Venus Returns to the Final Degree

4.5.09


To cap off her unbelievably active six-week retrograde, Venus will be leaving us with a gift.

After having spent more than two months in Aries, the sign of her detriment—where she feels most ill at ease, torn between her typical 'bringing people together with other people and other good things' behavior and the impulsive pursuit of self-satisfying actions associated with Aries—she returns, for a brief spell, to Pisces.

And Venus is much much happier in Pisces, particularly at the tail end of the sign.

Venus is in her exaltation in Pisces, where she can be a most benevolent goddess, bubbling over with compassion for those she cares about, those in need, and those who Lady Fate has brought into her imminent sphere… and where she's often insightfully aware of her connection with all the universe in its massive mysterious entirety, astutely understanding the truest bounties of wealth and love do not come at anyone else's expense, and thus opening herself most fully, with a grateful heart, to the beautiful experiences always everywhere around.

If this flowery description sounds worlds away from my more recent takes on Venus, it is. Venus in Aries can be thoughtless, selfish, potentially aggressive… and not especially attuned to sensitively handling other people's feelings. Throw in the retrograde muddlement, and her ability to inspire kindly regard for how our actions will affect someone else is not exactly world-class.

The devil's advocate interpretation of recent Venus-related events (predicated justly on astrology's implied endorsement of 'a time for everything') lets us know we probably needed such a raw immodest Venusian energy to hoist us into serving ourselves finally… as well as to righteously voice our unwillingness to let the greedy needies who always serve themselves continue trampling on our daisies. Ahoy! Like usual, the planets gave us what we needed.

And now we get Venus at a royal high, not only in the sign of Pisces but essentially standing still in its very last degree—which is also the very last degree of the entire zodiac wheel, before it starts again at 0 Aries. This is not without significance, people. This 30th degree of Pisces represents nothing less than the culmination of all universal experience, an ultra-diffuse interconnectedness with all that ever was and all that ever will be (not necessarily a conscious one, of course). A stationary Venus situated here dares us to appreciate everything, in full gratitude, honoring the cosmic intelligence that dwells behind the Piscean veil, which draws us into the very interactions and encounters we require for our evolution.

This is a rather brief momentous window of time in which Venus lovingly loiters in the final Piscean degree—from April 11 to April 24—before heading back to Aries for another six weeks or so, to complete her efforts to stir the self into satisfying itself more shamelessly.

Think of it as your golden opportunity to feel out the status of whatever's recently been exhilaratingly fast-moving and frenetically self-centered: How does where I stand now affect those around me? What beauty can I now see that I wasn't able to glimpse before? How much more fortunate can I now view myself and my situation? And how can I now put my newfound self-satisfaction to good use in service to those less fortunate, those I love and those I know I can help?

During this magic window, I strongly urge you to open your eyes (and your psychic antennae) to everything and everyone else around you—since I'm going to assume you've been rather consumed by the very personal interests currently consuming you—and reaffirm your connectedness.

Each one of us badly needs to situate our present condition within the wider context of the collective, the zeitgeist, this moment in history, and all the other important reference points that anchor us to one another. Otherwise, as this unusual burst of me-first action continues, we're liable to lose sight of the respect we owe each other as fellow life-forces, since the earthquakes we cause in our lives are sure to spark aftershocks and tidal waves in the lives of others', and vice versa.

Yes, the aggressively action-oriented dynamics just keep on comin': Mars conjoins Uranus, an unpredictable power-surge of an aspect, on Apr 15, then heads into Aries (his ruling sign, where he's quick and strong and brave and uppity) on Apr 22 for a nearly six-week stay. Venus flips forward to direct motion again on Apr 17, returning to Aries for her six weeks on Apr 24. And the fires keep on burnin'…!