The Sacred Dance Continues…
The dance the celestial lovers make in the sky mirrors our relationship patterns and their role as key archetypes of feminine and masculine energy.
Venus and Mars will both spend time retrograde in 2018. Mars retrograde (June 26 to August 27 in Aq and Cap) challenges us by asking us to persevere and make an extra effort to attain our goals.
The Mars synod is the longest of all synodic cycles, so it stands to reason that Mars retrograde is the most challenging retro cycle. Retrograde planets press us to harness their potential, especially when they station. They are powerful, and so the tests that stationary planets set for us, we strive hard to master. Of course we are not always successful in this endeavour, nevertheless they urge us to harness their innate power.
Venus retrograde (Oct 5 to Nov 15, in Sco and Lib) reminds us to honour our principles and standards. It’s the perfect time to review our relationships and commitments and if necessary sever ties and establish new connections. This applies to a wide variety of relationships from personal ties to business connections as well as friendships and other associations.
Our priorities can change when Venus is retrograde, certainly they are up for review during this time. Venus is close to the earth when retrograde (like all planets are) but this proximity in the case of Venus is all about being true to ourselves. This can mean that we can choose to sever connections with some individuals or groups if we realise that we are not supported by them.
After her inferior conjunction Venus transitions into the morning sky and goes direct. While the evening star is waning, Venus morning star is waxing and at this time she is somewhat vulnerable, but also happy to take risks with new people and new associations.
Venus and Mars are hardly ever both retrograde at the same time.
When Venus and Mars oppose one another, Mars will always be either retrograde or at a virtual standstill. Venus can technically be retrograde at such times, but the fact is that she hardly ever is. Venus and Mars will next oppose one another in late June 2018 (in Leo/Aq) and do so roughly every two years. Their conjunctions can happen a few weeks apart, up to 23 months apart. There is no apparent pattern until you look at them over the longer term. At 32 year intervals Venus-Mars conjunctions will move along the zodiac by a few degrees, either direct or retrograde.
When Venus and Mars are conjunct one another, Mars will always be direct because these conjunctions always happen within 48 degrees of the Sun, an area I call the Venus Zone.
What is most interesting is that Mars stations and Venus elongations occur at 90 degrees to one another, relative to the Sun and Earth.
Mars will station on average at 138 degrees from the Sun, Venus is never more than 48 degrees from the Sun, so these points are square one another.
Amazingly, this also matches exactly the way that copper (Venus) and Iron (Mars) work together as metals to create electricity and magnetism and drive our machines and power stations.
In the same way that female and male have gender roles, copper is warm, pure, malleable, light and beautiful. Iron is cold, heavy, strong and impure. But they operate as a pair of opposites that exchange energy, plus they work better together than they do solo.
Copper generates electricity and iron creates magnetism. The two together exchange this energy and this relationship also mirrors the way that they function in the sky.
It’s copper that starts the ball rolling and creates initial excitation with an inrush of power to generate magnetism in the iron. This inrush is much more intense than the steady relationship that then develops between them, and at first it is short lived.
Creation of magnetism in the iron opposes the electric field but then returns the power to the copper. Thus a continued exchange of energy is set up between the two in an AC circuit. The exchange of power always happens out of phase in a cycle at 90 degrees to each other. As energy in copper or iron begins to wane the other returns the power to the other to keep the things going.
If there is too much power in the system, copper will overheat and put too much pressure on iron, who will stonewall, forcing the energy back onto copper, which causes her to overheat even more. The machine is more likely to breakdown if the copper or iron is of poor quality.
One wonders how on earth the alchemists knew that copper was Venus and iron was Mars.
In another fascinating link, Nikola Tesla and Michael Faraday, pioneers in the development of electromagnetism, each had a Venus-Mars square aspect in their birth charts.
The fact that Venus and Mars are on opposite sides of the Earth in the solar system of course also mirrors their astrological rulership of opposing signs of the zodiac.
The actual arrangement of copper and iron in motors and machines is that one has to wrap and soft copper coil around a hard piece of iron. Literally! And we all know how much heat and passion is generated when we fall in love. The energy exchange between Venus and Mars creates life on this planet. Perhaps one day we will discover the exact way that electro-magnetic energy is transported via these celestial lovers to Earth to infuse life and electricity into living beings.
When I first examined the scope of the Venus-Mars cycle over thousands of years some of the important facts emerged…
- The Venus synodic cycle commences at inferior There is no question about this.
- Venus stationing direct is the key signal to start a new relationship. Not before she stations, but only after she does so.
- Venus stationing retrograde is the key signal to end any relationship that does not support Venusian standards.
- After the initial stages of a relationship, the Venus part of us must get used to the idea that Mars will leave, though he will always come back. The Mars part of us must go on the hero’s journey alone, but when he returns and expects to reunite with his love, she may be otherwise occupied (in the morning sky).
- Each Venus-Mars conjunction appears to resonate with the Sabian Symbol for that conjunction as well as the initial seed conjunction of its 32 year cycle and these are active until the next Venus-Mars conjunction comes along. The Sabian Symbol for the most recent Venus-Mars conjunction (October 2017) is An Automobile Caravan and its seed conjunction, A Daughter of the American Revolution. These will be active until August 2019.
- Each Venus-Mars conjunction is highly potent, and they can be creative or destructive. The morning sky conjunctions seem to be more creative and the evening star ones more destructive, but this trend requires much more examination before making any firm conclusions.
© 2018 Michele Finey
Read more about the fascinating interplay between these planets in Michele’s book, The Sacred Dance of Venus and Mars.