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Welcome to the final retrograde of 2024. Mars retrograde invites us inward. Instead of expressing ourselves outwardly into the world, we find ourselves turning within and creating space to observe our rhythms and desires. This fiery planet in retrograde asks that we realign with our truth. That we ensure our desires, creations, directions, and the way that we express and share ourselves comes from that truth.
When Is Mars Retrograde 2024?
Mars in retrograde begins December 6, 2024, in the fiery sign of Leo and draws to a close on February 23, 2025, in the waters of Cancer.
What Does Mars Mean in Astrology?
Mars is our planet of passion and motivation, will and drive. It is the energy that propels us into action as we strive toward our desires. It is what connects us with our personal power and ambitions. And it is how we advocate for ourselves and relate to our anger.
What Does Mars Retrograde 2024 Mean for You?
While in apparent backward motion known as retrograde, planets prompt us to revisit what we have recently experienced in life. In particular, Mars retrograde is a time to review steps taken, instincts followed, and desires pursued. As we do so, we begin to observe how we channel our vitality, our life force, and our creative energy into the world.
This energy is our greatest currency. Mars retrograde asks us to consider how we choose to use it and where we choose to invest it. As we recall recent versions of ourselves, it helps to explore how we have advocated for ourselves and our truth…or why have we chosen not to assert ourselves. Knowing the answer empowers us to move through life with more intention and purpose as we act in alignment with our desires. It also brings a keen awareness of what we have been creating through our actions as well as our inactions.
Leo is a sign of bold self-expression and courageous creations. It is loving and enthusiastic and reminds us that who we are is on purpose. Under the influence of Leo, Mars desires the most truthful and passionate celebration and expression of who we are. We are art itself. All that exists within us desires to be expressed through us into more art.
This is a time to reflect honestly on how we need to feel seen, acknowledged, and loved so that we may begin offering that to ourselves and come into a more balanced relationship with conflict.
Following its start in Leo, Mars retrograde will primarily take place in the healing waters of Cancer, a sign of emotion and intuition, tenderness and nurturing. Cancer relates to holding memories within our bodies. As such, it welcomes an exploration of our patterns, ideas, and emotions that we collected in our formative years.
As Mars retrogrades through this Moon-ruled sign, we experience a review of longheld perceptions and emotions that have been awaiting our presence. Here we review our relationship with experiencing our anger and drive, asserting ourselves, and expressing our emotions or not. We must all learn how to advocate for ourselves, honor our needs, and make known our preferences. By being more truthful with ourselves about what we are feeling, we can explore how to constructively express this very human and very real side of ourselves.
This retrograde is the beginning of our healing in these spaces. Your horoscope explains how.
Mars Retrograde 2024 Horoscopes
Only after becoming curious about your motivations can you integrate the lessons and glean the wisdom of the final retrograde of the year. Here’s what you need to know. Read for your rising sign.
Aries Rising
There is beauty and freedom available when you clear away the many ways you have been taught to dim, hide, or contort your self-expression. This retrograde takes you to that space of liberation. Inward reflection and contemplation will enable you to review the emotions and narratives formed years ago. Only then can you bring them into the current and most authentic version of you.
Taurus Rising
The initial phase of Mars retrograde invites you into your emotional body. How comfortable or uncomfortable do you feel with the expression of emotions? How were you taught to channel anger, assert desires, and express love? From early January onward, though, it asks you to explore your mind. Here you will be able to review, rewrite, and reframe the emotional insights you gained.
Gemini Rising
Offer your mind some rest. Create space to clear the mental clutter, consider your past desires, and perhaps find peace in the unknown of what comes next. This retrograde affords you a more intimate relationship with your self-worth and your sense of security and resources, both tangible and intangible.
Cancer Rising
It’s time to review of your innermost needs and desires to feel safe, secure, and comfortable in the world. As it highlights your relationship with material resources, it invites you to review your self-concept, rewrite your values, and realign who you desire to be in the world.
Leo Rising
This retrograde welcomes you into a space of quiet solace and inward retreat. Although life doesn’t stop for any planet’s backspin, it does allow you the grace to slow down and recharge your own energy. After connecting you to your source of creativity and inspiration, this retrograde builds by asking you to review who you believe yourself to be.
Virgo Rising
Allow yourself to reconnect with the source of your passions, whether you find that in the musings of your imagination, the sacred, or the silence. Let yourself retreat and find yourself anew in your solace. As Mars shifts into Cancer in early January, let your mind and body reflect on your dreams and aspirations as well as your sense of belonging and place in community.
Libra Rising
Reconsider your place in community. Create space between your heart and the desires and expectations of the collective. In this spaciousness, allow yourself to renew your sense of passion and direction with some dedicated time and intention. Then you can realign with your aspirations.
Scorpio Rising
Forward movement doesn’t always look like forward movement. Sometimes the greatest thing you can offer your goals and visions is space for recharging, questioning, and realigning. This retrograde invites a shift in your long-term prospects as well as your fundamental beliefs in this world, your truth, and what life means to you.
Sagittarius Rising
As January begins, inner journeying take you deeper within to explore your relationship with internal power, emotional expression, and self-assertion. Let yourself ask questions. Inquire about your perspectives and beliefs. How do you feel you belong in this world? What do you believe about life, truth, and the sacred?
Capricorn Rising
It’s a retrograde of feeling. Of reconnecting with impulse and raw emotion. Of letting yourself be taken into the depths of yourself. Here you will be invited to realign your desires within your closest relationships, your safety with partnership, and your expression of love.
Aquarius Rising
How do you offer your love and passion within partnership? How can you express yourself with your chosen people? This retrograde begins with connections to others before moving into your well-being, habits, and routines. From January onward, observe the way you channel your energy each day and consider whether or not it is in support of your happiness.
Pisces Rising
Mars embodies how we move our energy into and through this world. While it’s in retrograde, it invites you to express your energy with greater intention in your days, your habits, and your consistent movements. Are these acts supportive of your authenticity? As you bring greater intention, you find a more freeing, truthful, and creative expression of who you are becoming.
Learn more about the influence of the Moon and planets on your everyday life, including your weekly horoscope, when you sign up for our astrology email newsletter.
