Early on Monday morning (at least here where I live on the East coast), Mercury stations retrograde at 25° Libra. Other than the seasonal shifts and full moons, this is the part of astrology that most often leeks into the collective zeitgeist – often with funny memes about Mercury in Gatorade or in a shock value article about “What to Expect” in Vogue. This is your resident astrologer here to tell you that in two years of deep cycles of growth and undoing – this Mercury retrograde is no big deal.
I want to break down what Mercury retrograde is, whether it’s something that you ever need to pay attention to, how this one is going to feel, and how to get a sense of how it might impact your life by consulting your natal birth chart.
Mercury Retrograde
We say that a planet is retrograde when it appears to be moving backward through the degrees of the horoscope rather than forwards. All of the planets in our solar system have a retrograde cycle that happens with regularity. In that way, retrograde cycles are a little bit like astrological weather. Much like the monsoon seasons in tropical locales – you have two types of weather: wet or dry, or in the case of astrology forward or retrograde.
It is not inaccurate to characterize it instead as dark versus light though I hesitate to do so because of the associated stigmas attached to each term. Certain planets especially have an association with walking the low road, or road of the dead, when they move in retrograde. Mercury, the divine messenger of the gods, is associated especially with the chthonic journey. Here he takes on the darker mantle of the Traveller, one that perhaps connects him more deeply to the North and his connection to Wodensday rather than the Greco-Romans.
None of this is wrong or bad – that’s not how astrology works. It’s just another energy, a shift in the pattern. Like I said, nothing to worry about.
Do YOU need to pay attention to Mercury in retrograde?
Mind you, I’m an astrologer but I say yes. For at least five minutes. To know when it is and then to have enough knowledge to give you patience as things go wrong.
Because they will. They do. When Mercury Chtonia walks the land, things just get murkier. Technology goes on the fritz. People get more forgetful. There are more misunderstandings. Miscommunications. This just is. It exists.
And trust me, being able to swear at Mercury retrograde after your computer didn’t save your draft after all is well…something. Also likely better than lashing out at your partners or co-workers.
Let’s get a bit deeper though. Some people are more likely to be affected by Mercury retrograde cycles than others. Some people don’t notice retrogrades – maybe they are lucky fuckers but I suspect that they are simply unobservant and that’s okay. On the other hand, If you are an HSP, or an empath, or just plain sensitive, planetary retrogrades can run aggressively over your whole world and create a world of hurt. You need to know and be prepared. I know – I get that. That’s me.
If you are a Gemini or Virgo Sun, Moon, or Ascendant, you should probably always be aware of Mercury retrograde cycles since Mercury is your ruling planet.
For the rest of you, how much you will feel any given retrograde will likely depend on whether it creates an aspect/close angle with any of your personal planets. That will change each retrograde cycle so really all you have to do is check-in 3x a year before each retrograde, do a tiny bit of math, and see if it’s something worth paying attention to, or not.
This Mercury retrograde Cycle 9/27-10/18
For our third Mercury retrograde cycle of the year, Mercury will be retrograde from 25-10° Libra. This makes the planetary ruler of this retrograde Venus so this will likely be a highly emotionally charged retrograde. Throughout this cycle, Mercury will conjunct the Sun and Mars, sextile Venus, trine Jupiter, square Pluto, and oppose Chiron. That’s a lot of planetary activity.
Popular wisdom is that you can expect to do all of the “re’s” during Mercury retrograde. You may need to revise, rework, reexamine, and repeat. With the Sun, Mercury, and Mars in Libra, a lot of energy is going to be turned inwards towards relationships, family, and our most personal connections. Beware the passive-aggressive critic that lives inside so many of us though – much blood may be lost over half-spoken barbs and empty promises during times like these.
Here I see a reflection in some of the energy from the fall of 2020 when Mars went retrograde in Aries and squared off with Pluto in Capricorn three times. Now, one year later, Mars has made it almost exactly across the wheel to Aries’ opposite sign, and all three of our personal planets in Libra (Sun, Mercury, and Mars) are headed towards a square with Pluto in Capricorn.
The last two years have turned us inside out. It has brought out the best in us and it has brought out the worst in us. There was a time for many of us when our closest Others took the brunt of our grief, or joys, and even perhaps, our insanities. We’ve all (hopefully) learned better boundaries and how to live independently while being intertwined with our Others 24 hours a day. How we get what we want, how we treat our most beloved when we are at our worst, what we do when there is nobody there but the people that know us too well, all of these things may come up for review during this retrograde especially around 10/9 when the Sun and Mars both conjunct retrograde Mercury.
