This blogpost is a transcript from a YouTube video that I released on 8/3/25. If you would like to support your reading with some audio or visual stimulation, here's the video for your enjoyment.

This is a part of a series I made doing a deep dive on all of the planets in Astrology. You can find that playlist here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sfms9dnLM3w

*I will often refer to a Zodiac Wheel through the video which includes the Zodiac signs, their planetary rulers, element assignment, quadruplicity, and gender. This is extremely helpful as you begin your studies in Astrology. If you would like to download a free, high quality version of this graphic, click here.

Intro

If you are ready to go deep and harness the full potential of astrology to shape change in your own life and the world around you, stay with me. My name is Aleena, and I am the astrologer for creatives and change makers with a Physics B.S. from Yale. Today we're talking about Mercury, one of the trickiest planets in the zodiac. Mercury is more things than any other planet.

Why Study Mercury Alone?

What I'm going to do in this video is take a deep dive into what is Mercury's essential nature. So, I will not be going through "this is what Mercury in Taurus means" or "this is what Mercury in Scorpio means." Instead, we're going to just get into the essence of what Mercury is on his own. I think this is a really good way to learn astrology: to first understand each of the planets and their own essential intrinsic nature, and then get into each of the zodiac signs and understand each of them on their own terms in the most fundamental essential qualities that constitute what the zodiac signs are.

Then, with this very intimate direct connection to the symbols—understanding them to their core—you'll be able to really apply their meanings and be fluent in the symbolism to start to really inoculate your consciousness, go deeper, and harness their full transformational power. So, I would recommend for a program of learning that you start with each of the planets, which this series will go through. You can subscribe here if you're interested in following me through on this journey or just want to support my work, and then getting into each of the zodiac signs, then the houses, then the aspects. These are the four pillars of astrology.

Once you have a really deep understanding of each of these four core components of the language—the symbolism, the art, the science of astrology—then you'll be able to really fluidly converse with the cosmos in a way that will be even more transformative, powerful, and meaningful. You'll be able to apply the multivalent meanings of each of these core symbols to your life because not every single meaning of every single planet and sign is going to apply to every situation in your life or resonate with you. So, to be able to first understand the multivalent meanings and what everything really is on a deep level, you'll be able to pick and choose and apply what is resonating for you and how it works in your life uniquely, because everything is extremely complex and nuanced.

What does Mercury mean in Astrology?

Today we're talking about Mercury. Mercury is the trickster, the communicator, the messenger. It's hard to put your finger on exactly what Mercury is, and that is by his own design. Mercury is the only planet that is neither masculine nor feminine. It doesn't play for the day team or the night team. Mercury does as he pleases. Mercury is known for his mutability. Mercury can be whatever you need him to be. He adapts to the situation. He's like a chameleon. So, whether or not he is playing nice or being a little bit more malicious will depend on what's happening around him and who's nearby. He is very much influenced by the surroundings in his placement in your chart and in general.

In the Greek pantheon, Mercury is Hermes. Hermes trusts both. Hermes is the god of communication, the god of learning, the god of education and literacy. Mercury is very intelligent. Mercury governs letters, numbers, math, astronomy, and astrology. You can think of Mercury as sort of like left-brain thinking—this very analytical, "one before the other" logic. This is, of course, the way that language works. We speak one word at a time. When we write, we write one letter at a time. We're taking in the details. This is the left-brain way of thinking. This is also why Hermes and Mercury have to do with numbers and math. We can think of Mercury as intelligence in a sense, but it's this very left-brain, analytical, detail-oriented intelligence.

Mercury also governs tools, the ability to work with your hand, craftiness, building, and also business, commerce, and money. These things sort of have to do with being able to put things together, analyze fluidly, and maneuver many different things. Mercury is our ability to think critically. Also, our sense of humor as the trickster and the communicator—this is sort of another clever nature of Mercury. Mercury loves jokes, which is fun if you are Mercury making jokes, and less fun if you are the joke. But he will go both ways for you, probably at different times.

Interestingly, Mercury is associated with astrology and astrologers, as well as magic and dream interpretation. There's a way that all of these things are a language, a way of communicating, but into more of the depths. Symbolic thinking, I suppose, is at the root of all of these things. Letters and numbers are all symbols, and symbols are a tool to help us think clearly and analytically in a very straightforward, detail-oriented type of way. These are very powerful tools.

