The Sixth House

Daily Routines and Obligations – Work and Relations in the Workplace – Practical Skills – Health Issues – Lifestyle – The Balance Between Mind and Body

The Sixth House At A Glance

House Classification: Mutable – Opposite House: Twelfth – Natural Ruler : Mercury – Natural Sign: Virgo – Core meaning: – Developing the skills to deal with external necessity – Outer meanings: Work – Service – Health Issues

Traditionally associated with work and health, the sixth house is a watershed between the upper and lower hemispheres of the birth chart. As the last house below the horizon, preceding the house of personal relationships, it prepares us for our first encounters with the external world – and the notion of co-operating with others.

But it also follows on from the fifth where, as we have seen, the creative principle prevails. No matter how good our creative ideas may be, they require hard work and skill to bring them into being. The focus of this house, therefore, is on necessity – the need to adjust to the mundane realities of life.

This can be an extremely testing house for planets to handle. On the one hand, it demands that we attend to the endless number of practicalities, in particular our work and our relations wit work colleagues, that we ignore at our peril, a fact that is made clear by this house’s position opposite the twelfth – the so-called house of ‘self-undoing’.

On the other hand, too much time devoted to our daily obligations and not enough on pleasurable pursuits can erode our physical and mental wellbeing, especially if our work holds little meaning for us. This is why this house is concerned with health; at a fundamental level, it directs us to find a balance between the demands of external reality and our ‘me’ time. If it is ignored the finely tuned balance between the mind and body will suffer.

Planets in the Sixth House
Planets in the sixth house can indicate healing abilities or an interest in health and fitness issues. They can also reveal how well we work with others, as well as the kind of work to which we may be suited. Uranus and Neptune here may find it particularly hard to find fulfilling employment with routine working practices.

Reference: The Instant Astrologer: Felix Lyle & Brian Aspland