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Dear Friend and Reader:
Hello…your weekly audio is done. I cover Mercury stationing direct in the discovery degree of Chiron: the issue is self-esteem; faith in oneself; getting over the judgments that we think that other people have about us. I also cover the Taurus New Moon. Here is the audio widget with the presentation. This device works well on the vast majority of computers. If you’re having trouble listening please add a comment below with the kind of computer and operating system that you have — and check back, we may have questions.
Of course I made one error on the recording: after describing Mercury stationing direct, I mistakenly said ‘retrograde’. It has definitely stationed direct.
Below is a written recap of Mercury stationing direct, which happened last night, or overnight, depending on your time zone. I’m asking readers for your experiences of what happened during this rather rugged Mercury retrograde in Taurus. It takes about 10 seconds to sign up to comment on our WordPress blog, it’s free.
Yours & truly,
Eric Francis
The station direct seems to have made things get a bit less…tense. I think the reason I never post about the inner workings that I have is because I have been in “survival stressed-out traumatized” mode for the past six years to the point that the low level stress just hangs there in the background like a system-taxing computer program running. I don’t even notice the stress a lot of the time unless something happens to trigger it and then it is full blown, stomach clenching, high stress. This Merc rx triggered that reaction several times. I have realized that my life growing up with my catastrophizing mother has set my emotion meter to “extra sensitive.”
I am still in my Chiron Return which means every day or so I realize something about my past…like that light going on about how my family did “gaslighting” on me when I was growing up. Sometimes it is just an “oh…that’s interesting” moment because I am too busy to give it any kind of emotional response. Other times things hit me and I cry buckets. My husband has been so busy trying to get through this asinine student teaching assignment that I have had no real time to connect with him to get his emotional support for that and I have no one else; my friend that I could have shared with moved out of state and is very busy. So I just push these things aside in order to continue functioning. Sometimes they overwhelm me and I just have to cry but the bad part is, my kids see that sometimes and I know they know it is not just that I am “going through the change.”
I feel like my emotional life is on pause……
April 5th, moving quickly down the stairs at work while carrying mail (fleet footed Mercury), I lost my footing and tumbled down the stairs, spraining my knee, impacting my lower back, shoulder, and elbow. I tend to ignore body injuries and recover quickly. However, by the following week I was in a leg brace with crutches and seeing doctors and physical therapists throughout the retrograde, still am. So, I had the advantage of being forced to slow down, take care of myself and recognize my limitations. I was also extremely well prepared for the astrological atmosphere thanks to Eric and Len. The result was, this was not so bad a retrograde for me. Lot’s of “things” went wrong but I was in the perfect spot to let it go and keep my focus. I had an enormous amount of energy, centered around my home. I continued to work as I was able to, but even with missing work for appointments, pain, and the usual to be expected problems with computers, software glitches, screwed up telephones, etc., I was so organized and productive that I’ve managed to keep up with the work flow without losing my cool. This retrograde has given me the insight that I place too much pressure on myself, and that when I am not attached to the outcome, the outcome is highly acceptable and even enjoyable. I have been practicing just doing the best that I can at any given moment and that some things are just not in my control. Lovely! I’ve spent a lot of time taking in what is happening, all of the outer events that have been covered so wholistically through Eric’s reporting and the comments on this site, as well as through my own researching, but this time without my usual emotional attachment and judgements. Instead of being angry and frustrated, I’ve focused on keeping my thoughts positive, feeling that is really the only power I have in the situation. I did some reviewing of decisions and actions taken, and discovered that those things still stand true for me; a wonderful affirmation. I feel some changes coming on, and I am excited for the possibility that comes with change. My body and spirit have grown stronger during this retrograde. Yes, I know, this too will change . . .and that’s OK too.
