Under a Perseid Sky

Star trails, looking like meteors rain down behind Lick Observatory atop Mount Hamilton

(photo credit: LKluft, June 2005)

 

Having begun last month, the 2014 Perseid meteor shower will be reaching its peak between August 9th and 13th.

While that is happening, Juno will be entering Cancer (on August 9th at 1:30 a.m. UT/+0 time), a Full Moon will occur at 18 Aquarius (on August 10th at 6:10 in the evening UT/+0 time) and asteroid Pallas enters Libra...all of which will lead to the point when Venus enters Leo on August 12th as Jupiter and Neptune perfect a transiting quincunx.

Venus will be left for a different post, mostly because this approaching New Moon is such a moment of its own. But that Jupiter inconjunct (aka quincunx) Neptune - that deserves a mention, mostly because its miasmic effect is feeling more to a few people like an ill-defined overwhelm in which Jupiter’s too much is being bent back on us in every way we cannot defend against, believing in our right to believe...if nothing else.

Jupiter is Pisces ‘in door’ ruler - and as with all three (Scorpio, Aquarius, Pisces) ‘co-ruled’ signs, the original/ancient ruler is that part of the learning process/lesson in growth which in part determines the outcome of the relationship, situation, effort or whatever else simply because it expresses how well we understand sign basics. In Pisces, Jupiter asks how much we know. But this isn’t intellectual knowing - this is all about our feelings. How well do we know how our feelings work? Are we afraid of our feelings? Are we in denial of our feelings - or even that we have and need feelings and relationships and ways to express our feeling human nature?

To the extent that we truly understand our emotional standing (in particular with our Self), Pisces becomes the road to wisdom, a term astrology defines in Piscean terms as knowledge (Jupiter) tempered by  universal human experience along with the experience of being one with our emotions, able to tolerate and understand our emotions... and in short, the universal nature of emotionalism.

To the extent that we meet our Jupiter/Pisces challenges, resistance drops - first within our Self and then (in response) from others. And so long as we are able to keep ego out of things, this opens the way for growth, accomplishment and all sorts of amazingly quasi-magical sorts of moments.

But let us fall back on ego, whether through self-assertion or through failing to accept our own humanity (read: isolating ourselves through criticism and/or the abandoning of human/humane standards), that’s when the Neptune effect becomes one where the veil fades away and we find our Self disappointed - most of all in that Self.

With Neptune currently in Pisces and Jupiter in Leo, the aspect between struck is that of adjustment. From Neptune to Jupiter is six signs, and six signs always indicates requirements, responsibility and the need to deal with all things in factually morality terms. On the other side of this aspect, from Jupiter to Neptune is the famously eight sign harmonic we know as eternally transformative. In this case, the first version speaks to some sort of ‘dissolution’ which unveils some fact. Has this fact simply gone unnoticed - or was it being deliberately hidden? Was it something someone couldn’t deal with for their own emotional reasons, whether we’re aware of that or not? We could say we don’t care, but if we go in that direction that triggers the theorem commonly known in astrology circles as Neptune’s anti-ego requirement.

It’s a mandate, one we violate at our own risk. But given all the energy in Leo at the moment (Sun, Mercury, Jupiter and Black Moon Lilith)... well, those who are risk averse are probably already sitting on their hands. But those who like a little risk... a little gamble...? Those who live (and die) not by ‘nothing ventured, nothing gained’ but rather by ‘the best defense is a good offense’ are likely to feel prompted. It may not be obvious...not much about Neptune Manifest is ever obvious.

Until it becomes inescapable, that is. The metaphysical teaching here is that Neptune transits (of which this is one type) often create feelings of helplessness, vulnerability or haplessness merely because that is how those who belong to Club Stubborn (you know who you are!) can only be taught the Neptunian (Piscean) path of salve and salvation so known as humility and acceptance.

Since few astrologers give an inconjunct/quincunx aspect more than a 2-degree orb, with sitting at Neptune at 6 Pisces for the whole of August that means this aspect will have begun taking effect as of August 3rd...and that after coming to fullest strength at 4:15 in the morning of August 15th (UT/+0 time) it will taper off to nothing by August 25th.

The problem (challenge) here would seem to be obvious: Neptune asks that we allow ourselves not to know while Jupiter is all about what’s what, what’s right and what (right or wrong) others will accept as allowable or true.

What to do? Who to be?

Yes, those would be but a few of the questions. Plus there is one other special thing...namely that 6 Pisces is the degree Neptune loitered around in earlier this year, specifically between March 22nd and April 23rd - leading into that 8 Taurus solar eclipse of April 29th I’m sure we all so...enjoyed.

(Not really.)

Normally one would think this sort of transit would manifest as fleeting floating disruptions, household insurrections and personal insecurities. But since Jupiter/Neptune are doing this dance of mutual discomfiture during the Perseids, there would seem to be a ‘peppering’ of voices, ideas, issues and other such phenomena coming more from the ‘don’t you know...’ Jupiter side of the coin than the comforting Neptunian shoulder-cum-slippery-slope.

And why would that be? That would be because Swift-Tuttle, the comet which produces the Perseids, does its orbiting through our solar system in a form of astronomical lockstep with Jupiter known as ‘magnetic resonance,’ this particular magnetic resonance coming to a ratio of 1:11 (one to eleven). That means that for ever one (1) time Swift-Tuttle completes its orbit, Jupiter orbits the Sun eleven (11) times.

Think of it as cosmic gearing - a gearing which at present refers to a rising tide of intermeshing factors which we cannot fully define, but can very definitely feel.

Clockworks on display at the Liverpool World Museum

(photo credit SomeDriftwood, 2011) 

As if that wasn’t enough to think about (or cope with), while we’re adjusting to all our ‘longer term’ Jupiter-Neptune situations, along comes a Juno in Cancer dynamic.

Juno represents the idea of management and managing, whether internal (managing our thoughts, feelings, appetite, longings, etc.) or externalized in whatever form. In entering water sign Cancer, Juno summons up matters concerning home, hearth, house, culture, family, land and nation. All those things which are native to us or native to this planet are Cancerian - as is all which affects or supports us, or any other form of earthly life... existence... eventuality...

Juno will be entering Cancer on August 9th at 1:30 in the morning (UT/+0) and remain in Cancer until October 7. And while Juno transits this most basic of water signs we will all be encountering things which prompt us to manage situations and our feelings about things even while stretching our native abilities a bit more.

At least a bit more.

Things won’t be dull, in other words. Transits - even one which sounds as status quo oriented as this one are still energy which somehow becomes manifest. Maybe we will only reflect on or reassert our efforts to maintain current standards, but in some way Juno will always make itself known, even if we manage to make our Juno known only to our Self. (Which yes, is sometimes the whole Juno effort.)

Juno and Jupiter by Gavin Hamilton (1723-1798)

In a more active mode, Juno energies often surface through the determination and effort to protect, guard, maintain or utilize things - and when under stress (look for aspects in your natal chart) Juno is seen as a factor which contributes with great strength and loyalty to the defense of something considered ‘intrinsic’ whether that concerns a position (tangible, verbal, financial or emotional) or some standard which is under threat or challenge.

All of this takes us into Sunday, August 10th - the date of an Aquarian Full Moon which in being positioned at 18 Aquarius recalls the Mercury retrograde of last February (2014) with all its Olympian world participation and the division into increasing world hostility which followed. Such different or diverse thrusts are quite typical of anything (and everything) Aquarius though it doesn’t represent Aquarius success. Taken in isolation the idea of the Olympics is quite Aquarian: the world coming together to enjoy the universality of sport as a way to test our physical human and compete against other humans while enjoying each other’s company without hostility. When Aquarius works well it utilizes energy in a systemically functional cause. And when Aquarius doesn’t work well, anarchy, disruptions, protests and explosive situations (physical, verbal, emotional) often result. Where Pisces is a test of what we can emotionally accept within our Self, Aquarius tests our ability to exist as part of a system we may never know the full extent of, which we may even dislike some of the parts of but which supports our vital functionality, nevertheless.

