by Robert Wilkinson
In part 1 I related that I was recently interviewed about my take on retrogrades, why they may or may not be challenging, why they recur so often, what’s good about them, how natal retrograde planets work, how to use retrogrades to best effect, and more. These two articles are from the notes I prepared for that interview.
In part 1, we covered a lot of material related to retrogrades, different kinds, and different meanings of these periods. Today we'll keep going deeper and wider into the subject of retrogrades.
Today we’ll cover some historical Mercury retrograde events, what it means to have birth planets retrograde, progressions and retrogrades and more.
As I mentioned, the interviewer is going to use some of this as well as material from other interviews in her upcoming book on retrogrades. She sent me questions, and here are my answers from my notes as well as additional material from the interview which I include here. While some things repeat, it was how the interview unfolded, so some of this is a perfect example of a retrograde piece!
Interesting Mercury Retrograde Historical Events
When I was doing research for my pioneering book A New Look at Mercury Retrograde, I found Mercury retrograde periods are great times for uncovering past corporate criminal activity, exposing wrongdoing and wrongdoers, and times when that which was hidden comes to light.
They are great times for things from the past coming back up. They are times when things happen initially which will take time to develop, or turning points in how things are developing from the past and they haven’t yet been resolved, but they’re being revisited and will probably resolve in a future Mercury retrograde period. I have an entire chapter in the book where I list Mercury retrograde events. Here are a few from my research notes which aren’t in the book:
Columbus set sail from Spain on the voyage that would take him to the Americas for the first time, 1492; Leo (SD) It is famously said his name wasn’t Columbus, when Columbus started out he didn't know where he was going, when he got there he didn't know where he was, and when he got back he didn't know where he had been. That’s a retrograde!
Spanish Armada set sail to invade England; after unexpected storms, it was destroyed by England in August, 1588; Taurus
John Wilkes Booth and Jefferson Davis caught, 1865; Taurus
Seward reached agreement with Russia to buy Alaska, 1867; Aries
President Andrew Johnson suspended Secretary of War Stanton; sparked first impeachment proceeding against a US President in history, 1867; Leo (SD)
Women in the Utah Territory gained the right to vote, 1870; Aquarius
Custer massacred at Little Big Horn, 1876; Gemini
Supreme Court ordered Standard Oil breakup, 1911; Taurus
Roald Amundsen discovered South Pole, 1911; Capricorn (SR)
The "Titanic" sank off the coast of Newfoundland, 1912; Aries
Republicans propose first ever federal sales tax, 1922; Aquarius (and they just did it again during the past Mercury retrograde!)
Lenin dies of cerebral hemorrhage, 1924; Capricorn
J. Edgar Hoover given post as FBI Director, 1924; Taurus
Amelia Earhart became the first woman to fly non-stop across US, 1932; Leo (SD)
Dirigible Hindenburg explodes at Lakehurst N.A.S., 1937; Taurus
Russians invade Finland, 1939; Sagittarius
All-India Congress demands total independence from Great Britain, 1940; Leo (SR)
Nazis confiscate French art treasures, 1940; Leo (Later on, during another Mercury retrograde period, Allied soldiers found art treasures buried in a salt mine.)
