Venus: Bringing Balance

I've been feeling uninspired for a while. This year has been, until this point anyway, a time of inner reflection rather than outer expression, but Venus has just come home to Libra (on the 6th of August), my rising sign and first house, and I feel inclined to put pen to paper (so to speak) and tune in to what our Great Goddess of love and beauty, our cosmic Queen of harmony and pleasure, Inanna, Ishtar, Aphrodite, has to say about the time we find ourselves in.

Venus can currently be seen shining brilliantly on the Western horizon after sunset, in that time of the evening when it isn't quite dark and the air is still warm. She is hard to miss if you're out at that time and looking up. And this is how She begins to speak and how we can begin to listen, if we're so inclined. Venus attracts. By Her very nature she draws us to gaze at Her. And, since She is present in all of our charts, She speaks to what we attract and are attracted to: pleasure, beauty, connection, sweetness, joy. When we feel these things and move towards them we are in the energy of love and feeling Venus.

“The greatest thing you’ll ever learn is just to love and be loved in return.”

Venus is our yearning to love, and be loved. To be in union. We can translate that as our desire to become one with another, and that tends to be what we think of when we think about love, but what we 'forget' as human's living in our little, complicated worlds, is that love is who we are. Love isn't something out there that we need to find, and grow, love is an energy that lives within, is inherent, and always available. Venus is always a part of our expression (She lives in every one of our charts) and Venus is always present in our sky above, whether we can see Her there, or not.

As above, so below. As within, so without.

Venus has just stepped into Libra, one of her two home signs and the place where she feels most at ease showing her relational, social, and idealising side.

Libra is the cardinal air sign of the zodiac.

Cardinal means it carries the energy of beginnings. Like the first cool breath of autumn, it gets things moving, creates momentum, and pushes us outward into new connections and conversations.

Air is the element of ideas, words, and the way we meet each other through the mind, through listening, speaking, noticing, and relating.

And Libra is a yang (or masculine) sign: active rather than receptive, oriented toward the other rather than turned inward toward the self. It reaches out. It wants to meet, to balance, to create harmony between “me” and “you.”

Seen through the lens of the seasons (in the Northern Hemisphere where Western Traditional Astrology was born), Libra is the time of year when the air grows cooler and the light begins to wane. We turn in toward each other and spend more time indoors with the people we live and work with. It becomes natural to put our energy into relationships and into creating a harmonious environment that can carry us through the darker months ahead.

Venus rules both Taurus and Libra, yet She shows two very different faces of herself in each.

In Taurus She is slow, earthy, and deeply physical. She lives in the body, in the pleasure of good food, soft fabrics, and in the garden, in the scent of soil after rain, the pungent sweetness of a honeysuckle bush in the late heat of a summer's day. She is the part of us that wants to savour what is already here, to feel beauty of the current moment through our senses, and to build a life that feels solid, steady and nourishing.

In Libra She turns outward. Here She is lighter, more social, more concerned with the space between people. She asks: How do we meet each other fairly? How do we make things beautiful together? How can both of us feel seen and valued? Where Taurus says “this feels good in my body,” Libra says “does this feel good between us?”.

Libra begins at the autumn equinox, the moment when day and night stand equal before the dark slowly grows longer. That image of perfect balance is the heart of the sign. Libra is always weighing, with a quiet longing for things to feel right, fair, and in proportion. Between people, within ourselves and with the wider world, between what we take and what we give.

This is why Libra cares so deeply about fairness, beauty, and the careful choosing of what stays and what goes. Beauty here is the art of making life more graceful, more harmonious, more pleasing to the eye and the heart. And like every gift, it has a shadow: the temptation to smooth things over too quickly, to prioritise appearance over truth, or to keep the peace at the cost of real honesty. Few things feel more uncomfortable to Libra than open conflict.

When Venus moves through Libra She softens us toward each other. She reminds us that love is not only the private, physical closeness of Taurus. It is also the daily practice of meeting another person, and the world itself, with fairness, grace, and a willingness to keep finding the middle ground so that both can stand in dignity.

But Venus in Libra isn't the only thing happening in our current sky, and the moods and feelings of the other Gods, and the conversations They are having with each other, and Venus, will tell us more about what we might be feeling at the moment and why we might be feeling it.

