Venus Retrograde in 2025 and reclaiming the power of Venus

Before getting into Venus retrograde, let’s talk about Venus. Her pantheonic ancestor is the Greek goddess Aphrodite (1-2000 bce), who was said to be the “personification of the generative powers of nature.” She was connected to love, beauty and sexual desire and was sometimes associated with war, as was HER pantheonic ancestors Inanna of Sumeria (2900 bce) and Ishtar of Mesopotamia (3000 bce). Ishtar and Inanna, along with Astarte in the Levant, are the same goddess and these precursors to Venus carried a more powerful archetype. They were associated with the power of eroticism and therefore more yang than Venus, seen to be receptive and yielding in her power of attraction and therefore more yin. In Babylonian astrology, Ishtar was the planet Venus, taking the form of the Evening Star until turning retrograde and disappearing from the night sky for a few days, just as Inanna entered the Underworld in the old stories re-emerging as the Morning Star after the retrograde phase is over.

The fact that the Greek Venus carried less power than the more ancient goddesses with similar qualities follows the male-dominated culture of ancient Greece which placed men on a pedestal compared to women. This continued into the early Roman culture which, of course borrowed its pantheon largely from Greece. But times have changed, and I like to think that we can reclaim some of that ancient power of the old goddesses in today’s astrology. RE-claiming after all fits perfectly into the narrative of Venus turning retrograde and retracing old ground to transform and evolve.

This cyclical transition mirrors a journey of death and rebirth, descent and re-emergence, making Venus retrograde a powerful time in areas of love, beauty, personal values and finance, and relationships. It gives us an opportunity to reassess our values and the things and people to which we would like to remain attached. We may reconnect with old friendships and lovers, we may change our appearance and re-assess our stock portfolio. Venus retrograde periods can challenge our relationships and force us to look below the surface at what motivates us in our interactions with others. Conventional wisdom advises not to begin a new relationship when Venus is retrograde, but like everything in astrology that depends. Because we tend to retrace our steps, we may begin a new connection using old patterns of behavior and this would not be helpful. On the other hand, we may find ourselves healing an old pattern by going through a familiar crisis in a new way.

This Venus retrograde will most potently affect those of us with planets along the path of this retrograde cycle. Here are some important dates to be aware of: