By Amanda Painter

Even though Venus has not yet entered Taurus — its own sign — to resonate with the Sun, it figures prominently in this week’s primary aspects. So that’s an immediate indication to notice where you’re at in your relationships (especially the ones where love, lust, and other big emotions reign).

Photo by Amanda Painter

You may have felt a little introspective in this regard beginning the week, as Venus in Aries squared Saturn in Capricorn. With the late-week aspects Venus is making, you may notice a shift to needing to express some energy around these topics. But how might that look?

We can get some clues from the other major aspects Venus is making. Today into tomorrow, it enters the Pluto-Eris square (squaring Pluto in Capricorn and conjoining Eris in Aries). Venus also makes a trine to retrograde Jupiter in Sagittarius (exact today).

One way to look at this overall configuration is that it’s asking a question about receptivity in our current moment — a question that relates to some much longer-term activity. If you’ve read and listened to the INTELLIGENCE annual readings for 2019-2020, you know that Jupiter, Saturn and Pluto all factor heavily in the marquee aspects that define late this year and next year. So you could think of this early contact by Venus as a way of warming up your most personal feelings about any process of growth and development you’re in currently, or which you think you might be headed for.

With Venus in Aries, we get the idea of initiative: what it feels like to just go for what you love; how to get started; the act of expressing emotions that put us in vulnerable or exposed positions. What’s at the heart of that? One answer might be: being seen and received for who you really are. How do you feel about that?

With Pluto and Eris in such a close square, Venus brings your most personal relationships, and a facet of your emotions, directly into the collective social matrix of change and destabilization. That’s the macro issue we’re all grappling with (even when it’s just haunting us in the background), and much of the struggle is occurring in the realm of identity: how it’s shifting, what it aligns with, how we ‘perform’ it online — and what can build up or undermine it in ways that are unique to the digital sphere. Relating via tech is changing how we conduct many of our most personal (and theoretically private) relationships.

Specific to the current astrology, Venus-Pluto aspects tend to reflect intense emotional and/or sexual experiences. This may be especially true regarding changes in a relationship that need to be acknowledged and accommodated so the relationship can keep growing. As you know, just like any living organism, relationships between people need to evolve and be responsive to both external and internal developments. A stagnant relationship is effectively a dead one — though people soldier on in them for years, even decades. The fear of change and the fear of being ‘alone’ are incredibly compelling for many.

Yet, little shifts and the signals for bigger, needed adjustments creep in nonetheless. Usually, once a person is aware of these movements, it takes far more energy to ignore and repress what’s going on just below the surface. It’s no wonder so many of us feel stymied in our creativity, or lack vision for our lives, or have trouble setting goals and moving toward them, if so much life force is being used to prevent movement rather than to direct it consciously.

Eris in the mix is a red flag to stay aware of how noticing, processing and expressing these underlying changes can feel a little destabilizing. After all, even though relationship dynamics shift because of individual changes that are already happening to the people involved, it can feel like a threat to one’s identity when a partnership is compelled to evolve. If that feels scary to you, it’s key to see it for what it is, and to own your reactions.

In other words, engaging in manipulative or attention-seeking behavior in an effort to hang on to ‘what has been’ is only going to cause difficulty. Given how much energy it takes just to prevent your own growth, you can imagine that trying to control the changing needs and desires of another person is that much more demanding. It’s energy that could be allowed to fuel your own expanding consciousness, instead.

It’s hard to tell how attractive that option is, though, in a world where algorithms are telling us what to buy, what to read next, and who our ‘closest friends’ are. Awareness is often uncomfortable; it can set us apart as ‘different’. ‘Different’ can be a reason to fear expulsion from the tribe, from a partnership.

But what if you’re not currently in an intimate relationship of any kind? You may find it worthwhile to consider these ideas in terms of your other friendships, creative partnerships or work collaborators, especially the more emotionally connected ones. That said, even if you simply run into someone new that you’re hot for, it would be wise to stay super-aware of when you might be tempted to seek their attention via particularly subversive or ‘sneaky’ methods.

You might think you’re being innocent enough about it, but there’s high potential for that behavior to be a bit of a blind spot to you right now. (Conjunctions can indicate blind spots, especially when a planet of perception is involved; I think of receptivity — the domain of Venus — as a form of emotional and energetic perception.)

Thankfully you have some support, described by Venus making a trine today to Jupiter in Sagittarius. This speaks of fun, easy, lively social interactions, and could be cushioning Eris’s edges some. It’s an aspect that’s not known for a great deal of serious follow-through, however.

Since Jupiter is here, it could help soften any insecurity-based actions and reactions (there’s always the potential for their expansion; but with Jupiter retrograde, that may manifest more internally rather than externally). It might even lend a slightly philosophical air to things — or, at least, an ability to find it all a little entertaining.

Today I read a theatre director’s exhortation to actors to play comedy for its dramatic moments and high stakes (because the comedy will take care of itself — you don’t need to push the humor, or it withers); and to play drama for its humor and heart (that’s what allows the audience to lean in and connect, rather than close off to the pain). It’s such a simple, effective formula for creating theater that’s alive, whole and affecting — meaning, able to change both audience and actor alike in beautiful ways, open to continued evolution. I have a weird feeling it might apply to the current Venus astrology, thanks in part to the presence of Jupiter. Give it a think and let me know.

As we go deeper into this most unusual and challenging phase of history, intelligence is the thing we need the most. That is the theme of the 2019-2020 annual edition of Planet Waves — audio and written signs available for instant access. See more information here. If you’re looking for individual signs, order here.