This Sunday morning, the divine feminine caps off her Saturday night by catching up with the divine masculine she’s been pursuing, and taking him home with her for a sexy romp. At least, that’s one way to look at the conjunction of Venus and Mars in Aries that has been heating up all week, exact at 12:58 am EDT Sunday.
This conjunction could actually be a little trickier than some instances of Venus and Mars hooking up, because it’s happening in a sign Mars rules — and where Venus is not generally thought to express herself best or easily.
Venus in Aries can be very forthright in matters of desire, but then struggle with things like empathy that give love and sexual exchange their gentler, more generous side. Be on the watch for that trend in yourself.
In fact, this conjunction could play out as a competitive situation of some kind — ultimately pointless. If there is a ‘winner’ and a ‘loser’ in sex or love, you’re playing the game wrong.
If a situation in your life starts feeling testy, pushy or like some kind of contest, stop and ask, who is competing for what, exactly? This weekend, anyone getting competitive is likely to lose the very game they want to win. If you want to move things forward over these next few days (whether in love or anything else, really), avoid competitive people and seek out the cooperative ones. Eric has pointed out that these people “are most likely to be the ones who know what to do with a mystery, with the unknown, and who are comfortable making changes.”
Another word for this kind of person might be ‘playful’. Mysteries, the unknown and change all ask for our curiosity; some of the most fun you can have is when you let your childlike curiosity lead the way. This is especially true in sex, love and any other sincere, open avenue for getting to know another person. Especially someone you desire.
Venus and Mars in Aries also suggest letting our actions do the talking when it comes to what — and who — we want. (Don’t forget to stop and listen, too!) There are times when fantasy is the name of the game, or love letters or subtlety; this is not one of them.
Let what you want show in your actions, whether that means returning eye contact and smiles more pointedly during your day, or saying outright to the object of your desire, this is what I want tonight; are you up for that? With Venus pursuing and making contact with Mars, this could bode especially well for women taking the initiative.
That said, with Venus-Mars in Aries, there is an overemphasis on the masculine side. So if taking initiative, pursuing and stating your desires (or demands) comes easily to you, watch out for the possibility of taking things too far into aggression, or forgetting to listen and feel with empathy. A lot of people don’t feel like being receptive right now; someone has to be.
Remember, too, that conjunctions begin new cycles between planets. Consider carefully how initiative and receptivity are balanced within you and in your relationships and adjust accordingly to reflect what kind of cycle you’d like to set in motion.
Finally, can I get a ‘hallelujah’? Saturday morning Mercury finally leaves its post-retrograde shadow (or echo) phase. It will still be moving through Pisces until April 13, but at least it will be covering new ground (or waters). If this post-retrograde phase has felt wiggier with your communications, electronics, travel and thought processes than the actual retrograde did, this is welcome news.
But don’t forget that the main point of Mercury’s retrograde phases are not to vex us, but rather to help us look inward and review. If you have a moment this weekend, trace the arc of what has come up for you since Feb. 23 regarding creative expression, spiritual understanding, and the process of bringing your thoughts into harmony with your feelings (and learning to distinguish between the two). What insights have you received, and are ready to act on?
Thanks Planet Waves for your article this me recall the previous cycle of Mars and Venus and the DSK case who circumnavigated the world. Its Sun in Taurus framed by the cycle March and Venus to coincided with the cycle of May 23, 2011
http://www.astrotheme.com/astrology/Dominique_Strauss-Kahn
good evening to all !
Amanda, I scanned this post a few days ago, and said, I’m gonna let Mars do his thang, and focus on my Venus for a few days. Intense working, creativity, with an unhealthy dash of struggle over this winter/Merc retro called for a full stop. For two days I engaged in relentless Self Care (this gem from a client: self-care is your belief that your are worthy of receiving what you have asked for). A shamanic massage that moved a LOT of energy, play with art and music, the historic first ever Cuddle Party in Maine, and a hike in the local Mountains, all in the company of friends, not my usual meditative solo trek. Venus is still holding her own this morning, giving Mars a reason to care as he contemplates his challenges next week.
Strawberry, your comments move me, and I wish you all the best. it’s a joy to be here with all of you, opening, playing, renewing, awakening. Wishing you the delights of Mars/Venus/Sun conjoined. April is the cruelest Month in the Northeast.
PS, I’ve been stargazing in the darkening moon, and have seen the Comet Panstarrs and Andromeda Gal with my binoculars, at last!
My sense is that one form of the “competition” is the tendency to revert to old “tapes” / “patterns” / “rules” of relationship. Running into that with a couple people — “This is the way things are going to be, because that’s the way they’ve always been and that’s what’s ‘right’ in relationship.”
