This episode marks my first attempt to explore Neptune, one of the most elusive planets in astrology.

Neptune symbolises the longing to dissolve the self and return to an imagined state of perfect origin. What are the hidden benefits of taking on the role of the victim? How might illness contain an element of subtle manipulation? Within Neptune’s sphere, things are rarely as straightforward as they appear. The longing to return to a lost golden age seems to carry a particular enchantment. Why does this happen? This episode will explore these themes.

Jung himself was an example of a Sun square Neptune aspect. When we project Neptune’s ideals onto living human beings, what awaits us is disillusionment. Jung experienced this twice, first with his father, and later with Freud, each time encountering the disillusionment of placing his ideals upon real male figures.

I believe the resolution he eventually found was to take Goethe as an ideal, and then attempt to become such an ideal himself. For those with strong Neptune aspects in their chart, the way to approach the ideal is never through external authority figures. It can be sought in artistic expression, or, better still, by finding an ideal that does not truly exist as a person, and attempting to live towards it as one’s own inner form.

References

Liz Greene, The Astrological Neptune and the Quest for Redemption

Paul Bishop, Analytical Psychology and German Classical Aesthetics: Goethe, Schiller, and Jung, Volume 2: The Constellation of the Self

Ruth Benedict, The Chrysanthemum and the Sword

Georges Bataille, Eroticism

Stephen Arroyo, Astrology, Karma and Transformation

Liz Greene and Howard Sasportas, The Inner Planets

Aniela Jaffé and C. G. Jung, Memories, Dreams, Reflections

A note on Memories, Dreams, Reflections: due to the publisher’s commercial motivations, the book has often been presented as Jung’s autobiography, despite less than half of the text being written by Jung himself. Aniela Jaffé’s contribution is frequently overlooked. The book is more accurately described as a biography, and Jung himself regarded it as such.

In addition, a forthcoming volume titled Jung’s Life and Work: Interviews for Memories, Dreams, Reflections with Aniela Jaffé is scheduled for publication in December 2025, edited by Sonu Shamdasani, with Thomas Fischer as consulting editor, and translated by Heather McCartney and John Peck. It is expected to include original interview material between Jaffé and Jung, offering further insight into the formation and content of Memories, Dreams, Reflections, with the hope of restoring Jaffé’s rightful place in its authorship.