Retracing the Steps of Mars and Getting it Right

You can't shake hands with a clenched fist - Indira Gandhi

It is easier to point the finger than to offer a helping hand - Anon

The world can only be grasped by action, not by contemplation. The hand is the cutting edge of the mind - Jacob Bronowski

The lonely one offers his hand too quickly to whomever he encounters  - Friedrich Nietzsche

Every 2 years or so, Mars goes retrograde (backwards) in the heavens for some seventy five days. Of course, planets don't actually travel backwards, it's the view from our perspective here on Earth that makes a planet appear to be doing so. (We know that so much of life is about perspective and astrology is no different!)

Mars is the planet that shows how we manifest ourselves out in the world in terms of ego, energy, push, ambition, passion, aggression and anger. Mars goes retrograde on November 15, and for several days it stops in its tracks, and, in a week or so, it will start to move backwards through the zodiac. The Sabian Symbol for the stationary Mars is Cancer 13: A Hand Which is Held Out Receptively, is Remarkable for the Suggestion of Character in its Prominent Thumb.

Mars' energy is rather tightly bound up in our forward movement and in our modern society we're often not very content with moving sideways (Cancer), let alone backwards (retrograde). It's also a bit antithetical to emotions and caring about other people's feelings.