This one precept is likely to be a problem now and moving forward as the most common reaction to Aquarian differences is rejection and isolation, not provisional acceptance. But that’s part of the Aquarian lesson - a lesson which tests our ability to be tolerant of that we don’t choose to be but which works (in its own right and space) as part of a whole.

Back in February, Mercury went direct at 18 Aquarius...

- link to -

Mercury Direct at 18 Aquarius

...and now that same degree is being ‘highlighted’ by the Moon, ‘shining a light’ on the question of how far we have come since last February.

Among other things, that is.

The Full Moon at 18 Aquarius (text chart)

August 10, 2014 - 6:10 p.m. (UT/+0) - Aries Wheel (Location Not Specific)

The Full Moon at 18 Aquarius (glyph chart)

August 10, 2014 - 6:10 p.m. (UT/+0) - Aries Wheel (Location Not Specific) 

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That we may be having some issues with what we’ve learned (or not learned as yet) is basically imaged here through the picture of a t-square and t-squares are always about some need to rise above a personal focus or investment in some issue. With t-squares, only the overarching (non-ego-driven) position ever wins.

Imaged by the Sabian symbol 'A FOREST FIRE IS BEING SUBDUED BY THE USE OF WATER, CHEMICALS AND SHEER MUSCULAR ENERGY' (typified by astrologer Marc Edmund Jones as ‘the skill and courage necessary to bring under control the destructive potential of carelessness of karmic ‘visitations’…’), 18 Aquarius is spoken of in astrology as a degree which displays (or exposes) whatever issues are blocking connectivity of the very most human and often vital kind. Here the ‘standing’ of any person comes into the spotlight highlighting where problems exist in our individual life - or in the life of a community, group or nation. With 18 Aquarius is concerned, isolation is often considered (and tried) as a stopgap measure, but seldom does it provide any lasting answer as in the long run, the sign of Aquarius will not support boundaries based on preference or presumed (individually defined) differences. Whenever we see 18 Aquarius, activities which provide opportunities for integration and functionality are called for, though they may be in part difficult to implement. Patience is required, and the perverting of ideas is to be avoided, inclusive of a perverse tendency we are seeing a lot of here at the dawn of the Aquarian Age with regards to ‘shaping truth’ through selective phrasing and various efforts to use public/social communication methods (or the media) for openly or subliminally deceptive purposes.

The Sun in this figure being conjunct Mercury-Germania on one side speaks to strength of focus and like as not many a strident opinion (whether voiced or merely held). That both objects are at 20 Leo speaks to a need to know our own thoughts... along with how important it is to think through the positions (and possible objections) of others. With Black Moon Lilith (denial of, or by others) and Lachesis (duration) just 'behind' the Sun (in terms of the degrees they are placed in) there is some enduring position coming into the moment of the Full Moon or which is brought up (or out) at this time - and for those who attempt to deal with things through simple ignorance (or deferring to some lack of information) if this is a ploy (or flat-out lie) the effect is likely to be lasting.

And costly.

But of course many will just go ahead and do what they're going to do, thinking they're going to get away with it.

(Good luck with that - and the karma you're stirring up!)

The 'object' here would seem to be expressed by the Moon conjunct Damocles in Aquarius - getting out of (escaping) trouble or something troublesome.

And something's in the way. What is that 'something' which is sitting at the "hurdle" of this Full Moon t-square challenging us to get past it, most of all in our minds?

That would be Saturn, yet another form of inevitability we meet up with in the chart. Saturn's version of 'karma' is generally called "earning," a precept which allows us to fail any number of times providing we haven't done what will get us where we want to go.

