Mercury square Neptune Part 3

• Mercury Square Neptune Part 1
• Mercury Square Neptune Part 2
• Mercury Square Neptune Part 4
• Mercury Square Neptune Part 5

Water on the brain

The hard aspects involving Mercury-Neptune are much more troublesome than the easy flowing aspects. When Mercury and Neptune come together we are bringing the conscious (Mercury) and the unconscious (Neptune) into conflict. Some of the effects of this can be quite disturbing to the rational mind (Mercury). Fear, doubt, and confusion can take over the mental reasoning. At it’s most extreme the Mercury/Neptune individual can feel as if they are losing their mind. Yet Neptune can add a rich quality to the imagination, and such great sensitivity and receptivity can prove to be of immense value to the individual, and it is well worth developing, but as always with Neptune if the ego is not contained or strong enough to handle the oceanic waters then there is inevitably a severe threat to the individuals sense of reality in everyday life. Strongly Neptunian individuals have to struggle in life with having unrealistic ideals, and having those dreams face harsh reality. The aspect if not channeled constructively can seriously disturb the ability to function in the world. Mercury-Neptune individuals therefore can have trouble organizing themselves, as Neptune clouds the conscious mind, rational thought processes can be taken over by emotional complexes which seem to be unconscious. There is often a need to escape from everyday reality through drugs or alcohol, or losing our minds in television & movies and letting our minds become absorbed (Neptune) in fantasies and daydreams.

The Collective unconscious/mending the bridge between the conscious and the unconscious

Neptune in astrology is called an outer planet and this means that the planet has a collective meaning for all, to explain this further I will reference some of Carl Jung’s work on the subject. According to Carl Jung the collective unconscious contains archetypes. Jung believed that important creative ideas come from influences greater than those in the mind of a single individual. The images, figures, and characters seem to be remnants of the experiences of our ancestors, it’s a place were all souls are connected and have been through the ages. These are the archetypes you find in stories, myths and legends. According to Jung this explains the similarities of the creation myths, the resurrection and flood stories found in widely separating cultures. Jung believes the collective unconscious was inherited rather than developed. It’s a knowledge we are born with a container of our experiences as the whole human race. Jung believes that whoever speaks in primordial images (Neptune) speaks with a thousand voices, he enthralls and empowers while at the same time he lifts the idea he is seeking to express out of the occasional and into the transitory realm of the ever enduring.

Jung believed that individuals tapping into the collective unconscious, are those most adept of high quality creative activity. Thus the many individuals with Neptune connected to personal planets in the chart (Sun, Moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars) or even Neptune on an angle or 12th house planets can have a connection to the collective unconscious where deep reservoirs of images and archetypes exist in a flowing motion. The aim of an active imagination is to find the middle position between “conscious” and “unconscious” having a quality of conjoined opposites. Jung also spoke of a transcendent function of opposites. A precondition for the success of active imagination is that it shall not be a pretext for flight from life. “Fantasies are no substitute for living” they are the fruits of the spirit which fall to him who pays his tribute to life. The shirker experiences nothing but his own morbid fear, and it yields him no meaning.

 Our Collective dreams

The collective unconscious (Neptune) has been likened to a “world spirit” or a “world soul”. Something which flows from the divine into the human subject, the unconscious begins when emotions are generated. Jung put his hypothesis of the collective unconscious on solid ground and in reality by observing and investigating the dreams of modern men and women. Unconscious material is often repressed and forgotten, and it often appears in dreams. The individual with Mercury in aspect to Neptune when exploring the unconscious realms can have a difficulty in judging whether the conscious is predominating over the unconscious, or the unconscious over the conscious. According to Jung in coming to terms with the unconscious the ego takes the lead but the unconscious must be allowed to have it’s say. 

The individual who won’t own Neptune

Some individuals with this aspect will deny the unconscious exists. There will be a deep fear of anything spiritual, psychological and what the person may call irrational. The intellect may be used to combat Neptune. The truth can be distorted in this area as the person holds on desperately to what can only be perceived as logic. This type of individual may accuse others of being gullible wishy washy fools for indulging in the Neptunian world of dreams, fantasy, art, music or the whole of the imaginable realm.

Mercury square Neptune Part 2

• Mercury Square Neptune Part 1
• Mercury Square Neptune Part 3
• Mercury Square Neptune Part 4
• Mercury Square Neptune Part 5

Early education and the workings of the mind:

The Gifts

1. Mercury in combination with Neptune gives the child a powerful imagination. The storyteller.
2. The minds sensitivity & receptivity is enhanced.
3.  There is often an interest in the spiritual and the occult.
4. A deep appreciation of art, music, and beauty in general anything which uplifts the mind. May favour fictional writing especially of the mystical kind.

