrant, represent the energy of arising or initiating. These signs correlate with the equinoxes and solstices that begin each season and the correlations are true regardless of hemisphere. However, which sign correlates with which season differs. The same can be said for the fixed and mutable signs discussed next.

The fixed signs of Taurus, Leo, Scorpio, and Aquarius, which are the second signs in each quadrant, represent the energy of sustaining what was started and, I would argue, peaking. These signs correlate with the middle part of each season when the energies peak to their maximum and persist there. The mutable signs of Gemini, Virgo, Sagittarius, and Pisces, which are the third and final signs in each quadrant, represent the energy of falling away. These signs correlate to the transitional times from one season to the next when energies are in flux.

We can see this same pattern of arising, peaking and persisting, and falling away in the cyclic developmental unfolding of the human being in that each developmental stage first arises, then peaks and persists, then falls away in preparation for the next stage. Thus, it makes sense to see if we can map human development on a wheel that delineates this pattern, a pattern we can posit is a fractal of a more universal cosmic pattern, at least as it relates to the universe we reside in.

The Three Human Developments

In general terms, we can say that there are three human developmental processes: physical, emotional, and cognitive. We could argue that there is also soul and spiritual development, but our purpose is to zero in on the human part of our development. Soul and spiritual development, it could be argued, are part of the being part of our development.

While this distinction is artificial, I believe making it helps to highlight that there is a human dimension to our developmental experience. I would even go so far as to posit that our human developmental process is the process through which spirit unfolds and manifests in human form. Thus, to fully understand our spiritual experience, we need to understand our human developmental experience.

If we consider the human part of the development of the child from early infancy to young adulthood, we see a pattern that starts with a focus on the body, moves to a focus on emotions, and completes with a focus on the mind.

If we apply the idea of fractals to this high level view of child development, we can posit that each developmental stage arises first in the body, then peaks in the emotions, then falls away in the final reasoning phase of the process. We can then map that process to the quadrants on the tropical zodiac wheel. We will look at those correlations in the next section. First, let’s consider the wave pattern through the quadrants.

Once the three-fold wave pattern in one quadrant completes, the next three-fold wave pattern begins in the next quadrant. Once all four three-fold wave patterns complete, a new round of stages begins. In this way, we can map the unfolding of development for different parts of the human lifecycle, from fetus, to child, to young adult, to mature adult, to elderly, each progressing through four three-fold stages. This scheme is elegant and promising, but needs to be explored to determine its merit.

Although not yet confirmed, there are three potential benefits to mapping human development on the tropical zodiacal wheel in this way. The first is that knowledge of human development may help to inform and expand our understanding of the signs. The second is that our knowledge of the signs may help to inform and expand our understanding of the developmental stages. The third is that, because the stages of development for each part of our lifecycle are mapped on the same wheel, we may be able to see correlations between different stages of development that might have gone unnoticed before.

While these potential benefits are compelling to contemplate, it is yet to be seen if they prove true. Also, as with any model, although it may provide valuable insight, it would not be able to reflect reality perfectly. If a choice came down to prioritizing the model versus prioritizing the development that is happening, the latter would take precedence and the model would need to be revised.

With all that said, let’s move on to detail the stages and make the correlations to signs. Below, I focus primarily on physical and cognitive development. I will have to learn more about emotional development before I will be able to do more than suggest sign associations based on the scheme presented.

Stages of Development and the Modalities

The scheme laid out so far consists, in general terms, of four stages of development mapped onto the four quadrants of the tropical zodiac wheel. More specifically, at this time, I am correlating physical development to the cardinal signs, emotional development to the fixed signs, and cognitive development to the mutable signs. This mapping might not make immediate intuitive sense, and, indeed, it may need to be revised in part or entirely. But, at this time, I believe it has merit and is compelling. At the very least, it provides a good place to start discerning these correlations.

Cognitive Developmental Stages

To map this scheme, let’s start with Piaget’s stages of cognitive development since it was when learning about them that the correlations started to clarify. Piaget’s four cognitive stages of development are:

1. Sensorimotor (0 to 18 months or 2 years);

2. Preoperatory representation (18 months or 2 years to 7 or 8 years);

3. Concrete operations (7 or 8 years to 12 years); and

4. Formal operations (12 years to 14 or 15 years).

You can find these stages, including the details of them that I outline below, discussed in chapter 1 of Piaget’s book, Child and Reality.² Let’s look at each in turn, focusing on their outcomes.

Sensorimotor Stage

The outcome of the sensorimotor stage is coordination of movement and the holistic integration of the senses. Prior to this outcome, each sense operated disconnected from the others.

