Signs & Skymates

CHAPTER
1

SO YOU WANT TO KNOW YOUR SOUL, MATE.

LET ME TELL YOU A SECRET: THE UNIVERSE WANTS YOU TO FEEL LOVE. It wants you to experience rich friendships. And it wants you to excel in whatever you decide to pursue. The Universe wants you to laugh your butt off at happy hour and to feel vulnerable enough to let someone who loves you wipe away your tears at the crack of dawn. The Universe wants you to feel sexual bliss and intellectual stimulation. It wants you to travel, learn, teach, remember. It wants you to let yourself get angry, jealous, resentful, and passionate when those emotions come over you, and it also wants you to meditate, be still, and feel peace.

The Universe wants you to see yourself reflected within it. It’s here to help you create a life you feel compatible with, while meeting and merging with those with whom you’re most in tune. And if you’re reading this, you’ve probably asked yourself the question, “Well, what people am I compatible with and how can I find them?” You’re in the right place. I have several in-depth insights—and many more questions—for you as we embark on this journey. And by the time you’re done reading Signs & Skymates, you may very well have a path to finding your answers.

Who am I? I’m Dossé-Via, an evolutionary astrologer, author, and artist. I help humans who are seeking a spiritually awakening experience cultivate healthier relationships through studying their natal charts. With the insights I gain, I share how their connections can become enriching experiences that flow and grow with them, rather than work against them. What exactly is an astrologer? My definition is pretty simple. It’s someone who seeks to understand the skies and themselves, simultaneously. Someone who sees the skies within themself. That’s me! And that can be you too, if you’d like.

One thing you must know about me: I’m an astrologer, but not necessarily a relationship expert or guru. One could say I’ve had an atypical path exploring relationships, particularly romantic ones. Then again, is there even such a thing as a “typical” path? I entered a relationship with my college boyfriend when I was eighteen, we got married in 2016, and we stayed together until about two years ago, when I was twenty-six. We have two kids together, whom we co-parent, but ever since my separation from him, we haven’t been romantic partners anymore. It wasn’t until the end of my twenties that I experienced the dating world. This is my first time being single in my adult life. But what does it actually mean, to be “single,” to be “in a relationship,” to be “engaged,” to be “best friends,” to be “lovers”? What do our connections with others mean, and how do our perceptions of these connections shape the way we see ourselves? These are questions to ask of our minds and hearts—but also of the stars. That feels truer to me now than ever before, as this turn of events in my life has heightened my awareness and curiosity about astrological compatibility.

This puts me in an ideal position to write a compatibility book, because like some of you, I have my moments of skepticism when it comes to whether I’ll ever successfully date long term again. I also have my moments of idealism when I match with someone on a dating app, we go on a few dates, and I immediately project us into a fantasy future in which I feel loved and all is right in the world. I have moments of despair, too. I wonder if there’s something wrong with me personally, if I’m an insatiable lover, or human in general. I have experienced passionate and torrid love affairs, as well as moments of being primarily in a relationship with myself and relishing in it. And I also have moments of contentment with my current journey, even if my relationships are either a roller coaster or seemingly nonexistent. I, like you, have moments of indifference and dullness and drama and epic sagas. In fact, it’s one of those moments, which took place on the 18th of February 2021, a year and a half into my separation from my husband, that motivated me to start writing this book—for my own sake.

I had just gotten back from a workout and decided to check something on my old cell phone. I was on a “new year, new me” resolution kick and had recently gotten a new phone. I’d transferred only 25 percent of my contacts to it, eager to start fresh. And yet what did I immediately see on my old phone as I opened up WhatsApp? A message from a past Scorpio lover—someone who had disintegrated into a person I once knew, talked to, loved. With just three days left in the first Mercury Retrograde of that year, I wasn’t surprised when his name popped up on my screen. Instead, I sighed.

