Substack seems to be another channel for AI slop. There is a part of me that hates this term; it feels so inelegant, so crass. The other part of me knows this is exactly true. Absolute slop. I see friends – smart friends! emotionally aware friends! – subscribed to channels of flatness. Intellectual deflation. I am concerned for humanity, more so when those I hold in higher regard don’t see what I see. Send me an essay, and I will tell you right away. Why does it matter to you so much, Zivar? Live a little. I’ve always been a devotee of the truth, of the source, of honoring where “it” came from.

Perhaps it is an orthodox upbringing where the rabbis often said plagiarizing someone is like killing them. Perhaps it is because my own shadow fears being found out for not being smart enough, resourced enough, or grammatically sound. I can just hear my mom screaming, “Well, weblet. You are not good, you are well.” Somehow she captured the sound from across the house, through the bathroom door where she took a bath with a bag of Cape Cod chips and a Tab. Well.

I joined this space with excitement, a place of frontier and also a return to long-form conversations. When I visited Prague, I have a distinct memory of sitting in one of their magnificent old tea houses. At every table there seemed to be an elder, maybe two or three, with a huge stack of newspapers. How are we to draw our own conclusions without noting all angles and views?

I was listening to a podcast yesterday, hosted by The RealReal, and Kristin Naiman was speaking to the idea of dress code, how we find our people, and who we discover through the pieces we wear or don’t wear. Uniform can be a place of hiding or exploration; it’s the intention and curiosity behind it. I wore a navy blue jumper, then skirt with a white button-down oxford, from elementary school through the first two years of high school. At the time, Newsweek was sort of pop intellectualism, and I liked it. There was an article written by a senior at a boarding school about his relationship to uniform and how it might seem restrictive, but it actually allowed him the space to explore other parts of his personality without worrying too much about the costumes of life. I always loved that article.

Perhaps because it spoke to the ease of dressing each day and the energy accumulated for other things, perhaps because I was trying to rationalize how out of rhythm I felt with my peers. I love fashion. I have always loved fashion, and I could probably be a stylist myself if I wasn’t so devoted to comfort. I was medically what one might call obese at 13. At my heaviest, I was 210 pounds, maybe more. Nothing fit. Very few things fit. I was forced to wear doudy women’s clothing; no teen brand was offering modest clothes in my size. My friends went to Macy’s, and I sat in the dressing room with them as they stole Rampage, Bulldog, and Esprit. I never stole anything. I am from the Midwest. We don’t do such things, or at least not in groups.

In my adult life, I am always seeking the one who stands outside of the dress code, even slightly. Better if it’s just slightly; too much and it’s signaling a ravenous desire to belong. When I lived in San Francisco, I wore little dresses and tights almost every day; in New York, leggings from H&M. We live upstate now, and the new-age hippie, shave-half-your-head look doesn’t do it for me, nor does the trad wife, spin-your-own-wool-to-make-frocks-of-hemp aesthetic. Clothing says a lot about who we are and nothing at all. I am a bit of a chameleon. One day I am in shorts and a T-shirt and the next in a flowy dress and beads. I am moody, my Mars is in Cancer, and I am the middle child. The middle of two girls.

I like being seen in my clothes, and upstate there are fewer eyes, which offers less motivation. I like seeing how people get dressed. I like sitting at the edge of their bed and witnessing their decision process. The unique way they come after their day. Maybe pulling from a pile in the corner, same old, same old. Maybe the walk-in closet that whispers to them, pick me.

I sometimes think about death. I actually think about death a lot. Having kids doesn’t make it easier, but it’s been a lifelong fear. My father dying when I was turning 19 brought it all front and center, and it was way worse than I had envisioned. His departure was brutal. I think about death and the embarrassment I would feel when friends and sisters descend on my messy closet. She was so particular, her home so clean, even her car. She vacuumed it every week and had a strict no-snack rule. How could this be? Her closet is a disaster.

I love clothes, I love adornments, I love words that feel specifically true to me or you. My friend often says, “allll the things,” and it’s so charming coming from her because it is her language, her way. Zach writes a letter to his community each week. He is one of the people who can seem so normal, running around in his ripped-off jean shorts and Nike tank, but just below the surface is a roaring river of intellectual rigor and curiosity. His writing reflects this, somehow both digestible and wildly complex.

When we first met, Zach said, “You should work on your grammar. Your writing is beautiful, but your grammar is preposterous.” For the first years, I felt defensive and even allowed him to edit, but the words never felt like me run through his brain. I write like I think, tentacles stretched far, somehow finding their way toward some truth or conversation worth exploring.

AI slop, dress codes, messy closets, and the feng shui of it all. For years I have heard people speak of the “Aquarian Age” of self-led, sovereign, and true-to-you paths. They will be rewarded. They will be recognized and appreciated over willful blindness and sheep mentality. I had hoped this would be true. I wish for this to be true.

I come here and see influencers and “writers” using AI to craft essays that sound like no one. A race to the bottom. Our friend Rudy, an Indigenous jeweler and maker of magic, says that channeling requires “hollow bones.” I see so many people inflated and proud of themselves. I “wrote” this essay, it’s so smart. But really it’s stupid. It’s a dirty river. A toxic dump. What nurtures a hollow bone? How have we become so polluted and lazy in spirit?

Do I stay here and continue speaking into the void, or do I find another way? I don’t know. But it has kept me quiet and listening. I want so much for us to sit together in a gaudy tea room, surrounded by stacks of essays written with your whimsy and your knowing. I want to drink your waters, pure and mineral rich. I want that for myself, too.

“The words you speak become the house you live in.” Hafiz

We arrive at Sivan after the initiations of Nisan (Aries) and the deep repair work of Iyar (Taurus). The fire has been lit. Now comes the question: What will we do with what has awakened?

Sivan (Gemini) is the month of revelation. The month of conversation. The month where spirit moves toward language. Gemini is mutable air — movement, exchange, thought, storytelling, connection, nervous system currents pulsing beneath everyday life.

Where Taurus rooted into the body and the earth, Gemini expresses in breath (air). Toward dialogue. Toward meaning. Toward the electric space, the eros, between people.

Sivan carries the energy of Sinai. The channeling of Wisdom. The great encounter.

And while many imagine revelation as certainty descending from the heavens, the mystics understood that revelation rearranges you from your root.

The mountain trembled. The people shook. The Voice became visible.

Midrash teaches that the Divine split into seventy languages so every soul could receive it according to their own understanding.

This is Sivan’s medicine. Truth arrives through many doorways, according to our soul’s need.

Kabbalistic Wisdom | The Mystical Map of Sivan

In Sefer Yetzirah, Sivan is associated with the letter Zayin (ז) — the sword, the channel, the tool that cuts through illusion (notice her shape).

Sivan is both a month of receiving wisdom and active participation in it. Revelation requires presence and discernment – an awareness of our own projections.

The mystics say every soul — past, present, and future — stood at Sinai. Revelation is both a return to the ancestors and an awareness of what “is”.

We stand at Sinai every time something awakens our heart. Every time language reaches beneath the intellect and touches the soul. Every time we become willing to hear differently.

The Sense is Walking

Sivan is associated with movement.

The kind of movement that happens when the inner world and outer world begin speaking to one another – the alignment of soul and body.

