22^nd of July (the Sun Enters Leo)

Leo is the hottest and driest, as well as the most playful and creative time of year. Our task, during its season, is to balance hedonism with duty. You know...hang out at Greenlake all day and enjoy these glorious long, warm evenings but remember to water the garden when you come home. Responsibility is good for you but so is taking time to play in the sun.

30^th of July (New Moon with a Solar Eclipse at 8 degrees of Leo)

The Moon and Sun are conjunct in the sky. The moon is dark and gradually increases to a crescent. This is the time to begin a ritual involving a new project, to ask for new vision.

This is the third eclipse of the month. This eclipse will not be visible on the West Coast of the U.S. Last June 28^th there was a lunar eclipse so it may be helpful to look back to that time to see what issues will be stimulated by this solar eclipse.

1^st of August is Lammas

Lammas or Lughnasadh honors the Sun god Lugh, the ripener of grains. Traditionally, this is the time to bless the harvest tools, local water sources and beehives. Villagers would decorate the springs and fountains with wreaths of flowers. Choose a time today to go outside and enjoy the riches of nature. Float a few flowers in a bowl or basin of water and allow them to coax a little Summer into your home.

4^th of August, the first Friday of the month, is The Monthly IEM Get Together. Thanks to everyone who came for our Cancer party! So please join us for Leo. Click here for more information.

15^th of August is the Full Moon

The Moon and Sun are opposite each other in the sky. The Moon reflects all of the Sun's light. This is the time to perform rituals for protection, clarity of vision and consecration.

22^nd of August (Sun Enters Virgo)

Look for our Virgo Edition!

This is an amazingly useful website for anyone interested in the spiritual or occult. The main topic headings are: Channeling, Lightwork, Healing, Out Of Body, Reincarnation, Meditation, UFO Sightings, Light Tech, Veda & Dharma, Yoga Paths, Theosophy, Mysticism, Astrology. I think that pretty much covers everything!

Some of the info pages are really useful for research purposes and the search engine is excellent. I routinely hand out a graphic chakra page that I use with Spiritweb's permission and I have participated in their astrology forum several times.

Personally, I avoid the channeled information because it all sounds the same to me: "Sananda, channeled by Lisa J Smith, Blessed Co-Creators of Peace. Welcome to Phase 2 of universal completion and integration in its entirety, that of the unveiling of the consciousness known as the Great Central Moon." Yes, I know there is an amazing amount of incredible channeled information out there. I would just prefer it if they didn't sound so...Californian. -- Inga Duncan Thornell

Click here to visit the SpiritWeb site at www.spiritweb.org

We gave Gramma our VCR so we are temporarily unable use our Yoga Zone videos. I decided to try this CD that I first saw on Living Arts (www.livingarts.com). I found it for a cheaper price on Amazon.com, of course, so I ordered it from them. This is an audio CD not a CD Rom. The kit contains a poster with the asanas pictured and two CDs. Each is an hour long and one is identified as Solar: An energizing sequence for strength and flexibility and the other as Lunar, a rejuvenating flow for deep relaxation.

The first day I did CD2, the Lunar workout: Full body warm up, Forward bends and twists, Hip openers and twists, Inversions, Meditation/Pranayama and Shavasana. Really great complete flexibility workout, a full hour of classic pretzel yoga. The second day I decided to do a custom practice, from CD1: Sun Salutations, Standing poses, Abdominal strengthening. Then from CD2: Hip openers & twists, Meditation/Pranayama.. This was a good, strenuous yoga class.

Shiva Rea's cueing is excellent and she describes the poses well enough that, even the first time through, I seldom needed to refer to the poster. She designates this program for experienced beginners and intermediate yoga lovers and I would agree with this assessment. You must know some basic asanas, such as sun salutation, warrior, tadasana, namaste and yogic body-alignment or this could be pretty frustrating. I found it to be very enjoyable and choosing tracks to customize a practice was even smoother than I thought it would be. This set would really be perfect for travel but don't overlook Yoga Sanctuary for at-home-practice either.

