Welcome Back to part eight of 2020, the cosmic context here on the Maya Games podcast.

At the time of recording this intro, it's been over a week since I had the live conversation with Vince, and from where I sit now, on Tuesday, February 24, 2026, I have completed all 11 recorded conversations.

I have this one to share with you, and I have three more.

One with Caitlin Mason on the nodes, one with Lex Perkins on Uranus, and one with Amalia Gollum Leavitt on Venus.

So I have those three yet to produce and release to y', all, and they're getting longer and longer, so buckle up for that.

This one, as you can see from having pressed play on your podcast app already, is a pretty long one, so I will attempt to keep the intro pretty I want to frame one a couple of things about this episode.

For one, this one gets pretty technical, which I thought it might, so I wasn't terribly surprised that it did.

I didn't know quite what to expect for this episode.

I love how it unfolded.

I think Vince was the perfect conversation partner for it.

I think you'll find out why.

But since it does feel quite different, especially the second half of it feels very different than all of the other ones, I wanted to give you a heads up about that.

So for just shy of the first hour, Vince and I are in a pretty big zoomed out space about Mercury and about much more than Mercury.

We get really into some human design astrology overlap at the time of recording the episode and at the time of recording this intro.

Mercury is in Pisces, which is a significant component of Mercury's process this year, which we talk about.

And so in this Mercury in fall, Jupiter ruled Mercury, Pisces transmission.

We go especially in the first hour to somewhat what I thought were like really mind blowing places about the role that Mercury plays in general and the role that Mercury plays this year.

And yeah, if you're not super familiar with awareness as we understand it in the body graph via human design, some of it might go a little over your head.

I wanted to give you a heads up about that, but I also wanted to let you know, like that's the point of solar plexus awareness, spirit consciousness, Mercury and water.

Many of the things that Vince and I reference in this conversation have to do with guidance away from a purely analytical mental orientation to reality, to ourselves, to astrology, to everything.

And so even if you aren't following some of these really big ideas that we talk about with this transition to receptivity, this transition to spirit consciousness, this Evolution of awareness, this evolution of human consciousness through the raves, even if some of that gets lost on you, just know that the Mercury in Pisces transmission, that this episode is, I think, is meant to wash over you, to invite the analytical mind to relax a bit and receive.

I wanted to offer that.

And then for something really different after about an hour into the conversation.

So more than an hour into the episode, since I've already been talking for almost four minutes for the intro, after about an hour in, that's when we start to get really technical, which feels distinctively different from every other episode thus far.

The Venus episode gets a bit technical.

That's the final one as well.

So Mercury is the first of two, not consecutive, but of two episodes in the series that isn't just looking at the planets in a wide lens.

It does that a bit.

And then it starts to really get into the detail.

And we actually go through Mercury's journey through the zodiac this year from start to end.

So if you're not a very mercurial person, or if you're not in a very mercurial mood, those parts of the episode might not super duper hit and.

Or you might just enjoy kind of taking it in passively.

Some people love the technical stuff.

I sometimes struggle to focus on other people's technical linear orientations, especially to astrology.

That's kind of far in the future, like the end of this year and even the middle of this year, feel at the time of recording.

So I just want to encourage you, as always, to practice relieving any sense of pressure that you have in your own system, to listen a certain way or retain in a certain way, and just let all of this episode, including the really, like, big, watery, transmutational, intuitive contemplations in the first part of it, and the really technical stuff that we get into in the second part, just let all of that wash over you.

It might be quite a different listening experience than you've had.

If you've tuned into other episodes of this series so far, and if you're used to tuning into me in general in the latter half of the convo.

When we do start to look at Mercury Linearly throughout 2026, we focus largely on Mercury in the water signs, which is a significant component of Mercury's process this year, as Mercury will retrograde exclusively in water signs.

But we do also take a look at Mercury starting in Pisces, moving through every sign that it moves to through the end of the calendar year, which is through the first few degrees of Capricorn.

And so I think what I'm gonna do check the show notes to ensure that I did, but I think I'm going to put a time marker for those three Mercury retrograde periods and when we get to them in the episode.

So if you want to come back to this episode as the year goes on and refer specifically to these Mercury retrograde places and the quicker mercury transits that surround them, you'll see a time marker for where you can go back and review those as they become more chronologically time relevant.

That being said, I do think this whole episode is a timeless transmission that is going to have relevance across timelines and dimensions and bridges timelines and dimensions, and may feel refreshing and resourcing all year and beyond in different ways, as we are different versions of ourselves with different contexts each time we tune in.

And I think what I'm saying about this Mercury episode can be said for the entire series.

I don't think this series of conversations is meant to be engaged with only early in 2026.

I think it may serve some of us far beyond then perhaps via tuning back in throughout the year and beyond, perhaps just via remembering felt sensations upon an initial listen.

I'm super excited to introduce listeners to Vince.

I've known Vince for quite a while now in various capacities and they are just a delightful human being and they know themselves with such precision.

They carry a quiet confidence and they share a playful yet formidable perspective that I really enjoyed being conditioned by and invited into and feel really lucky to get to share with you all.

And to get to share with you all the dance that happened in this conversation.

I felt very surrendered into some kind of dance, if you know what knowing circuitry is.

Vince has a mental channel, the channel of awareness that operates on this knowing pulse.

And I really found myself knowing and then not knowing and then knowing again and then not knowing again throughout this conversation and felt myself getting lost and found again.

Which now that I'm thinking about it, does feel characteristic of the Mercury that we discovered in this conversation together.

The Mercury in 2026.

I hope you enjoy meeting Vince.

If you haven't met them yet.

I hope you enjoy possibly dancing with us in this multi dimensional grid of various awarenesses.

As always, I would love to know how it hits you.

Find some places to share that with me.

There's Instagram, there's Patreon, there's the Discord if you're on the Patreon.

Oh, that's right.

I do have a logistical thing to share.

I almost forgot.

Vince orients us to the esoteric phrases for the signs quite a bit in this episode and I request a list from him at one point.

And if you want that list as well, I have a new category on my Patreon that is free to take a look at.

It's free.

Everything in there is going to be free to access called Cosmic Context 2026.

So if you go to patreon.com KelseyRoseTort and you look for collections, there will be a collection called 2026 the Cosmic Context, where I will include various resources that are mentioned throughout the conversation series, including a list of the esoteric phrases for the signs that Vince has provided me with.

And I also have a post in there for discussion.

So even if you're not a paid member of the orbit field, you can still join in to some discussion.

You can let me know there, you can let us know there some imprints, you can share your thoughts.

If you are on the Patreon at $15 in the Solarium or any of the higher tiers, then you can also join in the conversation in the cosmic context.

Chann on the Discord server and reminder that we start Ascendant Assemblies gatherings next month.

So March 7th air and earth risings will be meeting.

March 14th water and fire Signs will be meeting and then we'll be meeting again in June.

We're meeting quarterly this year.

So for more information on that, go to the Ascendant Assemblies collection on Patreon and join us if you'd like to.

I'd love to chat with you about this current and future Mercury transit as they hit your whole sign chart with your fellow Elemental Rising signs.

Okay.

That's plenty, I think.

Enjoy.

I'm here with Vince.

Hi, Vince.

Hi.

Happy to be here.

This is what this is part.

I think this is.

Oh man.

I think this is gonna be part eight.

Oh, okay.

Well, let me see.

I know I can't keep track because everything's backlogged.

Jupiter came out today, which was part six.

Yeah.

And so Saturn will be coming out next, which is part seven.

And this will be part eight.

Yeah.

So eight parts into 11.

So we're rounding the corner.

Lovely.

And yeah, my context, I realized just maybe a week ago that the equivalent today's the eve of an eclipse.

We have our first Leo Aquarius eclipse tomorrow on February 17th.

And this will be the first eclipse in my third house, ninth house axis.

And the nodes aren't there yet, but when they move it'll be north node in the third house.

And I was just thinking about how much this Project is a north node in the third house project for me.

It's just like so much podcasting.

It definitely feels like a storm of podcasting.

It's a podcast storm.

Are making all of this happen so quickly, but so beautifully.

I've only tuned into a little bit of the other episodes that have been released, but it's just been amazing.

Like, your frequency is so clear on these podcasts.

I feel like.

And I even just the moments that I've listened to, I'm like, this is awesome.

And I'm super happy that I get to be a part of it.

Thank you, Vince.

That's so sweet.

Thank you for the confidence boost early in our episode.

That feels like a good segue to introduce you, at least by your design, because that was a little projector recognition coming my way.

So.

Yeah.

What do you want to share about your design and go into astrology too, if you want.

The thing I want to lead with and that feels correct.

To lead with is like substructural, but it's my.

I have personal view, which is a design thing.

So if you're tuning into this podcast and you feel like this person talks a lot about themselves and their experience, they're telling a ton of stories about what they think and what they view, that that's me.

So you're.

You're welcome.

Fuck off.

If you have a problem with it,

like, I'm not going to apologize for that.

That's who I am.

And if it.

If it resonates with you, that's awesome.

But on the more general level, I'm a 13 quad left emotional projector.

So I have two channels.

The channel of synthesis is the 1939.

It is on the unconscious side for me.

So I have this unconscious solar plexus emotional authority.

And then my other channel is the 6124.

So I have a defined head, a defined AJNA, and I have a broad split that runs through my throat.

So one of the ways that I connect and feel wholeness is like through conversation and interaction with others.

So that's a huge part of my process.

Learning when to like, just relax and be and observe and learning when to like, integrate, involve and like, you know, exchange and share with others has been a big part of it.

I shared personal view before, but also we go through the four transformations.

For me, I have hot thirst, determination, natural shores, environment focused personal view, and strategic hope motivation.

There's a lot of kind of like binaries is what I would call them in my design.

Right.

So it's like, I am a projector who's designed to be invited into things, designed to be like, wait for anything, wait until you get into it.

But also I have this observed body.

I'm meant to be observed.

I'm meant to be out there kind of doing it, living life.

So that's kind of a catch 22.

Having the emotional authority of the waiting for clarity versus the defined mind of what's true, what's correct, what's accurate.

Right now, that's another big one for me.

And I think the other thing I'll share from a design perspective, I have the sun in gate 24, so I have a conscious sun in my defined Ajna, which has been a real interesting thing to awaken to as I keep deconditioning earlier versions of myself was like, I need to be right all the time about everything and I need people to be aware of that versus now.

I'm like, my mind is here for other people and they will invite like truth out of me.

I don't actually need to put that out there.

It's just something that happens.

And it's like people either see me as very intelligent, very knowledgeable, very deep, or like silly and goofy and doesn't care about stuff.

And I think both of those perceptions are accurate.

But yeah, that's kind of a quick rundown on my design and who I am.

That was so beautiful to hear.

I haven't when's like Venusian revolution was the end of when we were regularly connected.

And that was like spring of 2024.

Sounds right.

So it's been almost two years.

It feels almost longer than that somehow.

Saturn has a lot to do with that.

Saturn has a lot to do with that.

I was also pregnant at the end of that.

And so then my last trimester and the first year and a half of parenthood have also been between then and now.

And those.

Yeah, that was a lot.

That's been a lot.

So I've aged and yeah, time has moved slow, which again, is not unrelated.

This has been Saturn in my fourth.

Yeah.

And maybe to kind of bridge into.

Oh, I was gonna say that's a good bridge into astrology.

But first I wanted to remark on how cool it is to hear two years later you speak about your design like two years deeper into your process and your experiment.

Not that there wasn't a clarity of self knowledge, but yeah, I feel like I hear you speaking with a really gentle authority.

That sounds not new, but evolved.

Thank you.

And I agree.

Yeah, very cool.

And on the astrology side, well, okay.

I also wanted to say I don't think anybody who listens to my podcast has too low of a tolerance for what some might call navel gazing, because, yeah, this is an Aries stellium sag moon and rising.

I'm always talking about things from my perspective, which is interesting because I do have the opposite perspective of you, which is power view, which transfers to personal.

So I've been thinking about that a lot lately and noticing that a lot lately.

But I also think there's something.

I mean, this is a totally different topic than our topic of the day, but whatever.

Mercury's topic is just everything.

So whatever we talk about is fine.

I do think there's something to power and personal and any of the rave psychology, harmonics or opposites, that's like, they're actually kind of the same thing, right?

So there's something with power and personal where we.

Whether you have third color perspective, power, or sixth color perspective personal, you are oriented to see things on this spectrum of agency.

And there is, like, a personal tinge to that within power.

And then there is this, like, personal agency is kind of tinged by power in personal views.

Something I've been thinking about a lot lately.

So.

Yeah.

And I remember when you were in Venusian Revolution, I didn't really teach about rave psychology distinctly in that container, but I remember when I was teaching profile lines, I brought in color a little bit.

And I remember there were, like, a bunch of people in our container with sixth color view, Personal view.

And I remember we were kind of relating that to Aries.

Cause a lot of y' all also had significant Aries placements.

So.

Yeah, Vince has an Aries moon.

So there is this real centrality of the emotional experience, the emotional receptivity, the internal landscape having this very localized, singular, my me, me, me experience to it.

Ruled by Mars and Leo.

Ruled by Mars and Leo.

Is the other piece there one of my three final dispositors.

If we really get into the trad astro of it.

I think I want to say one thing about personal versus power as well.

The human design experiment, right?

It's a lot about coming to terms with your own authority.

Like, what is my personal authority?