If you’ve been wondering why things seem to be ‘stuck,’ this may be part of your astrological reason. Saturn is currently in Scorpio, sign of all things karmic. Probably more importantly (in astrological terms), Saturn is also spending its very last day at the degree (16 Scorpio) it went direct at back on July 20th as the Moon does it's Aquarian square dance in phasing itself into fullness.

Simply as defined in lore, 16 Scorpio is a degree known more or less for its positives... humanitarianism, everyday kindness and traditionally accepted manners and ways of relating to one another ranging from a simple ‘thank you’ to the most exotic of protocols and formalities. Yet like all other degrees, 16 Scorpio also has a ‘not so nice and not so mainstream’ side as well in being known equally for overgrowth as undergrowth and for over- productivity as well as problems and challenges where maturation (of various kinds) is concerned. In this tendency to arrest or polarize, fixed degree 16 Scorpio is theoretically testing our ability to respond with flexibility - in particular, emotional flexibly. But it also assures that when we are tested, when we’re being called upon to use those  resources of experience in the course of dealing with some ‘forest fire’ or other ‘incendiary’ situation, in order to achieve the maximal positive we need to accept everything which goes with being called upon for on-the-spot, present-tense (often tensely tendered) solutions.

That all this happens with the Sun, Mercury and Jupiter in Leo promises much drama and many an opportunity to be massively...even outrageously creative in overcoming emotional challenges (and challenges to emotionally bolstered and/or emotionally provocative opinions, situations, relationships, convictions, etc.).

It’s a personal moment. All Full Moons heighten sensitivity and reactivity (which can be wonderful or terrible, depending)...and with asteroid Pallas at 29 Virgo as the Moon comes to Full in anticipation of leaving Virgo for Libra early on Monday, August 11 at 3:29 a.m. (UT/+0 time) there is something intensely personal... if very impersonal about this Full Moon.

And for many, that will prove the very thing which is needed. As Pallas moves into Libra it leaves the personal/private zodiacal zone and enters into the realm of all things public, visible and interactive - which doesn’t just mean that others see us, but also that we see (or recognize) things in others we’ve never seen.

Or at least which haven’t been on display in the past couple of years. With its 4.6 year orbital cycle around the Sun, Pallas spends around two years in each of the zodiac’s hemispheres...

 The natural zodiac wheel (by quadrant)

...which means it spends roughly just over a year in each of the zodiac’s thematic quadrants.

For the past year or so Pallas has been moving through the zodiac’s 2nd quadrant - the quadrant which is all about development of abilities and our ability to put some sort of current plan into effective motion. As an emblem of all things mentally processed in a dispassionate manner, transits of Pallas (which is to say, whatever sign we see Pallas placed in) speaks both to where we need perspective and where we will learn about perspective... or at least how important understanding the whole of a process or situation really is.

But will we? And if we don’t, where does that leave us?

While there is no question but that anything we go through throughout these several days will embody its own importance, to those who believe that age-old metaphysical maxim ‘unbeknownst to us, the universe is unfolding as it should’ whatever happens is not only its own experience but preparation for what’s to come.

So since next up (astrologically) is Venus in Leo, that suggests that after experiencing all which comes our way we are either going to arrive at that moment feeling more determined than ever to be who we are (or want to be)...or simply full of some need to (come what may) be validated for something, lest we have no sense of validity in our own eyes and mind.

And yes, we may end up feeling both.
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Mercury Direct at 18 Aquarius

In accordance with the Sabian image for Mercury's station degree, a photo of a forest fire in Russia's Yugansky Nature Reserve taken by Tatiana Bulyonkova (July 2012)

One of Aquarius’ interesting qualities is its dual rulership by first Saturn, a symbol of solidity…then Uranus, the energy of being freed, which is about as theoretical a notion as any – and therefore capable of being molded in any of a thousand ways.

Of the three signs of the zodiac with such dual rulers, two (Scorpio and Pisces) are water signs – water being the symbol of all things emotional and emotionally insightful, provocative…or otherwise educational if trying when it comes to the subject of trying to live the lives we really want.

