“Don’t call me a Baby Boomer”

The majority of people don’t know it, but the division of people into generations is really based on astrology.  The Baby Boomers, for instance, are loosely tied  to the post-war period between 1946 and 1964.  However, as I wrote a few years ago, there is a huge difference between the early boomers, with Pluto in Leo, and the late b[l]oomers, who were born after 1956 with Pluto in Virgo.

A recent New York Times article pleads “Don’t call me a Baby Boomer“:

This year the youngest of the baby boomers — the youngest, mind you — turn 50. I hit that milestone a few months back. But we aren’t what people usually have in mind when they talk about boomers. They mean the earlyboomers, the postwar cohort, most of them now in their 60s —not us later boomers, labeled “Generation Jones” by the writer Jonathan Pontell.

The boom generation really has two distinct halves, which in my mind I call Boomer Classic and Boomer Reboot. (Take this quiz to see where you stand.) The differences between them have to do, not surprisingly, with sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll — and economics and war. For a wide-ranging set of attitudes and cultural references, it matters whether you were a child in the 1940s and ‘50s, or in the 1960s and ‘70s. And it probably matters even more whether you reached adulthood before or after the early ‘70s, a time of head-spinning changes with long-term consequences for families, careers and even survival.

Perhaps valid correlations can be made with the cultural references with which you grew up, but these differences identified by the author as the dividing line between early and late boomers can be traced right back to the difference between Leo and Virgo.  Leo is all about development and celebration of the self – pleasure and creative self-expression.  Each sign reacts to the one immediately before it, so when Pluto moved into Virgo there was a reaction against the self-involvement of the Leo generation and a move towards service and self-sacrifice.  Where Pluto in Leo is idealistic (Leo) and ready to destroy (Pluto) for those ideals, Virgo tends to lack passion and be more pragmatic.  As this author writes, ” I remember, as a teenager, seeing old footage of the riots outside the 1968 Democratic convention in Chicago, and thinking, “People my age don’t feel that strongly about anything.”  Virgo doesn’t believe; instead it is pragmatic and deals with life as it comes, seeking safety and security rather than the big dramatic views that Leo inspires.

Economics are another big disparity between the two generations.  The Leo generation grew up in post-war prosperity, often discarding it with great glee to live in communal situations or other alternative communities.  The Pluto in Virgo generation grew up in Jimmy Carter’s malaise – a period where there was little inspiration and a great deal of worry, a quality strongly associated with Virgo.  If I can quote myself from the article cited above:

These Boomers are those born with Pluto in Virgo (after October of 1956), and their generation has been marked by a strong resentment to those who came directly before them. This is no surprise, because Virgo doesn’t like Leo much. Where Leo seeks the spotlight and takes center stage, demanding attention and adoration, Virgo is selfless and service-oriented and seeks only to serve others and live a life that is safe and orderly. The sign that Pluto falls in typically doesn’t express our individual personality but it does reflect who we are as a generation.

The Leo nature doesn’t have much thought for the future – it is anchored in the present and a need for pleasure and fun. Virgo, on the other hand, has a tendency to worry about the adequacy of available funds and planning for the future. Where Virgo is willing to work long hours toward a goal, Leo is more concerned with doing work that will allow the fullest expression of oneself. Where Leo seeks to express the Ego in the most perfect way, Virgo has an intense dislike of Ego expression, and herein lies the deepest difficulty between the two generations.

Understanding the astrology behind the cycles of life adds a dimension of understanding that is not otherwise possible.

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