By Len Wallick
Venus will form a conjunction with one of the newly-discovered planets, Varuna, on Friday. Varuna is a slow-mover, spending more than a decade in the sign Cancer, and is one of those behind the scenes influences. In fact, one of the key ideas of Varuna is that it’s behind everything, and since it’s in Cancer, it’s an emotional influence. Most likely you will feel this conjunction as a change of heart. This would be nothing sudden, but rather something that develops over time.
There are three things to remember about conjunctions. First, it is the beginning and the end of a cycle for the objects involved. It’s very much like a New Moon, when the luminaries come together to start a new month, familiar in its phases yet distinguished by a unique context.
Conjunctions also merge the identity and expression of the aspect’s constituents. Sometimes it’s an easy blend of the archetypes. Other times it is a strange brew. Every time the location is a part of the mix, as is the residue that each participating planet carries to their merger from other, recent encounters.
Finally, the close quarters of a conjunction imply the existence of a blind spot. Being deeply involved with a person, place or situation can obscure what is apparent to a detached observer. Perhaps this accounts for the term “love is blind.” The phenomenon may have positive results, facilitating growth and healing. Often it does not. It is always quite an awakening when time and/or separation removes the blindfold.
Venus splashed into Cancer on the Fourth of July, breaking the surface tension of a solar eclipse unseen by any human from the face of the Earth. It proceeded to gather cardinal elements of grace, embellishing its archetype of attraction. This began promptly with a baptismal water trine from retrograde Neptune in Pisces. What followed was the consummate, cumulative continuum of a grand cross as Venus squared Uranus and Saturn, interposed with an opposition to Pluto, all in the course of seven days. Then, last week, the brightest planet disappeared from our view, into the Sun’s golden shroud. Is that epic or what?
We ain’t seen nothin’ yet. Nor will we for quite a while, but we will feel it. Venus has left our sight until September, when it will re-appear in the western twilight as a changed planet. In the meantime, it is doing a little alchemy.
For more than two seasons, since November of 2010, Venus has sailed the eastern sky on a voyage of surrender and discovery. Once a month it returned to lunar port, giving up a little of what it was to make room for what it will be, becoming a sleek and slender crescent planet in the process. Now, out of sight, Venus goes to work. Step by obscure and mysterious step it will combine the treasures it has collected, transmuting itself into something infinitely more precious. A crucial phase in that process is the conjunction with Varuna.
When it comes to the archetypes we have in astrology, Varuna is about as far back in our history as it goes. When it comes to objects in the solar system, it’s nearly as far out as it gets. Astrologer Juan Revilla characterized its energy as that which is “behind everything,” holding cosmos separate from chaos, making all things possible. Incomprehensible as it may be, that’s enough to assign it an active role of distinction.
The actual, astronomical object Varuna orbits the Sun outside the orbit of Neptune. It takes nearly 285 years to make the round trip. Accounting for retrogrades, the net result is that it moves through the zodiac at a rate of about one degree a year. Venus is currently covering that much ground in a day. That disparity makes this conjunction like a voyage to a mountain, floating on a island, slowly drifting. The periodic return renews the cycle when our pilgrim, Venus, relocates the place.
As with each of their conjunctions, Venus brings an active-receptive archetype to merge with the passive-actuator of Varuna. Combined, they function like the little dots that give the yin-yang symbol its dynamic. What makes this get-together different is where it takes place and what Venus is about.
This conjunction’s blind spot is enhanced by the location of Varuna’s mountain in the Sun’s fire, providing both a secret place and sufficient energy for Venus to transmute the heart of its being and purpose. So may we expect this conjunction to play out in our lives. The gathered and nourished values that account for Venus’ archetype of attraction are being brought to the mountain and combined into something more. Something that infuses the spare and essential structure of an indifferent universe with that which is more rare than mind, more precious than life. It is for you to decide whether you will open your own living, mortal, human heart to know, receive and and share what the ultimate separation of this conjunction will will reveal. It is so simple. There is still time.
Offered In Service
so sweet. it helps.
be, Half De Witte, zerosity, patty, aword: thank you for your kind words.
fontanelle33: You are not dumb. Please don’t feel that way. If there is any failure, it is mine. A failure in service.
Please forgive me. Please allow me another chance to serve you with a reiteration.
To reiterate – we cannot see Venus from Earth right now. It is beginning a voyage that will take it behind the Sun to a superior conjunction with the Sun next month. In September it will appear in the West after Sunset (as the so-called “evening star”) after having recently concluded about eight months in the East before dawn (as the so-called “morning star”).
