June : Water Element | LGBTQ+ Pride Month : Litha

June is a time of beautiful contradictions — fluidity and fierce clarity, quiet reflection and joyful celebration. Here, Water, Pride, and light converge and weave vivid tapestries of authentic human expression.

You are wholly welcomed here.

How will you allow the sacred flow of this season to surge through you?

Whatever you choose is welcomed.

Now is a vibrant time to honor the depth and vastness of your own Water Magic. You are no small pond, fellow Practitioner, you're a vast sea of magic.

Recognize the variety of every body's individual spark and path; marvel at the stunning creation that is our shared Magic In Action.

Allow your heart to shine brightly, without apology, however your inner light may choose to manifest.

Concluding our Water Element focus until next year, we celebrate this elemental power with unbridled joy, while embracing and flowing intuitively with all of the LGBTQ+ Pride celebrations, and landing in the fiery embrace of Litha and the radiant peak of the Summer Solstice.

Did you miss the first two Water Element explorations?

Dive into the April and May Pages to soak them up!

And, if you're moved to Contact us,

we'd love to hear what surfaced ♥

Are you willing to contemplate your own contradictions?

This month offers us an extraordinary opportunity to harness these combined energies for personal transformation, community connection, and magical practice.

Moving forward, may we harness these converging forces — Water, Pride, and Light — for transformation, connection, and the satisfaction that comes from living as our truest selves.

June | the fierce 'n tender Divine Feminine

June draws its name from Juno, the powerful Roman goddess who rules with both fierce protection and tender nurturing. She is not just the goddess of marriage and partnerships; she is the sovereign protector of sacred promises - including the ones you make to yourself.

Feel her regal energy coursing through the month, demanding truth in all vows and commitments...

Where are you being asked to fiercely protect your energy?

What boundaries require a royal decree from your inner sovereignty?

How can you help yourself honor those boundaries while still nurturing what truly matters?

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Juno's presence also reminds us that our emotional waters need strong banks to flow in ways that don't flood the boundaries meant to be breathing.

When someone crosses your boundaries, do you respond with Juno's famous righteous indignation, or do you allow your waters to overtake their space and become all muddied?

This month, let Juno's blend of nurturing love and protective ferocity inspire the honesty of your own relationships - especially within Self. Try one or both of these rituals to put more of June's Magic In Action today:

1) Settle into your favorite journaling environment (quiet space, candle, tea, crystals, etc.) and spend some time reflecting on the questions in these Palimpsest pages. Revisit them as needed this month:

• How deeply can you explore each section and question?

• Which parts make you the most curious?

• When will you decide to fully dive into the exploration of Self?

2) Create a small altar with peacock feathers (Juno's sacred animal), a bowl, cup, or other vessel of fresh Water, and a physical item that represents the boundary you're establishing or reinforcing. If you don't have a physical peacock feather you can find an image of one or try drawing your own as an additional offering to Juno's month!

• Touch this representation daily and reaffirm your sovereign right to protect your sacred spaces.

• Meditate into the eyes of the peacock feather(s) with intent to strengthen divine awareness.

• Offer your honest words to the vessel of Water allowing it to amplify your intentions.

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Lunar Magic: The Strawberry Moon Illuminates Our Path

The Full Strawberry Moon on Wednesday, June 11th is so juicy and rich in sweet seasonal offerings that you might feel the feminine urge to pluck it straight from the sky and devour it while lounging naked under its silvery glow

This is not just allowed, but highly encouraged.

According to Rachel Herbert in "Moon Names and Their Meanings" (The Old Farmer's Almanac, 2023), this name originated from Native American traditions, particularly the Algonquin tribes who recognized the perfect timing of wild strawberries ripening with this lunar phase.

Reflect on a personal story that you have which includes strawberries. Is it a sweet or sour?

Can you remember ever enjoying a truly wild one?

Alternatively, the Snohomish and Tulalip Tribes of Washington State call this Moon "The Time of the Salmonberries," which is the yellow, orange, or red-colored regional fruit bursting with vibrant promise during the season.

Have you ever experienced a salmonberry?

Have you ever savored this member of the rose family? Do you have a favorite berry? When was the last time you were able to savor and be satisfied by it?

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This Full Moon serves us a full feast of Sagittarian energy - a bit of spice, a splash of umami to expand the pallet, and the ever-seeking of Life's remedy by way of (sometimes bitter) truth.

