This is posting on May 1st, so a bit about today and then we'll get right into Venus.
The Moon continues her journey through fiery, fun-loving and dramatic Leo. She has a lovely sextile (good for errands, writing, communicating, socializing) with Venus this morning (7:15AM EDT) and then goes void off an opposition to Mars - so get things you need cooperation with done early! - at 12:04PM EDT and will be void for the rest of the day, moving into practical Virgo tomorrow.
Saturday's lunar aspects are REALLY good. On Sunday - the day looks a little overly idealistic (we start that Venus/Neptune square that will be in play all month and we will talk about in this post), but we need that sometimes, right? And the evening looks quite positive and powerful.
OK - on to our lovely Venus!
Venus goes retrograde every couple years and every eight years Venus will retrograde through the same sign.
If we were to draw a map of these retrograde points in her eight year cycles we would draw a five pointed star. And if we drew a map of these Venus retrograde points (named Venus Star Points) over long periods of time we would draw a perfect and graceful five petal flower/a delicate piece of sacred geometry showing us something of our own Venusian nature's kinship with beauty, balance, love and connection.
Since the 1980's (when Aquarius and Virgo cycled out) Venus has cycled through retrogrades in Aries, Capricorn, Gemini, Leo and Scorpio. Over the next ten years Aries and Scorpio will cycle out and Libra and Pisces will cycle in (more signifiers of the gentler and more cooperative years ahead). So, different generations of people are born into, and live through, different Venus Star Points.
On May 13th , Venus will station retrograde (when viewed from our position on Earth) at 21 degrees Gemini.
Venus retrograde - all 40 days and 40 night of it - will have us re-assessing BIG themes in our lives.
The theme of our natal Gemini house, the themes of the houses Venus rules in your natal chart (our Taurus and Libra houses) and the collective Venusian themes of love, money, our values, our resources, beauty and our self-esteem are all up for a re-evaluation. We do the "re's" - re-do, re-think, re-evaluate, re-novate, re-union, within these themes. You know the drill.
Having Venus in Gemini, and answering to Mercury, for such a long period time is also going to impact Uranus, who is in Taurus answering to Venus. And the North Node, our collective way forward, will be in Gemini during the retrograde.
We will get a lot of mileage out of this.
The last time Venus retrograded in Gemini was May 15th - June 28th, 2012.
Do you remember what was going on in your life back then? I'll write my story from that time after the closing and I am definitely seeing some interesting connections to some themes in my life now.
APRIL 3RD - Venus into Gemini
APRIL 9TH - Venus reaches 5 degrees (starting her retrograde shadow)
MAY 13TH - Venus stations retrograde - 21 degrees
JUNE 25TH - Venus stations direct - 5 degrees
JULY 29TH - Venus reaches 21 degrees (ending her retrograde shadow)
During this period Venus will meet up with Mercury, square Mars - probably a bunch of other stuff I am missing just glancing through, but her most impactful aspects,
because they will be repeated three times, will be her squares to Neptune in Pisces and her sextiles to Chiron in Aries.
Let's unpack this!
First, let's think about Venus herself. Unlike Mars who goes out in the world and takes action to get what he wants, Venus attracts what she wants. She coaxes a response. This doesn't mean she isn't dynamic - she is, she brings things into relationship/into balance. She makes things beautiful. She is the energy of attraction, love - what we love and how we love, art, beauty, relationship, our resources, our money.
I work with metals with my jewelry making and have heard that Venus rules copper. If you have ever worked with it, it is a soft metal and can bend more easily than others, but then it can also just suddenly break. It is malleable until it isn't. Kind of the way Venus-ruled Libra can cooperate and accommodate and then just suddenly snap!
