If you have felt a pull toward something you have been avoiding, whether a fear, a grief, an old hurt, or a truth about what you want, this email is for you.
Yesterday we opened our Descent and Return to Love course, and each participant spoke the words out loud, “I choose to descend,” as we began to embody Inanna, queen of heaven and earth, who answered a calling to go down into the underworld where her sister Ereshkigal reigns supreme.
That story is also unfolding in the sky right now, because Inanna is Venus. In the myth, Inanna passes through the seven gates of the underworld, surrendering her crown and her robes one layer at a time, until she stands face to face with her sister Ereshkigal, who hangs her on a hook and leaves her to die in the underworld. Venus is retrograde in Scorpio for the next 40 days, and as she moves through Scorpio and Libra, she travels that same road through every one of our charts, exploring the terrain of emotional intimacy, fear, control, and our relationship to self and other.
This retrograde is a powerful passage, and Venus (Inanna) meets powerful celestial beings along the way: Pluto in Aquarius, Chiron in Aries, Eris in Aries, and Mars in Leo. Her tense aspects with them force us to face the wounds we carry around power, the ancestral hurts we guard most closely, the discord and chaos we have lived through, and the anger and rage of our divine masculine energy, misused or frozen. If we choose to descend with her, we meet our truest fears and the dark places in our lives that we have been avoiding, and honest reflection lets us face them head on. The fear, rage, sadness, grief, and shame that live there ask to be met fully, and that is best done in community, held by others who are walking the same road. We move through the dark to reach the light, and the descent is the road that takes us there.
Saturday’s New Moon in Libra, at 8:50 am PT, brings the next test, as Venus Rx in Scorpio squares Mars in Leo. Libra governs balance, fairness, and partnership, so this new cycle begins with how we meet each other. Mars in Leo can stir up fury and conflict, or leave our fire stuck and unable to act, and either one invites us to channel that fire toward something worthy. Whatever surfaces is the place to set an intention, and these questions can help you find it:
• Where in my relationships am I giving more than I receive, or receiving more than I give?
• What anger is asking to be heard, and what action would honor it?
• Where have I been frozen, waiting for permission to act?
• What do I want to ask for boldly and fairly?
• What would balance look like if I told the whole truth?
Love,
Kris
This Week’s Transits
October 5 to October 11 (lunation times PT)
October 6 (Tuesday)
Mercury in Scorpio conjoins Venus Rx in Scorpio
Mercury in Scorpio meets Venus Rx in Scorpio, and the mind and the heart finally share a sentence. Venus Rx in Scorpio turns our attention toward shadow, to the desires and truths we have kept below the surface, and Mercury in Scorpio gives language to what has been felt and not yet spoken. This is a day for saying the true thing to the person or to the page, because the words are available now and they carry the weight of what you have been holding.
October 7 (Wednesday)
Mars in Leo sextiles Uranus Rx in Gemini
Mars in Leo sextiles Uranus Rx in Gemini, and spontaneity becomes an act of self-respect. A small break from routine, taken with full ownership, restores your sense of authorship over the day, and Mars in Leo supplies the courage to follow the impulse that Uranus Rx in Gemini sends through. Let the day surprise you a little while you stay in charge of how you answer it.
October 10 (Saturday)
New Moon in Libra (8:50 am) \ Venus Rx in Scorpio squares Mars in Leo
The New Moon in Libra opens a fresh cycle around balance, fairness, and the give-and-take of real partnership, and Venus Rx in Scorpio squaring Mars in Leo overlays it with some static. Mars in Leo may stir up conflict or tension around what we want and how boldly we ask for it, and setting an intention around whatever surfaces connects this first of three Venus and Mars aspects to the next two, which are both harmonious
