The Flow State Herald: Edition 2, Libra the Courtier
The Flow State Herald
17 to 24 October 2026 · Edition 2 · Vol. I · No. 2
The Courtier's edition, for Libra rising
Read this first
- The week: Venus, retrograde, squares Pluto on Tue 20 Oct and lines up with the Sun on Fri 23 Oct; Mercury turns retrograde early on Sat 24 Oct.
- For you: The Treasury and Pantry, 2nd house: Venus, Mercury and the Sun all pass through it, so money, food and values take most of the week.
- Do this: Tue 20 Oct: write two columns, pleasure and keeping, and circle the one item that appears in both.
- Dates: Tue 20 Oct, 2:56 am ET; Fri 23 Oct, 11:44 pm ET; Sat 24 Oct, 3:12 am ET.
Your birth chart is a castle: twelve rooms for twelve areas of life. Each week the planets open different doors, and this paper tells you which rooms are busy this week.
New to the rooms? They are explained on the castle page.
Album of the week
Look to the Rainbow, Astrud Gilberto, 1966. Ten tracks. Source.
Recorded in sessions from November 1965 to February 1966 at Van Gelder Studio in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, and released on Verve in 1966. Creed Taylor produced it, and Gil Evans arranged the orchestral backing.
The Weighing Room: your sky this week
You are the Courtier: Venus turns backwards through Scorpio, squares Pluto and then meets the Sun, and the week is about what your pleasures cost and what they are worth.
What belongs together this week: the things you enjoy, or the things you can afford to keep enjoying?
Venus squares Pluto · Tue 20 Oct, 2:56 am ET (06:56 UTC)
THE TREASURY AND PANTRY · 2nd house · money, food, what you value
THE GARDEN AND BALLROOM · 5th house · play, romance, creativity and pleasure
Venus, retrograde in Scorpio, squares Pluto in Aquarius, so your 2nd and 5th houses pull against each other: money, food and what you value meet play, romance and pleasure. The pull is between what you spend on enjoyment and what you hold back. With Pluto moving forward again, the squeeze tightens slowly.
- Tue 20 Oct: Write two columns on one page, what you would spend on pleasure and what you would keep, then circle the single item that appears in both.
♀︎ Venus in Scorpio, retrograde · 2nd house · square ♇︎ Pluto in Aquarius · 5th house · Tue 20 Oct, 2:56 am ET (06:56 UTC)
Venus lines up with the Sun · Fri 23 Oct, 11:44 pm ET (Sat 24 Oct, 03:44 UTC)
THE TREASURY AND PANTRY · 2nd house
Venus, retrograde in Scorpio, lines up with the Sun in your 2nd house, where money, food and what you value live. The Sun moved into Scorpio earlier that day, at 5:38 am ET. Whatever you have been re-pricing, re-tasting or re-choosing since Venus turned backwards comes to a head in one conversation about worth.
- Fri 23 Oct: Tell one person plainly what something is worth to you, a favour, an hour or a price, then ask what it is worth to them.
♀︎ Venus in Scorpio, retrograde · 2nd house · conjunct ☉︎ Sun in Scorpio · Fri 23 Oct, 11:44 pm ET (Sat 24 Oct, 03:44 UTC)
Mercury turns retrograde · Sat 24 Oct, 3:12 am ET (07:12 UTC)
THE TREASURY AND PANTRY · 2nd house
Mercury turns retrograde in Scorpio, in your 2nd house, sharing the room with the Sun and Venus. Messages, plans and agreements about money, meals and what you value are due for a second look. Mercury stays retrograde for the rest of this edition, so check any price, bill or order twice before saying yes.
- Thu 22 Oct: Read the fine print on one bill or subscription and write its real monthly cost on a card, before Mercury turns back.
☿︎ Mercury in Scorpio, stations retrograde · 2nd house · Sat 24 Oct, 3:12 am ET (07:12 UTC)
Whatever you have been re-pricing, re-tasting or re-choosing since Venus turned backwards comes to a head in one conversation about worth.
Tarot
Look. A young man in a tall red hat holds two gold coins in a looping ribbon, ships behind him.
Ask yourself. Which coin would you put down first if the ribbon went slack?
Show the reading
Then read. Two of Pentacles, reversed. You can't keep both going and one drops. Venus squares Pluto on Tuesday, setting what you enjoy against what it costs, so choose instead of weighing.
Look. A worker on a bench faces two robed figures, one holding plans, under three carved pentacles.
Ask yourself. Who in the picture is looking at whom, and who is looking at the work?
