Saying I’m Sorry...
Sometimes I get that not-so-fresh feeling.
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It’s been two months since I last wrote. Thank you so much for your patience. The last few weeks have been particularly challenging, amid a challenging almost-year of neck and head pain the likes of which I’ve never known. And I’ve known some pain! It’s being managed and I’m completely fine. But it’s slowed me down in terms of sharing work, here and elsewhere online.
I usually thrive working in—and supporting other creatives to embrace—the scrappy, anti-perfect or punky “good enough” energy of sharing something, as opposed to nothing. Next to reading tarot cards, this is what people come to me for help with. But I’ve realised that in my relationship to myself, this is conditional. It hinges on a certain quality of masking; one that’s easeful, upbeat, and chill. The fucking “chill girl” demon is yet to be exorcised.
Because I haven’t been feeling chill. Nothing has been easy. As Vickie Miner said so beautifully quoted, “sometimes I get that not-so-fresh feeling”. We could easily call it internalised ableism, or a perfectionism relapse, or the legitimate concern of a business owner all too aware of the fickle nature of social media algorithms and audiences under technocracy.
Whatever the reason, I struggle to share “content” (fml) when I’m not feeling fresh. When my health or words or demeanour don’t “sell” ease or happiness or chill. The yarn I’ve been subconsciously spinning myself is: people don’t value you if you’re not in a position/mindset they aspire to be in. If you can’t find the diamond in the mud of experience and use it to inspire them. And so, I’ve been withholding unappealing parts of myself.
Of course, no one lets it all hang out in the public realm, nor should they. But I’m talking about unpacking the ways that even the most defiant among us can fall prey to the insidious, stupefying personal consequence of marketing-think. As in, end-stage capitalism’s spectacle of performance we’re contracted like labourers into when we open a social media app. Even for people who aren’t trying to earn a living with the help of social media—as “users” we’re put (or put ourselves) in the default position of performer, of clown, of “content creator” of one kind or another. Whether we’d like to admit it or not, we all know what the algorithm rewards. We know how consumer psychology works. We know we’re using apps designed to—much like a Vegas mega-casino—captivate, entrance, and mollify. So we play the part.
And this isn’t a judgement. All of us are born to express ourselves and will do it however we can. This form of media works precisely because we want—as our whole selves or at least a version of us—to be seen, known, and understood. We want connection. Based on feedback, I’ve come to learn that my own “part” in other people’s content feed for the last six years is a character who’s fun, colourful, and offbeat. Like Curly Sue, but with tarot. Plus, many casual followers still confuse me for my genius friend, Jessica Lanyadoo.
While I know that the people who engage with my work are more than aware of the vicissitudes of real life and the particularities of social media performance culture, I haven’t given myself the grace of connecting with them (you) when things in my life are actually hard. But as I said in a recent post, I’m becoming more and more okay with being seen differently, as I grow differently.
I’m becoming okay with saying: yes I’m a spiritual practitioner, a creative facilitator, and a future therapist and sometimes I’m a fucking mess. I’m often sad. Sometimes I’m angry. I’m always contradicting myself because I can argue any point and that makes me confused. I’m often in pain. For 10 luteal days out of every period cycle, I feel like I’m going to be sectioned. Sometimes I have autistic meltdowns. Sometimes I just shut down. Sometimes CPTSD won’t let me sleep. And yet, weirdly, I’m also more in touch with the at-peace part of myself than ever.
I look at my family, struggling with their own inherited trauma, addictions, and other maladaptive coping mechanisms, and I think (all together now, al-anons) “only by the Grace of God go I”. I look at my own willingness to try new things, my curiosity as to my own bullshit, and I’m proud. It doesn’t matter whether you feel incredible or like a piece of shit, if you know what you value and can make the smallest step towards that value.
When I’m in pain and I don’t want to eat breakfast, I might recall that I value my body. Then I could get up and at the least, sip on a dairy-free Up&Go, because it proves to me that I care. When I’m melancholic, I might recall that I value forgiveness. Then I can choose to look at myself in the mirror and say I’m sorry, because it proves to me that I care.
I think this is the source of my at-peace part. It’s a quality of willingness. Willingness to make amends with self, again and again. And the more I make amends, the less I need to perform chill-ness founded in self-abandonment. It’s a journey without a map. I don’t know exactly where I’m going. I just know that I’m in that phase of unmasking where neuro-neutrality, like body-neutrality, is more aligned with my values than performative put-togetherness.
Lately, I’ve made small steps towards a more unmasking-informed, value-anchored version of online expression. They might seem trivial, but I hope they offer something in the way of inspiration for considering your relationship to yourself and its impact on the way you express yourself publicly as a creative.
~ I finally changed the colours on my website. I did this both to temper the noisy “look at me” brightness of my previous colours, and because said colours have become a little too on-trend for this contrarian wild brumby. There’s nothing like writing a book on colour magic to make you sensitive to the sublimative impulses alive in digital decoration.
~ Likewise, I changed all the photos around, to mix muted colours with black and white, and choose pictures that felt more grounded.
~ I also went through all the copy and deleted or edited anything that felt persuasive. The ethics of copywriting are non-existent, outside of individual moral code, so as creatives and artists we can never be too discerning with our choices.