You can program, or empower, any stone, amulet or magickal article you choose. Without your intentionally programming it for a particular goal, it is just jewelry.

Hold the article in your right hand and focus on your need. Visualize yourself attaining it and then project that image of yourself into the stone. You can take as long a time with this process as you wish, but allow your visualization to become vivid and real to you. Repeat whatever affirmations you have composed for that particular goal. This procedure is all about focusing your intent, so really plug your power into your desire. The stone will store your programmed image and help attract to you what you need to attain your goals. Wear it within your auric field, hold it and look at it often to remind you of your goal.

You can add more trappings of Ritual to the procedure if you wish. Wear a scented oil or clothing in a color appropriate to the goal, light colored candles, repeat the ritual every night for three, five or seven nights in the hour of Venus; whatever works for you. Check out our Table of Intentions and Moon Phases pages in our library for more ideas.

Periodically, or if you have had a particularly difficult day, your gemstones should be cleared of any negativity which they may have collected. Cover with salt overnight, hold under running water or in sea water for a few minutes or hold in incense smoke while visualizing the dissipation of negative energy. Don't worry...your programming will remain.

We think of this newsletter as a community forum. You, our friends and clients, can participate by letting us know what topics you would like us to cover. We would love to see reader ideas reflected throughout the newsletter. We celebrate diversity and we'll print whatever you send in whether it be Wiccan, Christian, Pagan, New Age, etc. as long as it reflects Love. Send in your own book reviews, ideas for rituals, ideas about stones, tell us your experiences with stones or ritual and ask us questions. We love answering questions!

Quote received from C.S. - "Who so would be a man, must be a nonconformist. He who would gather immortal palms must not be hindered by the name of goodness, but must explore if it be goodness. Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind..." -- Ralph Waldo Emerson, "Self Reliance", 1844

Stew reports on his recent trip to Bali:

When a god asks you to dance, what do you do? Sounds like a funny question, at least it did to me before I went to Bali. Each of us carry around a certain set of assumptions about ourselves and how the world generally works. It is not often that I have had the opportunity to have these assumptions 'stopped' and pulled out in front of me where I had to look at them. I was lucky enough to have this happen to me with my trip to Bali. My teacher calls this "culture shock". I call it valuable.

Valuable because it was a time of challenging many of my base precepts about my world view, about how things "should" be and the added bonus of learning about a culture that is richly present with a spirituality in everyday, every moment, of life. This note is about some of my personal reflections about that valuable experience.

As an example, in the airport in Bali there were several Coca-Cola vending machines. At each one was a young lady dressed in a white shirt and a Coca-Cola sarong and selling various Coca-Cola merchandise; western marketing practices in full swing. As I watched one young lady, she stopped her business, prepared two small offerings of flowers and incense. Placed one on the top of the coke machine and one at the bottom and had a moment of silent prayer. When I asked why two offerings, she said because the one at the top was for the "high" gods, and the one at the bottom was for the "base" god or demons - because they deserve to be happy too.

This type of ritual was heartfelt, and ever present. It was not uncommon to see people stopping business at any point and doing an offering, and then resuming business. The Balinese fully expect a god to walk through their daily lives at any given moment.

One of the most memorable experiences for me was Wayun Kulet. Wayun Kulet is a shadow puppet show. The Wayun Kulet happens at many of the various ceremonies that happen throughout the course of the year. Now, for many of us, the idea of a puppet show may sound interesting and maybe entertaining, but for the Balinese it is more like riveting. These puppet shows could go for three hours without a break, and I would see young and old totally absorbed with the show in a state that I can only describe as a raucous meditation filled with focus and laughter.

There is a banana log laid down on the ground. Tied to this with brown rope is a scrim or sheet that is in turn tied to the ceiling with blue rope. Behind the scrim there is an small gamelan (a Balinese orchestra) and a live flame lamp suspended from the ceiling. The puppet master sits directly under the lamp with a wood box full of thin leather puppets that have small holes punched through them.

