Think back to fall of 2018, more specifically the month of October.
Do you remember falling in love, falling out of love, or dreaming about a new love? Possibly you were contemplating values that were most important to you in your relationship and generally in your life? Or maybe you were creating something you loved.
To me, eight years seems like ages ago, and at the same time, like it was just yesterday. Sometimes it’s easier to recall what was happening in our own lives when we look back on cultural events or the season of the specific year.
The fourth big-screen version of A Star is Born was released October 5, 2018. A movie about fame and love, but through the lens of relational codependency. And the terrible personal cost attached to getting what we want.
On that same day, while audiences were watching fame tear a relationship apart in theaters, another drama about the cost of getting what we want was unfolding in real time in London.
October 5, 2018, around 9:00p.m. BST, the gavel fell at Sotheby’s auction house on Banksy’s famous painting, Girl with Balloon, selling for $1.4 million.
The moment the sale was finalized, the canvas was pulled down into a hidden shredder built into the frame via a remote trigger. But the shredder jammed. Getting stuck halfway through, the top half of the painting stayed intact while the bottom half, as planned, shredded into ribbons and hung loose from the frame.
But the story of this painting does not end here. What might have been a devastating loss was instead something entirely different. The partially shredded painting became a new piece of art, renamed and authenticated by Banksy (and his business Pest Control Office) as Love is in the Bin. The original buyer decided to keep the piece in its new form, and it sold at auction on October 14, 2021, for £18,582,000 (then equivalent to US$25,327,452 or €21.62M), a new record for Banksy. Sotheby's released a statement that called it "the first artwork in history to have been created live during an auction.”
By now, some of you might be wondering: where is she going with this article?
Banksy’s painting is a wonderful example of how an intentional failed destruction turned into an entirely new creation. Much like a life experience that tears down our carefully planned outcomes, either partially or completely, and asks us to find value in the wreckage. The tension between what we create, what we lose, and what we choose to revalue is connected to the cycles of time, and is deeply associated with the planet Venus.
On October 5, 2018, Venus stationed retrograde in sidereal Libra. And now, almost exactly eight years later, on October 3, 2026, Venus will station retrograde once again in Libra.
The Remarkable Cycle of Venus in Libra: 1986 – 2026
Venus has a unique retrograde pattern that repeats itself every eight years, and the upcoming October 3 retrograde phase is the sixth Venus-in-Libra retrograde. These five previous retrograde phases track back over forty years: 2018, 2010, 2002, 1994, and 1986. All of these retrograde stations began in October and went direct in November, with each retrograde phase lasting about six weeks.
While Venus stations retrograde about every 19 months, the pattern that it forms within a sign every eight years is unique to Venus, and is remarkable.
Venus also completes five synodic cycles with the Sun approximately every eight years, creating the famous five-pointed Venus pentagram when the inferior conjunctions are plotted against the zodiac. Five repetitions of the eight-year pattern bring us to approximately the same place again, creating a larger forty-year cycle.
Although it is not an exact repetition, every eight years, the degree that Venus stations regresses in the same sign by ~2º-3º. Eight years apart, the same planet, the same sign, and almost the same time of year. This pattern in the sign of Libra for the last 40 years is the focus of the article.
About midway through the Venus retrograde cycle, Venus reaches its inferior conjunction with the Sun, passing between Earth and the Sun. In Jyotish, Venus is technically combust at this point. Venus disappears from the western evening sky for a few weeks, only to return as the morning star, rising in the east before sunrise.
Each eight year transit has a similar shape: something disappearing, then coming back changed, repeating, yet without doing so exactly as before.
And this is when the image of the shredded Banksy painting comes back to me. The retrograde phase becomes the disruption that forces a reassessment of value, not an event that changes the thing itself.
Finding Beauty in the Fractures
October 2026 begins the sixth retrograde station of this Venus-in-Libra pattern, and it does something the previous cycles did not. Venus crosses out of Libra and into Virgo before turning direct.
Unlike the previous five cycles, Venus spends about seventeen days in Virgo, roughly half while retrograde, and half in direct motion. This shift connects the 2026 retrograde phase to two houses in the birth chart instead of one.
At first glance, Venus in Virgo may be judged as flawed, especially when values are measured against an unrealistic standard. Something or someone that we value might be placed under a microscope, picked apart, and require a willingness to strip away superficial ambitions in favor of authentic purpose. But sometimes, recognizing the flaws in ourselves and others, or seeking perfection in creative work, is part of the process of transformation. Not to reach perfection, but to transform.
For example, for Sagittarius rising this retrograde phase connects the 11th and 10th houses. This transit will require you to clean up unresolved issues in your workplace or business, reconsider past professional commitments, and refine your public reputation before the full gains and rewards of the 11th house can be sustainably realized.
