A Look at Love and Relationships
22 May 2025
The above picture is taken from the movie “The Women”, MGM 1939 and is one of my favorite movies. Starring from left to right: Paulette Goddard, Mary Boland and Norma Shearer - who were major stars in their day under the studio system. And this also my most favorite scene from the movie - Mary Boland (center) is speaking about “L’Amour. L’Amour” - Love. Love. That’s really what it’s all about, non?
I spend lots of time watching old movies. I feel that older movies deal more with life themes than the newer movies which seldom want to delve into - love, hate, sexuality, values, morals, money, poverty, etc.
The theme of this movie is set amid Manhattan’s wealthy “ladies-who-lunch” set and the chaos that ensues when gossip breaks that virtuous loyal wife and mother Mary (Norma Shearer) has lost her husband to a gold-digging shop girl named Crystal Allen (Joan Crawford). Mary, surrounded by her gossipy friends, including Rosalind Russell, Phyllis Povah and Florence Nash, decides to head to Reno for a quickie divorce after listening to their so-called “advice.” There she meets the Countess de Lave (Mary Boland, in what I consider her best performance) and Miriam Aarons played by Paulette Goddard. How many times have we met someone and fallen completely, totally, head-over-heels in love with them? How many times have we become infatuated and smitten with another? How many times have our relationships been threatened from outside sources? How many times, have we questioned what it's all about?
Since a lot of the tarot readings I conduct for clients are for love/relationship issues, in this article, we will be taking a look at how the planets and some asteroids play a pivotal role in love. The main three planets and asteroids responsible for attraction and love, are in my opinion: Mars, Venus and Cupid. These three in themselves have a tale to tell as they are closely related. If you’ve read Jessica Adams’ website, you will know about the complicated history and relationships that these three planetary bodies have with each other.
In a nutshell, Mars in a woman’s chart indicates the type of man she’s attracted to. Venus in a man’s chart indicates the type of female he’s attracted to. But the asteroid Cupid can at best be described as a “wild card” in the area of attraction, love and relationships.
Mars, Venus and Cupid all represent archetypes and myths that can manifest themselves on the material, psychological and even spiritual planes of our lives.
It usually all starts with Cupid. Cupid is famously known as a tiny baby, baby-faced angel that flies around shooting arrows of love at the unwitting and unsuspecting. Also known as Eros, he is the God of Love. Just hearing his name can evoke images and feelings of passion. Cupid is the god of "erotic" sensation and fantasy - that thing in the heart of poets, playwrights and troubadours have spoken and written of for some 900 years. He is the youthful, trickster god that shoots arrows of romantic love into his victim’s hearts, rendering them senselessly and hopelessly lovesick and thus unable to think or act rationally. He is the child of Venus (Aphrodite) and has within his domain, the ability to perform whatever the goddess of love wishes.
But in order to truly understand who Cupid is or what he represents, one has to look at HIS story or myth: Cupid himself was once in love with Psyche - a mortal and the beautiful daughter of a prominent family; so beautiful was she, that men from near and far came to worship before her as if she were the goddess of love herself. This act serves to infuriate the REAL goddess of love, Venus, who flies into a jealous rage and immediately calls for her death. Psyche's family, not wishing to offend the gods, resolves the issue by bringing her as an offering (sacrifice) to the gods. She is taken to the sea and blindfolded, and as it is there she will be met by a deep sea monster who will escort her to her death.
To keep her from being fearful however, her family tells her that she is being taken to met her handsome, young bridegroom. But at the fated time and place, the god of love, Cupid (Eros), flies by. Spotting her exquisite beauty, Cupid himself, is momentarily awestruck and "accidentally" wounds himself with one of his own love arrows. "Rescuing" her, he quickly takes her away for the rock in the ocean, off to his own secret hiding place - a beautiful palace in the clouds. Psyche by this time, has already fallen in deeply in love with her rescuer, but as she passes her time in Cupid\'s palace, she is still prohibited from knowing his identity. He comes to her only at night and only in the dark. This continues on for a while until her jealous sisters pay her a visit and instruct her to light a lamp once he is asleep and thus learn his "true nature”.