Only Aquarius differs – and it does so by being an air sign. Aquarius is also fixed, which is to say its operations tend to be particularly ‘calculated,’ whether that means a goal is predetermined, why that goal ‘works’ (or is fitting) and/or how the ‘style’ of one’s methodology tends to be determined as well as in some measure determined by moment-to-moment facts at hand.

But Scorpio is fixed too...although Scorpio is about the sticky parts of emotions - the parts of emotions and emotional experiences which 'stick' with us (and which sometimes even stick it 'to' us...) - as opposed to the Aquarian wrangling of the idea - be it complex, incomplete, universal, rewarding, acceptable or unacceptable. The difference is very much with us at the moment seeing as the end of last year was all about that sort of uniquely Scorpio feeling of getting emotionally wrung out even as - and strangely enough - in virtual diametric opposition to all the difficulties, doors seemed to open.

At least in our minds, hearts or spirits.   

But now we're in the Aquarian realm. A very ‘big picture’ sign by nature, the biggest Aquarian challenge seems to be getting from the idea of what needs doing to the 'done' point with all in order and on time without emotional frizzles.

Aquarius teaches us that we can't have it all...but we can have what we really value providing it's an honest expression of who we really are. When Aquarian influences run thick in life's Mercurial mix (such as over the next few days) we will tend to think down the road, around the corner and into that next dimension no one’s thought about thinking up yet – although this 2014 Aquarian passage of Mercury has been anything but glassy slick or smooth. Comfortable and profitable have not seemed to exist in the same breath – at least not all the way around.

We've all had to surrender something. It was something of a lesson in humility - which Aquarius is also about in the sense that it's a universal/universalist dynamic both about the individual human and the whole of humanity, which perhaps you'll pardon me for saying...I found a particularly intriguing thought while the Olympics were going on in Sochi while not so far away fires were burning in the Ukraine.

I mean no criticism here...it's just...these two events were happening at the very same moment. That's the level at which astrology functions on a global level.

I just wanted to point that out. The combination of Mercury's retrograde starting in feeling Pisces seems to have pulled emotional energy into our Aquarian thoughts. It challenged and exhorted us, reflecting the onset of Ixion conjuncting fixed star Ras Alhague at 22 Sagittarius - the call to attend to our injuries lest we be injured by sheer self-motivated insistence. 

It’s definitely been one of those times when no matter how ‘fine’ things are, something – and something unexpected at that – is turning desires, hopes, plans and other such personal cravings for whipped cream and sprinkles into a not-so-merry-go-‘round of conflict.

And all this has been highly encompassing if also something of a ‘backdrop’ against which we know life is playing out…a life which is our motivation, challenge and glorious disappointment often all in one whether you’re dealing with the fires of war or fires on the personal home front as you work out personal problems.

To the extent we have based our hopes on others – or what others ‘do’ (or don’t do) and not on what WE do to interface, connects to or contributes to the overall environment…or which affects capacity to function or functional capacity…to the extent that we have spectated on our own life we are being tumbled. Sometimes thought of as substances metallic or crystalline, there’s always a strong positive in any Aquarian issue or drive which serves to clarify our thinking.

Yet even as it does that, even as the Aquarian ability to parse, fissure, factionalize and factor finds ever greater comprehension, so it also raises new questions.

That’s just the Aquarian way. Understand that one idea and you’ll understand why Aquarius is the sign of modernization, upgrades and all the ruptures – social, mechanical, economic and individual – which in breaking something down…or in breaking us down to ourselves or someone we love, or in some plainer fashion leads to greater potential, power and plain old everyday likeability.

Acceptance, call it.

Or maybe success.

All this – all the challenges and enhancements to our ability to understand and utilize any such notion or focus which began back in January issues returned  by mid-February. And from there…as Mercury backed down (retrograded) through Aquarius, so life backed us down in one or another way, starting in the public (third decan/degrees number 20-29) arena.