What is my personal wisdom, my personal way to find capital T truth in all of this?

And I think that's.

Yeah.

Tied into this weird balance of personal versus power, because there's a power in your authority, and it is personal.

Right.

So again, just highlighting what you said about any type of view kind of being two sides of a single coin and how that's all connected to your authority.

Right.

All of these substructure things that we love to get lost into and spiral into and talk a lot about and overanalyze, that's just naturally tied to your authority.

So it's going to come out.

And I think that's something I've been in big process with over the last couple years of my deconditioning is like letting that go, like having the mind wander about it, but not getting stuck on like what's the correct answer with this thing, Just living life and letting the authority come through it.

Hell yeah.

So that was one thing I wanted to say.

That's beautiful.

Yeah.

I talk so much with fellow emotional folks about the distinction.

Like the, the thing that has set me the most free, I think in all of my human design, experimentation and learning is having a clear distinction in my own embodied awareness around what is my mental awareness and what is my emotional awareness.

Whether you have a defined mind or undefined mind, if you have a defined solar plexus, knowing the part of you that is like calculating, figuring out from this dualistic perspective of binary and understanding what is different about that than this, deeper, because the solar plexus is still meaning, that's something that's been really big for me is like non emotional authorities, they're not looking for meaning.

And so that distinction between mental meaning and emotional meaning, it's like it's not that it's not important, but like it's maybe not as important because they're not meant to rely on the spirit consciousness, solar plexus meaning either.

But we are so understanding these two meaning making centers and how they make meaning differently, which maybe there's some Mercury relevance here.

Absolutely.

Because.

Yeah.

I was telling you in a voice note I've been thinking about, one of the ways that helps me calibrate to Mercury is to think about it as the sun's moon, so the solar plexus as the earth's moon, emotional meaning versus the Ajna, perhaps as the sun's moon, like analytical, rational meaning.

Anyways.

Yeah.

It's so important for us emotional authorities to make that distinction because we do.

We are meant to calibrate to what we know, to awareness in a meaningful way.

But it's this multidimensional awareness that transcends binary, that, that stays with us and brews and stews and all along that that process is happening, the mind is going ping, ping, this, that black, white, figure it out, figure it out.

And like once you're freed from relying on that Version of meaning.

You get to have fun in that version of meaning.

Right.

And that's like, that's what we're gonna do today, I think in large part is have fun in the mind.

I think we're gonna have so much fun today.

And I have one little thing to riff off of that.

With respect to like solar plexus as spirit consciousness, spirit awareness, spirit truth.

I had a session with someone who's emotional lately and a way I kind of described it was like, like the solar plexus is like this supercomputer.

It's like this calculus level math that's happening over different integrations and different differentials of like existence.

Right.

So it's like you don't even have to get into the math of it.

You just like feel that and let it work and let it calculate on its own timeline.

That's again, like you said, separate from your mind, separate from your mental awareness.

That awareness is happening there regardless of what you do or don't do.

That's so good.

Yeah.

But we can leave that there and talk more about astrology maybe.

Yeah, I don't know.

I have a feeling that that conversation though is going to resource something later in this conversation.

I'm glad we dropped it.

Yeah.

Introduce yourself re astrology.

I will also though, on behalf of everyone older than you, I will say welcome to the post first Saturn return era of your life.

Vince is recording this within days of completing his ninth house Saturn return in Pisces.

Congrats.

Thank you.

Yes, thank you for that.

It does feel like a graduation.

It feels like a completion.

It feels like a full exhale.

I have Saturn in Pisces, Natalie opposite Chiron in Virgo.

It's on my third house, ninth house axis.

That's high level.

Let's zoom back into the low level.

I'm traditionally tropically a Taurus sun with an Aries moon and cancer rising at zero degrees.

Not in a way to qualify myself, but a way to kind of, I guess, give context to how I approach Mercury.

How am I mercurial?

Like, what am I even doing on this Mercury podcast in the first place?

That was something I was thinking about and reflecting kind of leading up to this conversation.

But I do have point of fortune in Gemini and Chiron in Virgo.

So I have some sort of mercurial stuff.

Stuff.

But I think what's really interesting for me tropically anyways, is I have mercury at 22 degrees Taurus and it is, I'm like 98% sure it's in this basis Placement.

Right.

So it's like just come out of the beams of the sun.

It's like just emerged from that combustion.

So there's like a real.

I feel like urgency is the word I want to use.

There's like an urgency with my mental process to understand, to gain awareness, to locate the facts and concretize them.

Because that's Mercury in Taurus to me.

And then that Mercury in Taurus is ruled by Venus in Aries.

So right there you want to talk about urgency and immediacy.

Venus in Aries is like, what do I need right now?

What would make me feel good right now?

And it's looking over that Mercury Taurus placement.

I don't know, anything you want to talk about.

My tropical chart.

Anything that I missed?

Maybe before you went into the Venus and Aries ruled piece of it, you were delineating Mercury coming out of the combustion, coming out of the beams of the sun.

There was something you said that felt very 6124, your mind channel.

But also something that was coming through for me is I have sun and Mercury in Aries, the sign before you.

And my Mercury is applying to my sun by six degrees away.

So I was also really feeling into.

There's different ways we could look at your Mercury being just.

Just on the other side of the process of mine.

Right.

I have Mercury applying to the sun in Aries, and you have Mercury widely out of the beams separating from the sun in Taurus.

So while we both share a very immediacy Aries, me, me, you do bring a sense of maturization, slowness, embodiment, more mental clarity.

Right.

With it coming out of the beams of the sun than I contain.

So that's kind of interesting.

And yeah, I wonder if that's one of the threads I'm feeling into when one thing I told Vince before we hit record is like the Mercury conversation is the one I feel the most unhinged about.

I'm like, I don't even know how to approach.

I don't know.

I don't quite know what to think about, how to think about it, what the arc should be.

Which feels very like me, Jupiter trying to Mercury, which is hard.

But there was something about once it was realized that it was gonna be Vince in this convo with me, there was something that helped me just really relax into it.

And I do think there's probably something to trusting your defined mind, trusting your maybe slightly or very much more clear mental clarity around things.

And just the Taurus.

Yeah, the embodiedness of it.

There's something about it that I think is helping me be, like, okay, I can be chaotic, open head, Gemini, Kelsey and Vince will hold something.

Absolutely.

I think the other thing to mention here that's coming up for me right now is, right, so my Mercury emerging from the beams of the sun, great, that's one thing.

But applying a square to Mars in Leo.

So it's like there's this, again, urgency, there's this fire, there's this personal aspect to mind for me, and that's something like comparing my design versus my astrology has been really interesting in that regard.

Like, how.

How do I challenge people with my words and with my mind?

And how can that challenge, like, actually be a good thing that I'm, like, meant to do and grow and learn from versus, like, something like, something that I could challenge and should, like, not engage with, you know, does that make sense?

It's like the challenge of the square.

It's always there.

But whether or not you, like, see that challenge through, push through that challenge, or, like, engage with it versus, like, I don't know, remove yourself from it is a.

Another interesting piece.

Totally like our mechanics from a human design perspective, our mechanics are always there.

Like, I don't need to be acting on anything for people to be feeling provoked by my 39, 55 and judged by my 1858.

Right.

But there's a very different experience of that when I'm like, relaxed into this is happening, and it's not my fault, and it's not your fault, and I don't have to do anything about it.

It's just happening.

That's a very different approach than, like.

Yeah.

Getting all ego, mind wrapped up in it or trying to control it.

Right.

Or direct it in any particular way.

So, yeah, with the 6124, you're like, There's a.

There's a kind of mental poking.

Right.

Like, there's the capacity to always be mutating and, like, inspiring some kind of mental clarity for folks.

But you don't actually need to do anything.

You just get to relax into it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I'm gonna ask you this, and I think it's probably maybe helpful context for listeners, but I'm asking for me because as we said, it's been about two years since I really connected with you.

We connected first on astrology.

Right.

Like, you were already pretty fluent, if not entirely fluent.

You were fluent in astrology before we worked together, right?

I'd say so.

I remember taking your houses class or workshop way back when, and that opened Up.

The idea of houses are not just this isolated place in your chart, but you're actually kind of working on this axis.

You're working on this opposition.

You can't talk about one house without talking about its partner.

But anyways.

Yeah, we love the binary in this realm of Kelsey's work, which actually I'm gonna drop, I think my house's workshop as the February workshop inside my patreon this.

So thank you for that plug.

Yeah.

And then what was.

So you kind of.

No, we met in an aura.

Right.

But that was after.

Was that during?

That was before.

In aura.

Definitely after the house is working.

But before Venusian Revolution.

Before Venetian revolution.

Before, like six months.

Ish.

Before.

Okay, okay.

So we met in person at an aura, which I actually didn't.

I forgot until I was speaking it aloud just now, which was cool.

That was fun to have you there.

And then you joined me as co pilot for Venusian Revolution.

And.

But you must have already been pretty into human design at that point, right?

Like, okay, my first intro to human design with you was anti capitalist human design with you and Kat.

And that was like my first initiation into the human design system.

And like, just remember learning about what a projector was.

And I thought it was a bad thing.

I thought it was a horrible thing because, like, society is like, why are you projecting?

Quit projecting.

You're projecting so much.

And I'm like, I'm a projector.

It's like, well, these are different meanings.

Yeah.

RA really confused everyone with that.

The fifth line projection field, the second line projection field projector, and it's like all completely different things.

Yeah.

Okay, so you did begin your HD journey through one of my transmissions, and then you eventually did Lyd through Venusian Revolution, but you were already pretty in your experiment at that point.

Okay, so then two years past, what's been happening in your emotional mental melting pots with astrology and human design?

Like, how do you orient to each system?

Does one inform the other?

Does one feel primary to you in this moment?

Great question.

And I think how I would answer it is kind of how my practice has always been oriented ever since I like started doing consults, readings, offering my services to people as like a business.

It's that it's all very multimodal to me.

Right.

I'm usually not prioritizing one thing.

I'm usually not too zoned in on one thing.

It's rather that, like, everything is optional to me.

Right.

Like, I have this option to attune more into design, or I have this option to attune more into astrology and the movements of the planets.

I have this option to turn into tarot or a Magic 8 Ball or whatever.

So that's kind of how I approach it.

I think human design has been really important for me in the sense of like deconditioning my open centers because I do look back on my life and I think of all the ways that I acted out of a lot of openness and like this is not a judgment on anything.

It's just like how I was at that time and who I'm becoming is like, feels very different from who that person was.

But yeah, I think my, my primary relationship to design is that like I'm gonna, whenever I have a client reading or anything, I'm gonna get as much information as them as I possibly can and pull up all so sorts of different things to look at.

What is the best tool or resource in my pocket to help guide them through whatever they need me for.

And a lot of times that looks like dipping into all of those different buckets.

And sometimes it's like actually we just stayed with tarot and that was exactly what they needed.

Or actually they just needed forecasting in astrology or they just needed a little bit of reminder of their own authority.

So that's kind of my approach and my practice in general.

So even the question of primary is kind of an irrelevant question to you.

They're all just part of this multimodal, you might say mutable, mercurial.

Ooh, yes, absolutely.

And it's like I will in true solar plex fashion, kind of go through waves of them.

Right.

I won't say put astrology down, but it's just like my utilization of astrology had decreased, I would say like since Venusian revolution until now.

I think Venusian revolution was kind of the last time that I was very oriented with astrology and doing a lot of astrology stuff.

Every morning I have ritual.

I have a lot of ritual in my life.

Every morning I do peek at the transits a little bit, I pull some tarot cards, I reflect on stuff that's very defined head of me seeking some sense of consistent inspiration.

But beyond that, I don't always do too much with astrology on my day to day.

I used to be very into planetary days, planetary hours, and I still do a handful of that.

Sometimes if I need to send an important email at work or if I need to find a time to do a thing, sometimes I'll astrologize and I'll be like, when do I have A Mars hour?

When do I have a Venus hour?

I want this to come across in a Venusian way.

So I'll get a little mental and a little mindy about it and plan stuff astrologically.

But that utilization has also gone down a little bit, I think.

And then you mentioned until now, have you been finding yourself not shifting gears but becoming more aware of astrology lately?

I think so, partially in preparation for this talk, but also just naturally, and I don't know, I think from a physical standpoint and an environmental standpoint, it's like in the winter, I, like, tend to disappear.

I tend to get very hermity and less out there in the world.

And I think that also means dropping into human design more and dropping into my authority more, versus when stuff starts picking up again, when it starts to feel like spring, when the days get longer and, I don't know, brighter, smiley or happier, I feel more energized to delve into astrology.

But that's a very fresh observation.

Let me throw another astro design overlay consideration onto that.

So you're a Taurus, I'm in Aries.

We both have spring birthdays, and so winter for us is not only collective winter, it's also like the winter of our solar process, right?

And I've noticed for a long time that that closing square.

So for me, when the sun is in early Capricorn until it hits my 8 degree Aries sun, it is like my personal winter.

And per human design, we would call it our personal quarter of mutation.

And then especially the middle and later part of that is kind of like the balsamic moon phase of our solar journey.

And I've been thinking about this for a long time and noticing it for a long time.

And then I have a friend, Sammy Rae, who's a splenic projector, who she's a couple or a year or two or three years older than me, can't remember, but her birthday's the day before mine.

And we were processing this once and she mentioned, you know, that closing square is when we have our design birthday, right?

Like our design side hits its solar return 88 degrees, 88 days before our personality side.

