Dissolute – Neptune Returns to Aquarius

By Len Wallick

Everything that man dreams of making come true as well as everything that man thinks is true, even though it isn’t, comes under the influence of Neptune. – Robert Hand, from Planets in Transit

Neptune retrogrades back to Aquarius overnight as the Sun draws very near the halfway point between the Cancer Solstice and Libra Equinox. Neptune re-enters Aquarius after having spent a preliminary foray of four months in Pisces. Neptune will come back to Pisces next year when the Sun is very near the mid-point between the Capricorn Solstice and the Aries Equinox. In Pisces it will stay until 2026. All of that is true. The brief return to Aquarius is a reminder of how the very end of the 20th Century, and the first decade of the 21st have proven Robert Hand’s pithy appraisal to be true as well.

Among other things, Aquarius is the sign of the collective. Traditionally ruled by Saturn, it is where the individual human encounters limitations which confer definition, role and place in society. Uranus, the modern ruler, raises the revolutionary question of the individual assuming conscious responsibility for the condition of society.

When Neptune began its Aquarian journey in 1998, the outlook was optimistic. Political, economic and technological developments encouraged the dream of material abundance and spiritual advancement for one and all. It seemed true that the world was on its way to becoming a safer, more peaceful place. At long last, we dreamed that ignorance and want were finally to be banished. Now, on the other side of nearly a decade and a half, things look a lot different.

The United States, which held so much of the new century’s power, came under the thrall of a criminal enterprise masquerading as the executive branch of government. That administration started two false and interminable wars as the megalomaniacs in charge assumed the mantle of fact makers and reality creators. The Internet, which held so much of our dream’s potential, was manipulated for profit at the cost of dependency. Everywhere, power exploited and the concept “We the people” somehow evaded those people caught up in ‘for or against’. Now we are faced with price instead of promise. Having gone through all of that, it is legitimate to ask whether six more months of Neptune in Aquarius is anything to look forward to.

The answer to that question, of course, is ours to provide. Or rather, it is ours to finally begin providing solutions instead of simply accepting them. Neptune’s last return to Aquarius in this century is, if nothing else, a chance to take responsibility for learning something from the mess that we thought would become the best of times. To learn once and for all that war is no good for anything or anybody except profit itself. To educate ourselves that government is not our answer, but that we are the answer to government. That when the collective gives its power away to a corrupt few, the inevitable peril and price cannot be evaded by any individual.

When we wake up tomorrow with Neptune in Aquarius once again, the Sun will be entering the threshold between seasons. So will we be entering a threshold in our history. We have the chance to awaken from the dream of what we thought was true — that we would be taken care of, protected and sustained by those to whom we have surrendered a greater dream. We have an opportunity to at least turn our individual heads around, if not our collective condition. We need not abandon our dreams, but we must reclaim control of our own minds. If we can do that, we will have another chance. For as long as we survive, that will be true.

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3 thoughts on “Dissolute – Neptune Returns to Aquarius”

  1. Seems appropriate that Mercury has gone retrograde simultaneously giving an oomph to our review of communications, use of technology, etc as you describe.

    I would also offer that balance is a necessary part of dreams. “positive thinking” courses tell us to believe it is so and then “magically” it is so. Robert Hand reminds us that this is where a fine line exists between dreaming what can be vs delusion. A good point to consider and find grounding in during this respite prior to Neptune returning to Pisces.

    Thanks Len. xo as always.

  2. Beautiful piece, Len.

    “We need not abandon our dreams, but we must reclaim control of our own minds.”

    I can’t overemphasize how important I’m finding this to be, both personally and politically, but as you say it starts with the individual. “Free your mind, and the rest will follow.” (I also like the Funkadelic version: “free your mind and your ass will follow.”) Neptune currently opposite retrograde Mercury highlights this point.

    As someone with an extremely dignified natal Mercury in a very tight opposition with retrograde Neptune from the IC, squared by Saturn from the 12th, it has taken me a long time to realize that so many of my problems & anxieties originate on the mental/subconscious level & aren’t actually grounded in reality at all. Mercury has a tendency to take the outer planet energies and rev them up and spin them out of control, until one (or society) is caught in a web of one’s own creation. I think of Aquarius/Saturn: crystalized thought as entrapment, like a recursive computer program in our minds. But we have to remember that we can hit the escape button; we can choose release (Aquarius/Uranus). We can’t turn off the outer planet energies, but it is possible to step back and watch them operating consciously. This is what psychology, astrology, and many forms of Buddhism (among other paths) teach us to do.

    If you are having trouble picking up & carrying a positive vibration/thought/belief, the first thing you have to do is release (let go, dissolve) the structures that are standing in the way. That’s a Neptune speciality. But it really helps to be aware of those structures first. That’s Mercury. Incidentally, meditation works wonders.

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