Venus First Gate of Ascension…

The Mythic Context…

The alchemical journey of Venus, is a conscious, embodied, reenactment of Innana’s Descent and Ascent from the Underworld. “She is from very early times a goddess of the radiant, erratic morning and evening star, awakening life and setting it to rest, ruling the borderlands, ushering in or out her brother the Sun God, and her father the Moon God. She represents the liminal, intermediate regions and energies that cannot be contained or made certain and secure. She is not the feminine as night, but rather she symbolizes the consciousness of transition and borders, places of intersection and crossing over that imply creativity, change, and all the joys, and doubts that go with a human consciousness that is flexible, playful, and never certain for long.” - Sylvia Brinton Perrera. This ritual journey gives women and men the experience of being reborn on a spiritual plane, just as Jesus was when he was resurrected after the crucifixion. And just as Jesus' alchemical journey  is the crux of Christianity, so to was the yearly descent and ascent of Inanna for Mesopotamian society.

Visual Cycle of Venus’ Alchemical Journey by Gary Caton http://www.dreamastrologer.com. Here we see that Venus starts her journey high in the Morning Sky (just as she did June 9th 2020) and progressively descends into the underworld, where she stays for 60-90 days, then is reborn lower in the Evening Sky while progressively ascending upwards again. This visual representation gives new mythical context to the literal descent and the rising. On May 3rd Venus becomes visible again at her Heliacal Rise. (#5 is in the cycle)

May 3rd Venus’ triumphantly emerges from the underworld the threshold between chaos and creativity

“You’ve seen my descent, now watch my Rising.'“ -Rumi

A damsel in distress taking a harrowing plunge into the underworld, is a popular motif throughout all of documented mythology. Stretching all the way back to the oldest recorded cuneiform texts, “The Epic of Gilgamesh”, and “The Descent of Inanna'“ through to more westernized forms like the story of Persephone in Hades. But what about the ascent? It points to an important, and often overlooked inquiry. How do we reclaim our power, and rise from the midst of the panic and chaos? What does it mean to be sovereign, to rule oneself? How do integrate our underworld experiences healthily, and locate ourselves on our own mythic timeline? And lastly, (most importantly) how do we “get our groove back”, after the fall?

Chaos is the void of pure potentiality. She can be a wildly disorienting force if we aren’t accustomed to living outside of our day runner, or google calendar. But stepping out into the wild unknown, is the mandate of the moment as Venus travels through Taurus where destabilizing Uranus has been tilling the ground since 2018. Wherever Uranus is we can expect radical shifts that shake up both our personal and collective paradigms. So don’t be too alarmed if you’ve noticed the things that you now are attracted to may have seemed to riskee or taboo for you in the past. That calling to step outside of the status quo is where the juice is. This isn’t about our comfort, or drawing within the lines but rather, this is about creating from the canvas of chaos. We are experiencing the paradox of wanting things to stay the same while encountering ceaseless change. While you may feel like you’ve been shot out of a pinball machine, the anecdote is connecting to our inner compass, while cultivating a practice of allowing. The fullness of our surrender to the unknown is our invitation to participate in creation.  “If one opens to chaos, magic also arises.” -CG Jung

Art by Linz Archer

The Work

I'd like to extend an invitation to come into the mythic realm and claim yourself as a Planetary Priestess. The Venus cycle allows us to intentionally work with the descending and ascending channels of energy that run up and down our central spine. Each month at the Venus Moon Conjunction, a new Cosmic Chakra Gateway opens, that is directly connected to a Chakra Gateway in the body. When we put our attention on that chakra, with practices and meditations, we encourage it to unlock. This gives us access to a greater sense of groundedness, an expanded sense of consciousness, and continual cycles of growth, and relatedness. Venus provides the template, as she filters the sun’s rays into ecstatic light codes that illuminate the “Way of Love” on the planet. Each month we will use the current astrology to guide the alchemical practices that clear the path for the activation of our light body.

Interacting with the Venus cycle as embodied myth we begin connect to something much larger than our everyday selves. When myth and cycles intersect they assist us in identifying patterns of self limitation. As we begin to distinguish our participation in the small stories, we simultaneously begin to cleanse the energetic and emotional field, priming the way for conscious co-creation with the universe. What follows is meant to be a long, deep, luxurious, sip of the Elixir of the Goddess. It's an entire month of Venus Alchemy. Transformational work with her is meant to be enduring. Take your time, go slow and layer the practices, Touch into them a little bit each day.