For clarity's sake, and in case you haven't read one of my blog posts before, my interest in astrology, and the contemplation of it, has never been about prediction or fate. It rests on a simple assumption:

We are here on Earth to grow and expand, and step into more authentic, more free, expressions of ourselves.

I arrived at astrology through shadow work. I learned (the hard way, through the body of a man and the promise of a “destined” relationship) that everything we carry within us: our beliefs, our expectations, the way we were loved as children, the quiet chatter that runs underneath our conscious thoughts, the feelings we buried after every disappointment and heartbreak, is expressed outward as the events, relationships, and patterns of our lives.

As within, so without. Our world is a direct reflection of our self.

The birth chart is the blueprint of that self. It shows the original pattern: how we tend to love, where we get stuck, what we keep recreating until we see it clearly. That’s why Carl Jung used astrology before client sessions. That’s why, in 2020, I decided I needed to learn it myself. It cuts through the clutter and takes us straight to the heart of the matter.

So when I look at the sky and I'm writing this blog, I’m not looking for what “will happen” to us. I’m looking for the invitation. The current positions of the planets describe the weather of the psyche right now, the particular flavour of longing, tension, beauty, and challenge that is available for us to work with. In my experience we grow more through the difficult moments than the easy ones, but since we’ve been speaking of Libra and balance, I’ll do my best to hold both: the places that ask us to stretch, and the places that offer grace.

If you’d like to understand more about the foundation I’m standing on, you can read my fundamentals and my manifesto.

With that in mind, let’s walk through the next week or so together and see what the sky is asking of us.

New Moon Solar Eclipse in Leo on the 12th of August

What is happening?

On the 12th of August 2026 we have a total Solar Eclipse at approximately 20° Leo.

This is a New Moon (Sun and Moon exactly conjunct) that is also an eclipse, which means the usual New Moon themes of fresh starts are intensified and accelerated and may arrive as a fated event that comes suddenly out of nowhere. The eclipse falls at the South Node, where we let go of something old, so it carries a strong flavour of release and completion as well as new beginnings.

Key features of the chart:

• The Sun, Moon, Mercury and Jupiter are all in Leo → a concentrated Leo stellium.

• Jupiter’s presence expands and amplifies whatever the eclipse touches.

• Venus has recently entered Libra bringing a relational, balancing quality into the wider picture.

• Mars has recently entered Cancer bringing will and action into the realm of family and home.

• There is a supportive Air Grand Trine involving Venus (Libra), Uranus (Gemini) and Pluto (Aquarius), which can help new ideas and social/creative shifts move more freely once the initial disruption settles.

Astronomically it is a total eclipse (path of totality crosses parts of the Arctic, Greenland, Iceland and northern Spain) and it can be strongly witnessed from the UK for the first time since 1999. Astrologically it is the first major eclipse on the Leo side of the new Leo–Aquarius nodal axis that began in mid-2026.

What this could mean?

In the world around us Leo rules visibility, leadership, creative self-expression, performance, and the need to be seen and recognised. A South Node eclipse here often coincides with the shedding of outdated forms of authority, celebrity, or public identity. We may see leaders, public figures or institutions having to confront where their image or power has become performative, inflated, or disconnected from genuine heart (for those in the Astrology world we have seen this clearly demonstrated through the drama and division that has blown up around Steven Forrest). At the same time, new voices and more authentic forms of creative or political expression can emerge. The Jupiter influence suggests these shifts can feel larger-than-life.

In our own lives this eclipse asks: What version of myself am I ready to stop performing? And what more authentic expression is waiting to be claimed?

Because it is a South Node eclipse in Leo, the invitation is often to release:

• An old self-image or way of seeking attention/validation

• The need to be the centre of attention in ways that no longer feel true

• Creative or leadership styles that have become rigid or ego-driven

And to make space for:

• A more heart-centred, courageous self-expression

• Creativity that comes from joy rather than proving something

• Leadership (of your own life or of others) that feels genuine rather than theatrical

The house in your chart that contains 20° Leo will show the life area most strongly activated (see below for a run through the rising signs). Anyone with planets or angles near 15–25° of the fixed signs (Leo, Aquarius, Taurus, Scorpio) will feel it most personally.