Hitler orders preparation for British invasion; Battle of Britain begins, 1940; Leo
FDR re-elected to become the first third term president in history, 1940; Scorpio
Hitler begins war on Russia, 1941; Cancer (SR)
Mexico declares war against Germany, Italy, and Japan May 30, and then agrees that war had already existed since May 22, 1942; Gemini (SR)
Battle of Midway, the turning point of the Pacific War, 1942; Gemini
Eleanor Roosevelt advocates voting rights for ages 18 and up, 1943; Aquarius (eventually the 26th amendment was passed in 1971 due in part to the song “Eve of Destruction”)
Mexico issues a decree ending the siesta, 1944; Taurus
Battle of the Bulge begins at Bastogne, Belgium, 1944; Capricorn (SR)
US Senate ratifies water pact with Mexico "guaranteeing" them 1.5 million acre-feet of water annually from the Colorado River, 1945; Aries
Atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Russia declares war on Japan, Japan surrenders, 1945; Virgo (SR)
First underwater atomic test at Bikini Atoll, 1946; Leo
India invades Kashmir, 1947; Scorpio
Xerox and Fax machines were demonstrated for the first time, 1948; Libra
Senate issues report stating that 20 big oil companies dominate the industry, and oil shortages of 1948 were induced to increase profits, 1949; Aquarius (AND, we just found out during the past retrograde Big Oil made all time record profits last year due to price gouging.)
What About Retrograde Birth Planets?
Often people with a natal planet retrograde may have an easier time during the times when that transiting planet it retrograde. Mercury retrograde people often do well during Mercury retrograde periods because they are familiar with that pace. Someone with Venus retrograde at birth understands how to deal with Venus retrograde periods because they’ve been attuned to that energy since birth. However, that doesn’t mean they’ll necessarily do the right thing, since each retrograde forces us to adapt our understanding to the new information we’re receiving, whether from outer or inner sources.
Here it’s important to note whether Mercury and Venus are in front of or behind the Sun, since that shows us whether we were born with a long progressed retrograde or a short progressed retrograde. Those with Mercury or Venus retrograde in their charts probably will see those planets go stationary direct by progression. Those point in life mark major changes in how the person views and expresses their internal Mercury and Venus energies.
To me, a retrograde is just a different way of experiencing that planetary principle. There are times when we’re moving forward in life, and then as we progress, we hit points where we have a different pace of learning and relating.
In my life, I was born with Mercury direct, but it went retrograde when I was 13. Because Mercury was retrograde for 23 days it meant that my progressed Mercury was retrograde for 23 years. Then it went direct when I was 36 and began to move forward again.
Not all retrogrades are equal, because some Mercury retrograde periods are as short as 17 days, while others can last 24 days. You can see how that would make a big difference in someone’s life, since a progressed retrograde of 17 days represents a 7 year difference from someone with a 24 day retrograde. A long retrograde isn’t necessarily bad, because Mercury retrograde people often do see things others don’t see because they’re focused on what’s missing, not what’s there. They want to sift through all kinds of information from a lot of different angles before they make up their minds.
That quality doesn’t go away just because their progressed Mercury goes direct. It just means that they have that quality, though as they get older their ability to coordinate things, to process things, and to communicate things speeds up. A Mercury retrograde person still needs time to reflect, but when their progressed Mercury goes direct their ability to coordinate and process things speeds up. This also applies to Venus retrograde going direct in the progressed chart.
Best Approach to a Retrograde?
Reflection, review, receptivity, awareness of different angles of approach, and don’t push the river! In the case of the recent Mars retrograde in Gemini (it entered its shadow zone in early September 2022 and will remain there until mid-March 2023), because Mars is how we “attack the problems of life,” as well as our “fight or flight” principle, it was a good time to slow down, find alternative ways to get things done, adapt to a slowed pace, diffuse tensions and work on other things which will support the original initiative after the retrograde is done.
How Wide is the Influence of A Retrograde?
We’re all under countless retrograde influences whether we’re acting, reacting, or being acted upon. I explain that in A New Look at Mercury Retrograde. The planets don’t make anything happen. We’re the ones who are acting, or reacting, or being acted upon. Each planet shows us a part of our personality. It’s our job to elevate their expression to the highest level materially, emotionally, mentally and spiritually, across the personal, interpersonal, and transpersonal dimensions of human existence.
We move forward in life, expressing our skills when planets are direct. We slow down, then review and reflect and find a different angle on things during their retrograde. Each is necessary for us to learn what we have to learn in life about each planet’s function within us.