Underneath all of this, you could also think of Mercury's primary function as to transmit and convey. He is the messenger, the go-between, and also the one who receives. Mercury has to do with hearing as well—our ability to articulate ourselves and also to understand language being spoken around us. Mercury is quite adaptable, very skilled, and very talented. Mercury can do lots of things. Anything you need, anything you need him to be, anything you want him to do, Mercury has got it. This is a strong Mercury in a good position in his own essence fundamentally as the god Hermes. Whatever you need, he's a "catch all," a jack-of-all-trades; Mercury has got you.

You can also think of Mercury as being sort of neutral. You think of maybe Switzerland—this neutrality where Mercury doesn't take sides. This can make him quite controversial. He does get some flak in the zodiac for this quality of not choosing to be "this way" or "that way." Mercury is curious to hear both sides. Mercury is interested in understanding everything without taking a moral stance. You can think of Mercury again as tools, where a tool like a knife, for instance, is not intrinsically good or bad. You could use a knife for good—maybe you're cutting some carrots—or you could use a knife for evil—maybe you are enacting some violence. But Mercury is just interested in how to use the knife skillfully, not making a judgment call of whether or not you should or shouldn't use the knife. We're just trying to get to know the knife and its technical ability. This is Mercury's attitude.

Why does Mercury rejoice in the First House in Astrology?

Mercury also has his joy in the first house. I'm using "his," but Mercury is really a "they/them." Mercury is neither masculine nor feminine, but just for the sake of coherency, most people seem to use "he" for Mercury. So, Mercury has his joy in the first house. The first house is a great place for Mercury. It is called the "helm" in traditional astrology. This is the hands on the wheel of the ship that is your life, steering the direction.

In traditional astrology, the first house, the first place, is where the ascendant is. I am a Hellenistic astrologer, so that's what I'll be speaking on. Traditional astrology uses whole sign houses where the first house is the entire zodiac sign where the ascendant is located. Because the ascendant is located here, but the first house is taking up the whole sign, there is a part of the first house that is above the eastern horizon. The ascendant is the exact eastern horizon. So, if the ascendant is in the middle of whatever zodiac sign that is—let's say Cancer—if the ascendant is in the middle of Cancer here, then there will be a part of Cancer that is above the horizon and a part of Cancer that is below the horizon.

This is the reason why traditional astrologers associated the first house with both the mind (you could think of this as the air, the sky, what is above, what is mental spirit) and also the body (what is the earth beneath the horizon, the foundation, the physicality). So, the first house represents both the mind and the body. Mercury is essentially dual in this nature. You could think of Mercury as kind of like black-and-white thinking, but it's not really necessarily black-and-white thinking per se, but just that it is useful to understand things in dualities.

For instance, technology is very much a mercurial thing, and this is extremely technical. The ultimate language of computers is binary—zeros and ones. But this very foundational black-and-white thinking is able to do incredibly complex things. And it's not that this is the ultimate nature of reality, but this is the way that Mercury is able to really break things down, understand them on a deep level, get super technical, and create all these permutations and combinations. His brilliance is his ability to break things down in this ultimate, very detailed, particular way. All of that to say, Mercury is very much associated with duality in a sense—being this and that, the trickster, good and bad. So, the first house makes a lot of sense for him being that it is a place that has to do with two things: the mind and the body. It has both the sky and the earth. This is the helm. This is Mercury's joy.

The Zodiac Wheel + What does planetary rulership mean in Astrology?

It can also be useful to understand Mercury through his opposite. If you look at the zodiac wheel, which I will pull one up here, you can see this is a super potent symbol full of information that will be extremely valuable to your astrological learning. There's way more information here than I will dive into in this video, but if you want to blow this up and have it for your own study, this is available for download for free on my website, which you can find the link in the description below.

In the zodiac wheel here, we have the planet Mercury ruling Gemini, and we also have Mercury over here ruling Virgo. In this wheel, we have all of the zodiac signs in English on the outer circle. The next circle has their symbol and also the image associated with the constellation. Gemini is this little symbol that looks like the number two in Roman numerals and also the twins. Over here in Virgo, ruled by Mercury, we have the Virgo symbol and then also the maiden here. It's really interesting and important to look at the zodiac signs that Mercury rules to illustrate more of who he is and get to understand him on a deeper level.