Art by Holly Sierra

Creating Cosmic Sympathy

The world as an ensouled being ….First Gate of Ascension

“Nature is always differentiated unity, not unified differences.” -Alan Watts

We are now ready to embark on a triumphant alchemical journey of reclamation. Where your divine child self is restored. Each chakra gate of the ascension journey is an opportunity to deepen into your innocence. To remember your identity as a fully sovereign, integral, node on Indra’s net. To rise up, walking the path of love in embodied divinity. It is a voyage that clarifies, and refines.  May 13th the descending energies from the grand central sun meet the elevating energies from earth’s crystalline core

When Venus is reborn as Evening Star she is considered Aphrodite Urantia, or in other words, Venus our lady of the Heavens. When Venus is a Morning Star she is Aphrodite Pendamos, meaning the lady of Earth. In her Heavenly form, Venus as Evening Star is developing her spiritual gifts. No longer only concerned with self and fleshly concerns, she is now interested in ways she can be of service to other. She is exploring her gifts as a Priestess, Lover, and Mother.

As Venus Moves towards the first gate of reclamation, (Venus Moon Conjunction) on May 12th - May 20th she is coming into an applying trine with Saturn at 13 degrees Aquarius. Saturn is the Queen Bee of Karma, the Great Mother Goddess of the hive, High Priestess of the Zodiac. Her sacred geometry is the hexagram which appears emblazoned on Saturn’s North Pole. The hexagram is an indestructible structure, which marries the above and below, phenomenal for constructing the foundation of our inner temple. The Root Chakra gateway asks us to arrive here now, and claim ourselves as “I am essence”- body and breath- an inextricable part of the world soul. In cosmic sympathy we are cultivating the ability to find ourselves, like a pin on a map, as part of the interconnected, interrelated, field that unifies all things and shares a common essential intelligence. At this threshold there are, no labels, attachments, seemings or shoulds. No limitations, no additions, no subtractions, no identifiers, nothing but essence can successfully worship at this altar.  In medical astrology the Root Chakra, Muladhara, is governed by Saturn. Saturn is the limit of all, first before the beginning, and last after the end. Saturn, Queen Contemplative, trine Venus helps us to sink into what is fated with grace and ease, allowing us to see the holographic nature of the universe and to take our place within it.

Seated on the earth, we feel our connection to her across all timelines and dimensions. We tune our ears to the wind, and listen, listen, listen, for the call. We are imbued with a sense of deep connection to her crystalline core. Aware that we are hurtling through space as one. We spend our lifetime nursing from her surface that has been perfectly designed to support and nourish us the way a mother’s milk is perfectly designed for her baby. We cannot be separate from her, or the cosmos. This gate is the monad, the one, where we root into Unity consciousness, ready to fully reclaim our divinity in human form. Through the act of allowing, we can begin to experimentally measure our expansiveness. How much can you hold without collapsing into self-judgement?

Our only attachments at this gateway is to that of impermanence, innocence, and truth, seeing things as the really are, in all their glorious messiness, and loving it all. We work to clear the noise from the signal and come into resonance with the hum of all life. The embers of Venus’ evening light will provide us with the embodied knowing that from all points within the hologram we are connected to the whole, to everything that stretches between heaven and earth. To the knowing that we are a spirit/soul entwined with our ancestors, woven together across the fabric of time, with all that came before us and all that is yet to come. That we are infinite. The German poet Goethe once said that "he who cannot draw on three thousand years is living from hand to mouth." For the first time in months, we notice our hands before us. Helping us to distinguish that which is “story” from that which is real. And when we identify that we’ve entered into a narrative, we exit it, and arrive back in the eternal, effervescent, holy NOW.  But this isn’t some passive, airy-fairy, assignment. It’s so darn hard to stay still, to be empty. It takes actual practice. And because it takes actual practice, I’ve added a link about how to cultivate a practice of empty presence.

The crux of the root chakra work is to redefine our relationship to safety. Not as in “home, job, money, family etc”, all of the traditional ideas of safety. But as in, “how do I feel safe if I have none of those things”? It is crucial at this time that humanity look at the the cost of pimping our personal and collective protection. Wars are fought in the name of security.

For this work, we need to be able to clearly discern what is real. And to clearly discern what is real, we need to develop long vision. The vision of 7 generations past, and seven generations forward. All of this, true safety, or rather resonance, and seeing through non linear time helps us fall into cosmic sympathy by living in congruence with natural cycles. When we see through to the quality of truth, we remember that we have intrinsic safety, the fear we are being sold is an illusion.

Lastly, familiarizing ourselves with “story”. What do I mean by that? “We think we tell stories, but stories often tell us; Tell us to love or hate, to see or be seen. Often, too often, stories saddle us, ride us, whip us onward, tell us what to do, and we do it without questioning, the task of learning to be free requires learning to hear them to question them, to question them, to pause and hear silence, to name them, and then become a story-teller”. -Rebecca Solnit. When we learn to distinguish if we are being run by, or hooked by story, or when we are spinning a narrative, it can pull us further and further away from our center. Just for this month, observe how story weaves through your life. Learn to identify when you’ve agreed to play a character or a role. We will talk more about mythmaking and storytelling as a spiritual tool at later chakra gates.

