Weekend Metaphysical Forecast 8.11.23
FINDING RELIEF FROM VENUS
WHAT?
This week has probably felt like an interminable extension of the last week, in that Venus is still in retrograde, still in Leo, and forcing us to autopsy our past and how it relates to our creativity, appearance, love, and friendships. Been feeling bad about yourself? You're not alone!
Many of us have been struggling, particularly people whose creative ventures support them financially, or are otherwise intrinsic to their life trajectory. Anyone with fraught Venus placement in their natal chart, or a lot of Leo and other fixed sign presence (Hi! It's me!) is also probably having a pretty crappy month. As Venus seems to move backward through Leo, our aspirations, confidence, and ego are being forced into the 'way back' machine, which can produce equal parts nostalgia and trauma. Some of us have been taking measure of past efforts or past relationships and noticing disturbing or unhelpful trends, but the nature of a retrograde is making it difficult to enact any progress or find acceptable solutions even after we've identified problems. It is natural in the throes of an intense life recap to feel immobilized by uncomfortable clarity, like a patient strapped to a chair undergoing radical therapy. But just because an experience is natural doesn't mean it is fun.
Thankfully, there may be a brief moment of relief this weekend as Venus enters a conjunction with the sun for a spot of illumination. For those of us that have been enduring a bit more of a struggle, this is an excellent moment to rest and tune out the world. In fact, consider Sunday an apex of misery that will, hopefully, arc toward something more pleasant as August wears on. For people with more favorable Venus placement in their charts, though, job opportunities, creative inspiration, and sweet moments with friends or partners are the things to take advantage of on Saturday and Sunday, before the tumult returns and we finish out the other half of this irritating mobius strip.
WHY?
Search the phrase 'Venus Cazimi' online and you'll encounter breathless declarations of romantic getaways, uncanny moments of inspiration, and gushy promises of admiration and a new, beautiful makeover. And if you have a favorable Venus placement in your natal chart, that may certainly be the case. Although many astrology blogs and articles in the digital sphere are hyper focused on the 'love, laughter, and light' possibilities of a Venus Cazimi, I happen to feel far more circumspect and cynical. The reasons for my diversion in this regard stem from the mythical origins of Venus, once Aphrodite, once Astarte; an eternal stand-in for women and the role of the feminine within human society.
The eminent Western perception of Venus is Botticelli's doe-eyed, placid princess on a shell*, which jives nicely with the idealized, Judeo-Christian idea of womanhood that became dominant during the Holy Roman Empire and has prevailed ever since - in fact, I suspect it still colors the landscape of modern astrology when it comes to defining the role of the actual planet within the universe. This would explain the cliched insistence that Venus brings love and beauty to our collective table (because according to science, only women care about love or are capable of love, duh) and little else. The Roman Venus, however, is a mild mimic of Greek Aphrodite, who was guilty of torture, murder, and violence, often in cahoots with aggressive hothead Ares. And Aphrodite herself was a poor copy of Astarte, the Phoenician goddess that ancient Mesopotamians saw when they looked at the second brightest object in the sky during the third millennium BCE.
Astarte was not a love goddess, rather, she was a goddess of primal desire. Sex, war, hunting, and killing were her loyal subjects, making her a far more realistic proxy for women whose most optimistic life trajectory involved unwilling tween motherhood that, if it didn't immediately kill them, simply rendered them corpses by age 25. She is often depicted in antique statuary with fangs and fucking horns. Venus as Astarte blinked violently in the ancient sky and was co-opted by humans of yore as an explanation for their own short, woeful lives, wherein the desire for affection might literally end in death. By the second millenium BCE, bustling temples and enormous statues depicting Astarte adorned port cities throughout the Mediteranean region and overlooked brothels, abbatoirs, killing fields, and all the other places humans embraced animalistic desire. This is the goddess haunting many of us during Venus Retrograde; not Boticelli's naked fawn, but a horned, fanged creature who represents the violent desire that dooms the human race.
Our current situation, framed as an Astarte Retrograde, might make a lot more sense to individuals that have not had a great time this August, and it makes a hell of a lot more sense regarding global events. Women have been subjugated to second-class citizenry, again, as society wades through the same ancient notions of female pain and sacrifice as necessary to men's progress. In Texas this summer, women had to take the witness stand in public court to plead with a government that is just fine with sex ending in death and mutilation. They painstakingly detailed the horror of births gone wrong, replete with skull-less infants, septic shock, vomit, and ruined organs, to no avail. Suicide among women and men in developed nations is rising exponentially. The world may be in a perfect moment for Astarte to return, given our prediliction for moving backwards instead of forwards, just as Venus is doing in tonight's sky. That gentle waif on a clamshell isn't terribly representative of this retrograde, or even the current culture of 2023, but the patron saint of fucking and violence? The one who waits with open arms for those of us enduring bloody lives with bloody endings? She gets it, and she'll be waiting.
*If you haven't examined Botticelli's Birth of Venus in a while, check it out. For someone just emerging from the ocean and arriving on the shores of Earth, she doesn't look particularly stoked. Her eyes are resigned and her body language protective, as though she knows exactly what a world of men has in store for her.
WHEN?
Sunday, August 13th is the pinnacle of Venus conjunct with our sun, and one of the most excellent days for self-care this year has to offer. This also marks the midway point of Venus Retrograde in Leo, so if we can make it to September 3rd, things might get better. Maybe.
TAROT
Expect deception on Friday, possibly relating to security, property, or finance. Whatever corner it lurks in, greed or addiction are likely motivating factors. If circumstances allow, Saturday is a nice day for romantic excursions, freewheeling first dates, or collaborative art projects. Although Sunday may present some opportunites for love and prosperity, many of us will be too bound up in our own emotions to take advantage. Expect instabilty and flightiness. We will still be climbing out of negative thoughts and perceptions on Monday and Tuesday, so be cautious with anything near and dear to the heart - people will be struggling internally, and conversations will be filled with more emotion than logic.
As always, thank you to everyone who has been following the daily readings on our stories at RitualPNW on IG and YouTube channel at http://youtube.com/@alectochaos and everyone who has sent little notes of encouragement to me over the last month or so. It warms my black, evil heart.
LAGNIAPPE
The next version of this Metaphysical News is trucking right along, so do not despair, astrology fans...updates will continue to come from Substack once Ritual powers down our brick and mortar location. Despite being under construction, the first of many long form pieces is live now, explaining some of the more shadowy and uncomfortable reasons for Ritual's closure. While it is not the most uplifting subject matter, it's pretty truthful, and truth is the only thing I can offer at this point as a boon to the disappointment many of you feel. As a bonus, all of the Metaphysical Newsletters are back catalogued on my Substack as well, so we can all peruse them and point out how rightly (or wrongly) my astrological predictions panned out, which always fun. Find the link here.