When Pluto and Jupiter’s brother Neptune waltzes into Aries in 2025 the game changes dramatically. Neptune has been in its home base of Pisces since 2011 where it is the co-ruler along with Jupiter. For those of us living in the United States this will coincide with a newly elected President (you can read more about Inauguration Day of 2025 here: https://www.theclevelandshaman.com/post/inauguration-forebodings ). Neptune begins its journey through the zodiac sign of Aries on March 30, 2025 and will remain there roughly until March of 2039, a 14-year odyssey. As the outer planets, also known as the transpersonal planets switch astrological signs, we the people enter into a new collective consciousness. Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto cannot be seen with the naked eye and accordingly represent our ascent into enlightenment and transcendence of the ego. They correspond to the main psychological tendencies of entire generations of human beings or even of entire ages.
Before we examine the meaning of Neptune in Aries, let’s explore some Neptune facts that will help with an understanding of this transcendent planet. With the advent of better telescopes in the mid-1800s, the first observation of Neptune occurred in 1846. Ironically, this was just before the last time Neptune entered Pisces, which lasted from 1847 - 1862. This of course proceeded the last time Neptune was in Aries which was from 1861 – 1875. We will explore this period in great detail.
Neptune takes about 165 years to orbit our Sun. This means that Neptune spends many years in each of the twelve zodiacal signs. The qualities of Neptune are deep and diverse. Big picture and on the positive side it can represent spirituality, imagination, compassion, empathy, perfection, oneness, and infinite love and beauty. The challenging attributes of Neptune include addictions, deception, lack of boundaries, ambiguity, gullibility, suffering, delusions, and isolation. Neptune has come to be associated with things related to the arts like, film, music, and fashion. These are also linked to Venus. Neptune is known as a higher octave of Venus. Actions that are typically correlated with the great blue planet are dreaming, imagining, inspiring, idealizing, blurring, sacrificing, surrendering, letting go, relinquishing, transcending, and escaping.
When Neptune enters the sign of Aries it finds itself in a fiery world of creation and destruction. Fire is analogous to summer and thus its qualities are hot and dry. Hot in Astro-speak means reacting to things quickly… by expressing anger or impatience strongly and immediately. Aries is quick to decide, judge, execute, and move on. Aries is the creative life force that gets things going. It is the spark that ignites passion, courage, competitiveness, selfishness, recklessness, pioneering, and war-like aggressiveness. If Aries was a hormone secreted in the body it would be adrenaline. Contrast this with Neptune, which if it was a hormone, it would most likely be dopamine. By examining this divergence, we can begin to form a picture of what might be coming.
Looking back at previous times in history when Neptune trekked through Aries, we can begin to formulate a sketch of what types of events might unfold during the 2025 ingress. Mark Twain famously quipped “History never repeats itself, but it does often rhyme.” Let’s now follow the breadcrumbs left during the period from 1861 -1875. The elephant in the room is unfortunately the American Civil War. Neptune was in the USA’s 4th house, where it will also be this time as it returns to Aries in 2025. Amazingly, Neptune entered Aries on April 13, 1861 which is the same day Fort Sumter fell to the Confederacy. That war is on record as resulting in the death of over 620,000 people. Does this mean we will have another civil war? Not necessarily but it is a flashing red-light in our rearview mirror that tells us to pay attention and be aware of that possibility.
When looking at this event through the prism of Neptune in Aries we can see this type of extremeness embedded in their flammable union. Given Neptune’s association with covert alliances, clandestine activities, crazy persons, espionage, and secret societies it’s not much of a stretch to postulate that when in the sign of Aries these energies can become explosive, motivated by its propensity toward aggression and violence. Neptune also stokes the collective’s sense of idealism and dreams of rising above whatever pain, suffering, and chaos may exist. This can lead to social unrest as the collective unites in an attempt to overcome the shadowy apparitions that are inflicting instability, exploitation and involuntary servitude upon them.
Interestingly, and because of the severity of the experience of a Civil War (1861-1865), there was a conflagration of addiction that followed. Cocaine and opiates like morphine were handed out like candy during surgeries and to deal with gunshot wounds and diarrhea. There are historical accounts that indicate upwards of 10 million opium pills were distributed by the Army and 3 million ounces of other opiate compounds. Once home, many, many, soldiers were addicted. There are academic studies that also indicate this may have been the gestation period for the substance abuse issues that rage through American society today.
Such a development is not foreign to the combined energies of Aries and Neptune. Neptune is noted for its affiliation with addictions, escapism, and altered consciousness. When tossed into the blender with Aries this can create a raw lust and drive to pursue all of the above. Aries is reactionary and impulsive. It also is an energy that can make things all about the self instead of others. So, when adrenaline meets dopamine, it can result in extreme desires to run away from reality and destructively plunge into behaviors designed to make the craziness go away… if only for an hour or a day. These poisonous impostors are just that, charlatans falsely offering relief only to find a whole new set of subversive complications that also become a source of suffering. A vicious circle.
Altered states are not just the currency of drugs or alcohol, they can additionally be accessed and abused in the pursuit of ideas. Collective movements formulated under the pretense of spiritual perfection and oneness can become addictive and lead to a slippery slope into the realm of escapism. Given Neptune’s symbiosis with seers, mystics, divination, and mediumship, periods that Neptune spends in the forceful and self-promoting fires of Aries can be problematic. Its safe to say that between the time of the firing on Fort Sumter in April of 1861 and the inauguration of President Rutherford B. Hayes in March 1877, almost everything respecting religion in American public life changed. Religion and its sister spirituality always seems to play a central role after periods of conflict. The desire being to recover meaning when it seems meaning has been dissolved in the nonsensical fires of war.
During this period, we witnessed religious revivals and spiritual movements pop up like forsythia bursting forth from the spring rains. There was the founding of the Moody Bible Institute by Dwight Moody, the Theosophical Society by Helena Blavatsky, the Christian Science Movement by Mary Baker Eddy, The Salvation Army by William Booth, and Jehovah’s Witnesses by Charles Russell, just to name a few. Again, harkening back to Mark Twain’s take on history, will the next trip by Neptune through Aries bring the same? As an Astrologer my answer is a qualified “yes” but a new and different version. Assuming we as a collective are “evolving” (and I know that is debatable in many people’s minds) new spiritual movements and ideas will surely thrive during the upcoming period from 2025 – 2039 that could prove to be the enlightenment the collective needs.
My concern with all of this is that given the shadowy side of Neptune, there will exist the strong possibility of deceit, fantasy, and exploitation accompanying some of these movements. It will behoove each of us individually to recognize that the truth of all things ultimately lies within. It is here that we are inseparably connected to source. When we fall victim to hoaxers, pretenders, and scandalous schemes, more often than not its because fear has replaced the still small voice of our soul and we are desperately trying to find our way back to it. I’m not going to sugar coat what I believe is coming. There is going to be a period of extreme confusion and uncertainty (even more intense than what we have experienced since 2020). It may or may not involve wars or rampant social unrest. There may also be a war of ideas. My hope (contrasted with my concern) is that we are at a point in our evolution that we can use any sufferings that may come our way as a stepping-stone into a higher level of spiritual understanding that finally helps us all transcend the historic vapors of suffering we have continuously wandered in... for way too long.
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