So, now she is in Gemini, after eight years, for 40 days and 40 nights from 21 - 5 degrees. If we have planets in this hot zone Venus will meet them/merge with them. If we have planets and points in the other mutable signs, in these degrees, she will challenge them or be challenged by them - this would be Virgo and Sagittarius through squares (tense situations that force change/pivots/action) and Pisces (through opposition - this is where Neptune comes in because he is in this 'hot zone' in Pisces). She will sextile (create opportunities that will require action) Aries and Leo (again, our 5-21 degree planets/points) and trine (things fall into place or fall away more effortlessly) the other air signs - Libra and Aquarius.
Now, Venus is in Gemini, so we are most attractive (use our Venus) through Gemini (our mind). It's a good time (through July 31st) to be talking and communicating with lots of different people about lots of different things. Venus in Gemini LOVES variety. There are more options available. There is also more duality - this is the space where our heart is saying one thing and our brain is saying something else. Communications are more casual, more lively and humorous. It's a good time to set aside any existing constructs about what we like and what we don't like and stay open to new experiences, new people and new situations. Say YES to the things that sound like FUN now.
During this retrograde we could recognize a mismatch between what we have and what we want. Or maybe what we thought we had could be up for grabs a bit. The things Venus rules will be more 'in-flux',
This isn't the best energy to make an important decision (regarding our Gemini natal house theme or Venus ruled love, money, self-esteem, values, women or beauty) or commit to something permanently, but we can get a lot of mileage from Venus in Gemini if we can allow ourselves to kind of go with the flow here.
Our natal Gemini house is a space that just naturally requires us to be more changeable/more dualistic and now here comes the lovely Venus to offer us her beneficial presence here!
What house in your natal chart is ruled by Gemini? Venus will be back and forth through this area of your life for several weeks. The house answers the questions - where will the action of Venus take place?
Here is a brief list and by no means complete and may not be totally accurate for you since I can't see the houses in your natal chart, but you can get the general idea. Venus, retrograde in Gemini, also colors your natal Venus - so what houses does she rule? That would be your natal Taurus and Libra houses. Those themes will factor in here, too. Life is never just one thing.
GEMINI RISING - 1st house Gemini - our identity, actually our heroic quest for identity
TAURUS RISING - 2nd house Gemini - (one of Venus's natural houses) our values, our resources, our money, our self-esteem
ARIES RISING - 3rd house Gemini - communication, information, writing, doing multiple things at once, siblings, community
PISCES RISING - 4th house Gemini - our roots, home, family, our security
AQUARIUS RISING - 5th house Gemini - self-expression, creativity, romance, children
CAPRICORN RISING 6h house Gemini - our daily work, our health, our service, our pets
SAGITTARIUS RISING - 7th house Gemini - (one of Venus's natural houses) partnerships
SCORPIO RISING - 8th house Gemini - merging/purging, other people's resources, taxes, inheritance, secrets, life/death, sex
LIBRA RISING - 9th house Gemini - travel, higher education, publishing, religion, our beliefs
VIRGO RISING - 10th house Gemini - profession, vocation, goals
LEO RISING - 11th house Gemini - the goals that bring us into connection with others, friendships, causes, networks
CANCER RISING - 12th house Gemini - things done last, things forgotten and put away, imagination, healing, spirit
Now, during this particular Venus retrograde she will square Neptune (strong in his home sign of Pisces) three times - May 3rd - both planets direct, May 20th (Venus retrograde) and July 27th (Neptune retrograde).
Repeating aspects are always important, so let's look at this one. It is hard, and probably pointless, to look at anything during a pandemic/worldwide emergency without factoring that in.
This could play out a couple different ways.
Venus is going to station retrograde along with Saturn and Jupiter - all within a few days of each other. So we are going back over alot of things. As Saturn stations retrograde (daddy takes a vaca), mid-May, it is likely some of the restrictions we have been living with will start to come off.
Venus in Gemini is going to want to go out and try different things. She will make us curious and somewhat restless - and this is perfectly normal. She will also attract us to facts/information and yes, this is going to be in-flux.
