Venus Stations Direct: April 9th – April 16th Reading

As of today, Sunday the 9th, we are entering a zone of FIVE overlapping retrogrades. Heads and hearts will both be prone to confusion, but really, what else is new? Venus has put us through a lot in the last six weeks — you might think of this Mercury retrograde kicking in as the final push to cut off your head and embrace healing the heart, which operates with its own logic. Venus stations direct, sharing a degree with asteroid-healer Chiron, on Friday, April 14th.

Saturn also stationed retrograde last week right before receiving a square from Venus. This is a slightly more long-term (4-ish months) retrograde, Saturn’s last in Sagittarius, that serves to review and reinforce the lessons Saturn has been teaching us in the last year and a half or so. There may have been some truths revealed or uncovered that have required a fearlessness to face. The Saturn-Venus square connects this new knowledge to the ways we relate to the Venusian: love, money, beauty, comfort. When Venus meets Chiron on the very next degree, it’ll be be asking for healing on behalf of these traumatic truths as well. Thank you, Chiron. Thank you, Venus.

I’m not gonna spend too much time on the astrology this week, but I encourage you to think about what it means that Venus is the one delivering us to Chiron for healing/delivering Chiron’s healing to us. How is the Venusian healing in your life? What can you do to honor and thank Venus for undertaking this long and difficult journey?

It’s the moment of truth. This is where we can walk out into the light and never look back. This is both the ending of a long period of suffering and the beginning of a long journey that involves pulling ten swords out of our backs one by one. Because it’s better than giving up and letting them stay there. Because on the other side of that journey is a new life full of riches and wonders and comfort and adventure and discovery and spiritual awakening. We learn in Pisces to be open to possibility rather than rigidly clinging to our idea of what should be. Deep, intimate connection to spirit enables us to do this difficult work.

Swords are ideas. They are not themselves inherently good or bad, but for how they are used. The sword held by Justice exists to uphold a natural law; we might relate this to our personal ethics. We can make the decision every day to live in such a way that promotes equality and fairness in our relationships and the broader world — Jupiter in Libra has been working on this since last October. This decision matters, and is worth defending. That is a positive use of the sword.

Swords and ideas are also very dangerous. We must only use them with well-considered conviction and with certainty that we are causing the least amount of bloodshed possible. We must never use them out of fear or blind rage. We wound ourselves when we are so afraid of our own vulnerability that we cut off the parts of ourselves that most need defending. We wound ourselves (and likely others) when we hold too rigidly to any idea. Very few things are true in every single circumstance, but reason has a hard time accounting for this. It is necessary to think and speak with great humility so as not to invalidate alternative perspectives.

It is likely in this moment that we have been on the receiving end of our own or someone else’s misused sword, perhaps many of them over a period of time. It is appropriate to defend ourselves against these attacks, even if they come from another part of ourselves. At this point it may be that we are moving ourselves to safety in order to do the work of recovery. Pulling the swords out may be more painful in the moment than leaving them there, but it is only after we do so that we can heal. The first step is ensuring that we are safe from further attack — this requires functional boundaries. Some bodies are targeted for psychic and physical attack far more frequently than others, and so what safety looks like really varies from person to person. The goal is only to be both safe and resilient enough that we can be present with ourselves and our traumas and feel confident that we will not be destroyed. The second step is identifying those ideas we have internalized which are harmful to us. The third step is dislodging those ideas with strong, focused attention. This process takes time and will benefit greatly from the help of a neutral party who can hold space and help guide you through it.

What we access through doing this work is a mature and empowered sense of self, a confidence in our own capability and our inherent worth, and the ability to be flexible, to take what opportunities are presented to us with curiosity and excitement rather than anxiety and dread. From there, we are free to move forward in building the life we want to have.