Planetary rulership you can understand as each zodiac sign having a planet that rules that sign—that is an embodiment of that planet's nature. Up to this point, I've talked about who Mercury is sort of in a vacuum, the most essential archetypal essence of who Mercury is. Now we can look at not this sort of platonic ideal, not this perfect abstract version of Mercury, but Mercury sort of more on the ground. This is more of an embodied, holistic understanding of who he is and how he works when you look at him in his manifestations in the zodiac.

In ancient astrology, the way that they conceptualized the sky and the stars was that the sky is its own world. The sky has these 12 kingdoms that are the zodiac signs. Each of these kingdoms is like a country or a region. They have their own culture, they have their borders—these are the boundaries between signs. The planets are sort of the wandering characters who traverse around the sky world. Each of them has rulership or is the king of one or two of these kingdoms in the sky, of these zodiac signs. As the planets wander around, they might find themselves in a place that's very comfortable for them—their domicile, the place where they are the king or queen of that region—or a place where they are exalted, a place that is very supportive of their nature and what they want to do. Or they might find themselves in a very difficult place, in a sign that is very antithetical to their nature that wants to do the opposite of what they want to do.

So, these are the planets roaming around, the kings, the characters in the countries, the regions, the zodiac signs. And then the aspects in astrology are the relationships between the planets. Are these characters getting along? Are they supporting each other? Are they fighting? How hard is the fight? There are many different ways that we can get into evaluating the condition and the quality of each planet, sign, and house. I'm not going to get into all of that here, but it's important information for you to be able to understand this next piece about understanding Mercury through his opposite, Jupiter.

Why does Mercury Rule Gemini and Virgo?

Back to the wheel. We have in the zodiac wheel the order in which the signs go from Aries, Taurus, Gemini, etc. Then the inner wheel here shows the planet that rules each sign. Venus rules Taurus, and on the inside of that, we have the label so you know what each symbol means. For each sign, we have its symbol and the planet that rules it written out in English as well. Then we have the element, the quadruplicity (whether it's cardinal, fixed, or mutable), and masculine or feminine. All of this information is listed here, and the geometry between these different qualities is extremely significant and meaningful.

For this piece, we're just going to focus on Mercury and his opposite. You'll notice that Mercury is opposite to Jupiter. This is true in the Mercury-ruled Gemini versus Jupiter-ruled Sagittarius, and also on the Mercury-ruled Virgo versus Jupiter-ruled Pisces axis. In the zodiac, Mercury is opposite to Jupiter. That's because these two planets have opposite natures; they want to do opposite things. It's very useful to understand the polarity that exists in each of these axes. In the Gemini-Sagittarius axis, signs that are opposite will have the same gender. This is the masculine axis of Mercury-Jupiter. Then the Pisces-Virgo axis is the feminine axis of Mercury-Jupiter. Pisces and Virgo are feminine; Sagittarius and Gemini are masculine.

Jupiter has to do with justice, abundance, and good fortune—very much "Santa Claus" energy—optimism, joy, expansion, growth, and the big picture. The ways in which Mercury and Jupiter are opposite is that Mercury tends to be very much detail-oriented, analytical, sort of left-brain intelligence, and Jupiter tends to be more big-picture, expansive thinking, and also more concerned with ethics, justice, and what is right. Jupiter is associated with God, for instance, and lawyers and judges and other kind of institutional authority figures that are promoting ethics in a way.

Mercury in this sense does not pass judgment. Mercury is trying to stay objective, trying to look at both sides of things. Mercury's fundamental function is to question things. Mercury is not going to make a judgment, stake a claim, or plant a flag. Mercury is looking around, moving around, and just seeing what's out there. Jupiter's function is to confirm, to say, "Yes, this is just, this is moral, this is the way to go, this is the direction we need to head." It's almost sort of an "ethos versus logos" axis.

Gemini is a mutable air sign. Mercury is very mutable, and Gemini is very mutable. Air has to do with intelligence and the intellect, also playfulness. This is also Mercury's nature. Gemini is the messenger, the communicator. So is Mercury. This is a very synergistic synthesis here of Mercury and Gemini. Gemini loves to communicate, is very playful, has lots of jokes, is full of trickster energy, and is super smart and super good at stuff. He is able to be whatever you need him to be and do whatever you need him to do. He can be very good with technical things in the hands or more so an analytical brain, or the intelligence of communication and strength of articulating and being understood. This is the masculine air version of Mercury.

