First off I want to mention the Mercury phase change – yes, it’s here again!! It happens every 4 months, but does seem to come around somewhat faster than that. For further information on Mercury stations and apparent retrograde motion, please see my archive for the explanatory article which will clarify it for you.
This time, Mercury, ruler of the market place and communication sits at the mid-twenties of Libra and refuses to leave until beginning November.
When Mercury is retrograde, instead of the usual 3 weeks zip through each sign, it concentrates and focuses the energies of the particular sign he spends his sojourn. This then impacts through all the other signs, particularly his own Gemini and Virgo, by both position and rulerships, which I will take into account for each sign below.
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Libra, the flavour of this next year is marked by Venus, planet of beauty and love and incidentally, your ruling planet (could you guess?) changing her mind and deciding to stay put in Aries from February until June 2009. As she does, she has an on/off relationship with Mars that started just last September and which will continue throughout the summer months. These are THE relationship planets, Venus doing the attractive desire stuff and Mars providing the oomph. And Aries is the sign of relationships of all kinds for Libra, so when Venus takes up a long term residence there, then all thoughts turn to love. However, these two planets are all fire and air – hot words and passionate communicating. It’s not until they meet again in solid Taurus mid- June, that things can be put on some kind of firm footing.
Now Libra – come back to earth- that’s for the future! Here in October – Mercury is in your face for the next 6 weeks – communications, deals and negotiations of all kinds are the order of the month for you. It really is a case of now it works, now it doesn’t – with a lot of uncertainty around your effectiveness both socially and financially. During this time there will be possible opportunities to study or travel that may impact on your longer term future – and it’s your choice. However, some of the opportunities may make more demands on you than you would wish. This is the tricky aspect of Mercury – it really gets you wavering – decisions, decisions!! Just bite the bullet and do it anyway.
Your ruler Venus whips along through Scorpio for most of October, hotting up your desire to spend, spend, spend. However, with Mercury still doing his market place rulership thing, you will be reined back into the realms of common-sense. Then Venus shifts into Sagittarius during the last couple of weeks of October and half of November, your life begins to speed up again and becomes interesting on the social front. This is when you can sparkle and entertain with lots of short journeys around and about with friends and family.
When Venus enters Capricorn mid-November, you become aware that life is beginning to slow down after the mad rush of the last couple of weeks. This is a good time to focus on home, family and old friends. Your love of beauty can come to the fore here and you may decide to have a pre-Christmas make-over in your home or help a family member to do theirs.
In the run-up to the festive season you are determined to make a special time for all your loved ones but you need to be mindful of the cost of it all. People don’t need fabulous gifts in order to feel loved, sometimes it’s just the fact that you’re with them that counts. Otherwise, if you push the boat out too far, then Mercury’s three week stop in you money house in January could bring you back to reality rather quickly. However, January’s eclipse in your creative house could get you starting some new and uplifting project that could have a very long term impact on you.
As Venus begins her slow down in February, she gazes into the eyes of Mars – and the love is in the air – or is it? They pass like ships in the night, while holding onto the memories of it all. As a result, March – May could be a challenging period as you try to resist reality and battle with life as it really is, rather than as you would wish it to be. So a time of some emotional imbalance. Issues like hard work, attention to detail, dealing with duties rather than desires can add to the heady mix of Spring for you. Life is never simple!
By the final quarter of the Libran year at the Summer Solstice, you will begin to feel an intensity in all your relationships and a deepening of the atmosphere around you. Your career could become very demanding at the same time as your domestic situation and with the same profundity. You will be making big choices about yourself and you life by this time next year and things will look very different from now.