And she phrased it as like, my body has entered the next season of the TV show, but my mind hasn't caught up.

And that just struck me so much.

And I think about it all the time now.

And it does.

This wintry period for us, starting Capricorn season for me, Starting Aquarius season for you is like.

It feels like my mind is still like, I Should I, should I am.

But my body is just, like, in even more refusal to move forward in the old ways.

Like, it's just clocked out, but I don't understand it yet.

That was such a profound consideration for me that I've been working with for a long time.

No, that's absolutely major, I would say, because it's like every Aquarius season, without fail, when Venus enters in Aquarius, I dry out.

Literally.

My body is like, I cannot drink enough fluid to maintain, like, less than, quote, unquote, normal, like, existence.

It's like I have the capacity to do one thing a day maybe, and then it's like, yeah, my body is in, like, very rest, hibernate, restore mode.

And it doesn't matter the mental chatter, it doesn't matter the societal pressure.

It's like I am simply being.

Right now, I am getting through winter metaphorically and literally.

This is kind of skipping ahead a little bit.

And so my mind right now wants to go back after I say this and make a through line.

We'll see if that happens or not.

I'm not attached to it, but I think what we're talking about right now on this personal level might be a fractal representation in some ways of how I am kind of starting to see Mercury this year in 2026.

One of the things you and I talked about is that if you ask astrologers what the big news is this year, it almost entirely has to do with things moving from water and earth into air and fire.

And so there's a lot of, like, we were gestating, we were wintering, we were dissolving, we were receiving, and now we're going, boom, let's go.

It's out, it's hot, it's fiery, it's dry.

But Mercury is exclusively retrograding in water signs this year, which Mercury does a lot more than retrograde.

So when we're thinking about Mercury as a whole in the time span of a year, we're not only, of course, looking at the retrogrades, but because of the retrogrades happening in water signs.

And I'm pretty sure all the shadow periods are entirely.

Yeah, it's all water.

So Mercury's in water a lot more this year than typically and also kind of uncharacteristic as of late Mercury, during the retrogrades, it doesn't even dip into the other elements at all, which the last few years, it has retrograded across elements, and it's all in water.

So there's this really big Mercury water emphasis.

And yeah, one of the things that I remember noticing and bringing to you in some of our pre pandemic recording chat was Mercury's kind of staying behind.

Like lots is moving forward, but then our mental processor is still in water.

And I also noticed as I was looking at stuff, I don't really trust this observation as much as what I just shared, but I was looking at these three retrograde periods and their shadows happening in Pisces and then Cancer and then Scorpio this year.

And like most of the major astrological events this year happen while Mercury is in a water sign at least and often in the retrograde or shadow.

Is that something that you noticed as well?

I didn't have to put you on the spot.

I did very much look at just Mercury through the year.

So I wasn't super tuned into everything else that was happening.

But I feel like I would agree generally.

Yeah.

And I'll talk through some of those at another point.

This doesn't feel like the point for that, but I'm just kind of seeing a parallel to what we just talked about where the body has moved on a more subtle, more embodied, more felt, more other dimensional, faith based, but also seasoned and matured through other dimensional processes.

Like knowing is taking off, but then the Mercury rational mind is still processing or something.

I don't know.

Yeah, I don't have the right words for it, but I was just seeing kind of a metaphorical connection between what you and I were just talking about.

And one of the ways that I'm feeling into Mercury's role this year.

Staying behind primarily in the water signs and not just staying behind as in it has a lot more time and action in water this year while everything else has moved on, but also staying behind as in like it literally is going to slow down and retrace its steps through the water signs this year.

Yeah.

Something coming up for me that I want to share with respect to that connection is like we're starting Mercury retrograde water season right now.

We're in the pre retrograde in Pisces right now.

And the north node's there, Venus is there.

A lot of Pisces gates are in the solar plexus.

And medically, astrology wise, Pisces is the feet, Pisces is, is the ankle.

So it's like literally how are we moving with our emotions, with our bodies, but also emotionally that like calculus level emotional awareness is a Piscean thing.

Calculus is about like the infinite contained within like small segments of reality.

So like all of that is there all of that is there.

I'm obsessed.

Okay, thank you for bringing up all the Pisces gates in the solar plexus that I knew that but didn't remember it.

And that's a really helpful correlation.

And also I'm obsessed with calculus as a way of understanding the solar plexus.

And after this call, probably not today because I have to prep for the call on the nodes.

Energetically prep for it.

But at some point I'm gonna go learn more about calculus because I love a good metaphor and that feels right.

I took pre calc in high school, but not calculus ever.

Did you have to take calculus?

Is that part of your.

Yeah.

So I mean, like, like reversing way back to bio land.

Like my personal bio.

Right.

I'm a pharmacist, I'm queer, I play chess, I crochet, I'm a flow artist, I'm a wannabe clinical researcher.

I have a master's degree in psychedelics.

Like, there's, there's a lot going on.

You can't pin Vince down.

And calculus was absolutely part of my prereqs for pharmacy.

School and physiology is like another big thing that comes up with me as I again, like use these systems in a multimodal way, both on a science based reality kind of level and on a cosmic, spiritual, otherworldly, dimensionally kind of level.

Getting back to transits and whatnot, if you don't mind me jumping in, I think with regard to this pop astrology, a lot of other forecasts out there are focused on the air and fire and the outers changing and Saturn changing.

It brings me to this metaphor that I shared with you before of like this transit light switch phenomena that I think exists in public consciousness and especially in pop astrology and whatnot.

The idea that a transit happens and then the switch is on and it's over once that transit is done.

But again, to bring it back to the emotional awareness side of things, that transit happened and it's overdone, but that work is still being done through ripples, through conversations, through changes and alterations that came from that moment in time.

Right.

A transit is never really over.

It's never really done.

Saturn in Pisces.

Baby Saturn in Pisces.

Wisdom right there.

I think people are particularly guilty of this when it comes to Mercury because Mercury retrogrades have emerged in the public sphere now so much people are like regular people who don't actually know anything about astrology, hardly are knowing when Mercury retrogrades happen.

But they're also like, it's like you're so close, but you're not there yet.

There's an entire period that happens with Mercury retrogrades.

And it's almost like we're debatably more in a Mercury retrograde period most of the time than when Mercury is not shadows.

Exactly.

Right.

It's like such a longer transit than people care to realize acknowledge.

Because it's.

It's a threat to capital if we do that.

But yeah, I think pop culture treats Mercury retrogrades with this brevity and a lack of acknowledgement towards the entire retrograde period.

So I just wanted to share that.

And I think that can happen with any and all transits.

Yeah, that's like truly Saturnian Saturn in Pisces wisdom right there.

I think for sure.

And is related to a lot of what we've been talking about with, with mental awareness versus spirit consciousness.

Emotional alchemy.

Solar plexus awareness.

Yeah.

Which.

Okay, the thing that we skipped that I think I wanna maybe go to next is let's just drop into Mercury a bit and just like how do we think about Mercury?

But I did wanna bring in this other thing.

Cause I have a feeling we're gonna continue to be referencing mental versus emotional AJNA versus solar plexus awareness.

I think I'm wanting to calibrate listeners to this.

But also I don't know about your relationship with this Vince, so feel free to fill me in.

Part of the.

Like, there's this great mutation happening per human design.

And I have been talking about it this whole series and people know that there's a free three hour workshop and then a not free, but recently very highly price reduced six portion class that Jess and I taught on 2027 that talks about it.

And most of what I talk about is like the key changes.

Like there's these eight constructs that have been relevant in the human experience, the human collective experience for 410 or 412 years or something.

They're leaving and eight new ones are coming online.

And that officially happens February 15, 2027.

And so we are officially T minus T one year minus one day.

But we've been feeling the transition since 2020.

And there's this other stuff that goes with it that I don't talk about as much because I don't understand it quite as much.

And I also think it's probably not as relevant, or at least for me it's not as relevant, but part of what is changing this next era, which we refer to as the Cross of the Sleeping Phoenix.

But Also holds the cross of penetration is actually not for humanity as we exist right now.

Cross of planning was the last background frequency Cross of planning and cross of Maya was the last background frequency that was specifically for human Homo sapiens and Transitus, as Ra referred to us.

And the next era we will live, many of us will live many years into the beginning of it.

We won't live till the end of it.

It's 400 and some years.

But it's not for the human form and human consciousness as it exists in our bodies and our awareness.

It's for a new kind of consciousness and actually a new body, a new mutation in human beings that's coming online.

And part of that mutation has to do with changing how the next iteration of humanity will experience the solar plexus.

Whereas for us it is both a motor and an awareness center.

And for them it will only be an awareness center.

And so I need to at some point just like record my thoughts on this distinctly, because I have a lot of them.

And I don't think I've really put it anywhere, anywhere altogether yet.

But part of what we alive today are experiencing is we are like the doulas, the midwives, Our bodies, our lives, our consciousness are the doulas, the midwives for this next mutation to come through.

And we are experiencing, experiencing it as this evolution from primarily relying on mental Ajna awareness into relying more on solar plexus awareness.

Part of like 2026 being the last year of the cross of planning and a year where a lot of as Jessa and I talked about this in the Neptune episode, all of the outers that will be there for the beginning of the 2027 and next 400 years, they are either in place already or coming into Place in 2026.

So this year is like the energy really shifts in large part towards the future, towards what's next, which is outside of the realm of what we can comprehend based on the experience we've had in our bodies alive today, but also our ancestors up to 400 years.

You know, like we don't know what's next.

We cannot calibrate to it.

That's how a lot of astrologers I think maybe are orienting to Saturn, Neptune at 0 Aries.

That's big, right?

The first degree of the zodiac, Saturn, Neptune conjunction.

So yeah, that's very in the background for me of all these conversations and of my whole life is just this awareness that there's some large scale evolution happening that's so beyond what we can comprehend.

And it has to do with this transition of our orientation being primarily AJNA to more primarily solar plexus.

And just based on where you and I have gone so far today, Vince, and based on Mercury as a topic and Mercury in water particularly being a topic this year, I just feel that theme, I feel that theme of evolving from AJNA to solar plexus awareness.

So I wanted to lay a little bit more of a foundation for it because like I said, I don't know how much you were nodding, so I think I probably didn't say anything too new for you just now.

But yeah, you and I have a foundation of this like evolution and it's informing how we're thinking about it and talking about it, even when we aren't directly naming it.

So just wanted to directly name it a little.

No, exactly.

And like there's so much there, right?

There's so much there in that evolution, in the changing of the gates and the locks and keys and everything.

And I think the one thing I want to say, right, as in 1949, where the mutation is happening, and as a design, Mercury Gate 19 in Aquarius, it's all linked in there.

And I think a lot of us, even regardless of your attunement to awareness of spiritual systems, can feel that a shift is happening.

We can feel in our bodies and in our experience that something is changing on a big cosmic level.

And I felt that way for a long time even before I knew and had the vocabulary articulations to describe the shift that's coming.

So I think just wanted to give nods and acknowledgement to that to anyone who may be listening that feels the same way.

It's like you're not conspiratorial, you're not crazy, you're not out of your mind.

You might be out of your mind, but it's real and it's palpable in ways that are on a micro level right now, I think, and have been for several years.

This comes back to what we were talking about specifically around like emotional being emotional authorities and like needing to being so freed from having that distinction of what's mental awareness and what's solar plexus is like when you were saying you're not out of your mind, you might be.

I was thinking like, well, both and right, because as this like deep other dimensional spirit consciousness, knowing that something big is churning right now.

That's true.

And at the same time our minds are trying to make sense of it in a very outdated way with our like millennial long Ajna hangover right And I think that's a big part of, like, just intuitively, even if I don't look at the astrology, I think that's a big part of what this year is about on the localized, individual human level, which is part of what was the inspiration and vision for this series is like, I think we're supposed to be.

Like, this language is coming out stronger than I mean it to be and more dogmatic than I mean it to be.

But the old ways of looking at astrology are outdated.

Like, it's not about measuring time.

Like, you said, transit, start, end.

And I talked about this.

You listened to the Pluto convo a little, right?

Talked about this with John Pluto in Aquarius.

Like, what even is collective reality?

Right?

Like, what even is.

And we can put astrology in with that.

Like these kairos, transits unfolding that we're all tuned into.

We're not victim to them, you know, we're not outside of them either.

They're happening through us.

They're happening through our internal alchemy.

Right.

So I think that this is a bridge for us.

Interdimensional bridge.

Chiron completes its.

Like, goes into Taurus for the first time this year, stays there next year.

That's Chiron's first return to its discovery, which I think of Chiron as the interdimensional bridge.

Like, this year feels like a setting for us to bridge the dimensions beyond and within us through orienting to astrology.

Like measurable components of astrology, mind, mind stuff in a way that allows for that to happen while also trusting this backdrop, this inner drop.

I don't know how to describe it, of what we know.

What you just articulated, like, no, this is big.

And then our mind goes.

It's big in this way, it's big in this way, and we need to fight it in this way or resist it in this way or make something happen in this way.

And.

And probably there is some conspiratorial shit right up in there.

Like, it's both, I think, is what I want to underline.

And being more in relationship with, like, our spirit, passenger consciousness, embodied orientation to it, I think is the call moving forward.

Yeah, yeah.

I think the word that came up for me, as you were describing, a lot of.

A lot of what's happening is pivotal.

And I think pivotal is kind of a Mercury word.

Right.

