Mercury Retrograde In Sagittarius - Bigger, Better, and Backwards

Mercury went retrograde on November 23, and will keep moving along his backward path in the sky until December 13.  You can read an earlier post of mine to get my general approach to Mercury retrograde periods, with the difference this time being that Mercury is retrograde in the sign of Sagittarius. I want to focus on Sagittarius, but first I want to add another level to what seems to go on during these sometimes frustrating and sometimes surprisingly calm periods, by taking a look at Mercury himself.

MERCURY, GUIDE OF SOULS

In mythology, Mercury is commonly known as the Trickster. This is the face of Mercury that gets the most press during retrograde cycles, especially in the mainstream press, as he shows up in all sorts of inconvenient ways, interrupting what were supposed to be the normal, smooth, everything-going-as-planned days of our lives.

There’s more to Mercury than just this Trickster aspect, though; much more.  If we look at Mercury through his Greek counterpart Hermes, he is also known as the Guide of Souls.  This is significant.  What does that mean, to be a Guide of Souls?  And how might this shape our understanding of a retrograde period?

If you’ll notice, the “inconveniences” that annoy us the most during Mercury retrogrades periods are always the inconveniences in our physical lives.  It’s the toaster that breaks down, or the computer that crashes, or the files that were “suddenly” deleted by some invisible visitor who happened to use your computer (while you were on it), or it’s the phone that doesn’t ring, or it’s the phone that does ring (your cell phone, right in the middle of the most important job interview of your life).  Or it’s the new road construction that just began, right as winter is setting in.  Any way you look at it, it’s the strange detours our physical lives are forced to take—the inconveniences that we didn’t see coming—that get the most attention during Mercury retrograde.

Conveniently, Mercury is the god of the “in betweens” of life.  For example, when you’re on a road trip, Mercury is those “convenience” stores you stop at between the place you left and the place where you are heading, to get gas or get a snack.  Likewise, when something comes up “right in the middle” of something (after it starts and before it ends), you can be sure Mercury is making an appearance.

One of Mercury’s unique characteristics is that he is the only god allowed to freely travel from the soaring heights of Mount Olympus above, down into the dark depths of the Underworld below, always connecting with the world in between (our world).  No other god or human was allowed entrance to the Underworld, that remarkable place of astounding mystery only open to humans once they have died, and only then if they pay the proper toil.  Only souls are allowed into the Underworld, and therefore, the Underworld is the world of Soul.  And it’s Mercury (Hermes) who guides souls as they enter the Underworld.

What this has to do with us, physical humans living very physical lives above ground, is that we have souls, and the soul is the invisible, non-physical part of us.  And it’s not just a part of us—it’s everywhere.  Soul does not begin and end.  Soul is not bound the way we are.  We may not have access to the Underworld, but our soul does, and Mercury is our Guide.

SAGITTARIUS

They say everything is bigger in Texas.  This may be true, but what’s truer is that everything is bigger in Sagittarius!  A mind that was once small gets the bigger picture in Sagittarius!  What was once a normal and ordinary life gets slotted into the bigger and grander scheme of the whole of Life!  It’s part of a huge plan!  What were once simply little things enjoying their simple little lives get wrapped inside phrases like, “Little things mean a lot!”  What was once good becomes extraordinarily fabulous!!  And what was once merely likeable becomes the most amazing thing in the whole entire universe!!!  Whoever invented exclamation marks must have been a Sagittarius!

See, Sagittarius is a sign that is fabulous at exaggeration, in the best ways and the worst ways (if there is a “worst” way to exaggerate).  I could say that Sagittarius is the most amazingly terrific, astoundingly brilliant, ceaselessly wondrous sign there is, and I bet all of the Sagittarians would agree.  Behind this exaggeration, though, lies the larger truth of our lives.  There’s something mythic about Sagittarius, something that aspires toward the heavens, searches for meaning, and always aims at the higher perspectives of life, often through religion, or through spiritual endeavors.  Sagittarius loves to keep moving, always continuing this wondrous spiritual journey we call life.  Life as a continuous journey is a Sagittarian perspective.

But let’s shrink this down for a minute, so as to connect it to our still-ordinary lives that are in the midst of Mercury going retrograde in Sagittarius.

