Mercury in Detriment in Pisces: Is That Good or Bad?
Mercury in Pisces is an odd placement when it comes to assessing planetary condition. Mercury in Pisces is the Poet, and yet Mercury, the planet of writing, is in detriment in Pisces. How can this be?
The problem with Mercury in Pisces is power. In Pisces, Mercury is exercising the power of language in a disorderly way. Plato had very strong words about poets. He thought they should be excluded entirely from his ideal republic. As I've written about previously, even in modern times, poets have been thrown in prison for writing poetry that is a threat to the state.
This is only part of the picture, however. We would hope, after 4000 years, someone would have convinced astrologers to stop saying Mercury was in detriment in Pisces if Mercury didn't actually have a hard time functioning in Pisces. And it is true that Mercury faces challenges in that sign.
Mercury's Challenges in Pisces
Mercury's favorite past time is bean counting. It is the planet of data. It likes numbers, facts, and figures. It prefers that everything is presented in a clean and rational way. That is why Mercury is the ruler of Gemini the Journalist and Virgo the Analyst.
Pisces is not the place you want to go if you want clean data. Pisces is the sign of the ocean. The ocean is anything but clean. It was messy even before we threw a bunch of plastic in it. It is very difficult to convince ocean creatures to sit still long enough for you to measure them, and even if you do manage to catch one, which measurement do you go with? Many sea creatures have very different measurements in and out of water. The tide definitely doesn't sit still. Most of the time, the closest you can get to a precision answer on anything when it comes to the sea is, "It depends when you ask."
To make things worse for Mercury, Pisces is a water sign. Water is the element of compassion, and Pisces is the sign of boundless and unlimited love. Infinity is difficult for Mercury the counter. The best way to convince a computer to crash is to ask a program to count something, and keep counting it forever.
In Pisces, Mercury is the mind overwhelmed by compassion. You are having a Mercury in Pisces moment when you jump on a social platform and your heart breaks over the overwhelming number of the legitimate causes asking for your thoughts, prayers, and money.
Ideally, the mind in Pisces breaks in the most spectacular way. When ordinary language isn't enough to articulate emotions, the heart begins to sing in metaphors, and Mercury becomes a poet.
When Mercury becomes truly overwhelmed, however, it can be difficult to know how to behave. In Pisces, the mind becomes aware of the extremes of human joy and suffering. When you are painfully aware of human suffering, it can be difficult to know how to respond. A person can become paralyzed.
Handling Mercury in Pisces Overwhelm
The last few years have been hard. There have been times when it has felt to me like one long Mercury in Pisces moment. When I have found myself overwhelmed by the awfulness of human nature and the horror of natural disasters, I remind myself of a quote from The Fellowship of the Ring:
“I wish it need not have happened in my time,” said Frodo.
“So do I,” said Gandalf, “and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.”
When faced with an unspeakable horror, a person feels small. Sometimes, I look at the world and feel like I've been given a toothbrush and told to sweep up the Sahara, but Mercury, at its best, is realistic. All we can do is the best we can with the time and resources that are available to us.
It is said in evolutionary astrology that each sign is medicine for the sign that is opposite it on the zodiac wheel. The sign that is opposite Pisces is Virgo. Virgo is at its best when it chooses one thing to perfect, and this is the answer to Mercury's overwhelm.
Choose one thing that really pulls at your heart strings, something that is in your power to address. Whenever your heart is stirred to compassion, don't be distracted from your work. Use that energy of your compassion to return to your one thing and channel all of your heartbreak into refocusing on your one good thing. If we are really all connected like Pisces says, even if you are not directly jumping on a plane to help, your work will send ripples out into the cosmos, touching the lives of everyone you care about.
