by Robert Wilkinson
Neptune went stationary retrograde at 28 Pisces at 2:07 pm PDT, 10:07 pm BST June 30. What does this mean and how will it impact us?
When any of the planets go stationary retrograde, it marks a “forward station” in the pulse of that planet and the part it symbolizes in our personality (lower triad) or Spiritual Body (Upper Triad). The Sun, Moon, Mercury, Venus, and Mars are mainly associated with our personality, while Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn are mainly associated with our connection with society and our larger aspirations and duties.
The outer “Invisible Quartet,” Uranus, Neptune, Pluto, and TransPluto, show us the Transpersonal realms of existence. (While Uranus is occasionally very faintly observable, for all practical purposes it’s invisible to most.) Uranus individualizes us, and Neptune helps us move and groove within collective consciousness. Pluto shows us what must be purified to the core so we may know our Divine Power of eternal regeneration, and TransPluto shows us how to redeem growth after decay, and new life after a period of death or dormancy.
Any of these outermost planets going stationary retrograde indicates a threshold state in the Transpersonal energy field. Since we’re dealing here with Neptune going retrograde, and Neptune symbolizes collective consciousness and all it likes, supposes, and wonders about, we now enter a time when the collective atmosphere now reviews parts of what it explored and dreamed into manifestation since it last went direct at 23 Pisces in December 2022.
The Sabian Symbol for Neptune’s Station
Neptune represents what is “in fashion” in the collective. Different cultures and subcultures interpret this global pulse in different ways. This retrograde station is a high water mark, a crest of forward movement requiring us to review the shadow span from now through December when it goes stationary direct at 25 Pisces. We then move forward across the shadow zone one last time through early April 2024 before we enter into future unknown zones at the end of Pisces.
The Sabian Symbol for the 28th degree of Pisces is “A fertile garden under the full moon.” In the original notes from the Marc Jones class on the symbols published in The Astrology of Personality, Rudhyar says this degree is one of “normally unnoticed powers released at the fruition of natural processes,” “call of universal mind to the heart,” and “fullness.”
In the Astrological Mandala he goes on to say this is a degree of “the full satisfaction of the individual’s basic needs,” where “what is stressed now is not the full moon itself or its light, but the moon’s power to call forth the instinctive urge for growth.” He offers the garden is a metaphor for a place where many things are grown “to fill an equal variety of human needs and tastes.”
He states it’s “a symbol of abundance, an abundance fitted to individualized requirements and wants.” This degree falls in the Span of Protection, and is the third, or synthesizing degree, of the Act of Capitalization in the Scene of Perpetuation on the individual-mental level.
Dr. Marc E Jones, creator of the Sabian Symbols, says this is a degree of “a simple satisfaction through outer rather than inner manifestations of reality, or of a normal self-dedication to purely conventional accomplishment.” He says we are blessed when we are “more the average than the exceptional,” since we find others more of service in the former than the latter.
He continues that our struggles show our commonality in which “the race survives,” and in our “archetypal make-up there is room to salvage all the failures and embody all the contributions of the far more lonely genius.” He gives us the keyword ULTIMACY, and states when operating in a positive manner, this is a degree of “high reward in worldly goods and exceptional self-integrity in using them.”
So our review of and within the collective field these next 5 months involves us tuning into a vaster collective “fruition of a natural process,” where we may find abundance, growth, commonality, and the worldly goods we need to enter the Spring of the 21st century in 2025. We’ll then review how to use creative imagination wisely and “the fallacy of totalitarianism” in thinking.
Be flexible, play your cards a little close to the vest, and when in doubt, do your own thing in your own way and refuse to be coerced by authoritarian demands. We’ll eventually be in a new period of purification when Neptune moves forward in 2024 and again traverses the shadow zone from 25 to 28 Pisces.
This involves the middle of “the end of the end” in our individual and spiritual approach to perpetuating deep and vast feelings and the distributive water that Pisces symbolizes. Obviously the themes of this degree will be prominent in 2024, especially when Neptune crosses back over this point along with the inner planets.
The Larger Tides of the Collective Field
So we now begin to review all we’ve experienced since last November within that vast “feeling field” known as Neptune. This review will last through the beginning of December 2023, when Neptune will go stationary direct at 25 Pisces. At that point we will again trace the span between 25-29 Pisces, and will know what we have mastered, as we move into a new collective field of awareness by April 2024.
Neptune left the second decan of Pisces in February 2021 and has been in the third decan since then. This decan, which is the end of the end of the cycle, has a double Mars influence, so remember to take note of where Mars is and the aspects it makes during Neptune’s stay in the last third of Pisces.
