What's actually happening
Neptune takes about 165 years to complete one circuit of the zodiac, spending roughly 14 years in each sign. Libra is a cardinal air sign ruled by Venus. The Neptune in Libra transit that ran from roughly 1942 to 1957 is the astrological background of the postwar settlement, the founding of the United Nations, and the idealism of collective security — as well as the generation born into that idealism.
What the tradition makes of it
Neptune in Libra idealizes relationship and justice. The spiritual longing of this transit takes the form of the belief that genuine peace — between individuals, between nations — is possible, and that the creation of the right structures and agreements will produce it. The ideal is real and beautiful; the difficulty is that Neptune dissolves as much as it inspires.
The tradition notes the generation born under Neptune in Libra as one characterized by a profound idealism about relationship — about love, about justice, about the possibility of a world organized around fairness rather than force.
The shadow is the idealization of harmony that cannot acknowledge what the harmony is costing — the peace that is purchased by suppressing the conflict rather than resolving it.
How to actually use it
Hold the vision of genuine justice without losing the honest accounting of what it requires. The ideal of Neptune in Libra is worth defending; it requires being defended against the easy substitutes that look like peace from a distance.
When in doubt
Is this harmony — or is this the management of conflict into invisibility?