Justice, Venus, Io, Us
The When-it moment of March 2025 is “When-it Comes to Life” – because while bringing something to life, count on unexpected discoveries of your it: work you need and love now.
I shared how launching the When-it Studio revealed my it, which I carry forth as a collective hope and conviction: to slowly (even softly) understand “workstyle” as a concept outside of its (our) domination, so more of us can do justice to our own workstyle and its knowledge.
However, moving outside of this domination means going through its havoc and contending with its impact. How have our workstyles – and how have we – been subject to rigid western ideas of work/working? For me, the answer is an underworld journey and, characteristically, a chance to pave a new path forward.
So let’s talk about underworld journeys! They can help us face the aspects of work/working that are holding us back + connect us to some pretty cool deities like Venus and Io – who can aid us in doing justice to our workstyle.
Don’t Look Up
This is exactly what’s happening in our skies now, March 22, as I write this…
At the peak of its retrograde, Venus is midway through an underworld journey and a fancy cazimi (meeting) with the sun that promises to shed light on recent hard truths and heavy times. As long as we’re willing to face them – glare, heat, heart, and all.
This retrograde cycle asks us to review what’s been happening in the part of our astrological chart that contains Venus. And if we discern a kind of underworld descent there, we can consider what we’re learning and resource those insights with some context from the classics.
Astrologer Chani Nicholas has been referencing Innana’s journey below, at the behest of sister Ereshkigal, to embrace the power of witnessing shadowed pain and suffering. To further characterize the power of such underworld witness, I’m delving into the story of Io in Ovid’s Metamorphosis.
Io – mortal priestess of Hera, Naiad (freshwater nymph), daughter of river god Inachus and Oceanid nymph Melia – doesn’t just land in her own underworld following grave trauma. Rather, her body becomes her underworld.
She is raped by Jove, who then turns her into a cow because he fears getting caught by incoming wife Juno. Immediately, a triad between this bovine survivor, rapist god, and suspicious goddess results in a gross request. Juno wants this lovely cow for herself.
“Not to give – Suspicious,” writes Ovid, “shame persuades but love dissuades” (A. D. Melville translator, Metamorphosis, page 19). Jove’s fear, rather than Jove himself, is the real ruler here – something we see over and over again in reactive, impulsive leaders.
Io’s embodied underworld becomes triply violent: 1) transformation into a cow’s body, 2) ownership by her rapist’s wife Juno, and then 3) constant surveillance by Juno’s hundred-eyed monster Argus.
However, the power of underworld witness here is triply relevant. Across Io’s transformation, we meet the radical possibilities of: 1) sense, 2) self, and 3) persistence.
Venus-retrograde-cazimi-the-sun much?
The Possibility of Sense
Io doesn’t immediately realize what’s happened to her body. Sense leads her forward as she grazes, drinks from muddy streams, and – desperate for pity, respite, freedom, anything – reaches out to Argus. Then she realizes that she doesn’t have arms. And as she tries to speak, she hears only an abrupt and frightening “moo.”
Handcrafted Possibility of Sense Cuff: copper
With deep regard for Io, this copper cuff – stamped, punched, and formed – is my tribute to the Possibility of Sense in any underworld journey.
May our bodies, however changed and unrecognizable, move towards (not just away from) something. To keep worlding, however messy. To begin shaping resistance a little at a time.
Our outward gestures and sharp sighs are not for nothing. The laboring into a new body, the dirt and salt of the earth underneath, are not for nothing. The point at which you fear yourself is not for nothing.
The Possibility of Self
Sense makes sense, and Io finally reaches the river that, she realizes, is her father’s. Home! While peering into the watery surface, though, she gasps at her muzzle and horns…and flees in horror. Still, she knows who she is, where she is, and – dreadfully – how she is. Io continues following her sisters and father, exchanging gestures of love and affection. Per Ovid:
Her tears rolled down; if only words would come,
She’d speak her name, tell all, implore their aid.
For words, her hoof traced letters in the dust –
I, O – sad tidings of her body’s change.
A. D. Melville translator, Metamorphosis, page 20
Handcrafted Possibility of Self Rings: brass on copper
Inspired by Io, these rings are a tribute the Possibility of Self in any underworld journey.
That some part of our self survives all transformation, especially: 1) our way of seeing the world, and 2) our way of processing grief, tears, even rage.
The left ring symbolizes the perspective in #1: a human eye in a cow’s head with lower lashes that may gently sweep away starry tears. Io sees/grieves as Io, not as another. The right ring symbolizes the courage of transmutation in #2: an abstract new bovine form, horns cradling the rogue tears shaken off by the body – an offering. Seeing and processing are persisting.
The Possibility of Persistence
One thing about underworlds: they are not without crossroads, and crossroads are not without unreachable deities, guides, or turning points. As long as you have trust in the dark, and teeth in the night – as Io does. Even when her sisters and father don’t recognize her, even when Argus herds her back to distant pastures, Io’s distress calls burst forth, break out, bellow up…
And Jove can’t bear them. He bids his son Mercury to kill Argus. But Juno, in her own best-believe-I’m-still-bejeweled rage, puts dead Argus’s eyes in the tail of her peacock’s plumage and sends a gadfly to continuously sting Io, who is fleeing across the world. Upon reaching the Nile, Io’s “wild grief-laden lowings seemed to send / A prayer to Jove to end her sufferings” (Ovid, A. D. Melville translator, Metamorphosis, page 23).
In what’s considered one of the first instances of remorse from a god, Jove pleads with Juno to end Io’s torment because, he emphasizes, she is no longer a concern. Juno acquiesces. And Io regains her shape – “a goddess now, famous, divine, / And linen-robed adorers throng her shrine” (Ovid, A. D. Melville translator, Metamorphosis, page 23).
Handcrafted Possibility of Persistence Amulet: brass, copper, snowflake obsidian, prehistoric shark’s tooth from Venice Beach in Florida
In honor of Io, this amulet is a tribute to the Possibility of Persistence in any underworld journey. The bezel-set snowflake obsidian bears the contrast of black and white so integral to our trust in the dark. And the cold-connected prehistoric shark’s tooth is a symbol for the overwhelming, overarching potential of your/our/Io’s teeth in the night.
May we ever persist with trust in the dark, teeth in the night – never getting in our own way, and always speaking in our right.
And We’re Back!
Yes, this is still a post about the underworld journey of challenging the western ideas of work/working that hold us and our workstyles back. Constant productivity, hustle culture, timekeeping, record keeping, outcome obsession, perfectionism, hierarchical bias, red tape, etc.
Those ideas obstruct that sacred, sovereign wisdom that we access through our own signature workstyle. They tender control and seek to tame all possibilities of sense, self, and persistence.
In a moment still somewhat defined by quiet quitting, quiet firing, quit this-and-that – don’t be quiet. Be like Io, and resist until you can get back to the goddamn gorgeous and wonderful dream of a person that you are.
- Keep moving towards, not just away from, something – even if making sense of it requires a lot of translation (moo!).
- Hold on to the part of yourself that survives transformation – your self is your way back to your workstyle, back to your work (perspective, tears, offerings, and all).
- Have trust in the dark, teeth in the night – persist on your terms, with your righteous cry and where you choose to send it. But choose!
May this underworld journey, like this Venus retrograde, empower us to do justice to our own workstyle and its knowledge. We are in this workstyle journey revolution together.