What about Mercury retrograde in a birth chart?

What about Mercury retrograde in a birth chart?

Also as an abbreviated post in Facebook Soul Centered Psychological Astrology

February 25, 2014

My friend, it may be that Mercury on the near Earth side of its orbit is good for inner work; case in point, my article, written a few days ago. One of the reasons I thought there is rich value for counselors is my suggestions as to how to make positive use of the times Mercury is retrograde. Like you, experience has been my teacher and has disabused me of the doom and gloom of the things that are supposed to go wrong while Mercury slides between the Earth and Sun. “Retrograde planets in a birth map were anciently said to be weak or debilitated. . . That it continues to retrograde for a period after birth might detract from its capacity to incite progress . . . “, writes Nicholas Devore. With attention, we see that the business that causes chaos is often in our heads. 

          While it looks as though the tree falling on the car was just an unfortunate accident, we really don't know. Maybe the driver was in a rush and parked in an unfamiliar place. Maybe it was just coincidence. Maybe Mercury was direct in motion when it happened. If such Cosmic Authorities as Astrologers go off on the problems of Mercury Rx, aren't those who pay attention to such authorities on the lookout for "Mercury Rx distress"? I have a friend who regularly writes about news items during those Rx periods, but I find an equal amount of similar stories when Mercury is swinging around the far side of the Sun, in the same direction as the Sun. People aren't blaming the hard drive crash on little Mercury when Mercury is direct.

          In your case, "in the old days" (hopefully), Mercury Rx in a nativity had the astrologer looking for mental challenges like deafness, or what used to be called retardation, or at least a speech impediment, or being held back in school. While any of those things might occur for a Mercury Rx native, wider examination will often show brilliance. The actress Hedy Lamarr, while she's fading in the dust of time now, was once viewed as one of the most beautiful women in the world. Her Sun in smoldering Scorpio, had been crossed by Rx Mercury (5° 11’ past the Sun, about to go direct a week later, to chase after the Sun once again). To enhance her mystery and beauty, she had the Moon just over Neptune in Leo, but that's off-topic. She had plenty in her life that fit with the depths of Mercury Rx, but to point out that that factor has little effect on mental brilliance, her career might have taken a different direction.

          She spent much of her time in a workroom with drafting table and equipment. "It was Hedy's idea for a secret communications system - specifically one that could guide a torpedo using a technology called "frequency hopping" - so that signal couldn't be intercepted." [It was 1940, and German U-boats were wreaking havoc in the Atlantic torpedoing ships, very often with women and children aboard trying to flee the Nazis - something Hedy knew a little about, being born to Jewish parents and having fled Austria on a ship she knew was carrying Louis B. Mayer.] Her idea got a patent. "Today, frequency hopping is used with the wireless phones that we have in our homes, GPS, most military communication systems - it's very widely used,” said Richard Rhodes in his biography, "Hedy's Folly: The Life and Breakthrough Inventions of Hedy Lamarr, the Most Beautiful Woman in the World." So much for Rx Mercury twisting the mind into something not so useful. Of course, those delineations were from olden times when astrologers were looking for mental aberrances in Mercury Rx natives.

Note: Mercury is retrograde as I write this, so any errors are his fault. There are several articles here on Mercury's retrogrades. Under the title of the blog, Astrology STARTALK from Tim Rubald, is a search box. Just type in Mercury to pull them up.

 Copyright © Tim Rubald 2014

The Sun is the Heart (Your Valentine)

The Sun is the Heart

Something for St. Valentine's Day 

by astrologer Tim Rubald

         

Here is a light look at how the Sun expresses vitality, warmth, and energy through each of the twelve Signs in terms of romance, love and desire.  The Sun is only one of several horoscope factors that contribute to how an individual will express these things.

