Leo's public relations staff have been very busy in sun-sign columns, portraying the king of Beasts as the top of the heap.  After all, his ruler is the sun, the Great Light as it is called in medieval astrology.  So we have the traditional portrait of Leo:  mane flying, radiating confidence and sunshine, ready to outshare and outshine any foe, loving himself, life, and the applause of the crowd.  Most Leos do their best to help cultivate this image.  They will be the last to tell you it isn't what the sign is really about.  But it isn't. 

A reminder might be useful here how to read sun-signs in the horoscope.  Being born under a particular sign, or having a lot of planets or the ascendant placed there, doesn't automatically show that you are those things, that you have those qualities full-blown and ready to display in the shop window.  It means that there is a reservoir of potential innate in you, something to strive toward.  You grow into your chart, just as a seed grows into full plant.  The stars correspond to us, reflect us, have a connection with us, but they don't fate us. 

If you see someone with lots of Leo in his chart, don't make the mistake of thinking that he's confident, radiant, egocentric, creative, self-assured.  It means he is trying to develop confidence in himself, trying to radiate himself outward into his environment, trying to find out who he is, trying to express his creativity.  And because these goals are likely to be terribly, intensely important to him, he will spend a lot of time and energy developing them.  But Leo, confident?  Hardly.  His problem is usually just the opposite, which is why he spends so much time thinking about himself.  After all, if you look in the mirror and there's nobody home, what meaning can you find in life? 

Leo is a fiery sign.  The element of fire is concerned about all else with the discovery and fulfillment of future possibilities.  In Aries, these possibilities have to do with action, with leadership, with challenge.  In Leo, these possibilities have to do with his fulfilling his own peculiar myth.  And you don't have to go far to discover Leo's myth.  There is a wonderful book on the meaning of mythology by Joseph Campbell, called the Hero With a Thousand Faces.  There's Leo:  the hero or heroine, in a thousand different guises, playing a thousand different roles, disguised as somebody you know, or maybe even yourself.  Beneath the apparent worldliness and bombast of the fire signs there always lies a secret child, who mythologizes life.  And Leo, more than the other two fire signs, loves to make a myth out of himself.  He is so idealistic it can make you cry.  Even the Leo who cloaks himself in the cynicism of the world is really a romantic