MOVING BACKWARD

A retrograde planet moves backward in the sky.  Not really, but it just looks that way. So, at the heart of a retrograde period is the very notion that things are not necessarily as they appear.  How appropriate, then, for Mercury the Trickster!  And how appropriate, too, for Mercury as the one who guides the soul, that invisible, non-physical, non-literal realm of life.  And how appropriate as well for Sagittarius, the sign that seeks the invisible meaning of life not obvious if we look at life only from the ground (physical) level of things.

If we get stuck focusing on the inconveniences of our physical lives (as is usually the case with Mercury retrograde periods) between now and December 13, we miss a grander opportunity this time to explore the higher meaning—the symbolic meaning—hidden within those inconveniences.  You know, maybe there’s something more.  Maybe!  Maybe these things are literal exaggerations begging our attention so as to divulge the “real” reason something happens.  What may be seriously inconvenient to our physical lives may be a store of convenience to the soul, and Mercury is our Guide.

This requires a thoughtful, reflective, somewhat philosophical approach to life until December 13, but that’s what Sagittarius is all about.  And the soul in its very nature is reflective.  It requires a leap of faith from us when we are being too literal.  It requires a leap into something non-physical, rather than just looking for the hard-copy outcomes we may be more accustomed to.  With Mercury moving backward, it’s a good time to not only look backward (by reflecting on meaningful things of the past year, for example), but to look at life backward, where what you see isn’t always what you get.  Maybe moving forward all the time is what’s getting you stuck, and if you get stuck somewhere during Mercury retrograde, it may be what’s necessary to move you forward.

I know, that all sounds so abstract and philosophical, but at the heart of philosophy is “sophia”—wisdom.  And there’s often a wonderfully wise common sense about being where you’re at in life, accepting the things that happen in life (the ups and the downs, the happiness and the stickiness) with an active curiosity and wonderment.  A line from a favorite song (“The Journey Home”) often reminds me that, “Not every boat you come across is one you have to take; sometimes standing still can be the best move you ever make.”

This Mercury retrograde, notice the things that make you stand still, and take in the larger picture.  Wonder about the meaning of it all, and carry that meaning forward with you as of December 13, when Mercury starts moving forward again, guiding our souls into the holiday season.

Mars In Cancer - Make Omelets, Not War

The planet Mars has entered the sign of Cancer (on August 3) until September 18.

THE MAN IN THE MOON

Mars’ sterling reputation as a strong, manly-muscled Warrior God takes a bit of a beating in the shadowed, silvery moonlight of the vulnerable, caring, nurturing and emotionally oh-so-sensitive sign of Cancer. As standard practice, Mars is interested in “getting it up,” manning up, rising up. Just look at the symbol. If there is an uprising, you can be sure the god Mars is involved. The sign of Cancer, however, is one of the deepest signs, often tremendously insecure, and the downward pull into emotional vulnerability typically proves challenging for Mars. The downward drive is even expressed technically: Mars is considered in his “fall” in Cancer. Mars wants to be direct and straight to the point, and emotions aren’t exactly direct. The Man in the Moon was never depicted with a sword, was he? See, Mars just isn’t the type to offer a comforting squeeze and a warm hug when someone is feeling sad. Feelings? Who cares! Besides, battles are easier to fight during the day, in the light of the Sun, rather than in the mysterious and indiscriminating shadows of night. Ultimately, the battle for Mars in Cancer is between keeping the tide of emotions in versus letting it all out; emotions that are held in tightly tend to be released with steely force. Just think of Alanis Morissette, who has Mars in Cancer, and her scalding and scathing song "You Oughta Know," the murky "Madness" (lunar craziness rather than anger), the lyricism of "Underneath," or the simmering "Torch" in which she catalogues her burning memories of a former love. She even sings "In Praise of the Vulnerable Man."

THE MAN WITH A PAN

In the sign more associated with the kitchen than the battlefield, rather than putting up his dukes in war, Mars in Cancer is left to beat eggs, mash potatoes, whip cream, grate cheese, mince meat, and grill chicken. You get all of the basting, beating, thrashing, broiling, boiling, stewing, roasting, poaching, scrambling, creaming, scalding, grating, chopping, searing and toasting action that Mars loves, but you’re carrying an egg whisk rather than an axe. Rather than meeting his opponent with a battering ram, the only thing getting battered is the moist, soft cookie dough. Yum! It’s time to trade in the Super Trooper for the Hamburger Helper! Yes, it’s easy to make fun of Mars in Cancer – and the more you get him boiled, the more he’ll just stew in his own juices. (Secretly I think he loves it, because it gives him a good excuse to come out and fight – or at least try to.) In his sign of exaltation, Capricorn (opposite Cancer), Mars is the Man With a Plan; in Cancer, he is the Man With a Pan. Make omelets, not war!

