4 trips you *should* take during Mercury retrograde

If your response to seeing Mercury’s about to go retrograde is to cancel all plans and bunker down in your apartment for three weeks, you’re not alone—it can instill fear in even the biggest astrological doubters.

But traveling during Mercury retrograde (which, ahem, happens July 26 to August 19, 2018) isn’t a total faux pas. In fact, according to Brooklyn astrologer Sandy Sitron, it can actually be a really incredible time to travel—that is, if you’re booking the right trip.

“Retreat, renew, refresh: These are all things you want to be doing during retrograde,” she says. “Yes, technically it is a bad time to travel…but if the nature of your trip is to slow down, take a step back, and review the past in some way, shape, or form, then it’s perfect.”

“If the nature of your trip is to slow down, take a step back, and review the past in some way, shape, or form, then it’s perfect.”

What you don’t want to be doing? “No road trips! The least amount of time where you’re moving is best,” notes Sitron. “Make it a trip where you go somewhere and you’re just there and have some time to reflect. If [you want] to get a lot of things done at the highest speed possible, or if there are a lot of logistics involved, that’s the worse-case scenario.”

Planning to travel during a time period that’s in the midst of a retrograde? Here are four types of trips that Sitron says are actually perfect:

Go on a retreat

Mercury retrograde is actually a time to retreat, so you can do that on a personal level. The idea here is you’re getting time to go inward and reflect and review how you’re living your life. What do you want? Does it make sense? This is a great time to notice if any feelings are coming up.

To go away and travel [on a guided retreat] during Mercury retrograde is the perfect way to do it, because if something goes wrong, who cares? Maybe the shuttle will leave an hour later than it was supposed to, but everyone will get there—it will be fine.

Go on a trip you’ve previously planned (but never actually got to take)

Anything that was already in motion but for whatever reason you couldn’t do it before—but it’s almost like you’re re-doing—can be really neat.

Go reconnect with family or old friends

Mercury retrograde is really a time when people pop up in your life. It can be a great time to plan a trip with an old friend—a laid-back trip where you didn’t care if it veered away from the itinerary. It’s a great time to connect [or have a] reconciliation. Visit your family; maybe there are things you need to discuss or reconcile so you can move forward in a better way.

Go on a work off-site

If you’re traveling for work and part of the work trip is, “I want to get out of the office, go to Joshua Tree, rent an Airbnb, and go over everything that’s going on and start to plan for the [business’] future”—this would be an amazing time. You won’t want to put plans in stone, but re-evaluate old goals you had. If you’re with your work team, do some deeper group dynamics-building activities and go deeper with yourself. Mercury retrograde is an amazing time to slow down and review your work flow system.

But if you’re traveling for work and you’re going to a conference and there are 10 things you’ve got to do while you’re there and treating it like the way we so often do it—you know, “Yeah, I can fit it all in….”—that’s when you can run into issues.