The 12 Animals Zodiac is the most well known system of Chinese astrology.

The 12 Animal Zodiac attempts to reveal a person’s character, relationship, potential and luck thorough a person’s life by taking only the year of birth into the calculation.

This is unlike Ba Zi (also known as the Four Pillars of destiny) or Zi Wei Dou Shu (also known as Purple Star Astrology) which takes a person’s year, month, date and time of birth into the computation.

Readings done by skilled practitioner shows the systems to be astonishingly accurate and they are the systems of choice used by destiny counsellors to provide advice to their clients.

Why the 12 Animals?

Have you wondered why the Rat, Ox, Tiger, Dragon, Snake, Horse, Goat, Monkey, Rooster, Dog and Pig were selected and in that order? Or why was the cat not included?

There are many versions of the story but here is a version that I like. Of course, this is not a true story but it helps us to remember the characteristics of some of the animals and also explain why the cat was not selected!

An ancient sage wanted to select 12 animals to form the zodiac. He wanted to be fair and he sent a message out to all the animals to gather as a certain spot on a certain date. The first 12 animals to arrive will be selected and the zodiac arranged in their order of arrival.

The rat and the cat made an agreement to wake each other up early the next day to start the journey. The cunning rat however did not do that but started out on the journey much early hoping to be included in the zodiac.

The ox realized that he is slower than many of the other animals, decided to start the journey the night before and walk all night to reach the destination.

On the designated day the animals started arriving. The Ox was the first to reach the vicinity and thought he would be the first animal on the zodiac. However unknown to the ox, the rat was actually riding on the ox’s back the entire journey. And just before the ox reached the designated spot the rat jumped off the ox and took the first spot. And this is why the rat is in first place ahead of the ox followed by the other animals.

This is also the reason why the Rat is described as intelligent and cunning while the Ox is hard working and persistent.

The Cat never forgave the Rat, became mortal enemies and is after it ever since! And this is the story of the 12 Animal Zodiac.

At least this one version.

I believe that the animals were chosen to closely reflect the personality of those born in that year. For example, the Rabbit is friendly, the snake cunning, the goat is stubborn, the monkey mischievous and the dog is loyal.