Neptune enters Aries on March 30 after spending 14 years in Pisces. It’s one of the five outer planets (along with Pluto, Uranus, Saturn, and Jupiter) to change signs within a seven-month period. These shifts mark slower and more thorough processes of change—tectonic shifts that alter the environment as opposed to isolated subjects. For example, instead of noticing changes in the objects moving through the sky, we’ll notice a change in the sky itself.
The planet Neptune is named after the Roman god of the sea. Its jobs include eroding boundaries between all that we hold separate, and all forms of romanticizing, glamorizing, and mystifying the “ordinary.” Neptune can be the rose-colored glasses that help us see the sacred in the mundane. In its attempts to elevate the consciousness of mere mortals it can confuse, delude, inspire, and whip us into a frenzy over anything that we love and believe in. Neptune might argue that the interconnection of all things and beings IS the reality of life and that the stratifications and structures we live with are the illusions. True to Neptune’s mystical character, it goes both ways. Neptune lets the fog roll in to obscure information, and it lifts the veil to expose eternal truths. It takes love and compassion to the most exalted places of sacrifice and redemption, turning everything it touches into mythic expressions of art and piety.
Neptune is considered to be the modern ruler of Pisces. Having just spent 14 years in a sign that it’s very comfortable in, we’ve seen a rise in the acceptance of spiritual practice, religious affiliation, and holistic methodologies in the mainstream, along with heartfelt attempts to make the world a more inclusive place for every living thing. At the same time, we’ve witnessed many shams in the realms of truth-seeking, meaning-making, and healing. Over the past 14 years, technology—its products and its implementations—has both helped us connect to each other and have made it harder to know each other. It’s much more difficult to tell fact from fiction, leaving many people to just “vibe” things out. Neptune is very much a vibe.
Upon entering the sign of Aries, Neptune will begin to express itself through a different set of conditions and lenses. The most prevalent archetypes for the sign of Aries are the warrior and the pioneer. It has connections to individuality, leadership, heat, and, being the first sign of the zodiac, initiations and births of all kinds. When we pair the activities of mystifying Neptune with the battlefields and uncharted territories of Aries, a new experience of both planet and sign emerges.
When the mystic and the warrior come together, we could witness the rise of both hero worship and fighting on behalf of the vulnerable, disenfranchised, and marginalized, along with lots of confusion over identifying good guys from bad guys. Spiritual Neptune will find reasons to fight for a higher good and vanquish “evil” under the romantic notions of heroism. Conversely, some will be inspired to harm or sacrifice the self in attempts to inspire change for the many. Aries is not squeamish about violence, and with Neptune moving through it, it can be convinced that all sacrifices are a reasonable cost for a new beginning.
This environment can encourage people to believe that they have been divinely chosen to take up this mantle of crusading hero or martyr. Aries infuses Neptune with fiery passion for missions of all kinds and the courage to transgress boundaries. It might even be fanatical about what it believes to be true and its right to take action. This is the territory of god complexes, delusions of grandeur, and the appointments of “chosen ones” and messiahs. Remember, Neptune transcends limits, and Aries leads the way. We may also see more positive expressions of this in religious and artistic pioneering, visionary scientific breakthroughs, and large-scale confrontations over mass injustice.
The last time Neptune occupied Aries was 1861 to 1875, a time marked by the American Civil War and the invention of pasteurization. Fighting in the name of a perceived moral high-road and purification by heat are both perfect expressions of Neptune moving through Aries. When a planet makes its entrance into a sign, it announces the subjects it will work on during its tenure. These are just some topics that might get introduced. In our personal lives we’ll be sure to feel some raging fires within. We’ll be tasked with being scrupulously intentional with those passions, lest we add fuel to an inferno of delusion.