Childhood Memories/My own personal creativity

In school I was told off by the teacher’s for drawing the same picture over & over again. I always used to draw a house.  My school teacher thought me to be unimaginative which was not actually the case.

I thought drawing a house was a pretty common theme for all children. The meaning of a house obviously has it’s level of meaning focused on security and safety, and it has also been said to represent the protection of the great mother. The symbolic meaning of a house refers to the soul and the way we build our lives, the way we are in the world. Children’s early drawings are a form of non-verbal communication. I was terribly shy as a little girl and my head was filled up with all sorts of images I could not communicate, and so drawings are often expressions of a child’s personality, and also a child’s emotional state, which can be analysed through the use of colour in pictures, by using art therapy. I think if we let our minds look a little deeper at the Mercury-Neptune aspect it could indicate that the individual is learning the “art” of communication on many levels, through communicating a symbolic world that is difficult for many minds to reach, this may through literary pursuits such as storytelling, poetry, spiritual subjects, anything where the imagination is allowed free rein, or it may simply mean overcoming emotional complexes and sensitivity around communication.

The Challenges

1. The mind can be distracted from the ability to focus or concentrate by the need to escape. Listening can be difficult, especially if the child is not interested in the subject or the person.
2. Thinking may seem vague and unclear.
3. A sensitivity to drugs, and may have problems with substance abuse.
4. Learning difficulties can sometime be indicated, speech and hearing problems, dyslexia and other related conditions which may refer to confused or disorganized thinking.

By Liz Greene

One of the most profound and disturbing ways of gaining insight into Mercury is to work with severely autistic children, who have appeared to put the planet into cold storage. Little or no communication passes from the autistic child to the outer world, nor does any external event intrude upon the child’s enclosure in uterine waters. Emotional experiences cannot make their way past the barriers to produce recognisable responses other than terror and rage. On some level we all have elements of autism within us, where the lines of communication have broken down, or where our perceptions are no longer of what is there. Mercury-Neptune can provide a channel between the imaginable realm and the intellect, and between the individual and the oceanic source. Equally it may reflect broken bridges and severed telephone lines, where the individual is locked into the paradise garden and can perceive nothing outside it’s walls except the threat of extinction.

Brain Fog/ Feeling mentally lost in the journey toward enlightenment

 Mercury/Neptune can be likened to a kind of brain fog, often the mind is easily distracted and the attention can begin to wonder. The feeling of being in a fog or constant state of confusion can mean that on a deeper level  the individual is refusing to deal with mundane relaity . Mercury/Neptune can at times be confused by external matters, like forgetting to pay bills, or losing objects, to experiencing misunderstandings in communication. If we look at this from the view of psychological astrology, we realize that the outer events in the Mercury-Neptunes life are simply mirroring the deep mental disorganisation inside.

Is anybody there?

The individual with this aspect may be in a room of people but not seem present, they are physically there but not mentally in the same room, it’s like their lost in thought someplace else. This is mainly due to lack of grounding with Neptune. Mercury/Neptune can feel weakened and lethargic as Neptune has a way of dissolving and wearing away the mental capacity. The level of clarity can become decreased and the individual can become abnormally forgetful and detached from reality. There is often a feeling of literally ”spacing out”. I personally have had moments where my mind feels cloudy, and it’s very difficult to keep focused. This mental confusion and lost feeling indicates that inwardly we have lost the ability or motivation to make clear decisions in life, lost direction. Often the planet Neptune symbolizes the search for enlightenment, but in spiritual terms we do not know what we have lost until we have found it. Ultimately to reach a state of wholeness in communicating with Mercury-Neptune we need to repair the bridge between thinking and feeling, and between conscious awareness and unconscious motivation. 

Physical health and healing of the mind/My personal struggles in communicating

As a child I needed a minor operation on my ears and after the surgery I had to attend speech therapy lessons for some time. I am completely healed now, but I found it difficult communicating to people verbally. Maybe I still had an internal fear that they would not understand me, and through this I have always carried a deep intellectual inferiority as I found it difficult to effectively talk with confidence. This seems to be one of my greatest challenges. My communication is fine, but I seem to be blocked by my own emotional complexes. A lot of the communication problem’s may not be this evident with others. Mercury rules my Asc (chart ruler) and is powerful in my chart. I am very sensitive to people and the environment, maybe too sensitive at times and some of the the gifts of having such a strong Neptune doesn’t always seem to measure up to the high price I have to pay for the challenges it also brings my way.