Art by Jo Jayson

Invocation of Venus as Evening Star

I who am the beauty of the green earth and the white moon among stars and the mysteries of the waters, I call upon your soul to arise and come unto me. For I am the soul of nature that gives life to the universe. From Me all things proceed and unto Me they must return. Let My worship be in the heart that rejoices, for behold— all acts of love and pleasure are My rituals. Let there be beauty and strength, power and compassion, honor and humility, mirth and reverence within you. And you who seek to know Me, know that your seeking and yearning will avail you not, unless you know the Mystery: for if that which you seek, you find not within yourself, you will never find it without. For behold, I have been with you from the beginning, and I am that which is attained at the end of desire.

-Starhawk

Deepening tools and qualities

Patron Goddesses - Gaia, Pachamama, Queen Bee, The Melissae, Fortuna, The Three Fates- These Goddesses are keepers of the keys related to this gate, all cosmic/earth mothers related to fate, weaving, and the world tree. Feel deepen and explore with them. Keep them on your altar, draw them, create art. Learning their personal mythologies adds a powerful dimension to this work.

Sacred Geometry - The torus, and the hexagram.

Qualities- essence, simplicity, contemplation, foundation, security beyond the material, no story, no mind, breath, earth, new light codes, crystalline core, destiny (towards the stars), embodied blank canvas

Mantra - “I am essence”

Track the light - Observe sunrise and sunset everyday. 

Begin tracking the moon cycle, as it moves through her four phases. I have an app on my phone called “Moon Phases” which tells me the phase, and moon rise and set each day. Spend 15 minutes or more, once per week meditating on the phase. What does a waxing moon mean? What does it mean when the moon becomes full? See if you can glean your own organic answers without using the internet. Sign up for our mailing list for access to the portal. Once inside you will find additional resources to assist you with building deep, resounding relationship to the moon.

Begin a practice of cyclical living, and living in resonance with the breath of all life. Remember this is just the beginning. Over the coming months, these practices will become more sophisticated. This gate is around grounding, and rooting. We are building a foundation. “I simplify, I resonate.” 

Utilize Sound

Many people believe that it was written “in the beginning was the word”, however, the original cosmology said, “in the beginning was sound”. Use this song to open the field anytime you want to drop in and just be with the cycles. It will help you energetically open to the mythopoetic context of how the light plays out in your life. Notice if any symbols or synchronicities come forward for you while you sing.

Zodiacal Activations at this Gateway

As Venus is moving through the signs of Taurus and Gemini at this Gateway, 

Taurus, - Earth, Throat and Neck- cultivate a sounding, or humming practice to activate and tune the throat chakra 

Gemini, - Air, Hands, Shoulders, Arms, Lungs- begin a creative practice by drawing or journaling. Cultivate a breathwork practice.  

Root Chakra Practices

-Chant LAM 108 times. The vibration of Lam matches the frequency of the root chakra.

-Spend time in nature. Walk in your barefeet, sit or lay on the earth.

- Eat grounding foods. Root vegetables, potatoes, sweet potatoes, beets, carrots. Prepare in stews, smoothies.

-Carry root chakra stones

--Connect to the mycelial underworld. Watch Fantastic Fungi, meditate on the nature of mycelium. Ingest fungus in food or supplement form to synthesis her medicine.

-Listen to this root chakra activation regularly.

Root Chakra Stones

• Red Carnelian — Historically worn for strength and courage, red carnelian is used to cleanse and activate.

• Red Jasper — Known as the “ring bringer” stone, red jasper is used to cleanse and balance.

• Bloodstone — Traditionally worn to promote self-esteem and repel negativity, it is used to cleanse and balance.

• Black Tourmaline — Used for spiritual grounding, this stone is good for cleansing and balancing.

• Obsidian — A stone of protection, obsidian is good for cleansing and balancing.

Heliacal Rise as Evening Star Activation/ Celebration

On May 3rd, set aside some private time at your altar to view this activation Video. Light a candle, and grab your journal and a pen. Immediately following the video, take a few moments to write what was activated within you. What sensations, desires, visions, and messages are coming through now. Keep this page on your altar throughout Venus’ Evening Star Phase.

-Words from the forward of the Mayan Oracle by Ariel Spilsbury, the Creatrix of 13 Moon Mystery School, and produced by her personal temple, Sanctuary of the Open Heart.