🌑 I Did It! & No Fear

it’s a new moon in aries 🌑

Listen to me read this essay:

Well, I did it! I transitioned this newsletter to Substack

If you’d like to support my work — you can become a paid subscriber (thank you for your support).

Thank you for being here!

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Image description: Collage on black background with various images including from top to bottom, right to left: a femme dancer in a white dress, a group of people of color including American Indian elders praying, my sister Finot holding a handful of plants she’s pulled, a colorful illustration of planet earth with North America facing forward, a group of dancers forming a base around one dancer whom they are holding up, an illustration of femmer face with a cherry in their mouth, an illustration of a black femme with outstretched arms, a small photo of amsculine person with an outstrecthed right arm and an illustration of a person free falling forward with arms behind themselves.

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Next month, I’m teaching a 3–week course on grief and mourning and ways we can cultivate our own unique processes for exploring both. Let It All Out!: Cultivating Mourning Practices for Grief Release is happening Tuesdays, May 9, 16, & 23 from 6–8 pm ET on Zoom (and recorded for those who register). ✨REGISTER HERE✨

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Hi friends

Sooooo, those fevers I mentioned last time? Sepsis (!😮!), which landed me in the hospital for four nights.

I KNOW!!

I’m doing ok, but SHEESH!! I thought 2023 was going to give me a break.

I’ve long been susceptible to infections because of the effect of one of my hormone drugs on my lymphocytes, the lymphedema in my left arm/hand, and the overall toll that stage 4 cancer takes on my immune system. But this infection was caused by an undetectable bacterial exposure likely related to microabrasions on my skin that no one could have predicted or noticed. I now know that I must always carry broad spectrum antibiotics with me, especially when I travel (and for this knowledge – which I would not have without this experience – I am incredibly thankful).

This was certainly not my first medical emergency, or even the first one I confronted alone. But this was the first time in fourteen years that I faced such an acute crisis while living on my own. At home, unsure of what was happening, I had a moment of panic that touched into old wounds. I recognized a very young part of me who perpetuates a childhood narrative of abandonment. She was spiraling. I calmed myself by recognizing: 1) I am not a child — I am a grown ass capable woman 2) I have survived many, many medical calamities over eighteen years living with cancer 3) I am in fact not alone — I am surrounded by an abundance of incredible friends (in my building, across the street, blocks away, across the river, around the globe) who would appear at my side within a moment’s notice.

Lying in bed and shivering with chills, I placed my hands on my heart and reminded myself aloud “I am an adult. I am safe. I am loved. Everything will be ok.”

Then my temperature spiked to 104, I got my ass out of bed, notified some friends that I was taking myself to the MSK ER, packed a bag, and took a Lyft to Manhattan.

It took a while for the doctors to figure out what was going on with me. They conducted every possible test and scan (biggest shout out to MSK staff!). Because of some insurance issues, I haven’t had a PET Scan in almost two years (my oncologist uses a combination of other tests to track my illness). However, since they couldn’t detect the cause of the infection, they were cleared to order one during this stay.

Because PETs identify every spot of malignancy, and because my metastasis is in various locations throughout my body, these scans usually elicit in me very, very high levels of scanxiety about new or increased cancerous activity. But a funny thing happened – I was inside the machine, more than half way through the twenty minute process, when I noticed I wasn’t even thinking about the scan. I searched my mind and heart for fear and couldn’t find any. I was simply feeling sensations, watching the blinking lights, considering the kindness of the infectious disease specialist whose name I could not remember no matter how much I tried… you know, simply being in the moment.

Image description: Film still of Nina Simone with caption “I’ll tell you what freedom is to me, no fear.”

Before you get the wrong idea: I am NOT saying I no longer have fear. That would be ridiculous. Also, dangerous. But I am saying that maybe I have experienced so many brushes with death, so much loss, so many “emergencies” that I simply know in my bones that, overall, everything IS ok.

Because it is.

I have something that’s considered incurable. That’s ok. I have chronic conditions including pain that may never resolve. That’s ok. I feel better today. That’s ok. I may not feel better later. That’s ok. My body is scarred and deformed. That’s ok. It feels like my hot flashes may never ever end. That’s ok. I will definitely die someday. That’s ok. I don’t know when. That’s ok.

Sixteen years ago, during another hospitalization connected to another wacky confluence of events (a cancer drug shot that led to a cyst bursting that led to severe vomiting that led to a twisted intestine that led to kidney failure), my oncologist at the time said to me, You need this like you need a hole in your head.

Because I grew up with immigrant parents who did not speak to me in our mother tongue, I do not easily understand idioms or sayings — in any language. Generally, native speakers repeat idioms over and over again in context until their meanings become like mini teachings. Kids pick these up from their elders. But I didn’t regularly hear idioms. When I did, they were usually said around but not to me, so I classified them under “random things American adults say.” I never really bothered to try and understand them.