I remembered the days when seeing his name would have made me shriek with delight or feel butterflies in my stomach. But this time it made me wonder, “What does he want from me now? Did he forget to send his invoice for the work project we’re wrapping up?” It was the first day of Pisces season, so a small part of me allowed myself to fantasize that maybe, just maybe, he had reached out because he had been thinking nonstop of me, of us, and of all that we had been and could still be. Maybe, just maybe, he realized what he had missed out on when he stopped investing as much time, energy, and intimacy into the connection. Maybe he’d declare a grand apology and let me know that all he wanted was to be with me, but that he was too afraid to show it—that his Scorpio soul was so drawn to mine but didn’t know how to fully explore it. Maybe he’d say, “I’m finally ready to study my birth chart, Dossé-Via. And I want to know yours. I want to know ours. I want us.” Okay—clearly I might not have moved on as much as my Virgo Moon tried to convince me I had. (And having just watched the third installment of To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before was clearly getting to my head.)

I reminded myself of the pattern I was working on disrupting—falling for other people’s potential rather than truly facing situations as they are. Then I took another deep breath and decided to text back with the intention of receiving the closure I had previously pretended I didn’t need. I owed myself that. I decided that no matter what his response was, I would let him know what I was truly feeling. I would let him know that although I had been focused on work during our abrupt breakup that was never actually a breakup, I still had been thinking of us. I was still wondering how things could have changed had we both been vibrating at a similar frequency and taken the time to explore our compatibilities and incompatibilities in a mature, transparent way. Had we done that, could our relationship have been salvaged?

I didn’t end up going that far, though. You see, I have a pattern in my past of trying to be the fixer in a connection, subconsciously taking on the role of therapist or personal astrologer, when they never asked for all that. So instead I focused on getting my feelings off my chest, and I received the apology I had always wanted. I didn’t respond because I had nothing else to say. Then I opened my laptop and started writing Signs & Skymates.

Which brings us here: to an in-depth compatibility guide written with the aim of helping me better know myself first and foremost, and through doing so, helping you, dear reader, better know yourself too. Through better knowing yourself, you’ll begin to get a strong handle on the connections you attract in your life. You won’t beat yourself up about the ones that might not have lasted forever. You’ll acknowledge that we all play roles in each other’s unique stories—paths that intersect each other, at times mirroring each other and at other times completely disrupting what we imagined to be true. That’s because our truths may change based on the lens through which they are viewed or the language in which they are spoken.

How will astrology get you there? Astrology is a language that has been oversimplified for the purposes of popular culture, but that’s not what we’re here to do. Instead, I will encourage you to explore your own essence, nature, and consciousness before even thinking of judging another’s.

One of the most frequent questions I receive as an astrologer is, “Who am I compatible with?” And one of my go-to answers is, “With whomever you decide to be, so long as you both make concerted efforts to get to know each other’s intricacies and learn how to love without judgment or expectation.” That’s not the answer most people expect to hear, because they may have been conditioned to believe blanket statements like “Aries and Cancer never get along,” or “Libras and Sagittariuses are a match made in heaven.” My view is that there is no such thing as an entirely incompatible relationship. However, there are some connections that may be more challenging than others, while other relationships may naturally embody greater harmony.

And it is about so much more than just your Sun sign, too. Our Sun sign represents the zodiac constellation through which the Sun was traveling at the time of our birth. However, it is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to our natal chart—the grand cosmic blueprint of self, given to us by the stars. We all have a blend of different signs’ energies in our charts, which can show us aspects of ourselves as lovers and human beings that we may have been in denial about, or simply not aware of. The traits that may turn you off in someone could also exist within your own self when you look closely at your planetary placements.

As an evolutionary astrologer, I love helping people have their aha moments and see how nuanced astrological compatibility is, while opening themselves up to new forms of giving and receiving love—not just romantically, but with friends, family, pets, coworkers, and people they once viewed as strangers. Knowing your natal chart—and if you’re completely new to astrology and aren’t sure exactly what I mean by this, keep reading, I got you—and aligning yourself with its highest potential helps you live your life as an act of love. Your search for compatibility then transcends a human-to-human experience and becomes a curiosity about your compatibility with the seasons and cycles of life—and of love.

It’s not a coincidence that my “Love Mantra,” a musical meditation from my debut EP, is my most played mantra and has already helped hundreds of thousands of skymates shift their views on love and relationships. As I express in the mantra, “the Universe has plans for you, the Universe has love for you, the Universe is you.” Take a moment to read the entire mantra now to understand the vibrational influence I feel love has on us all. Feel free to play the track (available on all streaming platforms) too if you feel called.