An example is one woman I know who tends to form relationships in which she is “helping” the other, reforming the life of the other. In some way, the other person is needful of her. Seems to give her a sense of power and “control” in her relationships.
So, when I began approaching her, she was somewhat challenged — “How do I relate to someone who stands on his own feet, who doesn’t need me and over whom there is no control?” More simply, “What does it mean to actually meet and relate as equals?”
Couldn’t take it, she continued on in her way.
Obviously, when playing out canned forms of emotional interactions, there can be no true relating. It’s really just the patterns playing out. Which, of course, also means growth is not conscious, and is very slow.
Expecting this sort of experience may be playing out with many people these days, as the “sense of individuality” (earlier influences in the week/month), bring some people out of their old tapes to explore new forms of behavior.
Believe this relates to one theme of the post.
thank you eric!
Halleluja!? Ha ha…yeah, been walloped with cynicism as well as blessed with community, music and fun lately. A swirly mix of forces. With my own prog Mercury stationing direct in Pisces and prog Venus just having turned direct I suppose my return to singing and the portable, non electric accompaniment of a guitar are in tune with re-tracing steps taken before. Having been through a crash, an empty space and a return to music with fresh ears it’s both familiar and different.
Having gone into the monster lair of living through my teenage years with a devotee of Limbaugh and O’Reilly standing in for daddy I probably would have ended up one of those dead artists at age 27 if I hadn’t crashed my resentful teenage rockstar ego instead. I came out of my childhood home with more anger than is good for anybody. In the void where my music used to be there was room for yoga and tai ji to take root. When music began to come back it emerged into a more relaxed and compassionate space. It’s almost like I’m going back to the few years before the stepdad to pick up where I left off, when I was genuinely inspired to be a musician but without the rockstar and all his resentment.
I’ve been really intrigued by looking into the sign changes and stations of secondary progressions and how their timing coincides with deep changes clearly perceptible in hindsight. The year my Saturn retro’ed back into Gemini I lost my dad to mental illness and divorce. Before Saturn had cleared the 29th degree I had a stepdad. My retro Venus entered Capricorn the year my music died, 1999. The 2 years preceding the station direct was when I got involved in communities of musicians who helped me put a new set of skills together. Now prog Mercury stations retro and I find myself immersed in cultivating a lineage in myself that has roots in the past. I’m evolving out of a desire fueled by resentment for things as the are and have been- trying too hard to be original is trying too hard. Trying too hard isn’t any good for music, harmony or anything worth having as far as I can tell. Cutting off the roots, dissing the ancestors isn’t any good for music either.
Being original isn’t important to me anymore. Originality comes on its own as a solid fact of being who I am and not somebody else. A bard is one step in a process that’s far bigger than any human ego. Music as commodity drove me crazy trying to be original enough to get paid. Music as gift is getting back to my original impulse, before the rockstar and all his arrogance. Music as gift doesn’t alienate me from my community.
Thanks Daniel. I wish you a wonderful celebration of purification and renewal.
Thanks for the great article. Did you leave Uranus out of your “simplified” chart on purpose? 😉
Saturn has been basically dancing back & forth around my Nadir at 11 Scorpio since I first met Planet Waves. With a 12th house Mars and a Gemini Venus, I’ve always had something of an “It’s really not my bag” relationship to sexuality–my own and others’. I’d almost come to dread Eric’s posts, because he’s pretty much unrelenting (in a good way!) on that whole ‘get right with your sexuality’ front. But today, maybe because all this Venus energy is activating my Chiron, or maybe it’s my Juno-Pluto square that’s finally had enough, or who knows, but I opened up to the way I’ve let threats of jealousy, divine retribution, “dirtiness” & more shut down my sexual nature. And I’ve started taking steps to reintegrate that part of my life force. Owning that whatever started this, I’ve been finishing it–for decades. And limiting my own ability to accept & love myself.
I’m starting to get the whole Saturn in Scorpio thing. And it’s not scary, really. Not nearly as scary as I’d expected. It’s actually liberating to feel this well of life force, just over there. All of this living that I’ve not been doing, but can begin to. Like, begin to live with ALL of my energy. Get Mars out of that goddamn closet, & LIVE.
It’s shocking to realize just how much abuse we’re up against when it comes to truly living and loving ourselves. We internalize it without even knowing it. I realize this isn’t news to any of you, but it’s always stunning to me. The trust we place in the systems governing our lives, and the way that trust is–almost without fail–abused. Or so it seems right now. And I’m not stuck on the disillusionment, but part of this is facing how the threats are usually structured to maintain someone else’s comfort. And a little anger probably isn’t a bad thing when you realize you need to tell the systems keeping you in place to piss off.
Not for nothing, but Jupiter crosses my Saturn over the next few weeks. Looks like I’ll have some help on that “piss off” agenda.