Wednesdays correspond with communication, knowledge, and wisdom, so intentions embodied while engaging in a personal-truth practice can be amplified in effect and result at this time.

As a layer to any mundane or ceremonial workings, try tapping into the power of the weekday as well as the fiery astrological sign to help multiply the impact of your efforts this Full Moon.

Feel how this mutable Fire sign creates steam when meeting our Water focus; it's perfect alchemy to help with transformation.

Where in your body do you feel the watery rush to expand? What truth is flaring up, demanding expression? Allow the steam of your emotions to flow right into the next, just as rivers run to the sea.

How can you find and gift yourself regular ritual of nourishing emotional release?

If you are feeling the spark of this Full Moon, try experimenting with the following freedom ritual. You will need a piece of paper, a writing utensil, a fire source (lighter, matches), fire-safe tongs or tweezers, and access to a properly working toilet.

• write down the specific limitation, fear, burden or learned restriction you have been carrying along Life's journey that you now are ready to release

• fold the piece of paper as many times as feels right, always folding the paper away from you

• hold the folded paper with the tongs and stand with your hand held over the toilet bowl

• burn the written limitation and watch the flames consume it for as long as you're comfortable

• drop the remnants of paper into the toilet*** and flush your blockage right down the drain

(***This ritual honors the practical and symbolic release of burdens. If a toilet doesn't feel proper to you, release the ashes responsibly into running water, your garden, or even a compost bin.)

New Moon in Cancer: Diving into Emotional Depths

Swim into subconscious, get curious about your own depths...

The New Moon phase flows into the watery realm of Cancer on Wednesday, June 25th, and brings with it the dark, meaty fertility of new beginnings wrapped up in a sacred shell of emotional wisdom.

This phase can feel like going for a midnight skinny-dip in the depths of a secret lake - exposing, exhilarating, and profoundly connecting. Like a crab shedding a tired shell, how can you release what now feels restricting?

Cancer, ruled by the Moon itself, invites you to slip beneath the surface of your conscious mind and explore the treasures living in your emotional depths.

Are you brave enough now to take the dive?

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Another Moon phase that falls on Mercury's day - Wednesday - and another current of verbal expression surging forth with the bottomless power of your subconscious desire for exploration.

What secrets have your inner depths been keeping, that now demand articulation?

Which emotions have you been holding underwater that need to rise to the surface and breathe?

Take a deep breath. Hold your inhale.

Your throat chakra may pulse with potential under this influence; let it open, release your deeper truths.

Did you surprise yourself? Did you cry?

If you did, wonderful. Let's put those droplets of soul to use. You'll need them, a bowl, and some water.

Were your last tears from joy, or something else?

• practice your own "Tears to Power" ritual under this New Moon filling a small bowl (or other vessel) with water and hold it between your palms

• feel your heartbeat transferring through the vessel and into the Water as you infuse it with your specific intention for emotional healing

• add a single tear (or more) to the Water- whether from joy, sadness, or even from yawning

• watch how this droplet creates ripples through the entire vessel, just as your personal expressions ripple throughout your entire life

• anoint your heart center, throat, or third eye with this infused Water, reclaiming the power of your fluid emotional expression with each touch of your skin. Offer the rest back to Earth

Water Element : emotional currents and sacred tears

June marks the final month of our dance with the Water Element, and she intends to make this last waltz memorable. Water doesn't just symbolize emotions - it embodies them in their physical form.

When was the last time you felt the flow of tears hot against your cheeks?

Did you brush them away with embarrassment, or honor them as pure expression?

Your tears are salted moonlight made liquid. When you cry, you're gifting drops of the galaxy back to itself - each rolling drop containing an entire universe of emotion.

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In the journey of Tarot, the Water Element flows through the Suit of Cups; all of those vessels that contain and pour forth our emotional realities.

Water manifests strongly in some Major Arcana (or Spirit) cards, also. Such as with The High Priestess, whose classic blue robes cascade like waterfalls between pillars of duality, and in The Moon card, where creatures of all kinds emerge from our subconscious depths that both terrify and fascinate.

Which of all the watery cards do you feel you're most embodying as of late?

The Ace of Cups, beginning an emotional expedition?

Perhaps the Page of Cups, innocently discovering the true depth of Life's flavors?