Because as I was looking at the transits of Mercury for the year, kind of preparing for this conversation, I realized Mercury is beyond just the retrograde periods that happen.

Yes, that's a huge part of what's happening.

And I think it's a super critical part of what's happening.

But Mercury is always on some buzzy bee, some business, running around, changing signs, making aspects.

It is kind of like a second moon in a way, as we were talking about before.

So, yeah, just dropping into Mercury a little bit.

Thank you for bringing us there so seamlessly.

Yeah.

I feel like orienting to what even is Mercury has been subtly happening this whole time.

But let's see about naming it.

Yeah, that feels like my entry point right now is thinking about Mercury as the moon of the sun.

Right.

Because when we're looking at things from a geocentric perspective, which is primarily what we're measuring in astrology, seeing things from the vantage point of the Earth, we mostly are seeing Mercury and the sun together, not too far from each other, moving around Earth.

But what's actually happening is Mercury is spinning circles around the Sun.

That's what's responsible for what we see as apparent retrograde motion.

And I can't remember maybe, you know, or maybe it's relevant or not relevant how many days it actually takes Mercury to get around the sun.

Oh, go ahead.

Yeah, I don't know for sure.

Let's see.

It's 88 days.

Whoa, 88.

That's magic.

That's magic.

So, yeah, Mercury spends 88 days in rotation around the sun.

So it's longer than a lunar cycle.

But it's also short respective to a lot of what we look at in astrology.

And if we think of the moon as like the moon is orbiting the Earth, this is how I orient to the moon.

It's collecting the moon.

We think about it as one of our luminaries, one of our sources of light, but it's actually just a rock that is reflecting the light of the sun back to Earth in these different phases in these different ways.

So that has really helped me understand the significance of the moon in a natal chart and by transit is it's collecting data to send back to Earth receptively to send back to our bodies, to our embodied emotional experience.

And something really unlocked for me when I started, this wasn't sourced in my own consciousness thing, which north node in Aquarius, south node in Leo, I think we're gonna find out nothing is actually sourced in our own individual consciousness.

Anyways.

I can't remember where I first heard it, but it really unlocked something for me that somebody calling Mercury the sun's moon, because that really is kind of the role that Mercury plays.

It stays around the Venus does this too so you can transfer some of what we're talking about to Venus, but it stays around the sun and it goes around and it really quickly hits the aspects and then brings it back to us in.

In not necessarily maybe the embodied lunar way, but in some kind of rational way.

So, yeah, that's how I'll open my current way of calibrating to Mercury.

I'm wondering if that brings anything up for you or if you want to start from scratch and just let us know what's your kind of go to way for anchoring to Mercury or talking about or thinking about the role that Mercury plays in the orchestration?

I love the word orchestration, so I'm gonna start there.

Yeah, I think it reflects a lot of what you were talking about.

How I think about Mercury, yeah.

Is like this data collector, this scribe, this messenger who's always taking notes, always writing stuff down.

Again, this is maybe my Mercury placement coming through in Taurus.

It's like, how do we concretize the information?

How do we make it useful to find?

Find.

And yeah, Mercury as orchestrator I think is key because contrasting that with the Moon, where it's like this felt, emotional, intuitive kind of knowing, Mercury feels like an orchestrator in a more cold, metallic, y data kind of way.

So that's kind of one way that I think of Mercury.

And the retrograde periods are right.

It's like I've just been scribbling down so much, and now I get a chance to actually go back through my notes and what was important.

What are we repeating?

What are we not repeating?

That's one thing there.

I think of Mercury as pointy.

I don't know why that word comes through, but I think of Mercury as pointy.

Of course, the glyph kind of has those horns, if you will, but something about it is not soft.

I don't know.

Mercury is not typically soft to me.

Maybe through some certain signs and in some certain aspects it is.

But the nature of Mercury, I think, is a little more clinical, a little more pointy.

Yeah, that brings something up for me that feels very quintessential to Mercury, which is its ambiguity.

Cause when you said Mercury's not soft, my first thought was correct.

And then I was like, but it's not hard either.

Right.

And so.

And even the pointiness, like the horns, and then it's pointy because the bottom of the glyph is the cross of matter, which is pointy.

But then the middle.

Middle of the glyph is the circle of spirit, which is soft kind of Curvy and even the horns are made up of the crescent of the mind, which is.

Right.

So there is this ambiguity in there.

And then that is also in large part how I have attuned to Mercury and taught Mercury in the past.

Is like of the seven traditional planets we know, Mercury is the only one that doesn't fit into any of the binaries.

Right.

It's not day sect, it's not night sect.

What else?

Aren't there other ways that Mercury is non binary?

I feel like if we think about dignity, essential dignity is a huge one, we can dig into that a little bit more and technically.

But something else I want to bring up now because it feels right.

I love the metaphor of Mercury as rice.

I don't know if you've heard this before, but like feels right though, right?

So rice, it comes in so many ambiguous shapes, colors, textures.

And like adding rice to a dish, it's going to pick up whatever it's in proximity to.

It's going to pick up those tones, colors, textures, flavors.

And I think Mercury is exactly, exactly the same.

Right.

I've talked about my own personal Mercury in Taurus as grounded, wants the sturdy data, wants the confidence and security of mental information, of communication.

But then if you contrast that with someone with Mercury and Scorpio, they want that in a different way.

So it's like I can make a rice dish spicy and hot and red and orange, but I could also make a rice dish that's like cool and refreshing and sticky sweet.

So I love that analogy metaphor for Mercury.

And that's one thing that came up.

I love that.

And I think that is really quintessential coming back also to the ambiguity of it, the non binariness of it, that is Mercury.

Mercury is not any one thing, it's all of it, whichever it needs to be.

Mercury and Jupiter together are the only planets that rule.

Two mutable signs.

And Mercury and Jupiter together, that's another way of talking about Mercury's relationship to Jupiter as they're both kind of about the mind in some way.

But Jupiter's like this big mind, or you might say higher mind, more expanded mind.

Mercury is the detail, the small.

Yes, huge.

And one other thing to add on Mercury and ambiguity with respect to rice.

It's like rice kind of brings us all together, right?

Like all different cultures, all different human evolution.

Like they've relied on rice to have a way to nourish themselves and it's part of their culture.

And I think Mercury is a little bit similar in that way, in that we all work with Mercury a little bit different, but it's like role and there is something to distill down into that's true about Mercury.

No matter what culture, no matter what mind, no matter what authority, like bringing in.

So I think that's another interesting analogy to just point out.

Yeah.

So is there a way maybe this will kind of segue us into actually looking at Mercury more directly this year, which we have already done a bit.

But I'm curious cause I think you have done more like zoomed out mercurial research.

I've looked mostly at the retrograde periods personally.

And just Mercury's time in the water signs.

Yeah, maybe let's just go straight to this year.

Was there anything you noticed what struck you this year about Mercury as you were looking at it as a whole?

Even that I'm like, that's not how you look at Mercury.

But let's try a few pieces for sure.

And I think again they're mostly in the retrograde periods, the ones that were interesting to me and I guess since we're in Mercury Pisces time, maybe that's where we start.

But this pre retrograde shadow started with Mercury conjoined the north node, I'm pretty sure.

And that feels like a mental expansion, a change in the way we individually and collectively, societally are using astrology, human design, spirituality to either transcend reality or embody it.

So I don't know.

That was kind of one piece that came up for me.

Okay, question at the Mercury Jupiter intersection, I think in this moment, because I did look at the Mercury retrograde periods and the Mercury in the water signs specifically.

And then I went back a second time more recently and looked at what are the major events of the year that happen in proximity to or during these Mercury retrogrades.

And so in this moment I'm like, oh, Mercury, maybe Mercury wants us to actually go look at those details instead of having these much more zoomed out combos that most of the convos in the series have been.

And you just organically, intuitively were drawn to starting with just this current pre shadow in Pisces.

So a new question that came up for me is based on what you looked at as a whole, if we were to right now focus on the small, the details of these three Mercury retrograde processes in the three water signs, do you think that would be like missing or sidestepping anything super important?

Or does that feel like an appropriate kind of mercurial mental way of orienting?

My instinct is that it's like I Think it's good to be a little different with Mercury.

Right.

Whereas these past podcast episodes have been, like you said, more zoomed out, more about the nature of the planet in that droning frequency kind of way.

I think it's cool and interesting to take a different approach with Mercury.

And I think whatever will come out of that could reflect some of what we would have gone into otherwise.

Does that make sense?

Beautiful.

Yeah.

Okay, so let's another reframe here or a new frame maybe.

Not a reframe.

Mercury spends.

One of the significant things about Mercury this year, as we've discussed, is that it spends a significant amount of time, more in water than any other element moment.

And one thing that was interesting to me when we look at it linearly, is it's going through these water signs sequentially, starting with the mutable water and then cardinal water and then fixed water.

That's the order.

So there's mutability, which feels like you already kind of tapped into that with this expansion of mind.

Mercury conjunct the north node in Pisces in its shadow pre retrograde.

So yeah, I think that was something that struck me that I don't have any punctuation on, but I think I want to bring in like this mind thing that's happening.

This transition from AJNA to solar plexus.

This Mercury spending a lot of time in water this year and retracing its steps in water this year is moving through this more like solar plexus y way of being as we transition into this whole new era that is more solar plexus oriented.

And so yeah, I just want to bring in like it begins with a retrospective look at mutable water.

And then mid year we'll have one in cardinal water and near the end of the year we'll have one in fixed water.

I just want to bring that in as a Jupiter high level and we'll see if anything comes of that.

And now let's look specifically at this period that we're in right now with Mercury in its pre retrograde shadow in Pisces.

Yes.

And I mean something that comes through again to get like Mercury, Jupiter about it.

Right.

So we had that conjunction with the north node.

And then the next thing that happens is Mercury trines Jupiter retrograde in cancer cancer.

And that's happening these last couple days.

And that to me is this expansion again Jupiter in the way we mother parent harness conditions for growth cancer.

So it's this large boundless mental frame that benefits and develops an internal caretaking which I think is Again, reflective of the 2027 transformation.

It's an age of individualism, right?

Like, how do I, I, how do I, you know, better myself?

And not in an egoic way, but in a like authority, spirit level way.

How am I moving through the world in a way that's like nourishing to myself?

And again, this like watery trine situation or conjunction situation is gonna happen as Mercury continues to retrograde in those water places.

Whether it's directly by aspect, which is likely, but also just by signing like the Jupiter in Cancer work is something that I'm not sure has come up a whole lot yet on the pod, but Jupiter's been in Cancer for a while now and it's been doing a little retrograde there.

So Jupiter is here and Mercury is here.

Yeah, Jupiter in Cancer comes up quite a bit on the Jupiter episode which just came out this morning.

And yeah, we're only like 2/3 ish through it, but I'm a Jupiter ruled.

I've been in a Jupiter year for most of this transit and all of this transit for all of this transit.

And I'm feeling it intensely as this, like I'm gonna zoom out for a moment.

As an Aries, I'm often.

I say this all the time, but whatever.

Characteristically, in defense of Aries by reminding folks that Aries is the sign out of all the signs that has the most integrated knowledge of Pisces, right?

Like even more than Pisces, Aries knows that shit, right?

And that's why Aries has this sense of fucking worth because it's like the self is a part of the whole, right?

Like that connectivity lives in my individuality.

And I want to.

I'm bringing that up here because that's a big part of what Britain and I got into.

I think in the Jupiter episode I started thinking about it and talking about it less about Pisces to Aries and more about water to fire.

There's something that happens in the fire signs that is a natural and organic next step of the assimilation and reconnectivity of the immersion into water that permisses the self to lean so fully into the individual experience, into the separateness.

And so yeah, thinking about that, like Jupiter finishing up its retrograde in Cancer here, Jupiter finishing up its time in Cancer here.

A significant component of that happens with this bi sign Trine as you're talking about from Mercury in Pisces and also the nodes still in Pisces too.

And yeah, a big part of how I've been feeling into the Jupiter Cancer which also feels very Piscean, obviously.

Cancer trining Pisces.

This Ram Dass quote, we're all just walking each other home.

He's a Jupiter exalted in cancer in the first house.

Cancer rising being was.

And I've been really feeling into that, the surrendering to my role.

I think there's some power of you personal distraction here for me as well.

But surrendering into the role that it's not about me.

So even when we get to Jupiter in Leo and the task is gonna be like understand more fully through your solar central perspective and let yourself shine, let yourself radiate.

Right caveat with the south node there and Pluto opposing it, it's not gonna be just that, but when we get there it's gonna be based on this Jupiter in cancer lesson.

That's still gestating, that's still deeply in process right now.

But that I have understood to an extent to mean we're all just walking each other home.

Like in this situation I might play the teacher.

In this situation I play the student formally or informally.

In this situation I play the aggressor.

In this situation I play the victim.

And it's all beautiful, it's all sacred.

And so it's all necessary.

You know, it's all part of the tapestry of the matrix of connectivity and of us walking each other home through this karmic matrix that's unfolding.

Right.

And so when you understand that there's a different feeling of what it is to lean into your role.

You lean into your specialness.

Yeah.

Mercury in the water signs, that's part of what it's carrying.

I guess I zoomed back out, but that's part of what Mercury in the water signs is carrying for us is it's like the mind is constantly going to be calculating, recalculating, processing this water perspective even as so much moves on into fire, especially in air, to bring it back to Mercury.