Again, I’m so grateful to all of you. I learn from every one of you all the time.
Thanks Amanda! And Chief Niwots Son, I hope the gal in your life finds the confidence she needs to move forward in her process. I myself have been on a wonderful journey and am grateful for the space I shared with someone. Now it’s time for purification and renewal.
be — thank you for the extra web-spinning with the asteroids near jupiter! great food for thought.
tuesday and yesterday i thought i had a couple ideas about what attachment i needed to release. and i think those ideas are still valid. but the “crisis” i found myself in yesterday pointed to something else, actually — a tendency that may have once been a genuine need, but at this point, seems to be something more like a habit that does, in fact, bring me more inner conflict (which leads to outer conflict and unfair external blaming) than it does solace or nourishment, or stave off “pain.”
your comments, be, about it perhaps being time to stop storytelling brought the point home, assuming i’m reading my life and the signs correctly: i’m a lot better at self-nourishment than i used to be. sensual pleasures and the emotional connection that go with them are still enjoyable and have their (very important) place in my life. but i think perhaps i no longer need to cling to those moments when doing so is not in my best interests (especially in terms of time management and energy).
once upon a time, attachment to those moments were filling in for some things that were starkly missing from my life and my sense of self. now that those things are more present and recognized by me, maybe i can keep a little perspective, make better decisions, and enjoy sensual and emotional connection without throwing myself out of whack — and then blaming others for how messed up things are.
hhhmmmm… i guess you could also just call it “growing up.” but i like the sense of spiritual- and self-understanding that i’m feeling with this. thanks, mercury — enjoy the rest of your trip though pisces!
Hallelujuh and amen Amanda; my communications HAVE been “wiggier” in this post retro period of Mercury in Pisces. Or maybe it’s just because Mercury is in Pisces, that my thinking (and writing and listening and reading) has been tangled and not so co-ordinated with my fingers (typing) or mouth (talking) recently. There’s been a definite malfunction somewhere along the way, and yet, from a spiritual vantage point, the channels have been wide open.
I’ve taken into considered that as one of the rulers of Pisces, Jupiter, has been out of sync with the sign he co-rules with Neptune, just by being in Gemini, a sign that squares Pisces. Look at Jupiter’s situation; his companions, Atropos, an asteroid that symbolizes the death (end) of something, and asteroid Scheherazade, symbol of endless story-telling in order to prevent death (end) have affected his normally cheerful attitude. Not only that but his position as front-man in the yod between Pluto (death) in Capricorn and Saturn (grim-reaper) in Scorpio couldn’t have been all that pleasant. We know Gemini’s short-sighted (story-telling) approach isn’t his style. He’s best when he can take a long philosophical view of things, but all the messages he’s getting stress that the end is near. . . for something. Perhaps he’s taking the long view in his part of this ending of something. Maybe all these new beginnings (example: new cycle of Venus and Mars in Aries) need a grand clearing of space in the thinking process.
Len says that the square (last quarter) between Sun and Moon yesterday was a crisis point indicating we should look at our habits to see what we need to detach from. Maybe yesterday’s 4th quarter in Cardinal (initiating) signs, and Pisces (last) Mercury (thought) now exiting-leaving his shadow phase on Saturday, and Sunday’s conjunction (start of cycle) between Venus and Mars in Aries (new) are part of a grand scheme thought up by Jupiter.
Jupiter is co-ruler of Pisces and Mercury rules Gemini so these two symbols of thinking are in mutual reception, acting through each other. Scheherazade’s survival depended on her ability to tell a story so well it would fascinate her would-be executioner and delay her end, but Atropos says it’s time to stop the story (Gemini) telling. Maybe Mercury’s exit from the shadow of his retrograde in Pisces symbolizes a readiness, time-wise, to end the prolonged story-telling – to ourselves or to others – and start anew. A new way of thinking. . .maybe less linear (left-brain, masculine) and more perceptive (right-brain, feminine); more balanced. More spiritual even.
be
+1 paola!
While I can sit back and appreciate all the good that has come to me from this particular Mercury retro phase, parts of it were emotionally heinous, which seems to be the tone and tenor of Mercury retro in a Water sign. And oh look, we get to do this twice more in 2013, and I dare say mutable Pisces may be the most gentle of the three.
As for that Venus – Mars conjunction, I’m curious to see if that can help shift the scene with the gal in my life who is personifying Venus right now, she’s stuck in her fear and it’s sad to witness.
Hallelujah for Mercury sailing free! Thank you Amanda.
“What insights have you received, and are ready to act on?” Many – will do my best! Glad Mercury is finally leaving its pr shadow. Thank you for all your wonderful astrology pieces over these last days, dear Amanda.