Well, I know that the retrograde didn’t start until April 18th but mine started on April 10th
(or something did, I’m a virgo with cancer rising and sag moon) when I had a heart attack. The only problem is that the Drs. can’t find anything wrong with my heart. My arteries are crystal clear as evidenced by my angiogram, my blood pressure is fine, my heart muscle itself is strong and shows that on echocardiogram. Yesterday I finally got off all the cardiac medications which the Dr. had to agree to since there’s no good reason to take them when I’m so delightfully healthy! I normally use no medicines except homeopathic for years. But something happened even though they have no idea what it was. So I’m taking it as an invitation to slow down and really see what’s going on each day and I feel like I’ve had a warning of what might be if I continue down the path the same way. At least I know that my cardiovascular system is good to go despite weeks out of my life and a $43,000 bill so far since I didn’t have health insurance. And for that price they’re calling me a “mystery”.
The fear is the worst part of all of this. I’ve never considered myself a fearful person and surprised myself at how easily I fell under the spell of giving up my power to the medical “experts”….and I was an icu nurse for years!! So now I’m getting stronger each day both physically and emotionally and re-learning for the thousandth time (billionth perhaps) to trust myself and go with what I know is true for me.
This has definitely been one of the more problematic Mercury retrogrades for me. My calendar shows that Mercury retrograde began on April 18th and then stationed direct on May 11th. First, I should say that retrograde season began in the aftermath of a period of extraordinary (in this order) challenge, risk, effort, exasperation, loss, dread, fear, struggle, reconnecting, commemoration, reunion, memory, sense of getting older, evaluation, and then finally humiliation. I’m kind of at a loss for words to describe this period because of how much happened in the period from March 24th – April 17th. In just over three weeks, I felt like I had lived three years. (Chiron was EXACTLY conjunct my Ascendant and square to natal Uranus, so go figure.)
When Mercury retrograde happened, everything came to a halt. I couldn’t get my work done. I think I was rehashing a lot of issues from 2002, life altering issues that I thought had overcome. These issues involve passivity, delay, avoidance, and denial, combined with escapism, over-indulgence, laziness, and lethargy. I realize that there are some personal transits involved that have little to do with Mercury retrograde. Nonetheless, things finally started inching forward again starting around May 2nd. It all really took until May 9th to completely work itself out. And as of the last few days, things seem to be getting back to normal. In contrast to the weeks before, in the past three weeks I feel as though I have only lived three days.
But I know that things aren’t going to stay NORMAL. If anything, I get the sense that the process of upheaval I was experiencing before the Mercury retrograde is about to start up again. It might not be quite as intense and personal as before, but I can see in my chart that it’s coming. I have a series of major Mars and Uranus transits coming up over the next few weeks that look really disruptive. I get the sense that there may be some repressed anger that’s starting to bubble up. Unfortunately, I know that if I direct that anger at appropriate target…the results could be devastating for that person (not because of my anger, but because of the precarious mental state of that person).
This Mercury retrograde felt like a pause, a delay, a rehashing, and a simultaneous struggle against those things. I’m glad it’s over, but I’m also sort of dreading what’s ahead.
rekindled an old flame during retrograde and it felt really easy and good with a brand new start, but now, it feels like it did before , resistance on the other side. But I feel different. Strong enough now to know what I want and how to express it and make a choice. we’ll see what happens….bummer, i was looking forward to some good sex with someone other than myself…
jparoby wrote: “My centre is strong but everything else is crumbling.”
Boy, can I relate to that.
I started this new job in May working on a project called Green Acres in Sag Harbor NY, it sounds like my dream job, but in actuality I’m not sure it is. The night mercury stationed retrograde, I got an offer to work as a bartender on the weekends in Astoria Queens. I said yes and will be going there this weekend. The job would most likley turn into something more. My boyfriend plans to move to Astoria and I want to do that. I’m not sure what I should be doing. After all, the Green Acres job is what I have believed I’m suppose to do – it combines all my talents into this one job. It seemed like fate to find this opportunity, but in the back of my mind I always think about landing a bartending job and how much fun it would be to do that!