Writing this love mantra and listening to it daily have shifted my consciousness when it comes to love. I view love as everything and everywhere—not solely as a romantic or sexual force, but instead an integral energetic reality that binds us all to this Earth, this cosmos, and each other. Ideally, through reading this book, studying your birth chart, and getting to know your fellow skymates more holistically, you’ll cultivate or deepen this sense of knowing too. My role as an astrologer is to help us all reconnect with the fact that we are the Universe in itself, vibrating among fellow cosmic beings and healing, learning, and growing together day by day.

There’s still so much to discover when it comes to the human spirit—in that respect, it is much like the depths of the ocean, the reaches of science, and the vastness of the Universe. We’ve barely scratched the surface of what it means to be a spiritual being. That is why it’s essential to read this book with an open mind, as we’re all learning, remembering, and discovering our own essence, and those of others, as we go. That is also why this book will include the words and experiences from other skymates who have been paying attention to the signs within themselves, their connections, and their partnerships. You, my fellow skymate, are just as attuned to the magic of it all as any astrologer. I’m here to help you tap into and remember the ability you have to be your own astrologer and to form your own insights about what and whom you’re compatible with.

My intention in writing this book is to open myself up to loving, knowing, and trusting my own self, which in turn helps me love, know, and trust another—and others—particularly those with whom I’m compatible or even those with whom I can grow to be compatible. And this process of self-discovery and self-exploration, in turn, fosters those same things in you, my fellow skymate. After two years of being single and rediscovering myself after my first young adult relationship, I feel ready to specifically ask the Universe for a divine partner (or partners) with whom I’m magnetically, physically, intellectually, psychologically, and spiritually aligned. And I believe that through writing this book on paying attention to the signs and studying our fellow skymates—as well as ourselves—I can attract that relationship, even if it comes with plot twists or on its own timing. What are you hoping to attract through this process?

Divine timing, divine mates, divine love—there are so many types of connections to uncover, all of which are influenced by our charts. Throughout this book I’ll be integrating my own relationship experiences to illuminate the cosmic connection we will be exploring. I will be looking to all types of love, because as much as my romantic life matters to me, I’m also at the point in my life where I don’t want to take my friendships and family connections for granted. I’m ready to do the work to unpack what patterns have existed in those dynamics and learn from the patterns in myself and those in my orbit, using my birth chart and knowledge of astrology as a unifying and illuminating tool. Are you ready to do the same?

Astrology reminds us of the interconnected nature of life—we are never as alone as we sometimes feel. That’s why I’ve included anecdotes from my fellow skymates—readers like you (and maybe even you!), who so generously shared their own experiences of getting to know their own selves and their partners. Signs & Skymates comes alive through our openness to this exploration of self and others, so be sure to not just read the practical compatibility advice for each possible sign pairing—I want you to explore from cover to cover, taking into account real-life experiences that bring the actual art of relationship astrology—known as synastry and composite astrology—to life.

Another thing to know about me: I identify as an African astrologer, and while some might not have been aware of this up until now, astrology—and humanity itself—originated in the Motherland. The earliest human ancestor, commonly known as Lucy, was found in Ethiopia. Her indigenous name is Dinkinesh, which means “you are marvelous.” Human rights activist Jane Elliott spoke truthfully when she said, “The first modern human beings that evolved on this Earth were Black women—they evolved in Sub-Saharan Africa about 280,000 years ago—and every human being on the face of the Earth today has the memory of those Black women’s genetic structure in their genes.” The first stargazers were women in Africa who noticed the connections between the cycles of the Moon and their own monthly cycles. Way before Galileo and Aristotle, spiritually attuned African women were the original astronomers and astrologers.

The Dogon empire of Mali used its own systems of astrology as a tool for agricultural growth, tracking women’s lunar cycles and fertility periods, and plotting political strategies. Their knowledge of astronomy “predates modern technology for thousands of years,” historian Peter Pedroncelli wrote. “They have known information about the stars before telescopes were invented.” These West African astronomers were the first to recognize the binary nature of the star known as Sirius, the brightest in the sky. Their knowledge of Sirius A and its less visible companion Sirius B dates back to 3200 BCE. The Dogon Malians were also the first to discover key insights about the planets in our solar system such as Jupiter’s numerous Moons and Saturn’s rings. They were the first astronomers with the awareness of the planets’ revolution around the Sun. I wish I had been taught all of this in school, but I am grateful that I can share this with you now.

