Mercury began its apparent backtracking motion earlier today at 4 Virgo 05–so what should we expect? This retrograde starts in an Earth sign, one that’s ruled by Mercury itself, one that is focused on thought processes, language, comprehension, mental perceptions, the harvest/ results of efforts, and keeping careful track of these (Virgo). Add to this those things Mercury stands for: quickness, facility with thought and language, on-a-dime changeability, communication, contracts and agreements, and then focus difficulties with or withdrawal of forward progress in these matters through the lens of the natal House where the retrograde occurs. We must also look to Houses ruled by Mercury (Virgo and Gemini) and any aspects transiting retrograde Mercury makes to natal placements. That’s the formula for understanding the personal picture–but there are some general things that apply to the cycle no matter what House it occurs in with the natal chart, or what things it aspects for you personally.

Mercury starts retro motion poised to meet Venus, which has just entered Virgo; they’re already close enough to be considered in contact, and that paints a particular picture, one where we may try very hard to apply the mental faculties to relationship and/ or asset-related matters but find that either the mind is a distracting chatterbox that won’t let us focus, or that we can’t seem to form a clear thought at all. Mercury in Virgo asks us to make an accounting, to keep track, to know where we stand, to know who is entitled to what, and is dedicated to keeping both the facts and the results of our labor distributed accurately–but along comes the retro and we lose our mental grip–and though it’s uncomfortable, it’s supposed to happen. We are meant during a Mercury retro to stop relying so heavily on cognitive functions and open ourselves temporarily to the senses and the feeling nature to gain information.

The Moon will move over Merc just hours after retro, injecting a spark of intuitive insight or information delivered through the emotions, just the kind of thing a retro is meant to bring about. Note how this feels, and use that feeling throughout the retro time; taking a feeling-centered approach will provide your best and most accurate sources of both info and understanding, until Merc goes direct, on the 28th.

The next contact will be a quincunx to Pluto, itself retrograde at the moment. That likely delivers an urge to dig, overturn, reform, resurrect, or stirs our impulse to transform, and this is probably something we’ve either been contemplating through Higher Mind or involves radical alteration or ahead-of-the-pack innovation or creation (Aquarius). These aspects kick off our Mercury in Virgo retro experience, which overall will ask us to review material matters by asking ourselves: what do I have, and what do I think I should have? With both Venus and Pluto involved in the retrograde point, we shouldn’t be surprised that this question will be asked in relation not just to assets and their distribution (Venus, Virgo) but to relationships (Venus) and to big energies of permanent change (Pluto). We could, by the end of the cycle, discover we’ve made up our minds about what (or who) must go, about what must be eliminated, for our own good.

We should note that Mercury will pass back into Leo, where it will quincunx Neptune and then meet the Sun in Inferior Conjunction (the 18th), while at the same time as this latter aspect square Uranus. Moving back into Leo brings the focus back to ourselves as individuals, and asks: who do we think we are? and what do we think we’re good at? The contact to a 29 degree planet of creativity and delusion (Neptune)may be especially stressful, ramping up the feeling both that ‘something’s wrong’ and that we are out of control or unable to receive any info accurately. Again, this is a perception, not necessarily a reality. The Inferior Conjunction marks a point in time where new things are born–in this case, likely new ideas about who we are (Leo)–and the square to Uranus adds the element of surprise, the influence of chaos, or a shock, possibly related to our role within the larger group.

In just over three weeks (the 28th) Mercury will resume forward motion–but that’s the thing: it doesn’t really move backwards at all, it just looks that way from our vantage point on Earth. When the retro occurs we think (Mercury) things are suddenly different, that Mercury-related things don’t work right, are uncooperative, or can’t be fathomed by our mysteriously addled thought processes–and certainly, the feedback we get during the retro reinforces this; the mistake would be to think these things are happening outside ourselves. They are perceptual, and that means they are distortions of the norm, specifically meant to make us pause and re-think, to access and use the feeling nature and the intuition (which in too many of us are neglected, or spurned in favor of more tangible info, even, and particularly, when those feelings contradict what seem to be the facts before us), and access to the intuitive and feeling is spurred by the fact that how we typically process and judge information just isn’t working. That’s the gift of Mercury retro: it slows us down and realigns the ways we take in information. Relying too much on any one thing to process life events, our choices, our needs (the mind, the intuition, the feelings, what others tell us) will hobble the perceptual abilities overall. The Mercury retro helps us break out of those constrictions we assign ourselves. Relax, embrace as many ways of gaining input as possible, and accept that it’s likely we’ll have to wait until after direction to draw very many conclusions or make definitive statements. And that’s the way it’s meant to be.