#6: This sparks joy 💥💫

Happy Sunday darling wondrous being!

Feb 26, 2023

Hello loves,

The highlights of my week were: getting to see one of my best friends in NYC and drinking Rooibos tea with blankets in the cold air while catching up on life and what it means to prioritize peace, love, and joy. As always, long daily catch ups with my bestie where we cover the full range of everything — from despair to joy and back again and back again again, as two sensitive cancers doing our best to survive. And eggs. I love eggs a lot. Also I do believe a liberated future (where we are all vibing freely with all the resources we need to thrive, and Black people are safe and sound and regarded as precious, and there are no wars or weapons, and all prisons and jails have been abolished, and everyone can be Ugly because the inherent value of human life is acknowledged and the cult and heirarchy of Beauty is over) is also vegan unless you are an indigenous person or subsistence farmer but here we are. Here is this week’s list!

1. This art

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This week’s artist is: Sinalo Ngcaba. Follow on Twitter here and IG here!!!!!!!

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2. This essay

If you’ve been following me you know how much this essay means to me. I think it has saved me several times. I recommend it to anyone afraid to speak — where speaking could be: coming out, advocating for yourself, leaving a bad relationship, communicating your needs or boundaries, sharing your poems with a wider audience, starting something you have always wanted to. I recently spoke to a new friend about it and it was so lovely that we had both read it and derived so much from it.

3. This concept

My aspiration for friendship is that it feel romantic. It feels like commitment, like random cute texts, like thinking of you, like it was soo good to see you, like waking up to texts, like going on dates, like cuddling (I haven’t actually gotten here yet) and hugging and being together, like hanging out and doing nothing, like traveling together, like deep loving. Like actively trying to deepen our connection — instead of passively letting it be whatever it becomes. This reorientation to friendship? It feels GOOD. It feels like the longing in me for romantic partnership — while still present — is so much less sharp and painful, and it now like a hum that pops in sometimes but does not keep me up at night. And on its own, with no need to contrast it to anything, romantic friendship feels fucking GOOD. It feels like community. It feels like belonging. It feels like home. So my wish for you is that you find, create, and shape romantic friendships if you (perhaps desparately, like me) seek romance and have not yet considered the possibility that it can also be found in friendship.

4. This podcast

This podcast is so fun. I haven’t listened to this specific episode but in general I was craving something light and fun and insightful and that is what it is! I think capitalism and white supremacy is just a network of cults, celebrities, CEOs and entrepreneurs are the cult leaders, and everyone else is forced to become a cult member against their own best interests. Some cults are near and dear to our hearts. These are episodes I would love to see:

The cult of the United States of America
The cult of the military
The cult of beauty
The cult of TikTok (some cults are fun, okay!!!)

5. This essay

I truly feel we are living in an era of watching a true revolutionary, a glorious human being, a sensational writer and artist, and a deeply precious being unfold and share their consciousness with us in real time and I just feel incredibly spoiled and unworthy and grateful.

Ismatu Gwendolyn

we love you. You pour your heart and soul into us. You never shy away from the cold truth. You pick it up like a bladed knife and tell us not just how it looks but what it tastes like. You give us a window into the deepest parts of your existence. You are so complex and profound. You say what many of us are too tired, or afraid, or ashamed, or ignorant, or scared, to say. You are also just objectively such a fucking amazing writer and orator and such a wonderful friend. Thank you for being so generous of your spirit, of your consciousness, of your mind, of your politic, of your body, and of your soul. I love you.

Listen or read here it was hard to choose one but this piece on children really just spoke to me on so many levels as do all their pieces and follow Ismatu everywhere you possibly can and eat their words along with your breakfast and protect them and pour into them and if you have the funds please help feed their family here!!!

6. This episodse

I’m not sure you all know this but my podcast has been super not fun and painful to create. It has taught me a lot about myself. I’m taking a pause from it but it will return! In some shape or format. But TLDR, my experience of it has been one of stress and anxiety, of self-imposed and society-informed pressure, and a lot of my content on doing things that are embarassing etc is to speak to this very part of me that is so ashamed of herself.

All of this — my lack of enjoyment — has been at no fault of my guests who have been wonderful. But there are a couple of conversations that I really [allowed myself?] to love having — as in, I myself actually enjoyed the experience of being in my body instead of feeling terrified of not knowing what to say or how to say it or just being terrified because I am a terrified person. I LOVED having this conversation with Zanele Mji. I hope you’ll listen!

Follow her and her amazingggg work below!! I love her podcast so much!!!!!