The Wrong Tools For the Job – Part 6 – On The Generations
The third outer planet in sequence for Millennials is Neptune, and for those born after 1984 it is in the sign of Capricorn. Neptune is the dissolver and is known to make things unclear, putting rose-colored glass over your eyes coloring all that you see. As Capricorn is the place of boundaries, definitions, structure, and discipline, the combination of the illusory trait of Neptune is particularly unhelpful. The result is often believing that things are one way when they are not, and having certainty regarding your sense of the shape of things. As Capricorn is a cardinal sign this incorrect perception is then acted upon, like a flawed plan that is doomed to fail from the start. As the third catalyst in the sequence of the outer planets this is especially unhelpful, causing the natives to draw the wrong conclusions from what has come before.
If you have ever found yourself in an emergency situation you are aware of how people respond to the unexpected. The majority of people are often in shock and do nothing at all while a handful invariably go off the rails and need to be marginalized, but it is the one or two persons who lock-in and almost effortlessly size up the situation and begin to direct action who guide us through such situations. These people will describe the experience as a sharpening of their senses and a certainty about how to proceed. For them, understanding what is happening is natural and they have a talent for quickly breaking it down into parts and knowing what actions need to be taken and who can take them. The persons who are “good in an emergency” are invaluable in all kinds of situations in life and you’ll know them if you see them or if you are them. The primary skill in this situation is to accurately determine “what is happening” and to correctly direct the appropriate course of action. These people almost certainly do not have Neptune in Capricorn.
The trouble with Neptune is that it misleads and creates a false impression. Depending upon the sign in which it appears this will have a specific manifestation. For those early Millennials with Neptune in Sagittarius they will experience Neptune transits as some form of disappointment in outcomes. Sagittarius is the mutable fire sign and ruled by Jupiter – the affirming element. In Sagittarius, Neptune will encourage the pursuit and the adventure and things will go fine in that respect, but in the end it will wind up as a disappointment. The problem here is not that the plan was flawed, but that what the plan was designed to achieve was bad. A great way to understand this transit is to notice that it covers the entirety of the 1970’s, a decade known for experimentation, breaking boundaries, and adventurous pursuit of new ideas. These new things were achieved, but they mostly were left to the dustbin of history as soon as Neptune flipped out of the sign. The era is known for being tacky, ugly, and unappealing in its aesthetic and many of its beliefs. The most enduring products of the decade are the forceful rejections of it and some of the most deranged true-crime stories of all time. An appropriate summary phrase for the decade may be “It seemed like a good idea at the time.”
For Capricorn, Neptune creates a different kind of problem entirely. As a Saturn-ruled Earth sign there is a focus on specific, actionable, precise, and correct definitions. It is the blueprint that must be used for the construction project and it above all has to be very realistic. Capricorn is not a place for fanciful optimism but instead a place for grounded, practical realism. Capricorn is where the rubber hits the road and any errors in the manufacturing of that rubber can potentially produce a blowout. False assumptions and beliefs in this area will not produce the Sagittarius disappointment, but instead it will produce the Capricorn failure. This is a place of trusting one’s own senses and perceptions that absolutely cannot be trusted on its own. The information that you have to work with is not trustworthy, distorted, and frequently deliberately false. An appropriate summary phrase for this period may be “It wasn’t what we believed it to be.”
In an emergency, this is not the sharp, focused first-responder who knows just what to do, this is the person who takes the wrong action in response to a false impression of what the situation is. While they have the impulse to action and often great ability they are probably not the best person to take charge of the situation, and that is the most important lesson for Millennials to learn in order to make the most of their generational condition. This is decisively not a leadership position but it is one that is likely to believe that it should be. Poorly equipped from the start, the Neptune in Capricorn is likely to frequently experience failure regardless of their successful action at carrying out their plan of success. That is because it is their plan and it will invariably be based upon false impressions given by the delusional Neptune influence. Similarly, they can be given those false impressions by others who they believe to have authority and be trustworthy, only to and find out much too late that the authority was illusory and the results were personal failure for the fool who followed them.
The old proverb “The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry” was originally a closing line from a poem by the great Scottish writer Robert Burns. It was published in late 1785, when Saturn was in its home sign Capricorn at the 29th degree. This is the sort of wisdom that becomes commonplace after two and a half years of unobstructed Capricorn in its finest condition, and it is wisdom that will be most affected by Neptune in this sign. In the outer planet sequence, that three-act play of catalysts which drive our free will of choice under this grand calendar, the third placement is the one that calls for wisdom in response to the challenges that have come before. In the case of Millennials, there is “wisdom” but it is invariably a failure to learn the correct lesson.
This is a very challenged chart, one that implies strongly that the people born to it will struggle. They are simply not equipped with the right tools for the job, or so they will come to believe. In truth, with the veil of Neptune lifted, they are simply attempting to do the wrong job with the tools they have been given. While a generation may be a failure at what they undertake they also make up a full quarter of the people of the times and do have a critical role to play. In coming chapters we will explore what that means, what these tools specifically impact, and how to discern just what the correct job is for this particular generation of dopey, overly self-regarding, socially-inept morons who need to sit down and let the adults tell them what to do. Should they ever choose to do so, the results will defy even their wildest dreams.
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