Between the Moon - 8. The Eight Year Venus Rose with host April McMurtry

Episode Date: October 18, 2022

You are invited to come dance with Venus as she weaves her beauty in the sky and on earth. In this solo episode I explore the dates and themes of the eighth year rose that is completing with formation of the upcoming star point on October 22nd, 2022. As you listen you may notice the vibration of abundance and love that Venus transmits.The orbit of Venus is rhythmic and creates a rose or a five-pointed star by returning to the same points over and over throughout our lifetimes. These points of the Venus Rose are formed each time Venus aligns with the Sun and Earth every nine months or so. The points also shift ever so slightly around the zodiac, and we are about to experience the movement from Scorpio into Libra and what this could bring up.The Venus cycle plays a significant role in timekeeping for many cultures around the globe. Her dual nature from morning star to evening star and back again has been predicted and written about by Mayan astronomers as well as on ancient cuneiform tablets of Babylonia dating back to the first millennium BCE. Venus and the Moon also interweave their cycles together and offer context for practicing self-study in relationship with cycles.Mentions in this episode:Venus Star Rising by Arielle GuttmanThe eight year lunar cycle is called an Octaeteris in Greek.Your natal moon phase tutorial on the blog: Natal Moon Phase themoonismycalendar.com/articles/natal-moon-phase-tutorialJoin me and Susan Lipshutz, LCSW this Saturday Oct 22nd for an online gathering workshop called Venus Gateway: Anchoring the Jewel of Your Heart themoonismycalendar.com/events/venus-workshop-and-gatheringIf you are interested in learning ore about personalizing the Venus cycle, check out the upcoming course Know Your Venus themoonismycalendar.com/know-your-venusThank you for listening! This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit themoonismycalendar.substack.com/subscribe

Welcome, dear listener, to Between the Moon, a podcast about self-study in relationship with cycles. I'm your host, April McMurtry, founder of The Moon is My Calendar. In today's episode, we will be exploring something I like to call the eight-year rose. The cycle of time that corresponds with both the Venus cycle, as well as the lunar cycle. So I have many journal notes and drawings and all kinds of things that are starting to weave together in a way. For example, you may have a sense of telling time by flowers,

even thinking about yourself as a child and having certain associations with certain flowers at certain times of year. So the Venus cycle can be that same relationship, but these flowers are in the sky, in the stars, and in the movement of the planets. This episode is my own reflection and sharing from lessons that I've learned, as well as offering some inquiries and themes for you to look at in your own life experience. And there's so much more than what is shared here. I'll just say that.

So this is not meant to be seen as complete. or exhaustive in any way. It's meant to be exalted and feeling that expansive nature of what Venus and the energy of Venus and connecting with the Venus cycle can bring into our own experience when we are dancing, not even alongside her, but dancing with her orbits that form this eight-year rose and this chapter of time in our life that we, we can look back on in hindsight and have awareness in the moment to move through times in our life and times of transition with an awareness of the background, not even background, just the container

of cycles that are unfolding that will have themes that may overlap, times of return, and times of upheaval and change and shifting. So as I'm recording this, the Know Your Venus course is open for enrollment. I have shared this course ever since the 2020 Venus conjunction in the Star Point in Gemini. And it was so generative and creative. And so now every nine months, basically every time that Venus transitions between Morning Star, Evening Star, vice versa. This time of disappearance or retrograde, I share this course to connect more deeply with Venus.

And I continue to learn, insights continue to stream in. And so I'm sharing some of those here with you today. And if you haven't already, you can visit my website, The Moon ismycalendar.com to pre-order your 2023 New Moon Calendar Journal. lunar wall calendar and they begin on the new moon December 23rd this year of 2022. Also on the website, if you'd like to go deeper with your Venus studies, you can look under courses. As I mentioned, the Know Your Venus course is currently open and will begin October 22nd. So again, thank you so much for being here and let's get started. There are several threads that are going to

weave together in this exploration that can help us to root more deeply into the practice of self-study in relationship with cycles. And the lunar cycle and the Venus cycle are woven together in several ways. First, the Venus cycle has an eight-year cycle where a complete rose or star pattern, a five-pointed star or a five-petaled rose is formed. And it's formed by points where Venus, the sun, and Earth are all aligned, where they line up in this rhythmic pattern. So the beauty of the Venus cycle is outstanding. It creates harmony just by feeling.

into it, feeling into the rhythm. So I wanted to call this episode the eight-year rose and offer this invitation to see the pattern of the eight-year rose forming in the sky and this pattern of a rose unfolding in your life. So there's a principle that astrology is based in. a hermetic principle of correspondence as as above so below and as below so above that there is a mirror relationship and what is happening in the cycles in the sky we can look at and reflect on those cycles in our own life so what is unfolding in the cosmos and what is unfolding in my life and the venus cycle is a beautiful place to enter into this sort of a step. It's not even a step beyond the moon.

