Venus in Capricorn: Fortifying My Own Foundation.
I gaze out of a window that will never be clean; cold aluminum-edged glass that rattles with every breeze.
Shoddy and ill-fitting in its frame, allowing moisture to seep in; a treacherous black patina of mold encroaches against the edges, making a virulent, dark rind of plotting, spewing decay.
The wood is deteriorating, like that of a decrepit ship lost at sea, a forsaken edifice slipping slowly beneath the surface of an ominous ocean of blackness.
This is no foundation to build a life from; the ravaged remains of a building built over one hundred years ago, repaired rarely and without a thought to permanence.
It groans with aching beams even as I write this, as if in protest, though the somber creaking timber knows that it’s true. They are dilapidated and neglected, a relic of a time long gone.
Passed epochs have been on my mind, halcyon eras of gold that I can dimly perceive. As twilight hints in the opal sky and the fog comes in over the hills, I remember a time when I loved this city, when I felt grateful for finding an apartment in San Francisco again after abandoning it for travel.
But now, I feel it’s clutches around me like a moldy vice, a trap from which I wish to escape.
As an astrological new year glints like a burnished disk in the future, I know I must make room for it by relinquishing the past; my white-knuckled grip to it.
Shivering at night beside a window that hisses the void at me with a cold, wet sneer, I think of sun-dappled islands.
I promise myself release from this foul, decrepit structure.
I promise golden sun and white buildings built on shining isles.
As Venus graces Capricorn, sign of foundation and structure, I recognize the need to renew my own, and my relationship with the idea of stability.
I see the beauty in careful planning, in ideas that germinate in steady productivity beneath the earth in fecund plotting.
I must elevate the tangible reality of the seedling’s promise above the misty, taunting whispers of nostalgia.
I’ve seen people who cling to the city become living fossils with envious eyes. I evade them, yet I reman in this city in the shadows of sinking towers — monuments of the conquering elite that are slipping into the earth with the weight of their mammoth hunger for power and juggernaut sense of entitlement.
They will see everyone else sink first, bubbling into a primordial vat of rugged survival and desperation long before the gleaming, leaning towers surrender to the sea like languorous leviathans, searingly reflective windows staring like shocked eyes at the sun in disbelief that they are not vaunted into the heavens like celestial spheres.
Even as the weight of the corridors of commerce pull downtown towards the depths, I feel myself, leaden and heavy, being swept into the suction, the slow-moving vortex.
I must escape.
I always escape in the summer, reigniting my life-force in sun and sand and sea, but now I wonder, what would escape with the intention of sustained growth be?
What would escape with a foundational mindset be?
Capricorn is a sign of both mountain and sea. It emerges from the oceanic depths, churning them with its fishtail, and reaches for the peaks with its shining hooves and horns. What move would encompass the Venusian energy of this moment, to be both of intuitive depth and lofty aspiration, how best to embody the beauty of the sea-goat at this time?
How can I fortify my own foundation even as my surrounds seem to be crumbling around me?
Perhaps in this moment I can join many others in a collective inquiry into the concept of security and foundation, and its intuitive connection with freedom, growth, and elevation.
As someone with natal Capricorn energy, I return to the body.
I return to the endeavor of strengthening myself from within. I will focus in this season on health and inner strength so that my body can truly be my home, from which all my careful plans can unfurl.
For me, the invitation is to see my body as more than a fortress from which to defend against attack, but a walled garden from which to nurture inner growth and sustenance.
Perhaps Venus invites all of us in this moment to return to the structures that sustain and support us, beginning with the physical foundation from which we move, explore and plan from.
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Maren Zweifler enjoys teaching Yoga with a focus on free movement and intrinsic shapes, emphasizing spinal fluidity and innate, primal posture. Deeply inspired by movement systems that embrace nature like Sridaiva and Continuum Movement. He completed a 500-hour certification in SF and has taught both there and in Austin where he honed his skills teaching private classes tailored to the individual needs of his clients. He created a wellness/yoga program at a non-profit. These experiences allowed him to explore both the unique individuation of the physical experience in one-on-one sessions, and the commonalities of the human form that can be witnessed in large groups. You could connect with Maren on Instagram.