What’s your favorite palliative? What substance takes you from how you feel now to how you’d prefer to feel?

Most of us have one. What’s yours?

In the last scene of the movie Drugstore Cowboy, our main character says that when you take prescription drugs, you always know how you feel – you just need to read the label.

It’s interesting that in these times of health and wellness, there is also an opiate abuse epidemic, increase in use of anti-depressants, marijuana legalization and a spore-like growth of alcohol establishments. I hear more talk about alcohol and marijuana now than I did in college.

Is the growth of palliative substances both legal and illegal the opposite and equal reaction to a society over-emphasized on “wellness?” Or, ironically, has the emphasis on wellness created the need to constantly control how we feel? Are we pariahs when we feel unwell? Will being unwell be illegal one day?

Uranus and Pluto in Virgo

Uranus, Neptune and Pluto represent generational energies as they have long revolutions around the sun. Uranus was in Virgo from 1962 – 1969. Pluto was also in Virgo during that time as well as before and after from 1956 – 1972. People born with one or both of these planets in Virgo are in their late 40s to early 60s.

Virgo represents work, health, diet and pets. Those with Uranus and/or Pluto in Virgo brought us the awareness of health and environmental issues. They are the “Green Generation.”

Virgo is also the worry-wort of the zodiac as it’s ruled by the mental Mercury but focused on earth matters like work so often creates the workaholic, the gym rat or the person with extremely particular and discriminating dietary needs.

A generation with this aspect has helped us focus on health and wellness so that we understand a lunch of Coke and Doritos is a poor choice. However, the focus is now so extreme that you can’t eat a piece of anything without a detailed analysis of its contents. Analysis seems to have taken away the simple enjoyment of food.

This is why Virgo experiences mental strain – it can’t shut off the mind and can’t relax into experience. It can’t eat the ice cream cone without thinking about calories and a treadmill (and the shopping list and the mortgage payment and . . .).

A generation with Uranus/Pluto in Virgo tends to carry these traits, although not necessarily as individuals and they’ve created products to serve this need such as the Fitbit. As with anything Virgo, Fitbit can create awareness of how our habits affect our health but also an excessive analysis making all activity into a goal or competition with the need for perfection that keeps the mind from relaxing.

The Equal and Opposite Reaction

The opposite of Virgo is Pisces which is ruled by Neptune. Pisces is diffuse and can enjoy the ice cream cone without wondering how many carbs it contains. Pisces is imaginative, empathic and emotional.

Neptune is currently transiting its own sign of Pisces and we’re experiencing enjoyment, glamorization and increase in Neptune’s love of escapism – moving image, alcohol and drugs.

Virgo and Pisces are polarities – they need each other. We need Virgo discrimination and Pisces imagination. The excess of Virgo has released Pisces to alleviate the strain.

Astrology teaches balance in a world constantly imbalanced. There’s a constant chase for one end of a polarity and our focus on Virgo has led to an increase of Pisces. Neptune in Pisces is balancing Virgo and since Virgo is extreme, so is Pisces right now.

The response to Neptune in Pisces illegal substance abuse is often additional, legal substances – i.e., Virgo. Back and forth we go from Virgo to Pisces, one substance to another in search of Virgo perfection.

Virgo perfection may be the issue here. Maybe if we let go of perfect, we can relax and need fewer palliatives. Then when we enjoy a glass of wine or a toke of marijuana, it’s for pleasure and not need, a positive action rather than reaction.

Maybe after Neptune’s 15-year transit of Pisces in 2025 we will have thrown away our measuring devices and learned to enjoy health as a feeling state, not as a set of rules to be obeyed, steps to be measured.

Our world is also increasingly ruled by Mercury with non-stop communication, non-stop distraction and non-stop reaction.

How can you stop without a little help from Neptune in Pisces?

If we balance the Virgo, then the Pisces will balance.

Related Neptune in Pisces blogs