Cancer's Mercury Retrograde Should Be an Easy Ride

Cancer is not an especially challenging place for Mercury. While Mercury will still be going against the normal flow and wandering down side roads and alleyways, you may actually have to look for the classic problems in communication, commerce, and movement. Rather than outward events, miscommunications are more likely subjective disagreements or matters of taste—so don’t make any one-size-fits-all assumptions. As Cancer is a cardinal sign associated with leadership, problems are also more likely when not honoring the chain of command or when trying to impose personal subjective feelings on the group.

Astrological aspects for Mercury retrograde in Cancer 2019

Mercury retrograde re-visits Mars on July 8, this time in Leo. The final conjunction occurs in Virgo on September 9, again in direct motion.
As Mercury also stations direct on the star Pollux, one of the Gemini twins, these three conjunctions to Mars point to a summer of adventure. The Twins were included in the Argonauts, helping the hero Jason to retrieve the Golden Fleece. However, they also abducted women promised to their cousins, starting a family feud which eventually led to the great Trojan War. The moral of this story is to choose your adventures carefully, and understand they will take months to fully complete.

Everything You Need to Know About 2019’s Mercury Retrogrades

Key dates for Mercury retrograde in Cancer 2019

July 7 Mercury stations retrograde at 4° Leo 28’
July 19 Mercury enters Cancer retrograde
July 21 Mercury conjunct the sun (closest to Earth)
July 31 Mercury stations direct at 23° Cancer 57’
August 9 Mercury at maximum elongation (begins to speed up)
August 11 Mercury finally leaves Cancer

Which signs are the most affected by the transit?

Water signs: Cancer, Scorpio, and Pisces
The fabled call to adventure awaits you—and refusal of the call only wastes time. A seemingly or nearly impossible task contains the potential to fully transform. Water magic is about connection, so honor your connections and gather tools and a team around you. The rest is simply about believing in yourself, especially when you have no idea how you are going to pull it off. Your faith will help you find a new identity you couldn’t have imagined before.
Fire signs: Aries, Leo, and Sagittarius
Yours is not the literal adventure or quest this time around. Rather, an inner journey awaits you. The demons you need to conquer are your own tendencies to move too quickly, too forcefully, or too far, bringing about unintended destructive consequences. For now, learn to take your time and divide the journey into stages. This means either cooling off to becoming more practical, or making and honoring connections with others to gain a more objective view.

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Horoscopes to Help You Deal

Summer is the time to experience water directly and revel in its vast array of sensual experience. Get in the water as often as possible. While soaking in hot springs can be relaxing and healing, more active involvement is also necessary, whether it be swimming, fishing, or boating. A cardinal sign, Cancer does not need variety, so you can pick one activity or one type of water and repeat the same experience. The activity and the nature of water combine to provide a thoroughly cleansing experience, and you should feel a lot clearer by summer’s end.

Aries

Why does the warrior fight and the pioneer quest? It is because they care deeply. This is a time to renew deep feelings of kinship and re-connect with your heritage. Focus on the positives, forgiving and releasing the rest. There are reasons you were born in a particular time and place and to particular people. Remember their gifts and consider how you may pass them along.

Taurus

Now is a time to say important things that need saying, dear Taurus. Work through any feelings of awkwardness by accepting them—and making a practice of communicating anyway. Overcoming your natural reticence can begin with simply stating the obvious. Things like the weather and the latest events around town are doorways through which you can show your heart to those who really need it. Walk through that door and magic will follow.

Gemini

You are known for being good at just about anything you set your mind to, dear Gemini. But what is it that makes you want to be great? Even the most carefree souls eventually need a sense of permanency in their life. It’s time to set aside the jack-of-all-trades approach that comes so easily for you and consider excavating something truly monumental from the depths of your being. Like the rests between notes in a piece of music, commitments give meaning and definition to freedom, when its time returns.

Cancer

Once every six to seven years, Mercury retrograde visits your home sign. While this could easily result in a ruckus and hurt feelings, it could just as easily become a rich productive ferment—the kind that makes beer bubble or causes bread to rise. How can you capture and put to use the volatile energies at hand? Looking back to the summers of 2006-7 and 2013 should provide some clues as to how and where this energy likes to play out in your life. Now, cast aside the drama and capture the magic.

Leo

Avoidant strategies aren’t always right for Mercury retrograde—but this particular retrograde is a perfect time for you to get away from it all, dear Leo. Rather than fun in the un, a quiet retreat with a spiritual focus can re-charge your batteries to a fullness you haven’t felt in a while. If this is not possible, then carving out quiet moments in your day could do much the same thing. Your spiritual health requires practice and diligence, as does your body.

Virgo

You crave hours spent laboriously but lovingly tending your craft in relative solitude. Bringing these products to market seems to require a whole other extroverted skillset which may make you nervous, but is nonetheless necessary. However, it’s really as simple as sharing your inner process with people and explaining your attention to detail and efficiency. This sharing can become collaboration; with enough of this, you could even develop something like the spirit found in the famous salon Virgo moon native Gertrude Stein hosted in Paris.

Libra

You tend to be very sensitive to appearances and find it hard to tolerate messes. Yet sometimes these are truly unavoidable, even in important areas like your career and public reputation. I suggest you adopt the attitude often seen in signs where work is undergoing: “Please forgive the mess, we’re in the process of remodeling.” Once you free yourself from the resistance, the whole project will run more smoothly—and probably get done a lot faster.

Scorpio

With your ruler Mars joining Mercury three times, you may find yourself on quite the grand adventure, one that also has considerable or even huge potential ramifications. The more that’s at stake, the more you may find yourself tightening your grip in an effort to control things. But this would be a mistake. Rather than control, cultivate faith. You must still do your best, of course, but your best will be much better when the energy you might spend fighting for control begins to be put to work going with the natural flow.

Sagittarius

You have a potential new influx of resources at your fingertips if you can navigate the strange hidden world of other people’s motivations. The added capital could seriously enhance your reputation, so try to make sure you’re doing everything you need to in order to make the process work. Consider multiple consults with someone who can peer into hidden realms for an extra advantage.

Capricorn

Your partnerships, both business and romantic, are likely to experience at least a little turmoil. You tend to pick your battles very carefully, but sometimes just allowing people to blow off a little steam can actually bring you closer. The thing you want to avoid is someone hitting too hard with pent up emotions and creating an enemy. In any case, a willingness to let go and make sacrifices or compromises will be important. Sometimes taking one for the team is the best way to show you care.

Aquarius

Your daily routine is in need of some adjustments, dear Aquarius. Your health and job skills need attention and updating. This, of course, involves delaying gratification and putting in the time now for a potential future reward. It might be tempting to listen to advice about what is supposed to be good for you, but if it’s not something you actually want then the investment is less likely to pay off. Find the intersection between science and desire.

Libra

Earlier this year you found out some new things about yourself. Now that you’ve become more familiar with the new you, it’s time to take some creative risks and find out what this new identity is good for. What’s possible now that wasn’t a year or even six months ago. Take the next step toward that possibility and see if it’s willing to meet you at all. Keep probing until you make that meeting.

Gary P. Caton is a transdisciplinary astrologer who maintains an active sacred relationship with the living Sky as his temple. Initiated an astrologer by a magnificent dream in 1993, Gary is the author of Hermetica Triptycha: The Mercury Elemental Year, and host of the popular Hermetic Astrology Podcast. Find Gary online at DreamAstrologer.com

Art by Taylor Leopold