Gemini energy moves quickly. Thoughts race. Ideas multiply. Conversations overlap. Windows remain open in the psyche.

The work of this month is learning how to move with clarity and way from fragmentation. (I believe dance is the portal for such revelation.)

Where is my attention leaking? What deserves deeper listening? What wisdom keeps trying to reach me?

“Attention is the beginning of devotion.” Mary Oliver

The Organ is the Nervous System

Gemini governs communication pathways. Synapses. Breath. Speech. The intricate electrical web connecting mind and body.

This month illuminates the state of our nervous systems.

Many of us are saturated. Too much information. Too much noise. Too much performance.

Sivan asks us to become more intentional about what enters our intimate field.

What am I consuming all day long? What frequencies shape my thinking? Which conversations nourish me? Which ones drain my life force?

The Tribe is Zebulun

Zebulun is associated with exchange, commerce, and movement between worlds.

This tribe understands something essential: wisdom lives in the messy aliveness of relationship and the breath between public and private.

Gemini energy thrives through encounter. A conversation that changes your life. A book arriving at the exact right moment. A child asking a question that dismantles your certainty.

Sivan reminds us that revelation often arrives through seemingly ordinary exchange.

Sivan’s Medicine | Curiosity, Communication & Sacred Listening

Gemini is ruled by Mercury — messenger of the Gods, patron of language, writing, travel, thresholds, and transmission. At its lowest expression, Mercury scatters. At its highest, Mercury reveals. A sentence can alter the trajectory of a life. A truth spoken aloud can liberate generational trauma.

What am I transmitting? What wants to be spoken? What deserves silence?

“Words are events, they do things, change things.” Ursula K. Le Guin

Body Wisdom | Breath, Sound & Regulation

Kabbalah: Speech shapes reality. TCM: Heart and communication pathways open through presence and coherence. Ayurveda: Vata begins stirring — grounding the nervous system becomes essential.

Slow walks. Breathwork and humming(!) for regulation. A good read. Conversations without phones nearby. Mineral-rich nourishment for the nervous system.

Let the body return to stillness.

Sacred Plants & Scents

Tulsi: clarity, nervous system support, devotion Lavender: calming overstimulation Peppermint: mental refreshment and movement Rose: heart coherence and truthful speech

Feng Shui | Air, Sound & Spaciousness

Colors for Sivan: sky blue, silver, calming white

West (Creativity & Children): music, bells, poetry, fresh air Center of the home: clear clutter and energetic congestion Windows: open them often, let new thought enter

Rituals for Sivan | Revelation as Practice

Listening Ritual: Sit in silence for ten minutes before speaking in the morning.

Letter Writing: Write a letter, tell the truth without reservation. Send or burn.

Conversation Practice: Spend time with someone who expands your thinking, extra points for someone who has opposing world views.

Journal Prompts for Sivan (Gemini)

What truth is trying to reach me? Where have I confused noise for nourishing connection? What would it mean to become a clearer vessel for my voice?

هر سخن که از دل برآید، بر دل نشیند Every word that rises from the heart enters the heart.

Sivan teaches that revelation is ever unfolding, all communication is sacred, and language carries the power to alter reality. Treat your voice with reverence.

May this month sharpen our discernment and bring care to our delivery. As the Buddhist teaching offers: Before you speak, ask yourself — is it true? Is it necessary? Is it kind?

Stop crying so we can figure this out. Where are you? I’m on the corner of Atlantic and Bond, I keep going in circles. It’s been road block after road block, no one knows where to go. I can’t believe this. I absolutely can’t believe this. I knew it, I told her so. She didn’t listen.

He seems annoyingly happy on the other side, excitedly preparing the space and unloading the terrariums from Triona, the branches from Caroline, and the gorgeous cake Taylor made in the midst of her own thunderstorms. I looked for shelled pistachios everywhere, and I finally found them where I least expected – Shoprite on Fairview. Yiska is there with her parents, Johanna has traveled from far away to be here with her mother, others are popping in early to help. A beautifully orchestrated moment of care. And here I am, in my banged up prius, circling Park Slope and praying, praying that I will arrive at an inroad.

Ask an officer. They don’t know. Ask an officer. I hang up on him, I’m annoyed and mostly at myself. I knew, I just knew.

I roll down my window, halfway between tears and hyperventilating. I know it’s a first-world problem, but I’m late for my party and I need help. Officer after officer – all male - immediately offer direction, and all are wrong. Go to Flatbush, up Union, past Park Place. I feel stalled, without options. There’s a marathon in Prospect Park, also a bomb threat, also my own parts in resistance. It’s perfect, just perfect, I say to myself in between screams and sadness.

My car, mint green and named after my great gramma Agnes who’s farmhouse was the same color, is my safe space. She is unfancy, I can’t even “plug in” my phone to listen to a podcast or phone a friend, but I feel held. Alone in the car, I can freak the fuck out. All the voices rise and I am surprised and delighted that the kinder ones are most prominent these days. It’s okay, you’re fine. You don’t even like socilaizing. This is perfect, you will come at the end and promptly leave. You manifested this, I love you. LET it OuT.

Around the park I go, past Crown Heights into areas I only ventured to when returning from the airport. I recognize a block in Bedstuy, another coffee shop I once met a friend at, and a gas station that sells no gas. How far are you? We want to start, we want to introduce your deck. It says 25, then 36, then 18. I woke up early, the heat wasn’t working at my friends place. Or it was and I couldn’t figure out how to use it. I was cold but happy. It was raining when I arrived yesterday, I thought to go out and get my nails done around the corner but half way up 12th street I turned around.

The night we brought Ara home from the hospital in 2020, it was cold but no rain. Up to the 4th floor, tonight I stayed on the 3rd. The subtle mold smell coming from a first floor apartment, the gatekeeper, and the lovely stones leading up to that old clock tower struck me. With delight and then melancholy. All memories flood.

I woke up early. Drank coffee with cream out of a Buddha mug. Stretched. Kundalini Breathwork. Shower. And an outfit chosen by Rumi. I wanted to wear my white linen dress but it was frigid. I got in my car.

I’m 8 minutes away. Okay, we’ll wait for you.

I rarely went to Williamsburg in the many years of living in Brooklyn, I insisted on being close to the trees and pseudo solitude of Prospect Park. I felt as if I was entering a foreign country but even in Lima or Berlin, I found areas more familiar. I got out of the car, Z was standing there, his brother, his other sibling Ani. His father. I told him there was a marathon, he didn’t say anything? No. Z forgets a lot. He forgets to turn off the stove, the heat, his car. He remembers the important stuff, the emotional stuff. But the regular, everyday people stuff eludes him sometimes. He puts his credit cards and cash in a pile and hopes for the best. I do, too.

I’ll take the seltzer, he’ll park the car. Go inside, we’ve got you. Everyone is happy, the space is dark then light, then dark. Dorothy says, you were meant to arrive to a full room. This feels sweet, true. I meet Johanna for the first time in person, we have spent years editing the deck. Every card, every aspect touched by yours truly. A little to the left, to the right, remove that or add this. She is warm and there is also a distance that is without any emotional complication.

The Wisdom of Birth was born out of my experience of going 3+ weeks “late” and being treated like a pariah at the hospital. Ironically, I am 3 hours late to my own baby’s party.