The idea that Sun Signs (there are twelve, each approximately thirty days long in a year) may be useful for analysis and prediction comes out of an astrological understanding of the Sun.  In astrology and astronomy (the straight laced child of astrology) the Sun is the center of our solar system.  By means of a system of correspondences, astrology recognizes the Sun in the horoscope as representing a person’s center (in several senses of the word).  In terms of the body the Sun is representative of the heart, the life sustaining core of a person.

The division of the ecliptic into twelve Signs has the Sun expressing through each Sign as through a lens or filter.  The lens qualifies how the “heart energy” of the Sun expresses.  Other factors further color the expression of passion and romance.  The Sign’s influence on the Sun is only one of several important factors.

ARIES

The Aries heart is like the old Adidas “Just Do It” advertisement.  There is action and impatience.  Don’t make the Aries heart wait and don’t slow it down in order to fulfill some notion of what love is about.  Appreciate Aries for its fearless and courageous march.  Give it reason to march your way and it may just do it.

TAURUS

The Taurus heart is like the steady, heady pulse of springtime.  It is bursting with beauty, sensuality, and a lust for touch, taste and luxury.  Don’t rush the Taurus heart.  Its love of life epitomizes the word savor.  Sample with it what the Taurus heart relishes and you become part of what that heart desires.  Appreciate its appreciation of the sense world and become a part of its world.

GEMINI

The Gemini heart is curious.  It wants to explore, not so much with some specific goal in mind but just to find out.  It's a mental kind of heart that fancies variety and experiment.  It is sensitive to nuance and subtlety.  Appeal to its love of variety with unpredictable gestures:  cards, letters, clippings, magazines, books, e-mail, aps, and URLs for the Gemini heart to explore.

CANCER

The Cancer heart is a blend of sensitivity and power.  It has the nurturing and protective force of a mother bear.  Romance, sentimentality, and emotion touch this heart.  Mementos, things from the past to cherish and protect, invite the Cancer heart’s participation.  Praise (even flattery) feeds this heart.  Criticism damages it.  While the Gemini heart offers mental variety there’s never a dull emotional moment with the heart of Cancer.

LEO

The heart of the lion is loyal, generous, and idealistic.  It loves to offer its protection and loyalty in exchange for admiration.  It is the true peacock heart, extravagant, ostentatious, and lordly.  It is inspiring and lively essentially within its own world.  Make the Leo heart your world and it returns great faith in you. 

VIRGO

The shy, Virgo heart is dutiful, affectionate and faithful.  It appreciates (loves?) order and method.  The Virgo heart likes “the real thing,” what is practical, what is felt and touched, held and compared.  It is discriminating to the degree that its appreciation is honor in itself.  Rather than compromise the Virgo heart may become self-sufficient.  If you are in doubt as to what it requires, this passionate treasure of a heart gives directions.

LIBRA

 The Libra heart is a companion.  It lives for sympathy and understanding.  It is so idealistic that it is hard to satisfy this heart in love.  It is not a hard heart though; it is surprisingly mental, ever imagining the pleasantest of worlds.  Win this heart with beauty and avoid “reality therapy.”  Flattery is not wasted on the Libra heart.  It craves appreciation.  Avoid what are ugly and unpleasant and nurture this heart with any kind of beauty.

SCORPIO

Thanks to stereotyping clichés, the Scorpio heart supposedly responds only to sex.  Sex isn’t the whole picture though.  The Scorpio heart is a proud heart.  It can be as comfortable with what to many might be excess in physical love as it is with continence and self control.  The love of this heart can be deep and lasting.  It lives in a world of emotion, the depth of emotion from which all “active” emotions arise.  The Scorpio heart lives in extremes of emotion, not in any middle ground.  It is the real thing. Don’t play here unless you understand.

SAGITTARIUS

The Sagittarius heart blossoms in nature, in the out of doors, in freedom.  Put it behind walls or in a cage and it will wither.  It is so friendly, and its actions are so human and attractive, that its flirtations might appear to be more than they are.  For this heart, flirtation is just an exercise of friendliness, of play.  This is the heart that aphorism seems written for, "If you love something, set it free.  If it comes back to you, it is yours."  The Sag heart feeds on the broadest possible range of experience, beyond any limits of thought or imagination.  Win this heart with playful kindness. 

