Previewing Mercury Retrograde in Gemini

Transcript:

0:00
Hi everyone, this is Acyuta-bhava from Nightlight Astrology. And today I'm doing a video about Mercury Retrograde. I was going to do a video about horary charts. But I had such a great Mercury Retrograde appearance in my life today that I decided I had to pause and just take a moment to recognise Hermes and a little Hermes magic. I'm going to pull up the real time clock and we'll take a look at this transit of Mercury retrograde that's coming up. We'll just do a little sneak preview today. And I hope that you find it as delightful as I did. So, before I do that, I want to remind everybody my new course ancient astrology for the modern mystic begins in June. You can check it out on my website, nightlight astrology.com, go to the courses page, check out the first year course. If you have any questions about the programme, if you want to know more about it, you can feel free to email me it's an awesome programme. It has about 100 hours worth of really deep structured well thought out content I've led several 1000 people through over the years. There is a lot of optional reading homework assignments, quizzes, group forum discussions, breakout study sessions, live clients that we have in the classroom, and a lot of a lot of really a lot of focus placed on the spiritual philosophy. You know, why are we doing astrology and also on the delineation techniques that can help you to become a really concise and focused practising astrologer if that's your goal, or just give you some skills to be able to, you know, use astrology for yourself and people close to you. It's a it's an amazing tool, it's, I always say it's like the equivalent of having a cosmic GPS app on your phone. It's, it's incredible. There's nothing like being able to track transits it's an incredible thing to add to your spiritual life. So this class is meant to give you a lifelong, really foundational, structured learning experience with ancient astrology. We have a lot of fun along the way to like easily my most fun that I have is as a teacher, so check it out. Any questions again, info at nightlight astrology.com.

2:12
Alright, so let's take a look at the real time clock today. And I just can't believe this mercury story, it just sometimes the planets, they've been hitting me with storytelling lately. So here's the chart on the screen. And let's just advance this a little bit so that you can see what's going to happen with Mercury. Here's Mercury right there. So you can see Mercury Venus is going to actually catch Mercury, which is not common because Mercury is the faster moving planet. But when Mercury slows down Venus will sometimes catch and surpass mercury. We're going to see that happening right as Mercury is stationing on Friday, May 28 into May 29, and you're going to see mercury turning retrograde by Sunday the 30th. So, you know this is this is just a few days away. Obviously every Mercury Retrograde is a little different. And I think we'll have probably a few videos worth of talking about this transit so that we can cover it from a few different angles but Mercury is about to turn retrograde and I have such a great Mercury Retrograde story that I think gets to the heart of you know how we can get the most out of a Mercury Retrograde and you know how to prepare for one. Okay, so this is kind of an elaborate crazy story but here it is. So, I think I told you guys if you were watching my videos this week that I had a I had an encounter with my desk I just got this new desk and one of the cool things about this desk is that it goes up and down. You can lift it up, you can put it down adjustable and I really liked that because I work a lot at my desk and to be able to stand for part of the day and not be you know seated all day long. It feels incredible. So that was one of the reasons I got the desk anyway. The new camera for my webcam that I got the cord that connects it to the the the tower which is underneath the desk but attached to it was very short. And when I was trying to basically what I was doing was I was pushing the I was bringing the desk up or down and remember which one, because I was trying to tighten something with a little one of those crescent wrench screws that the desk comes with or whatever they're called. The camera the cord was going to pull the camera off the desk and so I jerked really quickly to save the camera and ended up slicing my finger pretty good. Now you have to understand that I've been really struggling because of how slow moving in has been going. I mean, it hasn't been it's really been pretty fast, but I'm just an impatient person.

4:54
So when when I hit a glitch something isn't working, whatever I'm like, Oh my god, you know, I just want everything to be set up. I don't want to keep tinkering with things, unpacking boxes, throwing things away, you know, sorting things. I'm just so sick of it. So that's kind of the space that I was in. If you can imagine this. Equipments not working, I hurt myself, due to my frustration that it's not working, we're trying to move too quickly and not being careful with my new equipment. Alright, so I realised I need a longer cord. I don't have the right length of cord for this camera. Okay, so that's my realisation. After all this happens. And I would I thought, well, I'll make do with a shorter cord until I can go and get one. Right? That's my big, okay, okay, fine. And I'm really kind of pissed off about it. So today, I come to use my camera again. And it's not working at all, like the camera is working, but it's not transmitting to the computer, it's not working at all. And so I go through several different help centres, we talked to Dell, we talked to Zoom, we talked to Sony, like, you know, like the camera, the zoom, like, whatever I'm going. And I'm not much of a tech person so I'm just covering all my bases and pretty much not like I'm not like a ruthless mean person. But I would say that for me, I got to the space of jerk mode with every single customer rep that I talked to who was sincerely trying to help. And they were not difficult people, like I was the difficult person, I guess ever had a day like that. I'm embarrassed to admit it. But that's where, like, that's where I was at. So the story gets good, pretty quickly.