You do not carry this all alone, no you do not carry this all alone.

It is way to big for you to carry it on your own. No, you do not carry it all alone.

I sing this to everyone, as we had planned, and I enact a part of myself that is practiced – the social butterfly who effortlessly moves between people and conversations but ends up depleted and alone. We cut cake and bring joy and exuberance to the first moments of her launch. We intentionally go live on Kickstarter at 12:50pm for her to be a Leo Rising, like her mamas.

The sun is out, it is warm and people are happy on the streets. Sundays in Brooklyn have a particular flavor, it pings a bit of longing in me but I know more than anything I want to go home. Z agrees to take the kids and I set my eyes north. My phone dies, all I have are me and my own thoughts.

For days I explore the meaning of the day, the symbolisms yearning for interpretation. I use my own deck to guide me, it helps a lot. I come to the conclusion that an imperfect beginning does not determine one’s success or worthiness. I recognize the importance of a doula through all of life’s passages. As Z commanded me not to cry, Yiska kept offering — it’s okay, we’ve got you, cry it out. I have a session with Randy, the Akasha offers me something no one else can touch. It changes something fundamental about the story and my own view of myself. I feel immense relief.

You know, trust your knowing. The Wisdom of Birth is a gift of empowerment. It is a talisman for moments of threshold, which can often feel crowded by outside voices and distraction. It is a return to yourself as sovereign. The deck is a companion, a place to sit with and explore your own feelings, and to offer those who love you an anchor through such passages.

A few days after my return, feeling incredibly discombobulated in creative postpartum, I went to visit a friend’s studio. Outside Lilah is standing with my dear friend who I hardly recognize. Omg, Maya. I’m sorry. I’m so out of it.

Maya is tender, creative, and owned a bar for many years near where we had the party, a former Williamsburg mama. The campaign is filled with love, I felt so happy at seeing the photos of the party and all the weavings of people and story. I tell her I feel differently, strange and off-center. She reminds me of postpartum weather — the baby is perfect. They fill the home with light and hope while the mother is looking for her own lantern in the dark. It is a strange juxtaposition of life and death, the most real it will ever feel. Together they’ll find their way with The Wisdom of Birth.

Wisdom of Birth Tarot Deck is LIVE on Kickstarter. We deeply appreciate your contributions & sharing with friends. With love, Z

“I am deliberate and afraid of nothing.” Audre Lorde

We arrive at the threshold of the year’s wheel with Nisan (Aries). If Adar dissolved us into the ocean, Nisan lifts us from its depths and places breath back into the body.

Aries is cardinal fire – the first spark, the sacred YES, the moment of emergence. She is instinct. Flame before form. She has no doubt, she asks no permissions.

Where Aquarius reimagined and Pisces dissolved, Aries ignites.

Nisan is the month of liberation, of prayerful rupture, of crossing thresholds that once felt impossible.

Nisan also offers spring’s first exhale, when life returns above the earth’s surface. Buds emerge through tender ground. Blood quickens. Something ancient in us remembers how to begin again.

Kabbalistic Wisdom | The Mystical Map of Nisan

In Sefer Yetzirah, the month of Nisan is created through the letter Hei (ה) — the breath-letter, the opening, the space through which spirit enters form. It is the letter of Divine articulation, of becoming.

On the full moon of Nisan we celebrate Pesach, the great story of liberation. The exodus from Egypt (Mitzrayim or narrow places) is not only historical, but cellular. And while I bemoan preparing for the Seder every year, there is always a part of me redeemed and renewed through the retelling.

“God created man, because He loves stories.” — Elie Wiesel

Nisan teaches that freedom must be continually reclaimed. We must choose it. As Heschel writes, “The exodus began, but it did not end. In fact, it was meant to be a beginning.”

The Sense is Speech

Nisan is associated with speech — the power to name, to declare, to call reality into being.

In the story of Exodus, liberation begins with voice. With refusal and protest from the Israelite Midwives, Yocheved and Miriam. You will not murder our children.

Speech is never ornamental, it is a creative and alchemical force. Nisan reminds us of this potent magic at the tip of our tongue.

What am I ready to name?
What truth has been locked in my throat?

The Organ is the Liver

In Kabbalistic tradition, Nisan corresponds to the liver; the seat of anger, vitality, and life-force.

Anger in its purity is ignition, initiation – the creative spark.

The work of this month is to refine our anger into movement and right action.

Where has my fire been suppressed?
What is my anger protecting?
Can I let this anger be fuel for liberaton instead of fracture and further exile?

The Tribe is Judah

Judah (Yehuda) comes from the root hodaya: gratitude, praise, acknowledgment.

This is the tribe of leadership through presence. Through heart. Through stepping forward.

Don’t wait to be chosen, choose yourself.

Nisan’s Medicine | Courage, Action & Sacred Beginnings

Aries is ruled by Mars — the force of will, desire, and movement.

Act. Begin. Trust your fire. There are no failures.

Nisan asks:

Where am I being called to begin?
What am I no longer willing to tolerate?
What would it mean to move without overthinking?

This is the month of first steps, bold declarations, and choosing life forward.

Body Wisdom | Blood, Muscles & Activation

Kabbalah: Speech animates the body and auric field.
TCM: The Wood element surges, liver energy rises, movement is essential.
Ayurveda: Kapha fades and Pitta rises; stimulation and clarity are needed.

Movement that builds heat
Leafy greens for liver support
Bitter tonics to clear stagnation
Sunlight on the skin for emergence

Wake the body…

Sacred Plants & Scents

Rosemary: clarity, memory, activation
Dandelion: liver cleansing, resilience
Neroli: courageous heart

Feng Shui | Fire, Light & Forward Motion

Colors for Nisan: red, gold, bright green

East (New Beginnings): fresh flowers, open your damn windows
South (Recognition): candles, light, visibility
Entryway: clear pathways, we dont want anything blocking our movement

Rituals for Nisan | Liberation as Practice

Threshold Crossing: Step forward across a doorway and say aloud, “I am ready.”

Cleansing Ritual: Sweep and deep clean your space with intention.

Voice Activation: Speak a held and difficult truth — to yourself, another, or into the air — and let it ripple through the vortex.

Journal Prompts for Nisan (Aries)

Where am I being asked to lead my own life?
What does freedom feel like in my body?
What is one courageous action I can take today?

در دل آتش، تولدی دیگر است
Within the fire, there is rebirth.

Nisan teaches us that beginnings require courage, liberation is an embodied and ongoing practice, and the spark within each of us is ancient, instinctual, and wise.

“Emancipate yourself from mental slavery, none but ourselves can free our minds.” None but ourselves… Deep bow to the mystic, Bob Marley, who’s music liberated many of the beliefs passed down to me in tribalism. Mi’mytzrayim.

ONE LOVE. May this month bring freedom first within you, and may it ripple outward into the collective with love.

Zach, my husband and rabbi, and his brother, a celebrated chef, created a series a while back to support us in creating a meaningful seder plate. Enjoy.

I have a memory of taking a standard hearing test at school, in the large (now tiny) boardroom off the main hallway. As we get older, everything seems to get smaller. I heard every beep and screech from the traveling machine but continually lied. No. Yes. Again? Still no. My mom told me I would need to see a specialist, she seemed worried. They came back a few weeks later to that tiny boardroom. All eyes on me. Miraculously, I passed. I am convinced I failed first because I wanted some attention from my mom, who was a very busy woman. See me, notice me.