During a Mercury retrograde, we learn about how we’re responding to the “Guide of Souls,” and whether our ideas are bringing our mind to life or leading us to dead ends. That’s because Mercury’s duality is Life/Death, in that our ideas are either leading us to life or leading us to stagnant approaches and understanding. Either our ideas are leading us to dead ends, or leading us to a better life.
Venus retrograde helps us understand how our subconscious mind is attracting what we want or what we do not want; I explain this in The Magic of Venus: Friendships, Soul Mates, and Twin Flames where I have an entire chapter on Venus retrograde. The book explains why we have positive and negative attractions, conscious attractions and unconscious attractions. We have the power to reprogram our inner Venus to attract more perfect relationships. Venus retrograde periods help us reflect and review some things from the past to assist finding better relationships in the future.
Mars retrograde teaches us about patience, that we cannot push the river, and we cannot move forward in certain ways until certain other things are done first. Jupiter retrograde teaches us about factors in our expansion process and how we were protected in the past, or how an opportunity we were offered in the past had to be delayed until we learned certain things. Saturn retrograde teaches us through repeat lessons so we may round out our understanding and wisdom. Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto all bring returns of spiritual lessons we’ve already seen but must continue to master.
Final Thoughts?
Retrogrades are great for getting signals from within we may not have noticed before, and they’re also great for getting signals from the collective field which help us understand how sometimes what we’re thinking or feeling is coming from an external source we’re tuned into, and not necessarily our own feelings or thoughts. That helps us get clear about ourselves.
I think what most people get wrong about retrogrades are they think there is something bad about those periods, or that they think their lives can’t move forward in some way. Using Mars retrograde as an example, life is still moving forward in many ways during those periods, but we may have to do other things in the short term which will support our efforts in the future. I often remind people that “to defer is not to abandon.” It’s just sometimes in life you can only go just as far as you can go, and reach a metaphoric “road closed” sign and you have to go somewhere else to get around the “closed road” before you can resume forward motion.
A huge misconception is that because Mercury, Venus, and Mars go retrograde, somehow those parts of our lives crash. A surgeon’s skills don’t desert them just because Mars is retrograde! It is equally possible that when Mars is retrograde what was thought to be the problem is discovered not to be the actual problem, but there’s another one which must be taken care of first.
Venus retrograde has a reputation for being too introverted, too complex, too distant, too interior, or too standoffish, among other traits. It is true that Venus retrograde focuses on the past, because it is a retrograde. But reviewing the past doesn’t doom us to repeat it in the future! It’s often useful to look at the past so we can get insight into what happened and why, but also to get insights about how to correct the problem, if there is one, so we can move forward in that part of our life.
This brings us back to the heart of our evolutionary need. The only problem we have is in the malfunction of a planet, not what sign it’s in or whether it’s retrograde. As Eternals having a human experience, it’s our task to integrate our personality so it productively expresses our Higher Self. Ultimately we’re here to perfect every one of our planetary expressions so we can fulfill our purpose for being here, living happy Soul-ful lives and relationships with self, with others, with the Earth, and with Spirit/Source.
Retrogrades are a natural part of the process. Mercury and Venus retrograde periods help us with those personality functions, and the oppositions between the Sun and outer planet retrogrades illuminate that planetary lesson, message, or possibility. All retrograde give us a chance to take a new look at how we understand and express that planet in our lives.
So a natal retrograde is not a bad thing since they show you are reviewing those lessons and getting a new understanding of that planetary function. And if a retrograde planet goes direct by progression, it shows that we can now move forward having learned a lot along the way from multiple angles of view and can turn old negatives to current positives, regardless of the sign it’s in.
The dance of retrogrades is a marvelous thing to behold, and are a natural part of life and evolution. Have fun taking a new look at your natal, progressed, and return retrogrades, as well as the constant swirl of retrogrades going on most of the year for most of the planets!
© Copyright 2023 Robert Wilkinson
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