Or the Queen of Cups, being deeply intuitive and emotionally connected to the juice of Spirit?

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A simple practice of Water Magic is to feel your way through the card you most closely identify with.

If you have a favorite Tarot deck, grab it and sort through to find your chosen card.

If you don't have have a physical deck, search on your favorite platform for the card and work with the image you are most intuitively drawn to (there are countless styles of decks/art, go with your gut!)

Get cozy with your card's imagery, taking in every detail regardless of how simple or complex the artwork is. Consider:

• What kinds of lines are used?

• Colors?

• Contrast?

• Is it minimalist or maximalist?

• What first grabbed your attention?

• What took a while for you to notice?

• How do those aspects apply directly to you?

If you are inspired to, add another watery layer to your reflection ritual with a cleansing bath.

Fill your bathtub with hot water and a handful of sea salt (Epsom or other salt could work too, don't overthink it and use what you have.) If you're called to, light and float blue, silver, and/or white candles on the water's surface (or around the edges) then lower yourself into this makeshift ocean.

Whisper or speak aloud the emotions you've been holding captive, let them rush or trickle at will.

Feel each word dissolve into the water around you, neither rejected nor clung to, simply acknowledged and released into the surrounding Element that knows how to carry all burdens and reintegrate them into the cosmic seas.

When you drain the tub, visualize these released emotions flowing back to the great waters of the world, transformed into wisdom... how do you feel now?

LGBTQ+ Pride Month : celebrating fluidity and resilience

June unfurls its Pride and rainbow flags across the country's windowsills and storefronts, each color vibrating with the energy of celebration and resistance.

There's a stunning synchronicity in honoring Pride alongside our Water Element focus - both exemplify the power of fluidity, authenticity, and the courage to carve one's own path through even the most resistant landscapes.

How big and bright do you shine?

Have you ever watched Water slowly erode stone? That's an example of Pride energy: persistent, patient, and ultimately transformative.

Without the embrace between Water and light, we never see a rainbow - this natural phenomenon beautifully symbolizes how emotions (Water) and visibility (light) together create the full spectrum of human identity.

Where are you right now on this spectrum?

How visible do you feel?

What colors of your authentic self do you allow to shine brilliantly?

Which remain submerged, waiting for calmer waters to surface?

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Pride Month commemorates the Stonewall Riots of June 1969, when patrons of the Stonewall Inn in New York City erupted against decades of oppression.

As we know from Lillian Faderman's "The Gay Revolution: The Story of the Struggle" (Simon & Schuster, 2015), transgender women of color, like Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera, led this resistance against police harassment, their courage flowing like an unstoppable tide that catalyzed the modern LGBTQ+ rights movement.

Can you feel the echoes of their defiance in today's celebrations?

In what ways are you honoring their legacy through your own authentic expression or allyship?

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Popular Pride celebrations bloom throughout the U.S. like wildflowers of joy after a long season of darkness. For example, Seattle's Pride in the Park transforms public space into a sanctuary of community resources and entertainment.

However, in our current political climate and with policies like the Trans Military Ban restricting rights, Pride remains both celebration and necessary protest.

How will you stand in solidarity with those still fighting for social equity?

How can you be a safer space for others to exist as their authentic selves?

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Engage with the array of colors calling this month. Amplify your truth and personal boundaries with the duality of Water and fiery energies. Try exploring yourself with the following intentional exercise.

What You Need:

• If possible, a sunny spot to feel the warmth of the light as you engage in this moment

• A vessel suitable for liquid

• Water, whatever kind you have and are called to use is ideal (tap, distilled, Moon, Sun, etc.)

• A journal or piece of paper

• A writing utensil, multiple colors if possible (pens, markers, crayons, whatever you have and want to feel in your hand is absolutely grand)

• Additional items, if you have the privilege- one item to represent each color of the rainbow (ROYGBIV), or whichever colors you're drawn to work with

Engage yourself and express on paper this Pride month!

What To Do:

1. Center the chosen vessel on your piece of paper and trace around its base, leaving a circle, oval or other shape. Divide the resulting shape into pie pieces, labeling each with one of your chosen colors.

   
   

2. If you are using only paper and writing utensil(s), draw a simple picture to represent an item for each of your colors (representation, not perfection) around the shape's outside edge (you can do this if you use physical items too); if you're using physical items, arrange them around the vessel of Water.