Preoperatory Representation Stage

The outcome of the preoperatory representation stage is the ability to use one thing to represent another. Preoperational presumably means prior to manipulating objects.

Concrete Operations Stage

The outcome of the concrete operations stage is the ability to compare and contrast objects so long as one has physical objects to manipulate to get to the answer. The child, in other words, is able to draw conclusions using, or operating on, concrete objects, to aid her or him. Piaget gives the example of determining the relative length of sticks. So long as children in this stage can compare the physical sticks to one another, they can tell which ones are longer and which are shorter.³

Formal Operations Stage

The outcome of the final stage, formal operations, is the ability to make connections that do not depend on incremental associations built on physical reality. If one reads something about quantum physics, one might make the connection to a healing modality one has also read about. Quantum physics and healing are two distinct fields and the correlation was not made by linking one physical thing to another. Rather, the connection was made via a cognitive leap abstracted from any concrete objects.

Cognitive Development and Mutable Cross Correlations

Using this delineation of the cognitive stages, we can correlate them to the mutable cross as follows:

• Gemini: Sensorimotor (the body comes under the control of the child)

• Virgo: Preoperatory Representations (in crafts, we can see the possibility of one thing representing another)

• Sagittarius: Concrete Operations (truth-finding involves comparing and contrasting and making judgments)

• Pisces: Formal Operations (the lack of structure and order lends to the ability to connect seemingly unrelated things)

These correlations show resonance between sign and cognitive developmental task and may provide further insight into the stages of development. However, we would need to be sure not to assume a correlation simply because of the sign relationship. In other words, just because the sign symbolizes something, doesn’t mean we can assume that symbolism reveals something about the stage. It might. But the decider in the pairing would be the developmental stage. Any ideas that arise from sign considerations would need to be validated against the stage.

Physical Stages of Development

Now that we’ve considered the cognitive stages of development, let’s look at the physical stages of development. Because I haven’t researched this subject yet, I am relying on what Claude shared. Specifically, I asked it to list the progression of motor development identified by Arnold Gessler, a researcher recommended by Claude, and to correlate these developments to Piaget’s four stages of cognitive development. Here is the list Claude provided:

Stage 1 (0-18 months/2 years): Gesell observed rapid motor progression during this period that aligns with Piaget's sensorimotor stage:

• 0-3 months: Head control develops

• 4-6 months: Reaching and grasping emerge

• 7-9 months: Sitting independently, beginning crawling

• 10-12 months: Standing, first steps

• 12-18 months: Walking becomes refined, climbing begins

Stage 2 (18 months/2 years - 7 years): During Piaget's preoperational stage, Gesell documented:

• 2-3 years: Running, jumping, beginning balance skills

• 3-4 years: Tricycle riding, alternating feet on stairs

• 4-5 years: Skipping, hopping, improved coordination

• 5-7 years: Refined hand-eye coordination, beginning sports skills

Stage 3 (7-12 years): Coinciding with Piaget's concrete operations, Gesell observed:

• 7-9 years: Improved balance, coordination, and strength

• 9-12 years: Refined fine motor skills, increased physical endurance

Stage 4 (12-14/15 years): During early adolescence (Piaget's formal operations):

• Physical growth acceleration

• Strength increases

• Temporary coordination challenges due to rapid growth

• Gender-differentiated physical development⁴

Claude finishes by saying: “Gesell didn't frame development in four distinct stages like Piaget, but his observations do show patterns of reorganization at similar transition points. The most cardinal-like developments (new movement patterns) occur primarily in the first two Piagetian stages, with later development focused more on refinement than initiation.”⁵

Although Gesell didn’t frame his findings using the construct of stages, we can perhaps talk about clusters of motor development associated with each cognitive stage as delineated by Piaget. For simplicity, I will use the term stage interchangeably with cluster.

Cardinal Signs and Physical Development

Although Claude points out that physical development aligns less and less with cardinal energy as development progresses, I am going to stick with the scheme and map out these motor development clusters to the cardinal signs. However, we can draw on the seasonal cycle to provide a possible way of understanding why cardinal initiation wanes as the stages progress.

In the Northern Hemisphere, Libra aligns with Fall. During the Fall, the Sun begins to sink in the sky and the temperature cools. Thus, the energy wanes. Capricorn aligns with winter, when the energy withdraws more fully. These seasonal correlations relative to the last two cardinal signs suggest that within the cardinal cross itself, there is a shifting in how cardinality expresses. In the Northern Hemisphere, this seasonal shift is from vibrant flourishing to increasing internalization. Thus, we may expect to see subtleties in how cardinal energy expresses through the motor developmental stages. This shift in how cardinality expresses might also give insight into how physical developmental stages progress across the lifecycle.