Tying past and present together, Uranus first transited 25-28 Pisces between April and October 2009, late January to mid-April 2010, and October 2010 through January 2011. Then Jupiter occupied this zone in May 2010, and again late September and October 2010, and December 2010 through January 2011, with Jupiter conjunct Uranus at 28 Pisces in January 2011.
Whatever was awakened then is now going to echo back, since the stone thrown into the pond then will now ripple throughout collective consciousness. Most recently, Jupiter “primed the pump” on that conjunction energy to “boost the signal” of that which is now the threshold of the collective feeling field. So much of what we can expect during the second half of 2023 will in some way echo or be related to what was awakened in collective consciousness back then.
When any of the outers go retrograde or direct, it shows as major “sea changes” in the global field. Neptune going retrograde will affect that part of our Hologram that interfaces with the collective field. Up to now, we’ve all been moving through the dreamscape wherever we have late Pisces. In 2016-2018 we were introduced to a greater Spiritual realm, went through tests proving we could express the spiritual energy of our “spiritual office,” and had to demonstrate courage. We then had to find the right “camouflages” for our public work, and a willingness to “rehearse before the battle,” “subjecting appearances to real necessities.”
In 2018-2019 revised some of our ideas “back to source,” and/or put ourselves forward in a public way to inspire others. Other themes involved getting away from the routine to get a new inspiration, and participating in forms of collective rebirth. 2020 helped us find new ways to touch and be touched to discover something about the world of feeling, find what nourishes us “at the end of our day of labor,” and “take a walk with our wisdom” so we could be invested with a technique to perpetuate our wisdom into the future. We began to finish our time in that atmosphere in November 2020, and by March of 2021 we knew we had achieved a goal of living according to a new set of standards, and began to explore inner powers and outer relatedness.
Other Factors in the Collective Field
So the tide has turned again! If it’s time to sail, give thanks that the outer planet relationships are more harmonious than they’ve been in a long time! Jupiter is favorable to Saturn, Saturn is favorable to Uranus, Neptune’s back into a long term sextile with Pluto, and the Uranus septile to Neptune is rapidly finishing up, ending the Grand Irrationality.
Because of the important aspects now in play, keep your focus on expressing heart power and a simple, natural work which gives you momentum and the ability to see the abundance of the universe which is ours if we accept it. While Neptune’s effects are deep and vast, we also have new initiatives rapidly taking shape which are leading us to a new day and a new way of living. Pay attention to your empathic connection to the collective field, and you may find yourself “knowing” without using your mind.
Now we review our sense of “the abundance of our life,” and review how we’re using our creative imagination, how we’ve created a poetry to our life, and final purifications to be done before everything changes in 2024-2025. Keep taking time occasionally to tune out the white noise of outer things and listen to the Voice of the Silence which can teach you the Wisdom you need.
Since February 2019, Neptune’s been in the second half of Pisces, the “end of the end” of the Whole Cycle of 360 phases. It will continue to occupy the final face of Pisces through January 2026 when it moves into Aries for the long run. So In early 2019 we left the “Span of Innocence” and “Scene of Federation” which we explored since April 2011, and now have been immersed in the “Span of Protection” and “Scene of Perpetuation” which are the themes of the last half of Pisces.
The span between 16 and 20 Pisces is said to be “actional,” the span between 21-25 Pisces is said to be “emotional-social,” while the span between 26-30 Pisces is said to be “mental-spiritual.” Regard the next year as the fulfillment of our collective Pisces experience, where we see how the events of the past few years have moved our awareness from emotional and social expression into a more individual spiritual expression. This is Neptunian activity which perpetuates the best of the current vision in a way that operates from a centralized view of our higher awareness within the larger Soul field we share with others.
We are in a time of powerful spiritual growth into our authentic power; be compassionate, forgiving, and bless many things to flow down the time stream, and you will see your unique spiritual power within the Soul field more clearly by 2024. This station activates a new collective Neptunian theme related to the individual and spiritual dimensions of that planetary influence.
All we build this year is serving the new era launched in December 2020 at the Grand Mutation in Aquarius. We have begun a new world with new visions, new ideals, and new ways of relating to and working with each other. We’ve ended a 200 year materialistic Earth era and begun a 200 year idealistic Air era.
Much has been set in motion which is leading us through powerful collective transformation these next few years. Because of Saturn and Neptune in the final part of the zodiac, and Jupiter securing the new openings of the past 2 years through its sextiles and quintile with Saturn in Pisces, we have hit a phase of productive openings and closings where the past has met the future at “the edge of time.” We’re literally “moving between worlds” right now, with an entirely new landscape coming for us all by 2025.
So we’re at the end of the end at the dawning of a brand new world. As it was once famously sung, “If I don’t meet you no more in this world, then I'll meet you in the next one and don’t be late. Don’t be late!”
The tide has shifted. See you in the review!
© Copyright 2023 Robert Wilkinson
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