Venus in Leo

'Summer' by Alfons Mucha

(1896, oil on panel)

When I think of Venus in Leo, my mind goes to moments of warmth and caring…days filled with laughter’s carefree sparkle…that singular satisfaction which comes of making something fun or great out of nothing special.

Then I think of that other side…those strains of Venus in Leo which manifest as arrogance, selfishness, lack of accountability and an inability to tolerate any opinions apart from your own.

Then I think about why this would be, and I realize it’s because Venus functions like a hinge.

A hinge

(photo credit: Sindala, October 2007)

What we bring to the situation, the level of quality we put into what we make of our abilities, these are where those Venus potentials born of its rulership in Taurus and Libra find their way into manifestation.

And depending on what we put out there…that pretty much dictates what we’ll get back. Venus is the hinge where cause becomes the reward we call effect.

I guess that means that if Venus Aphrodite sat down at a table with Newton, they’d have a lot in common. When Newton wrote his third law of motion – that idea which comes down to us as ‘for every action, there is an opposite and equal reaction’ he was giving a scientific explanation to the Venusian process we understand through our ability to create and maintain relationships – or not. We recognize our own quality (or lack thereof) through our ability to be respected for who we are.

Or not.

The Taurus Venus craves satisfaction. And like its native 2nd house it describes how we seek that through some form of validation. That we have to take our resources, whatever they may be, and put them to work and develop them into what they can be, that is the foundational work we do on our way to presenting ourselves and being received and valued and applauded by friends and strangers alike.

Or not.

And it’s that process of development which is so Leo. Leo envisions what can be made of things. Leo sees the possibilities. Leo drives to see how things work, and to come up with ways to express our inner desires, beliefs, discoveries, ideas which display our courage and willingness to be unique and individual.

Or...not!

Considering that this particular Venus / Leo ingress occurs with Venus conjunct asteroid Charybdis, there’s a ‘continuing’ factor in play.  This could pertain to something already in progress. Then again, it could point to some status quo or ‘repetition’ of response - you know, that same old issue bopping us in the nose yet again?

But there are two other items adding to the intrigue of the moment. The first is the idea that as Venus reaches 0 Leo, a degree which asks for clear thinking but which tends to incite some tendency to posture or bluster even if that seldom works, Ceres is right there at 2 Leo.

Ceres, as you probably know, is a harvest goddess. But Ceres isn’t just about ‘reaping the wealth.’ Far from it! Ceres is all about the process which leads to being able to reap of fruit of one’s labors. Or (since this is Leo) the fruit of one’s creative efforts and willingness to step outside of your own mental comfort zone.

All signs have their weaknesses. And with Leo, there seems to be a bit of a tendency to forget that if you’re going to be grand and glorious, YOU don’t define that!

Huh, you say? What the fern do I mean?

Let’s think of Leo as a creative energetic.  The polarity is Leo-Aquarius, which brings up that Leo love of being in the spotlight for what they do so well and the fact that Leo seldom shies away from competition. Being the sign of the creative urge (whether that means creating a relationship, a family, a product, social stir or plain old ruckus!) Leo is still a 2nd quadrant, natively below-the-prime-horizontal zodiac sign.

That means the crux of Leo competition is about whether you are doing all you can do. Or whether you are doing something as well as you can. This is Leo’s principle competitive quality; as the second of the zodiac’s fixed signs Leo ‘fixes’ to develop our native Taurean attributes, talents and resources so that they are ready to be put out into the world.

Wherever you see Leo in the chart, that’s where you will meet up with your finest – and darkest – Leo hours. That is where you will be tested – and test yourself on the subject of whether you are ready for your public debut.

The most common problem Leo has is remembering that we do not ‘define’ the interest or approval of others. This gets back to the idea that whatever you’re into investing in, it’s always good to know your audience. You can’t force people to love what you’re doing…but you can – by taking careful stock of who others are and what they’re interested in – learn how to appeal to them. Or what factors in what you’re doing are likely to appeal to them. Or work for them. Or even shock them.

So Ceres at 2 Leo is a sign that this is a moment to reconnoiter and think things through. Two Leo is a degree which asks that we do the right and righteously developed thing in the right setting. Sometimes the outlandish will work, but sometimes it doesn’t. So while you may get attention by belting out some giant aria in the center of a busy intersection, that also might just get you arrested.

Like they say – it’s all timing and location, location, location, right? (And ‘who you know,’ yes…which suggests alienating people is not the way to build your brand!)

After entering Leo on June 27th at 5:04 in the afternoon UT/+0 time, Venus will go on to conjunct Ceres late on June 30th (which will already be July 1st for those in Middle East longitudes or points east of there). And since 3 Leo is a degree which endows the ability to see life without preconceived notions, those who come into this time set in concrete may, within a few days, have an epiphany of some sort.

Which sounds sort of nice, don’t you think? That it happens as Venus conjuncts Ceres suggests that just as June turns into July there’s an opportunity to have an ‘aha!’ moment and see a way to do things which is going to get us more of what we want is decidedly nice.

Of course Mercury is still in retrograde. So this may not be the moment to act. Investigate? Yes. Ask questions? Sure! Think things through from a new perspective? Absolutely!

