The Day Between

Before the Lions Gate Opens

July 25 is known as the Day Out of Time, a pause between cycles where we are invited to step out of routine and reconnect with a deeper rhythm of life.

This year, I am choosing to experience it as a pause between what has been quietly forming and what is ready to be seen.

Tomorrow, the Lions Gate Portal begins to open. The Lions Gate is an astrological and energetic alignment that occurs each year when the Sun in Leo aligns with the star Sirius and the Earth, creating what many experience as a period of heightened awareness, insight, and energetic amplification. This alignment is often associated with themes of awakening, clarity, and transformation. It begins to build July 26, reaches its peak on August 8, and quickly closes by August 12. The energy does not disappear when the gate closes; what has been revealed continues to move through us.

For the past several years, I have gathered with a small group of people during this time. The gathering came into being because I made a decision almost 10 years ago to make this a time of sacred gathering. In that time, I’ve asked people close to me to join me in making it a time of conscious connection to the gate, ourselves, and each other. The number of people has varied over the years, and it’s certainly evolved in that time.  Each year, we enter the gate together, listening and reflecting on what is ready to be seen, released, or brought forward.

Last year, we worked with a framework I had developed alongside a set of oracle cards. It was powerful, and afterward I began considering what to bring into this year’s gathering. The framework felt important to return to, but this time I felt called to bring it more fully into lived experience.

The cards were created by a dear teach I met in Africa almost 10 years ago and had been a meaningful companion for me in so many ways. I initially planned to use the same deck again and began writing individual teaching for the cards more in line with the gate and its teaching. But something felt off in the writing.

In meditation, it became clear the reason it felt off was that the cards weren’t truly mine. They are beautiful and have supported me in so many ways, but they carry someone else’s vision.

Then the idea came: what if I created my own?

So it began.

I sat with the closed gate and listened. One card name came, then another, until I had a full set. Eight times eight. August 8, the day the gate is fully open. And 64, the year I was born.

Then came the teachings. I asked what needed to be revealed, and one by one, the guidance emerged.

Eventually, I was sitting with the full set. Names, images, and teachings, and bringing it together became a labor of love.

Now I have the prototype of all 64 cards at home. And a few days ago I ordered the first proof of the guidebook. As I did, something settled in me: I created something of my own, and I wrote a book.

The Lions Gate has become more than a date on the calendar for me.  It is a living practice of remembering. Remembering who I am and what my gifts are. Remembering to trust myself first. Trust my body. This year, I am standing at the threshold of sharing something that has grown directly from that practice.

The Vulnerability of Showing the Work

I have spent many hours creating this work, writing, revising, questioning, and listening.

Years ago, I began writing a different book. I worked on it, stepped away, returned, and eventually let it go. Releasing it was difficult, but it created space for this work.

Those earlier stories and that book shaped me, but it’s not the book or the story I am living and writing now.

Creating something privately is one experience; allowing it to be seen is another.

There is vulnerability in sharing work that comes from such personal places. It carries pieces of my history, my spiritual journey, my grief, my joy, my wisdom, and my relationship with the lions and ultimately with myself

Sharing it means risking misunderstanding, judgement and letting go of the need for perfection. It also means acknowledging that this work is still alive and evolving.

Part of me wants to protect it, while another part knows that protection can become hiding or avoidance.

There comes a moment when what has been forming privately must meet the light, and I know I have reached that moment.

A Threshold, Not a Finished Destination

The Day Out of Time feels like the right day to begin, not because everything is finished, but because it represents the space between who I was, who I am,  and who I am becoming.

This work is about that threshold. It is not meant to give rigid answers, but to invite reflection and awareness.

It asks questions, what is becoming clear, where our energy is being scattered, what deserves our devotion, what is being asked to release, what truth our body is already holding, and what it is ready to move into action.

And the question I am sitting with today is this: What am I ready to let others see?

Recently, I looked back at my journal from last year’s gate and found a purpose statement: “My purpose is to be a guide and teacher of staying in all the stages. Magic happens when you stay with yourself over and over.”

I realized that is exactly what I did. I stayed with myself through each stage, kept taking the next step, kept following the next yes,  and something meaningful emerged.

Before the Gate Opens

Today, I am honoring the space before the opening.

I feel both excitement and vulnerability as I recognize the years of experience that brought this work into form.

I honor the lions, the ancestors, the teachers, and the people who have walked alongside me, as well as the part of me that is still nervous.

Courage does not always feel like certainty; sometimes it is simply the willingness to take the next step.

Sharing this work is that step for me.

In the coming weeks, I will begin introducing more of what has emerged and the deeper layers of this body of work.

For today, I am simply standing here, listening, breathing, and allowing it to become visible as the gate begins to open.