There was a meme going around about accessing our inner children and what it might mean to be that child who wasn’t particularly joyful, funny, or cute. I was happiest in introversion, melancholic, and always quite serious. I asked my mother once, what was I like as a child?

Sick. You were always sick. Ear infections, viruses, all the things that “required” antibiotics. See me, notice me.

Below are some favorite things I use often to mother and care for my body & heart. What a vital practice it is to see ourselves and honor our becoming.

Organic Olive Oil
I drink a shot in the morning, with warm water and my coffee (with cream & coconut sugar). I massage it all over my face and body, too. Lightweight, smells good, and gives me a bit of a glow.

Castor Oil
I live for this stuff and am pretty sure it would cost a lot more if people really understood its benefits. I rub it on my belly before putting a heating pad on at night. I also use it as a moisturizer in the winter. It’s very thick, so don’t get dressed right away — lounge in a robe and let it sink in. Maybe meditate or read a book. Always use cold-pressed and no plastic, please.

Heating Pad
Everyone should own one. My favorite winter companion. I lay it over my belly every night and it drifts me promptly into sleep.

Weleda Skin Food
The best cream-based moisturizer. I keep tubes in my car and large tote. It feels like an immediate hydration boost and leaves my skin glowy.

Copper Dry Brush
Essential. I use it every morning before showering. Long strokes toward the heart. It wakes up the skin and moves qi through the body.

Liquid Stevia
Some people hate it, others love it. I put a few drops in a big bell jar with cold water and Lakewood lemon juice. I drink it every day, and my kids do too. “Mama Lemonade.” (Don’t buy the stuff with added “natural flavors”—bad for you and tastes gross.)

Basmati Rice
The big sack from India. Not organic but it tastes like heaven. I make a pot almost every day and eat it with olive oil, butter, and salt. My kids love it, too.

Beeswax Candles from Camphill Village
I burn them early in the morning as my kids wake up and again before bed. The particular honey smell and soft light affect our home’s energy. I often say a prayer for Shalom Bayit as I light the candles, and a prayer for release of any negative entities as I blow them out.

On Guard Essential Oil
My signature scent. I love the smell, the feeling of protection, and I often receive compliments. “You smell so good.”

Wisdom of Birth Tarot Deck
I pull from our deck often. It guides me through my days – reminding me to listen to my body, trust thresholds, and stay close to the intelligence that lives beneath the waves.

Floradix
A long time ago someone named Gabriel, who now owns a fancy acupuncture franchise in NYC, told me to take this every day. “You will go from a wilted flower to a buoyant rose.” He was right. When I remember to take it, I feel so much better.

Pure Encapsulations Magnesium
Two every night before bed. I don’t notice it when I take it, but when I run out, my gut feels off.

Nivea Lip Balm in Cherry
On my lips, on my cheeks. As makeup-y as I get.

Organic India Tulsi Rose Tea
Every time I drink it I feel held – with love and sensuality. A true balm.

Three Books, Always Nearby
You Can Heal Your Life — Louise Hay
Return to Love — Marianne Williamson
Why People Don’t Heal and How They Can — Carolyn Myss

These are the small companions of my ordinary days. With love, Z

Audio version above for those who requested.

I couldn’t sleep last night. Iran was invaded, the files are floating – redacted and unclaimed, my friends in Minneapolis are planting seeds as Ice storms the streets. It can be so cold in Minnesota. I remember this one time I was walking home with my sisters from school. We wore white shirts with long, pleated navy-blue polyester skirts or jumpers. I’m not sure how thick my tights were, but I remember my legs tingling from the frigid air. Up my skirt, a sort of misery that turned to heat to protect my young body. There was probably snow too, lots of snow.

I am Jewish, half-Iranian, and was sexually abused as a child in a Chabad community in St. Paul, Minnesota. The rabbis, pious as they were, never said St. but “S. Paul.” I found it silly, and luckily my mother, however devoted to the fold, did too. She also found the children’s books poorly written and so, against culture, we read Goodnight Moon, Where the Wild Things Are, and Love You Forever.

It feels odd to hold so many identities mirrored in the collective right now. Am I being punked? Jokes on me? Friday I ran errands, I wrote emails, I generally felt great even though I was feeling some grief at the distance in a close friendship. She went to California weeks ago and I haven’t seen her since. What is she allergic to in me? What do I activate in her that hurts so badly? I spoke briefly about it in therapy before it turned into other things, bigger things. My own, damn things. Is it true? Alas, often it is not. At 3 p.m. I decided to be a “good mom” and take a shower, knowing I would feel more awake, ready to be with my kids for the evening marathon. Settle in, play, prepare dinner, eat dinner, bath time, book and bed.

I got out of the shower and couldn’t stand up. I felt nauseous, achy. My entire body a river of chills. I lay on the couch, I motioned to Zach for this or that. Do you want water? No, no. Rumi, come lay over me. Ara, Zach, lay heavily on me. My body is floating, and not in a good way. I took one ibuprofen, then another. Do you really want another? Yes, I need it. My mom pops Advil like it’s candy. I sometimes worry about this but she is a doctor, and she says it’s fine.

All night I toss and turn, trying to find comfort. It’s like I was readying for birth, or a growth spurt, or moving through a death. In my attempt to figure it out, I turn to Google. Period flu during perimenopause. Possibly food poisoning? My throat felt parched, my body scratchy from being so dry. I wondered as I lay there awake if this is how my father felt during his many rounds of chemo, as he was dying in the hospital. He kept complaining about achy joints, but he was a hypochondriac. Not a big feeler, not an empathic feeler. No, he was crazy. He finally received care and attention when they were concerned he might be addicted to painkillers. You have leukemia, the child kind. The weird kind. He died within a year.

I “woke” up the next morning feeling as if I had moved through ceremony. A pattern interrupt, a new way of being or seeing. I felt exhausted but clear-eyed. Unusually happy, but in a settled, mature, old-person kind of way. Ah, yes. Yes, yes. They say yes a lot. An affirmation of seeing without attachment, a way of being without clinging. I moved through the day slowly, intentionally. My girls had a playdate with their grandparents who recently moved here. God bless the grandparents. I walked for 15 minutes, I went to Rolling 19 and bought whatever looked good to my gut. I made brown rice swirlies with Rao’s sauce and parmesan. I ate a California orange offered by another friend, a different friend. More of Zach’s friend. It scented of heaven. I smelled it for a good minute before peeling through the pith.

I settled into the couch and saw the news of Iran. Is this what was moving through me? Gaura texts, seven generations back. Seven generations, but many more my family lived in Northern Iran. They raised animals, built sacred spaces, grew community and flowers and fruit, vegetables. The trad wives’ dream compound. My grandmother was the matriarch, Zivar at 13. Married with 10 kids who would survive and grow older, leave during the revolution which wasn’t a revolution at all. It was a death portal, a torture chamber. I see people on Instagram glorifying kids who are unschooled and illiterate. Illiterate?! What are you to do when the world is falling apart? How will you know what is true and right?