By February 20th (the 19th in some time zones) Mercury backed into Aquarius’ most fervent, most driven second decanate (degrees 10-19). And since Mercury was in retrograde (where energy is internalized) we pushed internally towards goals – which yes, in the case of a couple of nations meant civil unrest (the push on a nation’s ‘internal’ affairs).

Mercury goes direct on February 28 at 2:01 in the afternoon, UT/+0, which means there will be an uptick in activity between February 26 and March 2nd.

March 2nd is the date for Saturn going retrograde, by the way. It’s doing so in a degree known for dissipating Scorpionic energies – which we can hope will mean a ‘dissipating’ of ongoing violence.

The truth is however, such a dissipation – especially in the wake of Mars’ March 1st Libra station – could just as easily represent the ‘dissipating’ of pent up (or controlled) energy in some sort of “explosive action.”

The degree Mercury is stationing at being 18 Aquarius, there are likely to be highly quirky challenges which arise from ‘turnabouts’…(large and/or small; singular and/or as part of a greater action, movement or process)…wherever our plans, actions, hesitations, methods or responses to others and the society in general are derived from false information, presumptions, diversions or incomplete (and/or) overly simplistic reliance on ‘socially accepted’ answers as opposed to reality, or the facts of the matter.

The Sabian Symbol for 18 Aquarius (which is numbered phase 319 for those looking it up) gives us the following image: A FOREST FIRE IS BEING SUBDUED BY THE USE OF WATER, CHEMICALS AND SHEER MUSCULAR ENERGY – an image astrologer Marc Edmund Jones typified as the skill and courage necessary to bring under control the destructive potential of carelessness of karmic ‘visitations’…which is a curious sort of comment when applied to airy, theoretical Aquarius (metaphysically karma is generally thought of as watery or emotional) ….very curious except for how the days may affect how we operate.  

Or maybe they’ll just end up turning us in a whole new direction.

The reference to karma also tends to remind us of Scorpio, karma’s ‘home sign,’ if you will. And that’s a bit of a reminder that Saturn…which is, after all, the primary ruler of Aquarius…how Saturn is about to go on station in Scorpio.

Things aren’t a joke right now. They don’t even feel like a joke right now. Between the seriousness and our (Sun in Pisces) sensitivity to our inability to escape our feelings of limitation, anyone can get to feeling terribly raw now. So kindness counts – to yourself equally with others. A cross-collateralization of some type may be possible if you’re willing to wade through choppy waters…and for those who realize those waters are their own feelings, things will become manageable.

That’s a persistent theme which has…and which will continue to carry for a couple of months yet: the projection of power on others. We have the ability to walk some longer road ourselves. We just want…and hope…and dream of somebody helping us.

According to that which lore says about this 'Mercurial presence,' help is now to be found in our friends, in our societies, in our wits. Those of us who think in terms of connectivity between self and others or in the sense that any system of any type has to be connected to work…those people will see a path forward. No – it isn’t simple.

Nothing which is both Aquarian and high quality is ever simple. It may LOOK easy…but it’s never simple.

And there is the fact that by the time Mercury goes direct a couple of days from now, other things will have happened. The time between now and the 28th will present us with all sorts of moments which ask us where we’re going and what it will take to get there – which rather automatically ask if it’s worth all that effort…which may be another way of seeing the symbol for this degree, as all astrological symbols are first and foremost about our relationship within our Self.

From that, all else flows…which is why people say ‘life is what you make it’ – which in the case of an Aquarian Mercury station starts with what we conceive of as our current status quo, and what needs bettering from here.
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Mercury (and Byblis) Retrograde

Highway I-80  (the Eastshore Freeway) near Berkeley, California

(photo credit: Minesweeper, May 2005)

All those many things that the December-January Venus retrograde revealed things to us about how satisfied or dissatisfied we are with who we are and how well we are embodying the truth of who we are and can be to and with others…

All that is starting to dawn, to congeal, to become manifest realistically and in real world terms about who we think we actually are as the dark pall of Venus retrograde begins to retreat.

