The Deeper Meaning of Venus in Pisces

Hey everyone, this is Adam Elenbaas from Nightlight Astrology. Today, we're going to take a look at Venus as an entrance into the sign of Pisces, which is the place of Venus's exultation. In order to do this, I'm going to show you an episode from a previous series that I did some years ago called Planets in Profile, where I took Mercury, Venus, and Mars through all 12 signs and explored the archetypal significance of each of the planets through all of the signs so today, we're going to rewind that episode on Venus in Pisces to remind ourselves about the archetypal significations of Venus in her exultation.

The other reason this is important is that Venus is the host of the upcoming Lunar Eclipse in Libra, which is happening on March 25, and Venus is also going to be the host of the Jupiter-Uranus conjunction on April 20. So what Venus is doing right now is of greater significance because she is sort of fueling two of the biggest transits of our spring.

So, on that note, we will be I will be showing you that episode, and the other thing I want to point you to is that if you've never seen those episodes before, you can go back into the archives and look at the Planets in Profile series and you can watch Mercury, Venus or Mars through all 12 signs. So I like to just remind people once in a while of those videos by recycling this evergreen content when a planet ingresses into a new sign.

The other thing to note is that we're in the midst of doing the moon through the 12 signs and I think probably next week or the week after, you'll be seeing the next episode in that series, which will be The Moon in Cancer. It's a great way to learn more about planets and signs, really, and a nice appropriate one for this week as Venus has just entered Pisces. So that's it.

Before we get into it, don't forget to like, subscribe, and share your comments and reflections. It really helps the channel to grow. As you guys know, transcripts of any of the daily talks, including today's, can be found on the website nightlightastrology.com. This Thursday night, we are really excited for the next in my monthly series of webinars. This is a series on the outer planets in love and relationships. So, if you click on the Events tab on the Nightlight website, go to live talks, and from there, you'll see that you can register for Neptune in Love. That's this Thursday night, March 14, from seven to 9pm. Eastern time, when you register for $20, You will get the link to attend the live webinar. It's about two hours long with a Q&A, and then we will be sending you the link to the recording afterward if you can't make it live. That's nice because then you can watch it afterward or even you want to watch it a second time if you attend live. You can also check out Uranus in Love on April 18. If you missed Pluto in Love last month, you can pick the recording up as well in the shop or on the events page.

Now, one thing to note about this series is that it's totally okay for beginners, and it's specific enough that I think advanced students will get something good out of this, too, but we're looking at the outer planets and how they show up either in the natal chart or transits to the natal chart with respect to the topic of love, sex, and relationships and what we can learn from them. So that is the agenda of that series. Be sure to check that out. The other thing that I am promoting right now is my wife's herbal apprenticeship program. Ashley's Herbal Foundations Apprenticeship begins on April 24. You can learn more about it on the website skyhouseherbs.com.

So if you go over to skyhouse herbs.com and click on the Courses tab, go to Herbal Foundations Apprenticeship, scroll down to learn more about it, and if you stick around at the end of today's video, you will see an interview that I've tagged on to the end, where I talked to Ashley about the program, and you can learn more about it if you haven't watched that interview already. So that is it for announcements, and on that note, we will rewind and check out this Planets in Profile episode exploring the deeper meaning of Venus in Pisces. So I hope you guys will enjoy this, and we will see you again tomorrow.

Hi, Everybody. This is Adam Elenbaas from Nightlight Astrology, and this is another episode of Planets in Profile. In today's episode, we're going to take a look at Venus in the sign of Pisces. Now, if you're new to this series, I've been tracking the movements of Venus and Mars through the 12 signs. Somewhat this year and 2019, some last year in 2018. So, I will eventually be looking at all of the planets in this series, but right now, I'm just looking at Venus and Mars for the signs in particular.

So we've gone through quite a few signs, and in today's episode, as I said, we're going to be looking at Venus in the sign of Pisces, which is an interesting place for Venus because this is the place of Venus's exultation is a very powerful place for Venus, and there are reasons for this that are really interesting, which we're also going to take a look at. So, let's go ahead and get into it. Basically, the thing that you need to know about Venus in Pisces is that this is the place where Venus is said to be exalted.

