Neptune Meets Aries: Dreams Meet Action

By Pam Pleviak

On April 18, 2025, the long journey of visionary, mystical, dreamy Neptune in Pisces ends, traveling into Aries's cardinal territory of initiatory, action-based courage. Neptune will retrograde back into Pisces on August 31, 2025, then re-enter Aries on February 5, 2026. As the energy moves from Neptune's mystical egolessness in Pisces into the bold realm of Aries, it is an opportune time to decide what dreams and visions are worthy of action. By consciously combining intentional dreaming with the guidance of astrology, Neptune’s entrance to Aries creates an opportunity to move forward on the soul’s path.

This article will briefly summarize the groundwork for connecting dreams and astrology through ideas set forth by Jung and Rudhyar. It includes excerpts from an interview with Victoria Allen, a dreamwork practitioner and family therapist. Finally, you will learn specific steps to integrate astrology and dreams within an astrological practice.

Jung's Psychology and Dreams

Perhaps the best-known thinker to explore dreams and their potency was Carl Jung, Freud’s former student and dream luminary. In his book Dreams, Jung devotes an entire chapter to the practical use of dream analysis as the “direct expression of the unconscious”1 and that they reveal the “inner situation of the dreamer.”2 Galaxies away from the idea that dreams are just an undigested bit of meat as Scrooge muses when Marley’s ghost visits him, Jung assets that “dreams are diagnostically valuable facts.”3 Unlike ubiquitous dream dictionaries, Jung insisted that to work with dreams effectively, one must ascertain the conscious situation of the dreamer. 

Not only did Jung’s work confer credibility to dreams, but he also respected the horoscope as a tool capable of affording deeper insight into an individual. He writes that the horoscope “represents, in essence, a system of original and fundamental qualities in a person’s character, and can therefore be regarded as an equivalent of the individual psyche.”4 Reportedly, Jung used astrology as a sort of archetypal polaroid snapshot into the psychological schema of his patients. During Jung’s time, some therapists employed astrology to examine their clients' inner consciousness more deeply. However, it took the work of Dane Rudhyar to explicitly introduce the worlds of dreams and astrology outside of the therapist’s office.

 

Rudhyar on Integrating Dreams and Astrology

Rudhyar’s scholarship was far-ranging across a variety of disciplines; however, an article that he wrote entitled “Mysteries of Dreams and Sleep”5 introduced the idea that dreams may integrate the polarity of our conscious lives through the lens of personal planets and our unconscious lives through the transpersonal planets: Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto.5 Like Jung, Rudhyar linked archetypes and symbols with the message of dreams, yet Rudhyar overtly connected dreams and their messages with astrological symbolism. In so doing, a crucible between the waking and sleeping dreams emerges. "The planets from the Sun to Saturn drive us to conscious activity, but the planets beyond Saturn — when the day is over — lead us to the vast spaces of the galaxy, where we know our greater self, the stars that we are.”7

Rudhyar asserted that Neptunian dreams are the most common and are responses to situations of all sorts. These may be complex moral issues that the dreamer or the simple effect of a cold room leading to a dream of being in a storm. More thought-provoking is his belief that dreaming refers to polarities “of our being — individual and collective, conscious and unconscious, day activity and sleep.”7 In the context of Neptune’s ingress to Aries, one could say that Neptunian symbolism with the resonance of the collective consciousness, combined with the Arian fire of self, will reflect a connection of the unconscious mind with the conscious self.

Although Rudhyar expands the scope of dreaming potentialities beyond the therapist’s couch, its reach does not extend to the power of intentional dreaming. Learning techniques for intentional dreaming empowers the dreamer to guide Neptunian vision into the waking world via the gift of courageous, active Aries energy. 

Intentional Dreaming as an Evolutionary Act

First, knowing how not to analyze dreams is necessary. Dreams work not only within the context of archetypal symbolic thinking but also within the dreamer's consciousness, as Jung noted. Likewise, the dreamer's cultural and familial context and experiences are crucial to creating meaning. As such, rigid and fixed dreaming dictionaries offer little help in deciphering messages of the unconscious world. Dream dictionaries are like cookbook astrology, lacking the depth and relevance necessary for those who wish to dive into deeper self-understanding and guidance from their unique inner selves. Yet systems exist to sharpen the lens of Neptunian messages and make them more useful for self-understanding and daily life.

Intentional Dreaming in Practice

For over thirty years, Victoria Allen, who holds a Master’s degree in Family Counseling, has been a sort of dream midwife for her clients. An early apprentice of don Miguel Ruiz, author of The Four Agreements, she has guided hundreds of people in their search for greater clarity, self-understanding and healing by combining her expertise with therapy, dreams, and the power of the Four Agreements. 

