Picture of the Week: The Venus and Mars in Cars

I have a very limited range of emotional responses to cars. If it works, is relatively clean and gets decent gas mileage, I’m good. If it doesn’t, I get frustrated. I suppose that’s because my Mars is more connected to practical, pragmatic needs than to the aesthetic value or power drive that is visible in other people’s connections to their cars.

Astrologically, when talking about cars and trains and other things that get you places, we’re usually talking about Mars — the explorer, the scout, the pioneer. This is especially so when metal and machinery is involved: Tools help Mars scout and explore, and people with strong Mars energy tend to enjoy using rakes and lawn mowers, chisels and drills, crampons and carabiners to achieve their visions.

Look at the activities we’re talking about here: driving down an open road, taming a garden, climbing a mountain, building a bookcase or a wooden train. All of these activities, in some way or another, take raw material and form it to reflect an internal vision. The road, the soil, the hillside, the pine board are there awaiting the active manual work of driving, tilling, climbing, carving — physical energy must be applied to an external object in order for Mars energy to succeed in its goal. The power lies with the actor, not with the acted-upon. And that’s how Mars likes it!

This is in contrast to Venus energy, which would rather move with the flow of the atmosphere around her. Whereas Mars is jumpy to get out on the open road, Venus might meander through the market first, choosing just the right watermelon and daffodils for when we get there. While Mars wants the garden to behave according to his vision — rigging sprinklers, building stone walls, weeding aggressively — Venus is more satisfied to prune here and there, to let the plants grow in the ways of their instincts. When Mars is up at dawn to strap on his harness and head for the next cliff face, Venus would rather sleep in, then have a late-morning picnic in the shade of the mountain, awaiting Mars’s return. And while Mars wants the pine board to become something else — something more functional, more useful — Venus likes it the way it is: We could just rest it on these bricks and make it a shelf.

It is important to note that no one is purely Mars or purely Venus energy, though we all have a tendency to one way or another in certain areas of life. And neither is a better or worse way of being; both are needed for life and creativity and energy and enjoyment. But it is good to know which energy is driving you in a given moment so as not to disappoint or frustrate yourself or alarm or anger others. It is also important to know which energy is more appropriate to which tasks. If you’re going to climb a mountain, it is better to leave your Venus idling at home. Not that you can’t appreciate the view from the cliff side, Venus-style, but the primary task is more Mars (or, more precisely, Mars-Saturn — safety first!).

The photo of the car above also reminds us that rarely is any single activity strictly Mars or Venus. Cars function in a Martian way, yes, but they’re also used in Venusian style: for the aesthetic, the showy looks, the shiny paint job, the curve of the lines; to seduce objects of attraction past the passenger-side door; to enjoy the hum of the engine and the music on the radio and the tires’ hold on the road. Even the idea of taking a photo of a car is more Venus than Mars: It shows an appreciation of beauty — Mars-inspired beauty, perhaps, but beauty nonetheless.

Photo: exfordy