Another way of thinking about exultation is to think about a planet in its exultation as being lifted on high or being lifted up. So, it has a kind of exalted status. It sort of has a worship, full worship feeling, and it has the feeling of being sometimes very powerful. It can sort of point to fame or high levels of success or good fortune anytime a planet is exalted. You know, in the language of traditional astrology, it's a little like, ooh, for example, it's Aries season right now, the Sun is in Aries. That's the exultation of the Sun. So the Sun is lifted on high in Aries. Every planet has a place where it's exalted. Every planet also has a place in the opposite sign of its exultation where it's said to be depressed or fall.

The basic meaning of exultation or depression has to do with the concept of fortune; all expectations and falls are related to the moon, who is the ruler of fortune, what is fortune, it's the world of change, the world of material fluctuations, and change that moves in cycles and rhythms, as opposed to or in relation with the unmoved center of being the pure conscious soul or the pure conscious identity that we are, which is, in a sense, an observer and an unmoved mover, connected to the idea of God or divinity.

So, in ancient astrology, there is a kind of pure consciousness, and then there are things that change and move and revolve around it. We can see this from the fact that the entire meaning of the sequence of the Zodiac is derived from the idea of the Zodiac revolving around a pole star that does not change and the fixed rhythms of the cycles of the seasons that repeat over and over again, are moving in a circle, a circle of change and fluctuation that moves around an unchanging center.

So when we're talking about exultation, what we're talking about is something happening within that realm of cyclical change, which is the material world that we live in, which is our bodies, which is the highs and lows of life and when a planet is exalted, it is said to indicate things relative to the natural significations of the planet that are of high exalted, lofty, good, usually sort of good fortune, which is to say they're at a high point.

So Venus is the natural ruler of love, beauty, harmony, sensuality, the senses of desire, jealousy and envy, lust, and betrayal; these are all things that Venus can represent, as well as friendship, the arts, pageantry, jewelry, the beauty of flowers, and nature. So, these are all things that Venus can naturally represent. Right. So when she is in her exultation, it says that these qualities are all exalted; they're all sort of lifted up on high. So that is what it means to say Venus is exalted in Pisces, but then we have to ask the question, well, why? Why is Venus exalted in the sign of Pisces? There's a good reason for this.

The main reason is that Pisces is the sign that comes just before the spring equinox when all of the quality of light during the solar year is moving towards a takeover of the Yang, the Yang being the light principle, which is more closely related to the idea of that unchanging center, we can see this because as we are approaching in a Pisces season, the spring equinox, the light of the Sun is growing in the days are getting longer, and the Sun is moving the arc of the Sun that the ecliptic pathway of the Sun is moving higher and higher, toward the pole star in the north.

As it lifts up, it's it's aspiring upward. So we have in Pisces, the very end of winter and the shifting and changing into the Yang or sort of solar half of the year where everything is reaching, reaching high upward toward that pole star on the spring side, and so that's where we get that kind of aspirational Venusian quality from this is Jupiter's home sign. Pisces is the feminine abode of Jupiter, So it's called a double-bodied water sign; and it is double-bodied because it's coming out of winter, as we just said, but going into spring, so it's of two natures has a little bit of winter, but is aspiring to come out of the darkness into the light.

So you always have this really two-sided nature to planets in Pisces. On the one hand, a planet in Pisces tends to represent something or someone potentially grappling with something a little dark, a little heavy, a little depressive, a little wintry, a little dark and soulful, and then we have the other quality of moving toward the light. Let me Aspire upward and outward, you know, and so there's this kind of conflicted relationship between darkness and light, with an overall aspirational quality toward the light.

So we say it's of two natures; it's double-bodied. It's watery and feminine. It's a very, very moody feeling-oriented sign, and it's aspirational; like Jupiter, it's heading upward towards some bigger, unchanging ideal at the top.

Now, because of that, because spring is on the rise, and the light is on the rise, and we're moving out of winter. Venus is exalted here because Venus is related to springtime qualities and to life and the proliferation of life and to sex and to birth and, like, the proliferation of plant life when it rains, and it's warm outside. These are all Venusian qualities.

On the other hand, if you put Venus in Virgo, Venus is in her fall. This is because it's a hot kind of dry time of summer and things are declining down into the death of fall and Autumn where all of the natural Venusian qualities are falling and so we say that Venus is exalted here, because at this point, that kind of the appetite, the desire, the beauty that the sensuality of spring is stirring and rising to life.