It's a step with the moon because the moon in Venus meet up every lunar cycle. And the moon has an eight-year cycle as well. And that cycle, the word in Greek, I don't know how to pronounce it, but I will try my best. It has oct is the prefix. so octa terrace. I'll put it in the show notes. And this is a period of eight solar years after which the moon phases will occur within a couple days. So for example, and I want all of this that I'm sharing really as a way to personalize cycles for you in your life. As a way, you know, there's phonology, right?

Is this term that phonology wheels, phonology coming from phenomena and the study of the influence of seasons or the sort of the external world and linking that up with your internal world. So there's a precedent for all of this and really a lot of astrology, at least that developed throughout the Middle East, and the Mediterranean and up into Europe that probably had many other roots and branches, this connection of studying the movement of the stars and the fixed stars and these moving stars being the planets, that ones that move throughout the constellations, and looking for

correspondences that happened over hundreds and thousands of years, these correspondences and the sightings and the writings of the Venus morning star rising and evening star rising on the Venus tablets from Mesopotamia, Babylonia, Middle East, present-day Iraq. So these records. And I see the tracking and the charting and the working with a circular calendar. in this case, the New Moon Calendar and Journal, as a place to record some of your own connections, your own making sense of what is my connection and that reflection from what's happening in the outside world and what's happening for me personally in the moon being sometimes what's hidden. Okay, so coming back to this eight-year rose and the eight-year pattern of the moon,

when I looked to see what moon phase I was born under. And if you haven't done this yet, there's a post on my blog or the moon is my calendar blog for finding your natal moon phase, the phase that the moon was in on the day you were born. And when I looked at mine, I noticed, oh, the year I was born, there was a full moon on Christmas, and then I was born six days later on New Year's Eve.

And so that was my point of reference. Oh, six days after a full moon was about the time that I was born. Eight years later, right around this eight-year cycle, the octa, how did I say that? The octa-o-tteris, the moon was almost full again on that, on Christmas, that year, eight years later. So what that means is that Venus is completing a cycle. alongside the moon sort of catching up to the similar phase that it was in when Venus was eight years later in a similar place. So they're in conversation, and so there's this weaving that the moon does of connecting

up with Venus in the sky as a morning star for nine months, as an evening star for nine months, this sort of pendulum swinging. This can be a period of time to look back at any of those what are called Venus star points by the astrologer Ariel Gutman. And she wrote the book Venus Star Rising and did a lot of the research on what is now uncovering of these connections and these alignments and this pattern of the Venus cycle creating this rose and five-pointed star. and she just put language to it. So when I say Venus Star Point, this is Ariel Gutman's language. I refer to these points in different ways as my learning deep ends and spirals as seeds and petals, seeds being the time that Venus goes in retrograde and the petals being the time of this unfolding and Venus behind the sun.

I'm picturing it as I'm saying it because I've made a lot of visuals for myself to make sense of the cycle. And I share those in the course, Know Your Venus. Really, through that modality of visually seeing this unfolding happening. And it's like the inner workings, the clockwork of the planets. So the eight-year rose, as I'm recording, this, Venus is about to create one of those points. Again, the point is created when Venus, the sun and the earth all line up. And this alternates with Venus behind the sun and Venus in front of the sun. There's this rhythm that's so soothing, really calming the nervous system when there is

rhythm. And so when we look to the cycles in nature and the cycles in the sky as a way of telling time, that can be a way of bringing rhythm into our life, into what can oftentimes be hectic and chaotic and time only existing in these digital numbers and boxes on a calendar that may feel, and many people that I have talked to, have that feeling, and you may too, of being confined by time.

So just feel in for yourself as when you think, about time and how you, you know, kind of check in with time throughout the day or the week. How could it feel more rhythmic when there is a practice of working with a circular calendar with cycles of planets such as Venus and the moon? Okay, so this rose, the eight-year rose, as I was saying, were coming up to one of those points in this formation. Any time that Venus meets one of those points, there can be seen a completion of an eight-year star, an eight-year rose. So this October of 2022, this star point that Ariel Gutman would say, for me, this pedal, this pedal point, this sort of outward final point of the pedal,

the meeting back to 2014 when eight years ago that point of Venus was in a similar place in the sky. So there's a returning. And even that word, a returning is coming back around. This turning and returning of time, anytime we celebrate a birthday, there is a solar return. The sun is coming back around to the place. that the sun was at the time of birth. A lunar return coming back around to the place that the moon was. At the time of birth, the phase that you were born under,

which you can revisit every single month with a lunar return. And then a Venus return, this returning back eight years later, to a similar place. And since it's not the exact same place, there's an invitation to look back, where was I? October 2014, when Venus was forming this pedal point or the star point. And then halfway through that cycle, so this eight-year rose, this formation, this unfolding, halfway through, there's a checkpoint, October 2018.