I always loved symbols and archetypes. When I went away to an all-girls school in Pittsburgh I was miserable for 23 hours a day. I hated the host family, the putrid smells of the hallways, and the kosher cheese everyone ate at lunch. There was one hour that was perfect, Mrs. Deren’s Midrash class. I was in 10th grade but they put me in the 12th grade, all in Ivrit (Hebrew), with the principal. I was that good. We dissected passages from the Torah, we counted words using numerological tools, we made sense of why this was put there, or that two lines away. We made parallels, we drew conclusions. We did as the Kabbalists would do—recognize patterns and make meaning through them. Everything is connected, nothing is by accident. When I left abruptly toward the end of the year, Mrs. Deren sat me down. I don’t remember the exact words but they were tough and deeply loving, like a grandmother screaming at you to put on another layer or drink some more fucking tea. You belong here, in this world. You have a gift for broader vision. Don’t squander it. I never heard from her again.

A girls’ school was bombed. By who? Nobody knows. Maybe all of them together? The political theater to keep us away from the files, from AI building centers of horror, to clean their hands of genocide, from the concentration camps across the country filled with immigrants wanting a better life. No, you will not have a better life. We will trap it, we will trap you. No vision, no creativity, no love for the artist or the educated daughter.

Multiple truths exist at once. This can be true and that can be true, and they can stand in opposition. So, what? When I was in Midrash class it was never about conclusion, it was toward curiosity. How can we turn this upside down, another way? What might it tell us about the pasuk? I married a rabbi and whenever he’s preparing for a class, or a sermon, or our Super Bowl which is the High Holidays, I am giddy with excitement. Tell me more, can we play? It might be this or that. He rolls his eyes at how far my eyes see, but he listens and might include. Often woven in.

People are celebrating and children are dying. People are celebrating and children are dying. Two truths. Can our hearts extend to feel it all? Francis Weller says things are different now. When we used to receive bad news, it was often with another at least. Maybe two, maybe an entire tribe. Now it’s just us and our phone, day after day. So much dark news. We are not meant to grieve like this, to hold pain like this. You’re wrong, she screams from her phone 20,000 miles away. But you don’t know me, I say. Heart coherence changes everything.

I feel better today, just a little. I feel sad, too. Happy that the sun is shining. An eclipse on Tuesday brings messages of release, we are all imperfect it echos. Can you accept that? Can you grieve the lie of singularity? My coffee is less hot. My family await my presence – my lunch-making skills and my insistence that they wear one more layer. It’s still cold outside, it was really warm on Saturday but it’s back to being cold now.

Can we accept that it is still winter and spring is coming? Can we trust that being here will lead us there?

I love you forever, I like you for always. As long as I’m living, my baby you’ll be.

We arrive at the end of the wheel with Adar, the 12th moon of the year and ruled by Pisces. If Shevat poured the water, Adar dissolves into it.

Pisces is mutable water – mystic tide, porous veil, the place where endings blur into beginnings. She is the ocean before language. The womb before form. She does not carry the water, she is the water.

Where Capricorn built structure and Aquarius reimagined it, Pisces unravels all edges. She loosens what we have outgrown. She invites us to trust in the unseen.

Adar is a month of hidden miracles, divine comedy, and salvation through disguise. She swims in the deep, meets mystery, and returns laughing. Her medicine is profound.

Adar is also my anniversary month. Zach and I married in a small ceremony on the full moon and I conceived both of my children on this date (March 6). It is a potent threshold for transformation and renewal; I bow at our collective becoming.

Kabbalistic Wisdom | The Mystical Map of Adar

In Sefer Yetzirah, the month of Adar is created through the letter Kuf (ק) — a letter that dips below the line, descending into secret places. It symbolizes what is concealed, what lives beneath the surface, what redemption looks like from going down.

On the full moon, we celebrate Purim which is the most paradoxical of holidays — masks are worn, roles reversed, and the hidden hand of the Divine is revealed through sychronicity. The story of Esther is one of exile and revelation. God’s name is never mentioned in the Megillah, yet His presence saturates every line.

Adar teaches us what is hidden is not absent. Where Shevat honored the rising sap, Adar brings reverence and illumination to the under current.

The Sense is Laughter

Adar is associated with laughter, a sort of holy inversion. The Hanged Man. Laughter breaks spells. It loosens fate. It allows the nervous system to exhale long enough to see truth.

Joy in Adar is an act of resistance to despair and depressive ends. When laughter returns, so does breath. When breath returns, so does spirit.

The Organ is the Spleen

In the Kabbalistic tradition, Adar corresponds to the spleen — the organ associated with melancholy and its alchemical transformation. The work of this month is subtle: to sweeten judgment, to transmute heaviness into compassion.

Where have I hardened?
Where have I mistaken vigilance for wisdom?
Can I let grief be washed instead of guarded?

The Tribe is Naftali

Naftali is described as a “hind let loose” — graceful, swift, untethered much like the Fire Horse. Adar invites movement after the constriction of fixed Aquarius. Dance after winter’s haze..

The Letter is Kuf (ק)

Kuf descends below the line — into shadow, exile, unconscious terrain. Adar’s wisdom lives below the surface. In dreams. In tears. In places of vulnerability and collective pain.

Adar’s Medicine | Joy, Surrender & Hidden Miracles

Pisces is traditionally ruled by Jupiter (expansion, faith) and in modern astrology by Neptune (dissolution, mysticism). Together they whisper:

Trust the current.
Release the shore.
Let yourself be carried.

Adar asks:

Where am I gripping the story too tightly?
What would it mean to trust the unseen?
How might I embody JOY as devotion?

This is the month where “v’nahafoch hu”, everything can and will turn upside down.

Body Wisdom | Lymph, Feet & Sacred Rest

Kabbalah: Laughter restores circulation.
TCM: The Water element reigns — kidneys require warmth and ease.
Ayurveda: Kapha begins to accumulate — stagnation can turn to heaviness; movement and digestive care are deeply important.

The body asks for broths, bitter greens, citrus, and gentle spices.
Dry brushing.
Epsom salt baths.
Walks near water.

Sacred Plants & Scents

Rose: heart-softening
Nettle: mineral nourishment, blood vitality
Tulsi: clarity through surrender
Lemon balm: uplifts melancholy

Feng Shui | Water, Flow & Hidden Corners

Colors for Adar: indigo, pearl, seafoam green

North (Life Path): a bowl of fresh water with floating petals
West (Creativity): bells or chimes to invite laughter
Bathroom/Hidden Spaces: cleanse, cleanse, cleanse

Rituals for Adar | Joy as Resistance

Mask & Reveal:
Write down a role you are tired of playing. Write down a role you long to play. Journal about these archetypes.

Laughter Practice:
Gather with friends, or infront of a mirror, and read something absurd aloud. Let the body shake. Let sound come through without judgement.

Hidden Providence Invocation:
Place your hand on your heart and name
Even when I cannot see it, I am carried.

Journal Prompts for Adar (Pisces)

Where is mercy asking to enter my story?
What if joy is an act of resistance?
How might surrender strengthen me?

آب اگر دریا شود، از خود نمی‌ترسد
When water becomes the sea, it no longer fears itself.

Adar teaches us that surrender and mystery offer new beginnings. In the hidden chambers of the soul, laughter loosens decrees and compassion rewrites fate.