The other thing going on during this period is Saturn loitering around at 4 Scorpio in anticipation of a station-direct moment soon to come. That suggests that at some level or in some way the ‘stakes’ for us are up there. There is, in fact, a major planet (Saturn-Jupiter-Neptune) grand trine in water which becomes a grand trine in water on the date that this post goes up by virtue of June 26th being the (UT/+0 time zone) date that Jupiter enters Cancer, thus ‘filling in’ the grand trine by coming within standard (5 degree) orb of Neptune at 5 Pisces.

I’m sure we’ve all felt it ‘coming on’…which for some has been a subtle feeling of impatience, for others a sense that something isn’t quite right, or that important factors aren’t being paid attention to.

That grand trine being a subject I’d want to think through in its own right (read: you’ll see that blog post in a couple of days), since from our Earthly position Saturn appears to be ‘sitting there’ immobile and unmoving, from the astrological (geocentric) perspective this moment…these next few days or the next week or so is a time to take stock. Venus with Ceres says we should think through our plans and our positions and our (Mercury retrograde in Cancer) priorities so we have in mind what we’re aiming at – and why.

Saturn goes direct on July 8th and Venus is in Leo until July 22nd. The grand trine will be in force for the whole of the time Venus is passing through Leo. Some of us will experience this as an interrupting of what we want to do in favor of what we need to do, and that will like as not be signaled by events between June 26 (the date of Jupiter entering Cancer and Venus entering Leo) and Saturn’s station.

Some of us are going to recognize that there’s a greater pattern at work – a shift from what we thought life was going to be in the late 1990s and early 2000s. All that began to change between 2008 (the shattering of economic stability and all those rosy expectations) and 2011 when Uranus hit Aries, Neptune entered Pisces and a tsunami hit Japan and – beyond that – the consciousness and conscience of our world.

People are still saying ‘why can’t things be the way they were?’ to which the answer is ‘they simply aren’t.’ Humans are funny that way…we yell and scream that we want change but then change comes along and our first instinct is to cling to the old and known, tatty and unworkable though it may be.

Come July 6th, there’s another process which looks like it’s worth a thought or two…Venus will be reaching 10 Leo and thus coming into orb of square aspect to the Lunar Nodes, which are still sitting at 15 degrees of Scorpio (North Node) and Taurus (South Node) representing the cross-quarter thing.

- link to post -

The Lunar Nodes at Cross Quarters

 
Considering that as Venus reaches 10 Leo (a degree known for relationship tests and karma-laden dynamics) on July 6th Venus will also be in a passionate if uncomfortable inconjunct-of-the-6th-harmonic-kind with Pluto, this seems like a moment when more than a few of us are going to feel that not-so-fickle finger of fate pointing in our direction. And with Pluto conjunct Industria (industriousness) at the moment, the question would seem to be whether we have been working at something, whether we have been working against our better interests, whether our efforts are (Pluto) destroying our Capricorn structures (purposefully or otherwise), or whether we are about to pay the price for having ignored life's Capricornian 'rules of the road.'

You know, standards and such.

A few of us will now leap into action, trying to avoid that fate which fickleness has set them up to experience.

Will they succeed? Oh well...y'know, this is one of those questions which no astrologer likes to answer. It’s not just that you’re going to throw tomatoes at me (I guess those would be digital tomatoes, if still rotten)…but nobody likes saying ‘probably not’ when the answer equals pain or loss or humiliation, defeat or shame-inducing rejection.

I used to be a lot more glib about such pronouncements. But whether it's age or experiencing a few really hard falls myself (there's nothing like going through a few major health crises when it comes to learning about humility!)...as have gone along I've become less and less gleeful, smug or satisfied when seeing anyone fall.

Even those who ripely, even richly deserve it.

So here’s the deal…IF you have been working towards getting past those knee-jerk, pacification positions which are easy to take because they feather your bed and otherwise take less than buckets and barrels of nose-to-grindstone effort, those efforts which are continuing to evolve (grand trine = ongoing energy systems) will probably work okay. Even fine.

But those efforts (or positions, or alliances, or habits or whatever else) which you have been resisting changing, even if you know they’re not productive in the ultimate and worldly sense? Those are likely to now become a headache or burden.

And no, you won’t be able to fix things instantaneously. That’s the other side of grand trines. They preserve the ‘thing in progress’ like some oil tanker you’re trying to get stopped. Yelling ‘whoa, Nellie!’ doesn’t help – it’s a long slow process.

Which (interestingly enough! brings us back to Sir Issac Newton.

Mister 'Laws of Motion' himself, Sir Isaac Newton (1643-1727) is here pictured

in a portrait by Sir Godfrey Kneller (1689, oil on canvas)

Sir Issac’s first law of motion is the one we know as ‘an object in motion tends to stay in motion’…and between that and his third law (the one about actions begetting opposite and equal reactions) sort of encompasses the whole of this Leo Venus period of transit.

I’m thinking that if Venus Aphrodite and Newton sat down at a table (to enjoy some figs nicely poised on fig leaves, no doubt) they would have reached an agreement on the Venusian form of astro-attraction.

Basically, in the end what we put out there attracts a response based not just on what we intend others to see, but the qualities we bring to the table in putting it out there.

What you see yourself as giving is not always what you get back in other words, if only because we tend to see only what we want to see – and that may not be what others see at all.
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