And the details, some of the stuff that I noted and wrote down that happened happens either during Mercury's pre retrograde shadow in Pisces or during the retrograde or during the post shadow are the Saturn Neptune conjunction, the transit of the year happens during the pre shadow just in a few days from now.

You mentioned the Mercury trine to Jupiter in Cancer.

The first eclipses of the year happen during this period of which Mercury rules the second second south node eclipse in Virgo.

And that one happens during the retrograde.

But the first eclipse that we have, which is also the very first of the Aquarius Leo eclipses Which is also the eclipse and nodal axis that take us into this transition into 2027 and beyond.

All of that happens in the pre retrograde shadow of Mercury in Pisces.

And then we have the first conjunction of the sun in Aries to both Neptune and then Saturn respectively.

Also happened during the post shadow.

So those are all really big things that happen this year and they're all taking place as Mercury's in its pre retrograde shadow in Pisces, or in retrograde in Pisces, or in its post shadow in Pisces.

Yeah.

And it's like all at this juncture of Pisces, Aries.

Right.

So I'm glad you initiated that.

And I think something that it brings up for me is something I haven't mentioned yet is I dabble with esoteric astrology, which is really kind of its own system of astrology.

It uses all of astrology and then some, but it's just kind of.

It operates differently than trad astro than sidereal astro.

And I think this switch from Pisces into Aries that you were identifying early really resonates with what are called the esoteric phrases for those two signs.

There's an esoteric phrase for every sign and it just kind of encapsulates that energy.

And there's sort of like, like mantras, they're sort of like affirmations.

They're just these like beautiful words that you can always pull out and reflect on.

So for Pisces and for Mercury in Pisces, like this infinite boundlessness, this, I don't know, oceanic warm water, Mercury there, like trying to calculate and distill that stuff down and leading into Aries is a whole thing.

And the esoteric part phrase for Pisces is I leave the father's house and turning back, I save.

So to me that is so Mercury retrograde in Pisces.

It's like I'm deep in the ocean of it and at some point I have to emerge, at some point I have to come up for air.

But also I do turn back and I do go back into the boundlessness in the infinite until I'm ready to Aries, until I'm ready to, to exit or enter, however you want to think about that.

And the esoteric phrase for Aries, fittingly is I come forth, and from the plane of mind I rule.

So there's like this whole esoteric astrology is weaved into what Mercury is doing throughout this year.

And I think the Aries bit comes more in the post retrograde shadow there's this race, race.

Mercury is planning to catch up with Mars because Mars is a little bit ahead of Mercury at this time around April 10th.

And I sense that's gonna be like this rush, quickening, hastening to integrate all of what happened during the Pisces retrograde period.

And it feels like this desire to fast forward, to skip a scene, to leap across that boundary from Pisces to Aries.

So that's just another thing I looked at here.

That's so good.

Can you say the esoteric phrases again for Pisces and Aries?

Yeah.

Pisces is I leave the father's house, and turning back, I save.

And Aries is I come forth, and from the plane of mind, I rule.

I don't know why this is the thought emerging, but I hadn't thought about this as pointedly until for some reason it was popping up for me as you were sharing all of that.

Mercury's retrograde in Pisces here is happening after Neptune has left.

And for as much as Neptune unveiled to us about the Piscean perspective, it also provided plenty of illusion and delusion about the Piscean perspective and glamorize everything.

Spirituality, connectivity, karma, the void.

And so, yeah, just also feeling into that as part of it was like the look back.

Looking back, I save.

Something about that struck me as like.

Like Mercury's like, I'm gonna go back right now.

Yeah, Neptune, go on, get the momentum going.

Here we go.

It's Aries time.

But Mercury's going back to be like, let's get a little clearer and more discerning and decisive about what Pisces is and what we actually just discovered and learned and assimilated by going back sans Neptune.

Like, this is, like, this is the first Mercury transit through Pisces without Neptune in 12, 14 years, since 20.

A long time without that co presence, for sure.

Yeah.

It feels like there's a lot of potential and intentionality from the cosmic orchestration for this first mutable Mercury retrograde in water of the year.

Yes.

And the other thing to add there too, right.

We touched on essential dignity.

But Mercury is what triad Astra would call unhappy, debilitated detriment in the sign of Sagittarius.

Why does that not come up?

Because that opposes Virgo.

It's exaltation.

Yeah, it's domicile and exaltation.

Once again, Mercury being ambiguous and indecisive.

Yeah.

So it's like, not only has Mercury been going through Pisces in a.

This second moon kind of way, multiple Multiple times every year.

It's consistently been met with Neptune that shroud, that fog.

But also, I think what wants to come through right now is more esoteric astrology doctrine.

You've talked about the outers on this podcast as sort of this, like, low drone frequency, these slow moving planets that are setting a tone as the bass does in music.

Esoteric astrology flips that doctrine a little bit and poses and posits that the outers are higher octaves of inner planets.

So when we think about Neptune, Neptune is considered esoterically to be the higher octave of Venus.

So there has been a Venusian quality to Neptune in Pisces.

Like you say, there's this rosy retrospection.

Exactly.

Like, how do we make this weird, tricky thing beautiful and appealing?

How does it connect and glue us together?

And now that Neptune is moving into Aries, where it's still gonna have that Venusian quality in a Neptune way, but now doing it in a different place gives Mercury this ripe opportunity to be like, all right, we've sort of separated ourselves from that neptunian Venusian quality.

And we have again, ripe opportunity to delve into the depths and bring something forth from that beautiful.

Okay, I actually need to pee.

Can we take a pee break?

Yeah, bio break for sure.

Bio break.

And then I want to feel into the cardinal water cancer retrograde, what happens there.

And then also, also noting that before that happens, Mercury takes on rulership of Uranus, moving into Gemini, which is a big part of the year too.

So maybe we slip that in there.

Yeah.

Okay, cool.

See you in a minute or two.

Or three.

Great.

Oh, man.

I normally remember to hit stop recording, but I forgot I had to pee so bad.

Oh, well, there'll be sounds of eating almonds on the record.

I'll edit them out.

But I was going to tell you before we hit record, but maybe since I never hit stop record, I will just leave it.

Who knows?

Just that this conversation is so epic and good already and I'm so excited about it.

There have been moments of brilliance that I've been living for.

Absolutely.

Like tying together in ways I could never have imagined.

So cool.

I mean, that's Mercury and water tying together in ways that I could never have imagined.

Yeah.

Solar plexus influencing AJNA awareness.

I don't do much.

What do you call it?

Oh, my gosh, why can't I remember the words where you use timing astrology to plan an event or whatever.

Electional.

Electional.

Thank you so much.

I don't do much electional, but One thing that I would do if I did elect weddings, it's like mercury and water.

I think that's like a Mary.

Love that.

Ugh, yes.

Cute, intuitive.

Electional.

Same hope and innocence.

Just don't really fuck with electional.

I had a conversation with Caitlin who you know from the Venus fan about that.

She's guilt motivated and she does fuck with electional and we had a convo about.

Yeah, that hope.

Hope and innocence.

No guilt and desire probably.

Yes, on quality time.

We talked about that.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

Anyways, okay, so we've set the tone.

Mercury retrograde in Pisces is like a large part of how the year opens in some sense.

Then next we're gonna take a look.

Well, let's give the dates since we're in Mercury mode.

Oh yeah.

Mercury retrograde in Pisces.

I think the direct, the station retrograde happens on Venus.

Right, right.

It's February 26th.

I have the 25th, but sure.

25th, 26th to March 20th.

That's the retrograde in Pisces.

It's from 22 degrees Pisces back to eight Pisces.

And so then the shadows.

I also have these dates.

The shadow period, the pre Mercury retrograde shadow in Pisces started when mercury hit 8 degree Pisces on February 11th.

And then the shadow period ends when Mercury gets past 22 Pisces on April 9th.

So as Vince has mentioned in a couple ways.

Ways so far we do have these threeish week retrograde periods.

But if we consider the shadow, the period of time where Mercury is in this section of the zodiac, where it will move through it three times forwards, then backwards, then forwards, we're actually looking at February 11th until April 9th.

So we're looking at two full months and that happens three times.

So that's half the year.

And that's not even considering when Mercury's in the water signs, but not yet in the shadow area.

So more than half the year Mercury's in water.

Which is crazy actually.

Yeah.

Actually it's so common for retrogrades to dip across sign boundaries and things like this.

And it doesn't do that at all in 2026.

Wow.

It feels like a treat.

Which is crazy to say about Mercury retrograde because there's so much doom and gloom about it, but it feels like a treat.

It feels like refreshing.

Talk about that.

Yeah.

Before we get back into the details.

Talk about that.

Because when you used the word refreshing with me, I felt.

Felt that.

Yeah.

I think because there's so much going on in fire and Air signs with the outers, with Saturn, with other planets through the year.

It's like we're all thirsty.

We're all thirsty for some water, for some intuition, for some spirituality, subconscious stuff.

We need it.

And this is a huge way that my general practice has involved.

Right, like less looking at charts and body graphs as what's missing.

How can I be clinical about this and diagnose someone about this and instead saying actually all charts have everything in them, all astro charts have all signs in them.

You might not have planets there, you might not have placements there, but it's there and it gets activated.

In some ways it's the same with the body graph.

Like I don't have a defined sacral.

It doesn't mean I don't have a sacral, it doesn't mean that there's not a gut doing something.

It's just the way it works is different.

So, so this comes through in the transit tier because we are all focused on the fire and air.

That's ignition, that's lighting a match.

That's literally a flamethrower is what I think of when I think of air, planets placements and fire planets placements coming together.

So it's like after I launch a flamethrower, I need a drink of water.

I need something to quench, something to satisfy my thirst, something to again refresh and be a treat.

So even though it is mercurial, it is retrogradey and there's gonna be oopsie daisies in there, there's gonna be fuck ups and find outs.

It's essential for what else is going on.

If you take Mercury retrogrades out of the equation, you're left with something.

Catastrophic is the word that comes up.

Something just popped in for me.

Okay, okay.

I like really want to bring this in, but I don't know if I can.

Mercury stationing in Pisces.

Okay, wait, I want to highlight.

The phrase that you said that brought this in was if you take Mercury retrograde out of the equation.

And what did you follow that with?

Oh, you're left with like air and fire.

And that would be catastrophic.

Catastrophic.

Okay.

So much of the conversations we've been like, we've been preparing for this, right?

Like things are going to get crazy, but we're ready.

Like the alchemy, the evolution, the consciousness of this last period has been preparing us for this.

And I keep having this thing poking me that's like.

But not all of us actually.

Right.

And I don't know how to talk about that.

And I don't even know how to look at that.

But when you just said if you take Mercury retrograde out of the equation, what that brought up for me was like, that is what the unconscious experience of these mass events unfolding on the planet and unfolding within us is.

Right.

And I'm looking at that as Pluto in Aquarius opposite Leo.

Feels like something with that south node eclipses starting in Leo this year in the south node in Leo.

It feels like one of the things I talked about in the episode with John is starting to look at the Aquarius Leo axis as the ego Leo mind, Aquarius axis.

And Mercury is also mind.

So Mercury is also deeply related to ego.

And the ego version of moving through these energies is a very different version of how we're experiencing it.

If we're experiencing it from passenger consciousness, self reflected consciousness, I don't think you've heard me talk about this.

But 55 is the case gate that's coming in as the key for the new way.

And for me, 55, which is also my personality North Node, which is a Pisces gate, has started to feel very much synonymous with self reflected consciousness and passenger consciousness.

And so if we're experiencing the transits in an unconscious way, in a shadow way, as Britain brought up in the last episode in an unskilled way, is another way of talking about about it.

We're having a very different experience than if we are.

Actually, as has been my campaign for this series, witnessing, digesting, integrating, 2026, you know, and something about you being like, if you take Mercury retrograde and water signs out of the equation, like it felt like that thing that I keep thinking about that I haven't known how to talk about.

And so I'm just seeing a connection there, like as everything moves forward into fire and anger there.

If you take this retrospective, nourishing, watery connectivity beyond the realm of ego out of the equation, you're having a very different experience.

So real.

And some people will be doing that.

I think that's one of the temptations, right?

Or one of the possible issues with like looking at the transes this way, like trying to pull back the veil on a single planet at a time.

It sounds great in theory, but it doesn't work because we've been trying to talk about Mercury all day, but we've talked about Jupiter, we've talked about Saturn, we've talked about the nodes.

So it's like, yes, Mercury is the focus and we're taking everything else into consideration.

So there is a bit of danger in Locking in too hard.

Mm.

I can't quite tell how.

But it does feel in some way directly relevant to this next piece that I wanna look at, which is, I don't know which will go first.

For some reason they feel like they go together, but kind of moving into.

Okay, then we have Mercury retrograde and Cancer and what all happens there.

Maybe we start with the dates this time.

Sure.

But before that happens, this is one of the huge things that happens actually.

Not while Mercury is in in retrograde or shadow in a water sign is Uranus.

I haven't done the Uranus episode yet, so I feel like I've been ignoring it.

But Uranus moves.

It finishes up a seven year transit in Taurus and moves into Gemini.

And there's a link here to Mercury because Venus is passing off rulership of Uranus to Mercury.

And so yeah, there's been a lot of like talk about and forecasting about Uranus in Gemini and the chaos of that.

And just thinking about that statement that you made.

If you take Mercury retrograde in water out of the equation now that version of Uranus in Gemini is something very different than the version of Uranus in Gemini we might be resourced for and held within.