Then we have Virgo. Virgo is the mutable earth version of Mercury. This is the feminine version of Mercury. Earth is an interesting element for Mercury to take because he wants to be so changing. Of course, it makes sense that it would be mutable Earth. Both of Mercury's signs are mutable, and that is really the only way that Mercury wants to be. In the Virgo manifestation of Mercury, we have a sign that is extremely detail-oriented and very good at getting things done. Virgo has a much more practical bend to it. Whereas Gemini, as an air sign, is like, "We could just think about this; let's just see what's out there; it doesn't have to necessarily mean anything or go anywhere," Virgo is like, "Okay, here's what we need to do. Here is the to-do list. This is how we're getting this done and who needs what from me. Okay, first we're going to do this."

Virgo is also very much the editor. Virgo is the maiden in the zodiac, so Virgo is also much more tending towards being helpful, being practical, and being in service. Virgo is also very much known for being an editor, very good at detail-oriented tasks, finding minute little flaws and correcting them. For this reason, Virgo can sometimes be associated with a little bit of perfectionism, especially as the maiden. Virgo tends to have a little bit of a better rap in the zodiac. Gemini, as the twins, has very much this dual nature of being good and bad. Gemini tends to get a worse rap in the zodiac for being two-faced or being able to be this person and then that person depending on what the situation calls for. They can sort of change their face in a way which can be quite concerning if you are in a relationship with a Gemini and you're wondering, "Well, who are you really? What do you really believe in? Is this all just a game to you? Where are you actually underneath it all?" This is sort of the shadow side of Mercury.

On the Virgo end of things, and the shadow side of Mercury in a mutable earth Virgo type of way, we can get into this very analytical, detail-oriented awareness of the flaws in everything. That is a superpower, but it also can sometimes be a little bit self-destructive and even neurotic—being able to zoom in so close and get everything perfect, looking at all of the details and maybe potentially sometimes being overwhelmed by the expectations that they set for themselves and others because they can see all of the flaws. This can sort of be overwhelming sometimes and even lead toward a little bit of neurosis, feeling like everything might need to be a particular way because they can just see what is best and what the perfect version of anything is. That can be a hard thing if you don't have that balanced out.

Gemini-Sagittarius / Mercury-Jupiter opposition: How they have opposite natures

To look at the axis now, the opposites, we have again Gemini opposite Sagittarius. In this opposition of air Mercury Gemini and fire Jupiter Sagittarius, both are mutable because they are in this axis. Signs that are opposite also share the same quadruplicity. The fundamental opposition here that we see is that Sagittarius is full of passion. Sagittarius as a Jupiter-ruled sign normally has something that they are very passionate about that they almost tend to want to evangelicalize in a way. It could be something about justice or something about religion—one of these Jupiter-sort-of-big-picture-idealist types of things where they really want to spread the word. Mutable fire is a forest fire: "Let's get it out there and get everybody on our same page and go forward into what is just and righteous and good." This is the centaur as well—very much a warrior spirit pushing forward an ideal, an ideology, or something like that.

Gemini not so much. Gemini can see how that could be good. He could also see the other side of it. Gemini is going to ask, "But what about the other guy?" There's probably validity to both sides of this. Air signs also tend to be a little bit more dispassionate—not so much passion. They can almost be sort of cold sometimes, which is a quality that gets associated with air signs. Opposite to this fiery passion of Sagittarius, Gemini just wants to think about stuff and have fun. Sagittarius knows what is good and just and wants to spread the word about that. This is the Jupiter-Mercury duality.

Pisces-Virgo / Mercury-Jupiter opposition: How they have opposite natures

On the other axis, in the Pisces-Virgo axis—the feminine axis of Mercury and Jupiter—we have the very detail-oriented, practical Virgo against the big-picture, dreamy Pisces. Again, this Jupiter of idealism is very dreamy because it's a water sign now. Whereas Sagittarius had more of this fire of passion and spreading, as a mutable water sign, Pisces is more in this kind of liminal, almost subconscious, dreamy, artistic healer state. As a mutable water sign, Pisces is very empathetic and very much can feel what's happening in people around them and has this ideal. Pisces is the mystic more so.