   
   

3. Assign a personal truth or boundary to each of your colors, writing them down next to the pie piece or drawing. Speak your words aloud and deeply infuse them into your sketches or tangible objects.

   
   

4. If you're working in a sunny spot, allow the light to filter through and infuse the Water with solar power. If a naturally sunny spot is not an option, send the Water the same strong, warm, nurturing, bright vibrating light straight from your heart-space instead.

   
   

5. Allow the light (from the sun or heart-space) to amplify your spoken truths and boundaries absorbed by the Water. Give thanks to the Water for holding your messages and amplifying the solar energies.

   
   

6. Whenever you feel the exercise has come to its end, close it by collecting your physical items (if applicable) and keeping them together and/or in place that allows you to see them regularly as reminders of your commitments to Self.

   
   

7. Finally, utilize the Water in one of the following ways (whichever feels right is the right way for you):

   • Sipping the Water from the vessel, intaking the energy into your physical being

   • Pouring the Water into a houseplant, imbuing your boundaries into your home space

   • Returning the Water back to Earth, gifting the intentions of your efforts to the greater world

Litha : a Summer Solstice celebration

Friday, June 20, 2025, Litha arrives like a lover bearing gifts of golden light and fresh petals of pure possibility.

The Summer Solstice seems to stretch time itself, offering us the longest day as though the Sun cannot bear to leave our sight...

Can you feel the buzzing intensity of this celestial peak of light?

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Nature shimmers with juicy potential as the Sun moves into Cancer's watery domain, creating an alchemical marriage of Fire and Water that feels both electric and soothing against the Spirit's skin.

The name "Litha" traces back to Anglo-Saxon traditions, appearing in the Venerable Bede's 8th century writings as a sacred month in the ancient calendar.

As Ronald Hutton reveals in "The Stations of the Sun: A History of the Ritual Year in Britain" (Oxford University Press, 1996), this midsummer celebration has woven itself through countless cultures over time, from Celtic Fire festivals to Norse sun veneration and Roman celebrations of Juno herself, along with so many more.

How do you honor your inner flame this time of year?

Which of your ancestral traditions bubbles up in the blood as this Solstice approaches?

Can you feel it set your Spirit afire?

What flames of remembrance still flicker in your modern practices?

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As the natural brightness reaches its climax, clarity arrives alongside. However, care must also be given so as not to get burned by the heat of living in life's full radiance.

What truths are being illuminated for you right now, golden and undeniable, in this Solstice light?

Which aspects remain in shadow, all the more visible as contrast?

This point of balanced reflection invites deep honesty when recognizing both your brilliance and your darkness with equal reverence.

Whisper or shout this short carol on the Solstice, or any time you want to call on peak solar energy:

My world is drenched in sunshine gold

while shadows hide in plain sight. 

Everything I am,

blooming and buried,

bursts forth vibrantly alive.

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Confluence of Water + Pride + Solstice

This month, how will you choose to play with these three powerful aspects - the Water Element, celebrations of Pride, and Litha's solar peak?

How can they converge to create something greater than their individual flows?

Can you feel them mingling within and around you- the emotional depths of Water teaching fluidity and intuition? Pride's rainbow energies celebrating authentic expression against all odds? Litha's brilliant illumination revealing both our light and shadows with equal grace?

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As we navigate June's currents, remember that like the tides, our magical practice naturally ebbs and flows. There will be moments of high energy and powerful inspiration, followed by necessary periods of rest and integration.

Honor wherever you are in this cycle.

Whether you find yourself called to publicly celebrate during Pride events, engage in quiet contemplation during the lunar phases, or simply enjoy joyful connection with nature at Litha, know that each expression is valid and valuable.

You are magic, are you making enough space?

The Water Element teaches us that power comes not just from forward movement, but also from the depth of our being and our willingness to flow with, rather than against, life's currents.

Take a few mindful moments to just sit with your own magnitude.

You are so powerful.

Until next month, when we transition to the Fire Element, may life's Water run clear, your Pride shine bright, and the Solstice illuminate both your light and shadows with equal grace.

♥

This blog is created with respect for all spiritual paths and personal identities.

Our mention of deities, rituals or practices, and celebrations are offered as inspiration rather than prescription. We honor your sovereignty in adapting what resonates and leaving what doesn't.

Magic exists in infinite forms; you ARE magic, and your expression of

Magic In Action will help transform the status quo.