Hey, it’s Pam 🦋
I’m not sure if I’ve ever shared this, but I am way into astrology. Ever since I met Dyalekt and he and his astrology friends read me like a book and told me all about my Virgo self, I was hooked.
I have a favorite astrologer, The Quietest Revolution, who eerily predicted–in her vaguely specific way that all good astrologers do–all the huge shifts in my business and the Virgo tendencies (rigidity, perfectionism, high expectations) that were holding me back from getting everything I wanted.
I bought a tarot deck in 2019 and pulled the empress card (fertility, nurturing, abundance) three times in a row on three different days and two weeks later I found out I was pregnant.
When Mercury retrograde became part of the zeitgeist, I was all in. Finally, there was something out of my control to explain why things were going wrong! Why I was late to meetings or appointments got canceled, why zoom glitched out every 5 minutes, why I got into silly arguments with everyone around me.
It became a running joke in our Brunch & Budget team every time Mercury retrograde came around, with us sending memes to each other about how to “survive” this time around. It was annoying that we couldn’t work our most optimized workdays, but at least we had something to blame.
Over the last few months, I’ve been listening to a new astrologer, Sarah Vrba (@sarahvrba on IG). I found her in a reddit rabbithole and came out the other side to someone who called us all her “fellow space blobs.” I was so taken with her soothing and forgiving readings that I signed up for her patreon immediately.
Sarah Vrba loves loves loves Mercury retrograde, and not in the oh haha, we’ll survive this one too kind of way, but in the you get the opportunity three times a year to slow down and reflect on your relationships to your loved ones, to work, and to how you want to show up in the world kind of way.
Whether or not you believe in astrology or think it's a little silly, this type of regular reflection a few times a year feels like a breath of fresh air.
And then, Sarah Vrba said something that blew me away. In a Patreon video, she said, “[Mercury retrograde] is very anti-capitalist, it’s very anti-productivity.”
I stopped in my tracks and let that sink in.
Mercury retrograde interrupts technology, causes communication issues in all the ways you can imagine, causes unexpected delays, plans go awry. The most devoted say you’re not even supposed to make major decisions or sign contracts.
In other words, the hyper productivity and efficiency and straight-line progress that capitalism demands is cosmically disrupted. We’re meant to rest, recharge, re-examine how we speak to others, and rediscover our relationships.
Mercury is telling us to slow down and find a different flow. We’re meant to see progress as the squiggly messy journey it is.
The last Mercury retrograde was right before Brunch & Budget shut down. It felt like everything was falling apart around me and no amount of work or effort was going to get me out of this situation.
From Sarah Vrba’s latest youtube on Mercury Retrograde:
A lot of us creatives, a lot of us sensitives, we will feel like we are going backwards, or stalling, or not doing anything… I’m just sitting here, I can’t work, I have to close my eyes, I have to rest, I don’t have the idea yet, and it feels like we aren’t moving forward. It appears as though we’re going back over things… but in reality something is culminating, something powerful is happening, and it is counter cultural because it doesn’t look like external achievement.
As I experience my first Mercury retrograde after shutting down the business, I’m remembering this - it’s only from our perspective that Mercury looks like it’s going backwards, it’s not actually going backwards.
The system thrives on you feeling like you’re behind. Your to-do list is too long, your bank account balance is too small, you haven’t hit the same career milestones as your peers, you’re falling behind at every turn.
You are not going backwards and moving forward into someone else’s vague definition of success is not actually moving forward.
Let this Mercury Retrograde remind you that you’re right where you’re supposed to be.
—---
Okay, time to share some exciting news - we are re-opening See Change!! We’ll be opening it on Sept 30th with early access on Sept 9th for folks who join the waitlist.
You’ll be hearing a lot more from Dyalekt and me over the coming weeks on how we have envisioned this version to be a soft landing place for creators of color and the liberatory practices we will be doing together in the community.
The website is updated if you want a peek into what we’re cooking up. Let me know how it lands for you!