Initiate Yourself: Recipes for Collective Evolution in June 2020
Theme for June – New Dimensions
We’ve consumed all the media on our to-watch lists, we’ve revisited the nostalgia that keeps us warm, we’ve started regular video calls and events to keep ourselves busy, but the ache for novelty, for exploration, for self-discovery still gnaws from within, and the uncertainty of the global situation obscures the future.
While creativity has taken a backseat to self-care for several months now, you may feel its reemergence as it asks, what can I not help but make? Now is the time to explore the trapeze between artistic mediums as you play with depth, texture, meaning, and pressure. How can you add another dimension to whatever is calling you? What are you beginning? What makes you a beginner?
Below, you will find experiments for reestablishing access to your creativity and building bridges toward community inspiration.
These are games for your intuition. If you're not having fun, stop and go do something fun or fulfilling. You will find ease in accessing intuition, so if it isn't easy, it isn't intuition. If you don't believe in intuition, use your imagination.
Experiments for June
1. Sustainable Hedonism – In Pleasure Activism by Adrienne Maree Brown (highly recommend), the author states that “pleasure… is about learning what it means to be satisfiable, to generate, from within and from between us, an abundance from which we can all have enough.” Explore what it means to live from your own pleasure, seeking out only what feels good and is an act of self-love for your future self.
Make a detailed list of what you find pleasurable and what would be enough (poem as example below). Get specific about how often you need something to happen in order to feel satisfied. How does identifying areas that feel impossible to satisfy open new portals for self-discovery and growth?
Challenge Mode: Isolation, lockdown, shelter in place, and reopening all create an experience in your body that you have little control over. What steps could you take to enjoy even that state of being? Where are you afraid of enjoying yourself? Where does guilt stop you from your complete experience of pleasure?
2. Your Perfections Are Showing – Now that so much of our lives has moved online, the tailored, polished, Instagram-perfect smiles aren’t cutting it anymore. We crave authenticity; we crave the flaws, imperfections, and details that give dimension and shape to our personalities. Post an unmanicured selfie online, share some in-process art, show the reality of your lived-in experience in all its messy glory.
Challenge Mode: What do you hide from the people in your immediate circle? What do you enjoy being left out of? Where do you seek out privacy? What does it mean to keep secrets not out of dishonesty but for the sake of surprise and pleasure? Share a secret moment with someone close to you (whether in person or over video) and explore how this adds a dimension to your intimacy.
3. Divided Attention – Splitting your awareness between activities does not necessarily diminish the experience of doing either. In fact, you may experience less restlessness and more pleasure by multitasking. Doodle while talking to a friend on the phone, crochet while watching TV, set your feet in a warrior pose while doing the dishes, wax philosophical while watering your flowers. How does the addition of an activity create unexpected layers in your experience?
Challenge Mode: One of the best ways to add story and meaning to a situation is to experiment with roleplay. Ask yourself: what type of person would enjoy this activity? Why would they enjoy it? Consider doing mundane tasks as that character. What does it feel like to run or cook or sleep or clean in character? What do you discover about that personality type and yourself in this process? To find a community involved in this process, see r/tulpas.
4. Comfort in Connection – If you are not physically comfortable when you do video calls or attend online events, you will be unable to give yourself completely to the experience and will spend the whole time hoping it will be over soon. Take some time this month to increase the level of comfort, access, and beauty in the space where you connect digitally with others. Change your background, add pillows, get a better chair. Allow digital connections to come to you in your comfort zone rather going to them.
Challenge Mode: What events haven’t yet successfully made the transition online? Explore the options to become a facilitator of an event you are missing right now. Host an open mic, do an improv dance night, teach a skill, start a book club, guide a ceremony.
Here are a couple resources to help:
Jitsi – This is a free Zoom-like platform that is free, doesn’t require an account, and promotes easy access through a simple browser link. You don’t have to download anything.
Jackbox – This is a set of party games you can play over video with friends and family in multiple locations. You only need a phone to play. Though this is not free, only one person needs to purchase it.
