This is part of a series about Venus retrograde in Leo. In this series, I’m distilling hours of podcasts and mountains of information on Venus retrograde into tangible and actionable plans for what to look out for and how to best work with the energy of this 6-week period.
If you want to learn more about where this falls in your chart and how it might impact you personally, reach out to schedule a call.
Venus is currently retrograde in Leo, from July 22 through September 3, 2023.
Retrogrades take us out of the forward motion of life — the constant go, go, go culture in which we are always seeking progress — and invite us to reflect, review, and retrieve what may have been lost or forgotten in the daily hustle of life.
On the most basic level, the topics that come up for review relate to the significations of the planet that is retrograde and the sign in which it is traveling.
On a personal level you’ll also want to look at the area of life covered by this sign in your chart, as well as the areas in your chart ruled by Venus, as those will be particularly impacted.
More on this in a future installment of this series.
6 Core Topics To Review During Venus Retrograde in Leo
Venus stays retrograde for approximately 6 weeks. To fit that timeline, here are 6 core topics that come up for review during Venus retrograde in Leo:
(1) Relationships
Venus is most well-known as the planet of love and relationships, and this is one of the areas that is always a hot spot for Venus retrograde.
There are 3 types of relationships to consider in Venus retrograde:
Relationship With Yourself
The relationship we have with ourselves sets the stage for all the others. How we show up for ourselves, how we speak to ourselves, how we treat ourselves — these determine how we show up for, speak to, and treat others.
Relationship With Others
Venus rules all relationships, not just intimate ones. During a Venus retrograde, we might consider the various relationships that we have with other people: friends, colleagues, mentors, clients, parents, siblings, children, neighbors. The groups and communities we associate ourselves with are also under Venus’ purview.
Relationship With Life
How we feel about any aspect of life is defined by our relationship to it. Consider the things that you do with enthusiasm and ease, on one hand, and those that you tend to avoid. You have different relationships with each of those areas and activities.
For example, what is your relationship to money? What is your relationship to exercise? What is your relationship to your work or craft? What is your relationship to the daily life tasks that need to be done no matter what: laundry, cleaning the house, cooking meals, etc.
How do you show up for those different parts of life?
(2) Personal Values
Many of the major significations of Venus are well-known: beauty, art, love, desire, money, relationships. What all of these things have in common is that they speak to what we value.
Venus, at its essence, is the planet that represents what we value: in life, in others, and in ourselves.
Venus retrograde is a good time to review the values guiding your decisions, and to assess whether they reflect how you actually want to live.
This is also a potent period for reflecting on how you value yourself.
Where does your sense of self-worth come from? Do you draw it from achievements and accomplishments? From the size of your barbell or bank account? From the numbers of followers you have on social media or clients you have?
Or do you find your value in the fact that you are a human being, inherently worthy of love and affection just for being who you are?
(3) Image and Appearance
Venus is known as the planet of beauty and art. It gets this signification in part because of the image created by its synodic cycle — a 5-pointed star — and the pattern of its retrogrades, which create a flower shape when mapped onto the zodiacal wheel.
This signification makes Venus retrogrades a time to reflect on our image and appearance. This can be in a literal sense of how we look physically. Venus retrogrades often mark times of change in fashion trends and hairstyles, and we might reconsider these areas for ourselves on a personal level.
But this isn’t just about the surface appearance. Astrologer Austin Coppock described how Venus “holds up a mirror.”
As you look in that mirror, do you like what you see? Do you like how you’re showing up?
Image can also speak to “what things look like” — the optics or appearance that might mask the truth of something.
(4) Desires and Tastes
On The Astrology Podcast, astrologer Austin Coppock described Venus retrograde as being like a Mercury retrograde but with respect to matters of the heart and our desires.
He cautioned that during this time we might question everything we thought we liked — from people to places to fashion to food.
Venus is the planet of love and desire, and that includes what we have a taste for. Maybe you realize you don’t like that breakfast you’ve been eating habitually every day for the past year.
On a less mundane level, questions of desire may pop up regarding your work. Perhaps you realize that you don’t actually like working remotely, or that sitting behind a desk all day isn’t the right job for you.
You might also question whether you like the people in your life. Perhaps you realize your ideal client isn’t the client you thought it would be. Or that the people you hang out with all the time drain your energy.
Be prepared to question everything.
(5) Social Contracts and Unwritten Rules
Venus is also the planet of consensus, which speaks to the social contract and unwritten rules that set our expectations for how life “should” be.
During Venus retrogrades, it’s common for us to experience collective change in the social consensus. When Demi Moore posed on the cover of Vanity Fair pregnant and naked, it was a deviation from the norm. She didn’t break a law; rather she violated an unwritten rule that pregnant women not be on the cover of a magazine without clothes. These days, that would be no big deal.
On a personal level, we can use Venus retrograde to investigate where we are operating by unwritten rules and expectations — set by others or ourselves — and how they might be holding us back.
What rules do you live by that may not even be a part of the social contract?
(6) Visibility
Leo is a sign of confidence, courage, and creative self-expression. It’s home to the Sun, the brightest light in our solar system. This is a performative sign, a sign where the spotlight shines bright and where we are invited to step into it.
Venus itself is a shining light — the brightest star in the sky. In Leo, it is performative and dramatic.
As Venus travels backward in Leo, it invites us to consider the ways in which we might not be claiming our space in the spotlight — how we stay in hiding — and why.
At the opposite extreme, it invites us to consider where we are too visible, where we reveal too much of ourselves.
We all have a desire to be seen, but not all of us needs to be seen all the time. In this era of social media and constant personal promotion, where life itself often forms and informs what we share, treading this line can be a careful balance.
During the retrograde, Venus will go dark for a while when it disappears into the heart of the sun, similar to a new moon. Likewise, there are times for us to go dark. And also, if you’re someone who struggles with visibility and errs on the side of too much hiding, this is an opportunity to inquire what’s keeping you in the wings.
Over the next 6 weeks, we’ll be coming back to all of these topics and more as we dive deep into Venus retrograde. I’ll also be holding some community calls for group sharing. If you want to stay informed, please make sure you sign up for
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