Healing Crisis - Venus Retrograde in Aries & Pisces

 

Virgo lunar eclipse wave has come through, forcing us to purge, purify, and get rid of impurities that settled in nooks and crevices of our bodies. Mercury, ruler of this eclipse, is now retracing his steps, following Venus in the martial sign of Aries. 
 
I want to get back to Venus and look at her separately, apart from her dance lead, Mars that I wrote about last month. At that time, we were at the beginning of Venus's retrograde journey. Now we're really cooking. Venus is stripped naked. Like Inanna on her way to Ereshkigal, Venus lost of all her power and dignity. She's bruised and aching. During her time in Aries, she's been shedding and burning away what's no longer desired. 
 
The healing crisis comes to my mind when I reflect on this Venus retrograde cycle across Aries and Pisces and the symbolism of these zodiac signs. 

Aries, ruled by Mars, brings intensity, heat, and inflammation. In this context, we can see Venus retrograde in Aries symbolically as a healing crisis. When you are on a path of healing, you might experience the symptoms of sickness temporarily worsening after having a natural health therapy as your body starts to detox rapidly. This temporary decline in health occurs before your overall state begins to improve. It serves as a confirmation that you are on the „right path“ to becoming healthier, having cleared toxins from your body. Unfortunately, we get easily confused by this experience as the symptoms are similar to illness and we might misinterpret it as deterioration in health. We might assume that what we do to improve our health is just making everything worse and prematurely stop before we can see the fruits of our efforts. 
 
During the detoxification, our body is eliminating harmful toxins and waste products. This is something that our body does all the time however it intensifies during the treatment. A healing crisis is a natural part of the healing process and things need to often get worse before they can get better.
When our body has been out of balance for a long period of time, it can start to feel powerless, helpless, or numb. Healing therapy is there to stimulate and re-awaken our bodily intelligence which then points out what is wrong in the body. 
 
During a healing crisis, we can often experience old symptoms as when we suppress our feelings, it causes them to go into our bodies and show up as physical symptoms, like a return of a rash from when we were younger. 
We might also experience emotional releases or the return of unresolved emotions. An emotional release may give rise to feelings of anger, grief, or another emotion. These intense emotional eruptions are signals from our bodies that it is time to deal with it. 
A healing crisis is not a disease crisis.
During a healing crisis, we’ll usually feel that these temporary symptoms are a necessary part of our healing journey.   
 
In the similar fashion that healing crisis acts on our bodies, Venus retrograde in Aries might bring a temporary intensification and negative development of the topic in the Aries part of our chart. Conflict suddenly arises (think back to February 4th when Venus entered Aries). It feels like things got really complicated and we’re stuck, not able to proceed ahead where we want to go. 
In our modern world, we expect our life to be linear. We often assume that if things don't flow and we run into an obstacle we must be on a wrong path. We might give up our direction without even trying. We need to keep in mind that in Aries, Venus is in Mars territory and sometimes things must get messy before they can progress. 
 
Venus naturally tends to direct us towards things that go smoothly and feel pleasant. However Venus in Mars's sign of Aries, the sign of her detriment, will challenge us to do the hard things, to deal with them directly, put in a good effort, and persevere through obstacles. Venus in Aries inspires us to burn for what we love and demands that we have some skin in the game. Aries teaches us that frustration and pain are a natural part of life. 
Aries, as a masculine cardinal sign, is about initiation and action, about earning things through individual effort. Aries principle is not about winning every time but giving it another chance again and again, despite our fears and insecurities. 
 
How can we start fresh, how can we experience a truly new beginning in the Aries part of our chart if we’re staying passively in the old situation out of fear? Instead of bursting through a new ground like a seedling, we´re being burnt on the inside.
 
If Aries represents a healing crisis, Pisces represents the healing phase, the rejuvenation of our life after a period of strife and high intensity.
Healing is a wholesome process of reconciliation. In a general sense, Venus tends to bring things together. In the same manner, healing is about bringing together aspects of ourselves  -  body-mind-spirit. Healing is a process leading toward integration and balance with each aspect having equal importance and value.  
 
Venus transition back to Pisces is a call to surrender to the healing process. We’ve done what we could when Venus was in Aries, now we have to „let go and let God“. We have to release things that we’re trying to control. We don't realize that when we hold things tightly, they have power over us and not the other way around. 
 
In Pisces, we are asked to be open and receptive to what’s coming our way and let the ocean gently wash away our hurts. Venus stations direct on April 13, 2025, at 24° Pisces while conjoining Saturn and North node in Pisces. Neptune has already shifted into Aries. 

Venus retrograde is about facing our desires. This distinct shift in Venus cycle brings a new level of emotional maturity. During Venus time in Aries, we got a chance to reach greater clarity about our desires – what we want but also what we don’t want. This hard-won awareness gives us a solid footing for building better relationships in the Piscean part of our chart.   
 
Venus movement across the signs of Aries and Pisces is a dialogue between our individual needs and asserting ourselves in the relationships and a desperate longing for nurturing relationships where we feel loved and accepted.
 
This resolution of Venus retrograde in Pisces sets the stage for the current eclipse cycle across Virgo-Pisces.
On the contrary, during the previous 2017 retrograde cycle, the direct station of Venus bookended the Virgo-Pisces eclipse cycle. Considering the position of lunar nodes, 2017 – South Node in Pisces, 2025 – North Node in Pisces, we can symbolically think of these repeating Venus retrogrades as the closing of the Piscean portal in 2017 and the opening of the Piscean portal for growth to come in current eclipse cycle.

​This hopeful vision of further growth and support is enhanced by the fact that Jupiter, the ruler of Pisces, is going to enter Cancer, the sign of its exaltation in June of this year, forming a lovely trine with the sign of Pisces.
 
There is so much to look forward to…

"Let your hopes, not your hurts, shape your future."  
Robert H. Schuller

Keep hope alive, keep dreaming.
Petra