Psyche, being young, naive and inexperienced listens to her sisters and complies with their advice. That night, she lights the lamp from the darkened corridor and finally gazes upon her beloved. so awestruck is she by his beauty and sweetness that she accidentally spills the oil from the lamp. It lands upon Cupid's shoulder, immediately awakening him where he takes flight.
Pause for dramatic effect…
Now, let's take a closer look at this story. Notice how accidents and fated encounters play a large part in this story? The two characters fall in love before they really know each other, but more importantly, before they really KNOW THEMSELVES. Separation from each other forces growth, personal change and maturation for both parties. And this story plays out constantly in human life. Love's search for soul and the soul's search for love is the theme often portrayed in both epics and plays of yesterday, but also in the films of today - Psyche means “soul” and thus is one of the mysteries enacted in this story, is the meeting - for the first time - of love (Cupid) and soul (Psyche) and a mere glimpse of this kind of love is so frightening that most mere mortals can't sustain it.
Awkward and nervous actions conspire to give us a momentary glance and then quickly remove it from our sight until such time as it can be handled. Fate would eventually reunite the two lovers, but only after MUCH conscious effort and focus towards that end on the part of the young Psyche, who is required to endure many trials and challenges (thanks to Venus) before Cupid can be hers once more.
Cupid by sign and house in your natal chart, can give you glimpse of the what first attracts you or what attracts a person to you. It can also show you your "love style"...in Air, you might tend to be a bit more judicious, detached, intellectual or even unorthodox in your attraction. In Water, you might tend to be more deep, possessive, suspicious or sensitive in your attraction. Or can appear that way..in both instances. However, there is a warning with Cupid....as he can also be just about appearances or love for appearance's sake. Cupid is the symbol of desire and short-term passion.
Cupid even had a prominent cycle during the 1980s when the AIDS epidemic started to rear it's ugly head along with Pluto in Scorpio (this transit equates with illness/sickness/disease). And at the time, AIDS was associated only with "gay" men or was considered the "gay disease" because of the seemingly "wanton" nature of Gay male sex. Cupid can also represent that "wham-bam-thank-you-ma'am" or that one-night stand that can leave you with regrets and sometimes a bit of something more.
This image by Albrecht Durer illustrates how things can go horribly wrong with Cupid.
But here's another take on Cupid: In the Greek language there are four different words for love…that’s right Four. And they build up level by level to the purest of forms.
The first word is EROS. It equates to the feelings that come from passion, attraction and desire. It’s that red hot feeling that comes over us when we feel attracted to someone. Everything depicted by the God of Desire Eros (or Cupid) is what represent the word Eros in the Greek language. It is the first stage of love and it runs hot just like passion does.
The second word is Storge. This is the word used to describe the love between parent and child or families. It’s the kind of love that comes from being tied by blood and very different than attraction.
The third word is Philia - which is the love felt between friends. It’s a totally non-sexual platonic-type love. This, of course, is a very important facet of love because friendship is a special component in most of our relationships.
The final and most important word that describes love in the Greek language is Agapé. This is the kind of love that most of us crave and the one that keeps relationships strong.
Agapé is what makes us put our own personal desires aside and do for someone else. It pushes us to a selfless love state where the sexual part gets removed from the equation. Saying something like “I love him/her so much that I’d die for them” is what Agapé is.
Agapé is the kind of love that Eros and Psyche had. Its love is in its purest form. It’s saying I love you to the moon and back — forever and ever — no matter what the cost. If anyone out there has ever had to fight or hurt for love – than you’ve experienced Agapé . In our personal astrology we can find out more about our Agapé by looking at how Cupid\'s mother, Venus operates our charts. This planetary mama represents who we want to love, what we like and how we approach getting it. Romance is what she’s all about. Her operation also reveals how our affectionate side works including how we give and receive love. However, we can’t forget about creating some necessary sparks in order to help bring love alive.
