A Third Look at Relating to Others in Gentle and Enjoyable Ways.

Mercury is going direct at 8:17 pm PDT on May 14 and will be in its shadow zone through June 1, after which it enters its next phase of moving through "unknown zones" where the themes of this retrograde will be played out in forward motion.

So for the next 2 weeks expect some very productive intersections of past and future, giving us a chance to show how willing we are to update our perceptual files, moving from Taurus personal pleasures into constructive building with others.

Themes related to the span between 6 and 16 Taurus will be prominent until Mercury enters its next shadow zone at 9 Virgo on August 4. While all Mercury retrogrades give us “a look back,” some give us “a look forward.” This one has occupied a span which is identical to the Jupiter retrograde span this coming Autumn, making this another “back to the future” type of experience.

As noted in part 1, last year all Mercury retrograde spans began in early Air signs and retrograded back into late Earth signs, helping us start with ideas and finish with practical grounded insights. This year we have three Mercury retrograde spans which begin and end in Earth, showing we’ll begin with practical approaches, and finish with practical approaches.

This Mercury direct station falls at 6 Taurus. It is said that the first third (decan) of any sign deals with the actional and material levels of life, and as this falls in the first decan of Taurus, it has a sub-influence of Taurus with an added dose of Mercury. Because Mercury is in Taurus, it has been and continues to be ruled by Venus which is now in Cancer. This gives the current Mercury in Taurus experience a Cancer backdrop, specifically in the emotional and social phase of decision.

Aspects in the Shadow Zone

Mercury will transit its “shadow” span of 6 to 15 Taurus through May 31, with residual echoes for the next 13 weeks as well. Mercury going direct will re-activate many of the aspects it's made over the past few weeks, including its long term sextile with Saturn and novile with Neptune, offering productivity, patience, gestating intuition, with Mercury stabilizing our understanding of how to make things flow in practical, simple, obvious ways.

As Mercury moves forward from its station, it stays in sextile with Saturn through the 4th week of May, after which it makes a quintile. During the period between this station and Mercury leaving its shadow zone, Mercury makes a sextile and quintile with Venus, a binovile with Mars, a septile to Jupiter, a novile and then semisquare to Neptune, and a biseptile to Pluto.

Of course there are other aspects as well, which I’ll go into in the coming New Moon articles.

The Moon and Sun at this Station

The Moon at the station is a 3rd Quarter Moon, said to be future oriented, inventive, and focused on building something to preserve the harvest of the cycle to come. We are told this phase is one of applying universal principles to everyday situations. As the Moon is at 28 Pisces exactly conjunct Neptune and trine Mars, it’s extremely powerful as a guide for seeing the future and the abundance coming between mid-May and mid-August. As it triggers the Grand Irrationality, this Summer is clearly a turning point for those with planets in the active zones. You can find more about these zones in the recent Lunar Eclipse articles.

At this station, the Sun is 25 Taurus sextile the Moon/Neptune and Mars at 27 Cancer. This is an enjoyable mobilization which leads to the abundance mentioned above. With the aspects involved, this should be an excellently productive period of reading the flow, letting go of the old, and moving easily through the endings and beginning indicated at this station.

Looking Back, Looking Ahead

So from here Mercury moves forward! We can now take what we reviewed, got a new understanding of, or found new information about that helped us remember and/or reevaluate some things and move forward with a larger view and contemplation of what has been and what will be, especially in the houses where we have Gemini and Virgo, since Mercury rules Gemini and Virgo.

As it was retrograde between 16 and 6 Taurus, those house(s) in our charts have been the areas where our review, reflections, returns, reconsiderations, and/or rehearsals have taken place. I gave you some of the possible effects of Mercury in the houses in the article Mercury Retrograde in Taurus in April-May 2023 - What It Means For Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo, Libra, Scorpio, Sagittarius, Capricorn, Aquarius, and Pisces.

Since it is now direct, if there have been misunderstandings or delays these past 3 weeks, it's all moving forward from here! We can begin to get a lot more accomplished, after a period of slow downs, turnarounds, review, reflection, reworking, undoing, and re-planning. We’ve been offered a chance to rethink many things, and experienced new ways of seeing how to organize or reorganize something, or make something more efficient. Now we move forward into a new life knowing we’re traversing familiar ground before we leap into the future in early June.

So things should start moving forward anew fairly quickly. Right now, it’s a good time to use the different information, views, and approaches we’ve been examining through the retrograde lens these past several weeks to find a new productivity as we join with others to use new approaches and methods to bridge gaps. We now have an alternative take on some things, as well as a more organized approach to making things work better or more pleasing, and having taken a slight detour through the past, can move forward into a time of linking up with our Spiritual Brothers and Sisters in a group building effort.

Now that we've done our rehearsals, reviews, revisions, and/or research on those inner and outer experiences showing us the need to simplify and reconsider some of our methods, we can be at ease as we move into a more enjoyable building phase. Here we again face the future, knowing a different sense of Being and a new vision of our wisdom.

Despite the tensions of the coming weeks from the monster T-square coming soon, the sextiles promise productive intuition, productive linking with others, and a glimpse of the benefits of leaving our old field of focus. And even if it seems like you’re not clear about what way you’re going, see what good there is to be done, since as Spirits flying freely in the direction we choose, remember the immortal words of George Harrison, “if you don’t know where you’re going, any road will get you there.”

From Here We Speed Up!

Things related to Mercury will speed up considerably for the next three months, so flow with the new YOU you’re experiencing! Meditate on the symbol “A bridge being built across a gorge,” since it’s the Sabian symbol I gave you in part 1. That sets the theme for the next three months, and helps us be clear about our most effective social technique for linking our energies with others. This allows us to explore different “building techniques” to bridge “chasms,” within us and outside us. Take the challenges with a more easy-going approach while finding the elusive truths of life.

There are tremendous spiritual rewards for standing for what we believe in and being clear about our focus. This station allows us to go forward, resuming many things put on hold during the last Mercury retrograde in December and January. We now have a new way of seeing the structure and limits of things. When we get a clear vision or understanding, as we act on it we’ll be flooded with feelings which will lead us to a newer understanding. This begins a period of opening to a deeper vision and deeper understanding than we’ve had before as we move through a time of high productivity and life renewal beginning in June.

A New Look at Mercury Retrograde

In a final plug as Mercury moves forward in its shadow zone, if you want to know more about the qualities of Mercury retrograde in all the signs and houses, please consult your copy of the expanded 2nd edition of A New Look At Mercury Retrograde, available on Amazon. It's a handy reference for everything you could want to know about Mercury retrograde people and Mercury retrograde in the signs and houses. It explores how Mercury retrograde people think and work through things, and why roundabout or delayed interpretations aren’t necessarily a bad thing, whether in kids or adults. Here's the link to where you can order your paperback copy of A New Look at Mercury Retrograde. The ebook is available on Kindle and Nook. (Again, just make sure you get the 2016 edition published by the Fifth Ray rather than the 1997 edition originally published by Weiser.)

Reprinted on crystalwind.ca with written permission from Robert Wilkinson. Copying this article to other blogs is strictly prohibited. It is copyright protected. 

© Copyright 2023 Robert Wilkinson

© 2023 crystalwind.ca. All rights reserved. We track all IP addresses. Using a VPN will now also get tracked to original source IP.