If you are Libra rising, this is a deeply personal retrograde cycle that moves back into the 12th house, bringing up questions of identity, value, and desire to move into a more private and reflective space. And since Venus is also the chart ruler for Taurus rising, this transit will have important implications for health and daily routines, as well as creativity.
The Eight–Year Venus Retrograde Echo
Bringing this Venus retrograde cycle timing back to our personal experiences, we can reflect back to 1986 in eight year increments since 2018, if you are born early enough to do so.
The house Libra represents in your birth chart can give tremendous insight about the theme for the last forty year cycle. If you are new to Vedic astrology or are unsure of the house that Libra represents in your sidereal Vedic chart you can calculate your sidereal chart for free here. On the report, find the corresponding house numbers for Libra and Virgo.
What was beginning, ending, being reconsidered, or being revalued in your life during these previous Venus retrograde cycles? Think relationships, career, income, family, home and what you truly value. And then question what you wanted and whether you were willing to sacrifice something in order to get it. Sometimes the circumstances might be different depending on the eight year cycle, but the underlying question is surprisingly familiar.
What did you think was valuable in 2018 or 2010 that you might value more or less now? What seemed like a loss at the time that turned out to be a transformation?
And if you are in the Mahadasha or Antardasha of Venus, Mars or Rahu during October and November, this retrograde period and the house it activates may have a greater impact on your experience. Mars and Rahu are included because Venus moves through Chitra and Swati, the nakshatras ruled by Mars and Rahu, during the retrograde itself.
Shukracharya and the Art of Rebirth
In the stories shared in the Guru Wars series, I touched on Shukracharya’s unique ability and the Sanjivani Vidya, the sacred knowledge capable of restoring life.
As Venus moves out of the balanced zone of Libra, and into its debilitation sign of Virgo, we are asked to consider: Does restoration mean returning something to the exact shape it was before? This was the theme from my last article on the Lunar Eclipse and the art of Kintsugi, and this theme is still relevant to Venus retrograde.
Sometimes, what survives a break becomes something entirely different. Much like the deeper magic of the Sanjivani Vidya that is reminiscent of a phoenix-like renewal.
When Banksy’s Girl with Balloon passed through that hidden shredder on October 5, 2018, on the exact day of the Venus retrograde station eight years ago, the original artwork was technically destroyed. Yet, the intentional failed objective of complete destruction did not end its life in the art world. It gave birth to Love is in the Bin, which ultimately became far more culturally significant and valuable than it ever was in its original, untouched state, or might have been worth when fully destroyed, as Banksy had intended.
Perhaps this is one of the lessons of this Venus retrograde. As Venus transitions back into the analytical sign of Virgo, our values are under a microscope, raising the questions: What is this worth now that it has changed, and what happens when Venus retraces decisions you have already made?
Maybe like the half-shredded painting, it is the imperfections that create value.
On the day his artwork transformed into Love Is in the Bin, Banksy shared a line from the nineteenth-century anarchist philosopher Mikhail Bakunin: 'The urge to destroy is also a creative urge.'
Somewhere in your chart, in the house Libra represents, something valued in 2018 (or 2010 and 2002) is about to undergo scrutiny again in the sign of Virgo. As with Banksy’s painting and it may not survive the pass in its original state.
What seemed like a loss at the time might have been the catalyst for what came next, or what looked like devotion may instead be revealed as habit, and asks what are we willing to find, once we look closely enough to see it clearly.
Author’s Note
I hope you enjoyed a slightly different take on the upcoming Venus retrograde. It seemed genuinely fascinating to me that two such prominent and unique artistic endeavors debuted on the same day that Venus stationed retrograde in 2018.
As Venus stations direct and traces its way back through the late degrees of Virgo and to Libra by mid-December, it will be an important time to reflect on the retrograde period and the questions posed in this essay. If you have anything you want to share with me once Venus is direct and has moved beyond the retrograde degrees, I would love to hear you experience.
If you are comfortable sharing, which house does Libra activate in your chart, and can you recall anything that occurred during Venus retrograde in Libra in 2018 or 2010?
In October of 2018, I was returning to ink drawing. I participated in inktober, a challenge where you make an ink drawing everyday for the whole month. That Fall I had started my first semester of college. Film school to be exact. When Venus stationed direct I went back to my hometown to visit old friends. I was having trouble making friends in college.
This time around, I’m getting into playing guitar and singing. I really want to refine my skills in guitar. In 2018, the retro cycle happened in my 6th house. This time around it will go 6-5th.
I agree... fascinating! This is one to read over and over! Thank you! 🙏💜