The puppet master controls all. He tells traditional fables in the high language of Balinese and then translates this high language to the common language (with lots of comic interpretation, I hadn't laughed so hard since I was 10). He also manipulates the puppets (often close to 100 in one show), does all the voices for the puppets and directs the gamelan behind him by tapping his foot on the wood box next to him while holding a small wood hammer in his toes.

The Wayun Kulet master is the bard of the times, like that of Shakespeare, he is a commentary of the life and politics of the world at large while carrying the responsibility to continue the transfer of the traditional stories, values and wisdom of the culture.

Now for the symbolism, the log represents mother earth. The blue rope that ties the scrim to the ceiling represents the sky. The flame represents the light of god. The puppets themselves as they are placed between the light and the scrim are our ideas or thoughts. The shadows that are produced on the scrim itself for the audience to view is the reality that we each create. In the Balinese view, we are each our own puppet master, creating the world we live in through the thoughts we hold.

Life is not so much about winning the rat race, as it is about transcending something to begin a cycle anew. About creating a phase, career, project in one's life, preserving and refining it, and then, when the time comes, letting it die so that the creation may begin again. Misery happens when we try to hold onto one of the phases for too long and not move to the next.

This Balinese world view is also about holding the creative tension that emerges in the battle between good and evil, there is no victory, only balance. It is like the energy that is carried in a rubber band when stretched. And there is certainly a lot of creativity in this place. I have never seen so much of the creative arts in one place. It seemed as if not only did everyone speak at least five languages, they also had at least three jobs with one of them having some aspect of artistic creation about them.

The overall effect was incredible, the music is driving, inspiring, almost trance-like AND I was able to contribute. The feeling of being apart of this larger whole was comforting. You see, the whole of Balinese world view is about relationships, that everyone should have a place to express themselves and be connected with others. Their whole culture is based on a concept of finding inclusiveness with others - a focus on relationships first, tasks second (in contrast to my view of our western world as being tasks first, relationships whenever we have time left).

Trance takes many forms, this of course being one of the more extreme. And trance is practically an every day part of life. Balians, local shamanistic healers, are everywhere and most of these work through some source trance in order to channel the gods powers for healing and advise.

I can't dispute it. However, in returning to my "normal/western" world, something is different. Magic is afoot. The gods are here as well, and are dancing about us, if only we have the eyes to see.

So, when a god asks you to dance, what do you do? You dance!

We've always wondered what would happen if we got the friends we've made through Inga's Earth Magic (IEM) into a room together. Why? Because every one of us has a unique gift to offer to the world. And if we get enough of us in one place at the same time, something magical is bound to occur.

• When: The 1st Friday of every month. We start eating at 6 PM so please join us but feel free to drop in later, too!
• Where: Our place (click on LIBRARY in the navigation bar at the top of the screen and then MAP ROOM for directions)
• What to bring: Just your enthusiasm and love! There's a big pot of pasta on the stove and plenty of microbrews and red wine. If you have specific preferences, please bring whatever you'd like.
• How long: Until the witching hour, midnight, at which time Scott turns into a pumpkin. It's quite a sight! If you'd like, you can spend the night on one of the couches with the kitties or bring your sleeping bag and mat and camp out on the floor of Inga's office.
• RSVP: Just let us know in advance via e-mail or phone if you are coming and if you are bringing guests so we don't run out of food or beer!

The more my good friend Joe kept insisting that we motorcycle out to the Little Bighorn Battlefield in Montana, the more I insisted that I had little interest in going there. To humor him, I finally assented and we made plans to go. A dear friend at work who has been there couldn't wait to hear what happened when I visited the site and I assured her that her glee and anticipation were for naught. This was going to be a Joe thing, not a Scott thing. Yeah, right!

With a great sense of adventure and camaraderie, four of us departed Washington State astride our motorcycles. We journeyed for three days to reach the battlefield. On the morning of the fourth day, we rode about half an hour to reach this national monument and the closer we got, the more I felt myself tighten up psychically. As I dismounted in the parking lot, I found myself using strictly my five physical senses and my conscious mind to explore the museum. We listened to a lecture given by a park ranger and then decided to walk down to the river where the Native Americans had been camped at the time of the battle.