CAPRICORN

The Capricorn heart is ambitious, has goals, and appreciates material advantage.  There is a sense of calculation with the Capricorn heart.  Once the “externals” are understood, the heart of the Sea Goat is as passionate and sexual as Scorpio; as sensual and physical as any Bull (Taurus) in a meadow at the bursting climax of Spring.  Care for this heart and it will take care of business, be dutiful, and take care of everything that needs managing.

AQUARIUS

The Aquarius heart is mental, and humanitarian.  It is nothing if not fair.  It is not that it is uncomfortable with emotion; it is just that for Aquarius, emotion seems to happen in the mind where it becomes rational.  The Aquarius heart can seem scientific that way.  Its greatest gift is one of friendship.  Even though it can be oriented in a democratic way and have an intimate sense of the future, don’t expect wildness (craziness and unpredictability yes) as the Water Bearer’s heart may hold and apply rigid moral convictions.  It is the water of Spirit and focused ideal that is carried, not that of syrupy emotion.  Allow the Aquarius heart in by allowing it to be helpful; praise and compliment and it’s yours.

PISCES

For the sweetest of sloppy emotion take the Pisces heart.  It is more than simple charity, more than plain sympathy, more than hospitality, kindness and generosity.  Take this heart as far as you can imagine and it goes farther.  The Pisces heart is so intuitive, receptive, and mediumistic that you can break it before you do.  Walk gently with this heart please, however impractical, inefficient, swayed, and tempted by emotion it may be.  This heart swims in a sea of emotional excitement; dive in, only if you are a strong swimmer.

© 2000-2012 Tim Rubald

startalker@aol.com

Helping conscious people in transition or crisis to understand their life cycles and optimize their timing for success.

NEPTUNE STILL on November 9, 2011

NEPTUNE STILL on November 9, 2011
 

Neptune stations today (the still point where we look out to the solar system toward that planet and due mostly to our orbital motion about the Sun Neptune changes from backward to forward against the measuring dial of the Tropical Zodiac) which means, it resumes forward motion. For a few days though Neptune has pretty much not been moving and that will be the case for a few more days to come.

Neptune (discovered 9/23/1846 in Berlin) is a slow mover anyway, taking about 164.79 years to orbit the Sun, 14 years in a Sign, moving about two degrees a year, and due to how we view and track Neptune's motion through the Zodiac it appears to spend about 5 months of every 12 in backward, retrograde, motion. That slowness and infrequency is one of the factors that make a Neptune station (change of direction) special.

I saw a fellow on the beach the other day burning a drawing into a piece of flat driftwood. He used a hand magnifier to focus the sun's rays to burn in a design. When the alignment is right and steady the focal energy is powerful enough to burn the wood. Similarly, when a planet reaches a station point it is as though it is in a similar state of high focus. That's what we have now with Neptune.

Neptune is the planet of the Great Dream, of emotional absolutes like Truth, Love, Beauty, and of the higher realms of music and art. What first came to mind as I allowed the Neptunian flow today (after bravely resisting an impulse to meditate - which by the way is an excellent idea when Neptune is emphasized) was the Lovin' Spoonful song that I've been a fan of since it first hit the airwaves in 1966, "What a day for a daydream,"  begins the tune, Daydream.
 

I just wanted to point out Neptune's station today and suggest that on the one hand it's okay and appropriate to give time to your dream, and, on the other hand, that a bit more concentration is in order if you have a job in something that requires critical exactitude (like an air-traffic controller) or even in, as drug labels may say, driving or operating machinery. That applies any time Neptune is in emphasis.

While I'm not a big fan of degree symbols, I will point out that the most popular symbols, The Sabian Symbols give this for the degree of Neptune's station today:  28-29 deg Aquarius - A Butterfly Emerging From A Chrysalis.  Isn't that special?