In Comes November

Unless you're here for the first time and know nothing about witches, you know by now that October is my absolute favorite month. This one was a little rougher than most, but in true October fashion it all came together and created a stunning bigger picture for the season and I am so happy with how it all came together. Here's some snapshots for the month as we move into November. I often forgot how lovely November can be too. This year I might have some fun semi-surprises going on in my personal life, and will have some events/press/etc. going on that I'll probably talk about here. Here's where October took me:

• My Tarot Practice: took a bit of a hit this month, and after a real rollercoaster year in my creative life, I struggled to find spiritual and emotional centeredness, eventually getting there by the end of the month. I've decided to shelve my push to work events for awhile (inspired in part by this post), if not forever. I was shocked when that decision resulted in a new burst of individual client work, potential writing and collaborative opportunities, and a few exact ideal events (but not an overwhelming amount) cropping up. Sometimes you have to kill something that's been stressing you or bringing you down to achieve the greatness you know you deserve, and that's a core tenant of my life, yet I am always surprised by how quick that turnaround was.
  
  My tarot highlight of the month was reading at the anniversary party for the Eye of Horus--I had such a lovely time and got to read for a store regular dressed as Rose Quartz from Steven Universe! I love my work family so much. They have been so supportive of my tarot career inside and outside of the store and I really feel I've grown as a reader and a witch in ways I never anticipated when I nervously went in for my audition gig. I'm so grateful and so happy for such a celebration of their 13th year.
• Things I Wrote: While I kept up with my steady writing gigs and am happy with the (sparse, few, but lovely) things I posted here, one of my best memories for the month (and year!) was featuring at Story Club, a local storytelling event in which I talked about one of my worst and least talked about trauma sources. The crowd was perfect and I feel such an intense relief--and an intense eagerness for more storytelling opportunities!
• Theatre Life: GADFLY KILLED IT THIS MONTH. I am beside myself. Our first mainstage show at the Gallery sold out it's entire closing weekend, and in fact oversold one night (which was stressful in its own right, but the right kind of stress). In addition to that, we welcomed long-time queer art icon company Patrick's Cabaret into the space for regular events, and got to see some of our all time favorite performers at Outspoken queer open mic's third anniversary.
• Other Things I Loved: Manny and I's queerplatonic partnership turned 13! Exciting stuff. We met right around Halloween--we didn't get to celebrate until just barely into November, but it was marvelous nonetheless. Our Samhain ritual with another friend was very special and really magick (and unexpectedly invigorating). Other fun things from the month:
  • All of my friends' Halloween costumes were so cute! Manny went as Tina Belcher, and I spent time with a Ghostbuster. Those were my faves, but everyone rocked it this year. You can see some on my personal instagram. I also do a (mostly daily) free promotional reading to help guide your day there.
  • I saw Chastity Brown in concert again, this time on her own! Her voice alone brings me to tears, and the intimacy of the space we were at made everything extra evocative.
  • I guess I live here now? A couple of my favorite nights of the month were spent with a fancy overpriced OR really crappy beer, long intense games of oversized Jenga, and some very hostile (on my end) pinball. They have them in more places than just Minneapolis, so see if one's near you if you aren't living here!
  • Walks along the Mississippi never get old, and Pokemon giving us extra candy and ghosts made that extra true. I also love just sitting by the dam and listening though, and there's usually a busker I really love right nearby.
  • I did try to go to the Luke's Diner pop-up because I am an unabashed Gilmore Girls fangirl, but the place I was at ran out of everything! I was so disappointed but consoled myself with Tiny Diner because it's also amazing.
  • Book recommendations! Even This Page Is White by Vivek Shraya left me unable to move or even blink in multiple places. One of the hands down best poetry books I have ever read in my entire life. Buy it right here. Just do it. In lighter news, Spider-Gwen took me awhile to get to. It was on my comics list, just not high priority. I'm glad I delved in though, it's pretty rad. I've also been plowing my way through 11/22/63 by Stephen King. I'm not finished, but I'm super into it. King is a bit of a guilty pleasure for me--I don't love his protagonists most of the time, and plotholes exist pretty plentifully in his world, but this one is really absorbing and a great offset to a hectic, tumultous, but ultimately good month.
  • TV & Music Recommendations: This season of How to Get Away With Murder is seriously heart attack inducing. I just want my big dumb babies to be okay. I also hopped on the Steven Universe bandwagon late in the game but I'm ridiculously here for it. I already talked to you about Chastity Brown but WOW. Her CD and EP will cut to your core. It didn't get much notice, but Rufus Wainwright has a CD of Shakespeare's sonnets set to music. It's not for everyone--but it is amazing if you're into that sort of thing.