Pluto is our pressure point blast from the past on 10/1 and 11/2, re: unfinished business.
Jupiter will just make the drama bigger.
Mercury makes a sweet sextile to Venus in Sag right before they station direct, a sign that this whole thing is about letting go and making more space, not less.
Our big pain point comes when Mercury opposes retrograde Chiron in Aries for an exceptionally long time – 15 days to be exact. This is because planets slow down substantially when they are about to station forward or retrograde. Whatever came up for us during this retrograde cycle is really going to pay out in pain dividends during Mercury’s post shadow. It’s okay, even if it hurts. Chiron teaches us lessons about leaning into the pain rather than hiding from it. With Chiron, the way out is always through. Onwards.
What does this mean for you?
To a greater or lesser degree, Mercury’s retrograde cycle is likely to have an impact on your life. Each cycle is different though – depending on the sign, how it aspects your natal chart, and the house of your chart that the current retrograde falls into all have an impact on how your “experience” of this retrograde cycle may unfold.
The first thing to do is to get a natal birth chart done. You need reliable birth information for an accurate chart – take the time to determine your precise time of birth with as much accuracy as possible. You can use a site like Astro.com to make a birth chart to refer to for the rest of this article.
For this purpose, we are focusing specifically on personal planets which means that I want you to read your birth chart and find the sign and degree of your Ascendant, Sun, Moon, Mercury, Venus, and Mars. For our purposes the other planets don’t matter much unless they are between 10-24° Libra.
- This retrograde is going to have the strongest effect on natives with a personal planet between 10-25° in the cardinal signs of Aries, Cancer, Libra, and Capricorn.
- This retrograde is going to have a secondary effect on natives with a personal planet between 10-25° Gemini, Leo, Sagittarius, and Aquarius.
- All Mercury retrogrades cycles affect any native with Ascendant, Sun, or Moon in either Gemini or Virgo.
- All Mercury retrograde cycles affect any native with a strong Mercury placement, notably Sun conjunct Mercury.
What personal planets, if any, do you have between those degrees? You will be experiencing this Mercury retrograde through the energy of that planet. You will feel an impact on the Lights of your chart (Ascendant, Sun, and Moon) much more strongly than if the retrograde aspects your Mercury, Venus, and Mars. That area of your life, indicated by the planet in question, will create the same aspect to Mercury two or three times are Mercury moves first forward, then backward, and again forward through the sign of Libra. This can manifest as a boon or bane with equal measure – it seems to be mostly, in the end, how you make of it and handle the change.
Secondarily to this, you can look at the house/s where 10-25° Libra falls in your natal birth chart. For simplicity, you can go to your birth chart and click on Additional Charts. There you will usually find a chart with your 12 houses starting with the Ascendant/1st House. Look at that and find where 10-25° fits into these numbers.
This is normally quite simple with one caveat: if you cannot find Libra with the chart you may be looking at an intercepted house which means that the chart would read one house starting with Virgo and the next starting in Scorpio (effectively looking as if they skipped Libra entirely). I’m not trying to get into the intricacies of intercepted houses but suffice it to say that 10-25 degrees of Libra is within that first house in that sequence (the one that began in Virgo). There are many resources on how to understand the houses of your chart online, you can consult them at your leisure to further this line of personal inquiry.
Putting it all Together
I am forever a Firebull (Taurus Sun/Aries Moon) so I won’t ask anybody to do something that I am not willing to do myself.
I’m a Taurus/Aries/Taurus – My Moon is at 22° Aries so will be opposed by Mercury three times throughout its retrograde cycle. The moon rules our emotions so I can expect to experience a heightened emotional reaction during the times that Mercury opposes my Sun. You might expect me to portray more Aries-like behaviors, I might have to face an Aries-type lesson. If I wanted to, I could consult an ephemeris and figure out exactly on what days those were to plan ahead.
Otherwise, none of my personal planets are particularly afflicted by this retrograde cycle. (Oh man, the moon is enough though).
That said, I’m highly sensitive and Mercury is extremely activated in my natal birth chart. (I have an Ascendant, Sun, Mercury, and Chiron stellium as well as both Venus and Mars in Mercury-ruled signs)
10-25° Libra can be found intercepted in my 6th house. Here you can see themes about relationships (Mercury in Libra) being work (6th house) and me having all of the emotions about it (opposed Moon in Aries).
Knowing this, I can take the steps to create a space of support in my own life around having these emotions. Maybe I need to schedule a day to stitch and bitch with my coven or I need to have a night on the couch with the cats, a hot glass of tea, and the fuzziest blanket I can find. Maybe I’ll feel the need to tell you all about it.