Now, this square to Neptune in Pisces (the planet of our imagination and illusions and delusions and no boundaries) can play out in different ways. Since Pisces certainly represents viruses, we can easily see the virus itself squaring Venus in Gemini -our need for more variety, to flirt, to communicate, to be out and about in our local community. It is also possible because Neptune in Pisces is very 'rose-colored-glassy' we could be more idealistic about how something here is going to turn out than it actually turns out. These are mutable energies, we need to stay flexible. It can be the virus (Neptune) interfering in what Venus wants to do, and also the virus dissolving Venus (relationships/money/resources/our values). Neptune is surrender/letting go and letting God.
Some Venus/Neptune square word salads could be - dissolving resources, attraction to drugs/alcohol/escape, delusional attractions, confusing social interactions (here is where things like masks will probably factor in), unrealistic expectations with love or money, a fool for love, the things we want eluding us, sadness with the choices we are left with.
On the other hand, and this is why we usually have at least two, sometimes we need illusion to keep us going! Just don't bet the farm, run off to Vegas and get married, yada yada or you will wake up with one hell of a hangover when this is all over.
Now, on another level there is a whole other/deeper thing happening here because we are living the crack between the chapters.
Our values are changing. Our relationships are changing. The ways we make money and spend money is changing. Our resources are changing.
Neptune makes it possible for these things to dissolve in a less painful way - it provides some anesthesia!
Even without us making foolish (due to Neptunian delusion) choices some of this is not possible to avoid.
We have been through a Saturn/Pluto square (time runs out) - many of our soul contracts have ended.
With Venus retrograde old relationships can come back around - the square to Neptune can activate VERY old relationships - past lives, ancestral karma - new relationships/resources (which may or may not prove lasting) can come in. Our tribal/familial energy - his-story and her-story - visits us through those Neptune/Chiron aspects and we are pulled into circumstances similar to those of our ancestors (and our own past lives), so maybe we can choose differently this time, finish what they started, make the amends they needed to make, even earn the rewards they (or we in a past life) were denied.
Venus also has a repeating aspect with healer Chiron (in Aries).
This one is a sextile, so more opportunistic if we take some kind of action with it - fire/air - so maybe through brave words or new ideas, speaking up for ourselves, being more independent minded - this kind of thing. This could also be about healing with our masculine energy/with men.
So, at the same time we have these challenges with Neptune - our boundaries/what is real - we are having these opportunities to heal our oldest/deepest woundings around our very identity with Chiron.
It's a brave new/brand new world.
*****
My story with this Venus Star Point - eight years ago as Venus went into Gemini (my 8th house) hubs and I were coming off a long few months with his brother - who suffers with schizophrenia and alcoholism - living with us.
It's a long story, and I talked about some of it here many years ago, but in more practical terms I think, since I was more of a business blogger (if you squinted from 20 paces back) in those days.
He was a part of the 2012 mystical awakening we experienced that left us disillusioned, depressed and isolated from each other and everyone/everything else.
This "wake" stuff ain't a basket of roses folks.
Hub's brother had been homeless and separated from family for decades when he suddenly appeared on CNN (?) after being beaten up in the woods by a couple teenagers (one of whom we later found out had a childhood story uncannily similar to hub's brother's story). This was in the early days of Facebook and the kids filmed this and the video was posted online - 'beating up bums' was a kind of spectator sport. Anyway, long story short, we reconnected with him and made plans for him to live with us after completing the free 30 day drug rehab he had been given.
We naively painted the spare room, got him a little TV and mini-fridge, clothes, you get the idea. We were wanting to help him. We were just kind of running on instinct.
When the day came we drove out to Pennsylvania to pick him up and he was very happy to see us and also sad to leave the treatment center. We had plans to stop at a diner for lunch, but when we pulled into the car lot, he jumped out of the car and screamed that he wasn't going in there. They didn't like him in there. He knew they were talking about him. Hubs and I were looking at each other over the top of the car thinking "what the hell have we gotten ourselves into". The counselors we had been speaking with were always talking to us about his addictions and getting him into AA when we got him home, but his mental issues, which we were totally unequipped to deal with and unprepared for were never mentioned. We hadn't seen him in almost 20 years. He had spent most of that time in jail for various disorderly persons offenses and some time, after winning the lottery (!) living it up with pseudo friends in a beach house.