If Sagittarius is sort of the gypsy and the evangelicalist, Pisces is the mystic. Pisces is having these Jupiter ideals, but it's a much more kind of numinous experience where they have more of a felt, emotional sense of what is right and just, and a feeling of wanting to bring that into the world around them because they can feel the suffering of others and really want to bring forward this justice and peace and whatever the ideal is. It can be very painful for them to not see that happening around them, which is partially why sometimes Pisces can tend toward a little bit of depression.

Pisces is swimming in this kind of artistic, emotional ideal dream world, which is extremely important in society. We need that, and we need people connected to that. But that is sort of opposing the Mercury aspect of Virgo that is more concerned about the real world. Virgo is probably the best at navigating the real world—the nuts and bolts, getting things done, putting the pieces together, enacting the things that need to be enacted. Pisces might be the sign that struggles the most with those kind of earthy, practical things and is much more in this mystical, dreamy place and these ideals.

You can think of the Jupiter-Mercury axis here as kind of Pisces being the big-picture dreamy ideal and then Mercury saying, "Okay, but what do we need to do? How do we get things done?" Getting the details sorted out—the big picture and the small picture. This is more of that "water-earth" duality, where water is going to have this more healing, emotional, creative bend to it, where earth is going to be more practical and functional. "What are we doing?" Water doesn't care about that so much.

To bring it back to the Sagittarius-Gemini axis one more time, another essential function of Mercury is to destabilize through this questioning, whereas Jupiter is in its function to stabilize and confirm. Gemini as the trickster is fine playing his little jokes and poking fun and poking holes in things. It's not just that he's neutral, but he also wants to have some fun with it. "Oh, you think you're so sure about that? Let me just... boop!" That's some Mercury energy—like, "Well, what about that?" having fun destabilizing what you were so sure about. Whereas Sagittarius and Jupiter are very much wanting to confirm. Again, this is what is just and it's very stabilizing. Jupiter is the largest planet—very expansive and solid, ready to just be kind of sure and certain and support stability in whatever it is that he is interacting with.

Light and shadow sides of Mercury / Strengths and Weaknesses

I have gone into some light and shadow qualities of Mercury already to some degree. Of course, Mercury's strengths will be in critical thinking, being analytical, being detail-oriented, communicating, and understanding in this very left-brain type of way. In the shadow side of Mercury, Mercury struggles a little bit more with big-picture thinking and also this kind of ethos, this ethical nature. Mercury is not really in the business of thinking about what is morally correct. So, that would be potentially a struggle for him.

How to interpret Mercury in a birth chart

To get into how you interpret Mercury in your chart, people most often will associate your Mercury sign with your style of communication. For instance, if you had a fire sign as the zodiac sign that Mercury was located in in your chart, like maybe an Aries Mercury, you would have more of this kind of aggressive potentially style of communication where you might feel more comfortable speaking your mind, being blunt, and saying the hard thing. This is kind of that warrior energy of Aries into your style of communication. Whereas if you had a more watery communication style, like maybe a Cancer Mercury, you might have more strengths communicating with feeling. Maybe there's a lot of feeling that comes through in the way that you communicate. Or maybe your style of communication is quite nurturing and supportive in this kind of motherly Cancer energy.

That's sort of the way that you get into interpreting Mercury in your chart as a style of communication. Also, this will become very clear and be emphasized through the aspects that Mercury is experiencing in your chart. We would look at potentially: do you have a conjunction? Is Mercury very nearby another planet? For instance, to keep up with this warrior analogy: if Mercury and Mars are very close to each other, conjunct in your chart near to the same place, then that would give you that Mars energy—that warrior, aggressive, moving-forward, bravery type of energy into your style of communication. Because Mercury is so adaptable, whatever the aspects are—squares and trines as well—they will have a really big impact on his style and your style of communication and thinking.

What does Mercury Retrograde Mean?

We also, of course, have to talk about Mercury retrograde. Even if you're not into astrology, this is something you've probably heard about. It's very popular; everybody loves to talk about Mercury retrograde. Mercury is retrograde right now at the time of me filming this video, so we'll see what he says about this in the end.

Mercury retrogrades happen about three times a year. This is because Mercury's orbit takes only about 88 Earth days to complete its full orbit around the sun. It's the closest planet to the sun; that's why the orbit is so fast. It is the first planet in our solar system. This is the reason that we see him from our perspective looking like he's moving backwards in the sky. That's what a retrograde is. A retrograde is when, from our earthly perspective, the planets are generally moving forward in the order of the zodiac, but occasionally they turn around and start to move backwards. Then they'll move forward again. This happens most frequently with Mercury because of how short his orbit is and how close he is to the sun.