Show the reading
Then read. Three of Pentacles, upright. Shared work pays off when each person's part is seen. Venus meets the Sun in your 2nd house, money and worth, late Friday, so say what your part was.
Look. A horned beast on a block, a man and woman with loose chains around their necks, shown upside down.
Ask yourself. Could either figure lift the chain off, and what keeps them standing there?
Show the reading
Then read. The Devil, reversed. A grip loosening. Mercury turns retrograde on Saturday to recheck old terms, so don't agree to anything until you've read it twice.
Cards: Pamela Colman Smith, Rider-Waite-Smith tarot, 1909.
Planet of the week
In your chart. Mercury sits in your 2nd house, the Treasury and Pantry, so prices, receipts, shopping lists and talk about what things are worth are in its care this week.
This week. Mercury, direct in Scorpio until then, turns retrograde on Sat 24 Oct, 3:12 am ET (07:12 UTC) and stays retrograde for the rest of the week.
Hindu. The Hindu Mercury, Budha, was born to Tara, wife of the gods' teacher Brihaspati, and to Soma, the Moon god who carried her off. A war followed until Brahma stepped in, and Tara admitted the child was Soma's, and the boy was named Budha, "the wise". Sources: Tara and Budha.
Norse. English Wednesday comes from Old English Wodnesdaeg, "Woden's day", a translation of Latin dies Mercurii, "Mercury's day", because Roman writers matched Mercury with Odin. Snorri Sturluson's Prose Edda tells how Odin took the mead of poetry from the giant Suttungr and flew it home to the gods as an eagle. Sources: Skaldskaparmal and Wednesday.
Chinese. In Chinese astronomy Mercury goes by Chenxing. It is the planet of Water, tied to the north and to the Black Tortoise, a snake-wound tortoise guarding the northern sky. Sources: name and Black Tortoise.
The Porcelain Cabinet: the museum object
Look first. Two small porcelain figures dance on rounded white bases, a woman in a flowered skirt and a man in a pale cap, both patched in diamonds of blue, rust and gold, arms lifted as if mid-step.
Context. The Fürstenberg Porcelain Manufactory made the pair in hard-paste porcelain about 1753 to 1754. The Met's record names them Harlequin and Columbine, and each stands about 19 centimetres high.
Notice. Look at the diamond patches bending around hips and knees, and at the two gestures that answer each other across the gap.
The deep dive
Two readings of the same Greek texts sat on the scales for a century and a half, until a close reading of the Greek in 1614 settled it.
Around 1460 an incomplete Greek Corpus Hermeticum arrived in Florence. Cosimo de' Medici had Marsilio Ficino put it into Latin at once, ahead of his Plato translations.
The first reading: the texts were credited to Hermes Trismegistus, Hermes the Thrice-Greatest, a figure who joins the Greek Hermes to the Egyptian god Thoth. Ficino took him for a wise Egyptian priest who came before Plato and was a source for him.
The second reading: in 1614 Isaac Casaubon, a Swiss-born scholar, weighed the Greek itself. Its vocabulary, style and ideas matched the first centuries CE, not ancient Egypt. Modern scholars date the texts to roughly 100 to 300 CE.
The dating is certain enough to teach. What followed is interpretation: Frances Yates called the redating a blow to Hermetic natural theology, while Jan Assmann and others note that belief in an older origin carried on.
To think about: Which reading would you have trusted in 1460?
Go further: Egyptomania and the Hermetic texts
Sources: Encyclopedia.com, Hermeticism; Source Library, Isaac Casaubon; Britannica, Hermes Trismegistus.
This week's calendar
- Sat 17 Oct: Jewish: Shabbat Noach, the Sabbath on which the Torah portion Noach is read: Noah, the flood, the ark and the rainbow covenant. Source.
- Mon 19 Oct: Hindu: Maha Navami, the ninth day of Navratri, a day for Ayudha Puja, when tools and instruments are honoured. Source.
- Tue 20 Oct: Hindu: Dussehra (Vijayadashami), the tenth day, ending the nine days of Navratri; in many places effigies of Ravana are burned. Source.
- Fri 23 Oct: Chinese: Frost's Descent (Shuangjiang) opens at 5:38 am ET (09:38 UTC), the final solar term of autumn. Source.
A line to keep
A false balance is abomination to the LORD: but a just weight is his delight.
Proverbs 11:1, King James Version
How this was made
Times are Eastern (ET), with UTC in brackets. The sky is calculated with the Swiss Ephemeris. Pictures come from museum open access collections and are credited in each caption. For reflection and enjoyment, not medical, financial or legal advice.