Alvaro Lopez Watermann, PhD, was Victoria's principal mentor as she learned the dreaming process. According to Victoria, Lopez-Watermann received a download during meditation that revealed a framework for understanding dreams and working with them more intentionally. Watermann’s system led her on a decades-long firsthand journey into dreamwork. She used this framework personally and with clients.

Although astrology was not a part of Victoria’s training, it played a role in a profound dream at a turning point in her life, following a breast cancer diagnosis–a particularly Neptunian experience and a call to action. She initially took a holistic healing path for cancer treatment, but eventually, the surgeon recommended a mastectomy. After the surgery, Victoria dreamed of opening a refrigerator and taking out a vaccine. She thought, “Oh, this is a Pluto vaccine.” She most assuredly had taken a Plutonian journey but was unaware of the broader archetypal meaning of Pluto astrologically. Synchronistically, after the dream, she saw a book about Pluto on the shelf of her radiologist’s library. She picked it up out of curiosity and read part of a section explaining the Plutonian journey and the role of karma. 

The Pluto message came through her unconscious dreaming self and onto the actual bookshelf of her radiologist! Incidentally, the timeframe for these dreams was in the mid to late 90s, suggesting that the Pluto book was from one of the “Pluto brothers,” Jeffrey Wolf Green or Steven Forrest.7 

Victoria's practice is permeated by the concept that dreams can be used to grow and allow one to evolve. She is currently writing a book and continues to see clients. In their lives and her own, Allen stresses the need to seek the dream intentionally and then courageously take action–an excellent example of the Neptunian function in an Aries way. Her method actively invites the unconscious into consciousness. Sometimes, the message results in deeper self-understanding, while it is a call to action for others.

In a recent interview, Allen outlined the basic process for dreaming as a means of personal growth and awareness.9

• Acquire  a dedicated dream journal.
• Write  a dream incubation, which is an intention for the dream.
• Commit to recording each dream on the night you plan intentional dreaming. This is a crucial step. Imagine you’re conversing with a friend, and she begins texting another friend, ignoring your message. Failing to record your dreams ignores the message and stifles the flow of information.
• Before opening your eyes, summarize the major points of the dream in your mind. Once you open your eyes, the dream may flee from consciousness.
• Limit intentional dreaming to no more than once a week.

She advises that incubation must be open-ended; avoid asking yes or no questions. Instead, begin with a salutation to the creator, your higher self, or a deeper aspect of your inner self. Follow with a phrase like, “Please show me in a dream what I need to know…” about a situation, relationship, or question.

According to Allen, with the help of the right questions, many clients find answers from within and use their dream messages to change their outer world. She states that the “higher self knows right action.”10 Victoria encourages dreamers to see others in the dream as an aspect of themselves, much like a person might see planets in the 7th House as projections until they become more consciously integrated.

Example of a Dream Interpretation

Below is an example of a client’s dream shared with permission:

I’m riding in the backseat of a car while a man is driving. The car is new, but a late model with a red leather interior. I’m feeling as if I have no say in our destination. After looking more closely at the driver, I realize he is left-handed. He is my father! I recognize that I need to be the driver and tell him to stop the car. I take the wheel and drive off.

Within Victoria’s framework for dream interpretation, the driver represents intellect and family programming. This woman’s father always paid cash for his cars, and he had the right to take the car wherever he wanted. For many of us in the Western world, the intellect takes the wheel, and the emotional body takes a backseat. Furthermore, a car is manmade, which, in the interpretive framework used by Victoria, is symbolic of the authoritarian mind. This mind is rules-based and often represents authority figures such as a mother or father. “Use your head” (intellect) was a common admonishment in the dreamer’s household. Meanwhile, emotions and personal desire took a figurative backseat. 

The turning point in the dream occurred when the woman recognized that she needed to take action by driving the car, thus allowing her heart to have a greater say in her life’s direction. This led her to deepen her esoteric studies and encouraged her to listen to her emotional needs more carefully.

Conceptual Framework

Key concepts in Allen's framework define four types of mind that resonate with specific colors. 

• Feminine Mind: signifies the emotional mind/body and is often represented by white or yellow colors.
• Masculine Mind: signifies the intellect/rational mind and is often represented by the color red
• Authoritarian Mind: signifies those in authority, rules, and boundaries and is often represented by the color black
• Spiritual Mind: signifies the spirit or soul of a person and is often represented by the color blue.

In addition, the age of a person appearing in the dream is relevant. For instance, someone older, whom the dreamer respects or looks up to, might be an aspect of themselves that is latent, waiting for development or action to come forward. A baby might indicate an idea recently born in the dreamer. Rarely are dreams what they seem to be on the surface. Instead, they find life within archetypes, symbolist thought, and the context of the one dreaming.

