Bring it on, ring the alarm
Don’t stop now, just be the champion
Work it hard like it’s your profession

Work Bitch, Britney Spears

• Visit The Bakkenalia at the Bakken Museum for a night of drink tastings, crafts, and learning about botanical oddities. The garden party is from 6-9pm on Thursday June 6th. (Event is 21+ and Admission starts at $17.50)

• Recognize Black liberation at the commUNITY Juneteenth Celebration. On Sunday June 9th, from 2-5pm, this free event will include “a live DJ, food trucks, community partners, and celebration!”

• Celebrate the longest day of the year by, “making fresh-flower head wreaths, singing songs, listening to live music, and dancing around the midsommarstång (maypole)” for the Midsommar Celebration. June 15th at the American Swedish Institute. ($15 for adults, register ahead of time).

Painting is The Covenant, 2016, Bo Bartlett

Archetype of the Month - from Liana

The Good King

“The heaviest penalty for declining to rule is to be ruled by someone inferior to yourself.” - Plato, Republic 

The Good King rules our internal kingdom. By seeking out the organizing principles–values, expectations, goals–we build a structure that, with a sense of safety and purpose, supports self-authority and efficacy. The Good King may also encourage appropriate aggression to protect what you have created.

The King remains good as long as he is serving a generative energy. When we see this archetype in mythology, there is often reluctance or delay in taking the throne (such as with Hindu God-King Rāma, who in the Sanskrit epic the Rāmāyaṇa of Vālmīki is unjustly sent into exile, but in embodying Dharma, a complex concept applying both to his individual path and cosmic law, he fulfills his sentence). This may allude to an intuitive function of the King, as to the most fertile time to rule.

A willingness to abdicate the throne when structure becomes more stifling than supportive also indicates we are not yet in the realm of the Tyrant. We all have external and internal authority figures who impose order through shame, out of desire for power, or in service of values that feel antithetical to our true nature. The archetype of the Good King calls on you to have the courage to rule, to nurture and encourage the strengths of self and strengths of others, and to enact your vision for the kingdom.

Image credit: "Rama Receives Sugriva and Jambavat, the Monkey and Bear Kings," Folio from a Ramayana ca. 1605

Creature of the Month - from Kenna

The Emperor Penguin

It is commonly said that emperor penguins are the best animal dads out there. During the winter, the male penguins huddle together in one large group. Each penguin is incubating one pear-shaped egg while battling the brutal arctic weather. The egg incubation period lasts over sixty days. Throughout that entire time, the dad stays. He stays with the egg that is gently nestled against himself. Waiting, protecting, and loving. A bit over sixty days later, the baby penguin hatches. Still, the dad remains. Now tasked with nurturing the newborn. Eventually, the female penguin does return to assist in raising their little one. 

Here is the real kicker though—throughout that entire time, including the incubation and newborn penguin stage, the male penguin hasn’t eaten a single thing. He never leaves his post. That is real dedication. That is sacrifice. 

Let’s say that the egg represents your goals, dreams, or desires. How can we be like the male emperor penguin? What would it look like to keep your dreams growing despite the elements thrashing against you? If wielded correctly, we can use the dedication and sacrifice embodied by the emperor penguin as an example for nurturing our own goals. It certainly wasn’t easy for the emperor penguin. He barely moved for literally over one hundred days. But at the end of it, his hard work hatched into his baby. Our own goals are often riddled with hurdles and barriers. We must each decide what can be endured and battled to achieve our goals. As the things worth doing, often aren't easy. 

So, what’s your egg?

Thanks for reading!