Sticking with this first lifecycle circuit, we can correlate motor development clusters to cardinal signs. Doing so gives us the following:

• Stage 1: Aries

• Stage 2: Cancer

• Stage 3: Libra

• Stage 4: Capricorn

Let’s look at each in turn.

Stage 1: Initiating Assertive New Action

In the first stage, we see a focus on the head and various initiating actions, like grasping, crawlng, walking, and climbing. These all fit with Aries. The inclusion of sitting in this group is surprising from our perspective as adults because we think of sitting as a retreat from assertion. But, for the baby, sitting represents a new frontier of physical development and independence, and thus can be considered a form of assertion.

Stage 2: Expanding Movement within a Safe and Secure Family Context

I found the second stage hard to make sense of within the context of Cancer, but Claude pointed out that all of the motor development that occurs during this stage happens within the safety and security of the family.⁶ This correlation reveals that the signs don’t just signify the development we do, but the context and conditions we need to do them.

Stage 3: Balance and Refinement of Skills

In the third stage, we can readily see the development of balance and refinement of skills fitting with Libra’s energy. The fact that Libra comes just after Virgo clarifies that the refinement of skills is prompted by the natural progression of stepping into relationships, and thus expanding our known field of operation. One question we have to answer is how endurance and implied mastery development fit with Libra as both are naturally associated with Capricorn. Here, we can draw on Capricorn’s ruler, Saturn. Saturn, it turns out, is the exalted ruler of Libra. It’s association thus explains both the stamina and inclination to mastery we see in this stage.

The other question we have to answer is the mismatch between cardinal energy and the developmental tasks of the stage. As noted by Claude, this correlation begins to wane in Libra. We addressed this question in a general way above noting the natural ebbing of energies as the seasons progress through the year in the Northern Hemisphere.

With this framing, we can posit that the initiating cardinal energy expresses through the striking up of new friendships. We can futher say that these new friendships provide the context and conditions that allow development to proceed when independent inner assertion might be naturally waning. Thus, we can posit that the initiation in Libra is strategic in that it is designed to ensure conservation of energy during a period when energies are naturally waning.

Stage 4: Challenges, Increased Strength and Stamina, and Gender-Differentiation

In the fourth stage, we see challenges, increased strength, and gender-differentiation. All fit with Capricornian energy. Gender-differentiation might seem like an outlier, but it fits with the process of defining our roles. The acceleration of growth that we see in this stage can be understood as an inevitable result of moving into a larger sphere of existence - the sphere of the world and responsibilities as opposed to relationships.

As with Libra, this movement into a new field can account for the cardinality of this stage. Also as with Libra, we can posit that this initiation is strategic, serving the purpose of creating the supportive conditions and structures required to continue motor development during a time when inner energies might be waning.

A Personal Example

In my chart, I have Mars, ruler of Aries, in Capricorn. Aries and Capricorn are both cardinal signs and thus both relate to physical development within this developmental construct. As a kid, I was extremely active within established sports structures. At age 35, I became acutely ill and am still recovering a quarter century later. This acute illness completely depleted my energy stores. Over time, insomnia, something I had never struggled with, became an increasing issue until it was downright miserable. After a couple of decades of incremental healing that required drastically decreasing my activity, Covid hit and I could no longer walk the 2-4 miles a week I was walking to get to appointments. Within a short time, my insomnia resolved and I discovered that the more I lay down, the more I was able to heal.

One way to interpret this experience using the cipher of the stages mapped to the modalities is that the development associated with Aries was not sufficient to meet the Capricornian developmental challenge of maturing by entering into the world. Interestingly, issues of identity (Aries), role in the world (Capricorn), and efficacy (Capricorn), have surfaced as a result of this experience. In fact, one might see the illness as the end result of not having found my way - identity and role - in the larger world.

While identity and roles (other than gender roles) are not relevant to the motor development we have been exploring, their manifestations in my experience suggest a link between the motor development associated with Aries and Aries’ rulership of identity and the motor development associated with Capricorn and Capricorn’s rulership of roles. One question to explore for both Aries and Capricorn might be the question of a link between the physical aspects of development and the non-physical aspects. While doing so is beyond the scope of this article, we can posit from this experience that without the former, the latter can’t establish itself.

Benefits and Possibilities of This Structure

Some exciting possibilities arise from this framework. First, by mapping development to the modalities, we map it to the seasons, thus allowing us to see more explicitly that the human developmental cycle is a natural expression of a larger cosmic cycle that expresses fractally in many ways - in the ebb and flow of ocean waves, the waxing and waning of the moon, and the progression of each season. Given how far we humans have distanced ourselves from our identity as part of nature, this correlation may help us to re-align our psyche.

