
There are some cycles, passages, or even life-purposes that fly (or flow) in direct opposition to the more Saturnine, Capricornian, structured, hierarchical, “Puritan work ethic” oriented norm that is celebrated in much of Western culture, and certainly in the U.S. culture.
If you’ve been Neptuned, by innate pattern (aka you were born that way) and/or by transformational cycle or life-passage, you’ll know what I mean.
In astrology, the archetypes of Neptune, Pisces, and the 12th House speak to the attributes of water, flow, dissolution, formlessness, Divine Love, the great sea of being, going with the flow … you get the drift, no pun intended.

Look at any geological landscape, and see the effects of water on even the hardest stone to reshape form.
Consider the ocean, and you’ll have another sense of the immense boundaryless, formlessness of it.
Similarly, these forces in our lives move through just like water — sometimes persistently trickling water that slowly softens hard edges, and sometimes like flood waters that wreak havoc — reshaping or completely dissolving the worldviews, order, habits, and structures that have shaped our lives up to that point.
And there is a point, a purpose, and a meaning to it, or there can be if we look to discern it.

But it’s also very much about the rather out-of-control, fear-inducing experience of like-it-or-not surrender, faith, grace, the Big Love, empathy, compassion, rather than the clearly visible, structured, guaranteed, well-mapped and well-known supposed certainties of terra-firma landscapes.
Anyone who’s lived through this sort of relentless passage of form dissolving and reshaping (or unshaping), no matter your best and most adept, effort-full attempts to hold things together, has an inherent understanding of how these archetypal energies work.
They don’t require you to “opt in,” though it’s likely helpful when we finally do.
(Pluto is a similarly unrelentingly deconstructive archetypal passage, or transit, and has its own unique transformative signature.)
The fact is that it’s hard to explain or articulate such experiences in words, even for those who are gifted in words. It, in some ways, transcends definition and articulation, and that, too, has the imprint of Pisces and Neptune.

But we try to put it into words, either to share the wisdom of the experience — particularly in times when the long-marginalized, suppressed Feminine, right-brain ways of being are re-emerging to keep us from a wholesale catastrophe-in-the-making — or because we’re trying to explain the enormous change in our lives and beings to those who just don’t, won’t, or can’t understand it.
I appreciated coming across someone else’s Neptune – 12th house story today, by way of Anne Whitaker’s article, “Contemplating the 12th House – An Optimist’s Take on Self-Undoing.”
I recognized my own journey in Anne’s words, and even relative to the same long timeframe (Neptune through Aquarius, 1998-2010+), and wanted to pass her story along since it might resonate with some of you, too.

