Holiday Blessing with a Side of Mercury Retrograde

Another holiday season is upon us. This one was preceded by a flurry of events that have left many people a bit out of sorts, if not genuinely stunned, for the holidays. Not only major national events, but also many local and personal events have shown up in very unusual ways.

Add in Mercury retrograde beginning just before Solstice. We could be in for a roller coaster ride. This round's intensity rises alongside its close alignment to Pluto, ruler of the Underworld actively guiding the Middle World. It's a good time for research, uncovering secrets, reconnecting with people, revisiting events, and redoing projects. Making it the perfect time for family gatherings ~ as long as communication happens with great love and care.

Mercury retrograde provides the opportunity for reflection and insight before responding to challenging circumstances. If we quiet ourselves, it's the time when our intuition can speak the most clearly ~ if we listen.

Mercury is the messenger of the gods, both between the deity and between gods and humans. As a planet, it's the director of alchemy. It communicates the changes and transformations we need to move to the next phase of our lives. During this one in particular, Mercury goes retrograde in Capricorn, the realm of responsibilities, career, plans, structures, goals, and control. If we quiet ourselves, we will receive the awareness and insight we need.

This year we will be entering 2017 with Mercury in retrograde. That gives us a slow, contemplative start of the new year. If we use this reflective time wisely, we can move into 2017 with more awareness, understanding and information than ever before.

As a messenger, Mercury also rules the throat chakra, the place from which we communicate and speak our truth. In retrograde, some of what may surface will be the secrets and old pains. we have the choice of how we speak our truth about those feelings. If we listen and choose to do so we bring awareness and understanding to the surface. In retrograde, Mercury gives us the reason to pause, look and listen to catch the fullness of what is being offered.

In this respect, fluid and retrograde Mercury is part of the blessing of the season. We can slow down and listen before we speak or we can rush right in and precipitate a quicker change by blurting things without thought or care. It's a gift of choice as we get together with family and friends.

What blessings do you have in this moment? How much time do you take for reflection during the holidays? What are you skimming over? What are you missing? To what do you need to pay more attention? What new responsibility are you considering taking on? How is your communication affected during this time? What creative ways can you use to slow yourself down? How can you help others have a better life?

New Moon in Gemini and Grand Cross

New Moons are always about letting go, change and transformation. This one in particular, intimately connected with the mutable Grand Cross, is about changing direction, changing perception, changing affection.... releasing anything, any little thing, inhibiting our deeper, truer Selves from showing up.

This New Moon, as it squares Jupiter, Neptune and the Nodes and opposes Saturn, lights our way to discerning the truth in our life and making decisions to release the past so the new can show up for us. We must relish our own self-love in order to express our love for others in the best possible way. We have to learn and experience and practice how to do things differently, to create new pathways in our very being leading toward that creation and creativity. We benefit from remembering our power is in embracing Mystery and Unknowing in order to shift our reality and create change by unlocking the alchemy of surrender. This New Moon also celebrates the facets of the Divine Feminine: instincts of the Moon, physicality of Venus, resistance of Lilith.

Because this New Moon is also activating many planetary energies, there is potent and potential energy in this New Moon, preparing us to consider the seeds we want to plant for the future. This is something we should take seriously ~ or find ourselves stuck in the patterns of the past. All the recent retrograde energy we've been rolling through (see my post on the Full Moon in Sagittarius and Other Wonders) has aided us in stirring up the past in order to release it. Gemini is all about communication and the throat chakra to express our truth and feelings and call forth what we truly want.

As we look for what has been cleared and released from our lives during all the retrograde cycles, the golden opportunity of this New Moon is to notice the cracks and seek clarity on how to proceed. Our actions and energies, current to the next eclipse season starting in September. will shape what is to come. As we clarify and set our intentions, in writing preferably, it would be wise for us to remember that when one door closes, another opens.

What are your intentions for the future? What are you willing to release? What do you wish to call forth? What do you wish to manifest? How will you speak your wishes? How will your intentions affect those around you? To whom will you speak your intentions?