Second, by correlating stages of development with the modalities instead of to the elements, we create a situation in which each aspect of development - body, emotion, cognition - progresses through all four elements. This progression creates unexpected correlations. For example, Aquarius, an airy, intellectual sign, becomes the final stage of emotional development for each cycle.

Rather than negating the approach, these correlations open up the possibility of progressing through different orientations to each aspect of our development. While exploring emotional being and thus Aquarius’ association with emotion will have to wait for another article, we can see this progression over the course of the developmental stages of our body. It starts off in fiery Aries with the fetus initiating birth and the baby fussing to get its needs met. It then progresses through a Cancerian environment of emotional security and care from our families as we advance in our physical abilities. Then it moves through airy Libran coordination and balance as we learn to refine our movements. Finally, it passes through Capricorn’s earthy form changes, solidity, and stamina as our bodies mature.

Conclusion

This structure is promising, but much more work needs to be done. The emotional stages, for example, have not been mapped. The possibility exists that, in attempting to map them, the structure will break down. But I feel confident that that the pattern will hold and provide more insight.

Because the stages are mapped to the natural cycle of the seasons, we can see our human stages of development as a fractal of a larger cosmic pattern. This connection to a larger cycle may suggest that the model would be viable across cultures. One specific indication that suggests this viability is that the seasonal framing implicitly incorporates the potential for understanding the process of unfolding through a hemisphere-specific seasonal experience.

My work will be to learn about these stages and to apply them as able, at least initially, to my Northern Hemisphere context because that is the reality and experience that has been imprinted in me.

One motivation for me in pursuing the development of this model is the possibility that it could serve as a bridge to people in other disciplines and thus open up the channels of meaningful communication and collaboration, thus breaking down barriers to acceptance and valuing of astrology. Another motivation is that it provides a way to bridge human and spiritual experience by framing human development as the path of spirit in human form. Making this connection, we can better appreciate the worthiness of our human experience. This appreciation of our worthiness is needed, I believe, for humans as a collective to truly transform our structures into ones that foster and support the full potential of all humans.

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Cover Image Credit

Cover image by Nanou22 from Pixabay

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Updates

February 25, 2025

• I added additional titles to make it easier to find the discussions on cognitive and motor development. To accommodate these new titles, I changed the heading sizes of those underneat them.

• I revised the final paragraph of the A Personal Example section to make it better and more accurate to my intended meaning. I did so by moving the to make it flow better and to tweak what I said, moving the sentence about not being able to establish the latter without the former from the middle of the paragraph to the end. I also change the phrasing The first question to explore to One question to explore.

• I changed the heading sizes of the Benefits and Possibilities, Conclusion, Cover Image Credit, References, and Notes sections from H1 to H2 for consistency.

• I added this Updates section

February 26, 2025

• I corrected a typo

• I further revised the final paragraph of the A Personal Example section, eliminating redundancy in the first sentence and clarifying that motor development doesn’t cover roles beyond gender roles.

References

Claude.ai. response to “If we take the ages of Piaget's cognitive stages of development, how might Gesell's motor stages correlate? Stage 1: 0-18 months/2 years; Stage 2: 18 months/2 years - 7; Stage 3: 7 - 12; Stage 4: 12 - 14/15”, Anthropic, February 23, 2025 (a). https://claude.ai/chat/74ade833-57c5-45f3-bf88-8c17d064fa4b [Private conversation]

Claude.ai, response to “Stage 2 takes a little more work to fit with Cancer, but all the developments fit with an emotional experience of joy”, Anthropic, February 23, 2025 (b). https://claude.ai/chat/9d1812c4-1eb9-4505-b939-927ad73d2bf5 [Private conversation]

Piaget, Jean. Child and Reality: Problems of Genetic Psychology. Translated by Arnold Rosen. Grossman Publishers, 1973.

Pinchera, Michael. “Michael Pinchera – Becoming Human - Soul Unfoldment - Planetary Phases, Lunar Node Cycles,” September 18, 2018, Accessed February 25, 2025.

Notes

1. See Pinchera.

2. See Piaget

3. See Piaget, pp. 22 - 24. To understand the essentialness of the presence of the physical objects in making determinations, read through the whole section in the first chapter on this stage, as indicated by the page numbers.

4. See Claude, February 23, 2025 (a)

5. See Claude, February 23, 2025 (a)

6. See Claude, February 23, 2025 (b)