So this is considered to be a high place for Venus, a place that's naturally suited to Venus's romantic imaginative qualities, and it's a water sign. Everything's getting wet, and everything's starting to come to life around this time of year, Pisces time of year.

Now, Venus can never be more than a couple of signs away from the Sun. So, for Venus in Pisces, and like all planets, really, you don't. It doesn't have to be literally spring where you live or at the time of your birth for Venus to express these qualities in a person's life. These are archetypal qualities. They're symbolic; they're derived. They express themselves through the seasonal archetypes, but they're not caused by them. Okay, so in fact, ancient astrologers have it just the opposite way that these natural archetypal qualities are what cause nature to express itself in the way that it does not that not the other way around, but at any rate.

Another thing to note is that when Venus travels through Pisces, she is in Jupiter's home. So whenever she is in Pisces, you always have to look at Jupiter. Where is Jupiter? She's an exalted house guest and Jupiter sign. This is another benefic planet that's related to very similar qualities, life growth, proliferation, and the great green light in the sky; that's Jupiter. Venus is very similar. They both rule the benefic aspects like the sextile for Venus and the trine for Jupiter.

When Venus is in Jupiter sign, she enjoys benefits from friends, from lovers, from people who are important, you know, because you're looking at Venus significations, receiving benefits, lovers, friends, harmonious connections, anything that's, you know, beautiful or sensual is basically on the rise and is going to grant blessings or typically be favorable.

So, that's, you know, very important, but you have to look at where Jupiter is if Jupiter when you're born, if you have Venus in Pisces, and Jupiter is in a really bad house, and you know, pretty like messed up with its dignity or something else receiving some hard aspects from Saturn or whatever, that will affect Venus, and so it's always a very nuanced interpretation.

Anytime you're looking at a planet in a birth chart, it's never as simple as being like, Oh, well, Venus in Pisces is just like this. It always has to do with Venus, knowing the dignity, knowing the tendencies of the sign that it's in, how it relates to that sign, and also knowing where The planetary host isn't and what kind of relationship Venus has to the planetary host.

If Venus can't see the planetary host, has an aversion to it and ancient terms, or is within a sextile or trying to Jupiter or send an opposition or square. If Jupiter is well dignified or not, you know, depending on Jupiter's condition on the chart, the whole thing is modified.

So I say this not to discourage you; you can still hopefully gain a lot from hearing about Venus in Pisces, but also because people will sometimes be like, what? My life is nothing like that, or I don't have anything like that going on in my life, and I have Venus in Pisces. One of the reasons for this is that often enough, we're not looking carefully enough at the condition of Venus in aspectual relation to house dynamics or in terms of its host, Jupiter.

So those are some good things you always have to consider when looking at Venus traveling through the home sign of Jupiter. She's a house guest. Yes, she's an exalted house guest, which means she really gets along well with Jupiter, and Jupiter gives her a lot of good things, blessings, augmentation, and growth. But, you know, it's always a tricky situation to look at the nuances of all the planets involved.

So now, what can you say? How does Venus in Pisces behave? What can we say about Venus in Pisces? Well, first of all, we're going to say that she is Jupiterian. She's very happy in a feminine abode. She's very happy in Jupiter's home as well. So she expresses herself in grandiose ways, right? And like, that's not bad for Venus. Right? Like think about a beautiful play, a theatrical performance, and think about the over-the-top colors and voices and songs and the amazing bodies of dancers; all of these things are in a sense that when you see it all on stage, and the lights and you're taken into it, that's very Venus in Pisces you've ever been to Disney World before. Some people can't stand Disney World I get it. I was kind of taken by the magic of it with a three-year-old recently.

So Venus in Jupiter's sign of Pisces is sort of like the over-the-top characteristics of Disney World, the magic, the imagination, the costume, the colors, the dancing, you know what I mean? It has that feeling to it. So anything that is Venusian, naturally from theatre, performing arts, romance, beauty, friendship, love, harmony, music, and desire can become greatly enhanced, made much, much bigger because that's what Jupiter does.