Eclipses rarely deliver their full meaning in a single day. The seeds planted or the releases begun around the 12th of August are likely to unfold over the following six months, and sometimes longer. The surrounding Venus-in-Libra energy can help us navigate the changes with more grace, fairness, and attention to how we relate while we reinvent ourselves.

Venus is watching this eclipse from her new home in Libra.

She has just stepped into Her sign of balance, relationship, and the quiet art of making things fair and beautiful between self and other. From here She looks softly across the sky at The Sun and Moon meeting in Leo, and she sees something both fierce and tender.

Leo is the sign of the heart’s courage to be seen. The eclipse is asking us to release an old performance of self: the version that needed constant applause, or the one that hid behind image, or the one that never quite felt safe enough to shine without armour. Because it is a South Node eclipse, the invitation is not simply “become more Leo.” It is “let the old Leo skin fall away so a truer one can emerge.”

Venus knows that none of this is possible without love.

She has always said the same thing, in every sign and every chart: it begins with loving ourselves. Not the polished self we show the world, but the one that carries the quiet, steady anxiety we barely notice anymore because it has been there so long. The fear of not being safe. The ancestral memory that lives in the body. The collective history that once watched The Sun disappear and called it an omen: kings falling, birds falling silent, the air growing cold. Eclipses were never just pretty events. They were moments when the light was taken away and we were left alone with whatever had been hidden underneath.

That is what this week is offering us, whether we asked for it or not.

Eclipses, and what they change in our lives, are fated in the sense that they arrive whether we are ready or not. We can't schedule them or negotiate with them. They simply come, and something in the outer world or the inner world shifts in a way we could not have predicted. The work is not to fight the change. The work is to meet it.

I have felt this in my own body these last couple of weeks. As a Libra rising with Venus in the fifth house in Aquarius, this eclipse falls opposite my ruling planet, and Pluto is involved too, pulling up what has been living quietly underneath the surface for a very long time. The low-level anxiety that has always been there. The lack of safety that feels so normal I almost forget it is not the natural state of being. I suspect many of us carry some version of this bag.

There is a children’s book I used to read to my daughter called The Huge Bag of Worries. In it, a little girl called Jenny finds that a great blue bag has appeared at the end of her bed. It is full of every worry she has ever had, and it follows her everywhere: to school, to the bathroom, even when she tries to watch television. She tries to ignore it, throw it away, lock it out. Nothing works. The bag only grows heavier.

Eventually she meets an old woman who simply says, “Let’s open it.” Together they take the worries out one by one. Some shrink the moment they are named. Some turn out not to belong to her at all. Some are still real, but once they are seen they no longer take up the whole bag. By the end, Jenny can walk again without the weight of everything she had been carrying alone.

That is one of the gifts Venus is offering us this week, even as the Leo eclipse darkens the sky for a moment.

She does not ask us to pretend the fear is not there. She asks us to love the one who is afraid. To turn towards the bag instead of away from it. To remember that love is not something we have to earn from another person, or chase in a relationship, or wait for the world to give us. Love is already the ground we stand on. When we remember that, when we can feel it in the body even while the old anxiety is still humming, we begin to attract a different quality of connection, both with others and with the larger life that holds us.

The eclipse will do what eclipses do. Something will be revealed. Something will be released. Something new will ask to be born. We can't control the timing or the exact shape of it. But we can choose how we meet it. And Venus asks us to meet it with grace.

Venus’s teaching remains the same: start with love. Love the self that is scared. Love the self that is changing. Love the self that is still here, even when the light is briefly taken away. From that place, the rest becomes possible.

The Leo eclipse through the rising signs

Aries Rising

Eclipse in the 5th house Focus: creativity, pleasure, children, romance, the courage to play and be seen for who you are. You are being asked to release an old way of seeking validation or performing for love. Venus in your 7th house helps you do this in relationship through fairness, mutuality, and learning that you don’t have to earn love by being the most dazzling. Soften the need to win affection; receive it instead.

Taurus Rising

Eclipse in the 4th house Focus: home, family, emotional foundations, the private self. Old patterns around safety, belonging, or the role you play in the family system are ready to be shed. Venus in your 6th house brings a practical, caring quality. Pay attention to tending to the body, daily rhythms, and small acts of beauty that make home feel more harmonious while the deeper roots shift.