Because the orbit of Venus is inside of ours, it does not go all the way across our sky. It rises in the East (about 45 degree at maximum extension), goes down, goes behind the Sun then it rises in the West (also about 45 degrees), goes down, goes between us and the Sun, retrogrades, then back to the East again. It also shows full and crescent phases like the Moon. You might say what is doing right now is something like changing base metal into gold while offline on a road trip, meeting up with various and sundry who play a part in the process. How is that?
I’d like to ask for some clarification or maybe it’s extrapolation: “What makes this get-together different is where it takes place and what Venus is about.” Really? How so? and “This conjunction’s blind spot is enhanced by the location of Varuna’s mountain in the Sun’s fire.” Now I just feel dumb.
Thank you Len. I’m on board for the ride. I pray it is gentle.
(Natal Varuna conjunct Pallas ‘near enough’ to MC being transited by Jupiter – opposing natal Jupiter/NN/Neptune conjunction. Ya. It’s alllllll good……I just need more tell-tale dreams to help me understand what that “alllll gooood means” lol! 🙂
Heads up and Back to the Wind.
“Be the Lampstand” over the coming days, is a spiritual ‘word’ from God i read about the last few days. Offer light and love and darkness cannot enter in. Think seven angels and seven lampstands guiding the little sailboat home.
ss cancer 22 A young woman, neatly attired in outing clothes, eyes softened by dreaming, awaits a sailboat headed toward her.
That’s what this post is making me think of…or is it dream of? yes.
Len,
I confess to being a faithful lurker for almost a year, avidly reading your offerings. You have a marvelous talent for not only explaining the basics in a clear and concise manner, while you also have an incredible and awesome gift in presenting numerous threads in a beautiful tapestry. I can only express my awe and extreme gratitude for your writings.
Today’s comments about conjunctions, blinds spots and Venus brought a multifaceted focal point for me this day. As of approximately 5:00 ay em EDT today, my “second Saturn return” is now fading when Saturn moved off 11 Libra 27. Also fading is transiting Saturn’s conjunction to my natal Venus.
Because of Saturn’s retrograde, I have had three conjunctions of the transiting Saturn to the natal ringed one (and of course, also to Venus since she is conjunct Saturn natally). This Saturn return, which began in mid-October of last year, will finally move along on August 14.
I know the effects will linger, and know that I have tried to do my best to learn the lessons presented, though much of the time I have felt overwhelmed by all that is flying about after hitting the proverbial fan. Time to look up, look around – as in around whatever has been blocking the path and see beyond.
To all the PW blog people – thank you, especially to those of you who know far than I do about archetypal astrology and who also write and communicate so well. Mercury must be smiling upon this blog.
JannKinz
Len, I shall now reciprocate your acknowledgment.
You take the mundane and intuitively draw it out, evolving truth in pictures that offer alchemical potential and this particular article reflects that in both form and content.
An asset to the Planet Waves community, I really feel you offer a unique gift with your explanation of energies, patterns and stories. Bravo and thank you!
On a personal level I enjoyed the lyrical quality of this post immensely and the challenge it issues is right on the money and in line with consciousness shifts that many are feeling and participating in.
I like to think myself a fairly decent astrological thinker – but with yourself and the rest of the team around it is made much easier to acquire new knowledge and insights.
Keep delivering, Len! 😉
Half
There’s so much to think about and ponder in what you say today Len. Like “Venus brings an active-receptive archetype to merge with the passive-actuator of Varuna.” I’ve probably stereotyped Venus too often as strictly receptive, but she’s quite flexible isn’t she? This ‘active’ part; could this might mean that she not only receives energy from other planets and signs but she also affects their dispositions. . and how they behave in their future aspects and with their future visitors? I don’t know how much she could change Varuna, but I personally sense a bit of change in the sign Cancer already, and also how Uranus, Pluto and Saturn express their energy since she’s made contact with them. It sounds a little like a vacation spa, you know? Venus visits Varuna again this year, the island with the mountain, as it floats slowly along in the sign of Cancer. And this year while the Sun blindingly shields her get-away, she is rejuvanated- body and soul – in preparation for her visable return in the fall. You won’t recognize her! Yeah, I’d like to do that myself.
I appreciate you making me aware of the blind spot resulting from this conjunction of V and V. Better to be prepared when the perspective changes. Love is letting go, or never saying goodbye, or something like that.
be