Anyway, he was mostly sweet, but always disagreeable and sometimes explosive and I worked at home, so hubs started taking him to work with him. He had a truck repair shop and his brother would help him clean up a bit, but mostly fall asleep in one of the trucks. At night we would all have dinner and hubs or I would drive him to an AA meeting. We were given a case manager who was kind, but very inexperienced and sort of enamored with his local 'celebrity' status/10 minutes of fame.
This was when Neptune moved permanently into Pisces after his retrograde at the end of 2011 and literally Neptune (via my brother-in-law) moved into my home (4th house) ruling 5th house (children).
We were waking up. We were falling apart. We were drowning.
Back and forth between moments of pure love with him/for him (he is quite a lovable character in his own way and looks very much like a hobbit) and moments of pure despair. At some point I started feeling like his mother and having dreams of being his mother and dreams of reluctantly kicking him out of our house, circa 1800's, due to his addictions/mental illness. Hubs began dreaming of being his commander in a war, circa 1800's, and sending him into a battle he knew he would probably not survive due to his addictions/mental illness. We started feeling we were living out some kind of past life dejavu with him.
At the same we were in this 'beyond our control' situation with my brother-in-law (we were never able to get him on any kind of medication for his illness, although we did keep him sober for many months), we also had a 'beyond our control' situation happening for my daughter. I have a policy of not talking about her on here out of respect for her privacy - she was going through something very sad and hard and it was something we had no control over and couldn't fix. And at the same time my two jewelry lines were being copied, one by a guy who was getting into the handmade tradeshow sections that I had not been able to get into - more 'out of control' stuff and also situations where I needed to 'stand up for my children/creations' or this was kind of how I was seeing things at the time.
I got back into the astrology and spirituality I had back-burnered for years trying to not only explore the deeper meaning of what was going on, but also to figure out 'what was going to happen' - which, of course, doesn't actually work.
Whew. I hope you have coffee!
So, right around the time Venus was stationing retrograde in Gemini, and maybe at exactly that time, my brother-in-law, was starting to go awol/off the wagon. We got him a home. He got thrown out. We were kind of chasing after him, sick to our stomachs like worried parents when he would disappear. We were coming out of this winter/spring hibernation period because we couldn't really leave him home alone, so we were mostly always home.
This kind of feels like now. The hibernation through a Neptunian energy. The Ceres aspects of not being able to control/protect what we have mothered/birthed. Great grief.
At the end of that time period my brother-in-law was back in jail. My feelings for him dissolved. Hub's feelings began to morph back into the brotherly energies he started out with. We still help him as we can from time to time, but decided he can't live with us anymore.
By the end of 2012, I had become immersed in conversations around "ascension", and hubs in conspiracies, and what might happen on the Winter Solstice that year, and was thrown into darker waters during the Newtown, CT shooting of all those little children. I knew then I wasn't on any quick "ascension" timeline. Lots of things were going on in my chart, but in this 3D world, as is prone to happening with spiritual awakenings - my connections to other people and everything that once mattered to me was unraveling.
My daughter's situation, which lasted throughout 2012, resolved in September 2013 with a miracle and her miracle and my focus over there, easily ended the work focus that had consumed a great part of my life (Cappy South Node here plus Mercury in Capricorn and Sun in 3rd house - Mercury's house).
What we didn't know eight years ago as this story with hub's brother was dissolving - because it was a slow anesthetic fade-to-black - when we thought we could go back to our old life and old ways of connecting with each other and with our lives, was that we were different people and there was no going back.
We were 'awake" but at a great cost ..
Anyway, maybe think back to 2012 and see what was going on in your life. I better wrap this part up for now, this is way too long for our covid-frazzled brains to read and please excuse any of my too frequent typos because I won't be rereading it either. :)
xo all
photo by the amazing thefirebomb
