Mars: Retrograde/June 26^th, Opposition/July 26–27^th, Direct/August 27^th

Where­as Mer­cury moves ret­ro­grade 3 times a year for about 23 days each time, and Venus ret­ro­grades about every 1.5 years for about 40 days, Mars will move ret­ro­grade about every 2 years and 2 months, and this time it will do so for 62 days. It is the plan­et that goes ret­ro­grade the least, so you should always take advan­tage of this opportunity.

When­ev­er a plan­et is mov­ing ret­ro­grade it is actu­al­ly mov­ing clos­er to the Earth; Mars and Earth will be clos­er to one anoth­er than at any time when we reach the mid­point of the ret­ro­grade, when Mars is Oppo­site the Sun, with the Earth between the Sun and Mars. This time that will occur on July 26–27^th.

Though some might con­sid­er a plan­et to be some­how “weak­ened” by mov­ing back­wards, you must remem­ber that this is only an appear­ance for us here on Earth. In the mat­ter of Mars, it is we on Earth who are “catch­ing up” to Mars and pass­ing by, as if we were on an inside lane of a race track. More­over, as we do catch up we make our clos­est approach to Mars as it “grows” big­ger and brighter. Mars, the Avatar of Desires and Actions will shine red­der than ever, and much will be stirred with­in and around you too. You will see Mars most lumi­nous, a glow­ing crim­son orb, when it forms the oppo­si­tion to the Sun at the end of July.

Mars rules your actions and desires, it serves your “self” (the Sun) by pro­vid­ing the dri­ve to secure your needs and wants. But when it turns ret­ro­grade it sig­nals a time for you to turn inward. Mars ret­ro­grade offers you the oppor­tu­ni­ty to re-exam­ine what exact­ly it is that you do desire, and, just as impor­tant­ly, it calls upon you to re-con­sid­er how you should secure it.

This time Mars is ret­ro­grad­ing through Aquar­ius until August 12^th, and then con­tin­ues to ret­ro­grade in Capri­corn until it turns direct on August 27^th, so the review of your desires and aims will be upon your dreams of a bet­ter world to be made true, and then shift to con­sid­er­a­tions about your path of self-ful­fill­ment and your respon­si­bil­i­ties. It will prin­ci­pal­ly bring a re-exam­i­na­tion of your friend­ships and com­mu­ni­ties, and it will remind you that your dreams are made of one anoth­er, and you can only be ful­filled if their dreams come true too.

Many observers have not­ed that when­ev­er Mars turns ret­ro­grade the forces of Self-Asser­tion seem to slip beyond the nor­ma­tive bounds of cau­tion or self-restraint, and we find increas­ing man­i­fes­ta­tions of aggres­sion and even violence…yes, there is real “dan­ger” here.

The mis­un­der­stand­ing and mis­use of Spir­i­tu­al Ener­gies is always a prob­lem no mat­ter what is hap­pen­ing “up there”. But the time of Mars Ret­ro­grade stirs more strong­ly the shad­owed depths of the human psy­che where hurts and resent­ments have fes­tered, and the result of this stir­ring of painful ener­gies inflames pas­sion, stokes fear and anger, and this col­li­sion of pas­sion, pain and anger erupts in actions that can lead to the harm­ing of one­self or of others.

Always remem­ber, the Ener­gies evoked or stoked by Mars are nei­ther “good” or “bad”…rather it is your degree of spir­i­tu­al aware­ness and evo­lu­tion that will indi­cate how the ener­gy will be received. And, then how you will pass it on equal­ly depends upon your own spir­i­tu­al devel­op­ment and self-con­trol. How you receive the Ener­gies around you, how you work with them, and in what form will you pass them on is deter­mined by your Spir­i­tu­al Inte­gra­tion and Awareness.

To the extent that you have become more Self-Mas­ter­ful, guid­ed by your High­er Self and not your Ego, then to that same extent will you be able to wield your Phys­i­cal, Emo­tion­al, Men­tal and Intu­ition­al Pow­ers in a Lov­ing and Con­struc­tive Man­ner. And, to the extent that you remain unin­te­grat­ed, with con­flicts with­in and between your Hier­ar­chi­cal Nature of Body, Feel­ings, Mind and Spir­it, then to that same extent will you act Destruc­tive­ly towards your­self and/or towards oth­ers. This is true always.

This is why Mars mov­ing ret­ro­grade is such an oppor­tu­ni­ty for spir­i­tu­al quick­en­ing. What Mars ret­ro­grade can and should be used for is to take this time and use it to pierce through those self-made shad­ows of old fears and hurts. You can trans­form your­self and your world by over-turn­ing lim­it­ed fear-formed desires, trans­form­ing those mis­di­rect­ed ener­gies into aspi­ra­tions. Mars ret­ro­grade is tru­ly a time to stir your awak­en­ing, as you con­tin­ue on the one true path of greater mind­ful­ness, uncon­di­tion­al love and a cen­tered will.

In the end, as always, it comes quite sim­ply down to one thing, do you Love Your­self? Do you have and know the Love of your High­er Self as real and ever present and before you at all times? Do you stand in its pres­ence, so that this eter­nal foun­tain-source of love per­vades your entire being and all of your actions too? And, from this expe­ri­ence of your true self you will equal­ly know that you are to treat the oth­er before you as you treat your­self, with uncon­di­tion­al love too.

Mars is the part of your jour­ney informed by your Desire. You are always on the path of awak­en­ing, of learn­ing to become a bet­ter or more com­plete human. Yes, as long as you strive to become out­ward­ly what you are in your High­er Self, to be ful­ly awak­ened, to become a Deva or shin­ing one, you will con­tin­ue on this jour­ney to dis­cov­er, accept and embrace your true nature which is Spir­it, which is Love.

As Mars grows brighter, night after night, as you move towards that moment of greater rev­e­la­tion, take time to re-con­sid­er where you are going and how you are get­ting there. Look more deeply with­in your­self and ask:

“Is this what I should aim for, is this the way to move my dreams and the dreams of oth­ers clos­er to the One Uni­ver­sal dream? Is this the noble path forged and formed by uncon­di­tion­al Love and Truth? Is this the way we will enter with song and laugh­ter, to become that shin­ing city on the hill?”

In the end, as it was at the beginning,

We are here to be the Light,

We are here because of Love.

Just Love one another.