As someone who loves words, it is a bummer to have no instinctive capacity with pithy expressions (although, I do love imitating my mom’s adorable attempts at American idioms — my favorite: quick, Sebene, go find a piece of wood and touch it). Knock on wood was probably one of the few idioms I understood because it was incredibly common and its meaning was easy to grasp because it was a practical (and ominous) instruction.

Of course, I’d heard the “hole in your head” idiom but had never really considered it because it was never directed at me. When Dr. Grace (best name for a doctor ever) said “you need this like you need a hole in your head,” the absurdity of my situation allowed the saying to finally click. In that instant, I thought to myself: I have so many other things to worry about, like, oh, I don’t know, stage 3 cancer and impending surgeries and chemo and radiation… I need a twisted intestine and kidney failure as much as I need a literal hole in my head. Yes, YES, this saying makes perfect sense! I actually said aloud to him “Oh, NOW I understand what that means!”

These past two weeks, as I considered whether to make the jump to Substack, the expression experience is the mother of wisdom has been reverberating in my mind. I thought about the incredible insights I’ve gained from the life I’ve led. As I’ve shifted my writing away from didactically teaching the wisdom of others, I recognize that sharing my life experience IS the value I have to offer.

Except it’s hard to share it if I’m hiding it.

Someone emailed a few months ago to ask me where they could find my past newsletters. I had to respond with “nowhere.” The platform I used, while otherwise fine, does not have an archive for posts. The hard work I put into dozens of newsletters over the past decade is concealed (though I did cut and paste over 2 dozen into the Substack archive).

Why am I hiding my wisdom?

In addition, it’s hard to share my work it if it’s not sustainable.

[Yes, I am talking about cash dollar bills. I will write about money in a future post because I know it makes most of us uncomfortable mostly because we project a lot of fear and centuries of oppressive human mess onto it… poor, poor money.]

I rely on my newsletter (and somewhat on Instagram) to reach new people. While I have a decent size list, it’s hard to get new subscribers on a “private” platform. In contrast, in the two days I’ve been on Substack, I’ve gotten over a dozen new subscribers (including a few paid) without any promotion whatsoever.

I no longer have a jobby job and I do not center my teaching through institutions. I don’t have a salary (or sick leave, hello!). This newsletter is the primary audience for my offerings, and my offerings are my current livelihood. This means, that I generate most of my own income, through my own promotion of my workshops and courses. Substack will allow me to invite support for my writing as I continue to promote my teaching.

Why would I leave money on the table? (Now, there’s an idiom for you.)

If you would like to support me financially in this space, you can become a paid subscriber.

Thank you for being with me in this new form. I’m happy to be here with you… like, literally.

May we all remember that everything is ok.

With love,

Sebene

p.s. The new moon/eclipse is actually tomorrow but it’s not wise to start new ventures during a solar eclipse so I’m sending this a bit early — there’s your cosmic connection for today. 😉

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I recently took an incredible “Writing About Ancestor Trouble” class with Maud Newton. She will be teaching a one session, stand alone class called Family History with Imagination on June 18th, and I know it will be wonderful.

My friend and coach, Chela Davison, is compiling her decades of leadership and genius into a self-paced, self-coaching program called Lead Yourself that starts May 22. I’ve recommended Chela’s work here before as well as to numerous friends who’ve all benefitted greatly from her process and presence. She’s a master-coach and Lead Yourself is her master-piece. I’ve known and worked with Chela for many years and I cannot say enough good things about the incredible power she holds in helping people find and harness their calling. I get nothing from promoting her except the satisfaction of steering folks toward their purpose. If you’re interested in learning more, she’s leading a series of free workshops where you can explore her work. You’re welcome.

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Let It All Out!: Cultivating Mourning Practices for Grief Release

Grief and mourning are often incorrectly considered synonymous. But grief is what we feel when confronted with loss. Mourning is how we process those feelings. Every traditional culture honors grief as a threshold, not an indefinite state.

Grief is an awakening portal. Mourning is the passageway through.

Except most of us have lost our traditional mourning rituals. As moderns, we are steeped in an anti-death culture that obscures grief. We lack ways to honor loss as a natural part of life; we lack processes for channeling the strong energies of grief. This leads us to become trapped in our own ongoing, agonizing thoughts and feelings.

Mourning is inherently embodied — energetically shifting and transmuting the energies of loss & sorrow into gratitude & grace. Mourning rituals are creative and collective and celebratory. They include wailing, song, dance, prayer, the elements, nature, community (and more wailing).

With attention and care, we can understand loss as a natural part of the cycle of the universe, we can revive our innate understanding of how we specifically need to mourn, and we can release grief -- allowing it to be the portal to wisdom & compassion — to awakening — it's always been known to be.

Over these 3 weeks, we will explore both current and traditional relationships to grief & mourning. Each of us will touch into the particular losses that we have not yet fully mourned. Participants will be invited to independently explore the mourning practices of their ancestry as well as others that might feel resonant. Finally, we will craft personal, unique, embodied, expressive mourning rituals to release our grief.

Come, let it all out!

Register Here