Beyond Illusion: Unveiling Neptunus "In Us"

By Stephen Hershey 

Since 2011 began, astrology has eerily been opening new perspectives in my brain for an awkward month, my inner-network rampantly midwifing these foreign structures of thought to fruition. But, studying its intricacies, complexities, and rules have given me yet another beautiful lens to view the grand mytho-verse, and I couldn't feel more blessed to relay my eager and infantile new passion.

The planet Neptune, eighth from the Sun and herein subject, has been effectively deconstructing the confines of my reality for the past year, an effect so gradual and slow that I’ve only lately witnessed the ceremonial blending of inner and outer perceptions, peaking with an enlightening and well overdue exposure to "Labyrinth"—astrologers must already sense the irony—one that will arguably continue and strengthen through a crowded third house for at least the next five years.

Before I could even fathom the impact, shamanic ceremonies signaled, with an enticing shimmering beyond reality's veils, the need for my corporeal curiosities to go beyond perceived limitations of consciousness. The awakening into astrology was both sudden and fortuitous to my interests, appearing at just the moment where I might’ve collapsed into overwhelming confusion, and it allowed me to mitigate my energy toward the direction of both the literal and mythic heavens. Researching Neptune’s archetypal influence allotted itself to my interests, which led me to Liz Greene's book, "Neptune: The Quest for Redemption."

While the planet is more recently associated with the prominent god of the sea, the earliest known myths depicted the ocean as the matriarchal origin of life the universe. Ti’amat, the Sumerian mother of the ocean, was a monstrous serpent spanning the entire world. She was quickly and violently slain by her son, Marduk, her essence carved to form both the celestial heavens and the material earth.

A similar story mentioned in the Bible depicts Jehovah slaying the oceanic Leviathan, oppressing and punishing what was professed to be a great evil—I believe that both in this story and the Sumerian myth, the force was enacted out of fear toward feminine mysticism, though perhaps a necessary one. Not all so outwardly destructive, similar goddess-creation stories flowed out of Egypt, India, and pre-Christian Europe. Appropriately, modern consciousness is learning to know the serpent as an image of transformation, illustrated in indigenous shamanistic cultures, as well as DNA's spiraling double-helix.

Gnostic mythology tells that when the goddess Sophia fell from the Divine Source—perceived as the galactic center—or the Pleroma, the catastrophe of such an event similarly formed both the celestial heavens and the transmutation of the Earth, as well as the Demiurge, an immaterial deity who falsely anointed himself both creator and ruler over the world.

The Demiurge, equally doubled by the stories of both Marduk and Jehovah, is an illegitimate child, and his influence, while some might say is necessary, is the embodiment of empty aggression and fear, in direct opposition to the growth of our imagination, leading to the enforced, patriarchal oppression of sexual energy, the kundalini life force, and even the divine serpent of our origins.

What is an effective balance, if any, between the violence of perceived creation and an “attunement of ethereal oneness?” As we are chaotically born into this world, we are drawn to the underworld of our own imaginative center, only to be thrust back into the act of furthering manifestation within the proposed illusion. Does this equate itself with the image of the uroboros, the serpent devouring its own tail?

Gasper Noe’s psychedelic-film foray, “Enter The Void,” a comparable evolution of the abrasive “Requiem For A Dream,” deconstructs a DMT-induced trip to the release of death, associating the "oneness of spirit" with the bleak, nomadic regeneration of life insignificantly portrayed rather insignificantly by the Cosmos—as if all children were fodder to the indefinite cycle of the Universe.

Such an admission into chaos is only one, albeit prominent perception of Neptune’s unveiling power. She, the metaphor containing the source of all life, is also the harbinger for the raging energy of divine trance and inspiration, both the revealer and creator of illusions. It might be easy to become lost in such a vast, unexplored ocean; her energy continually asks for an undying faith in what is innately chaotic and unseen.

Neptune peeks through the primordial lens of Pisces in April before retrograding back into Aquarius, then returns full force for every other mythological musing happening in 2012. Aligned with similar prophecies, does this movement petition the unavoidable unraveling of our psyche, disillusionment of the individual self, and strengthening of an inspirational oneness?

From the cesspools of perceived Chaos, life has dutifully evolved—vibrating emanations of our Mother’s own dream—her children therein gifted with the ability to replicate the Universe, through all forms of expression, and procreate their own dreams. Thereby, imagination is the byproduct, and final resting point, of our grand design.

Image: Ti'amat and Marduk.
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