Why, yes, those are 2 separate audio links – 1 below, 1 above. || My reading of this essay is right before the opening Hi friends. 👇🏾 || A guided meditation is at the top of this email. 👆🏾 || An archive of meditations lives here.
There are 3 spots left for the BIPOC Meditative hike this Saturday, September 7th. More info and registration here.
Registration is open for my signature course (and this newsletter’s namesake), Ancestors to Elements. 🥳 This is a creative & soulful 6-week experience created especially for these challenging times. On Zoom every Wednesday October 9 — November 13, 6–8pm ET. Register and more info here.
Listen to me read this essay:
Hi friends
Happy Labor Day! May this Virgo New Moon initiate the transformation of systems, and usher in new possibilities of power to/for the people. All of us. 🍞✊🏾🌹
It’s autumn (not technically, but humor me), and I’ve been feeling big change of season feelings. Partly it’s the heaviness of all the political mayhem and planetary chaos. A lot is my inner stuff. Last week, it was primarily a certain anger I did not allow myself to experience fully when my marriage fell apart. Would not allow myself to experience fully. I think because, for a very long while, I was in shock and scrambling to figure out how to survive as a self-employed, cancerous, suddenly-single lady. Also, I was utterly exhausted. And kept getting hospitalized. Did I mention shock?
Sometimes dissociation is practical. And, sometimes, sitting in your friend's Subaru on a weekday morning, screaming at someone through the open window about a parking space—as your neighbor quietly watches you completely lose your shit (while seemingly silently acknowledging that, yes, that guy was being a total dick)—is a helpful, if unfortunate, release.
When I texted my friend Shawna, who lives directly across the street from me, to ask if she heard my tirade, she wrote back, "Something in me would love to see you rage. Glad you got some out!" [Thank you, friend. 🙏🏾] Later, after I realized that my meltdown was exactly two years to the day of my relationship imploding (I can't make this stuff up), I honored that pent-up energy by conducting a little fire ritual near one of my ancestor altars. [Thank you, ancestors & elements. 🌍 🌊 🔥 💨 💫] It’s not that I haven’t felt any anger in these two years (my bathtub was a small bonfire for about a month in early 2023). There’s simply a layer (or nine?) that I still can torch, I mean, transmute. That night, the tears came… of course. I always find grief underneath my rage—feelings surfaced by what’s within, but never separate from the pain and loss all around the world.
Thank you for being here and spending time with me despite my glaringly obvious work-in-progressness. How are you?
I have been exceptionally successful about not beating myself up about the above (and that’s one measure of my practice, just as not screaming at that jerk would have been another). Perhaps because recently I’ve had plenty of training in not self-judging. Since January, I’ve been in an amazing class called Personal Mythmaking. I haven’t mentioned this to you yet because I was a bit embarrassed at how unproductive I’ve been. This is a memoir writing class wherein I have produced almost no memoir writing. In eight months! Let me emphasize that this is not a reflection on the program or teacher. Both are absolutely superb. I take comfort in knowing I will have ongoing access to the course recordings and materials. And it’s not that I don’t attend the sessions. That’s where I do write “memoir.” It’s just that I have written close to nothing else. I’ve been both confused and surprised by this.
Obviously, I do not have a problem blathering on about moi (see the other 79 posts published here filled with my nonsense). As well, I know myself enough to understand that I need external motivations to support my aspirations (and this book helped me feel perfectly fine, even good, about that). That’s why I take so many courses and programs. They’re a surefire way for me to focus energy on something I wish to explore. Please give me assignments and targets—when I was writing my book, my editor asked me how I preferred to work with her, and I insisted on multiple immovable deadlines throughout the year. Or I will make some up myself—during my first freelancing stint in 2009, I created my own accountability system by sending emails of my weekly objectives and tasks to my three most disciplined friends.
I am usually a total keener,* so I recognized that something else was happening here. Because, although I started the program strong—clarifying early on that I plan to write a hybrid memoir exploring my Ethiopian and Eritrean heritage and the legacy of imperialism embedded within those cultures, and though Janelle’s genius method of identifying myths to guide our process led me to a tale from the Sami people that perfectly connected to a larger theme around indigeneity that I hope to investigate, and even if I could glimpse the many dots between the personal and the collective that I longed to connect—I still wasn’t feeling called to actually write any of that.
