Chinese zodiac signs are no different from Chinese zodiac symbols denoting 12 animals, each representing one full year out of a 12 year cycle, the years named after the names of the animals as such. It is believed that the traits and the tendencies of these 12 animals cover the total human spectrum as far as personality types are concerned. The year in which a person is born affects her/his traits matching them with those of the animal representing the year.

But that’s not all as far as the affect of animals on a person’s life is concerned. The system is not as simplistic as this. There are other animals too denoting months and affecting the traits of a person taking birth in those months with theirs. These are called inner animals.

Then there are others called secret animals denoting days and hours of the day and affecting the traits of a person taking birth in those days and hours with theirs. So in all it makes them to be 8,640 different possible combinations of personality. The calculation is simple: 5 elements (water, fire, metal, wood, and earth) x 12 yearly animals x 12 monthly animals x 12 hourly animals, everyday = 8,640.

The animals are the rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, sheep (ram or goat), monkey, rooster, dog, and pig. Each one of them associates itself with a polarity being either yin or yang; a trine (combinations of 3 animals making four trines of (1) Rat, Dragon, and Monkey, (2) Ox, Snake, and Rooster, (3) Tiger, Horse, and Dog, and (4) Rabbit, Ram and Pig; an element out of water, wood, fire, metal and earth; and a long list of traits including virtues and vices.

Chinese zodiac signs and Chinese zodiac symbols maintain a close association with Feng Shui – it’s meaning literally being ‘wind and water’ in English – through their common elements of water, fire, metal, wood, and earth as well as the concepts of the two polarities – the yin and the yang.