And now, something about ‘the idea of the feeling’ (or having had that feeling or being required to confront some feeling) at some level about some facet of our lives takes center stage.

Mercury will go retrograde on February 6th at 9:44 in the evening UT/+0 time just about as main belt asteroid Byblis (that terrible idea) also goes retrograde – this time in Libra. Call it a recipe for really terrible confrontations with our Self with regards who who we are to-and-with others.

No, we don’t (Byblis) want to have to even think about something, never mind contend with it.

But we have to anyway – and we will. Willingly or unwillingly, we will.

For those who haven’t already got a self-confrontational idea in mind, life is likely to provide you with one (actually, it probably already has…you’ve just been ignoring them or your issues with them)…and any such person will appear as ‘the problem’ in your life.

They aren’t. We are. The you, me, the guy down the street and that sovereign ruler across the ocean, we are all going to be going through something…well…here I will revert to a memo I got handed Way Back When in the Lore Days of Hollywood. Despite humble beginnings, Star Wars (the first one) had become a huge, huge, HUGE hit. So suddenly every Hollywood honcho (particularly those who had seen the project and turned it down) wanted to be worth their paycheck.

Out came this memo. I’m not sure how widely it was circulated, but there it was in studio black-and-white typeface: we want something just like ‘Star Wars’ but different.

That ‘just like but different’ idea is what I want to point out here. From December into January the planet was Venus and the sign was Capricorn. Where Venus is about feeling supported or rewarded and that had us wrestling with that working the way we wanted it to (even needed it to) versus how it did or didn’t work, Mercury is more mental. Mercury is about the idea, the text of the thing, the steps which lead us from one thing to another, through our day or through our mental processes.

So that this month’s Mercury retrograde…a retrograde which starts in Pisces (a water/emotionally evocative sign) and which then backs into Aquarius (an airy/theoretical sign) until it finally goes direct (on February 28th) at a point which incites ‘fervent determination – this would seem a time bent on making us understand that things can happen.

And that if we don’t make them happen and work to make them into the thing we want to happen, that’s not on any ‘them’ out there – that much is on us.

This is the onset of the Aquarian Age. Mercury is backing into Aquarius and heading for a station rife with mental conflict (and questions about how we feel about mental conflict) suggests we can make things happen, expect things to happen…and how the more we greet situations and people as provocations meant to get us to think.

So will we listen, consider or questions our Self or our own motivation, alienation, possible misconception, level of expertise or willingness to try?

Maybe. Then again, this is Mercury retrograde, so don’t count on it. Under this influence we often we ignore, resist, reject or otherwise avoid thinking through, about or into the ‘other side ‘of everything until it proves itself (generally at the end of the retrograde or in that week after) to be valid.

Still, our thinking does get affected – as should it. This is a time to think things through – inclusive of why we think we should be thinking what we’re thinking about anything. Others may ‘tap into’ in our heads now. And that will get a reaction – from us, at least.

Were they ‘doing’ anything? Probably not. The shift is happening in(side) us. That's how retrogrades work - they work inside us by calling our attention to some facet or factor in our life.

And that 'they' may or may not care as part of our current equation? Or that some part of the world doesn’t seem to be listening? That isn't the issue - what we think about it and what that means about us now or before or in terms of what we believe in but do or don't embody well (or not well)...

Who knows…that maybe be part of our problem. But whatever the problem is, the problem is ours. That’s the process in all retrogrades – to get us to understand that some of the issues or the reasons things aren’t working the way we might want them to is all about us. It might be about what we think something is when it isn’t that at all – for good or ill. The dream may not be dreamy at all and the monster under our mental bed may only be a personal phantasm.

Or maybe they are real.

The point is, our ability to confront our own demons is the heart and soul of Pisces – and however it happens, as Mercury goes retrograde on February 6th at 3 Pisces, we’re all going to be experiencing a little taste of mental traffic.