When we are assimilating and incorporating this retrospective other dimensional process of Mercury in retrograde, which I found myself using the words like held in just now.

Uranus moves into Gemini, Mercury takes ownership of it and then Mercury moves into Cancer, which Cancer is on the container axis.

I call Capricorn Cancer the container axis.

We are being held in Cancer by the edges of the matrix.

That's how I think about it.

Cancer is the matrix.

That's my primary orientation to Cancer.

So.

So should I say the dates or do you want to slide anything in before I do that?

And do you want to slide in real quick with just the other signs that Mercury goes through?

Because it's important, but we probably won't touch on it here.

Mercury in Aries, that ingress happens April 14th.

Mercury in Taurus, that ingress happens on May 2nd.

So time happens.

Mercury does things in these signs.

Mercury will meet Saturn and Neptune for the first time in Aries.

Yes.

Yeah.

Does Mercury meet Uranus in Taurus before it egresses?

No, I don't think so.

And that's like another really potent, powerful piece to me is that Mercury does not encounter Uranus in Taurus.

I think it makes this movement all the way from Pisces to Gemini.

So it makes a mutable square, you might say.

Yeah.

So those dates are there for you.

And then Mercury in Gemini happens on

May 17, and it conjoins Uranus right away, like immediately.

Yeah, like literally immediately.

And what I want to say about that again, is also an esoteric astrology bit that I think connects beautifully and wonderfully to a lot of stuff we've been talking about so far.

The esoteric phrase for Gemini is, is I see my other self.

And in the waning of that self, I grow and glow.

Geez, I'm gonna need a list of these phrases, please.

There's so much to them.

Like, I feel like I could spend.

Okay, open head idea for anyone who wants to play with this meditation on your esoteric phrase for your perfected house for a whole year.

Cause I feel like so much could unfold for a whole fucking year with those phrases.

Esoteric phrase is they're so powerful.

Contemplative, meditative, affirmatory.

They're this wonderful resonance that occurs with the sign regardless of the planets you're talking about there, regardless of the activations, like House activations that are happening there.

It's something that is like, I see it as both this very low tone resonance thing and this very high tone resonance thing.

And you can tap into it in many different ways.

But.

But with respect to this transit that we're talking about, how there's this handoff of rulership with Uranus from Taurus, a place of solidness, a place of Venusian glue, into the mercurial Gemini, into the chaotic Gemini.

You might even say it's like, I see my other self, Uranus.

I see the rebellion in the body.

I see the somatic rebellion.

And in the waning of that work, in the waning of the unhinging of the body, unhinging of the solid, I grow and glow into a more electric rebellion, a more Gemini mercurial rebellion I grow into.

Rebellion is the word that keeps coming up, like, through frequency with others, destabilization, through sharing with others, through this split consciousness, through this split evolution.

Gemini is a split.

Gemini is duality.

Gemini is multitudinous.

And the other esoteric bit that I think is really important to emphasize here, we talked about how Neptune is a higher octave of Venus.

Uranus is a higher octave of Mercury.

So while again, if we touch back to this, like, what if we took Mercury retrograde out of the experience, right?

We need that middle tone, we need that viola or whatever instrument is playing that to do this buzzy bee, back and forth business.

And if we lose that, Uranus has nothing to vibe off of.

Uranus has Nothing to harmonize with and to activate in a new way.

If Mercury is not there laying that groundwork, what happens to Uranus?

That higher octave, it either disappears or becomes something else entirely.

Yeah, There's so much there.

I have a thing to go on.

But I'm also just like hold on, just let that land.

The rebellion that you brought up, the revolution, the breakthrough of Uranus has been taking place through Taurus for the last seven years.

It first began in May of 2018.

And Taurus is the most fixed sign.

It's the most earthy sign, it's fixed earth, it's the most embodied, the most having to do with having a body.

Very simply put, that's what Taurus is about.

It's about the body and having a body.

And so this revolution, this liberation, this breakthrough, this radicalization.

What's the word that you use?

Rebellion.

All these Uranian wor have been happening through the fixicity of our form have been happening through the absolute capacity or non capacity of our bodies.

Right?

And we've seen this influx of awareness of the role that the nervous system plays, right?

That has felt like Uranus in Taurus.

We've seen the Kim Kardashian is that who said nobody wants to work anymore?

We've seen the somatic revolution of human design becoming popularized to Neptune and punishment Pisces for better and for worse.

And like you know, in mine and your we can talk about ourselves Aries non sacrals who during this Uranus in Taurus transit learned that our bodies don't do that, our bodies can't do that.

And our minds might hate that.

And we might have a lot of conditioning and pressure to think that our bodies are supposed to do that and fit that mold, but they just won't.

Right?

And that's like a version of the experience that you and I have had as non sacrals.

But sacrals have their version of that too which is my body does that, but it doesn't do that or it looks like my body doesn't wanna do this anymore.

So this like really becoming liberated, accessing this higher octave of experience through surrendering to the absolute fixicity of our bodies.

Taurus, right.

These are some of the ways that I've been really calibrating to what Uranus in Taurus has been.

Uranus in Gemini don't quite know what it is yet.

When we think about the Uranus in Gemini under Mercury's rulership as the higher octave of Mercury Trine, Pluto in Aquarius, there's this Real feeling of like the revolution happens through our relationship to our mind now, right?

It was through our relationship to our bodies in the last Uranus chapter.

Seven years long.

For the next seven years we find our freedom.

We access liberation.

We have breakthrough.

We rebel, we evolve, we revolutionize through our relationship to mutable air to our mind.

So from reckoning with the most fixed of our physicalness, Taurus.

That's how we got free in this last era.

In the next era we will be Reckoning doesn't quite feel like the right word.

Dancing with calibrating to embracing the most mutable.

Taurus is the most fixed.

Gemini's the most mutable.

It's mutable air.

There's no fixicity to that.

It's all multiplicity, right.

Like Gemini's non committal, ambiguous, non binary side and yeah.

Duality in the binary and like revolutionizing, becoming liberated through our relationship to.

To mind and Maya, that transition from

the body to the mind, from Taurus to Gemini, it feels like exactly the esoteric phrase for Gemini.

So I'm just gonna repeat it again.

I see my other self and in the waning of that self, I grow and glow.

Hell yeah.

I'm thinking back to early in the conversation when we were just getting started and we were talking about this distinction again between solar plexus, ajna, awareness and meaning.

And I'm thinking about how once we have acknowledged our relationship to the somatic wisdom of the body being what is most connecting us to spirit, consciousness and a truth beyond the binary, then we get to be in new relationship to the mind in a way that is not repressing or embracing the mind so fully.

And then there's like a freedom in having mind that was not for me, was not available until I reckoned with my body as the primary source for filtering my experience of mind and Maya.

And I'm feeling into that as this transition of Uranus from Venus's rulership into Mercury, from Taurus into Gemini.

This is first trimester earth and first trimester air.

Quintessential earth and quintessential air.

We are discovering the body through the lens of Uranus and now we are discovering the mind through the lens of Uranus with this transition.

And so like freedom within the binary, freedom in the duplicity, freedom in the multiplicity, freedom in the duality.

That yeah, is kind of a newer ish way that I'm feeling into this because we became liberated in our relationship to our body because we gained this somatic wisdom.

Wisdom and recalibrated to the somatic wisdom.

Now we have the capacity to have that same kind of transformation take place in our relationship to our mind, which is not unrelated to the bigger unfolding that's happening with Pluto in Aquarius.

Yes, literally all of that.

And I think what's coming through for me now is the liberation in the body.

Body, the non negotiables of form principle.

My body is not doing that or my body is doing that.

That helps you understand mind in a new way and it helps you get away from, I think, what some people can pick up from human design where it's this idea that the mind is the enemy.

The mind is my not self.

I need to like, destroy my mind and live completely in my body.

But that misses the point, right?

Yeah.

The mind is not your enemy.

The mind is a part of yourself.

And your mind can meet yourself in the present moment.

Your mind can meet the body in the present moment.

So that's all there.

And that's all happening in this transit from Uranus in Taurus to Uranus in Gemini.

That capacity becomes available because we have gone through the rebellion in the body and because we have unearthed that we've towered, that the Uranian is the tower in tarot.

And the tower is about utter destruction and.

And tearing it down to rebuild something new, better, different, other.

Yeah.

Freedom inside of the limitation of form.

Uranus in Taurus.

Freedom inside the limitation of duality.

Uranus in Gemini.

Ooh, I can't wait to see what that actually looks like.

Yeah.

Keep in mind, we're forecasting here, so we don't.

We're not in the future yet.

Observing the future from this moment.

Yeah.

But Mercury is in Pisces, so we also are in the future right now.

Okay.

So linear time.

Uranus makes this transition that I'm just like, something is here guiding us right now because I'm feeling like.

Yeah, really connected to multidimensional layers of awareness and perspective on this transit right now.

But it moves in on April 25th.

Wait, is that right?

Yeah.

And then let's repeat these Mercury ingresses that you mentioned.

So on April 24, when Uranus moves into Gemini, the Sun is in Taurus.

So we're in Taurus season.

Mercury is in Aries.

And then as you mentioned, Mercury moves into Taurus.

Co present with the sun on May 2, flies through Taurus, flies through Taurus.

Yeah.

Mercury's like, we're done.

We're done here.

We're done.

We're getting to Gemini.

Right.

It's like, I've seen that all before.

It's this transition that we are talking about.

Mercury's like, okay, okay, we've been with the body.

Our higher octave has been with the body for seven years.

I want to catch up.

Yeah.

So then May 17, 15 days later, Mercury enters Uranus and immediately conjoins.

Sorry, Mercury enters Gemini, which is now in some ways synonymous with Uranus and immediately conjoins Uranus at one degree.

And then on June 1, Mercury enters cancer co present with Venus and Jupiter.

And let me visit my notes here.

Mercury enters its pre retrograde shadow.

So the retrograde in Cancer is gonna be from 26 degrees to 16 degrees.

So Mercury first hits its shadow shadow for the second retrograde on June 12 and then it stations retrograde June 29, stations direct July 23 and doesn't end its shadow until August 6, which is all the way into nearing the halfway mark or so of Leo season.

So lots of summer is defined by this Mercury in Cancer and, and Mercury's in Cancer even before the summer starts.

And the shadow period starts before summer starts as well.

I think I said June 11th and June 29th is the station retrograde.

Yeah.

And there's another significant component of the astrology this year is.

Well, let me just read those.

So we have Chiron's ingress into Taurus, which is a really big deal.

It's just the initial ingress.

It will go back into Aries, but it spends the summer summer in Taurus.

This year.

Huge.

I could talk about that forever.

Stop.

That happens while Mercury is in its pre retrograde shadow in Cancer.

Jupiter ingress to Leo.

Huge.

This year that happens on, I think it's like right around the station.

Let's see.

Jupiter ingress to Leo June 29th.

Yeah, June 30th, June 29th, which is

as Mercury station retrograde in Cancer.

Cancer.

So it applies, but it's slowing down.

And it applies to Jupiter through its whole Cancer period.

But then Jupiter escapes and gets into Leo before Mercury stations.

So a huge event of the year.

Another planet moving from water to fire.

Jupiter moving into Leo happens during the Mercury retrograde in Cancer.

The Mars Uranus conjunction, which a lot of people are looking at perfect United States return United States war patterns.

That happens with Mercury in Cancer.

And Mercury is the ruler of that conjunction.

From Cancer, Jupiter in Leo opposite Pluto.

The nodes change signs now after Mercury stations direct in Cancer, but is still in the shadow.

The nodes officially change signs from Virgo Pisces to, to Aquarius Leo and then the Jupiter cazimi Jupiter conjunct.

The sun also takes Place in Leo, Very, very significant.

Jupiter cazimi because it's in the sun sign of Leo takes place during the post shadow of Mercury in Cancer as well.

So there's some of the stats.

Anything stick out for you in terms of symbolic relevance?

Yeah, it's a lot of astrology happening during that time for sure.

Um, I guess what sticks out to me was kind of like there's kind of that chase that happens with Mercury again and the slower moving planets like coming up on Jupiter.

It's crazy.

Sorry, Jupiter's running away.

Yeah, it's crazy.

Like Saturn and Neptune leave Pisces conjoined in Aries.

Mercury is holding it back, like revisiting Pisces.

And then the same thing is happening.

As Jupiter leaves Cancer and goes into Leo.

Mercury's like wait, let me go back.

And again it's like you can't not consider Mercury in these scenarios.

It's doing such important stuff here by going back into the water, by going fishing, I guess you call it

going fishing in Pisces, going back into the womb in Cancer.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I feel like most of the points that may need to be made about this have been made through just talking about this fractal idea of what happens in fire and revisiting water from there.

And also the Uranian component and Mercury now ruling Uranus in Gemini.

I don't know that I have anything more specific to bring in.

I have a.

The pre retrograde shadow Mercury sextiles moon Mars in Taurus and square Saturn in Aries on June 12.

I don't know if you looked at that at all, but that feels like something sturdy, safe, long lasting is being created.

Right.

Even though there's that square there.

It's like this mixture of water and earth having this fertile soil with the sextile chiron involved as well.

And the Saturn square is a part of it from a structure standpoint perhaps.

But again it's like this water earth stuff we still need while all this air fire stuff is happening.

And I think what comes through again, esoteric astrology, I'm leaning in the esoteric phrase for cancer is I build a lighted house.

