Retrograde Mercury returns to Aquarius late tomorrow or early Thursday depending on your time zone. If your personal life begins to feel less personal at about the same time, remember — it’s all good. This will not be about loss. This will be about gain.
In a rare confluence and overlap of their respective motions, the so-called personal planets (Mercury, Venus and Mars) are symbolically transcending their usual limits together, with implications that you may now do the same.
Mercury, Venus and Mars are considered ‘personal’ because of how they circle the Sun, and cycle through the zodiac many times in a human lifetime.
Hence, the more familiar patterns of your life often resonate with cycles of the Sun and Moon, stitched together by the tracing and retracing of Mercury’s thrice-yearly regressions. These patterns are then bookended with Venus oscillating from dawn’s declaration (as the so-called morning star) to dusk’s diamond (as the misnamed but visually magnificent evening star).
The biennial span of the Martian cycle often sees longer personal endeavors to completion, and from there it is a long way to Jupiter’s cycle of about 12 years.
The cycles of the outer planets, from Jupiter on out, are conventionally more about the collective or generational manifestations of ‘we’ than ‘me’ or ‘thee’. Nevertheless, for Mercury, Venus and Mars all to be in the slowest part of their respective cycles at the same time is a message. The message is how your influence over the next several weeks may be stronger, and last longer than at any previous time in your life.
Witness Mercury, which typically touches two (sometimes even three) signs in a single month, now about to make Aquarius home for most of what remains for this season.
Notice Venus, which has combed through Capricorn for more than three months when three weeks would be more usual, and not still not done for three weeks more.
Finally, behold Mars, which would have completed a routine two-month tour of Libra by now if not for an impending retrograde of its own, which will postpone any other field of expression until July has grown old.
In other words, all of the personal planets at once are behaving more like outer planets for the rest of this month and through the first week of March. If you feel as though your personal life has gone away for the time being, you are feeling it right. The key is to also feel all right about it.
If you feel as though daily duties have been overshadowed by an opportunity to do more, and by a responsibility to that which is more commonly conferred upon a generation, a tribe or a nation, you understand. The challenge is how to make the most of what most of your life has not prepared you to face.
Life in general does not train or prepare us for such seldom-seen periods when we are stronger, and our actions last longer than seems possible. It begins by being aware, which astrology is doing for you now. Then, it’s a matter of stepping up and doing what you can, while you can, so that it really is all good so far as you can make it.
You will not be required to achieve great things, but it would be a good thing to hold your head up proudly as if you had.
You will almost certainly not be vested with power over many. Yet, you will want to be conscious of your power to make or break the day of the precious few you have contact with. For those few will carry their experience of you to many more.
This period of your greater influence will not last forever, but what you do with it could last longer than any other mark you have ever made. So, look to maximize your impact as Mercury, Venus and Mars are doing — by combining your actions in coordination with others with whom you concur.
Soon enough, the personal planets will return to their usual pace, and their rhythms will once again spread out so as to assume a more human scale in their respective correlations to your life. That will all be good as well, allowing you to resume a more modest influence, with more room to err and learn.
Until then, gather to yourself all you have learned of your human failings to this point and work to transcend them until the comfort and familiar signs of a personal life signal their return. It’s all good, and you would not be here if you were not capable of making it so. Think of it as your own Olympics, and go for the gold.
Offered In Service
Len is available for astrology readings. You can contact him at lenwallick [at] gmail [dot] com.
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Thank you so much for the messages, Lizzy and Len. I was in a self-deprecating mood, now that I am more aware of the overbearing and erratic side of my personality, despite my desire to be responsible…Ok, I’ll give myself some credit.
I have a lot to study for an online course, the practice exam was a lot harder than the prior exercises, but at least I see what I need to work on for the actual exam.
I’m feeling better now. I’ll be able to sleep soundly tonight. I just hope I can find a way to work at the video store tomorrow, despite the snow.
I am very happy with my achievements at my internship though, I’ll be able to master a qualification by the end of the month.
muddpi: And a good year to you!
salamander: As Lizzy mentioned, give yourself credit. You are doing good things and doing them well. Given your intent, the fine points will smooth off soon enough.
Jude: Thank you for being so very generous. You are the among the best of valentines.
Lizzy: Thank you for your kind and gentle support of this blog, and of salamander.
Yes, I agree – this is wonderful “Yet, you will want to be conscious of your power to make or break the day of the precious few you have contact with”. Thank you Len. And loved your comment, Jude.