It’s like two seperate vibes…
Thank you Eric. Great audio, lots of insights.
During the retrograde it has been determined I can no longer hide. I must be free. No money coming in. Homeless at the end of the month. No ideas to push, as to what I am supposed to be doing with my life. I am an artist but the well is dry, currently. My centre is strong but everything else is crumbling.
Strange mercury effects around my world such as the electrical malfunctions is such minescule irritant compared to the larger shit going on in the world.
Repeated tradgedy in close conjunction to 1989 Exxon Valdez Oil spill- a massive heart wrenching experience for my then 23 year old heart – I was working aboard the NOAA ship Fairweather spending much time in Prince William Sound just months before the tragedy, we had been doing sea- beam, and tide station projects in and around Prince William Sound which was an amazing pristine place of ecological diversity – so many sea otters, whales, Puffin. Just days after the spill we were sent back and anchored next to the still spilling Exxon Valdez – where I took a team of “experts” into the hole in the side of the hull by a small zodiak.
We spent the next 3 months sampling for damages and the whole thing was a joke – I quit working for the government shortly after seeing so much B- shit.
I am haunted by the scenes of horror – the death and dying of so many of our animal kin.
Amazing and stressful. Every curveball had a beautiful moment. My dreams changed from nightmarish (the rat test! blech!) to visiting art galleries with breathtaking art, and lots of wordplay that I can’t remember. I laughed a lot during the day and cried in the bathtub at night. Today I have a splitting headache, but I feel new. I woke up when a jar, decorated with layer upon layer upon layer of richly coloured baked-on glazes and folds (could have been raku?) shattered on a kitchen floor in my dream and I said, out loud: That was jarring. Hahaha!! I woke up repeating that and laughing. That’s about it, really. Oh… And the usual mechanical malfunctions but I don’t get phased by those anymore. I just sigh and wave my hand.
I am reading a book by Dr. Judith Herman: “Trauma and Recovery”. I came upon it one day surfing online because I was hungry to find someone who not only understood the fallout and legacy of trauma but more importantly offered hope, healing and recovery to those who seek to become whole. It is a terrific book and she is a trailblazer in her field of psychiatry. What I want to offer here, this morning, is a quote she used from Salman Rushdie’s book “Shame” which she uses to open her book.
I offer the quote by way of a call to each of us to seek and find hope in a world rocked by seemingly endless abuse and cycles of greed and destruction:
What I take from this quote, is the hope that we take faith in ourselves and in each other, women and men. To consciously undertake the task of integrating our masculine and feminine selves and stare down abuses of power, any form bullying or power abuses, that we face each and every day, every time it comes our way, on the various paths we navigate. It is my belief that the repressed feminine is rising deep from within us, and all around us, to Pluto and beyond! That rising is rocking us, because many of us don’t seem to recognize it or haven’t found the courage to say hello to it. It is the energy that when acknowledged, faced, integrated, will absolutely fortify us for the stormy seas we continuously find ourselves facing. More importantly I feel that we have to drop any naivety that healing ourselves and our world will be easy, because as I alluded to in some earlier post this week, birthing is definitely NOT easy.
So let us birth this new society and let us start this moment. We’re already afforded that bonding here at PlanetWaves, a collective that, quite frankly, I do not know how I would get through my day without. My gratitude knows no bounds.
LindaGM from Sydney: I loved your post last night/this morning (!) where you wrote: “I’ve colonised the edge for so many years that it’s become my art.” That’s a great line and I loved it. You’ve colonized the edge, and I’ll bet you’ve felt quite alone while doing it, because I could have written that line, and I’m sure other wavers relate to it as well. But I put it to you and to wavers, that here we have a community of people dropping into PlanetWaves and other such consciousness raising communities, with a craving to be nurtured and educated and guided in our making of art, that we encourage each other to own our artistry and create, together, a brave new world of filled with compassion, generosity and forgiveness. There’s a lot of facing things down and fine tuning to be done, but hey, if Britain this morning can put the right and the left together on the same team, there is hope for us all!