Last year, I read a few books about memoir writing. In itself not a bad idea, but only if I know myself. I realized I was comparing my writing to those “rules” and also to the excellent prose flowing from others in my class. Months in, many were moving steadily along and I was still on Module 2 (I’m still on Module 2). And then, sometime this summer, in one of the Thursday writing circles, Janelle gave us a prompt. She instructed us to describe our family of origin using a reality TV show pitch. It was so. much. fun. And effortless. I giggled as I wrote. With tears streaming down my face, I read it to the others, at times laughing so hard I couldn’t get the words out.
Whether that piece is truly that funny or not is not the point. The point is I understood something fundamental. Of course I want it to be funny. Duh. I’m still that weird Black girl who memorized Monty Python skits, and loved Kurt Vonnegut novels, and has seen “Oh Mary!” twice. Yes, I want delve into these deep issues of ancestry and land and migration and domination and trauma. But I long to do it with both soul and humor.
I told my classmates (such a talented and tender group of people!) that I want to be the “postcolonial David Sedaris but not really.” Last week, I found an early David Sedaris paperback in a giveaway pile in front of a brownstone (Janelle regularly encourages us to look for synchronicities). The cover design is beautiful (books are rarely that pretty anymore), and he definitely can be very funny, but, oh man, a lot of it does not hold up.
I will be a Postcolonial Sacred Clown. Awakened, authentic, researched, raw. Soulful and silly. Indigeneity, Imperialism, Identity! But make it spiritual comedy! I have a lot to learn and practice. This will require time and patience, as well as devotion and compassion. So, I signed up for a six-week clowning class that starts later this week (may we all go where the love is). I’m ready for the ride. 🤡 🚗 🤡
With love,
Sebene
P.S. Janelle is teaching a six month version of Personal Mythmaking starting October 29th! This class provides an innovative, embodied, and rich process for memoir writing. Janelle is a delightful, skilled, and supportive guide. Do check it out!
* At the last Meditation Party, I discovered that keener, meaning someone who is super nerdily-zealous, is actually a Canadianism. None of the Americans, including Dan, had any idea what I was talking about when I used it. Jeff and the other Canadians present knew exactly what I meant and were also confused as to why most people were perplexed by the word. Who knew?
Registration is open!
Created for these challenging times, ANCESTORS TO ELEMENTS is a creative & soulful 6-week course designed to help you embody the sacred paradox of belonging: we are not separate AND we are not the same.
This course creatively engages these two frameworks — elements and ancestors — as ancient & expansive metaphors for exploring how existence rests on a key paradox: you are absolutely interconnected with everything and you are also a uniquely independent being. Through six-weeks of inspiring live lessons, creative practices, journal prompts, guided meditations and community sharing, this course leads you to (re)discover your unique & sacred sense of belonging.
Main sessions run on Zoom every Wednesday October 9 — November 13 from 6–8pm ET. There is an optional 1-hour practice/Q&A sessions on the following Sundays from 5–6pm ET). All sessions will be recorded.
There are three sliding scale payment options.
Pay-It-Forward Price: $480 (works out to $80/week) [This option is for those who easily meet their basic needs of food, housing, transport & leisure... and then some.]
Full Price: $380 (works out to $63/week) CLICK HERE OR USE COUPON CODE: FULL-PRICE [This option is for those who regularly meet their basic needs of food, housing, transport & leisure.]
Need-Based Price: $240 (works out to $40/week) CLICK HERE OR USE COUPON CODE: NEED-BASED [This option is for those who mostly meet their basic needs of food, housing, transport & leisure.]
If the Need-Based Price is a hardship, there are a limited number of pay-what-you-can scholarships available on a rolling basis. Please see the registration page for more info about scholarships (please do NOT reply to this email to request a scholarship).
What people say about my offerings:
"Sebene, You are a bright light of love and inspiration! I loved: you showing up on the computer screen, moving to the music, giving us music to guide our practice; caring feedback to each and everyone; the notions page for easy access to resources; the repetition of the honorings and blessings; summary, recap of the essence of the teachings between lessons, to help connect the threads."
"This is one of the best one-day workshops I've ever attended. Sebene communicates so beautifully and simply."
"I would sign up for literally anything that Seb offers. This workshop helped crack through limiting assumptions about coupledom I didn't even know I had. I've been feeling more comfortable, happy, and empowered in my singleness ever since. Thank you, Seb!
"I loved this course, Sebene! It felt really soulful, aesthetaically pleasing (both the music and slides), and full of brilliance."
"Sebene has a gift for creating space for exploration and acceptance, and I feel grateful to have been part of that space."
"I loved the spaciousness with which you hold space... I love how much YOU are in it. It's definitely not a pass through of generic teaching transmission. It is SO YOU and, at the same time, so expansively welcoming for everyone to show up as their own self."
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