The Shechinah dwells where masks fall, grief is moved into song, and hidden doorways of exile reveal openings for liberation. Amen.

Before the second session began, our facilitator told us someone else would be joining her to guide us. He was white, male, close to my age. I wanted to be open-minded, but I had already heard whispers of his name. Without permission, he touched women during ceremonies. At one point, he invited a dear friend of mine to an “all women of color” circle that he would lead — she declined. He hired my husband to play music during a ceremony, then asked if he’d like to “donate” the money that was owed.

When he appeared on Zoom, I was genuinely happy to see the new friends I’d made. I felt joy at the thought of being together again soon. We took turns introducing ourselves, and then he “popcorned” to me. Immediately, I felt unease. His eyes weren’t right.

I went back and forth about going to the summer session, but I ultimately decided to join. I told the original facilitator about his reputation and my concerns. They were met with “love and light” nonsense. My inner consent clouded by a desire to belong.

He approached me the first evening in the cafeteria. Again, my body sounded the alarm and I switched tables. When we sat in circle after dinner, he announced that he channels Messiah. He refused to participate in our collective sharing and brought a female friend who seemed to be in the grip of a severe eating disorder. I was triggered.

I didn’t sleep that night. I lay awake on high alert. The next morning we sat in circle again and then broke into small groups. Within minutes it started spilling out.

Something feels off.
I don’t feel safe.
Me too. Me too.

At lunch, one of the women told me other things — worse things. We both decided to leave.

I felt something violent rushing through me. My heart raced. My younger self rose to protect. I wasn’t calm. I wasn’t articulate. I was: Get me the hell out of here.

Of course, this was later used against me.

Maybe it’s karma from a past life, Zivar.
Maybe he is just a mirror of your unhealed parts.
Maybe your too sensitive, reactive…
Maybe the universe is simply testing you.

That’s how the story always gets rewritten.

Later, one of the women who had orginnally come forward backtracked. He’s fine, she said. I didn’t mind him rubbing my feet. She is now one of his main helpers in ceremony — a reward for her silence.

I have other stories too — men in power. Men in spiritual cloaks, hiding their darkness in plain sight. Shame runs deep: shame for not responding the “right way”, for being too emotional, too erratic, too much.

Be perfectly rational, or we won’t trust your gut.
Be calm, or you’re unstable.
Be gentle and agreeable, or you’re the problem.

I see some of the residency artists on Instagram now and then. A few have reached out. Others have said, “Well, that’s not my experience of him.” When I look back at this story, and at the stories I’ve heard from many friends, it always makes a kind of sick sense: how they get away with it. How people gather around and protect them. How an ecosystem forms around perceived power, doubt treated as disloyalty and harm reframed as misunderstanding.

It’s gross. And it’s insidious.

A few months after the summer session, he emailed me—childish, evasive, and utterly devoid of accountability. He blamed miscommunication, then ended with a threat wrapped in new age psychobabble. I never responded.

I hope I scared him away from doing worse to anyone else. I hope I protected another woman from his darkness. I know I protected myself in that moment —and for this, I am profoundly grateful to my inner wild.

There is a particular grief that hovers when the truth is exposed. As a survivor of childhood sexual abuse, I have been witnessing the release of JE files with rage, profound sadness, and a return to that vulnerable, scared child who simply wants to hide and seek solace — of which there was none. Many people are screaming: What next? Why did it take so long? How could this have happened?!

My inner world is more nuanced, more tender. How might I be with you, little one? How might I hold you, ever closer? What do you need? A drink of water, a hug, a warm blanket.

The world rushes to know, to conclusion, to clarify. And my heart says, slow. Feel. You are safe now. The worst is over. My mom hasn’t checked in, my siblings haven’t either. They all know my story. It is easy to feel outrage from a distance, it is easier to feel sorrow when it doesn’t collapse into confusion. We all need protection, we all wish to be seen and safe; to grow into our power and be held in a cocoon of care.

Zach, my husband of 11 years and partner of many lifetimes, is a rabbi, musician, mobile maker, theologian and pandora’s box of mythical story and lineage. He is also a damn good writer. Z writes each week to the Temenos Community — sometimes political, other times personal, and often a weaving of both. On Friday he wrote directly to me, or at least it felt this way. Below is the note in its entirety, and here is a link to sign up for his newsletter. I have urged him to join substack but he has his own rhythm, as do we all…

“At five o’clock yesterday, we received eight emails from the kiddos’ school - we’re having school tomorrow, no we’re not having school tomorrow, some classes are having school tomorrow. This was only to be the third school-day this week as Monday and Tuesday were cancelled on account of snow. Some of the teachers wanted to participate in the national shutdown by holding classes and other teachers wanted to participate by skipping them. In the midst of the hullabaloo, Zivar asked Ara, “Ara, do you know what a protest is?” She thought for a second and then answered, “It’s when animals go from one place to another.” Zivar, masterful esotericist said, “oooh, I love that.” It took me a second to connect the dots. I said, “Ara, did you mean a migration?” Her class had been speaking about protesting for immigration, like the animals making their way from place to place, and a child’s mind works wonders.

Just now, gray whales are swimming from the Arctic southward to warm lagoons off of Baja California, for calving. Humpback Whales are moving back from their breeding grounds, passing by the waters of the coast of South Africa. Great White Sharks in the Western North Atlantic are completing their southward trek from New England and large herds of Wildebeest are on the move in East Africa, following the rains across the Serengeti to find fresh grazing. Arctic Terns, known for making the longest migration, are typically near their southern wintering grounds in the Antarctic, and Monarchs are gathered in their overwintering sites in Central Mexico and along the California coast readying to move north in early spring.

I believe deeply in, I don’t know quite what to call it, some kind of an evolutionary consciousness – life forms and the atoms which composed them, the shifting bodies of existence, for millions of years, before human beings ever came into existence – for millenia we were trees and plants and rocks and fire and water. And what if our cells remember, what it was to be water, to have water wisdom, tree wisdom, and animal wisdom woven into pre-creational memory. For all the lifetimes that we existed as tree creatures, we had to gather our sustenance from the place where we were rooted. But when we spouted feet and wings, and allowed our roots to become metaphysical, we discovered the necessity and joy and sufferings of migration. How sick is a culture that claims to own its piles of dirt and pathways of water and dictate the passage of creatures over imaginary lines. How silly would it be to impede and deride the migration of the whales and caribou and sharks and butterflies?

And spirit too is a migrant. She is always withdrawing and returning, coming to reside where we have made a home for her, fleeing the abodes of cultures of cruelty. Whenever humans or animals make a ceremony, it is as if the angels herald the new home that has been made for her, and she moves into it without distance and time. But the home is as ephemeral as the ceremony, and so she is always migrating from sacred place to sacred place, between the fingers of those making blessings, never calling anywhere home forever. Within each of us then, is an itinerant soul. For the only way spirit can taste existence, is to incarnate her wind in a creature of flesh and blood or fur and leaf, and send a piece of her soul to be within the beauty of creation. The piece of g*d’s soul bestowed to each of us is a vagabond, and part of it always remembers how far she is from home. And when we cannot look at that part of ourselves that is ever without home, ever searching and yearning for welcome, the foreigner in others becomes a source of fear.

