Hey friends,
I hope you had a wonderful solstice! I spent the longest day tubing down the Rio Grande with my daughter and partner, feeling the heat of the sun on my legs, the cold water on my toes, and got back to the car right in time for a massive thunder and hailstorm in the canyon. A day of extremes, for sure!
How did you spend your midsummer, full-moon, solstice week? Let me know how the Gate of Extremes showed up for you in the comments!
Some Notes on Listening to Cycles of Time
I wanted to note that as you listen to this podcast, I think the best way is to let the words flow over you, and absorb the content through osmosis, rather than trying to intellectually understand it or hold onto it. I go over a lot of information in each episode, which I know could feel like a lot if you thought you were going to be tested on it at the end or something like that! In Human Design, it’s a common practice to not even study the gates until far along in the process of experiencing the information. And in ancient China, the I’Ching was developed as a system of divination using yarrow stalks, where there was a lot more downtime to contemplate and ponder a single hexagram, which is essentially just two parts of the natural world put together.
As I was tubing down the meandering lower Rio Grande river the other day, I was really enjoying taking the world in from that slow and drifting vantage point. My daughter fell asleep on my lap, and I watched the breeze in the trees, listening to the song of the redwing blackbird, watching tiny fish swim up the eddies. The pace of life was so slow, and I think that’s important to remember when trying to digest a lot of information about an ancient system- life was inherently a lot slower then, and we received a lot more information through osmosis in our bodies, through experience, through nature than we do now.
Our minds are far more on overdrive than they have ever been, and the point of this podcast and project is to slow down with the pace of nature and with the wisdom of our bodies, rather than trying to add more datapoints to and numbers to crunch and assimilate with our brains.
This week the sun is transiting through the Gate of Stillness, so it’s a perfect time to remember that- like a crab is still on a rocky shore until a wave crashes in, the best actions come from a place of stillness. Let this forecast wash over you like water, and if a key phrase or word sticks out to you, jot it down, but don’t try to hold on too tightly.
With that, on to the weekly forecast!
-Alison
This week’s highlights:
First full week of Cancer Season
Waning Moon and Waning Daylight until Winter Solstice
Human Design/I’Ching:
June 24-29: the Sun is in Gate 52, the Gate of Inaction, after leaving the Gate of Extremes
This week’s themes:
Stillness like a mountain
Being in our feels
Waiting for the right time to act
Our Place in the Wheel of the Year
Medicine Wheel Direction: South (Fire, Youth)
Wuxing Cycle Element: Fire
Pagan Season: Litha
Zodiac Season: Cancer (June 20-July 20)
Moon Phase: Waning
I Ching Hexagram/Human Design Gate: 52 (Mon-Sat) and 39 (Sun)
52= Mountain over Mountain (Ken: “Keeping Still”) or The Gate of INACTION
39 = Water over Mountain (Jian: “Obstruction”) or The Gate of PROVOCATION
The Cacophony of Gemini fades into the Changing Waters of Cancer
We’re officially in Cancer season starting with last week’s solstice, so I thought it would be fun to do a little review of the gates the sun just transited through in the month of the twins, and then see what gates we have to look forward to in the upcoming month of the crab.
The first gate of Gemini season, the sun was in Gate 20, the Gate of the Now, surrendering to deep presence and the power of the moment. Next was the Gate of Skills (Gate 16) and the Gate of Change (Gate 35), both gates evoking Gemini’s Greek and Roman origin story of the highly skilled and adventurous twins Castor and Pollux. Next we moved into Gate 45, the Gate of the Gatherer, where Gemini’s social skills shone through in the desire to bring resources and people together for the greater good. Next was the Gate of Caution (Gate 12), known as Standstill in the I’Ching, a time for chatty Gemini energy to recognize how important it is to wait for emotional clarity before speaking. Then, last week for the Solstice, on the cusp between Gemini and Cancer, the sun transited through the Gate of Extremes, which was all about being humble and embracing the diversity of experiences in life, from hot to cold, dark to light, happy to sad.
I love how each Zodiac season contains 5-6 micro-seasons informed by the 64 gates of the I’Ching. Following the order of the gates each season in this way, through each of these gates, tends to tell a story about the evolution of each Zodiac sign, at least in my opinion as I live through the meanings and vibes of the gates in my life and in my body. In this past season, the Gemini twins evolved from being in the moment, to focusing and gaining skills, to using those skills in embracing adventure and change, to becoming a leader by gathering resources from this adventure, to using caution to lead from a place of true heart, not ego. When I think about Gemini season represented by the life stage of childhood, this progression and evolution through this stage feels so fitting, a beautiful journey through the essence of Gemini’s spring.
