Make sure any intentions you set with this new moon are made with your heart and not your ego. This new moon is fiery and feisty! Watch your words and don’t say or do anything you know you’ll regret.

This is also the perfect time to purge. When in doubt, chuck it out! Possessions, people, patterns–whatever either no longer serves you or never even did.

And pull some cards. Here’s a spread to get you going.

The full moon in Capricorn is the perfect time to reflect on how far you’ve come this year and where you still want to go. Capricorn gets it done. If you’ve been putting off accomplishing something big, now is the time to kick it into gear.

This is also a great time to detox. Who needs to be let go? What are you putting into your body that isn’t healthy? What habits should get the boot? How can you declutter your house? Start the detox on July 13th. You can do one day, three days or until the new moon on July 28th.

An elephant family reunion, pogo stick market research, an Irish dance marathon, a floor-pacing how-to seminar, a clogging competition and a clodhopper focus group.

I was in a hotel where I swear all those things were happening simultaneously on the floor above me. All when my startle response was at an all-time high.

I have PTSD. Sometimes it’s manageable. Other times it feels like it’s trying to eat me alive. I’ve been working steadily to heal for years, each summer making a little more progress.

You know that feeling when you narrowly miss crashing into another car? The slightest stress can make me feel that way. Having to go to the store. Needing to talk on the phone. Hearing a siren. That elephant reunion. And then the jangly, anxious feeling doesn’t go away. PTSD affects both the quantity and the signaling of norepinephrine in the brain, which is a fancy way of saying I feel like I narrowly missed that car crash for days, even weeks.

This then triggers a fight-or-flight response. Or fight and flight response. I realize this is hard on my loved ones. I wish they knew it’s much more difficult for me. I can understand they want me to relax. To calm down. That I seem over the top. I need them to understand what is happening inside me is much more intense than what they’re seeing.

But I’ve discovered we can change the seemingly impossible-to-change.

How do you feel about karma? What do you believe it is?

I believe that karma is a balancing of energy and patterns from past lives. It’s not a punishment, it’s a choice. In each life we do things that hurt others or ourselves. When we die, at some point we realize the mistakes we made. When it’s time to come back and have another human experience, we decide how we’re going to offset that harm.

For example, if I were a controlling man in a past life, one who needed his dinner on the table at 6:00 each evening, who demanded his boxer shorts be ironed, had to have everything just so, I might see what this did to those around me, especially my wife. For my next life, I might choose to be someone subservient. The trick is to learn the lesson rather than perpetuate the cycle.

Karma is a very deep subject, and this example is almost an oversimplification, but you can see how it works. Our job in this life is to learn what we came here to learn. To balance what is out of balance.

How?

I am currently working with two powerful systems of change. One is opening the Akashic records, seeing your past lives and the mistakes you made and then altering the past. It’s like illuminated time travel. The other is called the Quantum Breakthrough Code. This is a simple method of decoding and then recoding patterns and behaviors.

I’ve had tremendous success both with myself and with clients. I’m currently working on my PTSD with these systems. That is more deeply entrenched but I’m confident I can minimize if not completely irradicate it.

Would you like to give it a try? What would you change if you could? Your weight? Chronic pain? A pattern of people-pleasing? Do you attract the wrong partners? Are you often betrayed? Or abandoned? Reply to this email and we’ll set up a time to talk. I know you’ll be amazed.

In the meantime, to everyone who has had to live with my over-the-top-ness, please be patient with me. I’m working as fast as I can and doing my best in the meantime.

This new moon in Cancer focuses on home, family, and community. How can you make your living space more homelike? What can you do with your family that’s fun? What ancestral wounds need healing? How can you make a greater positive impact on your community?

“Oh, my god, that dress tastes like a Creamsicle! And her sweater tastes like raspberries folded into whipped cream!” I exclaimed while watching Call the Midwife last week.

You may have heard of the Silva Mind Control Method. Basically, it’s a course to enhance your intuition. I started it a couple of weeks ago and it has kicked my synesthesia into high gear.

Synesthesia is experiencing one emotion through another. You might see a color while listening to music, for example. Or taste the colors that you’re seeing.

It may sound unusual, but most people experience synesthesia to some degree, typically with emotions.

You may be surprised to know that there have been multiple studies of the taste-emotion association. When asked, people described love as sweet and jealousy as sour, for example.

Interestingly, the taste of food helped produce certain emotions. After eating something sweet, participants in the study were more inclined to show leniency and to help others.

And it worked the other direction as well.  After reading stories of moral transgression, study participants said neutral water tasted disgusting. And feeling a sense of gratitude triggered a higher preference for sweet foods.

