“Perhaps we could see Venus as the sensory detector which alerts us to when we need to alter the outer garments to suit the inner self…” ERIN SULLIVAN (‘Retrograde Planets: Traversing the Inner Landscape’)
And once every 19 months she (Venus) gives us an opportunity to reflect on how this works in our lives. Venus is goddess of love and sensuality, of where we find worth, value and beauty – what attracts us! For women, she’s part of how we see ourselves. For a man, she’s more about what he finds attractive in a partner (part of his anima in Jungian terms). She goes retrograde at 13Aries08 tomorrow (4th March, 2017).
The 19-month pattern is part of a larger pattern which takes about 8 years (in March 2009, Venus was retrograde in Aries and moving back into the last degrees of Pisces as she does this year with a couple of degrees difference) and maps out the path of a pentagram in the heavens (the photo I’ve chosen is one from pixabay.com – see below)! Both the pentagram and the pattern of cells in a sunflower head (for instance) are connected to the Golden Ratio and the Fibonacci Sequence – what beauty there is in mathematics!
The inferior conjunction (on the earth’s side of the sun) of Venus to the sun during its retrograde takes place on 25th March, 2017 around 5 degrees of Aries. If you have planets around 5 degrees of the cardinal signs, this ups its importance for you but you might not see the results of this inner phase until much later in the year – even into January, 2018 and beyond when Venus reaches her superior conjunction with the sun (she lines up on the far side of the sun for this). The other two degrees to watch out for are the degree that she retrogrades from (see above) and the degree she moves back to (26Pisces54).
In 2010, following Venus’ superior conjunction to the sun in January, I got ‘itchy feet’ and moved base to Chester for a while. The move didn’t happen until August, but the seed was planted during Venus’ retrograde through my second house of security – and acted out whilst both Saturn and Pluto were affecting my nodal axis and natal Mars (ruler of my natal 2nd house). Have a look at your own patterns – which house this retrograde falls in, whether you have any planets/angles at the significant degrees and what was happening back in 2009-10, etc. – and do get in touch if you’d like to organise a consultation to explore this more deeply.
Erin also points out (ibid) that, “(t)he degree of discord that arises within one’s personal life during the retrogression signals the distance that one is from one’s core values and higher creative aspirations.”
And if you are a person born with Venus retrograde, “… during… the darkening of Venus when her power is obliterated by the Sun…” then you’re likely to “… experience more intensely the conflict between inner values and the learned rituals of society…” (ibid).
Love and blessings in this time of rediscovering your deepest values!
Helen x
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