Cupid's father, Mars, shows how we act and do things. In relationships, he reveals how we express what we want from other people. He relates to sexual energy as well but not the lustful kind that his son Eros equates to. If we really want to see how our love component works on a complete level, we have to look at both Venus and Mars in our personal astrology to gain clues. This is all because of how our lover boy operates. Cupid is the symbol of desire, lust and more specifically sexual attraction. We can easily become blinded when under his influence because quite bluntly – other things are taking over. The honest truth is that Cupid isn’t about deep long lasting love. He’s the catalyst that wakes the libido up. His force brings out eroticism and sexual energy. Love and libido are two totally different things.
Passion and desire are not love. They can lead into it but the leap there is a pretty big one for some and yes, of course, we need the heat of Eros to help move us to connect and feel alive. But passion and desire won’t give us the long-lasting relationships we really want. Those things can blind us into not being able to truly see real love. It actually prevents true intimate connection—which is the thing that brings pure love alive.
There are the three major components to creating true love. Cupid (Eros) is sexual or physical attraction. It is the first thing we feel when we meet another person we are attracted to. A spiritual affinity without sexual attraction is considered deep friendship which is Agape. Psyche is a Greek word for butterfly and also means “the soul”. The butterfly first exists and appears as a common caterpillar. But that cocoon which precedes its transformation is no different to our concealing barricade wherein we hide ourselves from the love we are capable of. Only when the two souls meet and sexual attraction as well as a deep friendship are present can it be considered True Love.
Yes, true Love has it all! But one also needs to be aware and take stock of what Mar/Venus/Cupid themes can play out. Mars in a woman\'s horoscope typically points to the type of man she is most attracted to. This applies as well to gay and lesbian couples. (Remember, Venus was married to Vulcano/Hephaestus, but cheated on him with Mars. And Cupid was the fruit of their illicit passion. Venus is the mother of Cupid...the jealous mother of Cupid, who did everything within her power to separate the couple (Cupid &Psyche). So if/when your Cupid or Psyche for that matter, are being activated, you may end up with some of the following "love drama":
Two women fight over one man.
Two women compete for 'Most desirable.
Two men fight over one woman.
Two men compete for \'Most manly/masculine.
Two women compete in a game of daughter-in-law versus mother-in-law.
Man versus woman in a battle of the sexes.
I would like to close out this article with a quote by Andy Warhol:
People should fall in love with their eyes closed.
In a very simplistic way, these words encapsulate the true essence of love or Agapé. It reminds us what we need to be blind to. For at the end of the day, the only thing that really matters is what’s inside the soul. None of us can see the other facets clearly anyway. The love that we all want, is the kind that entails someone telling us “I love you—no matter what.”
Sometimes, the gods and goddesses can and often do show up in synchronistic form. This could mean seeing their symbols in the real world.
The symbols of Cupid:
1. The bow and lyre.
2. Winged angels.
3. He is also associated with roses, torches and doves and all the symbols of love and romance.
The search for a soul mate often comes up in tarot consultations as well as astrology consultations - “When will I meet/find my soul mate?” or even “Do I have a soul mate?” In tarot consultations there can be many cards/combination of cards that may point this out.
In astrological readings we can look to the actual astro bodies of Mars, Venus and Cupid - even to Jupiter (Zeus) and Juno (Jera) for the archetypal marriage pair - is the marriage for status, power or even political gain. But soul mates - we can look to Eros (Cupid) and Psyche.
Neither technique is fool proof. We must be cautious and always be mindful that people can change their minds and alter the outcome of situations. This is what as known as the Free Will Principle in the prediction business.
Until next time. Be Good to Yourselves.
Tara, xx
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Lovely story ❤️
Thanks for the mention, Tara.