Blog — Venus

Venus in Aries. The evolutionary intent is to establish relationships that help the person learn courage and develop the will. There is a soul-desire to learn how to express strong emotions, positive or negative, in the context of love. This is in reaction to soul-memories of deadening prior-life dynamics in which intimacy was eclipsed by unresolved, unexpressed anger.

Venus in Taurus. The evolutionary intent is to develop lasting bonds that help one maintain calm, simplicity and an easy connection with one's instinctive side. There is a soul-desire to experience naturalness in the sexual arena, in reaction to stiff,  formal, or undesired prior life sexual relations. 

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The devil is in the details. So are the angels sometimes. In my transits and progressions work with clients, the focus is always on the “big picture.” That grand evolutionary perspective emerges most clearly when we reflect on the slow-moving, theme-building planet — basically the transits of everything out beyond Mars, plus the progressions. In the counseling room, it is usually practical to ignore the little “firefly” transits of Mercury and Venus, or the Sun and the Moon. They go by so quickly that they don’t have much time to develop depth and complexity of meaning. But they sure “work!” Let Mercury transit over your Sun, for example, and your phone is ringing like crazy and your email inbox looks like Obama’s.

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by Steven Forrest

If you have been watching the evening sky this year, you’ve witnessed a lovely minuet of bright-eyed Venus and much dimmer Mars. They’ve pulled apart since their spectacular conjunction last February, but they are now racing back toward one another’s arms. Their final embrace will happen on November 2, in just about exactly 24°Virgo. Over the next four weeks, on their way to that happy rendezvous, the two planets first do a line-dance with Neptune and then a sexy slow dance with Jupiter—two events in the heavens whose fingertips we will all feel in our intimate lives.

Most of my language here in this newsletter will reflect the classic Mars-Venus terrain of intimacy in a “partnering” sense of the word. But really, these configurations have broader meaning, affecting all of our various relationships. With just a little translation, all that we explore here is relevant to those kinds of connections too. Even if you are single, there are people you love. You also probably think about relationship—and these planetary patterns will underlie your thoughts and meditations.

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In planetary transit news this month, Venus goes direct, Mercury goes retrograde, and Saturn settles into Sagittarius. That's a lot of shifting energy, perhaps fitting for the "back to school" season.

Venus will station direct on Sunday, September 6 at 14° Leo. Check your chart for any planets close to that degree of Leo, Aquarius, Taurus or Scorpio. You folks will likely notice the station the most. Take note, and if you have any good stories to share after the station, Tony would love to hear them. Email tony@forrestastrology.com. If you track the shadow periods of retrograde cycles, Venus will remain in the shadow through October 9, when it passes the degree at which it stationed retrograde, 0° Virgo.

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Transiting Pluto is sitting right smack on my Sun. The “god of hell,” right up my nose. And yet, despite all doomsayers, I am still alive. When I was a young astrologer, I might have seen that transit coming and bet anyone five dollars that it would kill me. That was my training. I would have lost five dollars too.

Funny how fear gets in one’s blood as we learn astrology. There’s so much of it out there. Many of my private clients come to me knowing a little bit of about the planets—enough to be dangerous. I mention an upcoming transit of Pluto or Saturn in their charts and they grow pale, as if it’s some kind of death sentence. As most of you know, I constantly preach against that kind of astrology. Am I immune to the fear? I’ve got a student who adds a cool little colophon to her emails—“Start listening to your own lectures.” That’s a good reminder . . . for me, as much as for the rest of us.

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We are proud to offer our newest instructional program this month: “Working Consciously With Mercury, Venus, and Mars.”

I love the immediacy and liveliness of teaching a room full of astrologers, and I am never so happy in that department as I am sitting with my apprentices. With serious, informed students and four or five days to work, we are able to probe deeply into the heart of evolutionary astrology.

A year ago, I offered this particular program to my southern California students. Tony Howard brought his video camera and captured the introductory material, which is what we present here.

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Stored deep in the antiquarian depths of my memory banks is an old giggle about the dance that heterosexual people do: “She ran away from him until she caught him.” Are the times gone when people believed that script? Is it extinct? I guess that is an essay question nowadays as the old gender assumptions pass through the wringer of cultural change.

In any case, the saying came to mind as I watched Venus chase Mars around the Zodiac this month. At the beginning of January, Venus is speeding through the last degrees of Capricorn while Mars lies safely ahead, deep in Aquarius. Venus joins “him” there on the 3rd, but “he” quickly escapes into Pisces on January 12th. Venus tracks Mars down and enters Pisces “herself” at the end of the month, on the 28th. Mars nearly makes his getaway yet again—he just manages to cross the line into Aries in mid-February, but Venus finally catches up with him there on February 22nd.

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When Steven asked me to write this month’s newsletter, the first idea that popped into my head was “Venus Out of Bounds.” I’d spent the last month editing and preparing his Moon Out of Bounds video and audio programs, so the subject was fresh on my mind. I thought, “If the out of bounds Moon is so dramatic in people’s charts, what about the other planets?” How would Mercury, Venus or Mars express when outside the “normal influence” of the sun?

If the out of bounds concept is new to you, start by reading Steven’s Out of Bounds Moon article, originally published in The Mountain Astrologer, which will lay out both the technical and theoretical framework. After that, if you’re hungry for more, you might revisit the Out of Bounds section in Chapter 3 of The Book of the Moon, or check out the newly released video or audio programs on the subject.

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September opens straightforwardly with Venus in Libra and Mercury in Virgo. Each planet is in the sign it naturally rules, in other words. And that symmetry can be a bit bland, like a beige rug in a beige room.  But then things get a lot more interesting. On the 9th, Mercury crosses into Libra where it resides for the bulk of the month, until finally entering Scorpio on the 29th. Two days after Mercury slips into Libra, Venus leaves it, crossing the border into the classic sign of its “detriment,” Scorpio, where it remains until the end of the first week of October.

It is this period from September 11th onward, with Venus in Scorpio and Mercury in Libra, that I'm interested in.  Harnessed in an evolutionary way, this planetary combination can trigger conscious deepening, support both truth-telling and truth-hearing, and foster the resolution of tough, longstanding intimate conflicts. Experienced unconsciously, it can read like the script of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf.  People can tear each other apart in the name of love, in other words.

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We're now in the home stretch of Mercury Retrograde. Mercury stations direct early in the morning of August 8.

There plenty of levity to appreciate in today's Aquarius full moon energy, which is much needed after last month's challenging Mars aspects. Just as the moon is full, it will trine Jupiter, which will in turn form a sextile to the sun. The Sun and Mercury will trine Uranus, and even Saturn is feeling friendly with a sweet trine to Venus. If you're reading this, make the most of these positive energies while they're at hand.

Steven caught just enough of a breather between teaching events to write a wonderful bit about Venus in Cancer below. He's just now beginning his annual AP program in Australia. Then he heads home for a short break before the next program which starts September 28 in Calistoga, CA.

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