Venus was then halfway through in the seed point of the retrograde with Venus in front of the sun, closest to the earth. And if you've studied the Venus cycle, you might be picturing this in your head. If you haven't, then just picture a dance. There's a dance that's happening. And it will draw you in.

If you feel like dancing with Venus, then getting into this rhythm and this feeling will, may just draw you in to deeper understanding and connection and being in relationship. So halfway through then October 2018 would be a similar point in the sky, which has been astrologically in tropical astrology in the sign of Scorpio. And that's about to shift over from Scorpio into that point, returning and returning moving into Libra. So an interesting connection, again, with the lunar cycle and the Venus cycle, is that those points of Venus move clockwise through the zodiac.

So the Scorpio point moves to Libra, which is technically before Scorpio seasonally. In the lunar cycle, the lunar nodes, those are the places where the eclipses happen. And those also move clockwise, which would otherwise be said as sort of like backwards through the zodiac. So they're currently, the nodes are currently in Scorpio and Taurus, those polarity points. And then those shift. So the Scorpio one will go into Libra and the Taurus one will go into Ares. So interestingly, when I looked back and just thinking,

oh, well, these cycles meet up, this eight-year pattern of the moon and Venus meet up. That means that eight years ago, there should have been eclipses happening around the same time as well. And yes, so 2014, I'm trying to find the page I wrote it on. Yeah, 2014, October 23rd, there was a solar eclipse in Scorpio. And so we're coming up to October 25th solar eclipse in Scorpio. So humans have documented this. This is something that's not like a new discovery, but a remembering of something that was a guiding light

to understanding the rhythms and cycles of time passing. So just like what I mentioned about, what do I look to to let me know that time is passing? and for these cycles to return and to be understood, both the moon and Venus and the other planets as well, but this is just focusing on this eight-year rose and the moon kind of being a part of that and weaving in and out. This practice then of self-study is, okay, well, that's happening out there. What is my experience down here on Earth? and Venus gives us this both and Venus is a morning star and an evening star. Venus is the Venus of

the celestial Venus and the earthly Venus. Venus comes in this sort of dual nature. And so even charting for yourself, your experience of when Venus is a morning star, when Venus disappears from the sky, that transition time, that as I'm recording it, we're in this transition time of, Venus disappearing for two to three months to reemerge again December 2nd and then reemerging as an evening star and going round again. So what are the themes in relationship with Venus that were coming up around this time, October of 2014, of this star point time or this pedal that began to unfold. And Venus, as I mentioned, these points of right now the Scorpio point, which is what's hidden, what's not being seen or talked about, what is taboo in relationships, in how love is expressed

and the power that is there, that when that moves into Libra then, how is there more equality and equity in relationships, that there's a lot? some one holding power and then there being secrets and shame around speaking up and speaking out. So anything in Scorpio then that comes to the surface that has a great power and a rising. And this may be that experience many people speak of. And even the book by Ariel Gutman, Venus Star Rising, this rising of this energy and this point shifting in our lifetime into Libra, where there is more justice as love and love as justice as a form of really being in a relationship where there is the balance of mutuality.

As I said, this unfolding, this point stays in each of the 12 signs for a hundred years. This hundred years of like polishing the stone of like searching for these roses within us that want to bloom. And what do they need and how are they tended to? And so how are the themes of those points? and so Venus has five star points. There's five places in the sky where Venus will make these pedal points, seed points, star points. There's five places in the sky where that happens. And that gives that visual of the five-petaled flower, the ancient rose, the pentagram, the five-pointed star.

This point is shifting, and that has been in Scorpio for a hundred years. So it's this bigger cycle. that the moon gives us more of like a daily experience of cycles and Venus gives us more of like bigger chapters and really asks us like how are we tending to that garden of how are we loving ourselves what gets in the way what gets in the way of us loving ourselves valuing our uniqueness and beauty in whatever form that comes forth and forward to express itself and how radically healing beauty can be as a form of awakening and as a form of empowerment. And this isn't beauty standards of looking a certain way. This isn't just about like the roses in the garden,

but all the unique flowers and expression of life that there are. Flowers give us a way to see and unfolding in life expressing itself and going through all those phases, from seed to sprout to flower, flowers turning into fruits containing those seeds. It's so magical and mystical and right in front of our eyes and many ways and layers that this same cycle expresses itself, both on earth and in the sky, in the heavens. This way of looking at time and just giving these dates to look and see what significant things were happening, again, October, 2014, the beginning of this eight-year rose. and I'll say, you know, numbers and harmonics are such a part of the Venus cycle that the eight-year

rows is a five-pedaled rose. And there's this connection with the Fibonacci sequence of five, eight, 13 that continues on. And so the harmonics there are just being in the Venus frequency. And then when you connect in and start to really dance with Venus, you may begin to, to feel that, oh, what is opening me up to life? How might I experience pleasure in ways that I never imagined possible? How can I really, truly fall in love with myself to be my own beloved, as well as be in relationship with whatever form of life that may be? And here we're talking about flowers and gardens and how we tend to that and how we receive the beauty that's before our eyes that's showing us the expression of life. So what Venus themes may have been there,