Things that you might experience during a Mercury retrograde could be things that Mercury rules—the different qualities of life that I mentioned at the beginning that Mercury is in charge of. Those types of things might start to sort of come undone or move a little bit backwards in a way. For instance, Mercury rules technology, the nuts and bolts of things, how things fit together and work, and the function of all of the tools that we use in the world. So, oftentimes when he starts to move backwards, he starts to play his little jokes and says, "Oh, maybe this won't work after all. We are just not going to have that work." Lots of times, things will just not function as they should. This is the general thing people associate with Mercury retrogrades. There also can be struggles with communication, sometimes saying things that you later regret.

Anytime a planet is in retrograde and moving backwards, that sort of gives it this backward-looking orientation, too. So, it could sort of bring up something from the past. Maybe during a Mercury retrograde, you had done something in the foreshadowing period. The foreshadowing period is when Mercury is moving forward, but going through the same degrees in the zodiac that he will later traverse backwards through. That's the pre-shadow period. Then the post-shadow period is when he's moving forward again, but through those same degrees. There are sort of three takes over this little section of the sky that Mercury will go through during retrograde. So, oftentimes there could be something in the pre-shadow phase that you were like, "Oh great, I did that thing," and then Mercury goes retrograde and you're like, "Oh, that thing didn't really work, did it? Now I have to go through and fix whatever is going wrong with that." Then by the time he starts going forward again, hopefully whatever that issue was straightens out.

This is some general symbolism that you'll notice with Mercury retrograde. It can also be saying things that you later regret, issues with communication, and miscommunication also. Mercury is associated with business as I mentioned. So, sometimes Mercury retrograde can actually be good for business and businessmen, but it depends, of course, or it could be maybe things more like refunds. But some things connected to commerce can sometimes come up with Mercury retrograde. It can also depend on the sign that he's in.

From my perspective as a traditional astrologer, I understand that not every transit will impact people the same. So, depending on whether or not this Mercury retrograde is hitting any natal planets in your chart, or whether or not you are born with a Mercury retrograde, or whether or not Mercury is activated in one of the time-lord techniques—these are some different things you would take into account to consider whether or not a Mercury retrograde will have an impact on you. Some people will feel a Mercury retrograde intensely depending on their chart, and some people might not really notice it too much. Not every Mercury retrograde is the same for all people at all times. So, if we were having a consultation together looking at your chart, I would consider the planets that were there over which Mercury was going retrograde, and we could also look at different points in the past when Mercury was in retrograde at that same point in your chart to consider how this might affect you, for instance.

Because Mercury is retrograde three times a year, that's another reason astrologers will often be like, "People really tend to overblow this because it is quite often." Mercury retrograde is about 3 weeks long. So, that's going to be 3 x 3—about 9 weeks out of our 52 weeks a year that Mercury is retrograde. If you count the foreshadowing period and then the period afterwards, that's going to be about 9 weeks for each retrograde cycle, which turns into 27 weeks out of our 52 weeks. So, that's just a whole lot of weeks of the year that Mercury is sort of either in retrograde or in his pre- or post-shadow period. You're just not always going to notice it the same for all people. It really just depends on your chart. There are lots of different things that we could look at to figure out whether or not you will be very affected by a given Mercury retrograde. Maybe you'll always sort of feel it a little bit, but it can be quite dramatic or it could be not very dramatic at all.

Mercury’s Astronomy

Another thing about Mercury being the closest to the sun is that he is sort of the gatekeeper—sort of the gatekeeper of information, the light, and the spirit of the sun. Mercury is the go-between between the sun and all of the other planets. That sort of contributes to his symbolism as the messenger. Another super interesting thing about Mercury being so close to the sun is that he can never therefore be more than about 28° away from the sun. So, your Mercury sign will always be either in the same sign or one sign before or after your sun sign. This is interesting when we get into this concept of being "under the beams of the sun" and the maximum elongation period of Mercury.

The symbolism of astrology comes from the way that the planets look visually to us when we gaze out at the sky. Ancient astrologers were just looking out at the sky and seeing how planets were moving and the way that these visual experiences correlated with events that were happening on Earth.

