This lunation cycle asks: What burdens are you carrying that don't belong to you? What obligations have you taken on not from genuine care or sacred responsibility, but from fear of disappointing others, from childhood patterns of earning love through service, from the lie that your worth is measured by your usefulness?

Mercury retrograde through Sagittarius and back into Scorpio until November 29 adds another layer to this work. We're being asked to retrace our steps, to review the promises we've made, to reconsider the contracts—spoken and unspoken—that govern our lives. This is not about shirking real responsibility. This is about discernment.

This creature, also called Sea Star, which I love, inhabits the ocean floor across the globe, even at the deepest depths and in the most frigid temperatures. They have existed for at least 450 million years. Starfish was alive before Pangea was formed. Starfish is older than trees. Starfish is older than the North Star, and older than the rings of Saturn. The average lifespan of a single Starfish is estimated to be 35 years, with larger species living longer. Tens of millions of generations have come and gone. (Starfish also has a great butt FYI.)

The phrase "keystone species" was coined to talk about the vital role that Starfish play in their ecosystems, their presence a green flag signaling biodiversity and system health. Starfish asks, what are your green flags for good health?

Starfish teaches us that intelligence lives in the body, that wisdom doesn't require elaborate planning, that survival over hundreds of millions of years comes from sensing and responding rather than analyzing and controlling. When you feel that tightness in your chest when someone asks you for something, that's intelligence. When your stomach drops at the thought of a commitment, that's data. Your body knows what your mind is trying to rationalize away.

This is the work of mutual aid versus charity, of reciprocity versus rescue. You cannot pour from an empty cup, and more importantly, you are not required to be a cup at all. You are Starfish, ancient and resilient, sensing and responding, maintaining the health of the ecosystem through your presence, not your depletion.

We need to be cautious during this time of burnout, and of trying to bury emotions that we aren't willing to feel. You are a body. Your mind, your brain, your consciousness, those are part of your body. The body has to put its sensations somewhere.

If you won't feel your anger, your body will store it. If you won't acknowledge your exhaustion, it will accumulate. If you keep swallowing your "no," eventually something crystallizes, hardens, blocks the flow. The gallstone is the physical manifestation of unexpressed boundaries, of swallowed truths, of bitterness that had nowhere else to go.

Incidentally, it was much more recently that "the gall!" came to mean audacity, something that might be exclaimed about someone daring to set a boundary. This lunation, dare to have the gall.

I want to focus in ceremony this month on magical responsibilities and obligations. When you make compacts and agreements in magical settings, those responsibilities matter. If you have struggled with "productivity" or "habits" in the past, you may have a difficult relationship with responsibility. This month, I want you to pick something to do each day and actually do it.

It does not have to be the same thing every day. You can choose from a list of things with varying energy requirements if that's easier for you, you can even choose things that you do entirely in your head if that is all you have the spoons to do. This is about making commitments to yourself and to your spirits—ancestors, land spirits, deities, etc.—and keeping those commitments, allowing you to build your sense of trust in yourself.

Option 1: Body-Based Check-In Each day, pause and do a Starfish-style sensory scan. Notice three physical sensations without trying to change them. Where is there tightness? Where is there ease? What does your gut say about today's obligations? Record these observations in a voice memo or one-sentence journal entry.

Option 2: The Gall List Keep a running list of moments when you wanted to say no but didn't, or times you noticed someone else's boundary that you wish you could set. Not for guilt, but for data. At week's end, pick one pattern to address.

Option 3: Reciprocity Inventory Each day, name one thing you gave and one thing you received. This can be as simple as "made coffee for partner, received hug from kid" or as complex as "held space for friend's crisis, received validation of my work." Notice patterns of flow versus depletion.

Option 4: Micro-Commitments Make one tiny promise to your spirits each morning and keep it. Light a candle. Pour water for ancestors. Say thank you to the land. The content matters less than the practice of commitment and follow-through.

Option 5: Mercury Retrograde Review Since Mercury is retrograde until November 29, spend the first part of the month reviewing old commitments. Each day, examine one obligation: Is this still aligned? Is this reciprocal? Does this serve? After Mercury goes direct, the second half becomes about implementing what you learned.

For the Gemini full moon on December 15, I want us to celebrate in relationship. You don't have to "do a ritual" with someone else, but I do want you to at least have an enchanted conversation today. That might mean invoking Mercury before sitting down with someone to set a boundary with them. It might mean calling on the Gemini full moon before a stellar creative brainstorming session with an artist collaborator. It could involve lighting a candle before working with a small team on a leftist zine. The energy today is "talking the talk while walking the walk."

Theme: speaking truth, witnessing audacity, releasing resentment

For the Gemini full moon on December 4, gather with at least one other person—in person or by video. This works with small groups of 2-5 people who are willing to get real about capacity and boundaries.

What you'll need:

The Ritual:

Light your candles. Call in your guides and beneficent ancestral spirits. Evoke the Gemini full moon and Mercury for clear communication and the courage to speak truth with compassion.

Each person writes down:

Go around and read them out loud. Here's the hard part: no fixing. No advice. No "oh but I'm sure they didn't mean it that way" or "you're being too hard on yourself." Just witness. Let what's said be said and hang in the air for a minute before moving to the next person.

After everyone has spoken, acknowledge each other. Say something like "I witness your gall" or "I hear you" or whatever feels right. The point is to name that it takes audacity to speak these truths out loud.

Burn the papers together. While they're burning, say out loud what you actually need to keep these boundaries. Get specific.

The Cleansing:

If you're in person, you can do this together or separately. If you're on video, say goodbye and do this part alone.

Run a bath or fill a basin for your feet. Add salt and scented herbs or oils. Before you get in, say everything you're putting down out loud. All of it. The stuff from the burning and everything else that's been weighing on you.

Get in the water. Be Starfish for a bit. Don’t start planning or thinking about what you're going to do differently. Just feel the temperature, the weight of your body, where the water touches your skin. Your body knows things your brain is working overtime to ignore.

When you get out, go outside if you can. Say your boundaries to the wind. Gemini is air, the moon is water. You've worked with both.

After:

Check in with your ritual people in the days after the full moon. Not about whether you're doing it perfectly—you won't be—but about whether you're staying honest. When you slip back into old patterns, notice it. Tell someone. That's the work.

Relational responsibility means showing up as you actually are, not as the person you think you need to be to keep everyone comfortable.