The First 11 Days are the Hardest

There’s so much to discover in a Mercury Retrograde cycle. We astrologers are happy everyone is catching on, but there’s more to it than the usual mess up with computers, electrical appliances, cars, mail and phone messages. Especially now that we’re relying more on email, cell phones and the internet, Mercury becomes more important. After all, it was the Uranus in Gemini generation that brought us these fun new toys and Gemini is a Mercury ruled planet.

You know Mercury goes retrograde three times a year but how can you tell when? If you don’t have a personal relationship with an astrologer, buy a calendar from Llewellyn called the “2004 Daily Planetary Guide” (2005, 2006, etc.) It has all the key astrological information in a handy spiral bound desktop calendar that you can also use for notes and appointments. It costs $9.95.

The “Daily Planetary Guide” gives you the information you need in plain English. This little calendar is also a great way to learn more about astrology because it has good notes on moon cycles and the other retrograde planets as well.

Here’s a typical retrograde experience. I was out at the golf club during the last retrograde having breakfast next to some really nice guys. They were talking about the usual when I heard one of them say, “Whatever happened to that girl you met at xxx?” The other guy replied, “When I had that climbing accident and dropped my cell phone, I lost all the stuff that was stored in it. I figured she’d call me but she never did.”

I couldn’t help but think of all the girls who come to me for readings wondering whether someone is going to call them but this is a typical Mercury retrograde experience.

Somewhere off to the side, the god of communication stood chuckling as this poor fellow basically got to review his whole life. What kind of phone do you get now? Did you use all the features on the other one or could you do without? Who were half the people on there anyway? How many phone numbers do you really need? How are you going to explain this to your buddies? Are you going to back up your phone records this time? Why did you take it with you anyway … isn’t the whole idea of climbing to get away from the phone? And furthermore, she’s not the only girl in the world!

Mercury Guy is pretty chatty. Pretty curious. And pretty out of control during retrogrades.

The first 11 days of the retrograde cycle are the hardest. This is why. If we go without sleep for a few days (!), the unconscious and conscious minds begin to overlap or bleed into one another, causing hallucinations or confusion about what’s real and not real. The dream world begins to invade the waking world. This shows us the difference between the two ways we can process information. Dreams have wisdom and guidance but their language is very different from the everyday.

When Mercury is direct (the opposite of retrograde), as it is 80 percent of the time, the conscious mind is clearly in control. We think and process information in a practical way that we’ve adapted to fit our needs. Usually this results in a narrow focus. To reach goals, stay in relationships and get along with everybody, we actually tune out a lot of information that doesn’t fit the scheme of things.

All of this changes when Mercury goes retrograde. Like it or not, the focal length changes, the lens opens and information pours in. I didn’t realize how irritated I am with my wife. I can’t believe I’ve been ignoring that leak in the water heater for so long. What on earth am I going to do about that lost file? Why didn’t my order ever go through on such-and-such? Wow, I never noticed how good looking our new UPS man was before!

That’s one reason this transit is so disruptive. You‘re not the only one who’s having trouble concentrating. So is the mailman, the bank officer, the mayor, the governor and the president.

One Greek myth has young Mercury stealing Apollo’s cattle. Not easy to do under the eyes of the Sun God. How did our trickster get away with it? He walked backward over his own tracks in the sand. Keep that image in mind during the next retrograde. You are Mercury. You are the Sun God. And you are the cattle.

Mercury retrogrades for around three weeks but the first 11 days are the hardest. We’re processing a flood of new information plus getting subconscious reminders to review issues that have been dormant since the last retrograde three months ago. That’s the part about walking backwards over the same territory. These issues need to be reviewed and new thoughts on them also have to be integrated with the new information we’re perceiving about our current issues. You can see there are many levels to the way we process important information about our lives. There are many currents in the ocean of the mind.

We also move from conscious, linear and logical data processing to the favorite ways of the unconscious – dreams, symbolic or synchronistic occurrences, Freudian slips and messages from strange places or strange people. Ever had someone in line at the supermarket solve your whole life for you and walk away?

During a recent retrograde, my client was having trouble in her long term relationship. She had been separated for a few weeks and her boyfriend was returning home. She felt ambivalent. While we were talking on the phone, a hawk crashed through her living room window. This message from the natural world helped my client to see her very real distress at the thought of her boyfriend returning. It helped her to see she wasn’t ambivalent at all!

There is another time when the mind is operating on two channels at once. Driving while talking on a cell phone is like trying to be two different places at one time. Driving is a right brain activity where we basically look for patterns and spaces. Talking on the phone is a left brain activity. Ever try rubbing your tummy and patting your head at the same time? Who’s watching the traffic?

Especially during a Mercury retrograde, please don’t talk on your cell while driving. Your chances of causing an accident multiply radically.

Now that you know more about Mercury retrograde and the bigger reasons behind it, help spread the word. While cars stall, phones go dead, answering machines bleep and faxes die, important information is coming in unexpected ways. Please pay attention! There’s going to be a quiz.