Advanced Astrology: Mercury

In matters of the heart, the key to happiness in love is communication. Yet, everyone has strengths and blind spots, so gaining an objective view of your communication skills can significantly improve your love life successes.

Mercury is the planet that represents communication, as the god Mercury was responsible for relaying messages between the gods. Archetypal Astrology theorizes that all the gods symbolically depict different facets of our psyche, and by that light Mercury represents the part of you that communicates and learns in every way: emotionally, intellectually, physically, sexually, creatively and artistically.

Once you’re aware of how you may put the wrong foot forward, you can develop strategies to create more graceful approaches in all forms of communication. Your birth chart reveals the secrets of your strengths and weaknesses in communication by Mercury’s sign.

Mercury in Aries
As the first sign of the zodiac, Aries is fiery, active and quick. On the plus side, your mind is witty, learns at a snap, and is enthusiastic about communicating and learning. On the other hand this can make you impulsive, saying things cooler heads would keep well to themselves.

Mercury in Taurus
As caution is your watchword, you’re careful with your words and confident in your knowledge. This gives you the advantage of being clear and concise when you communicate but can make you a lousy listener. It’s the latter that sometimes seems to rise out of nowhere and trip you up in relationships.

Mercury in Gemini
You’re often the most gifted communicator at a party through words, laughter and highjinks. In fact, you’re so spirited and lively that you sometimes don’t realize how much you choose to ignore – and there’s your Achilles heel.

Mercury in Cancer
Empathy and compassion are your leading lights. You instinctively speak at the level of your listener, couching your words in phrases, ideas and images that they’ll readily understand, and you’re so sympathetic to others that you may temporarily lose your own point of view. This can make you seem deceptive to a lover when you later return to offer what seems to be an unexpected difference in opinion.

Mercury in Leo
You love to be generous, to celebrate, and to entertain with your intelligence and creativity. Generally, others enjoy hanging on your every word and basking in your entertainments. Sometimes you may get so caught up in your ideas that it doesn’t occur to you to consider important details that often affect your sweetie.

Mercury in Virgo
An attention to detail is the forte of a Virgo mind, as is the ability to discriminate between fine details of organization and information. You’re analytical and practical, even when it comes to matters of the heart. Often your partner just wishes you’d feel your feelings instead of trying to analyze them away.

Mercury in Libra
By nature you strive for balance and harmony in relationships, and your verbal flair and diplomacy make you a valued part of any circle, but you sometimes will go so far out of your way to keep the peace that your needs get lost. Eventually the laws of balance will demand redress and you’ll go tilting wildly in the other direction, all of which can be distressing to your beloved.

Mercury in Scorpio
Wow! Your Scorpionic energy penetrates right to the heart of the issue, no matter how complicated, intricate and confusing. Unfortunately, you get there with surgical precision and missile speed which can leave more pacific natures frightened to their core.

Mercury in Sagittarius
Idealistic at times, fascinated with new subjects and occasionally obsessed with the truth; you may live in your head so much so that you don’t notice the effect your words or actions have on others ’til the damage has already been done.

Mercury in Capricorn
Your mind is always hard at work, weighing, analyzing and remembering facts and information, making you a prized employee or entrepreneur. Yet, that storehouse of knowledge needs to be set aside from time to time. Make room for murmurings of sweet nothings from time to time or you’ll leave your love feeling cold, neglected and alone.

Mercury in Aquarius – Never missing a trick, your intellectual, scientifically detached and observant mind finds it hard to imagine that others might be different. Nothing’s more alarming and confounding to this placement than impulsive emotionalism, which means you can seem less than supportive when tears and furies arise.

Mercury in Pisces
Your mind is attuned to fine vibrations that others simply don’t and can’t pick up. This makes you unusually intuitive, perhaps even psychic, but it also can make you seem airily mysterious, irresponsible or flaky to the earth-bound.

If Mercury at your birth was retrograde, there will be an additional inward effect, your intellectual talents and communicative gifts will be directed internally. This makes you an intense intellectual force but can make you overthink everything before you reach a degree of maturity.