Following on the last post, in which I suggested to test the nature of the Mars retrograde, we are here already a week and a half into this retrograde, so I think some preliminary conclusions can be made.

The questions was, whether the retrograde’s influence of revising and going back on things touches only on what occurred during the shadow period (the area of the chart that is covered by the retrograde), or whether it touches on issues that were born long before that. Well, at least as far as my personal experience goes so far with this particular retrograde of Mars, it looks like it defiantly goes back on stuff that started long before the shadow period.

And it’s not even things that were only thought about and only theoretically planned, while only implemented and acted upon during the shadow period itself – it’s about things that happed in real life for a year or two before this retrograde, that now are being revised. This fact makes the whole shadow period idea kind of redundant, because if the retrograde manages to influence things that happened long before it, then the short shadow period doesn’t really add much to the picture.

Though what I mean here is the pre-retrograde shadow period, that should include the issues that are being revised by the retrograde. We haven’t been yet in the post-retrograde shadow period, that covers the direct-again motion of the planet over the same area that was retrograded over. Theoretically, the post-retrograde shadow should bring resolutions, clarifications and integration of lessons learned during the retrograde itself. This will begin in February 24th next year, so it would be interesting to keep an eye on what happens then with the relevant issues that are being revised and walked back on now.

I like this little experiment, it infuses astrology with a touch of empiricism, which supposed to bring to it more validity, at least in the eyes of some people.