Happy Mars Return!
Every 2 years Mars returns to his place of birth at your time of birth. Given Saturn’s orbit of 28 1/2 years, or Pluto’s of 248 years this little biannual homecoming may not sound particularly phenomenal. Or perhaps you simply have not noticed anything remarkable occurring every two years. But the energy is always there, awaiting your attention. Energy being available and energy being expressed is not the same thing, which I will go into somewhere else. Suffice to say that transits can absolutely be unfelt while the corresponding energies have not yet reached our consciousness. They may be observed through external events or the lives of others close to us and we can still miss the plot because we were not paying attention. However, if you do trace back in time and see what was happening every two years you may very well recognise the beginnings and ending of cycles in the external world, in the inner world, or both. Certain ideas implemented, conceptions conceived, jobs, homes, relationships, physical symptoms, simply ways of carrying oneself in the world begin to shift. The Mars return signals a new undertaking, a next level.
Mars is not ambiguous. He is impatient, willful, determined. He makes his case known because he must, he is the life force of your purpose, your intention. In each sign his energy takes a certain shape, and in Cancer, it takes a little more work to understand how to work him.
Now Mars in Cancer has a terrible reputation. Almost everywhere you look you will find him described as the lord of fire plunged into a wet abyss where he thrashes about in infantile frustration and upheaval. This is not because Mars is dysfunctional in Cancer, this is because we have perpetuated a societal psyche which for millenia has neither respected nor understood Cancer. This is one of the most obviously patriarchal descriptions in classical astrology and a source of great pain for what can be a stunning Mars in gorgeous Cancer.
The sign of Cancer in short represents nurture and all that nurturing encompasses. Of anyone or anything, not just suckling infants and the homestead. Business enterprises, artwork, building of social, educational, social centres, scientific projects/research, family, basically any and every endeavour requires nurture! This means from the moment of conception till the moment of complete maturity and independent sustainability, Cancer is holding, steadying, nourishing, protecting, growing, infusing, healing, loving, loving, and loving, ensuring a perfectly safe and wondrous environment for the optimal result. How she differs from the other signs is that whatever the undertaking, it embodies great emotional meaning, the drive to create is from a feeling heart, it is not just play, or ambition, or curiosity, or adventure seeking. We have Mars to inform us of our desires, to move towards them, and to do so with power. He charges the house and sign he is in with an undeniable and sometimes relentless urge. In Cancer his urge is both to protect the creation, and to feel safe enough to create. When the energy is distorted the former goes into overdrive and the latter is very tender and self protective.
Masculine energy has been conditioned through the ages to need and respond to an adversary or a challenge. When strife and conquest is utterly irrelevant to Cancerian energy, how is Mars to stake his claim? In addition, the ungodly amount of fear that has been engendered and ingrained in the human psyche and beliefs that security is something we are provided with through others and external circumstances is a perfect catalyst for the anger, emotional volatility, and tough exterior that Mars in Cancer is renowned for. However once the purpose of this fire and water amalgamation is understood, what you are witnessing is the expression of a fierce, unapologetic, instinctive, extraordinarily powerful love which ensures the life force of anything and anyone it comes near. It is a great privilege to have someone with a Mars in Cancer in life, when the energy is unthwarted and flowing.
This is being embraced so tight you are reminded of your own pulse through their touch. This is old world, tribal loving. This is the unceasing drumbeat of the ocean. This is concentrated engagement through depth of feeling, and like a sacred hot spring what Mars in Cancer has to offer never turns cold once it is respected and valued. It is truly a remarkable cooperation between the masculine and feminine, and learning this balance allows for a juicy maturation of being rarely observed in Martian energy. Crucial to this process is acknowledging and strengthening the inner sanctuary and becoming a self-sustaining source of unconditional care. Thus the instinct for conflict or protecting a false self based on false fears and dangers, completely dissolves.
In 2023 it is Mars who first steps into Cancer before the other personal planets, hence the special mention of this sign’s return. After a long 6 months in Gemini due to his retrograde he finally embarks upon a new sojourn through the Moon’s waters and given the rather outstanding transformation we have on hand this year with Saturn, Pluto, Jupiter, and the Nodal axis changing signs in a span of a few months, and Pluto squaring the nodes for half the year, how we relate to our sense of inner security in the midst of all this change is quintessential. For all my Mars in Cancer darlings, pay attention to what the new order of this cycle is. What or whom can you sense you are done with, bored of, sick of? Can you see that memories are immaterial to what is unfolding now? What has been slithering through you lately, getting hotter, quicker in your veins? What can you state clearly that you want right now and won’t wait any longer for? What does your body need, how does it need to feel? What would you like to envision life as in two years’ time? What feels loving and safe to you now? What do you want to pour your love on and unleash life from? It has already begun.