Our emotional state is further influenced by colors that we see, aromas we smell (witness the current popularity of essential oil diffusers), and noises around us.

On top of all that, if you’re sensitive to the emotions of others, you’re doomed.

Ok, not necessarily doomed.

But it can be hard to separate what we’re genuinely feeling from our environmental influences. This is one reason a spiritual practice such as meditation is beneficial. It can help us separate our true emotions from what we’re picking up from our environment.

Or maybe be sure to always have some cookies on hand.

This full moon, the strawberry moon, is all about optimism and refusing to accept limitations. But with the moon’s sextile with Saturn and square to Neptune, you may feel a need for stability. Try each out and see which feels best.

Explore and define your truth, but be logical and rational. Express your emotions, but avoid melodrama.

But more than anything else, shoot for the moon. What impossible thing now seems possible? Do it!

When I was three, my dad and I passed a house that had more dandelions than grass. “They’re the luckiest!” I gushed. My father laughed. They were the seasonal bane of his existence.

Each spring, as dandelions pop up in out front lawn, I still think they’re glorious. 

Did you know that dandelions are both medicinal and magical?

On the practical side, the sap from the stems can be used to cure warts. Dandelion leaves can be dried and made into a tea to aid digestion. In the past, a tincture made by steeping the flowers, roots, and leaves was believed to strengthen the liver. The leaves have long been used in salads and are believed to stimulate the appetite.

I’ve even made soap with dandelions to help treat my eczema.

Tea made from the plant’s root is said to increase psychic abilities like psychic dreaming and divination.

There are superstitions and magical beliefs that we all know, like blowing the seeds to make a wish come true.

Here’s something you can try as the flowers go to seed.

Sit among the flowers and think of a habit you would like to change like stress-eating, nail biting, poor sleep hygiene, or excessive negativity.  Draw all the little parts of it from through your being and visualize this habit gathering into your heart center. Now, pick a dandelion that has a perfect circle of seeds on top of tis stem. Take a deep breath and blow. See the habit exiting your body with your exhalation. Then watch as the dandelion seeds carry it away from you. Inhale, a fresh cleansing breath. Visualize the air rushing in, filling all the spaces the old habit resided with pure, positive energy.

And, as long as you’re sitting there, pluck another one and make a wish.

Communication is Gemini’s word. Don’t send mixed messages. Say what needs to be said–but without the drama please. Don’t put yourself down–not when talking to others, not when talking to yourself.

Are you suffering from heartbreak? It stinks, doesn’t it? And it’s painful. It makes my heart center literally hurt.

Although nothing works better than tincture of time, here are some easy spells to help heal your broken heart.

You Have No Power Over Me Charm

You’ll need a bowl of water, a small jar, a candle, some rosemary (dried is fine), vanilla extract, cinnamon, thyme, and the necklace of your choice.

Put the necklace into either the water or into the small jar if it cannot be put directly in water.
Light the candle and let some wax liquify.
Then pour the melted wax, the herbs, spice, and vanilla into the water.
Stirring clockwise, say, “You have no power over me” while visualizing the person who broke your heart.
As you wear the necklace, feel its protective energy surrounding you.

Let-It-Go Eucalyptus Vapor

Fill a bowl with hot water, add a couple of drops of eucalyptus essential oil, drape a towel over your head and inhale the steam.

Going through a breakup can put us on an emotional rollercoaster. Hurt, anger, sadness, nostalgia—it can be overwhelming. Eucalyptus will help release what you’ve held onto for too long.

Emotional Release Bath (or shower)

Ok, this will take more than five minutes but you’re worth the extra time. You know you are.

Gather ½ cup of sea salt, ½ cup Epsom salt, rose petals or lavender for self-love and peace, and lemon peel for emotional cleansing (put these in one of those mesh bags you have saved). If you have some hyssop (lightens your vibration) or angelica root (for healing), toss those in, too.

Run the bath, pour in the salt, hop in, and let the petals and peel steep. Cry into the water if tears come. Come to a peaceful realization that this connection must be severed because it is no longer serving your highest good (or theirs).  When you’re done, stay in the tub as you drain the water, visualizing your negative emotions going down the drain with the water.

If you’re not a bath person, make a scrub with equal parts white and brown sugar, a bit of jojoba, almond, or coconut oil, and the rose petals or lavender and some grated lemon peel. Use this scrub in the shower and again see your negative emotions running off you and down the drain. Careful—the shower floor may be slippery afterward.

Whichever spell you choose, when you’re done, put on your comfy clothes and settle on the couch with a cup of tea made with rose petals and a touch of honey.

Be gentle with yourself. Know that Spirit loves you deeply and eternally. A brighter future awaits you.