Please tell us how these experiments are working for you! We would love to hear from you at r/highpriestesses.
“what is enough” by K. M. Lighthouse
when i feel artistic, enough is lines of paint puffed / up from the canvas and marks / on my fingers for days at a time. when i am / intermittent fasting, enough is eating / lunch immediately after breakfast / and drinking iced seltzer / from a wine glass. when i am polyamorous / and open my heart to everyone, enough / is meeting strangers several times a month. when i am screaming / out for purpose, enough is one person / a week saying what you did is / valuable, i liked it, this helped me. when i am dirty / and water only drips, enough is the full blast / of a showerhead that will forevermore / be a luxury. when i am hungry / for affection, enough is kissing you / on the cheek seconds before you launch / a video meeting. when i want / my mother’s arms around me, enough is wearing / the blanket she made like a shawl, letting / my fingers poke through lacy edges. when i am sleepy, nine hours / is enough to know i’ve made progress / on the body’s deficit. when i am tired / of everyone, enough is having a room / to myself full of colors i always want inside me. when / i am angry and want to burn everything / to the ground, enough is one friend / saying just breathe / while i’m crying. when i am lost, enough is one / protein bar and comfortable shoes. when i am scared / of the future, knowing i make my schedule / on Monday mornings is enough. when / i am irrationally happy, enough is / wearing a sequin jacket that makes one person / laugh. when i lack confidence, enough is giving / a toddler a moment of agency / over her body. when i am bored, enough is one piece / of queer media. when i am starved for perspective, enough / is one person saying from a great distance / you don’t know everything yet. when i grow / disenchanted, enough is being the only one / to see the hummingbird at the window.
Recap of May’s Experiments
The offerings for May included finding flexibility in structure, revisiting media, exploring what progress is sustainable, and categorizing types of intentions.
When I was at my lowest last month, I leaned hard on the fact that I knew, regardless what happened, I would make a schedule for myself on Monday. If I felt listless and didn’t have anything to do, I could look at what I had planned for myself and take that as a cue. Though I started out only following my schedule about 60 percent of the time, I am gradually getting better at owning the breaks I need and staying on task during designated time periods. I try to leave space in at least one weekday for things I don’t anticipate needing extra space for.
Regarding my exploration of nostalgia, I found it incredibly fruitful to revisit video games now that I have more of a context for roleplaying. It was an entirely new experience for me, and I played Dragon Age 3 as an agent of Novelty, exploring what it would look like to play the game from an extreme dedication to changing things up. I loved it. I also found a lot of value in digging back through my job history to look for something I might enjoy doing part time since I lost my job. I remembered that I have a sincere interest in chemistry and have been wondering about getting a part-time lab tech position since the increase in testing has also increased demand for workers in that industry.
While I had been doing a half-assed keto diet plan for a while, it was becoming clear that it wasn’t working for me anymore as it has been more of an ordeal to get to the grocery store and my body doesn’t want heavy foods early in the morning. Instead, I have switched to intermittent fasting, which has really worked well for me. I am drinking tea and calling that breakfast, eating at noon, and making sure I don’t have anything after 8 p.m. If I get munchy before bed, I drink an iced seltzer water in a wine glass to feel fancy. My weight has decreased back down to what is healthy for me, I am sleeping better, and I feel thin and less bloated. It’s great.
With intentions, I have enjoyed separating out group intentions from the personal intentions I make at the beginning of the events I lead. I use two pieces of paper now instead of one to be clearer about which things I want for the sake of the group and the container and which things I want for myself inside the experience. I’ve also been exploring what it means to be committed to a process, especially in terms of living a revolutionary life. I am finding that living from my pleasure and being my whole queer polyamorous self out in the open is making the waves I want to see in the world. I was even contacted by a close friend about how it has been to continue living with an ex, and I was so happy to explain my obstacles and discoveries with her.
Thanks for checking out June’s experiments! See you next month!