Perhaps you have felt it already: a turning inward, a quiet recoiling, an insistence that your inner desires need attending to.

A name you have not spoken in years returns to you in a dream. A door you thought was closed nudges to be looked at once more. Questions of worth, long ignored, rise to the surface.

This is the journey of Venus retrograde. And this time, she's joined in the Underworld by Mercury. For forty days she travels backward through Scorpio and Libra, and midway along her path, Mercury turns to accompany her into the depths. 

The astronomer-priests of Babylon perceived two faces of the Venus goddess. As the evening star, Ishtar was the goddess of love, of longing and of beauty; as the morning star, she was the warrior queen, sovereign and unafraid. Between these two faces lies her descent.

In the Sumerian hymn of Inanna, and in its Babylonian echo, the Descent of Ishtar, the goddess passes through seven gates into the underworld. At each threshold she is asked to surrender something — her crown, her jewels, her royal garments — until she stands with nothing at all, and at her most vulnerable. The descent is then followed by a rebirth, whose emblem is the phoenix, consumed by flame and rising, luminous, from her own ashes. 

Scorpio asks us to look beneath the surface, toward what we most deeply desire and toward what still holds us bound. Libra asks what is just, and what we are no longer willing to exchange for the comfort of others. Held together, they bring love, worth, power and voice into a single, searching light.

This is the transformation by which the woman who lived to please becomes the woman who belongs, at last, to herself. She pursues her desires with unapologetic passion.

This is not a transit merely to be endured, it's an invitation to enter the fire with intention, and in a circle of reflection.

In this 4-week journey, you can expect:

• Five live  1-hour gatherings on Zoom
  • First Welcome Session is on Friday, October 23 at 5pm ET
  • Subsequent sessions on Sunday at 3pm ET
• Recordings of every session, yours to return to whenever you wish.
• Insights into your own chart, exploring how the Venus rx is activating your nativity.
• Sound healing and chanting, to soften the mind and open the heart to what lies beneath.
• Oracle card guidance, offering intuitive messages for your own passage through the descent.

• Dream incubation, a gentle practice for inviting your dreams to speak to the question each week holds to illuminate the wisdom of your unconscious.

• Group sharing in a safe and confidential space, where you can speak and be heard among women walking the same path.

Welcome and Opening Ceremony · The Venus Cazimi
Friday, October 23 · 5 PM ET

On the day Venus enters the heart of the Sun, we gather to open our journey together. In the hours before she reaches that luminous inner chamber, we will open a sacred space, welcome one another and offer our intention for the descent ahead, a quiet vow placed in the light of the cazimi, to carry with us through the gates.

Week 1 · Sunday, October 25 · The Descent: Laying Down the Crown
Noon Pacific / 3PM Eastern

• Two days earlier, Venus vanished into the heart of the Sun. Now, as Mercury turns retrograde to follow her and Venus slips back from Scorpio into Libra, we gather on the eve of the Full Moon in Taurus. This is the moment of Inanna at the first gate, laying down her crown. 

  • The Venus retrograde cycle: the evening star, the hidden passage and the rebirth at dawn
  • Finding the place in your own chart where this retrograde is unfolding
  • The Full Moon in Taurus square Pluto: what the body knows about your worth
  • Oracle card pull: What am I ready to lay down at the gate?
  • Dream incubation for the week: Show me what I am being asked to release

Week 2 · Sunday, November 1 · The Underworld: Communion With the Ancestors
Noon Pacific / 3PM Eastern

• We gather on the Day of the Dead, one of the most sacred days of the year. Across many traditions, these first days of November honor those who came before us: the Celtic Samhain on October 31, All Saints' Day on November 1, and Mexico's Día de los Muertos on November 1 and 2. It is said that the veil between the worlds is thinnest now, and that the ancestors draw near.

  It is fitting that we meet them here, at the very bottom of the descent. In the myth, Inanna comes face to face with Ereshkigal, queen of the great below and her own sister. With Venus retrograde in Libra, the sign of relationship, we turn slowly and kindly toward the grief, the anger and the longing so many of us were taught to keep hidden, and toward the mothers and grandmothers who carried them before us. What did the women of your line love, and what were they never permitted to want?

  • Venus retrograde in Libra: the patterns of love and relationship we inherit
  • Ereshkigal as the hidden sister who lives within
  • An ancestral offering to the women of your lineage
  • Oracle card pull: What blessing do the women of my line wish to give me?
  • Dream incubation for the week: Show me what my ancestors are asking me to heal

Week 3 · Sunday, November 8 · The Turning: Finding Your Voice in the Dark 
Noon Pacific / 3PM Eastern

• Mercury has just met the Sun at the heart of his own retrograde, and we gather on the eve of the New Moon in Scorpio. In the myth, Inanna is restored by two small beings who do nothing more than grieve alongside Ereshkigal, and are honored for it. This week belongs to the truths we have swallowed, and to the quiet, healing power of being truly heard.

  • Mercury retrograde in Scorpio: the unspoken word and the secrets ready to surface
  • Writing the letter you never sent, held for now in silence
  • A circle of witnessing among women, in small groups
  • Oracle card pull: What truth within me is ready to be heard?
  • A New Moon intention, spoken from your own sovereign desire

Week 4 · Sunday, November 15 · The Return: Rising as the Morning Star
Noon Pacific / 3PM Eastern

• Two days after Mercury and Venus both turned direct, we gather to welcome the return. Venus now shines in the dawn sky as the Morning Star, the warrior queen, sovereign and unafraid. Inanna rises, though the underworld asks that something go down in her place. Together we gather the harvest of these four weeks, and choose with care what remains below and what we carry back into the light.

  • Venus direct in Libra: relationships, agreements and what fairness now means to you
  • Gathering the threads of your dreams and journal pages
  • A ritual of phoenix rising
  • Oracle card pull: What do I carry back into the light?
  • A vow for the season ahead

• You have a working knowledge of astrology and are ready to go beyond the basics into the living, breathing dimension of the transits.
• You find yourself reconsidering what you value, what you desire, how you accomodate others, and seek a reset.
• You are drawn to astrology that integrates ritual, embodiment, and genuine spiritual inquiry.
• You are seeking community with other thoughtful, spiritually curious practitioners who are navigating this extraordinary moment in time.

Questions? Please contact Christina at: hello at radiant astrology dot com.