Mercury is the planet that rules all forms of communication, the nervous system, the mind, speech, respiratory system, hands, arms, travel and short trips. Being the planet closest to the Sun, Mercury moves relatively quickly, completing a revolution around the Sun every 88 days. During the retrograde periods, which occur about three times a year, Mercury is close to the earth and appears to be moving backward in the sky from our perspective here on earth. Of course, this is not the reality of its motion as all the planets move in one direction around the Sun. It only appears that way from our viewpoint on planet Earth because of the relative speed of Mercury and the Earth’s revolution and their proximity to each other in their revolutions around the Sun.
I like to use this image to help understand the concept. When you pass a car on the freeway and you come up beside them, it sometimes looks like the slower moving car is moving backwards as you slowly overtake them and move past them. That’s a bit like what happens with Mercury retrograde. It appears to move backwards through the sky from our view on Earth. Because of this unusual perspective, our minds process information differently during these retrograde times.
Everything under the rulership of Mercury is affected by this. For example, we don’t hear all the details of a conversation, we forget to write things down, we miss appointments, lose things, or our gadgets don’t function properly, etc. It is a period of major distraction and delay and people can drop the ball on details. If you are aware of these times you can cut yourself and others some slack as most of the problems are minor things that will straighten out when the retrograde period is over. Forcing things to happen according to your agenda isn’t recommended as you will not get the desired result. Things will fall into place when Mercury is back to normal motion. It usually takes around 3 weeks for Mercury to retrace over the degrees it retrograded over.
The main Mercury Rx dictum is DON’T SIGN any contracts (you will want to get out of them) and DON’T BUY any major appliances, electronics, computers or high ticket items during this time as you will have trouble with them. Contact me, jeanne@ celestialadvisor.com or 602-957-6008 for more details on how this affects you personally by sign and house Mercury is transiting.
DATES FOR MERCURY RX 2017
January 1 – 8 (cont’d from 12/19/16) 3 degrees Capricorn – 28 51’ Sagittarius
April 9 – May 3 4 degrees 47’ Taurus – 24 degrees 17’ Aries
August 13 – Sept 5 11 degrees 38’ Virgo – 28 degrees 26’ Leo
December 3 – Dec 23 29 degrees 17’ Sagittarius – 13 degrees Sag