That was my month! I hope you all had a marvelous month of spoop and celebration and witchery. Feel free to tweet at me, leave comments, etc. to tell me about your own month or chime in about my recommendations. Until next time,

Blessed Be.

Literary Magic: Two Must-Reads to Snag ASAP

Originally this was going to be two separate posts. I read a lot and I always do a book recommendation or two from the month in my End of Month wrap-up, but occasionally a book stands out so far above and beyond--AND fits right into what I want to do with my tarot practice and this blog that they deserve their own time. Each of these definitively deserve their own time, but between moving and maintaining everything I just don't have the time each deserves.

Nonetheless, I wanted to say SOMETHING about them and push, push, push you to go buy them as soon as humanly possible. The first will be of interest to ANYONE who found their way here via my Queering the Tarot series or by cross searching "queer" and "tarot".

Jailbreaking the Goddess takes critiques every progressive person has about the traditional Maiden, Mother, Crone Goddess path (ugh, virginity! ugh, wombs!) and offers a much-needed alternative. Larissa Firefox Allen's FIVE-FOLD Goddess path gets us away from woman = body and creates a nuanced, full look at Goddess energy and how it potentially applies to our work with this new understanding. Not only is this line of magick much more welcoming to trans Goddess worshippers, but the additional faces of the Goddess offer a whole new world of opportunity and understanding in our spiritual practice.

Firefox Allen also pulls no punches when discussing appropriation and colonization of spirituality. While those of us who have been doing feminist and anti-racist work for awhile may find a few chapters a little "Radicalism 101", for many picking up this book they are a necessity. For the rest of us--well, having some pages we can merely skim makes it all the easier to process our new understanding of our own dieties. My personal favorite part of the book's unique (and so easy to follow!) structure was the sections highlighting examples of dieties--AND REAL HUMANS--who exhibit the characteristics of the Goddess aspect being discussed. My only real critique of Jailbreaking the Goddess is that the journal prompts are almost too frequent. You may pick it up and decide I'm wrong, but since I tend to highlight, take notes, etc. when reading anyway, an additional prompt after basic material introductions threw me off. I complied in the beginning but by the third face, I just read several sections at a time and then journaled my reactions to the questions that came up either in prompts or other thoughts I had. Even with that distraction, this book significantly deepened my relationship with the Divine, helped me heal emotionally in a lot of places, and completely altered how I think about spiritual energy for the better. And even for someone who wears their queerness, their feminism, their radicalism like a second skin, it definitely opened my eyes to new ways to practice my faith in a more conscientious, decolonized way.

This next one may come as a surprise to some of my readers. I am incredibly skeptical about books bordering on self-help, even when disguised as business or finance books, and I keep my relationship with money pretty separate from everything else I do. However, a few people I really respect on the metaphysical blogosphere were pretty excited about it, so I went ahead and ordered Bari Tessler's The Art of Money. Three pages in, I had to put it down because I was crying. Hysterically. This book is about so much more than money, best practices, and spiritual entrepreneurship. It is part self-help but it actually helps. The first third of Tessler's program focuses on healing your emotional relationship with money, and before you roll your eyes, just check out the book. This section of the book literally changed my life. Tessler has us delve into money memories, and it has completely altered my perception of what is and isn't possible in my life in all the best ways. It has also made me more fearless in my business practices. It is intense emotional therapy, and everyone I've had read it had a similar reaction. Yet just when you think you're totally overwhelmed and aren't sure what your next move should be, Tessler introduces you to some incredibly practical measures that changed my life in a much more mundane but prosperous way. I was shocked when I did my first accounting session with myself; first by how much I was making, then by how much I was spending. One of the money stories that was wrong that I have told myself was "you don't have money"--over and over since childhood. Which made me unaccountable as an adult solo entrepreneur to anyone but my landlord (who I always managed to pull it together for). I'm certainly not dining with the Kardashians anytime soon, but getting my spending in a couple of areas under control is JUST as important to me right now as bringing more in after actually seeing the numbers. (Actually, post-move that's not really true, but in general it absolutely is.)