For some who have this ‘wiring’, or who have had the lengthy dissolution passages, it’ll be very relevant, affirming, and insightful.
But with Neptune passing through Pisces now (and for quite some time yet), everyone to some degree is getting Neptuned (or 12th Housed) at the moment, too, so perhaps you’ll find inspiration and insight here, too.
In her article about her own experience (excerpted from her memoir on the same), Anne writes:
“Being able to see our tiny lives as diamond sparks in relation to and part of the ‘dazzling darkness’ of Eternity, finding our own way to frame and live out this relationship – whether it be through conventional religious affiliations or whatever framework fits our particular era, culture, and psychological makeup – this is a big task for anyone.
But it seems to me to be the particular one that we 12th-house folk are asked to undertake to a greater extent than other people are.
This challenge, which at times is very painful and disruptive to ordinary dimensions of life, appears to demand periodic sacrifice, renunciation, and withdrawal from the ‘real’ world into that world whose compass is oriented to Eternity.”
Read Anne’s full article here.
Big Love, Jamie
March 29, 2015 at 1:10 am
Definitely getting Neptuned, Jamie! 😀 Thank you so much for your, as usual, insightful writing, and for leading me to Anne Whitaker whose writing is quite inspirational and insightful as well! Blessed be. <3 <3 <3 NadineMarie <3 <3 <3
March 29, 2015 at 2:53 am
I came in Neptuned ,and was extra Neptuned when he graced my Ascendant in 2005. Have not been on dry ground since. Thanks for another excellent timely post.
love,
Linda
March 29, 2015 at 4:19 pm
Many thanks for your kind words regarding my article, Jamie. I feel aTwelfth House support group coming on!
March 29, 2015 at 4:40 pm
You’re welcome, Anne. Yes, from various comments, a 12th house circle seems in the making! 🙂 So delighted to have come across your article, story, and work, too. Blessings, Jamie
March 30, 2015 at 10:01 am
I now get your posts via email, Jamie! And I’ve Shared on my Facebook Page. The 12th House circle is in process…
March 30, 2015 at 1:56 pm
Ahhh, wonderful. Thank you, Anne. 🙂
March 29, 2015 at 9:38 pm
I have been thinking a lot about this Neptunian/12th dissolving. I have Chiron and the North Node in my 12th house in Gemini and I feel this compulsion to write and share about the work of surrendering, and also the deep desire to help those who are disadvantaged, who have no audible voice. Not everyone has a clue as to what lies beneath, and the 12th house makes a lot of people uncomfortable. It is safer to stay in the concrete world of measurables, after all, and this means that many people will dismiss 12th house related things. For me this feels like a gulf in my life between the ‘serious’ or ‘real’ world where people can understand what I say, and everything else that intuitively makes sense to me – and I want to build bridges with words – but I’m yet to find the vocabulary or the opening. I love your work. Isa
March 30, 2015 at 2:20 pm
Thank you, Isa, for the kind words and for sharing your own beautiful musings as you’ve contemplated the Neptunian-12th House energetic, essence, or experience. It’s true … many people fear that territory: the unseen, uncertain, ungraspable.
That’s an exquisite sense of purpose or calling with your Chiron and North Node in Gemini in the 12th House naturally ruled by Neptune-Pisces – “I feel this compulsion to write and share about the work of surrendering, and also the deep desire to help those who are disadvantaged, who have no audible voice.”
Beautiful … being a voice and ears for those who aren’t seen or heard, and for the mysteries of the 12th house terrain (or lack of terrain!).
And yes, that’s a unique challenge with Gemini there … in the sea of the pre-articulated! Before words. 🙂 I do understand that, believe me. It won’t be through thought or command that the words come, but more spontaneously perhaps? Like spontaneous writing (or other Geminian communication modes!), perhaps?
Thanks for stopping by for a visit, Isa. 🙂
Love,
Jamie
March 30, 2015 at 5:00 pm
I am reminded of Indra’s Web….. Lovely, post. Trying to remember to breathe, here….
March 30, 2015 at 5:08 pm
Mmm, Indra’s Web is such a beautiful metaphor (and visual), and the gems or pearls in it. Thank you for sharing that, Michael. And yes … breathing is good. I’m trying to remember to breathe as well. 🙂
March 30, 2015 at 5:15 pm
p.s. For readers who’d like to explore the Indra’s Web (or Indra’s Net) metaphor — so beautiful! — here’s one link:
http://www.hinduhumanrights.info/lord-indras-jeweled-net-of-synchronicity/.
And if you ‘google’ the term, more beautiful imagery will show up to provide visual inspiration.
Blessings, Jamie
April 9, 2015 at 11:29 pm
I can relate because Neptune is the strongest planet in my Natal Chart and then Neptune in Pisces conjunct my Natal Saturn and Moon for 2 1/2 years ending last January. Now, it’s opposing Natal Pluto/Uranus. It is hard to explain Neptune. Well, that is the nature of this mystical planet–like Alice dropping down the rabbit hole.
April 10, 2015 at 2:21 pm
Thanks for visiting and sharing your comment, Patricia. ‘Like Alice dropping down the rabbit hole’ is a very good metaphor, actually! And yes, when we’ve been Neptuned, we have the experiential sense of it (Neptune transited my Sun-Saturn and Moon for quite awhile, too, so I get what you’re saying!). And good reminder that it’d be opposing the Uranus-Pluto in Virgo conjunction for a lot of us (which means it’s conjoining Chiron in Pisces, too). Neptune medicine! xoxo Jamie
April 10, 2015 at 4:21 pm
It conjuncts my Chiron when Neptune reaches 18 degrees. I’m currently experiencing an excruciating Chiron Return.
April 10, 2015 at 4:24 pm
Ahhh. Ouch. Well, I do understand that one (Chiron at 8:47). I’m wishing you wellbeing and resilience (and whatever other blessings you’d find most welcome!). 🙂
April 10, 2015 at 4:29 pm
I might come to you for advice on the Chiron Return. I’m experiencing themes around scapegoating, mental illness of others and that impacted me & people who lie about me to save their own reputations. I guess that’s more of the scapegoating. I’m noticing attributes from both Saturn and Uranus with the Chiron Return. The situations come on suddenly (Uranus) and I learn lessons (Saturn) which leads to liberation (Uranus).
April 10, 2015 at 4:54 pm
We can talk about it, for sure. It sounds really familiar to what came up (or came clear) just before and during my Chiron Return (and some similarities on the additional transit energies). Feel free to email me directly at info ‘at’ ivysea ‘dot’ com. xoxo Jamie