Gemini Rising

Eclipse in the 3rd house Focus: voice, mindset, siblings, local world, how you communicate and learn. An old story you tell about yourself, or a habitual way of speaking/thinking, is ready to fall away. Venus in your 5th house invites you to speak and create from pleasure rather than performance. Let your words and ideas become more playful and heart-centred.

Cancer Rising

Eclipse in the 2nd house Focus: self-worth, money, resources, what you value. Release outdated measures of your own value and the ways you have tried to secure safety through possession or people-pleasing. Venus in your 4th house helps you rebuild a sense of worth from the inside out through emotional honesty and creating a more beautiful, supportive private world.

Leo Rising

Eclipse in the 1st house Focus: identity, body, how you meet the world. This is one of the most personal eclipses for you. An old version of “me” is being eclipsed so a more authentic one can emerge. Venus in your 3rd house supports the process through gentle self-talk, honest conversations, and small daily choices that align with who you are becoming rather than who you used to perform as.

Virgo Rising

Eclipse in the 12th house Focus: the unseen, rest, endings, the collective unconscious, what you have been carrying in secret. Hidden fears, ancestral patterns, or the quiet anxiety you barely notice are being brought into the light so they can be released. Venus in your 2nd house reminds you that self-worth and simple, tangible acts of care for yourself are the medicine. Love the part of you that has been carrying the bag of worries alone.

Libra Rising

Eclipse in the 11th house Focus: friends, groups, future vision, your place in the wider community. Old roles within friendships or collective spaces, or an outdated vision of the future, are ready to go. Venus is in your 1st house, right on your Ascendant, so this is a powerful time to claim a more authentic presence. Your own self-love and sense of balance become the magnet that draws the right people and possibilities.

Scorpio Rising

Eclipse in the 10th house Focus: career, public role, reputation, life direction. A public identity or professional persona that no longer fits is being dismantled. Venus in your 12th house asks you to do the inner work first: meet the fear or hidden insecurity beneath the drive for status so that whatever emerges in the world feels more truthful and less defended.

Sagittarius Rising

Eclipse in the 9th house Focus: beliefs, meaning, travel, higher learning, the big story you live by. An old worldview, philosophy, or sense of purpose is ready to be outgrown. Venus in your 11th house helps you find belonging and beauty in new communities and shared ideals. Let your search for truth become more relational and less solitary.

Capricorn Rising

Eclipse in the 8th house Focus: shared resources, intimacy, what you merge with others. Deep patterns around trust, power, debt (emotional or financial), and the fear of losing control are being stirred so they can be released. Venus in your 10th house offers a steadying influence helping you rebuild a public or professional life that rests on more honest foundations of mutuality and self-respect.

Aquarius Rising

Eclipse in the 7th house Focus: one-to-one relationships, partnerships, the mirror of the other. An old way of relating or an outdated image of “the one” or “the perfect partnership” is being eclipsed. Venus is in your 9th house, encouraging you to bring more meaning, honesty, and shared vision into your closest bonds. Love becomes less about projection and more about genuine meeting.

Pisces Rising

Eclipse in the 6th house Focus: daily work, health, service, the small rituals that shape your life. Habits, work patterns, or ways of caring for (or neglecting) the body that no longer serve are ready to go. Venus in your 8th house invites deeper emotional honesty and the courage to let intimacy and shared resources become more balanced and less entangled with fear.

Venus’s overall teaching across all signs Wherever the eclipse falls, the deeper invitation is the same: face what has been hidden (the bag of worries, the quiet anxiety, the old performance), and meet it with love rather than force. Venus from Libra reminds us that the quality of our relationships, with ourselves first, then with others, then with life itself, determines how gracefully we can navigate the fated shifts that eclipses bring.

Wherever the eclipse falls in your chart, the invitation is personal. The house it activates shows the exact area of life where something is ready to be released and something new is asking to be born. Venus, watching from Libra, keeps reminding us that the quality of how we meet these shifts, with self-love, honesty, and a willingness to rebalance, makes all the difference.

If you’d like to explore what this eclipse (and the wider sky) is asking of you more specifically, I offer one-to-one readings. We can look at the current transits through the lens of your own chart, or simply get to know your blueprint more deeply.

You can book a reading with me here either in person at Essential Therapies in Sidmouth, or online via Zoom.

Sending love. 🦋