Retracing Through Fire
mercury enters pre-retrograde shadow in aries
Photo by Wolfgang Hasselmann on Unsplash
On March 9, Mercury emerged from his detriment and fall in Pisces, shaking the water out of his wings and drying off in the Arian warmth.
To recap, Mercury in Aries thrives off quick hits of inspiration. His ideas are fresh and pioneering, and his charisma takes flight once again. When others are not only lending an ear, but easily swayed by Mercury’s words, his energy is brought back to life.
Today, Mercury enters his pre-retrograde shadow at 15° Aries. This is the degree that, once he completes his retrograde movement, he will station direct and trace back over his steps again.
On April 1, Mercury stations retrograde at 27° Aries. Yes, the trickster planet goes retrograde on April Fool’s Day. He will continue his retrograde motion until April 25, then station direct, traveling back over 15°-27° in a forward motion. On May 13, he leaves the retrograde shadow and progresses towards Taurus.
It’s important to note that planets don’t actually move backwards - retrogrades are an optical illusion from our perspective on Earth, where planets appear to be moving backwards. Nonetheless, historically, they do affect our physical body.
The patterns of the planets in retrograde are actually beautiful and geometrical. The image below is from the New York Times.
Retrogrades get a bad rep. Many akin Mercury Retrograde to technology failures, being fooled by others, contracts going wrong, and other frustrating experiences. While not wrong, retrogrades aren’t inherently bad.
“Re”trogrades ask us to look inward and revisit, retrace, reflect, reassess, repeat, redesign, redo. When it comes to Mercury, god of communication, messages, and commerce, we can expect his retrogrades to impact these areas of life.
As far as technology goes, Mercury doesn’t rule technology - that’s Uranus - but we use tech to communicate.
Want to know how this Mercury Retrograde will impact your chart? This is a perfect question for the Advice Column! These Q&A style readings are on sale for $10 to celebrate my solar return - but not for long.
Mercury Retrograde in Aries
As Mercury begins his retrograde path in Aries, the aforementioned Arian communication style will come into question. Being loosely conjunct Chiron and the North Node (and, naturally, opposing the South Node in Libra), traveling past them thrice during retrograde and its shadows, core wounding about our own communication comes to the forefront.
More to come on the eclipses themselves.
This retrograde can teach us how we can be more Arian in our communication. Aries Mercuries are bold and don’t let fear hold them back. They need to speak and address things in the moment; once they gets what they have to say out of their system, it’s gone from the mind just as quickly as it arrived.
As a native Aries Mercury, I find a lot of my ADHD nature lives here. It’s my only fire planet - although, an important placement - and I had to learn how to manage the fleeting thoughts. It doesn’t necessarily need to happen verbally. I often find writing down my ideas and thoughts (that can even include my grocery list) is helpful; if I don’t get it out, though, I’m going to forget.
Some questions you can ask yourself during this retrograde:
Where do you hold yourself back for the sake of others?
Do you mince your words?
Do you neglect to address issues out of fear of causing conflict?
How can you be more bold and authentic in communication?
If you feel inclined to share your thoughts about this, or speak a commitment to yourself for this Mercury retrograde, I’d love to hear in the comments.