Wow, Virgo Venus. What a Venus. Let me get one thing straight—Venus in Virgo is not nice. It’s not supposed to be. It’s many things. It’s kind, it’s moving, it’s careful, it knows precisely what a moment needs in order to transform into something else, and it’s wondrously considerate of almost everything. But it’s not nice. It doesn’t play at niceties.

Venus in Virgo is a Venus that exists in fall. It’s a Venus that knows what you want to see it as and it’s also a Venus that feels absolutely cankerous at the thought of being seen at all. It’s annoyed by this knowing about what other people want. It wants to stop seeing itself through the eyes of other people. It struggles to understand and to admire itself through its very own gaze.

The gaze of others feels debilitating for Venus in Virgo. It mimics those who always seem to need help. It mimics those who always seem to have some way of nitpicking or putting them down. It mimics those people who are kind of like you but are not quite you, that you tend to feel so small and insufficient next to. The gaze of others feels pressing, urgent, and like a camera on the wall that can’t just be ignored.

People get all wonky when they know that they’re being watched. It makes you want to dig a hole and climb into it. Venus in Virgo is like Illumi, who can change his face at will, digging a hole in the ground on Zevil’s Island.

But, as tiresome and as debilitating as it is, it’s also important that Venus in Virgo doesn’t push away from the important defense of anticipating another’s gaze.

One reason why is that it is impossible to. You can’t forget your own defense mechanisms. Another reason is that we never try to lose coping strategies. We always try to add more. And, so, Venus in Virgo knows the strategy of either hiding or camouflaging or exhausting itself with trying to help as many people as possible. Okay. Now, let’s add some more strategies. Let’s do this so that you never feel as though you must only rely on one strategy.

What would happen if you didn’t step in to help right away? What would happen if you didn’t perform niceness just because it was expected of you? What happens if you don’t clean up after the mess is made? If you chose differently, what would happen?

Loving a Venus in Virgo is loving someone who has learned the hard lesson that there is no reason to feign perfection because no one on earth was put here to be perfect. It’s loving a Venus that needs, sometimes, to be reminded of this. It’s loving a Venus that simply is incapable of being anyone other than exactly who they are.

You see, Venus in Virgo is a Venus in fall. It’s a Venus that fails spectacularly when it tries to be someone who it is not. It’s a Venus that can’t pretend.

Loving Venus in Virgo is about loving someone who can’t pretend. It’s about loving very real responses. It’s about loving the sarcasm, the push back, and the dilly dallying that shows up before someone is able to fall into love. Venus in Virgo expects that you will be there when they hesitate because it understands that everyone has defenses when it comes to love, that none of us are healed and sane people and that we shouldn’t expect to be treated as such. Loving Venus in Virgo is about loving the authenticity of hesitancy.

You see, Venus in Virgo will always understand your hesitancy from the other side. It understands that, sometimes, when you’re not ready, you’re revealing a somatic truth and, yet, you have already decided to push yourself in.

Venus in Virgo is often uninterested in romantic overtures, in odes to pleasure, and that romance is just perspective that is firmly rooted in comedy. Venus in Virgo is interested in living through the thick and the thin together. It’s often suspicious of flowers and dubious around prettiness the same way it tends to doubt niceness. Venus in Virgo is always more interested in peeling back a layer than in finishing up the polish.

And, Venus in Virgo sometimes forgets pleasure. This is the hermit’s Venus. It’s a Venus that can stay in its hole where it attempts to find reprieve from the other’s gaze so immaculately that it forgets the pleasure of being. It forgets to unfurl itself out and to lay in the sun. It forgets that being looked at can sometimes feel good.

Loving Venus in Virgo is loving someone who will be there for you when things get hard. Venus in Virgo will be there when you struggle. In fact, sometimes, it’s like they’re not there for the longest time, like they’re always busy busy busy, and then they suddenly appear when you’re in trouble. This is Venus in Virgo. It’s like trouble draws them in like a magnet.

Loving Venus in Virgo is about loving someone who needs to be reminded to show up for pleasure and not just for necessity, that relationships are about play just as much as they are about accountability. It’s about loving someone who needs to remember that it is okay to lower the stakes of human interaction, that you don’t have to prove or to earn love but that you simply enjoy it when taking a stroll on a sunny day with a friend. Loving Venus in Virgo is about loving someone who needs to be reminded that there are sunny days in addition to cloudy ones. It’s about asking the one who helps what they’re like to do when no one in their vicinity needs their assistance.