Sorry this is such a long post, but I would like to include one other thing. I felt a different kind of energy flooding into me last night around midnight, as I began to fall asleep and I ended up having one of the best sleeps for a very long time. I’m still feeling further waves of something that I can’t quite put my finger on this morning. It could simply be hormonal/menopausal (and that’s definitely NOT simple!!) but I feel lighter and less anxious. Anyone else experiencing anything similar?
BTW, I really have to get going now, so I won’t be back on my computer for several hours. As I log off I want to send out warmest blessings to my fellow wavers this morning and wave a big “buh bye” to a very challenging but ultimately fruitful Chiron/Mercury retrograde!
holy crap…..can we say totall re-assessment…..I have re-vamped the vision of my business which has been in the planning phases for the past couple of years….now..I believe….I have a much stronger foundation and vision for what I want to create for the future….have totally re-worked my business strategy and how I will attain financing…..have found the strength and courage to say…I’m the boss here….this is what I want…..have also decided that it is time for me to move on to another relationship…I am looking at things as they are….not how I would like them to be…have pulled the band aid off the wound…time to heal for good and move on!!
Yes Spacesurfer – ‘specially with the 2 new leaders Cameron a Libran and Clegg a Capricorn, and our departed incumbent Gordon, a Pisces. Would be good to know more.
Right – I really do have to go now. H x
Just wondered if you have been keeping an eye on Britain lately? The election campaign has been very interesting over here, we did not officially elect an outright winner on polling day and ended up with a hung parliament once votes were counted, now as Mercury stations direct Britain has a new coalition government that comprises of the Conservatives (Right) Liberal Democrats (Left). This is brave new territory in British politics and the country has not been run by two parties in 65 years! It would be interesting to know the astrology of it all…..Change truly is happening as the universe speaks!
I on the other hand have been wrangling with my finances and values (on a non financial basis)
Spacey
was that to he or to me? amazingly good! the calm after the deluge. i feel ive aged 100 years.. surely not the same person as 3 weeks ago.
i realize ive had this (pyschotripping and march madness through my gemini bday in june) my entire life… now ive documented it for about 12 years… talk about awareness.
I asked my mother if im a sorceress, and what does she do with her similar powers… I wager its not the same stateside… too much tv and noise from things to worry about.
out here in the rolling hills with the cows the impact is heightened… something about the air in the french pastures… the geology between the jura and the alps. now I know why a pychic healer and post-trauma counselor I know told me recently, there is no shortage of work here!
thanks for your insight always… im so tired now, want to sleep a week.
ok here goes. you said somewhere if im 50 ive gone through this 150 times in my lifetime but I only recall two other times like this and they were, ironically about 7 years apart and felt much more like a breakdown… clearly a breakthrough… the truth comes out… much more revealed than I had thought possible.
it was all about violence and cruelty and power and about how pain and trauma is transferred from generation to generation. only I learned that sometimes healing and love that saves may skip a generation… was it you e.f. who said in one oracle, think back at something from your grandmother and see how you can make it come out differently… less violence, less pain, more healing?
no, it was rob brezny.
the whole tsunami or volcano lover spewed molten lava everywhich way, the perpetrators appeared as ghosts and monsters… the sky cracked open… tears and fears and an unleashing of a vicious spirit… a journey to the core… what was left in a pile of ashes was the finest dust of understanding, forgiveness.. and healing, with time.
gee. that’s … a lot in one day..! How are you doing now?
The Day mercury stationed retro-
I woke up to no water- I had to walk out to the pump house and had to reset the pump, then I went out to my barn to get hay to feed my horses and the barn light would not work, then later that day refridgerator light went out, then the computer speakers went out and the printer went down, and for the rest of the day my computer was fu—-d up. It was crazy the whole time with little things and I don’t usually notice the effects so much.