Mercury Square Neptune Part 1

• Mercury Square Neptune Part 2
• Mercury Square Neptune Part 3
• Mercury Square Neptune Part 4
• Mercury Square Neptune Part 5

Lost in translation

I have a personal interest in this topic because I carry this aspect in my natal chart. I have Mercury in Pisces(it’s fall) and it is square to Neptune.

 Neptune Ruler of the Ocean

Mythic Astrology ~ Contact with the great ocean of the collective unconscious, that eternal storehouse of images and dreams, may bring forth psychic earthquakes and sweep us into the stormy realm of Poseidon (Neptune).

Merging with something greater

In astrology Neptune is the desire to go beyond the self and merge with something greater. It is the urge to lose ourselves and dissolve all boundaries, to be one with all life. Neptune breaks down barriers and can overwhelm us by flooding our conscious selves with images of the unconscious, and unseen. Under Neptune we feel that there is a deeper emotional connection to the world and have empathy for all people no matter of their class, race, or religion. Neptune represents our universal feelings and it is primarily the ruler of water, this element in astrology symbolises all that is emotional, feminine, and mysterious. Water has the ability to flow through, over and round objects, it can wear away anything which gets in the way, water can create new life in response to it’s own inner urgings.

Spiritual Rebirth

Deep water can signify being out of our depth or entering into our own subconscious. The “spiritual rebirth” is represented by the cycle of water, and the sea represents our  cosmic consciousness, the original chaotic state in which all life emerges. Inherent in that state is all knowledge & completeness, although it may be obscured by our fear of it’s depths. The rise and fall of the tides is to be conscious both of the passage of time and of the rise and fall of our own emotions.

Lost

Often Neptune can have a dissolving effect and can wash away all personal identity, motivations, clarity, ego. Under Neptune either natally or by transit often describes a feeling of being lost and hopeless in the great sea, especially if we cannot stay on land and live in our physical reality. Neptune rules the 12th house & the Zodiac sign of Pisces. There are 12 zodiac houses in the horoscope and Aries being the 1st house symbolizes the beginning of our identity, the first emergence of physical being into the world. The 12th house belonging to Pisces and Neptune symbolise the pre-birth waters of the womb, before we are separated from the source. You can see why it is so difficult for Neptune to have personal definition when the planet is concerned with the realm we least know consciously. Thus Neptune is the most difficult planet to rationally understand, thus you can see the difficulty of this pairing as Mercury is the planet of the mind and how we mentally and rationally understand the mundane world.

David Blaine

The magician, performer, endurance artist:

I thought I would look at Mr David Blaine’s chart today to see what is in his chart, and what motivates his personality. I wasn’t sure what to expect from his chart, he comes across as a unique individual and some people do indeed find him strange. The most striking placement which catches my eye in his chart is Mars conjunct Jupiter in Aquarius trine Pluto in Libra. With Mars conjunct Jupiter in the sign of the water Bearer it can indicate that Blaine’s enthusiasm for breaking new thresholds is very high. Another person with this kind of dare devil approach is Reichelt who jumped off the Eiffel tower. The aspect is here again in the chart of Blaine who does some crazy stunts and pushes his body to it’s limit. David Blaine has broke a world record, he has held his breath for a staggering 17 minutes and 4 seconds. Blaine has also been buried in a coffin for a week, been encased in ice for two and a half days, and he has fasted for 44 days in a box.

Strength of the mind

Mars trine Pluto in air can signify an ease in expressing his will-power through the mind. Also present in his chart is Uranus in Libra opposing Sun/Venus and Chiron. There is the Promethean spirit here, Mars in Aquarius can be brilliant but add Jupiter and the Promethean vision is expanded. When Uranian energy is strong in the chart there is of course the danger of being perceived the fool. The Fool appears in the ancient tarot deck and is related to the planet Uranus in astrology. The card is numbered 0 signifying the new journey and discovery the fool is about to embark on. The fool can be obsessed with his vision and focused with the sky above/the universe that he often falls off the cliff.

The fool stands for originality, and the Aquarius/Uranus energy in Blaine’s chart wants to try and do something completely new. Blaine’s chart has the energy of Aries and this is a motivating factor with Uranus for wanting to be out there and win these endurance tests, to keep on challenging himself.

