Chinese Zodiac: The Tiger

The Chinese zodiac is a repeating 12-year cycle in which each year is associated with one of twelve animals: Rat, Ox, Tiger, Rabbit, Dragon, Snake, Horse, Goat, Monkey, Rooster, Dog, and Pig. The animal of your birth year is believed to shape your personality, temperament, and compatibility with others.

The Tiger is the third animal in the cycle. Recent and upcoming years of this sign: 1926, 1938, 1950, 1962, 1974, 1986, 1998, 2010, 2022, 2034. Those born under this sign are traditionally regarded as brave, charismatic, and independent, with an innate need to walk their own path and submit to no one.

Tiger Woman

The woman born in the years of the Tiger does not pass unnoticed. Even when she sits silently in a corner, something in her presence makes you turn your head toward her. She has a gaze at once wild and enchanting, a movement of the body that recalls an animal in the jungle, free and ready to attack or to flee, depending on what it finds before it.

She does not tolerate being given orders. From an early age she learns to resist every form of authority she has not herself chosen to accept. Her parents, her teachers, later her bosses, even her men — all will feel sooner or later that this woman is not to be measured by common standards. If they try to put her in a mold, she will break it — and the breaking will rarely be quiet.

In love she is passionate, almost explosive. She gives herself entirely when she loves and demands the same in return. Half-love does not suffice for her, lukewarm tenderness discourages her. She wants a man who can match her intensity, not one who will try to calm her. If she finds such a man, they can live a relationship full of flame. If not, she will prefer to remain alone rather than settle for something less.

Her mood changes quickly and her anger is something those who experience it once rarely forget. But she does not hold grudges for long — her very nature pushes her forward, into new battles, new loves, new plans. She is a woman who lives intensely and rarely regrets what she has done — much more often she regrets what she did not dare.

Tiger Man

The Tiger man is a born leader — or at least he believes so, and usually others believe it too. There is an authority in his voice and in the way he carries himself that makes those around him pay attention without his needing to ask for it. When he enters a room, the energy shifts — something he himself enjoys, even when he pretends indifference.

He is daring to the point of recklessness. He takes risks others consider madness, and often wins them. Luck seems to follow him — but this luck is the product of his own readiness to try when others hesitate. He cannot live a life of routine. If you trap him in a monotonous daily existence, he will grow unhappy and aggressive, and he will show it to you in ways you will not like.

In love he is impetuous and conquering. He enjoys the chase, the challenge, the woman who does not give herself easily. But once he wins her, he often begins to grow bored — and this is his great weakness. He needs a woman who can keep surprising him constantly, who gives him the sense that he has never entirely conquered her. With such a woman he may stay a lifetime. With another, at most a season.

Demetra Togka