As you focus your attention on the above picture of this little boy, what are you able to determine about him? If you are an intuitive individual, just looking into his eyes will tell you a great deal. Are you able to sense his gentleness and sensitivity?  It has been said that "the eyes of an individual are the gateway to his soul".  I believe this is accurate.  Perhaps when this child matures, he will wish to be involved in the arts, medicine, clergy, or social services.  He may aspire to be a veterinarian.  His focus will be on feelings, compassion, beauty, assisting mankind, etc.  Will he be encouraged to pursue his leaning or will his parents/authority figures try to persuade him to follow a different life career or path? 

There is a basic distinction between traditional psychology, whose  views on childhood experiences subscribe to the idea that a child is born as a blank slate (tabula rasa theory) and the way psychological astrology looks at life events.

The tabula rasa theory states that how other people treated you in early life gives rise to certain patterns or scripts which then determine your self-image and your expectations of what will happen to you later in life.  This is true as what happens early in life forms a very deep impression on us.  These impressions are embedded in the subconscious; often we do not remember them.  But we carry those expectations and beliefs around with us and we continue to perceive and organize experience according to them.  Even a fantasy about what happed in the past can determine how we interpret the present.  Later in life, we selectively perceive or attract circumstances which support our assumptions and beliefs, and we fail to see what doesn't fit into these expectations.

Psychological astrology views all this slightly differently.  Rather than just being born a "blank slate" and then having things done to you which then lead you to form opinions about life and yourself, psychological astrology believes that you are already born with an innate predisposition which expects things to happen.  Certain inborn archetypal expectations structure what you filter out of your childhood experiences.  An archetype can be defined as a mental representation of an instinct.  Over eons of time the evolutionary process has structured into our psyches certain expectations which are passed down generation after generation - a "cell wisdom."  

We are born with certain archetypal beliefs and expectations which we have to work with.  It may be that we inherit unresolved issues or conflicts from our ancestors just as we inherit physical traits.  We are born with an image of mother, an image of that archetype, and with an image of father, an image of birth, of growth, of death, etc. The exact nature of these images will vary with each individual based on their individual sign placement of the Moon, Sun, Mercury, etc. and the aspects made to them.  Perception is a function of expectation and content is a function of content.  What you are expecting to see will influence how you perceive what is actually there.

Planetary aspects create structures in our lives.  The Sun in aspect to Neptune  represents a masculine principle - assertion, expression and spirit.  It will also imply a great deal of sensitivity and creativity as well as weakness, dissolution, dissipation and elusiveness.  The Sun also represents the image of Father and the person's experience of  Father will be colored by Neptune; the father will receive the projection.  Father may drink too much, become dependent on drugs, is ill or ailing, psychologically absent  or simply disappear.   In some way,  the Father cannot be relied upon.  The child must endeavor to bring the energy between the Sun and Neptune together more constructively or more positively rather than just wandering around with a weak or nebulous sense of identity or power.  He should be encouraged to opening himself up as a channel through which artistic expression could flow. 

If a child has a Moon - Neptune aspect, he will be very sensitive to Mother.  Often the image of Mom is that of a victim or a martyr.  Many times the Mother will have sacrificed a career or artistic endeavor to become a parent.  Sometimes a child will feel responsible for any pain the Mother has experienced.  The aspect does give a problem with boundaries because the child takes on the feelings and needs of others and grow into an adult who suffers a great deal or becomes a person who repeatedly rescue others.  Or he may have a confused self-image because he is like a psychic vacuum cleaner, absorbing so much from the environment that he does not know who or what he feels himself.

Of course, other energies in the chart often help to balance and assist this particular archetype.  But the child must have an outlet to express his artistic sensitivity and compassion.