All joking aside, my real point: there is an amazingly constructive side of Mars in Cancer. It's not just in the kitchen, but any creative emotional outlet. I've already mentioned Alanis Morissette. Author Joyce Carol Oates also has Mars in Cancer and wrote "Because It Is Bitter, and Because It Is My Heart" and many other deeply emotional books. Stephen King marched into the darkness and managed to take a stand in "The Stand," creep the hell out of everyone with "The Shining" (talk about lunacy!), keep us up all night with "It" (best book title ever!), and most recently dim all the lights entirely in "Full Dark, No Stars." Other powerful expressions of Mars in Cancer include the works of Toni Morrison, Dolly Parton, Picasso, Jessye Norman, Naomi Judd, George Lucas, and Malcolm X. While I like to make fun of Mars in Cancer, its depth and serious side should never be underestimated.

While Mars in Cancer might be a strange combination any way you look at it, emotions are the name of the game. Keeping them in, letting them out, it's all a challenge. Fights happen, life goes on, much like the ebbing and flowing of the tides. The key hidden somewhere in the shadows of the Moon is to direct the emotions toward something constructive and creative, so rather than following a recipe for disaster, you stand a chance at a five-star meal—which hints a wee bit toward Mars in Leo, which begins September 18.

Jupiter In Taurus - Back In the High Life Again

“I still believe that in this world we’ve got to find the time for the Life of Riley.”—Lightning Seeds

Jupiter enters Taurus on June 4, 2011. The magnificent and beneficent King of the Gods, the ruler of Mount Olympus himself, comes down to earth for a year. How to make sense of this?

FLYING THE FRIENDLY SKIES

Jupiter is a planet of vistas, expanses, wide open spaces and openness in general, as well as generosity and optimism.  Jupiter is a glass-half-full kind of guy.  He is uplifting.   Where Jupiter is, things are looking up!  The very act of looking up reveals the mysteries of the vast skies above, opening as they do to the infinitely vaster mysteries of the cosmos, echoing the infinitely deep mysteries of the soul.   “As above, so below,” announces the mystical truth embedded into astrology, and it is within that very statement we can take a look at what Jupiter in Taurus is all about.

AS ABOVE

Jupiter is big!, huge!, enormous! and impressive.   When Norma Desmond said, “I am big, it’s the pictures that got small,” she was adamantly emphasizing the aspect of life associated with Jupiter.   Where Jupiter is, the pictures are always big, and we grasp the big picture.

See, Jupiter is connected to the faculty of pattern recognition.   If you’ve ever played connect-the-dots, where a series of points on a page come together to reveal an image, you know what I’m talking about.   Jupiter is the big dot-connector of the planets, the intuitive perception that connects the dots of life instantly to reveal the greater meaning of the plotted points.   

Example:  If you’ve seen the X-Files episode “Conduit,” you might remember the little boy who started writing pages and pages of binary data, very quickly.   He laid the pages out, which made it only look more confusing and absurd.   ”What does it mean?” asked Scully.   “I don’t know,” replied Mulder.   Yet when Agent Scully walked up the staircase and saw the view from above, with a gasp of “Oh my god!” all of the meaningless, separate data bits came together to form a picture, the image of a face.  Meaning emerged from nonsense.  This is the nature of Jupiter.

With Jupiter’s brand of connectivity via the big picture, life becomes meaningful, philosophies and faiths emerge, and you can trust that your life right now, at this point in its plot, fits into a larger scheme.   This archetypal perception of patterns is essential to Jupiter, evidenced even in the planet’s twelve-year orbit around the Sun, with twelve being one of the big archetypal numbers.

SO BELOW

Meanwhile, the earthy and material sign of Taurus is resplendent with the vibrant and vibrating life of the natural world.   Taurus is the awesomeness of the five senses that bring the aliveness of the physical world to our attention.   To smell the fragrances of fresh flowers, hear the hooting of the owl, taste the tangy tangerine on your tongue, catch the cacophony of color nature splashes everywhere, and feel the satisfyingly sensual surfaces of life—all of these are fundamental to Taurus.