2014 October, Midway Point, 2018, and then now October of 2022. So this is something that you could apply to any Venus point and just looking at the dates. And again, in the book, Venus Star Rising, Ariel Gutman has all of the dates of the star points. You can kind of like reconstruct these roses. and they'll hit certain, I don't want to say hit, they will massage certain points in your birth chart, wherever that Scorpio and Libra point, where is that polishing? What are those degrees there that just like keep revisiting, really just step by step? And with that too, it's like Venus is not rushing. It's not pulling open the petals of the bud to like prematurely develop.

This is a longer developing. amount of time. And to know this cycle, then, the cycle has been, the Venus sightings have been recorded, both in stone and mostly in stone and buildings aligned with the cycles in the sky that exist all over the world. So that this cycle has been happening. And then when we can bring our awareness to it, there may be things that just really stand out, like these ahas of, oh, I can see my life in a context, within a context of cycles, to make sense of some of the themes and the developing and why do I have to keep going back to this particular lesson over and over? And so there may be some sense of not necessarily a completion, although this is a completion

of an eight-year rose with the Venus cycle, but a new level or layer of understanding for yourself and the eclipse is coming up that's in the Scorpio-Toros axis that the lunar nodes are on where the eclipses are happening teaches us about worth and value and even money and currency having its own charge and energy both being a resource in the sense of what are the materials that I'm working with in my life as Taurus and the the earth being. the place of fertility and Venus being the guardian planet of Taurus. So there's that connection that's there. And then with the Scorpio energy of who holds the power, who holds the money and the power? And how can that power dynamic begin to shift and come to the surface and release any of the

secrets or release any of the sort of beholden to that is a distortion of the distortion of the power. And, you know, any themes that may be coming up about what is your relationship with money as currency and as a current? How does that current flow through you? What stops that current? You know, what are possible patterns of overgiving and not asking to receive or not asking for reciprocity in whatever ways you've been taken advantage of or allowed yourself to be taken advantage of that may just come from not fully understanding the worth of the gifts that you have to share. And this is where the thorns can be brought forth, the thorns of the rose that remind us to respect the gift. This is the energy of the queen of swords in the tarot. She comes in peace, but with teeth.

and just being in that energy of there's something here to cherish and really cherishing that and offering it in a way of I don't need to discount myself. With this episode, the invitation really is one of reflection, one of finding possibly your own ritual for integration of what could symbolize this eight-year rose. How do you want to mark this? And again, with cycles, there really is no beginning and no end. There's a meeting back up, that returning point. This Venus rose could also be said to start at that seed point, the October in 2014,

you know, seeds being beginnings and that pedal, that flowering being more of a fruition. And so the starting point, I would just say something to play with. And that's how I've approached this and hopefully how you've received, this to play with some of these overlapping cycles. And I'm still sitting with a lot of it. And it's pretty miraculous. The connections that I am integrating and the lessons that are taking me into a new cycle with a new awareness and a new approach to many of these themes that I've mentioned.

So this reflection, the eight-year rose, there's a cycle that's unfolding in the heavens. in the sky with this dance of Venus, the earth, the sun, and the moon is there too, weaving in and out, and the cycle is unfolding inside of each of us. So taking a moment and what is that fragrance? What is that flower, that rose, that's whatever seed has been planted in your own heart. What form is that taking and it's blossoming? what kind of initiation are you entering into to begin another rose so on october the 22nd is a saturday that is the meetup that's the the moment of conjunction the moment that the sun venus and the earth

are all in alignment with venus on the far side of the sun the farthest from the earth shining radiantly gloriously exalted in what some call this underworld time of disappearance and non-visibility. How might you connect with all of this energy of Venus that both is a warrior that fights to protect what you love and a harmonizer or a bringer of peace. And on that meet up day and point, I'll be co-hosting. a workshop gathering with Susan Lipschitz called anchoring the jewel in your heart, that space of the dark cave, that place of going inward, especially when Venus is out of sight to keep that flame and keep that presence with you to find what's there that is shining

within you. That spark, as Dr. Clarissa Pinkola, Estes, speaks of that chispa, the spark that never goes out, that Venus flame. So thank you for being here, for listening, and for bringing any of these elements into your own personal practice of self-study in relationship with cycles. If you like this podcast, please subscribe, leave a review, share it with a friend, all the things to help it reach more people who will benefit in some meaningful way. I'm April and I'll be with you next time on Between the Moon.