Lenny grabbed an interpretive guide and was educating us as we stopped at each marker along the way. This path retraced the route some of Custer's soldiers used to probe the Indian encampment and to subsequently retreat from once the Indians responded violently to protect their families. Halfway down, we noticed that a rain storm was imminent and Joe and I were not prepared for that so we retreated ourselves while Lenny and Vince continued on down. Joe and I returned to the museum and heard another lecture or two.

We then headed up to the monument erected to mark the last stand of Custer and his men. I scanned the engraved names on the monument to see if I recognized any of them but I didn't. I then stood at the fence at the edge of the hill. On the slope just below were the many headstones marking where Custer and his men fell. I felt compelled to learn more of what really happened here so I grounded myself and used Earth energy to extend my consciousness into the Astral realm. White Elk, my spiritual teacher, has been training me extensively to do this without entering a trance state so I quickly expanded my mind to "see" the astral and the physical simultaneously.

My conscious mind was not the least bit prepared for what happened next. I immediately became aware of a number of white men in astral form, ghosts, and they turned to me as they became aware of my presence. I linked with them empathetically and I could feel their confusion and fear and their relief and excitement that someone had come to help them. Standing in my time and their time simultaneously, I could sense the span of time between us but to them, the battle had just recently occurred. They began approaching me and my conscious mind was unsure what to do but then my training with White Elk kicked in and I instinctually took action.

As the first man came to me, I lovingly projected energy into his astral form which elevated him from a ghostly, physical form into a etheric form of pure light. As I did this, a huge opening appeared in the sky to my right and a beautiful, divine light radiated from it. The man before me rose into sky and went into that portal. I knew that he had just gone to the same place that I had been during my near-death experience, a place of Love, comfort and Divine assistance. I repeated this for each man and I recall seeing about a dozen of them before I was through.

I'm not sure how long all this took but my friends weren't tugging on my sleeve saying it was time to go so it couldn't have been too long. My conscious mind rebounded and reeled from the implications. It questioned why it had not been informed of this event and I smirked. It had been resisting the idea of coming here all along and it would have been filled with objections and fearful notions had it been told more. I could intuitively sense that this "project" had been planned for quite some time and that I had superconsiously been actively involved in planning it. My conscious mind was the last project participant to be notified, rightfully so, and once it relented and let things happen, I felt a huge cosmic "clunk" as it all fell into place. I marveled at the complexity of the whole event and how White Elk, my coach, had sent me in to the game strategizing that I'd respond and perform as I'd been trained. I felt both manipulated and yet amazed that I was able to play my part in facilitating this healing. How little I trust my abilities!

We mounted our bikes and slowly rode out the five mile road that traverses the length of the battlefield. I brought up the rear and as I rode along past more gravestones, more men came floating toward me. I again repeated the exercise of elevating them and I could feel their relief. I wondered about the absence of Native Americans but I detected that their burial ceremonies gave them closure and saved them from being stuck in ghostly form. I also wondered if I should stop and really be thorough in looking for other lost souls but I was told that if others remained, it was because they were too fearful still and would not be able to respond to me. That gave me closure and I stopped worrying.

As we returned to the Visitor's Center, we passed a sign across the road from the monument stating that a Native American memorial was going to be erected in the near future. We went back into the Center and Lenny and I saw a diorama of the planned memorial. It mentioned how it would use sacred geometry to allow healing to take place and that a "spirit gate" would be erected to help the ghosts to find their way! I jumped back like I'd touched a live wire and wanted to excitedly tell everyone in the room that I'd just seen the spirit gate in action but my conscious mind thought better of that. I calmed down and wandered into the gift shop. I bought an official t-shirt as a souvenir and as I held it in my hands, I wondered how many had come here before me to heal and how many more it would take to complete that healing. -- Scott Bruce Duncan */:-)