Mercury's Direct Station

Mercury's Direct Station — Slowdown/Turnaround

"To state the facts frankly is not to despair the future nor indict the past. The prudent heir takes careful inventory of his legacies and gives a faithful accounting to those whom he owes an obligation of trust."

— John F. Kennedy

Jupiter completes a highly optimistic, inspirational trine to Neptune and an activating, powerfully transformative opposition to Pluto on Monday of this week. An innovative, intellectually expansive Jupiter-Uranus sextile completes the following day — fully completing the coordinated interactions between Jupiter and the three 'Outer Planets'. The completion of Jupiter's coordinating aspects coincides almost exactly with an intensely activating 1st Quarter Moon — the Moon making the waxing square to the Sun, from Libra to Cancer. Jupiter's sextile to Uranus, coinciding with the 1st Quarter Moon offers extraordinary idealism and inspiration but needs support and reassurance in order to 'follow through' and effectively process the deeper shifts that are underway — a daunting and potentially overwhelming proposition. While we may feel the incredibly activating energies in this week's environment, it is important to recognize that there are much larger processes underway that will take a significant amount of time to 'play out'. Jupiter's benefic qualities certainly suggest good fortune — luck — as well as increased optimism. However, if we rely only on Jupiter's luck, we are prone to find that the luck can often run out before we know it — easy come, easy go. The good fortune of Jupiter always requires the self-discipline of Saturn in order to manifest the wisdom that Jupiter is seeking to discover — the significance of the Jupiter-Saturn interaction is well understood. It is important to recognize that Jupiter's involvement in this initial series of consequential connections with the 'Outer Planets' suggests not only optimism but also, the initiation of a truth-seeking exploration process — encouraged, of course, not only by the innovation of Uranus but also the inspiration of Neptune and the transformative intensity of Pluto. The initiation of this exploration and the inspiring, transformative, innovation process will be underway throughout the ongoing outer planet connections, culminating with the final Pluto-Uranus trine in May of 2028. Jupiter provides the initial expansive optimism of this process but not necessarily the self-discipline and 'follow through' that will be required. It is interesting to note, however, that both Chiron and Saturn will conjunct in Taurus, following that May, 2028 trine and make subsequent follow-up squares to Pluto during the months of June and July of 2028. In general, Jupiter's truth-seeking explorations and discoveries can be seen as a preparation for the building of Saturn's 'structures". In other words, once Jupiter 'Discovers the New World', Saturn takes over to erect and test the structures proposed by Jupiter's discoveries. The inspiration and innovation of the ongoing exploratory processes that are initiated this week will be tested for their structural validity once we reach the waxing Saturn-Pluto square in 2028, which reflects all the way back to the Saturn-Pluto conjunction of early 2020.

Mercury is 'practically' stationary this week — remaining on the same degree of Cancer all week — and returns to direct motion by Thursday. The Sun reaches Leo on the day before Mercury's direct station. By next week, the Sun will 'follow-up' on this week's potentially auspicious connections that Jupiter has made with Uranus, Neptune and Pluto. Although all of these developments might suggest a great deal of momentous activity, what we are most likely to see this week is actually a significant slowdown. In this week's atmosphere it is especially important to remain vigilant with our 'fact-checking', encouraged and supported quite effectively by the sextile of Venus to the stationary direct Mercury. Mercury's retrograde motion in Cancer has encouraged us to better integrate our emotional perspectives with our intellectual understanding, protecting our freedom of thought while finding more reliable ways of independently maintaining our security and stability. This has also been a process that has encouraged us to more honestly assess the validity of our deepest instincts, setting aside trauma-based responses and embracing a clearer perspective on our situations and circumstances. As we reach the end of the retrograde phase of Mercury, we are offered important opportunities to 'lay groundwork' — a Mars-Saturn sextile at the beginning of the week improves our self-discipline — but we still need to maintain a discriminating perspective and 'check our facts' methodically, especially throughout this week. We will learn much more after further investigation — assume nothing! By Friday, a Sagittarius Moon 'lights up' the intense 'Fire Sign Energy' in this week's atmosphere. The Moon makes a trine to Neptune and a sextile to Pluto, as we reach the completion of another in the ongoing series of Pluto-Neptune sextiles (the extended Pluto-Neptune sextile has been in 'orb' since before the first completion in 1950 and will begin to separate following the final completion in 2032). However, this 'action oriented' environment at the end of the week is mainly driven by instinct and is rather unrestrained and lacking in clear direction. As we get closer to next Wednesday's Aquarius Full Moon (7:35 AM PDT 6° Aquarius/Leo), we will begin to gain more and more traction in order to fully engage in the remarkable exploratory process that is seems to get a rather slow start this week. The Sun will conjunct Jupiter at the Full Moon as the Full Moon moves over Pluto. Next week's Full Moon will fully energize the extraordinary exploratory process, despite this week's seemingly 'slow start'.

In Sunday's atmosphere, it is especially important to remain vigilant in doing 'fact-checking'. We will need to do whatever we can to maintain our balance — particularly if we feel that our loyalties are being pulled in opposing directions. We are offered important opportunities to 'lay groundwork' on Monday but the need to maintain a discriminating perspective and 'check our facts' remains extremely important. While there is support for investigation, we may still be easily convinced that it's better not to 'rock the boat' — which is more than likely to be a trap. Our sense of direction is challenged on Tuesday with any number of distractions and tempting 'dead ends'. We are likely to prefer to 'bide our time', rather than strike out too far in any particular direction. We may feel a sense of imperative on Wednesday — 'something must be done'. However, the overall environment seems to stall our resolve or our confidence. We are likely to continue to experience bouts of suspicion for much of the day on Thursday. The value of 'letting go' is especially meaningful since we are especially likely to 'strain at gnats' or obsess over details that will soon be recognized to be 'beside the point'. Friday's 'action oriented' environment is mainly driven by instinct and is rather unrestrained. Nonetheless, we do find some support to help us to stay grounded and aware of the need for comprehensive planning and consideration. The lack of restraint intensifies and there is little clear sense of purpose or direction. We may be prone to isolation on Saturday or at least prefer to act without 'consultation'. Determined independence doesn't offer the sort of productive progress that we may believe it will.