And therein dwell

the matrix in which we are all walking each other home.

Yeah, I feel like some seeds here, but I don't have anything thing in particular.

I keep wanting to bring it back to like this is cardinal water now.

So we had this first mercurial going back into the ocean in mutable water as Saturn and Neptune moved on.

As we have our first eclipse season of the year and our first Aquarius Leo eclipse.

And then now we're in cardinal water.

And there's something in me that's like, there's something there, but I don't know what it is.

So I'm feeling pulled to call out the dignity of Mercury.

In Cancer it's less unhappy than it is in Pisces.

Cancer being a cardinal sign.

Cardinal signs always to me evoke direction.

Right.

We think of the cross of matter, we think of the cardinal directions.

So it's like what direction is Mercury headed as it traverses the womb in Cancer, as it moves around back and forth, forth, making all these busy aspects in these interesting configurations here.

To me it's like the aspects are less singular in nature.

It's not like Mercury trine, Jupiter, it's Sextile moon Mars in Taurus and square Saturn in Aries.

And then at the end it's the Sextile with Venus in Virgo and the square with Saturn in Aries.

So.

So it's like we're adding a layer to the mercurial experience at this point in time.

It's a bit less distinct.

Yeah.

Something that was coming through as I was talking about Jupiter with Britain and this was really unexpected for me.

Cause this is not a phrase that I had felt into or a feeling I had felt into prior to the convo, but I was feeling into Jupiter and Cancer as like these nonspecific blessings and non specific specific understanding.

And it has to do with that idea of we're all just walking each other home.

In the way that I orient to Cancer as being very fractal consciousness, you're a Cancer rising, so perhaps you feel this the way that the moon has an authority.

It's not what we typically think about as authority.

Right.

We tend to project authority onto Saturn, but I always like to think about how by the time Saturn has completed its rotation, the moon Moon has done all of that almost 400 times.

So there's this like unimpressed nature that the moon kind of has.

Kind of like what an aware person moving through their emotional wave might be like.

It's like, yeah, I've been here before.

I'm up and then I'm down.

I'm up and then I'm down.

And there's a similar but different feeling, I imagine for undefined solar plexus is like.

It's a feeling I'm not gonna hold too tightly.

I'm gonna let it go.

I'm gonna let it wax and wane.

Like that's some of the wisdom to keep Cancer it can't really be impressed.

I find the cancers in my life are honestly people that are very hard to impress.

Like there's some of the Aries cancer square is.

I'm like ooh, this, this ah.

And cancers are just kind of like yeah, okay, I've seen that, I've felt that, I felt that before.

I've got that imprint, you know, that's kind of the feeling I'm having as I look at the non specificness of how you're talking about like there's more going on and like it's all being ruled by the moon.

And so the moon is moving very fast.

It's way not only waning and waxing and giving us these very different perspectives as it wanes and waxes through its cycle ruling this Mercury period in cancer, but it's also moving through the signs really quickly.

It's taking a lot of.

So it's kind of like double processing here, right?

Like the Mercury processing is being ruled by the lunar processing.

Maybe that's where the, like it doesn't matter that much what we're thinking about here.

It's about what we're feeling.

We get this, this like solar moon, lunar moon kind of situation happening.

And yeah, totally resonate with being generally unimpressed.

One of my life mottos is like easily amused, not easily impressed.

Yeah, that's so you.

Okay, here's something coming through.

One of the ways I think I'll get into this more when I talk about Uranus in Gemini with Lex.

But one of the things that keeps hitting me about that transit that's not unrelated to what we've talked about about with this handoff of Uranus from Taurus into Gemini is I'm noticing I in my own deconditioning relaxing more and more into innocence as a perspective that's healthy for me.

Sixth color kind of detachment, right?

Which feels like exactly what we just described about cancer.

It also feels like the north node moving into Aquarius.

I have noticed for a while now that I have been less internally affected by external reality.

And so a past version of me was much more.

I identified as an activist.

I was much more locked into what was happening honestly mostly in a power view way to be honest.

Like I was like concerned with power, which is correct for me.

And then there's been, you know, I moved to the desert, I've been isolating, I've been calibrating to my hermit body.

I've been deconditioning into this innocent way of understanding the world more detached way.

And I Still feel myself feel, be really like moved lately.

Like in 2025 I started feeling more like my spleen was like pay attention.

So I've been paying more attention to the unfolding and it has been feeling closer to me and more like relevant to my body to be paying attention in certain ways.

But even then I notice myself being able to like emotionally calibrate and move through it differently and honestly more quickly than I have in the past.

And I recently heard other people like there was some conversation going on around some of the recent fucked up events in my orbit field, Discord server and other people were echoing back to me this feeling of like I was able, like I felt it, it was intense and I watched myself move through it rather quickly and then come back to my center and come back to my authority, my subjective reality.

And there's like lots in the astrology that I've been screaming about on this whole series is like pay attention to your subjective reality.

Get to your localized strand of passenger consciousness.

And yeah, I feel that kind of like unimpressed.

I felt it all before the wisdom of the Cancerian emotional processing and the piece that made me bring this up here is Mercury is ruling Mars conjunct Uranus which may be one of the most volatile virus violent astro weather events unfolding moment of the year over the summer.

Mercury is ruling it from Cancer.

So there's this support potentially to be able to feel it and be with it and witness it and digest it and integrate what's there, not repress it and also not fully embrace it to the point that you leave the solar center of your own experience Jupiter in Leo at this moment.

Right.

So that's kind of how I'm feeling starting and as we're talking to feel into this Mercury retrograde period which rules the Mars Uranus conjunction in Gemini.

Can you have the perspective of the Moon threefold because of the forward, backwards, forward retrograde motion.

Can you have the perspective of the Moon?

That's like yeah, okay, this is what's happening on the physical planet Saturn.

But I've been here before, I've done this way more times than Saturn.

I've felt this before.

This is just a moment in the emotional process.

This isn't the whole thing.

So that's perhaps some of the refreshing but also kind of existential Cancerian support that the Mercury in Cancer holds us in as we go through what will be volatile this summer.

I think what comes up too on a bit of a technical level, right, Cancer does not see directly what happens in general Gemini it's like this aversion there.

And despite Mercury ruling it, Mercury being the changeling being this neutral kind of back and forth ambiguous planet, it's responsible for it, but not in a way that feels like it's the CEO of what's going on there.

It's responsible for it in a way that doesn't feel like presidential or principal.

It's like that mess is out of my view at this time.

I'm aware of it, but I'm not perhaps I'm not truly responsible for it.

So powerful.

Yes.

That's like that is the attunement available to us.

And like there's a powerlessness that goes with the existentialist, existential nature of cancer to me that Leo eventually pierces through and breaks.

But there's this like powerless surrender that has to happen in cancer.

That's like I've discovered fire, I've discovered Earth, I've discovered air and now I've discovered water.

I have met all of the building blocks of this reality.

That's all there is.

Why go on?

And until we get to Leo, we don't know why to go on.

So there is this real, like that's it, that's everything.

Fractal consciousness, everything is everything.

Nothing matters.

That's why I'm not impressed.

And so that's, that's like, that's medicine for us.

That's available as medicine for us this summer actually.

Yes.

Yeah.

Huge.

Thank you for bringing in the in conjunction.

Yeah, that's just another layer.

It's really underlining itself there.

Okay.

Do you want to walk us through Mercury in Leo, Mercury in Virgo, Mercury in Libra, Mercury in this, most of the second trimester elements before we get into Mercury in Scorpio.

Yes.

I found as I was going through Mercury, it was like less and less became clear and potent and arose for me other than just this through line of esoteric phrases.

So I have a few bits on Mercury and Leo which starts on August 9th.

There's a mercury Jupiter conjunction in Leo which we hinted at.

I have that as August 15th.

And again I think this particular configuration reflects the esoteric phrase for Leo, which I love.

The esoteric phrase for Leo I'll share now is I am that and that am I.

It's very self aware.

It feels leonin.

It feels, feels solar, incredibly solar.

And this Mercury Jupiter conjunction in LEO feels like expanding this minutia.

Right.

The detailed Mercury, the dotting I's crossing T's Mercury that is process driven and details driven and changeable.

Mutable malleable, meeting the Jupiterian, which is ever expanding spiralically increasing high level, abundant magnitude.

So it feels like.

Yeah, expanding the minutia.

Coming into everything.

Coming into everything I am and nothing I am not.

That is very this aspect, I feel.

And I didn't look at the Jupiter cazimi in Leo.

That happens, but it's maybe a reflection of some of the themes available from that slice in time.

Yeah, that's what I've got on that.

Okay, so Mercury enters Mercury enters Leo after this really long period in Cancer, which is most of the summer on August 9th.

Yep.

And then it leaves Leo for Virgo on August 23rd.

Fifth.

Anything notable there?

I think toward the end of that Mercury transit was kind of interesting.

August 23rd I have sun in Virgo conjoining South Node in Leo.

Is that correct?

That's still with Mercury in Leo.

Right.

I think that transition is interesting because we started off this conversation in this Mercury year conjunct the North Node in Pisces.

So it's like now the nodes have shifted.

Shifted.

And Mercury is getting new information from the nodes.

Fresh Virgo.

Yeah, like fresh perspective, fresh environment.

So I think it's like, it's like we get to experience Mercury's exaltation for the first time in a couple of years without the South Node, which is nice.

I mean, I'll never get to experience that as a natal South Node in Virgo, but nice for y'.

All.

Yeah, we get to come back to Virgos.

I analyze the non esoteric version of the statement without the hypervigilance of the South Node or the difficult lessons that the South Node has been showing us about our compulsive hypervigilance in Virgo.

I think guilt is the word that comes through for me.

And not in the human design motivation word, but guilt in the.

The, I don't know, more feeling word.

I think of South Node Virgo as undefined, sacral, trying to do too much, trying to get involved in everything and doing a disservice to yourself because of that and driving yourself from a place of guilt.

Like I should be doing more.

I should be caring for more people.

And we're moving on from that.

Yeah, a big theme that's been coming through, came through on the Jupiter convo.

I think it's gonna come through on the nodes convo.

I have next is like, like this theme for me.

I've been looking at a lot of like, where's the line in my own system between care and hypervigilance?

Right.

So like where am I kind of like just organically wanting to take in information from the other and defer in a way that doesn't feel compromising to me because I'm a part of a whole and I want to feel the dance.

And when does that cross the line into I'm now editing myself, trying to make myself smaller, doing all these not self manifester things because I do care.

I am a South node in Virgo.

I have that care.

I'm a moon in the first house.

There's so much care for how I want to relate and go about my work and I want to be conscientious about my impact.

But then where is the line crossed?

Where that care becomes hypervigilance.

And now it's actually me micromanaging and removing other people's agency through my personal distraction to have whatever subjective feelings they're going to have about their experience of me, me.

Right.

And what I have found, I do think this is in somewhat a Jupiter in Cancer realization for me is I don't fucking know where that line is and it is not clear moment to moment for me.

Actually I often only get that information in retrospect that the line has been crossed.

So that's like a very thin, possibly non existent line for me.

And yeah, just kind of feeling into what will this fresher version of both sun and Mercury in Virgo, Virgo, later this late summer, almost fall feel like when I think we still have Virgo, Pisces, eclipses after that, but we don't have the nodes there anymore.

So there will be this refreshing, a really good word that you've brought in for Mercury all year in Virgo, the reflection of Pisces water.

We will be getting kind of a refreshing taste of that care and specificity and analytical intentionality that Virgo brings through and in us that is less about these really karmic lessons of having to let go and recalibrate that we've been experiencing with Virgo transits while the south node was there, which doesn't feel unrelated, perhaps too then we have a brief transit of Mercury through Libra September 10 through September 30, so 20 days.

So perhaps if some of the lesson or the the realization available in Mercury in Virgo is like, yeah, coming back into a relationship with care and intentionality that is not as laden with an excess of hypervigilance, we get to apply that in the context of relationship with Mercury in Libra.

Did you have anything come up for Mercury in Libra?

I had one little aspect I wanted to Pick up.

And that's the opposition with Saturn in Aries on September 18th.

18th.

So yeah, Mercury in Libra feels like trying to uphold this balance, trying to come to a neutral decision on something.

Weighing the options seems like a very Mercury in Libra kind of thing.

But that opposes the discipline and the boundaries of individuality that Saturn is creating in Aries.

So it really feels like, feels like this standoff.

And I think the medicine there is available in the esoteric phrase for Libra, which is I choose the way that leads between the two great lines of force,

the middle way.

And I think that's available in a lot of oppositions where we don't see a way out of it.

It's this or that.

Actually.

Let's calibrate to a third way.

What's the way between?

Between.

There's also like this.

Yeah.

The way between is we're reckoning with the limitation of duality which exists anytime we're in an air sign.

Right.

And so even before this Mercury opposite Saturn in Aries there's this Mercury trine.

When it's in early Libra, within the first few degrees it trines Pluto in Aquarius and then it trines for the first sign time Uranus in Gemini.

And so there is this huge recalibration happening as we've discussed a bit today and as John and I discussed in the Pluto in Aquarius episode about our relationship to our minds and everything, mind and everything intellect.

And this moment of Mercury in Libra following what we just talked about with Mercury in Virgo approaching, preparing for this opposition to Saturn that you're talking about, is joining forces in a really fluid and an obvious, but maybe not that obvious way with the backdrop or the higher octaves of Pluto and Uranus and air signs.