Jupiter augments and makes things grow and makes them bigger and larger and, sometimes, over the top, like way too grandiose, way too big, and the part where this can get a little troubling with Venus in Pisces is that we have to remember that even though Venus is very happy in Pisces, and it represents a natural peak in Fortune. When Venus arrives in the sign of Pisces, it's usually pretty celebratory. Hey, everything's going pretty well. I'm enjoying really nice connections with people. I'm feeling like I'm really in love with my friends, or I'm falling in love with someone or having a lot of nice romantic outings or something like that, right? But there's also this duality built into Pisces.

There's the part of Pisces that is still if, like the first 15 degrees of Pisces, we say, versus the second 15 first 15 more like winter second 15 Okay, springs coming on. So there's a duality and the the darkness of Pisces has to do with wrestling with that which is fallen or that which is complicated, that which is dark, and that which is more soulful, right so not all of that is bad either.

For example, let's look at some personalities and see how they express this duality. Let's talk about, for example, Kurt Cobain. Kurt Cobain Venus in Pisces right court granted he had his conjoined with Saturn but Venus in Pisces in his chart. He's someone who doesn't like false, you know, he's a grunge rocker. Right? He doesn't fit the typical like, oh, everything's grandiose and romantic and no, but he is still romantic in the sense of being tragic and that's the dark side of Pisces, right. is that entanglement with the material world that says I love you, but I hate you. I want you, but I reject you. Like an addict. For example. I can't be here. It's brutal here, I need a drug, I need something to make me feel better. But then I want the drug, and it makes me feel better. But then it's a poison, and I can't get rid of it; I need to get rid of it.

So that kind of tortured back and forth between having a body and being in the material world and feeling like it's a horrible entangling web of karma and illusion. But then also, you know, feeling so much compassion and love and being able to see the shimmering of divinity within it. Is this place good? Or is it bad? I can't decide; I'm torn apart. I'm torn apart. Is it a dream? Is it? Is it beautiful? Or is it a nightmare, right?

This kind of duality that exists in Pisces can bring out this kind of romantic, grandiose quality, as well as a real tragic romantic quality, and obviously, if you read Shakespeare at all, you know that one of the greatest love stories of all time is also a tragedy that in Romeo and Juliet, so there's this feeling of, of the complicated relationship that we have with life here, the life in the world, where it's, it's dark, and it's wintry, sometimes, and we're very entangled with the world here. We're like addicts of the material world; we can't get enough complexity, and we can't get enough stuff, right?

But then we want to leave, we want to go to, I want to seek higher ground, and we want to find religion and spirituality, which are things that really liberate or free us. That's the movement upward and outward into spring. But we keep getting pulled down. On the other hand, we don't want, you know, or appreciate people like Marilyn Manson, right, who absolutely like in a similar fashion to Kurt Cobain and does not want some kind of rosy, happy-go-lucky superficiality. Don't give me some Jupiterian, you know, like half-baked, you know, smiley face, right? If I'm going to see something beautiful, then I want it to be real. I want you to know what I mean. So there's that real dichotomy.

It doesn't sound like Jupiter on the outside at the outset; people are like this and sound like Jupiter or Venus, and Pisces should also be so rosy. But no, because we're talking about a true winter sign. But it's a yin sign, and it's dark, but it has this kind of aspirational quality. So, Jupiter's feminine abode is more conflicted about the light. No, I mean, it is no surprise that people have tried to rectify a chart for Jesus Christ, so he's given Venus in Pisces, right? Have you looked on whether it is Astro theme or, I don't remember which website it is, but I looked up, you know, celebrities with Venus and Pisces, and the top of the list was Jesus.

Like, well, it makes sense, right? Here's someone who represents the conflict of, you know, the material world and the darkness of it, the crucifixion and, but then, the rebirth and the resurrection. So there's this also the side of of Pisces that wants to bring the darkness into the light. Often, you'll see this with Venus in Pisces individuals, not in a way that's cheap or that denigrates, leaves behind, or casts out something valuable, right? So there's this very compassionate, this longing for everything to be included, even the darkness.

Now, that's Jupiter in a feminine sign. Because Jupiter wants everything included, Jupiter is all about making bigger holes. But the dark Yin half of the year is really reflective of our material condition, how complicated it is here, how heavy it is, and how much suffering there is here. So, what is it that can embrace all of that suffering and bring it through? That's why you have the association's Venus in Pisces with saints and martyrs and great sinners and, you know, people who have kind of complicated, tragic personalities.