‘Heavy car traffic on a narrow isthmus linking two seashore resorts.’ That’s the Sabian Symbol, one which Marc Edmund Jones typifies as ‘the mobility and intensity of interchanges which make possible and characterize complex social processes.’

The thing which is easy to miss here is that the whole is us – our Self. And thus all that ‘traffic’ refers to the many things in our (Mercurial) mind. That Mercury’s retrograde begins in early Pisces starts us into a three-week period of internal reflection and growth of self understanding on a feeling note. As an early (first decan) degree, 3 Pisces is all about what we are doing about our feelings or even our willingness to own that our feelings are ours and not anything someone else is ‘forcing’ us to have…at the moment, things are personal.

We’re just not entirely in the personal mood. We think we are – there is going to be a lot of ‘leave me alone’ going around now…but part of all that is our blanket mortal tendency to prefer projection.

You know, particularly when the emotional water gets warm. Or very, very cold. And because Mercury will quickly back into Aquarius (as of February 13, UT/+0), we can expect – at the best – to be working on clarification, realization, effective efficiencies…and a variety of understandings with our Self that if we are going to be who we are we don’t just get to be part of us.

We have to be the whole Self and nothing but the Self…(you hate that I took U.S. history, I know)…but that’s so help our Self.

That’s the thing to understand here: we either help ourselves now or we put ourselves in a place which is guaranteed to get slippery. Remember Sedna? Didn’t Sedna just go direct – in Taurus – with Venus, ruler of Taurus, having given us the pressure-cooking and Plutonic-transformative time of our lives?

Yes, we need to reconsider something. That 'old' or preconceived notion...that unrealistic dream...that unwillingness to face who we're proving to others we really are (or aren't)...that's in play.

You did hear the stakes change, didn’t you?

If you didn’t, plan on a bad time going forward. If you did, proceed on that basis, but no leaps off tall buildings. The lunar nodes will be changing signs very soon. Remembering that the nodes (as a function of what nodes are) cycle backwards through the zodiac, this means that the last two years of Scorpio-Taurus is finally coming to a close.

It also means that we’re working…or if you prefer, functioning (either may apply) at a very basic and  baseline level. This can become something to build on…or it can be experienced as a limitation. 

Moving forward into two-and-a-half-years of societal connections based more purely on the ‘I/thou’ principle of Libra-Aries (and thus what we are to others and what they see us as) being free of connections which clog the works is as important as whether we’ve built the right alliances.

And since this Mercury retrograde overlaps that shift of nodal (social – societal – relating/relationship) energetics, it would be implied that we’re up against a series of decisions.

No, not about them – about our Self. It’s another of those ‘who are you’ moments…which in this case is going to lead us (along a garden path or otherwise) to Mercury’s station at 18 Aquarius on February 28th which will be immediately followed by Mars…then Saturn going direct.

Let me say that again:

Mercury goes direct February 28th.

Mars goes retrograde March 1st.

Saturn goes retrograde March 2nd.

That is a major large sized astrological helping of emphasis. Mercury will be in Aquarius, land of economics, income, all things digital, societal, marketplace elitist and everyman… Saturn will be in Scorpio, testing our ability to deal with how we are tied to others whether we want to be or not because we absolutely have to exist on the same plane as everybody else (whether we like it or it scares the willies out of us)…and Mars is going to be in the latter part of Libra, confronting us with the essence of the Whole until we get it – we’re not alone but we do have the choice whether to be who we are or not.

How long it takes us to understand that is individual. How long it takes us to accept what that (Mercury in Pisces) really means in terms of what we’re going to have to deal with meeting up with in life…that’s up to us. Life isn’t about our cuddly comfort – it’s about being who we are. We can’t have the sense of existing without doing the existing and the interface between the idea of what we want to do and the doing it is all about our willingness to give both of what we can do – and what we feel.

You know, as a knowingly mortal human being.
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