So I volunteered for the afternoon daycare shift with Ara and her pals, Ezzy and Fiona. Over strawberry donuts and french fries we discussed migration. Why do animals migrate? For food, for warmth, to see their friends. Animals don’t have friends. What are you talking about? They don’t have far away friends. What if the elephants in Claverack wanted to visit the elephants in Germantown? And how do they carry anything without pockets? Well kangaroos, and some of the birds have big beaks, they could put stuff in. And how do they celebrate when they get to their destination? And we made blessings over all the children and their families, and we sent angels to be with the freedom fighters and the people of Minneapolis, making sure the home we give the children is a place a lost goddess or a wandering caribou might want to visit..”

May all beings be peaceful. May all beings know justice. May all beings be safe and held in sacred space. May all beings know love. May all beings be free.

we’ve come into a bad habit in the mornings. i wake early and he comes down before driving our kids to the bus, how are you? i am fine. i’m okay. yeah, life. i can feel how disingenuous it is to my spirit. i want to say, i am alive! i can’t believe i get to be here. the morning was sweet with our girls, they ate and we made lunches. i want to say, i saw a deer. i may have seen a fox. a murmuration. but it’s wintertime. and it’s cold. and we say hello in voices laced with melancholy.

being a mother was never on my bingo card. i did not dream of dressing them, joining mommy groups, or taking them to museums. i hardly dreamt of partnership, i hardly dreamt of any future. but here i am, raising two magnificent daughters — sometimes they raise and challenge me. i love them in a way that astounds me, opens me, and turns me toward goodness. but i do miss my mornings, those quiet mornings alone. i would wake just as early, a little after five, and turn the kettle on. i might putter around the house, dry brush and take a shower, i might sit down and write. so peaceful. so deliciously alone. it is the hardest part of motherhood for me, sacrificing my mornings.

rumi read The Borrowers after ara went to bed last night, tucked into ours with a heating pad on. mama, can i say gooodnight? she came down to zach’s office with her sleepy eyes and droopy bob. the fire blazing, over a foot of snow outside the windows, the end of a warriors game that was meant to happen yesterday but minneapolis. oh, minneapolis. my hometown. it’s weird, it feels an unlikely place for a war to begin. people are so nice, “minnesota nice”. the state is blue, progressive, so many people bike to work, all the universities. i return in the summer now, too damn cold in the winter, and i am reminded of her beauty. the river, good coffee, and spacious health food stores. the kindest of folk. the warriors won. i told zach, this doesn’t seem fair. the timberwolves must have had so much on their minds.

rumi comes down and we joke about when she was a baby, she never slept more than two hours for the first two years. we were deep into attachment parenting. let her cry, let her be — i was horrified at that advice and shocked by my devotions to her. i didn’t think much about parenting, but it just felt right. the only way. sleep in our bed, never let her cry. we joked that she would get so worked up toward 10pm that zach would have to bundle her up in the tiny snowsuit and walk the streets of park slope until she fell asleep. you were perfect but you never liked to sleep much.

rumi is my morning companion. she wakes with me, sometimes before. she crochets and reads, she watches Just Add Magic. she trails me with her snotty noise and morning breath, she insists on being near me. some mornings we bake, other mornings i make breakfast for her. ara usually stumbles down an hour later. i try to be here but i wish to be somewhere else, all alone.

i sacrifice my mornings and i have gotten in the habit of letting zach know. zach, our baba and late sleeper. we have a song, it’s 8 o’clocky… let’s wake the baba up doodoo doo. it’s cute and its annoying af.

i sometimes wonder if we have mistakenly sacrificed joy in the last few years. we were meant to let go of other things but we chose joy. she doesn’t matter, she doesn’t help us. she distracts our evolution, our healing, our next step. heal harder, social justice more, but don’t appear happy… it’s inconsiderate, it’s narcissistic, it’s just so fucking unkind.

i pulled a card yesterday with my girls. i have returned to the tarot with a great curiosity at her origins. i am reading a book by a friend of zach’s, jessica dore writes that mythology roots tarot to egypt. they would put codes and secrets into playing cards for those who were willing to brave the magic. some see a pile of paper, others see mystery worlds and hidden spells. what will the next many years of neptune in aries feel like?

Three of Cups, from Jessica Dore’s Tarot Companion:

As social beings, we reinforce each other in all kinds of ways. Sometimes, for instance, the way we respond to those we love who are suffering can inadvertently reinforce that suffering. If we extend care and attention to one another only during hardship, and ignore each other all the rest of the time, we risk sending the message that being in pain is the best way to connect. It seems clear that withholding care in hard times wouldn’t be right, but how do we also reinforce each other in joy and flourishing?

The Three of Cups depicts three people dancing, holding one another up in their joy, reinforcing it. It’s common to call a friend who’s experienced a painful loss, but do we also call to hear about their latest experience of flourishing? Could we get creative about coming up with potent ways to hold each other up in our joy?

the world is crumbling or falling into itself, it’s revealing what has always been there. it’s tower times and birth times. a new way crowning. i see all the righteous egos bemoaning and wailing into the abyss of social media. everyone posting the same image, the same sentiment. it feels important and ridiculous, all the sheep. so comical. how did we get here?

there has been much rhetoric about neptune in aries — war, mars, aggression. my moon is in aries and i feel most at home around aries energy. when i see people like mara hoffman or amanda bacon, both aries women, i feel deeply inspired and resonant. for me, aries is childlike enthusiasm, the newborn. joy for no reason, joy at being alive. joy at the breast, joy at the first taste of avocado, the first snow, the first sunrise.

when my sexual abuse surfaced, i cannot overstate the comfort and relief i felt at the sun rising. thank you, thank you. what a generous offering.
–

we are moving into neptune in aries today and there will be lots of noise about war, violence, and singularity, but i wonder at the possibility of revolution through joy and sharing this joy with others. the bull bursting through the gate with spring energy, spilling out. gorgeous flowers. contagious. it feels vulnerable, tender, and defiant in how it strays from the ways we seek validation.

i want this for myself, for my children, and for all of us — to leave the fog of victimhood that was neptune in pisces and remember just how precious a gift it is to be alive, to use our voice, and dance our way toward a future that belongs to all.

with love,
z

p.s. my beloved friend Petra and i have been working to get seeds into the hands of urban farmers in the Twin Cities. if you’d like to support this vision, please consider donating directly to Fruition Seeds. we’ll care for the rest.

pp.s. i have successfuly shifted my algorithm to the dancers of insta — human animal, gaga, contact improv and guan jing. there is no right way to move.

We arrive under the 11th moon of Shevat, ruled by Aquarius, near the close of the lunar year. While Capricorn taught us discipline and daily care, Aquarius seeks to disrupt what has grown rigid and envision what has not yet taken form. She is the Water Carrier — fixed air, conscious flow, future facing. She walks the garden of life holding a water jug in each hand, letting what comes from the sky, come and what nourishes the earth below her feet, fall. She is detached. She does not look back.

What blooms in her wake is medicine for all – flowers, plants, wisdom. She is proof that life responds when we are generous and faithful.

Capricorn taught us containment, endurance, and moral gravity. She asked us to stand upright in our truth, to hold form and sobriety of mind. Aquarius arrives to loosen any rigidity and remind us that no structure survives without reciprocity, pleasure, and imagination.