6:45
So after I get mad at all of these different people, I realise at long last through all of this, that what actually had happened had nothing to do with zoom, it had nothing to do with Sony, it had nothing to do with Dell, it had to do with the fact that when that when the camera was about to fall off the edge, because I had lifted the desk and the cord was too short, or whatever it was that the cord had bent and the little HDMI port, the tip of the cord had gotten bent and was now broken. So I realise this and all of a sudden, I realise I've got to rush to Best Buy so that I can make my video for tomorrow. Because otherwise I don't have a webcam. So I've got to rush to Best Buy, and I've got to get a new cord. I have an hour before the store closes. This is like such a Mercury Retrograde story. So I get to Best Buy and there's this guy, I'm going to call him Walter. And first of all, he spends some time helping me find the right cord that I need it. He's very knowledgeable, it was very easy. And then, you know, I tell him like, Oh, I'm a YouTuber, whatever, I make videos and he starts, he starts he starts talking to me about like, which lens I'm using. And Walter looks a little bit like Santa Claus, I would say and I, I start to smell garlic. I start to smell this overwhelming scent of garlic. And I'm like, Oh my god, Walter smells so bad. And this is like right par for the course with me being in just jerk mode. So I'm just like being blasted by garlic. And I'm like, Oh my God. And I could tell that Walter was trying to sell me a lens that he thought would be really good for what I do. And and I start feeling bad. Because I'm like, you know, poor, poor Walter, the guy smells like garlic. And he's trying to make a sale and like, I should probably just buy this lens. And then I also started feeling bad because I was judging him because I was sitting there having a really hard time not judging him because he smelled like garlic. And so then I started feeling like I should buy this lens. Like this is the answer to the problem that I'm facing right now is like, I feel like I'm obligated to be here to make sure that Walter feels good. I'm judging. He doesn't know that I'm judging him but I feel bad. So I'm thinking I'm really starting to thinking about buying this really expensive lens that I absolutely don't need. Alright, so anyway, I go out to eat so I didn't end up buying the lens. And while it was very nice of Walter to help me and I ended up leaving and getting my cord and I'm going out to the car. And I'm still like, man, that garlic smell is so overwhelming. Like where's it coming from?

9:58
And as I'm walking out to the car. I get into the car and I'm like, Man, it's still so overwhelmed. And then I realised that it's me that I'm actually the garlic fiend. So earlier in the evening, earlier in the evening, my wife had made this pitta bread. And it has garlic, it was like it was really delicious. And it had like a little bit of honey on it and like, crushed garlic over the top. The thing is in bhakti yoga, garlic is like on the on the naughty list. Like we don't eat garlic in Bhakti onions or garlic are part of like the dietary restrictions. And I could talk about that some other time. It's not important, so I'm not used to eating garlic. And the reason that it smells so bad because I was wearing my mask, you know, I was like I was in the store, you have to wear a mask in the store. So I was smelling my own garlic breath. And I was thinking that it was Walter. Poor Walter. I couldn't believe it. And then in the car I when I realised that oh my god, I was laughing so hard. I was like, this is this is because I don't eat garlic. So it was like what smells like garlic. And I just had forgotten that my wife made garlic and she didn't mention it either. Like I got home and I told her about this. She's like, Oh, yeah, I totally forgot. I'm really sorry. I forgot. You know, like, she knows that I don't eat garlic. And she does, but I don't. Anyway. So anyway, so it gets better. So first of all, I'm cracking up in the car realising that I almost bought a lens because I was afraid that I was judging Walter when actually it was me that smelled. It was just too funny.

11:55
Anyway, I get home from getting the cord from not smelly Walter but smelly, me. And the kids and the dog are all together, kind of like huddled in a room in one of the kids bedrooms. And they're they're like hanging out, but I could tell they're kind of worried. I'm like the dogs in there. The dog looks all weird and like what's going on? Like, I really tell them the story about Walter but like I couldn't because they were all worried. And my wife is like, we think there might be an animal in the house. And I was like I'm in like Pee Wee's Playhouse right now or something. This is crazy. And I was like, wait, there's an animal in the house? Like what's going on? Like, yeah, there's this chirping and it's coming from like, it's coming from upstairs. So we have this little like, kind of like a little in law suite area and that's where our offices are. And I was like, but so there's it's like it's coming from by the office and I was like okay, there's like a chirping animal like up there and I was like this is so Mars in Cancer you know, I'm gonna have to like fight a bat or something. Something crazy. So anyway, I go upstairs and I'm like walking around all nervous. And there's the the smoke detector in this office above my head is flashing because the battery is dead. And it was I can't explain it. It was like an angelic moment. Like, it felt like suddenly I was like looking up at the Sistine Chapel. I can't explain it but it was this moment of grace of like this chirping is like a warning in my office where all of my bad mood went down in my rushing and my impatience and my rudeness to several people my judging of poor not smelly Walter, you know? And there's while I'm gone doing this, rushing off to get my cord for the camera, there's this chirping and, you know, it worries my family and, man. I mean, I just I felt when I was looking up it and I realised what it was. I was like, wow, busted. Like cosmically busted. That's it so I changed the battery. My dog gives me this look like, Okay. It was like slinking off. I was like, all right.