My perspective is unique and distinct from more westernized views on astrology, and I’m inviting you into this world. I moved to West Africa in June 2018 and embarked on a journey of remembrance. Through doing so I began to see the ways in which much of the astrology I had learned in a Western way was actually tied to my indigenous astrological roots. I started making links between both, becoming more intersectional as an astrologer.

You now have the opportunity to undergo some of this journey of remembrance along with me through the book, as I integrate Yorùbá spirituality—my ancestral heritage on the maternal side of my family—into the astrological interpretations and connect them to the modern planets. Many astrologers believe that our field of study derives from Babylonian and Roman mythology, but the Yorùbá spirituality system and similar indigenous African religions existed since the Stone Age. We’re therefore going back to the source, the root, the origins from which astrology flows. By speaking about astrology through this indigenous lens, my hope is to correct the erasure, whether intentional or not, of indigenous astrological practices.

Steven Forrest, a fellow evolutionary astrologer—one could say he’s the OG of evolutionary astrology in the more Western sense—wrote a game-changing book called The Inner Sky, and that’s where I first discovered the term skymates. This word deeply resonated with how I view myself and the fellow beings—as vibrating molecules, coexisting with me on this earthly plane and in this solar system. I recommend that all astrology enthusiasts, whether beginners or advanced, have Forrest’s book in their collection. He does a fantastic job of explaining the main components of a birth chart and how to read one. Since this is a compatibility guide, I will also share my knowledge of birth chart analysis, but I won’t repeat information already shared by other proficient astrologers—instead, I’ll encourage you to read them as foundational texts for your astrological knowledge, and use Signs & Skymates as a deeper resource on compatibility.

In The Inner Sky, Forrest writes that growth is the aim of astrology. He encourages us to break past the stereotypes of each individual sign and see the multitude of possibilities that exist within them. This is much like how millions of humans can identify as type A personalities, and yet not all type As are the same. I’d add transformation and evolution to the central aims in astrology. Solely focusing on growth may make us feel like a part of our essence always has to get bigger or taller, to expand our inherent capacities in some way. With the concepts of evolution and transformation folded in, our essence is perpetually whole, but may shape-shift—it may turn itself inside out or in some other way show us aspects of ourselves we didn’t know existed before. Astrology is a light bulb that illuminates us for ourselves. And once we’ve been enlightened to ourselves, we can better see others.

So what happens when we start to pay attention to what we see in others? How are we able to live alongside someone else, while still acknowledging our own needs and establishing the boundaries our spirit asks us to? That’s what we’re here to learn, and there’s not one simple answer, other than being present with the process. You can have all the knowledge about the best-case scenario and the best possible pairings between signs, and you can study all of the highest potentials in each sign, as well as the shadows, but if you and the other individual(s) aren’t willing to emulate that energy of higher potential, then the relationship won’t reach it. Astrology shows us the possibilities, but we as humans are the ones who must take action and be sure our intentions are aligned with what we want.

To understand this book you should know that I do not subscribe to the idea that every zodiac sign is a fixed, unchangeable being that never breaks out of its box. Instead, I’m able to see aspects of signs that are not traditionally associated with them. Aries can be shy. Scorpio can be a social butterfly. Taurus can be superemotional. What we’ve been told we are is not always what we actually are; in fact, often we truly are what we’ve been told we are not. Most people are unaware of what they want in relationships because they don’t know what they want or who they are themselves. So that’s why I believe all aspects of compatibility and synastry should begin with studying oneself and one’s compatibility with self—to bring knowledge and self-awareness to the practice.

Another thing to know about my philosophy on love and relationships from the perspective of an evolutionary astrologer is that I believe there is more than just “the one” for each of us. In fact, “the one” is first and foremost our own self. I am the soulmate whom I wish to know most profusely. And after that, we can have several soulmates—and they don’t all have to be romantic. Too often we focus on our romantic connections and take for granted the more platonic, professional, and familial ones. But these deserve our attention and curiosity as well. And as you choose to view them with as much importance as your romantic connections, they only grow in value.

What is a skymate? Let’s break down the word mate