~ I’ve been offering creative facilitation/coaching to only 1—2 people at a time, which I haven’t done since 2020. I’m promoting this and tarot readings less in general, to keep numbers manageable and because I’ve needed a break to reflect on all *this*.
~ I’m using the word “facilitation” more and the word “coaching” a little less. Simply because it feels wider, truer, and more relevant to my ongoing M.A training as an arts-based therapist. I will still act as a private coach, but the methods are evolving.
~ I’ve been allowing myself to follow my obsessions more fluidly, which has led to starting a vintage clothing brand which is going well. I’m resisting the urge to self-criticise for making money in diverse ways instead of doing one thing well. Fuck that. I love market life. And I’m slowly putting pieces online too. Follow my store!
~ I’ve been on social media a lot less lately. It’s been nice.
Why am I sharing all this? Because I’m sick of personal growth and healing language being sieved through the discourse of capitalistic progress and optimisation. I’m sick of people making money by acting if they’ve beat the final boss of healing and now you can too. I’m sick of the MLM-ification of digital expression where everybody parrots each other. I’m sick of pretending that we’re not in a worsening climate catastrophe. I’m sick of people pretending they know what they’re doing. And if I ever gave you an impression to the contrary, then I’m so, so sorry. And when I say “sorry” (millennial women and AFAB people know all about the last decade’s feminist kibosh on apologising) I just mean that I care. About you. And about us.
I’m sorry that I’ve said things that I didn’t necessarily believe, out of hastiness.
I’m sorry that we live in a world where health is still tied to moral purity.
I’m sorry that I pretended to be happy in times when I wasn’t.
I’m sorry if I ever gave you the impression that linear progress is a thing. ꩜
I’m sorry to my own body. That I wasn’t taught, nor cared to learn, how to tend to it.
I’m sorry to the people I love for not knowing myself better when I should have.
I’m sorry to God/dess for thinking that there’s anything else that exists or ever could.
I’m sorry if you think this email is a bummer. Maybe it can be a generative bummer.
In making amends to myself, I want to welcome all my states, moods, and parts, and know that I’m equally each and entirely none. I want to continue to fail so I continue to learn. I want to be honest. I want to try. I want to always apologise when one is warranted. I want to allow myself to be unremarkable, or angry, or sweet, or sad, when I feel like it and I want that for you too.
I wasn’t born positively vibrating with a thousand passions—with lofty emotional summits and dark psychic canyons—only to mimic the chill mediocrity of characters who could never exist. Neither were you.
I know that unmasking is an unceasing process of self-permission. An ever unfolding way of moving, breathing, and relating to one’s self, as a mind, a spirit, and a body. And I know that the pain I’m feeling in mine right now is the result of a lifetime (generations, let’s be real) of disconnection and dishonesty. Of self-forbiddance.
What potentialities might emerge from gentle self-permission instead? What amends can you step towards making? What do you owe yourself an apology for?
Tarot card of the week: The Star
Of course, it’s The Star. You don’t write 1700 words on self-forgiveness while recovering from two epidurals in the neck, and not get The Star. Sometimes, the figure in The Star reminds me of Imperator Furiosa, from Mad Max: Fury Road. She’s hopeful but I’d hardly call her sanguine. She embodies a dogged, bullish belief (in the liberation of the warlord’s wives, in the existence of “the green place”) because she doesn’t have a choice. To survive, she needs something worth dying for.
The Star as Furiosa isn’t some virtuous agent of healing—a soothing balm following the catastrophe of The Tower—she’s the reckoning with trauma that’s leftover. The Star is where we find a path to survival. It’s the very beginning of healing, not the end. It’s only when Furiosa learns that the green place is destroyed, when she loses five of her seven remaining clan members, and when she must return to the place she hates the most—the belly of the beast—that she finds her purpose.
Life has no guarantees. Nothing is promised. Everything doesn’t happen for a reason. It’s only when you choose to find a reason—whether out of desperation or as a conscious, creative decision—that you can make your suffering mean something significant. Something that reveals your power and brings you closer to your true nature.
And it takes effort. Who’s to say that as leader of a Citadel, Furiosa will be a benevolent ruler? She could just as easily become another corrupt warlord. Hold too tight to the stories you tell yourself and you’ll begin building a new Tower on the same wasteland. Learning to walk with both flexibility and conviction is what guides you to the water.
Through sheer belief, through the stories we tell, we create our reality. When it seems like all is lost, no one but ourselves can convince us that it’s actually not. No one but ourselves can tell a new story.
xo Jerico
P.S. If you’ve read all the way to the bottom, ILY <3 And I have a favour to ask you. Can you please let me know what you’d like to read more of from me? I’m considering dreaming up everything from more creative prompts, therapeutic exercises, collective or per-sign tarot/astro readings, tarot lessons, meditations, my own poetic and creative dreams and work, round ups of what I’m interested in, dreamy playlists, personal essays, relevant cultural criticism etc—it’s all up for grabs.
Your honest opinion will help me inform The Dreamer as a free offerings, as well as what paid tiers would look like if I want to explore that in the future. So don’t hold back! Feel free to comment here, or reply to this email if you feel more comfortable….
Thank you for dreaming with me.
Love this. I’d like to hear what you would advise someone with a big dream who feels behind. I’d like to hear more about finding a North Star. I’d like to hear about something that excites you.
As beautiful and true as always. Your visualisations followed by journal prompts are amazing so i'd say those xx