14:20
So as I'm looking at this smoke alarm I had this moment where I realised that this was a really it was a really good representation of the astrology. First of all, you have Mercury about to turn retrograde, and Mercury Hermes, the trickster couldn't have been more at work in like the breakdown of the equipment and the returning thing getting a longer cord like, you know, malfunctions talking to a million customer reps and realising it was all just me. It was all just my impatience. It was all just my sort of block headedness about stuff. That's so Mercury Retrograde where Mercury will turn everything around us upside down in order to help us become more conscious of something, and I am really deeply thankful, like I said, when I looked up at that smoke alarm, and realise like, this is a warning. And I was like, hallelujah, like, that's freaking awesome. Are you kidding me? I get really I just get stoked about these. I mean, how can it could it possibly feel better to mess up if you have guides in the stars that are so willing to teach you and guide you in ways that are humorous, and funny, and painful, and beautiful, like all at once? So I had this other moment where I realised that there was a point in my life where when I was doing astrology, where I would have considered all of this, just the impersonal workings of karma. But I'm at a point now where one of the things that was so cool, and it wasn't intentional at all, and I looked up at that smoke alarm, and I changed the battery. And I was doing it. I said, Thank you, Mercury. Thank you, Hermes. And I realised, Wow, I've come a long way to be able to recognise that the powers that are moving around us are beings. I mean, there's two ways that they operate. And in the Vedic tradition, in the Western tradition, we talk about it in the same way. They're gods, they're like demigods. They represent their emblematic of the stars, the planets were called the stars of the deities, for example, Hermes, is the star of Hermes, Zeus is the star of Zeus.

16:52
So it's not that the deity is the planet, it's the planet gives signs or omens, or speaks on behalf of a god. And so on one hand, the planets represent the moving forces, the impersonal moving forces of fate and karma, but on the other hand, they are they are always inviting us into personal relationships with guiding beings like literal gods. And I just was so thankful. I mean, for the lesson, yes. For the learning. Yes. For the comedy and the beauty of it all. Yes, but then I also realised, I'm thankful that I've stuck with this long enough that I've developed a personal relationship with these planets have been able to laugh and, and recognise when it's a deity. It's not just, oh, there's my karma. And there's this thing I had to learn and, you know, it's not like it's not like an sh T or something. It's it's not like a standardised test that I'm trying to pass and well, if I would have gotten it right, I would have passed through this Mercury Retrograde, you know, unscathed. When these things happen, I'm so thankful that I'm at the point, I guess, in my practice, that at least occasionally, not all the time, but at least occasionally, I can stumble upon these experiences and realise that there's a person behind them. And from the standpoint of, you know, Bhakti at least we say that all of reality is personal waiting for personal, deeper personal relationships. And the more unconscious we are, the more that we experience one another and the world is impersonal. We live according to impersonal laws of nature that dominate us instinctually and so on and so forth. And I just realised today I objectified myself, my finger, the customer service people I spoke to, poor Walter at Best Buy. It would have been really funny had I bought that expensive lens. Thank you Mercury. But anyway, and then and then I thought, well, isn't it funny that in the midst of this right now Venus is also conjoining that stationed Mercury, because there was also this touch of good fortune, I got the longer cord that I needed all along. The only thing that I really needed was a longer cord because at some point, lifting my desk up or down was going to flip my camera off the edge of the desk. So I really did need a longer cord.

19:24
So there was a grace there was a mercy there was some good fortune and all of this I didn't end up buying the lens because of my own judgmental projections. I'm telling you right now when I was walking to the car, and I was like, it's not going away like, Walter must have like sprayed me with this garlic mist. And no, it's just it's me. Anyways, so, happy Mercury Retrograde, everybody. Happy upcoming Mercury Retrograde. I hope that Mercury grabs you by his invisible hands and pulls on your coattails and takes you on some magical rides. And I hope you enjoy them. And I hope you grow because of them. And I hope your mind is open because of them and your heart. And I hope you get a laugh and learn something really cool and recognise that there's divine beings all around us. I hope fantastic things happen for all of you. So that's what I've got, a little divergence. Again, I will be back to the horary charts and some chart examples that I do have in mind. We'll do that next week. So stay tuned for that. And yeah, tell me your Mercury Retrograde stories. I would love to hear if you guys have any really funny stories to share as well. Aren't that's what I've got. Take it easy, everyone. Bye.