How To Handle Retrogrades: A Planet-By-Planet Guide - mindbodygreen.com

On the heels of this month's Uranus retrograde, we're sharing a guide from the AstroTwins on how to handle these astrologically backward times.

You know those times when everything goes haywire, and you can't figure out why? Look up, stargazer: A planet could be retrograde—meaning that from the vantage point of Earth, it appears to be spinning backward. What's really happening? Well, the Earth is completing its orbit around the Sun faster than other planets outside its orbit. Periodically, it will outpace them—and that's when retrograde mayhem breaks loose.

Much like a speeding car or train passing a slower one, the planet that's being passed will appear to stop and move backward—which is the apparent retrograde period. Then, once the Earth completely passes this planet in its orbit, the motion appears normal again, and the planet is said to be "direct" or "prograde" (to use the snappy scientific term). Chances are, you've been in a vehicle that felt like it was moving in reverse when it was passed, so you know the feeling!

Each retrograde cycle has a "shadow period"—the awkward adjustment of the retrograde planet from apparent backward to forward motion…and vice versa. For that reason, you may feel the stirrings of a retrograde cycle for several days, even weeks, before it officially begins.

While retrograde planets are just an illusion, astrology followers can attest to experiencing their effects. The areas that a retrograde planet rules can become weak, challenging, or troublesome during this cycle.

All planets—not just Mercury!—go retrograde periodically, so we need to embrace these inevitable cycles as a fact of life, and an opportunity to build character. As the Buddha said, "No mud, no lotus." Sometimes, it takes a challenge for us to develop the inner strength and self-knowledge we need to evolve as humans.

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