The Joy and Healing Possibilities of a Mercury Retrograde.

It takes the Sun 225 million years to revolve around the Milky Way center. Keep that in mind because now I have to tell you that Mercury will retrograde from June 7 to July 2 this year. See now it is not 225 million years in retrograde so no worries! 

If you have been reading my blog for a while, you will know that I hate the doom and gloom energy that surrounds so much of astrological writings these days. Retrograde periods are a good time to go inward and explore that energy in our chart. We have an aversion to slowing down and assessing our talents in this society as we think we need to be always “on point.” We are so “go, do, move, be.” Instead of “think, assess, learn who you are and improve the inner self!” Retrogrades tell us to go within, assess and improve. As much as we moan about them, retrogrades are necessary evils. They are pointers to areas which need improvement in our lives. We have the choice of complaining or doing something about our issues!

With her permission, in fact, it was her idea; I am sharing the chart of Mari McCarthy, the dynamo behind CreateWriteNow, www.createwritenow.com.  Mari’s mantras are Create Your Life Write Now with Mari, and Journaling for the Health of It! She is a no nonsense journaling coach who helps motivated people who want to do to the work to get the most of their lives. She is a teacher who lives the lesson every day and has turned her Mercury retrograde around and now shows others how to do the same.  

Mari was born with her Mercury retrograded in her fifth house, the house of creativity and expressing our inner talents. With the Mercury in reticent Capricorn, an astrologer would immediately say this is a person with self-expression problems, someone who does not want her voice heard or cannot make it heard. That was the beginning of Mari’s story but not her current story. Through intense introspection, hours of journaling work – which she now teaches her client, and sheer courage, she has found the karmic and current life roots of that retrograde and has more than set that Mercury energy on a direct path again.

While as a child, she was afraid to express herself, always allowing others to be her voice Mari is now a fierce advocate for herself. She has literally found her voice – her singing voice - that she never felt had value and she has taken to the recording studio.

She didn’t stop there, however. Mari also has applied her journaling energy beyond “just" finding her voice and now is literally journaling her way back to physical health.  (Notice that Capricorn, ruler of her retrograded Mercury, opens her sixth house of health.) She wouldn’t let the health problems caused by this energy debilitate her and every day she is on a return path to wellness.

Mari has not only reversed her Mercury retrograded action, she has taken her lessons learned and paid them forward to people willing to do the work with her.  It is a classic case of karmic lemons into lemonades.

Mari and I became instant friends, having found each other through our work. One of the things that made me like her so quickly was that she didn’t give off the energy I see so often of “oh I can’t do anything because I have this retrograde here and that retrograde there.” Instead she was glad to see the retrogrades so that she could concentrate her energy on them. She had already been doing so much work on herself and now she said the chart was truly like a road map. Creative music to my ears!

So instead of complaining about the inevitable problems of a Mercury retrograde, use that inward energy to do that inner work necessary to correct your expression issues. While you are at it check out Mari’s website, CreateRIghtNow.com.