Mercury in astrology is the planet of communications, and the mind serves the Sun in Aries. Therefore David’s quest for being completely independent and original (Uranus), the spark that lights the fire is to be first and overcome challenges. Hermes in myth is the God we connect to Mercury. Hermes was known as the trickster and Blaine’s Mercury is placed in the sign of illusion Pisces. Mercury squares Saturn in Gemini which is a tricky aspect to combine, but combine them he does in his street (Gemini) magic (Pisces). Some individuals love his magic and endurance tests (Saturn), and others think he is the crazy fool. There was a very funny parody of David Blaine on you tube below.

Blaine it seems is destined to carry Uranus in his chart, and his feats seem to some people to have no point whilst others do indeed find him brilliant.

The Real Blaine:

The Parody:

 

By David Blaine

     “We are all capable of infinitely more than we believe. We are stronger and more resourceful than we know, and we can endure much more than we think we can.”

The Promethean spirit is certainly here in this statement, as he tries to see how far human’s can go beyond their own limits.

“In truth, the only restrictions on our capacity to astonish ourselves and each other are imposed by our own minds.”

The Uranian vision can be a lonely quest, Prometheus in myth suffered greatly by bringing enlightenment to mankind.

Mr Billionaire

Warren Buffett (born August 30, 1930) is an American investor, businessman and philanthropist. He is one of the world’s most successful investors, and the largest shareholder and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway. He was ranked by Forbes as the second richest American with an estimated net worth of $50 billion as of September 17, 2008.

Often called the “Oracle of Omaha“, Buffett is noted for his adherence to the value investing philosophy and for his personal frugality despite his immense wealth. His 2006 annual salary was about $100,000, which is small compared to senior executive remuneration in other comparable companies. When he spent $9.7 million of Berkshire’s funds on a business jet in 1989, he jokingly named it “The Indefensible” because of his past criticisms of such purchases by other CEOs. He lives in the same house in the central Dundee neighborhood of Omaha that he bought in 1958 for $31,500, today valued at around $700,000.

Buffett is also a notable philanthropist. In 2006, he announced a plan to give away his fortune to charity, with 83% of it going to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. In 2007, he was listed among times 100 most  Influential People in The World. He also serves as a member of the board of trustees at Grinnell College.

Named richest man 2008!

A look at the investor

You got your eye on the Jupiter/Pluto in Cancer! Pluto is the focal point of a Cardinal t.square involving Venus in Libra and Uranus in Aries. I have often read Cancer is the sign which has good business acumen, and I have always wondered why, maybe because I underestimate the crab. In astrology Cancer can be intuitive and have the canny ability to predict future trends, this zodiac sign is the great investor. Usually I have in my head the mother image, the nurturer, and the protector when it comes to Cancer. But… as I was thinking on these keywords I thought well here is definitely a man who protects his investments.

All the cardinal signs (Aries, Cancer, Libra and Capricorn) are about taking initiative. Aries is about energy, enterprise, and new beginnings, Cancer is protective, withholding until it feels secure to make the move at the right time. Libra is charming and very good at negotiating, and finally we have Capricorn, who is good at business and most of all at persevering. Also notice in this chart Sun in Virgo trine Saturn in Capricorn, here we an earth trine, and the Saturnian energy helps him with his excellent sense of timing, and with Virgo his analytical abilities overall good business skills come naturally to him with this trine.  We can also see that there are more hard aspects (red lines) than easy ones (green lines) in the natal chart. Which most astrologer’s agree give more drive in the chart through the tension. Usually for business Cardinal T, squares and fixed t.squares do seem to work well for the native. Jupiter/Pluto can handle big amounts of money (as I was talking about here in the Postcard Bandit) and in the sign of Cancer something to invest in (think in terms of building a nest) but a nice big golden nest for Warren Buffet!

Venus/Pluto and Venus/Jupiter can also signify dealings with money and we can see it doesn’t always have to be in trine. Although often you have to be careful of overspending with Venus/Jupiter but since he’s got plenty of money the large charity donations and buying planes hardly dents his bank account.

Asytology Vs Christianity

Astrology Vs Christianity

Interesting debate going on here, although looks a bit dated, but first time I have come across it. It’s very rare over in England here to have astrology debates on television. We get the odd “entertainment” astrology show. I like watching strong debates maybe because my Mars in Aquarius 6th square Uranus 3rd, can have some willful sometimes rebellious ideas.

This first part of the debate talks about being a spiritual medium for astrology. I for one have no psychic ability, because it is not needed in astrology. Maybe some intuitive ability is helpful just to have a feeling for charts.

However you do need powerful mental ability, as the analysing of charts takes time when your typing/writing up interpretations, trying to balance the contradictory elements is very analytical work. I wish I had psychic ability, I would throw the chart away and make a lot of money (joking).