Mula opens Sagittarius. Ruled by Ketu and presided over by Nirriti — the goddess of dissolution, the one who undoes — Mula is the nakshatra of the root. The name means exactly that: the part below ground, the source, the place where things begin and to which they return.
The symbol is a bunch of roots or a tied bundle of investigation. Classical texts do not soften Mula. It is associated with the kind of truth-seeking that pulls things up by their origins, even when the pulling is painful. The Galactic Centre sits within this mansion — astronomically, it is the direction of the centre of our galaxy, and mythologically, the gateway to the deepest causes.
People with strong Mula placements often have an investigative quality that goes further than is comfortable. They are not satisfied with the surface of a question. Many are researchers, philosophers, mystics, therapists, investigators — anyone whose work requires going to the root and being willing to find what is there. Ketu's rulership lends a quality of detachment that makes the work possible.
The shadow is the same energy unfiltered: dissolution that becomes destructiveness, the dismantling of things that should have been left standing, an inability to live with mystery without trying to expose it.
Classical remedies emphasise honouring Nirriti through the conscious release of what is genuinely finished — possessions, identities, relationships that have run their course. Ketu is honoured by humility before the unknowable.
One mansion in one chart. The root is real; what one does with it is the work.