This newsletter is part of a series on the magical-creative properties of the planets, as well as how to begin embodying them yourself.
So much of astrological study nowadays is confined to book learning but my understanding of the planets improved dramatically when I began engaging them directly. By doing this, I could conjure feelings, deeply-impressed images and great meaning behind the words I used.
This newsletter offers you a portal to have your own connection to the Sun. It’s one thing to say the Mercury is about communication or the intellect but it’s another to be in the midst of a study session or at a crossroads and think “Mercury would like this too”.
If you want help connecting to your unique Mercury, and the rest of yourself through the stars, my books are currently open! My readings are meant to lift you up, to secure you against difficulty and remind you that there is always space, creativity, play. Book now to remember your place in the cosmos.
This writing is intentionally not technical and meant to be understood even by those who have not studied astrology but want to connect more deeply to their world and themselves. Remember: these planets all describe fundamental parts of us. Whether you try to or not, you embody Mercury everyday. By learning what functions and activities with which Mercury corresponds, you learn more about yourself and your life, with nothing added but attention.
By reaching this felt understanding of Mercury (and the other planets), I believe we are also able to be better magicians and artists— two categories whose differences are slowly shrinking in my eyes. Do we not need the same centeredness and momentum to create a piece of art as we do to create a spell or gaze into the future? Aren’t we vessels for something beyond our small self in both? This essay also delves into where in your creative-spiritual practice a dose of Mercury could serve you well.
To read Part I, on the Moon, click here and Part I on the Sun, click here.
Fluid Disruption
“No one is anyone, one single immortal man is all men. Like Cornelius Agrippa, I am god, I am hero, I am philosopher, I am demon and I am world, which is a tedious way of saying that I do not exist.”
Jorge Luis Borges
Mercury is the only planet who’s nature is not fixed. While the Sun is always hot and dry and the Moon is always cold and wet, Mercury’s nature is influenced by the planets around them. They can be both wet and dry; hot and cold. Ultimately, Abu Ma’shar tells us Mercury prefers dryness,1 or the ability to soberly divide experience into its unique and useable parts, but Mercury is nothing if not constantly changing.
Part of this fluidity is due to its closeness to the Sun, the planet of God or the divine, giving Mercury a dual nature of both chthonic and celestial. They are close to the Source itself but not quite it. Think of how the word “hermaphrodite” comes from the fusion of “Hermes” and “Aphrodite”. Mercury is the both/and: “a devil or monster, but in another sense it is the “philosophers’ child”.2 Mercury happily contains all within heaven and earth.
Because of this fluidity, Dr. Ali Olomi calls it “the mildest of all planets,” especially when it comes to dignity and debility. Mercury is in detriment in Sagittarius and Pisces: the planet of facts and usefulness is not entirely sympathetic with signs of grand philosophies and dreamy poetics. But, ultimately, language can and is used for non-exact things: deep thought and overarching statements; slippery lyricism that mystifies the mundane rather than clarifying. Even when in fall, which it is in Pisces, one of the most difficult scenarios for a planet, I find Mercury delightfully dreamy, evocative and inspiring. They may cause some confusion or make it harder to put things into words but life is full of the ineffable: all translations are mere facsimiles of the thing itself— the job still gets done and Mercury finds a way.
But rather than just being unilaterally impacted, Mercury also has an amplifying effect on the planets it contacts. Ali Olomi points out that Mercury facilitates the influence and translates the force of the other planets: “It brings that nature out in them. It makes it clear. It clarifies it”.3 That's why people born with Mercury in the same sign of their Sun are said to be like the king always accompanied by their scribe. It is the King's job to rule and act through the will of God. He is unconcerned with telling people about his power or why he decrees what he decrees or even why he should be king in the first place. Mercury, in this instance, acts as the translator for these points and allows people to understand what the king is doing by translating his ethos and action into words. The king himself must also be sure of what he means when he performs a certain action: Mercury requires clarity with whatever it joins.
You can also see Mercury embodied through the Fool archetype. Court jesters were often seen as merely frivolous, turning ideas this way and that for the entertainment of the royals and their guests. Because of their humorousness, however, they were able to criticize the king and pre-existing power structures without being punished. People refer to this as “jester’s privilege,” or the ability to say whatever you want without blowback. This ability to safely disrupt the status quo, even if those being criticized don’t notice, is still vital to quietly shift public sentiment towards alternate views. Being able to poke holes in the self-seriousness of those in power is powerful itself. Mercury knows the impact of playfulness.
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