Tessler also takes care to stress that there are very real societal issues that may prevent you from fully reaching your financial potential, and admits she doesn't have solutions for that--instead the practical tips she does offer and her insistence on values-based bookkeeping will help almost anyone, and certainly anyone who does have steady income. Tessler also stresses that this one book is not the permanent solution. You have to keep healing your relationship with money, and you have to keep letting that relationship evolve and begin to affect your other habits. It may take re-reads and years of consistent journaling, but it beyond a doubt turned my relationship with money completely upside down even on this first go-round.

This is an admittedly abrupt end to this blog, but that's what I've got today! Now go, get all well-read and stuff. Until next time,

Blessed Be.

Los Angeles, Queer Art, and the Eye of Horus

Oh gosh, friends. March 2016 will go down in my personal history as one of the best and worst months of my entire life. The things that were good were unbelievable, but the things that weren't have made me feel like crumbling and giving up on various dreams for the first time really in my life. I absolutely love everything I do, but when you are trying so hard in one area and it feels like you're getting nowhere, it is a hopeless feeling. After many tarot readings and much soul-searching, I once again know I am doing the right things in the right place in generally the right time. I know things are going to turn around, I do. In the meantime, here are the highlights of where I went when I wasn't writing this blog:

• My steady tarot gig gives me so much solace. Everyone was so happy to see me when I came back from LA, and I have some clients going through much tougher things than I that are handling it with so much grace. Sometimes my clients truly do inspire me as much as I hope to be helping them, and it's such a joy be at The Eye of Horus a few days a week.
• I road tripped to LA with two of my dearest friends to marry off one of our other dearest friends. I never did do an official travel diary in spite of feeling incredibly spiritually connected to so much of what happened, but I ate some of the best food of my life, saw some friends who are so, so special to me when I wasn't doing wedding stuff, shopped Studio City, did so much tarot on patios and reading in hot tubs, and the road trip itself brought me to tears with the beauty of the Rockies, the desert, and so much more.

Ignore my total femme fail nail situation going on here.

• My beloved theatre company curated what I honestly think were three amazing nights of all LGBTQQIAP+ entertainment, and while so much of the process didn't pan out like we hoped, the generosity of performers, the venue, and the audience that did come was unparallel to anything we've experienced thus far. Honestly, by the end of the process I could have been a million times worse off but so, so many beautiful people around me gave so much of themselves when I needed them too, and in the end we did raise some money for a space, and we did make new Gadfly fans, and we did have so much to be grateful for.
• After L.A. I planned to get reacquainted with my new living space, and get the cats used to everything. In between writing articles, planning my next artistic ventures, and everything else that went on, I did manage too. My fluffy cat is still a jerk to the dog, but the dog's learned to let it go, and they DO all sleep in the luckily King sized bed with me.
• You might hear more about this later, but the QPP and I have been in a weird headspace so we've been adventuring around the Twin Cities by checking out new spots...but also by checking out old haunts from when we were other people with other squads. It's been interesting, and we're not done yet, so I want to see where this ultimately takes us and why before I say too much else.
• Among the great new things I've tried, there is an innovative new ice cream place that I'm in love with (so not vegan, so don't even care). I know that sounds hella pretentious, and it kind of us, but it's also a total party in your mouth. I also love the rebranding and new menu at one of my old faves, and two of my dearest friends took me here for belated birthday treats (pictured below).

• I was on a few podcasts and it was really fun. Check out Magnotronic here and Broadside here! I also did KFAI's Fresh Fruit again, but I'm not sure if the recording is still up.

There really were a lot of highlights this month. In addition to my personal highlights above, a good friend of mine won an amateur drag competition I was lucky enough to see, I read a lot of really amazing books (including the new Jhumpa Lahiri, which is one of the single best books I have ever read) and graphic novels, (This one sticks with me the most.) and I'm a little late to the game, but when I really needed to hide away from the world I caught up with Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, a surprisingly progressive show doing some really interesting things artistically and socially.

Please feel free to chime in promoting your own recent work or letting me know where to find cool stuff online or in Minneapolis I'd be into!

Until then, Blessed Be.