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It’s an exhilarating week in the cosmos as Venus finds herself in Virgo, Pluto emerges from the underworld of its retrograde, Mars enters the waters of Scorpio, and we meet our first eclipse of the season in Libra. With ample cosmic movement and invitations, the central theme this week is you.
Venus in Virgo
Venus generally spends only a few weeks in each zodiac sign, bringing beauty and blessings wherever she exists. This year, however, Venus extended her stay in the fiery sign of Leo from June to October. On October 8, 2023, that stay comes to an end as the story moves forward and Venus starts her next chapter in Virgo.
Venus desires harmony, beauty, love, and flow. She desires to stand tall in her worth and live in a state of magnetism, drawing her desires toward her. As she becomes influenced by the grounded sign of Virgo, her supportive Venusian vibes are filtered through the lens of the earth sign.
Virgo is a sign of self-refinement. It can see the potential in all things, including the self, and takes intentional and purposeful steps to reset what is misaligned and move toward the highest potential. Virgo directs us toward our everyday reality and the smallest of actions that take us in a certain direction. It brings our attention to our body as a vessel, sacred and worthy of care and attention. And it asks us to create practical structures, routines, and habits that support our well-being on all levels.
As Venus journeys through Virgo, we are invited to bring love and beauty to our bodies and to our everyday routines. This is a self-care transit, where the focus is on supporting ourselves by coming into the body, nourishing movement, daily practices of meditation, and practical planning. By caring for ourselves through arranging and clearing our mind, our calendar, and our environs. And by doing so from a place of self-worth—not because we think we should or because it is what others are doing but because there are certain structures and habits that, when put into place, allow us to experience life from a place of safety, ease, and connection to ourselves.
Pluto Direct
Pluto has been retrograde since May 2023. It has been journeying through the underworld for the last five months, inviting inner healing, transformation, empowerment, and reclamation. This week, Pluto emerges ready for its forward movement once again.
Pluto excavates. It brings to light. It asks us to be with what is. While Pluto was retrograde, we were taken by the hand inward toward our shadow. We were shown what is lying within and waiting for healing. Waiting for acceptance. Waiting for closure. Waiting for our presence. We were asked to dig deep within our hidden inner caves, our unconscious, the emotional body, and the hidden within us so that we could reclaim these parts of ourselves. We were swimming within our own underworld.
The outer planet has been moving through the earth sign of Capricorn since 2008. We have been moving through immense transformation in our foundations, our securities, responsibilities, and our legacy. Whether in our finances, work roles, or dreams we are building, Pluto has been pulling apart the structures that hold us so that as it begins to move in direct fashion this week, we can begin to put it all back together again.
As Pluto emerges from its retrograde on October 11, we emerge from our underworld. And we do so with more of ourselves, we do so with what had been unconscious integrated into our consciousness, we do so with the power back in our hands so that what we build will be real, lasting, and true to us.
Mars in Scorpio
In astrology, Mars is the fire that propels us forward in the direction that is calling our name. Mars is passion, motivation, a primal need. It urges us to take action towards our goals and make the changes that we know are needed. It is a source of energy on its own, a life force, a drive unlike anything else.
After being in Libra for a little more than a month, Mars shifts into the watery and transformative sign of Scorpio on October 12. As Mars journeys through Scorpio, we are offered an incredible and laser focused glimpse of whatever it might be that we desire to move toward and achieve. Here, our emotions offer power and force, acting as our main motivator.
Unlike the waves of an ocean, the waters of Mars in Scorpio are less about the ins and outs of our emotional current and instead act as still waters—lasting, penetrating, filled with a depth and force that we can tap into at any moment. From October 12, 2023, to November 24, 2023, we are gifted the energy, clarity, focus, determination, and sense of empowerment to move in strides toward what is ours to create and to become.
Solar Eclipse and New Moon in Libra
The solar eclipse on October 14, 2023, will be our first eclipse in the sign of Libra in more than seven years. It initiates a new, purpose-filled era in a beauty-driven air sign, one that will continue to unfold, evolve, and shift within us throughout the next 12 months. As we surrender to the new cycle, we will find ourselves, a year down the road, completely transformed.
A solar eclipse is a new Moon in alignment with the lunar nodes, a mathematical point in the sky in which the Moon’s orbit intersects the Sun’s apparent path. The nodes in astrology hold great depth and represent themes of destiny, purpose, and evolution.
The south node has been in Libra since July of this year, inviting deep healing and release of outdated patterns that live within the energy of this sign. For this next year, we are gifted the opportunity to release the layers that seem to only hurt and hinder our love and fulfillment. Instead we are guided to look toward the other and how we relate, connect, give ourselves, and come together in any kind of partnership. And we are asked if we are doing so in a healthy, life-giving, empowering, and authentic way.
While this new Moon solar Eclipse is a beginning, it is also a deep inner release. This eclipse begins a journey of healing the way we value ourselves among the lives of others, the safety we feel within relationships, and the balancing act of remaining “me” while also coming into “we.”
Under this eclipse, we are met with a renewal of energy that brings to light patterns of self-abandonment, undervaluing ourselves, self-sacrifice, and pleasing efforts to attain a feeling of safety and acceptance so that we may begin unravelling these cycles, returning to the core of where they all began, and offering ourselves true healing and empowerment by coming back to ourselves.
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Your Invitation
This week speaks to coming into your body and supporting you. Rebuilding and reclaiming you. Deepening into your dreams and healing outdated patterns.
As Venus moves into Virgo, you are offered an opportunity to truly and exquisitely take care of yourself. To take responsibility of the steps you take, the thoughts you think, and the food and information and environments that you experience. To do so in a way that serves you, because you so deeply deserve to build yourself up.
As Pluto moves direct, reintroduce yourself to yourself, for you have changed since its dive into retrograde motion. Reflect upon how much more of yourself you have become, how you have been shifting and changing and meeting yourself in new ways, and with that, deeply honor yourself. As Mars moves into Scorpio, allow this window in time to act as your direct pathway into claiming your passions and dreams. Mars is here to move, Mars is here to claim, Mars is here to win. What dreams are you here to win? What visions are asking you to move towards them?
And finally, the eclipse brings you wellness beyond the day it finds you. By building in energy for the entire week and continuing into the next, this eclipse wants to bring you home to the beauty you hold, your value that is undeniable, and the light and essence that you bring into any and every interaction and partnership with another. You must honor this within yourself. You must celebrate this within yourself.
Learn more about the influence of astrology in your life, including astrological events the Moon cycles, your Sun and Moon and rising signs, how journaling can help you connect with the current influences, and more with Jordane Maree at Girl and her Moon.
About Our Contributor
Jordane Maree is the founder of Girl and Her Moon, a platform and community exploring Soul through the lens of astrology, tarot, and energy healing. She is a writer, intuitive astrologer, energy and soul guide, and host of Girl and Her Moon, The Podcast. She is inspired, every single day, to be the mirror for you to see all that you truly are, you in all your infinite abilities, in total expansion, in infinite opportunity and love.