If there's one god who is unloved or misunderstood, it's Mars. The ancient Greeks called him Ares. Worshipped by the Romans, he is associated with war, brutality and masculinity.

In astrology, Mars traditionally rules two signs, Aries and Scorpio. Aries is the sign of all beginnings, represented by spring in the northern hemisphere. Mars symbolizes the primary dynamism, the vital impetus, and the emergence of life. Scorpio is more the energy of transformation, which explains why it is also associated with Pluto, the ultimate energy.

Every symbol, particularly in astrology, has a luminous side and a darker side.

There is necessary, helpful aggression but also gratuitous, often impulsive violence. I have not read him, but I know that Alfred Adler, one of the founders of psychoanalysis, studied the mechanisms of aggression. Incidentally, there is a Sun/Mars conjunction in his natal chart!

I've made several attempts in image generators to illustrate the dual nature of Mars. Most of the time, because there's a bias towards aggression, I got male faces. Obviously, mythology doesn't help since this god is represented in the guise of a male warrior.

In a birth chart, the astrologer examines the qualities of the position of Mars to find out how a person acts, makes, and fights. With Mars weak and challenging to aspect, it's not uncommon to find that a person suffers events more than they cause them. There are also personalities with powerful energy who are nevertheless victims. For these individuals, the moments of aggression they experience can be seen as non-consensual releases of energy. This does not mean that these people are the cause of what they suffer.

The fact remains that when they give themselves the means, victims find the inner strength to confront their aggressors.

Mars has many faces. The planet makes a complete circuit of the zodiac in two and a half years, making it a good tool for analyzing how a person works in their life.

The human race has inherited a fundamentally aggressive and combative nature from primates, for better or worse. Violence continually occupies our minds, and reason finds it difficult not to use the sword to establish its certainties.

The current era seems more warlike as if blood was bound to run like lava one day on once verdant lands.

As if in the hearts of men and women, a stubborn abscess had to be seared with a burning iron.