Okay, so let's give you a list of them. Like Martin Luther King Jr., That's pretty obvious. There's a martyr for a cause. I have a dream, right? Notice I always liked this phrase it wasn't I have a plan, it was I have a dream. It's a real visionary quality; sorry if you can hear that. Somebody's working on my house outside. Justin Bieber, he's a complicated character. It's the same thing. He's taking time off from his work right now for meant because of mental health problems. Yet he's this beloved kind of tragic rock icon.

Kurt Cobain, the same thing his love life got involved with with heroin in a really complicated way. But he and he was kind of this. The Sun is gone, but I have a Light. He has a very complicated personality but is both a beautiful artist and also sort of tragic. Heath Ledger, same thing. Vincent van Gogh did the same thing, a very post-impressionistic artist. Look at his artwork of Vincent Van Gogh's artwork has this quality of seeing something more in the world than what people commonly see in it, but it's not transcending the world. It's bringing something out of the world that's there already. That's a very important Piscean quality; Marilyn Manson is a goth glam rocker, and Penelope Cruz is a beautiful dancer but a kind of dark beauty.

George Harrison, who was the spiritual member of The Beatles and became a bhakti Yogi, joined the Hari Krishna movement, same thing and he was by the way he had his if you ever watched the documentary Living in the Material World, I think it's called. Brilliant about the spiritual legacy of his work.

Edgar Casey similar thing. He's a famous psychic who, you know, has this very complicated relationship with spirits and ghosts and, you know, dark things but also has this kind of prophetic quality. Edgar Allan Poe is a dark, tragic poet who's beautiful but it's dark. Billie Holiday, same thing really troubled childhood very complicated, soulful, dark, beautiful singer, Jules Verne, epic around the world. In however many days I forget. Journey into the center of the earth 20,000 leagues under the sea. All of these grand adventures capture the imagination; they're very grandiose and Jupiterian.

Maya Angelou similar thing. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, beauty and darkness combined, but with a redemptive kind of message, sometimes tragic. But there's something beautiful about tragedy with all of these characters. Galileo, well beyond his time as a visionary but also a martyr, similar to Martin Luther King, moves everyone forward, but he's caught up in the darkness of humanity.

Marvin Gaye similar character, peace lover, and yet, you know, he's murdered, he is murdered by his own father, if I remember correctly, Ravi Shankar, which is also he's a brilliant musician and one of the most well-known musicians in India and a fantastic spiritualist as well, Jack Kerouac, crazy problems with drugs and tragedy, in his life, and in a sense, really sick and as an individual, possessed with addiction and things like that. But he's a brilliant poet who moves us beyond the trappings of the material world to try to find something more. All of these characters are like this. They have that duality built into them. But there's inherently in them; there's something uplifting and hopeful even if the life is tragic; there's something that makes us feel like there was a bright, bright star in them that burned out like Heath Ledger, Kurt Cobain, Martin Luther King.

Even George Harrison, to a certain extent, had a feeling in his youth that he was someone who was instrumental in creating a yogic movement all over the world with the Hari Krishna, which, of course, is very important to me since I studied bhakti. So you get the feeling for Venus in Pisces. There's this built-in duality, and it needs the darkness and the soulfulness and the complications of being in the material world have to be addressed, and usually, it comes out through love, a way of glamourizing darkness, a way of embracing it and trying to lift it up a way of eulogizing someone or something, a way of dreaming something forward.

So it's like that it has, but remember, exultation is a planet, and its exultation is almost always related to a planet in its fall. What goes up must come down. So there's always in exalted planets, there's always some sense of potential for something that's really high up to fall down, what burns bright and fast and lifts up high, you know, it goes out fast and falls down. That's built into the meaning of Venus and Pisces, which is an exalted planet.

So, hopefully, this has been interesting to you guys. I'm going to try to get out of this one a little bit early before I say too much and before the banging outside becomes too annoying. I hope you can't hear it too much. Thank you all for listening. I hope that if you have questions, comments, or reflections on Venus in Pisces, please share, and we'll be doing a new one pretty soon on Mars in Gemini as well. So stay tuned for that. All right, take care, everyone. Bye.