What does it mean to be “under the beams of the Sun?”

With the concept of being under the beams of the sun, this is when Mercury is between kind of 1° and 15° away from the sun. When a planet is very close to the sun, you cannot see that planet very well because the sun is extremely bright. It'll wash out everything around it. This is when you might have a Mercury that is a little bit more merged with the ego. For instance, if your Mercury in your chart is under the beams—if your Mercury is very close to the sun—this can sometimes indicate people who maybe don't have as much of a super pronounced left-brain, critical thinking, analyzing function to them. That sort of Mercury aspect of themselves is sort of washed out in a way. It's not as clear or pronounced; it's sort of merging with the ego.

What is Mercury’s maximum elongation period?

Whereas if you were born with Mercury more towards its maximum elongation period—where Mercury is maybe up to 28° away from the sun—this is when we have the experience visually of Mercury being either a morning star or an evening star. In the morning star version of Mercury, he is coming up above the horizon before the sun does. So, we see Mercury clearly in the early morning. In the evening star version of Mercury, in this maximum elongation period, this is when Mercury is behind the sun and we see Mercury after the sun goes down. He's an evening star in that situation.

In these instances, this is when Mercury is, visually from our perspective looking out at the sky, the clearest. Symbolically, this tends to represent someone who might have a very strong Mercury faculty—this very strong thinking, analyzing, detail-oriented, trickster-type of energy that is something that is strong and pronounced, and an aspect of themselves that is quite clear and has its own kind of independence.

Some people also talk about the difference between being born during a maximum elongation period having a morning star Mercury. They might be someone whose ideas tend to be a little bit more innovative, where Mercury's coming out before the sun. Mercury represents the ideas and the thinking faculty, so they might have their own unique, original thoughts that are coming out before the light of the sun, the ego, has a chance to shine and sort of take over in that sense. Evening-star Mercury people might tend to have more of this post-processing analytical thinking ability where they are able to receive information and facts, and then synthesize and really get into this kind of concrete, detailed, "break it up, make it make sense" way to create form and structure out of it.

What is a Mercury Cazimi?

However, there is one more situation that is unique. Rather than being in the elongation period versus being under the beams, if you were born with Mercury exactly on the sun—exactly conjunct the sun within a degree—this is called a "Cazimi" or when Mercury is in the "heart of the sun." This has a little bit of a different symbolism. This can be more of a powerful, potent exclamation point of Mercury and the sun kind of synthesizing and coming into a new cycle. You can think of like an eclipse or a new moon type of energy, where Mercury and the Sun have kind of more synergy. Mercury becomes the heart of the sun. This can be a very symbiotic relationship between the sun, the ego, and Mercury's critical thinking ability.

What’s the difference between Mercury and the Sun?

It could also be helpful to talk about the difference between Mercury and the sun, because people do talk about the sun as the mind and I have been talking about Mercury as the thinking faculty. They are a little bit different. The sun is more of consciousness, the ego, and your sense of self, whereas Mercury is again this critical thinking, left-brain version of things. Mercury is not the totality of the mind. The mind also has the right brain that's more concerned with the big picture, taking in images, and more kind of intuitive sensing. Mercury is just this analytical, left-brain communication style. It's not your whole sense of self or identity.

Offerings

So, that is more or less Mercury on his own terms. If you resonate with the way that I think about and talk about astrology and would like some help interpreting your birth chart, I do offer consultations for 60 or 90 minutes, where we get into the essence of who you are, your character, and your purpose in the 60-minute natal reading.

If you go for a 90-minute reading with me, then we'll get into more timing stuff, talking about your past and your future and the cycles that you're in. We can look at career peaks and when you might encounter what becomes the focus of your life's work, and what you might expect coming up in the year ahead, which transits will probably be the most impactful or significant for you, different timing, things like that. If that sounds interesting, there's a link below to book a reading with me.

Of course, if you would like to download my zodiac graphic, there's a link for that as well below—free download. This is going to be a series. So, I have the moon video I'll put over here, and I'm on my way towards working through all of the planets. I'll make sure I leave the planetary playlist here. If you'd like to go through each of the planets with me, you can also subscribe again to make sure that you are notified about when that comes out. Or if you would like to just support me, you could also give the video a like. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to drop a comment. I will answer your questions. Thank you so much for being here. Be well.

Mercury in Astrology | Everything you need to know

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