Salamander – I hear ya. A lot of self-dislike and self-judgement is coming up for me these days – and it isn’t pleasant. But you’re doing such amazing things with yourself and your life, don’t forget to give yourself credit for that and to factor in lots of love and compassion for yourself too!
This is so powerful, Len — “… you will want to be conscious of your power to make or break the day of the precious few you have contact with. For those few will carry their experience of you to many more.” Keyword: precious.
If only we understood how influential we are in the lives of those we touch, sometimes with only a smile or a nod. Keeping constantly conscious of this truism can change not just our own life but, as you suggest, ripple out to influence the whole of it. The pay-off is that this “small step” takes us out of ourselves and allows us to experience ourselves as a source of contribution. Nothing small about that. That’s a game changer! Thanks, kiddo — profound and compassionate … again.
Essentially, I have strong desires about my professional goals, I want a job where I can help in the big picture while fulfilling my needs, and I want to learn from the best. However, in order to get there, and stay there, I realize that one important factor in reaching those goals is to be more professional in my behavior. I sometimes get overwhelmed by things happening in various parts of my life, and I end up talking too much. That is the one thing that tends to have people lower their impression of me, I think. So I need to find a way to resolve that.
I’ll focus on the collective instead of my personal issues, in order to solve my personal issues, considering the current astrology. Thank you so much for mentioning this, Len.
I really appreciate your interpretation of transits, Len. The way you described Sun square Saturn helped me handle the transit more easily than usual on Tuesday (I do have Sun square Saturn natally, and it’s difficult with Sun square Uranus natally too), I achieved a lot in my internship on Tuesday. Mercury reentering Aquarius explains why I have been told to be more emotionally detached and less personal if I want to achieve my academic and professional goals, which I admit I struggle to do (considering that I have Venus square Pluto, and a Moon-Ascendant-Jupiter t-square). With the run-up to the full moon, I am repelled by the repulsive side of my personality as well, and I feel like I must face up to this if I want to achieve the basics in life.
thank you Len, and bkoehler ….. this layering of experience, with the inner planet retrogrades, aligns with my life experience of late …. been a helluva year so far …. looking forward to the unravelling on the other side, but first — Mars …..
be: Thank you and welcome back – we missed you. It does my heart good to know my service made you feel better. Thank you also for sharing the adventure about how you restocked the bird and squirrel feed – i’m sure they appreciate you every bit as much as we do here on Planet Waves. Yes, the overlapping succession of personal planet retrogrades do have the appearance of preparing us for The Mars Effect that (rightly) moved Eric to make it the focus of his annual edition. You have (and continue to) inspire us all to step up our life’s purpose through your erudite and compassionate example.
strawberrry: Thank you for endorsing my humble suggestion (it is not for me to issue directives). It gives me joy to know that my observations resonate with your experience.
“Until then, gather to yourself all you have learned of your human failings to this point and work to transcend them”
Holy moly, Len, what a directive! That’s beautiful, and personally very, very relevant. It both helps explain the power each moment seems to have right now, and gives me something to do with it. Thank you! Eyes open and tuned to the truth that my mirrors are showing me.
Thank you Len, this makes me feel better, feel being the operative word. Having to buck the Aquarius Sun square Scorpio Saturn today has left me pretty apathetic about anything requiring (e)motion of any kind. However, the current weather’s curtailed the frequency of getting out for supplies, and since the birds and squirrels had already polished off the supply of (their) peanuts and were digging deep into my personal stash of cashews, getting out was non-negotiable.
The game was that I would “allow” Aquarian Sun to deviate (!) from the established path to the bird seed & peanut store, but because this “different” path was also more efficient gas and mileage wise, Scorpion Saturn kept the secret and made like he was giving in. Everybody enjoyed the ride, the sun was shining (although only about 15 degrees temp), traffic wasn’t horrible and I got a good parking spot. All in all a team effort.
As I read your words they seemed to be saying that Venus, Mercury and Mars were emulating Saturn somewhat. . “less personal” . . “slowest”. . “last longer”. . “hold your head up proudly . . and that prompted me to think of these three back-to-back retrogrades as a special kind of training or preparation of some kind. Looking back, Venus retro in Capricorn had definitely done some of that, so when just before Mercury stationed I lost my cable service (no TV) due to a cable break that took 6 full days to fix, it first felt like “loss” . But because the Capricorn Venus had already affected how I rate what I value, the forced change of focus and pace only enhanced that new perspective. Now I’m wondering if the Venus and Mercury retrogrades aren’t the pre-requisites for the Mars retro lesson. Yeah, that could be a bitch without these lessons learned. Perhaps hind-sight will provide understanding if and how I will have earned any gold medals in the process. 🙂
be