Sun and Moon
The Sun and the Moon are never retrograde. They define the inherent masculine and feminine potentials of the person that remain the same throughout the individual's life. Curious, then, that the Lunar Nodes are ALWAYS retrograde and the primary karmic indicators.
Mercury
Mercury is often retrograde and slows down the faculties, making them fixed to the present day. The individual is more practical and pragmatic - as if lacking imagination. The individual finds it hard to concentrate and focus, to think things through.
Mercury is the planet of communication and intelligence or learning. So a retrograde Mercury could indicate a shy person, someone afraid to speak or, alternatively, someone with learning difficulties depending on where the planet lies in the birth chart (in terms of sign and house placement). The person has difficulties coming to terms with the planets significance and requires an urgency to work out the challenges with more urgency.
Venus
Emotions are kept under control when Venus is retrograde. The person is 'poker-faced', inscrutable, and capable of hiding their feelings those around them. Venus, as a planet, indicates an appreciation of beauty or art. So a retrograde Venus would result in an inability to value the finer things in life.
Most of all Venus denotes love.
When retrograde, there are indications of problems in relationships in this life resulting from deep hurts or misunderstandings in a previous life. There is a tremendous and overwhelming reluctance to enter into relationships due to the fear of being hurt again. Similarly, there is the distinct feeling that the person is living in the past and cannot come to terms with living without a lost love in this life. The pain may be too much for the person to contemplate getting into the same kind of relationship and so they seek something different, such as a homosexual liaison.
Mars
Mars retrograde is indicative of restrained, but carefully applied, power. This energy has to be rationally or logically applied due to the limitations imposed on the individual by this planetary placement. Care must be taken to ensure that vital resources are not used unnecessarily and wasted.
Not surprisingly, the sex drive in the individual concerned is greater than normal and their appetites never appear to be satisfied. They will be single-minded in their search for sexual partners and have little or no time for flirting. They are likely to have multiple partners and indulge in extra-marital affairs.
However, these people are good workers since their energy is not wasted and put to good effect. They have high levels of energy that can be used slowly (much like a long distance runner rather than a sprinter) so they can achieve much in a short time. They are ideally suited to physical work and any kind of manual labour.
Jupiter
The retrograde Jupiter individual tends to get carried away by things and become over indulgent. A past life devoted to wealth and pleasure and the pursuit of luxuries are now replaced by a need for hard work to achieve the humblest of necessities. But when they do earn money, it is squandered on fripperies and trivialities. The person cannot resist the urge to be extravagant and the wasteful habit merely leads to meaninglessness and self-loathing.
It's as if the individual is in dire need of organisation or education to break these traits in order to recognise the value of learning and discipline in all things. Of course, they know that a good education can, eventually, lead to success in any chosen field but when achieved leads to a sense of hollowness.
These individuals need to build their self-confidence and self-faith while radically appraising their value system.
Saturn
The retrograde Saturn person is a reluctant leader. They tend to be extremely uncomfortable when placed in a position of responsibility and expected to impose their authority. They are afraid of hurting the feelings of subordinates and this further inhibits them. However, if they can build the self-confidence to accept this challenge they have the ability to learn the necessary skills, assertiveness and the confidence to delegate.
The individual is shrewd, clear-minded and capable of seeing things in the greatest detail, they never miss a trick. The restrictions normally associated with Saturn are removed and the person has a great innate wisdom. Ironically, it is this side of their personality that makes them ideal candidates for positions of authority! If they can overcome their fear, they are capable of making reasoned and logical decisions.
Uranus
Retrograde Uranus indicates arrogance and selfishness, boastful of their own (mainly poor) achievements coupled with contempt for others more superior accomplishments. Like they say, pride comes before a fall. And these people are in for a bit of a surprise! Recognition for their efforts is hard won. Credit is often misplaced and given to others, the person often being overlooked or ignored. Eventually, there is a feeling of pointlessness in continuing in the face of such frustration - the energy and motivation diminishes.
These people need to learn control and humility. Passing on skills to others and bringing on apprentices are an ideal method of achieving these aims. These people are also eminently capable of tremendous innovation and creativity, always assuming that the ego is kept in check. Suitable careers include science and research, or anything that challenges their inventiveness. In this way, the individual may achieve remarkable results through their individual, idiosyncratic way of thinking.
Neptune
Retrograde Neptune indicates a person unable to use their intuition, due to past indiscretions imposing a sense of guilt in this life. The person feels that they have lost their spiritual values and any connection to the Divine. They are here to pay for the sacred wrongs done in a previous life. It is hard work and one full of torture for the individual feels unworthy to the task, full of self-doubt. It's as if the person is forever doing penance.
This person must have the self-faith to persevere and not to continually live up to the idealistic view they seem to possess. They need to develop a more realistic approach to their spirituality and take it a step at a time. Allocating a regular time to undertake meditation and breathing exercises is a good start. The need to learn compassion means that a good career would involve psychology or sociology. Only the individual will really know what resources they have to effect the required changes.
Pluto
Pluto is the hardest of taskmasters involving danger, intensity and power struggles. It is also the plant of compulsion, obsession, regeneration and transformation.
Retrograde Pluto indicates a past life where the individual was manipulative and controlling to the detriment of others. Unlike the retrograde Saturn, the individual would have been placed in a position of authority but welcomed it in order to satisfy their obsession to rule over others, even if it is done badly. Also, unlike retrograde Saturn, the person would have been seeking to control the souls of others rather than commanding a misplaced authority.
There is the same compulsion to control the souls of others in the present life but, with retrograde Pluto, it is overlain with a sense of guilt. It is as if the person is playing out the part and has no control. To paraphrase a common saying: "The flesh is willing but the spirit is weak"!
To progress, the person has to learn self-control and discipline - the very control that they would wield on others has to be turned inwards to transform their own view of others. They have to see others as valuable individuals and not merely resources to be used and abused. Therefore, they should actively seek a career healing whether in the traditional medical field or in the more unorthodox areas of the new age. This would succeed in fulfilling two requirements; they would retain control and learning how to put others needs above their own.