Taurus also has to do with money and security.   They say money can’t buy happiness, but it sure can buy a lot of really nice stuff!  With enough money, and a decent purchase, you can be secure in experiencing the best food, the most comfortable furniture, something abundant in color (aah!) rather than saturated in cheap beige (ugh!).   The five senses come home.   With money you can purchase a most beautiful and precious work of art, and it can hang from the wall in your expensive and expansive home for as long as you desire to stand and see its image reflecting back to you something tangible about life.   Think of Steve Winwood, a Taurus, singing “The Finer Things” or “Back In the High Life Again.”

To stand firmly on solid ground knowing your life has worth and value simply because you are alive; to be self-possessed and affirm this with material things that act as mirrors, providing a sense of security by reminding you of what you value—that’s Taurus.

Le sens de la vie / The meaning of life

Putting Jupiter and Taurus together might, at first, seem like a strange combination of opposites.  However, one of Jupiter’s symbols is the Bull, the symbol of Taurus.  There seems to be something more going on here than just expanded waistlines, expanded wallets, or bouts of kingly overindulgence.  (Interestingly enough, “The Life of Riley” first emerged while Jupiter was in Taurus in 1941).  If we keep in mind Jupiter’s capacity to make meaningful connections, and add Taurus’ material-world senses, what happens?  What happens when meaning enters the realm of sense?

Curiously, if we look up (up!) the meaning of “sense” we find that “sense” means “meaning.”  Huh?  To be clearer, there is a strong inherent link between sense and meaning.   When we say that something is “senseless” (such as violence) we are saying that it is meaningless, or pointless.   To speak of the meaning of life in French is to speak of “le sens de la vie,” where sens translates into “meaning.”  To align meaning and sense together is only natural; it makes sense.  With Jupiter in Taurus, then, two powerful modes of sense perception connect:  our perception of life through the five senses connects with our higher sense perception from which life garners meaning.   Meaning becomes tangible, touchable, substantial, full of sense and sensibility.

MAN'S SEARCH FOR MEANING

Viktor Frankl, who had Jupiter in Taurus in his birth chart, wrote “Man’s Search For Meaning” and said this:  “For the meaning of life differs from man to man, from day to day and from hour to hour.   What matters, therefore, is not the meaning of life in general but rather the specific meaning of a person’s life at a given moment.”  Not only was Frankl invested in making the meaning of life tangible from moment to moment, but he did so from within the profoundly senseless (on every level) environment of a Nazi death camp.   To be in a black and white environment stripped of Venus—love, color, beauty, life!—and to have the five senses assaulted with nothing but horror, and to emerge to write “Man’s Search For Meaning” carries the full impact of Jupiter in Taurus.   Anne Frank, another Jupiter in Taurus, said from her hiding place in a tiny attic during World War II:  “I don’t think of all the misery but of the beauty that still remains.”

Martin Luther King (indeed, a King) had Jupiter in Taurus in his birth chart and generously afforded a meaningful life to all humans, deeply rooted in values. Said King:  “The great problem facing modern man is that the means by which we live have outdistanced the spiritual ends for which we live.”  This sentiment is echoed by Viktor Frankl:  “Ever more people today have the means to live, but no meaning to live for.”

With Taurus’ connection to values, money, and financial security—surely a complicated issue in 2011, in the midst of recession, when looking up reveals a ceiling of debt—it’s very possible that things could be looking up.  Less debt?  I don’t know.  But I look to Anne Frank again for curious possibilities and something more meaningful:  “No one has ever become poor by giving.”  One of Jupiter’s many strengths is generosity.

COME TO YOUR SENSES

When the band Lightning Seeds sang in “The Life of Riley” (from their album entitled “Sense”!!), “I still believe that in this world we’ve got to find the time for the Life of Riley” they remind us that life itself is fun, a pleasurable and sensual experience.  The phrase “the life of riley” can insinuate a kind of shallow materialism, but it also resonates with a world where pleasures are not automatically linked with “guilty” but are essential to why humans live in the first place:  to experience life on Earth, to experience being alive.

I framed this post within the mystical statement, “As above, so below.”  The mirroring of the spiritual world through the material world is essential to Jupiter in Taurus.  And its sensibility is at the core of astrology; some of the deepest roots of astrology go back to the Age of Taurus 5,000 years ago.  When we look up to the skies and see a bunch of dots we call stars, and imaginatively and intuitively connect those stars with daily life on the ground, the cumulative effect gives life cosmological meaning.  Some say that those stars are our ancestors shining down on us.  Jupiter in Taurus reminds us that we don’t have to literally be up in the stars, twinkling, to be back in the high life again—the high life is down here, right now, we need only come to our senses.