The Eight Gate of Ascent
September 14, 2025: Venus meets with the moon in Scorpio
Venus is high in the evening sky, shining brightly as Evening Star. She meets with the moon at the Crown Chakra gate.
Venus begins Her retrograde period October 4, 2025.
The Gatekeeper Speaks
The world exists as you perceive it.
It is not what you see, but how you see it.
It is not what you hear, but how you hear it.
It is not what you feel, but how you feel it.
-Rumi
Black Essence
The Quality of Pure Potentiality
We cannot recognize the truth of our experience if we don’t know where we are in the moment. We won’t recognize where we are if we resist being where we are. Not allowing ourselves to be where we are prevents us from understanding our experience for what it is, and we won’t see the truth of the situation.
And that truth turns out to be essential power—it is the power of truth and peace and stillness. This is the immense and silent power to be—to be undisturbed and unruffled by the ignorance and reactivity of the familiar self. It is simply the power to be who you are, without domination or control, the power of True Nature that brings a love and a freedom in simply being yourself.
-A.H. Almaas, Unfolding Now
Inquiry Questions
Take some time to drop in, deepen into the quiet of your unfolding soul, and explore what is here now in your awareness, rising as Evening Star.
Sacred Warrior, what is your experience of aloneness? What makes you want to resist it? What are you afraid of if you are alone?
Bold and beauteous One, what is your legacy? For what will you be remembered?
Sacred Warrior, what do you protect? Who do you build for? Who do you honor from your ancient lineage through your legacy?
Bold and beauteous one, what is created when your vitality impacts your capacity to build what is lasting?
What is your own unique lens through which to explore this Essence of Black, the quality of pure potentiality, for Venus’s ascent as Evening Star? With whom do you journey this cycle?
Ritual Space
Take some time to drop into ritual space as you receive the initiation of this gate. We step into liminal space, time out of time, in ritual space. We connect with the lineage of those who have watched the stars for millennia, receiving the gift of Venus's journey, aligning ourselves with the cycles that are already unfolding. We remember our nature as beings who cycle, change, transform. We remember how to receive knowing directly, rather than needing others to tell us what is so.
You may wish to create an altar, light a candle, and anoint yourself with oils. Sit with this gate, the quality of Essence that is being called forward. As you deepen in surrendering to receiving initiation, ask who would come to guide you in your journey with this quality of Essence? What of yourself do you offer in return? What is calling to be set down at this gate? What pattern, belief, way of being in this world, is challenged by this quality of Essence? What are you ready to release in order to deepen more fully in this journey?
What gift is revealed in the releasing of this pattern, belief, or way of being? What has more freedom to be itself in this release? You may see this directly, or may need to live with this initiation throughout the whole cycle and come back and answer this question before entering into the next gate. You may wish to draw cards to receive guidance in this way.
As you complete your experience in ritual space, take time to offer thanks and adoration to the archetype, to Venus, to your personal guide that arose for this journey, to your ancestors and lineage. Offer thanks to the land that holds and nourishes and grounds you. In the giving and receiving we remember our deep connectedness to all beings everywhere, throughout time and space.
