Mercury Retrograde Shadow: Reclaim Your Power with Jennifer Pilates

Are you feeling the energetic waves already? Miscommunications, tech glitches, unexpected emotions — welcome to the Mercury Retrograde Shadow, the sacred slowdown that invites you to realign, repair, and reclaim your power before the full retrograde begins.

In this illuminating episode, Jennifer Pilates—intuitive-medium, spiritual thought leader, and holistic wellness expert—guides you through the deeper purpose of this cosmic phase. You’ll learn how to transform frustration into flow and confusion into clarity as Mercury begins to shift gears.

Discover:
 ✨ What the Mercury Retrograde Shadow really is and why it starts weeks before the retrograde
 ✨ How to navigate emotional intensity, delays, and resurfacing patterns with grace
 ✨ How to use this period as an energetic cleanse to move forward empowered and aligned

This isn’t about fear—it’s about awareness. The universe is helping you pause, reflect, and rise stronger than before.

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Transcript

1:17

Welcome to Empowered Within a Soul Clenching transformational podcast that will set your soul on fire through candid and inspiring conversations. Leading experts, celebrities, healers, and I share our journeys of how we've overcome challenges to living an empowered life from within. I'm your host, Jennifer Pilates. Welcome to another episode of Empowered Within. Hi there, and welcome to this new episode of Empowered Within. I have a question for you. Are texts arriving out of order? Is your tech and your computers being moody and glitchy? I have news for you that isn't your imagination. Mercury, the cosmic messenger is slowing for its shadow phase, and with it comes your invitation to reset, repair, and realign today we're diving into the Mercury retrograde, why it gets such a bad rap and what to do and what not to do, plus the exact energies to expect as we move from Sagittarius exploration into Scorpio Truth. Let's get you ready, reset, and aligned. Welcome to Empowered Within. I'm your host, Jennifer Pilates, your loving lighthouse in seasons of shift If you're new, welcome. If you're a returning listener, welcome home. Take a deep breath with me. Inhale, clarity, exhale, heaviness. Let's dive into today's new episode. Before we deep dive into the Mercury retrograde shadow, first it's really important to know what the Mercury retrograde really is all about. Mercury doesn't really move backwards. It appears to from Earth because of orbital speed perception shifts, and so does our experience of time, messages and movement. Symbolically, mercury rules, messaging, movement, and timing. When it reverses the universe, spotlights, unfinished conversations, unrepaired systems, and un realign choices so that you can complete, correct recalibrate, review, revise, and reset. So why does Mercury retrograde always get a bad rap? Let's talk about why Mercury and retrograde tends to get a bad wrap. Here's some reasons. We're trying to sprint. We're trying to move forward. We're trying to open new doors. We're trying to launch new projects during a cosmic cool down Delays feel like punishment. Instead of the protection that they actually are, we treat glitches as chaos rather than course corrections. Retrogrades don't sabotage. They bring to surface the weak links so that you can strengthen them so that you're aware of what was loosey goosey going on in the system. Well, and the truth is culture loves drama, but Mercury retrograde is less doom and more maintenance mode for your life. For my life and for the collective, it really is about reviewing, revising, and taking some time to relax. So the shadow phase of Mercury retrograde that began on October 21st, this is a buildup, subtle misfires, deja VUS resurfacing themes. It's your checklist window to back up, tidy up, and most importantly, clear up. Mercury retrograde stations November 9th through November 29th. Then we have a post shadow, just like we had a pres shadow, and this is the norm. This always happens. The post shadow will run through December 16th. That's a period of integration. Steady forward momentum and closures landing. When we look at Mercury and retrograde, they happen throughout the year. This is nothing new, but each one, it has a flavor of its own. So let's look at phase one, mercury retrograde. In Sagittarius, which is November 9th through November 18th, that focus. That's a time to focus on beliefs, long distance communication, travel, education, publishing, and big ideas. When we look at medicine, I know that sounds kind of interesting, we don't ever really bring up that word here, but when we look at medicine, this is humility and refinement. Where did enthusiasm outrun the details? Where did I know override the curious listening and the leaning in to your intuition and what can you expect during this phase one. Itinerary edits, syllabus tweaks, contract clarifications. Wait, what do we actually believe here? It's really that time where we begin the review stage. Now when we get into phase two. Mercury retrograde will then be in Scorpio, which is November 18th through the 29th. The focus here is emotional truth, motives, money, entanglements, intimacy, and hidden data. What's the medicine to all of this courageous honesty. Say the thing cleanly. No daggers. Ask What's real beneath this reaction. What's really going on around this triggering moment, this triggering situation, and what can you expect? Deep talks, old feelings, resurfacing for healing. Intense dreams, sharper intuition, heavier words that want to be used wisely. I know that's a lot, right? What signs will be most sensitized during the pres shadow? We have Gemini and Virgo, both Mercury ruled. We're talking communication and workflows. Upgrade systems. Simplify your schedules and leave plenty of buffer time for getting from point A to point B and whatever you need to be getting done with Sagittarius, you're gonna wanna revisit your long range plans, and you're really gonna wanna truth test your big vision. Is it really what you're hoping for? Is it really what you're desiring? Review, revise, rethink, and Scorpio. You can expect emotional alchemy, boundaries, and transparency, strengthening your bonds during the shadow period. When we have a mercury going into retrograde, there's always things that we should do and certain things that we should maybe not do, perhaps postpone. So let's look at those. What do we do? So they all begin with the R here. Ready? We wanna review our plans, permissions, policies, and any passwords we wanna repair. Devices, cars, websites, update software, tidy your digital life, reconcile money matters, align agreements in writing. Reach out to clear up misunderstandings, assuming good intent, verify facts, reflect and record journal dreams, numbers. When we're seeing 1122. 