Here’s an Instagram post I made about Gemini Gates:
The cusps between seasons also tend to be very interesting associations. The first gate of the astrological year spans between Pisces and Aries seasons, and is the Gate of Innocence- literally coming out of the end of one cycle of life and into the fresh and innocent beginning of a new one. The cusp between Aries and Taurus is the Gate of Innovating or Ordering, transitioning between the innocence of the first season of the year to the stability and creativity of the second, from infancy to toddlerhood. The cusp between Gemini and Cancer season, the transition from childhood to adolescence in the life cycle wheel, is the Gate of Extremes, which we talked about in last week’s episode. I just watched the new Pixar movie Inside Out 2, about emotions personified inside a little girl’s head. In Inside Out 2, and as she turns 13 and enters adolescence, the new emotions that enter the picture- anxiety, ennui, embarrassment, envy- could certainly be considered extreme!
As we enter Cancer season, the season of midsummer in the wheel of the year and adolescence/teenagerdom in the life cycle wheel, these are the Human Design Gates we’ll encounter (along with their I’Ching counterparts):
The Gate of Extremes (15: Gemini-Cancer cusp) - Earth over Mountain (humility)
The Gate of Stillness (52) - Mountain over Mountain (keeping still)
The Gate of Provocation (39) - Water over Mountain (rapids on the river)
The Gate of Beginnings (53) - Wind over Mountain (gradual progress)
The Gate of Details (62)- Thunder over Mountain (smallness)
The Gate of Stimulation (56: Cancer-Leo cusp) - Fire over Mountain (traveling)
As you can see, we’re in the I’Ching season of the Mountain, where the mountain is the lower trigram in all of the hexagrams of Cancer Season. We started the year with Thunder as the lower trigram in Aries and Taurus season, then moved into Earth as the lower trigram in Taurus and Gemini, and now we are in Mountain season in the end of Gemini through Cancer and into the beginning of Leo season.
Here’s this month’s IG post about Cancer Season’s Gates:
My brain loves these interconnections between ancient ways of thinking, and in living the wheel of the year this way, my body really does too. The seasons, the weather, the cycles of life that we witness all around us, have a huge impact on us now and had a huge impact on our ancestors. Even though it seems so simple and obvious in some ways, the beautiful poetry and myth and complexity that comes out of these cycles, the cycle of the earth making a revolution around the sun, create such a pulse to our modern lives.
Gate 52: The Gate of Inaction, aka ”Keeping Still”
This week’s Gate is the Gate of Inaction, of Keeping Still, represented by the double trigrams of Mountain over Mountain in the I’Ching. It is a time of temporary and self-imposed inaction for the benefit of assessment.
My partner, who is a Cancer, is about to go on a 5 day backpacking trip to the mountains during the transit of this Gate, tapping into that perfect stillness of nature, the powerful, silent and eternal earth and rock mountains that keep watch over the earth. I love that he’s a reflective and sensitive Cancer sun and also an avid mountain climber in the season of mountains.
Mountain over Mountain is known as the Buddha Gate, a gate of meditation and contemplation, of staying still amidst life’s constant flux. Like the Buddha, those with this gate in their chart’s, or all of us as we experience the transit this week, know that the greatest seeds take the longest to germinate. Gate 52 is patient and lets life and dreams unfold without pushing, forcing or interfering. Out of deep inner stillness comes powerful action.
In the Gene Keys, this energy of the Mountain is represented by the Shadow of Stress, the Gift of Restraint, and the Siddhi of Stillness.
The shadow this week could show up in an inability to keep still, a restlessness, or a feeling of being stuck in a rut, causing stress to our system by moving too fast or seeing slowness as stickiness.
The gift of Restraint is often devalued because of how it sounds- not sexy or exciting. But it is truly one of the most important gifts and behaviors in the human genome- the ability to strike a balance between two extremes. Last week we were in the gate of extremes, holding positive and negative polarities together like a magnet, and this week we’re evolving to find a balance, or a still-point, between opposing energies.
“This Gift has a huge impact on the emotional body. It communicates and exudes calmness throughout the aura. There have always been people in the world who remain completely unflustered by external crises – such as emotional turmoil or human conflict and war. There have always been such people among us, and these are the people of the 52nd Gift.”
Taking time to take deep, conscious breaths this week is a great way to stay out of the shadow energy of restlessness and stuck-ness. You can listen to my Guided Meditation for Cancer Season to slow down your mind, or try this resonant breathing practice:
Have a beautiful week ahead! Thanks as always for your hearts, comments, shares, subscribes, and 5-star ratings, as they all help this project grow and reach more cycle-obsessed folks <3
xoxo!
Alison
Weekly Forecast for June 24-30: The Stillness of Cancer Season