Evolutionary Astrology and the Dream

With the upcoming ingress of Neptune into Aries, practicing astrologers might wish to blend dreams and astrology with their work with clients. Using the framework outlined by Victoria, consider that the following planets correspond with the four types of mind.

• Masculine/intellect: Sun
• Feminine/emotion: Moon
• Authoritarian: Saturn
• Spiritual: Neptune.

The first step is identifying which astrological house Neptune is transiting in a client’s chart. If a client has struggled with action in a particular area, this may guide intentional dreaming (also known as dream incubation) during the Neptune in Aries transit. 

Guided Questions

• What would your imaginative unconscious mind like to birth into the realm of your waking dream?
• What information does your dreaming mind hold in that liminal Neptunian space that could help you to act more consciously and boldly during this Aries time?
• Was a vision gestating in your mind while Neptune was in Pisces?

Now is the time to begin setting the groundwork as the energetic threshold into Aries approaches. Naturally, taking the native’s natal Neptune/Pisces and Mars/Aries placements into account will help to facilitate this process.

Using the House as a Compass

Identify the house where Neptune in Aries is transiting to guide your questions. For example:

• 4th House: What do you need to know about moving to another city?<
• 7th House: How might you deepen a relationship with your partner?
• 10th House: What do you need to know to achieve greater alignment with your career and internal vision?

Notice that these questions are open-ended. This allows the dream imagery to arise for later interpretation. Few dreams convey direct declarative sentences. Dreams require the dreamer to follow the imagery, symbolism, and emotional threads.

Remind the dreamer to write down the answers to these questions in their dream journals and that the answers will be symbolic. While some people, actions, or items may be archetypal, others will depend on the dreamer’s specific culture, family programming, and belief system. In some sense, dreams are like poetry, and their narrative is a crystallized message within the images and narrative of the dream. Hence, clarity needs to be teased out by careful questioning, either by the self or, ideally, with someone who has practiced the art of intentional dreaming or with a broad understanding of archetypal symbolism. 

Although the dream framework described above is a starting point, astrologers will find that openness to the client’s experience and personal symbolism is paramount for deeper understanding. The dreamer holds the key, but the facilitator helps to cast light upon blind spots and projections. 

Some questions to assist in clarifying these individual aspects and symbols are:

• What do you associate with a given item?
• If this person had a name, what would it be?
• Three words to describe …
• How did you feel upon awakening?

Ideally, intentional dreaming is supported by a trusted, intuitive person asking the dreamer questions about the dream. Many astrologers may possess the skill and desire to pursue this inquiry with clients. 

With Aries in the mix, the answers to these questions might need courage, bold action, and some self-interest. John Lennon said that the best songs came from waking from a dream in the middle of the night and writing it down.9 This is a perfect example of the mystic dreamer’s flow of Neptunian imagination as it integrates with concrete action. It is an opportunity for self-understanding and fruitful action, uniting the unconscious with the conscious. Many people dream; far fewer act upon the dream. 

The key to leveraging positive potential for Neptune’s ingress into Aries may be to align dreams with action. Astrology can light a torch that illuminates a person’s path toward action in a given area of life. 

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End Notes

• 1) Jung, C. G. (1974). Dreams. Translated by R. F. C. Hull. Princeton: Princeton University Press. p. 90.
• 2) Ibid p.90.
• 3) Ibid., 91
• 4) Jungian Center for the Spiritual Sciences.Jung on Astrology. Retrieved October 15, 2024, https://jungiancenter.org/jung-on-astrology/#_ftn2
• 5) Rudyhar, Dane. (1956, March). Mysteries of Dreams and Sleep, Rudhyar Archival Project. 
• 6 Ibid.
•  7) Forrest Astrology. The Pluto Brothers Measure the Night. Retrieved October 19, 2024
• 8) Allen, Victoria. (2024, October 5). Personal communication [Personal interview].
• 9) Moss, Robert. (2009) The Secret History of Dreaming. Novato, California: New World Library. p. 123.

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Images

• All images ©Astrodienst AG

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Author

Pam Pleviak earned a BA in English Literature from Lake Forest College, Lake Forest, IL and a Masters of Library and Information Science from Dominican University, River Forest, IL. Following a career in education, she dove into various esoteric studies, including: apprenticeships in dream work with Victoria Allen and shamanic journeying with Eve Lee. She is an Evolutionary Astrologer and has apprenticed with Steven Forrest in his former apprenticeship program and continues to study through his FCEA school. Additionally, she has attended two of Mark Jones’ Masterclasses in Wales, UK, classes held through Kay Taylor’s Soul Path School, and a nine month long Relationships in Astrology intensive. You may reach her through her website at https://www.pampleviak.com/.

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Published in: The Evolving Astrologer, December 2024.
 © 2025 - Pam Pleviak - The Evolving Astrologer

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