Intuitive Integrative Healing Art

12.21.13 Winter Solstice Cosmic Oracle

DesertStar Winter Solstice Cosmic Oracle

—12.21.13—

Pandora ~ Gift of Hope

The Heroine’s Journey

While the journey of the Sun through the constellations inspired the heroic quest, the changing phases of the Moon direct the heroine. Guided by lunar instincts, the heroine follows destiny’s course through the passages and periods of life, revealing archetypal truths about human condition.

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Pandora

Pandora inspires us to tap our inner reservoirs of faith and hope to support us through difficult times. On a divinatory level, the card augurs a healing balm after recent difficulties.

Feminine Wisdom

No matter how painful and devastating events may be, the goddess bestows her benevolent gift of renewal through the auspices of faith and hope.

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Winter Solstice * Venus Retrograde

2013

Venus in Capricorn will turn retrograde a few hours after Winter Solstice on December 21^st for 40 days, when it will sink into the Sun’s light to be reborn as a Morning Star. Venus goes direct on January 31, 2014 at 14* Capricorn

One look at her stunning visual brilliance and it’s certainly no surprise the ancients named her in honor of the goddess of beauty and desire.  For those so attuned to the magical and energetic pulsations of the cosmos, one glance at Venus creates a slight tug on your heart chakra.

Venus has a powerful magnetic appeal and resonance. Aside from her obvious visual beauty in the heavens, her cycle around the Sun, from our geocentric perspective, is mind boggling in its precision, perfection and accuracy.

Venus’ synodic cycle forms a near perfect rose shaped pattern. And within this perfectly symmetrical natural formation lies a stunning pentagram–each end formed by her retrograde stations that alternate between five zodiac signs.

The cycle of Venus moves to a very predictable rhythm and beat, with her retrogrades occurring in approximately the same location (within 2 or 3 degrees) every eight years.

As Venus travels through the great firmament, she weaves a beautifully intricate web that interconnects various timelines. She weaves our fate, so you could say, and when Venus turns retrograde many ‘fated’ encounters begin to emerge from the shadows of time.

New people, or creatures, with a familiar vibe suddenly emerge. Have we met them before? Perhaps from another life—perhaps a long time ago in another dimensional plane of existence, or another planet, maybe.

That sense of familiarity is important, and it’s all that matters. From that point on you know: there’s some important business to settle, some desire to exhaust fully.

Venus is magnetic and attractive. These connections reemerge because of this attractive force field inherent to the psyche…When Venus turns retrograde, we must re-connect bridges we may have burned but regretted. We must balance the scales in some way.

We turn our gaze backward; our ‘karma’ attracts some ‘unfinished business‘ with a particular association or experience our soul [or maybe ego] felt was incomplete, unresolved or unfulfilled. Something deeply fateful begins or comes to conclusion.

Either way, the pain, the joy, or the indifference is curiously familiar. It’s all happened before. This is a familiar crossroads. There was a lesson we didn’t learn, and now we get a chance to see it.

When Venus turns retrograde, as with all retrogrades, we must reassess some things. With Venus one keyword is reevaluation.

Our value system gets scrutinized, by ourselves or by others. Our relationships reveal shadows and blind-spots we usually push aside to keep the peace or to maintain a veneer of social grace or politeness.

A Venus retrograde can bring about a reevaluation of issues of dependency, self-sufficiency and emotional communication within relationships. Whether her dark side or light side emerges, something shifts, something changes. Values are called into question, as well as the personal sense of feeling valuable, lovable and worthy.

This retrograde cycle can be incredibly useful because it helps to create or reevaluate strategies to effectively and precisely break free of controlling or stifling circumstances.

The seriousness and focus of Capricorn lends well to getting to the bottom line, dealing honestly and authentically with things we don’t usually see, and very efficiently dealing with unresolved and deeply embedded karmic issues.

In addition to her conjunction with Pluto, Venus will oppose Jupiter in Cancer. The past and the future are at odds here. A desire to mature, grow up and restructure our lives finds a strong counter desire to remain in the past, to keep from rocking the boat.

But while Venus is retrograde, we must keep in mind that this is a natural time of reflection and reassessment. The ghosts of the past come out to bring us messages and reveal lessons.

This is a highly growth oriented cycle…This may be more of a time for intimacy with oneself, to practically restructure personal goals, relationship needs, and inherent values. This may also be a time of sorting through or processing painful emotional material.

With the presence of Pluto in the sign of Capricorn, this is a cycle that deeply emphasizes letting go and allowing those decaying elements to leave our experience.

With Venus turning backwards, there may be a profound change of heart. There may be a need to face deeply embedded fears and realities that our holding us back. Whatever happens, Capricorn, and its ruler Saturn, teach us about trust.

Can we trust the process at hand? Can we trust that letting go will eventually lead to something new and rewarding?

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Venus Retrograde Apothecary Suggestions

Journaling

As you reevaluate what you value, write about it in a journal. Since the energy of Venus retrograde is more internal than external, writing at this time may be especially helpful as a way to express pent-up energies. Plus, it will help your thoughts and feelings to become clearer, and you’ll have a record of your reflections that you can turn to in the future. While typing your thoughts into a computer may work well, consider using an actual journal; the tactile and tangible beauty of paper is well matched to Venusian aesthetics.

Collage project

Even for those who consider themselves not artistically inclined, a collage project can be a wonderfully therapeutic and relaxing activity to partake in while Venus is retrograde. Not only is making a collage a creative expression, but it can be a great vehicle for inventive problem solving. For this aim, focus on a challenge in a relationship for which you seek a solution. Holding the relationship in your mind’s eye, cut out words and images from old magazines and newspapers that reflect aspects of the situation as well as its potential resolution. Glue these to poster board adding fabric, shells, charms, or other small bric-a-brac in an arrangement that makes sense to you. This type of project honors the retrograde energy really nicely because we can repurpose material objects, finding a new value for them as they help us create a work of art that can offer some insight and clarity. Remember that there is no right or wrong here when it comes to the collage; just use your imagination and allow your creativity to flow in your quest for discovery.

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{Venus Retrograde Information}

Cathy Pagano,Chad Woodward,planetaryapothecary.com