And as Mercury is in Libra, it's being ruled by Venus in Scorpio.

So here it feels like a lot of potential for the big assignment of being in new relationship to the mind.

And then even while Mercury is in a mind sign this year in an air sign, it's still being held down by a planet planet in water, Venus in Scorpio.

So there is still this different approach.

I don't know how refreshing Venus in Scorpio will feel, but this other realmly approach that's influencing how we experience Mercury

in Libra, a necessary fixed water experience regardless of refreshing quality or not.

Yeah, refreshing in that other way.

Like.

Yeah.

And doesn't Venus retrograde in Scorpio this year?

Yeah, so there's that.

Yeah, it do it do she do more to come on that in the Venus episode.

Okay.

And then we have Mercury moving into Scorpio on September 30th.

And let's go over some dates here.

So this final Mercury retrograde, The shadow starts October 4th.

So a handful of days after the ingress, Mercury will enter the shadow.

And then the actual retrograde is the shadow starts when Mercury hits 5 degrees Scorpio.

The actual retrograde is October 24th to November 13th from 20 degrees, almost 21 degrees Scorpio to 5 degrees Scorpio.

And then it ends November 30th at 20 degrees Scorpio.

And then I'll still have like 10 more days or so, nine or 10 more days in Scorpio before it moves on to Sag.

So it'll be in Scorpio until nine.

I'll look at the exact date in a little bit, but nine or ten days into December.

So this is in large part how we're closing the year is with Mercury in Scorpio.

I have for a significant event that happened during this final one.

Let's see.

I had a similar experience to you where it was like less.

Yeah.

All I wrote down for this is that we have this Mars south node, Jupiter pile up in Leo square, Mercury in Scorpio, and some of the actual conjunctions happen during Mercury's retrograde in Scorpio and some happen in the post retrograde shadow.

So there'.

Syah.

One of the themes of this Mercury retrograde in Leo is the square against this pileup of Jupiter south node and Mars all in fixed fire Leo.

That happens while Mercury is conjunct Venus retrograde.

It feels like a serious planetary conversation happening.

Being ruled by the sun in Libra in fall, opposite Saturn and Aries in fall.

Yeah.

Don't know what it is, but there's themes of like the fixity of self and the relationship of self to the other other relationship.

Venus conjunction, Mercury.

To me, fixed versus mutable versus cardinal squares all have really different feelings to them.

Mutable squares are almost like that's not even a hard aspect.

Oh, you need me to budge so you can do your thing.

Okay.

You know, like mutable signs are down to budge and adjust.

Cardinal squares feel like second place easy or second place hard because they're fiery already and squares are fiery, so they're down to fight cancer.

Libra, Aries, Capricorn.

We're always kind of mad anyways our cardinal placements.

So we're like, you want to fight Mars's aspect the square.

Okay.

But fixed squares, like they're fixed squares.

So that's going to.

To be.

Yeah, a big part of this Mercury retrograde in Scorpio in fixed water.

I mean, retrograde in fixed water.

Anyways, it's like, yeah, it's hard.

You have to move through fixed water.

That's like sludgier than moving through cardinal water or definitely moving through mutable water.

And it doesn't help that Pluto in the north node are in Aquarius and then there's this stack of planets.

Planets and the south node in Leo during this time.

Maybe Venus brings some levity or something to it, but yeah, it feels sludgy.

That last Mercury retrograde.

I mean, I haven't felt that much into it, but it feels like if the Pisces one, the mutable one to start the year is kind of bringing this like, you know, Pisces is kind of.

Of excessively joyful.

So it's like there's like a levity to it.

And then the cancer one feels heavier.

But it's like there's the healthy detachment, healthy perspective of none of this matters.

I don't think we have any of that in the last one.

I think it's gonna feel harder.

That's intuitively how it's showing up to me.

It's like there's maybe not a whole lot of grace given.

It's just something really needs to be like, contended with and waded through.

The imagery that's coming to mind for me is like holding back an avalanche or like a rock slide or a mudslide.

Like there's all this tension in the fixed squares and it.

It feels like resentful and icky and bitter.

And it's like something any.

We have to like, move cautious, cautiously because something could set this off.

That's the analogy or the metaphor that I feel into here.

And I don't know, I think that's a little bit always there with any sort of planets moving through the via Combusta and this Libra, Scorpio place.

But especially falling planets, debilitated planets.

The chart I'm specifically looking at Right now is October 6th, 6th, Venus retrograde conjunct, Mercury in Scorpio.

And then we have as mentioned, south node Moon at this time, Jupiter, Mars, all in Leo and the sun and fall and Libra.

There's a whole mutual reception in only those three signs.

The Leo stack ruled by the fallen sun in Libra, ruled by the detriment Venus in Scorpio ruled by Mars and Leo.

And everything goes back to that.

Even Pluto in Scorpio ruled by Saturn and Aries ruled by Mars.

That's part of this grouping.

So there's like yeah, I guess, yeah, maybe the grace this time.

Here's what I'm seeing coming back to my conceptualization of trimesters.

All three of these signs that are holding this mutual reception that rules all at this time.

Our second trimester, which to me is all about our agency, our will, our selfhood, like conscious effort.

It's all like really in the middle of things, in the thick of it.

It's not the introductory first trimester and it's not the kind of, of like Jupiterian bookended relief in perspective, Jupiterian and Saturnian perspective.

And like, well, that was the hard lesson.

This is what we learned of the third trimester.

It's like the lunar, solar, mercurial, Venusian, all planets that are very close to like the self, you know, like the drama of the ego, the drama of the personal experience.

That's where we end the year is when, with this three way mutual reception.

Mercury, Venus, retrograde in Scorpio Square, all this fixed fire stuff in Leo.

I wonder if it's like something causes us to experience some kind of tangible shift, visceral, maybe a better word, shift from the chaos of the external reality, emphasis perhaps, when whatever happens in the summer happens with the Mars Uranus conjunction.

And then there's something that brings it much more to the centrality of the individual experience.

Like what was that for me?

What is this for me?

What's the alchemy required for me?

Something, yeah, like that in this last

part of the year that feels pretty definite.

And as I gaze at the chart and pulled it up here, I zoned in on Mars for no particular reason, but Mars on this day, October 6, 2026 is in concert with the outers.

It's sexual, hostile, Uranus and Gemini, it's Trine, Neptune and Aries.

It's opposite Pluto in Aquarius.

And Mars in Leo is away from that south node Jupiter Moon conjunction.

And I think, yeah, what's causing a lot of the ick and the stuck and the resentful are like the inner planets.

So Mars being in concert with those hierarchive versions of those inner, inner planets is bringing something unique and self oriented here.

Throwback to nature loves courage.

When Ari and I took our first look at Mars and Ari really helped me reframe what that conversation was going to be about.

Was not about Mars as a player this year, it's about Mars as a ruler this year.

And so a lot just comes down to Mars this year.

So that's really interesting connection to that.

And Mars ruling Mercury in Scorpio in this configuration has me compelled to share the esoteric phrase for Scorpio, which is warrior am I.

And from the battle I emerge triumphant.

Damn.

Also I heard myself earlier saying, after the chaos of the maybe collectively oriented summer, there's this shift and I used the words, what was that for me, me.

But if I come back to how I orient to the trimesters, we don't get that aftermath perspective until we have some planets in Sagittarius.

And at this time and through Mercury's retrograde in Scorpio, we've got Mercury, Venus retrograde in Scorpio, we've got the sun in Libra and then Scorpio, we don't actually have this breakthrough to that third trimester perspective at this time.

So it's actually what is this for me right now?

So that makes me feel like not to be doomy, but it makes me wonder what's gonna happen in the sun summer.

That puts everyone into a position of having to figure out what that means for themselves in the fall.

What does it mean for me now in the fall?

There's some kind of urgency to it, except it's fixed, so there's no.

Yeah, yeah.

And zoom out a little bit to like human design transit level being in the fall and connecting back to like that 88 degree mark kind of thing changing from one quarter to another quarter this summer.

I shouldn't speak on this because I don't know human design transits and cycles as well.

But the summer is 1/4, the fall is another quarter.

So having sun right in the mid decan of Libra at this time, 13° Libra, there's a light being shown on that quarter overall.

Yeah.

And then maybe there's some kind of breakthrough break into something in the very tail end of the year.

Mercury enters Sagittarius on December 6 and the sun will have already been there for about 14 days.

Venus is all the way back at 1 degree Scorpio.

So there's still a lot of Scorpio, a lot of water as Mercury leaves it behind finally.

And Mercury, Mercury enters Jupiter's realm.

And we get Mercury in a Jupiter sign ruled by Jupiter in Leo for the first time.

Right.

Cause when Mercury's in Pisces, Jupiter's still in Cancer.

So this is our first taste of Mercury under the rulership of Jupiter in Leo at the end of the year.

So that feels powerful.

Re like after whatever this like fixed pile up square season is.

And this like having to go to the centrality of my current experience.

As soon as Mercury breaks through into fire, it is its detriment, but it's being ruled by Jupiter in Leo.

So yeah, maybe some kind of perspective that is really served by that centrality, that central focus that we have been forced to go through.

And in some cases because Jupiter's still in Leo, remain forced within as Mercury breaks into third trimester.

Then on Christmas, Mercury enters cap Capricorn and that's where Mercury is at the end of 2026 square.

It's ruler Saturn in Aries.

Yeah, I feel like an honorable mention planet for the year Saturn.

I feel like you talked a lot about Jupiter and what Jupiter is doing with regard to Mercury.

But if I had to give yeah like an honorable mention runner up planet to what is directly influencing Mercury's activity in 2026.

Saturn say more about that.

I think Saturn in Aries as Saturn's fall is huge.

Right.

I think this is huge on a more collective societal level as we begin to witness external authority crumble, shatter, fall.

It forces you to create new boundaries, discipline within yourself to become your own authority.

And that's happening in a fire sign which makes it feel more urgent, more passionate, more energized.

And so again, when Saturn is, or I guess I should say when Mercury is interacting with that Saturn work that's occurring slowly but surely, it makes that water feel a lot the more important and refreshing to not just get.

I feel like Saturn in Aries there's a tendency to belittle stuff and get down on stuff and yeah, suppress, repress and compartmentalize in negative ways that it's like again, without Mercury's work in the water signs, that becomes a pit, a hole, an unwelcome void.

Mm, yeah.

From a rulership perspective, it's interesting.

Mercury on January 1st of this year is at 0 degrees 0 minutes at 1:10pm Pacific on January 1st.

So it makes the ingress from Sag to Capricorn on the 1st, January 1st, 2026.

And so the year, calendar year, we're done with this already as we're recording with Mercury in Pisces under Jupiter's rulership.

But we start the year with Mercury moving through the entire 30 degr degrees of Saturn, 60 degrees, the entire 60 degrees of Saturn's rulership with Mercury and Capricorn and Aquarius.

But in that time, Saturn's still in Pisces.

So ultimately it's still Jupiter's rulership.

Right, that's interesting.

And Then we end the year back in Jupiter's rulership in Sagittarius.

But then Capricorn.

So that very tail end of the year, was it December 25th.

I said, yeah, Christmas.

Saturn in Aries has its first actual hold, direct hold on Mercury in Capricorn.

And that's the energy that we transition into 2027 with IS Saturn in Aries ruling Mercury, ruling our minds.

Cool.

Well, this convo was fucking epic.

We went so many places.

Yeah.

Here's a real example of the gift of the undefined sage.

You know, like, we can go.

But it didn't.

I. I'm hitting my limit right now.

That's what I was gonna say too.

I'm like, I think we should reorient.

I don't wanna wreck your day.

No, I have to.

I somehow have to record on the nodes in 40 minutes.

But we did it.

We finished.

It felt good.

Wow.

This conversation was, like, amazing.

I felt.

Yeah, I'm excited to revisit Calculus style.

Yes.

Thank you, Vince.

It felt so good and I'm.

I'm so grateful that your perspective and your mental definition influenced this call.

Yeah.

What do you want to share with folks who are tuning in and just finding you about maybe finding you again?

Oh, yeah.

If you want to find me, like my official business, whatever account, it's probably best to connect on Instagram.

I'm Armastrology there.

Pharm.

Yep, Pharmacerology.

You could also email me.

I'm FarmAstrologyMail.

That's probably a better way if you want, like, connect slightly more immediate replies.

I tend to be a little bit offline, but I'm coming out of it again.

As we've discussed, we're coming into spring.

There's a transition happening there.

I'm feeling less wintry in my body and more open to connection and stuff.

But, yeah, I do a little bit of everything.

So if you're looking for a structure, I do consultations.

Human design.

I'm obviously a student of Kelsey's, so have taken Living youg Design.

Have been deconditioning since 2021, so I'm happy to guide people through there.

I also do tarot readings, which are probably, like, one of my most popular offerings.

I do tarot readings at, like, markets and things like that.

I also sell my crochet goods.

So if you're into crochet stuff or if you want to do commissions.

I've done a few commissions as my crochet, which has been really fun and really interesting testing.

I'm available for any.

All or none of that.

And if you're lucky, you might find Vince behind the counter at your local pharmacy.

In addition to all of that.

Very mercurial.

You're very mercurial.

All right, cool.

I probably will talk about ascendant assemblies and stuff in the intro or I'll record an outro, but for now, we gotta go.

Thanks, Vince.

Thanks, listeners.

It's great chatting,

Sam.