11, 11, 21, 21. Three. Three three synchronicities, their signal posts from the universe. They are your little breadcrumbs to what's to come. And rehearse. Rehearse important conversations before sending or pressing rehearse, review, revise important conversations before you press send, before you post that post, make sure your intent is clear and aligned with where you are in that moment in time. Okay, so those are all the things we wanna do. So what do we wanna avoid? What do we wanna go slow with during this time? Any contracts, any big launches you haven't pressure tested. If you must sign, double check every clause, date, and deliverable that goes with that contract. Travel without buffers. So you wanna build layover, time. Carry printed confirmations. Expect detours, delays, but don't expect disasters. Text fighting, pick up the phone, or meet via video. Clarity lives in tone, not in threads. So much is always misunderstood with a text. Pick up the phone and call. Over scheduling. We want to avoid overscheduling. We wanna leave buffer space. Leave 15 to 20 minute cushions between commitments, build in your workouts, build in your reiki meditations, build in your me time. And lastly, we want to avoid escaping our feelings. Scorpio phase will find you anyways, so my friend, meet it early, gently. And most importantly, bravely The collective energy. Forecast the vibe. Time feels elastic. Fate, rewinds to replay. A missed line. A missed message. Messages return with new context. Old chapters open for closure and renewal. Likely themes that you'll feel, see or be in that will be playing out. Travel and timing delays, detours, divine rerouting protection in disguise is what we like to call all of this tech glitches. Emails in limbo, device moodiness. Simple fixes can go a long way. Communication. Misreads meltdowns unless we slow down. Repeat back what you heard. Intuition spikes. We've got vivid dreams coming through. Emotional truth, surfacing, goosebump confirmations giving you that. Hell yes. In those moments of, I don't know. The past people in patterns reappear for second chances or for clean endings once and for all numbers, and well winks from the universe. You'll see the 11. 11. You'll see the three, three. Three ask. What is this confirming? And how can we reframe the collective energy and work with this? Every pause is a precision tool. Delays buy you time to get it right. Everything that's resurfacing is a sacred audit. Keep it, repair it, or release it with grace, ease and love. Every glitch is a diagnostic. So fix the system, not just the symptom. Get to the root cause once and for all. So what do we do during this phase? What can we do? Let's look at a step-by-step retrograde protocol from me to you to help you through the shadow phase. Remember, we're only talking about the shadow phase. We have not even gotten into the actual retrograde, ooh, honey child. So here we go. an ideal place to start is working with breath, resetting the nervous system, trying box breathing with four counts. It's four counts as you inhale for 4, 3, 2, 1. Hold your breath for 4, 3, 2, 1. Then release your breath for 4, 3, 2. One, and then hold your breath again for 4, 3, 2, 1. You wanna try this for three full rounds, hand over your heart, hand over your navel, and closing with I choose clarity, calm, and clear communication. I am safe. number two is a repair of practicalness. So this is where we wanna make sure that we're backing up our drives on the computer and our phones, updating our systems, renaming messy files, going through photographs and IDs and itineraries. And there's a two touch rule if it takes under two minutes. Reply, re reply, label file. Do it now. That's what you wanna get through first. I know some people say start with the hardest thing first. That one doesn't always work for me and not always during a retrograde. So start with that two touch rule. If it takes under two minutes, reply, label it. File it, get it done. Now, number three, realigning rationally. So how do we do that? Perhaps you've had a conversation that went awry. You can script it with something like, I might have misunderstood. Here's what I heard. Is that accurate? It's actually one of my favorite statements to use anytime. So write that one down. Here it is. I might have misunderstood. Here's what I heard. Is that accurate? Then we have our boundaries. I'll respond once I've had time to think. How about tomorrow by noon? And then there's always the closure prompt what needs saying so I can travel lighter into 2026. Some of this does not need to involve external people, places, and things. These can be things that you're working on within yourself for yourself. Talking to yourself, working through the mirror, journaling to yourself, tearing it up and being done with it. We don't have to overcomplicate any of this, some fun journal prompts to work with. Where did excitement skip the fine print? What truth have I felt but not spoken, which delay secretly protected me? What am I ready to finish? Forgive. Or finally release a lot of people don't talk about what happens after the actual Mercury retrograde, November 29th, mercury will station direct. Now don't floor all of your plans forward just yet. All of the systems are still technically rebooting. The energies still need to integrate, and this will happen through December 16th, which is known as the post shadow integration. This is a time of insights action. Maybe some apologies, amends. Then plans get the green lights by mid-December. The why behind every detour will click into place for you. You'll feel clear, steadier, and far more. You as 2026 comes into view, If this episode is leaving you feeling grounded, share what the friend who's riding the retrograde rollercoaster with you. And if you are looking for more details, more insights, join my email list for my lunar and retrograde insights, surprise specials, and heartfelt giveaways and insights throughout the month, you'll be one of the first to know every event and any new practice to keep your energy clean and clear, and most importantly aligned. Head over to jennifer pilates.com and pop your name on my email list. I will meet you in your inbox with lots of love. Until next time. Remember, delays aren't denial. They're divine design. Come home to your light, realign, release, receive, and as always, may you live and empowered life from within. Thank you so much for tuning into another episode. Please remember to rate, review, and subscribe to Empowered Within with Jennifer Pilates. Your feedback is important. It helps me to connect with you and gives me insight into who you are and what you're enjoying about the show. For today's show, notes and discount codes from today's sponsors. Head over to jennifer pilates.com. Until next time, may you live an empowered life from within.