Kabbalistic Wisdom | The Mystical Map of Shevat

In Sefer Yetzirah, the month of Shevat is created through the letter Tzadik (צ) — the Righteous one.

The Tzadik is Yesod Olam, the foundation of the world, and one who channels sustenance from mystery into form. Like a Tree, the archetypal Tzadik is rooted in truth and generous in fruit.

This month we celebrate a favorite Jewish holiday – Tu B’Shevat, the New Year for Trees, which marks when sap begins to rise beneath winter’s bark. While life might appear dormant, so much is percolating just below the surface. Tu B’Shevat acts as a reminder of His Grace. Fruits, nuts, wine and olives are placed on the altar for all to receive and enjoy.

The Sense is Taste:

Taste is the most intimate sense. What we taste, we intimately allow. During Shevat, reclaiming taste is reclaiming agency. Right pleasure refines our path. When taste awakens, we no longer crave what diminishes our life force, we fortify our gifts instead.

The Organ is the Stomach:

The stomach is the seat of digestion and assimilation. It asks: Is it safe to take this in?

The Tribe is Asher:

Asher is blessed with delight, “He dips his foot in oil.” Oil represents ease, sensual sufficiency, and arousal. Asher reminds us that pleasure is evidence that life wishes to continue. A body that enjoys being alive is a body invested in the future.

The Letter is Tzadik (צ):

Righteousness is not moral superiority, it is right relationship — with Self, with others, with the Earth.

Shevat teaches us that pleasure is an ethical act. When we learn to receive what truly nourishes us, we stop consuming what harms our own bodies and distorts collective vision.

Shevat’s Medicine | Pleasure, Flow & Collective Liberation

Aquarius is ruled by Saturn and Uranus — structure and disruption, discipline and awakening. Together they ask: What systems are ready to evolve? What loyalties no longer serve my path?

Shevat medicine lives in community. In chosen kin. In circles where we acknowledge the dignity of difference and what might come through these seemingly disparate weavings.

Shevat asks:

• Where am I starving myself — emotionally, creatively, sensually?

• Where have I mistaken isolation for independence?

• What waters will I allow — and where will I pour them?

Body Wisdom | Stomach, Nerves & Air Flow

Shevat carries winter’s cold with a promise of renewal.
The sap is rising.
The sunlight is quietly lengthening.

Kabbalah: Taste refines desire and restores balance.
TCM: Late winter bridges Water and Wood — rest gives way to growth; digestion needs extra love and attention.

Ayurveda: Vata is high — air and ether dominate. Warmth, oil, and gentle rhythm are essential to prevent depletion. When things feel urgent, slow down.

The body asks for warm, pleasurable nourishment. Think stews, kitchari, congee, and herbal teas. Eat mindfully. Sip slowly.

Sacred Plants & Scents

• Fennel & Ginger: digestive warmth and circulation

• Oat straw: nervous system support, resilience

• Cardamom – tridoshic digestion, moves qi

• Orange peel – joy, circulation, elation

• Damiana – arousal, wakefulness without burnout

Feng Shui | Flow, Circulation & Belonging

Colors for Shevat: blue-green, turquoise, silver

• East (Family/Roots): living plants, new candles — rising sap, ancestral vitality

• Southeast (Abundance): a bowl of winter citrus — pleasure as blessing

• Center (Health): a ceramic vessel with water — digestion, trust, flow

Remove stagnant and broken objects. Open windows, air out your home. Let qi circulate!

Rituals for Shevat | Pleasure as Devotion

Fruit Meditation:
Eat one fruit slowly. Look at it first, examine it. Pay attention to texture, taste on your tongue, and as it goes down your throat. Do you like it? Allow the sensations to enliven you and return you to pleasure as a form of attention.

Water Carrier Invocation:
Pour moon water onto the earth. Speak aloud:
What flows through me is abundant but not mine alone. I offer my gifts freely.

Community Blessing:
Name people who truly nourish you and thank them outloud. Release one relationship or pattern that dishonors your spirit. I release you with love, I honor the end of our story.

Journal Prompts for Shevat (Aquarius):

• What does my body crave when shame is removed?

• How might my pleasure serve the future ancestors?

• What vision moves through my roots as a generous offering?

آب که راه خود را پیدا کند، زمین پاسخ می‌دهد
When water finds its way, the earth responds.

Patriarchy taught us to mistrust the wilderness and fear our cravings – to hoard instead of circulate, to survive alone rather than sustain together. Kabbalah teaches when desire is purified through Capricornian discernment, it becomes profound nourishment and sacred flow for all. The Shechinah dwells where justice and joy meet, where sap rises through imagination and no one guards the watering well.

We arrive under the moon of Tevet, ruled by the sign of Capricorn, as initiates in a new cycle.

Scorpio season carried us through the dark night, through grief, ancestral shadow, and the intimate knowledge of harm. Sagittarius followed — stripping illusion, insisting on truth, widening the horizon. And now Capricorn arrives with a calibration of limits, the patience to see a vision through to its bones; she is not interested in catharsis or spiritual bypass.

Tevet asks: Can I carry my own truth, hold my own form, and let my actions reflect what my heart already knows?

Capricorn is cardinal earth – the sign of spine, bone, and moral gravity. She does not perform rage; she embodies it.

In Kabbalah, Capricorn is aligned with Binah – the Great Mother, the womb of form, the intelligence that gives shape to raw fire. She is severe mercy. She is the one who says enough.

Western astrology mistakenly coded Capricorn as masculine because it governs systems, structure, and authority. But in mystical traditions, containment is feminine. Holding is feminine. Endurance is feminine. Law itself was once the domain of the Mother.

The Zohar teaches that Gevurah – often translated as severity or strength – is protection. It is the fierce boundary that allows life to continue well. Rage, when purified, lives here.

Kabbalistic Wisdom | The Mystical Map of Tevet

The Sense is Anger (כַּעַס):
Holy anger reveals where something sacred has been violated. When purified, it becomes moral clarity and action.

The Tribe is Dan:
The judge. The one who sees clearly and names what is just and unjust. Dan does not flinch from truth, nor from consequence of that truth.

The Organ is the Liver:
The body’s storehouse of anger and detoxification. The place where we metabolize injustice – or let it rot our system.

The Letter is Ayin (ע):
The eye. Seeing what is actually happening, without fantasy or denial. Ayin restores right perception.

Tevet teaches us that anger is information. It tells us where our dignity has been breached, where systems are corrupt, where boundaries are required. The danger is not the emotion of anger itself, but unexamined eruption that turns inward or festers.

Tevet’s medicine is personal INTEGRITY.

Tevet’s Medicine | Sacred Rage & Moral Authority

Capricorn is ruled by Saturn – lord of time, karma, consequence, and structure. Saturn does not care about our excuses. He asks only: Are you willing to be responsible for the life you are living?

Where Sagittarius sought truth in ideas and belief, Capricorn demands truth in action.

Tevet asks:
Where must I grow up?
Where must I stop leaking my energy?
What structures must I dismantle and which must I build?

Body Wisdom | Liver, Bones, and Contained Fire

Tevet is cold, spare, often unforgiving.
The holidays fade.
The nights remain long.
Illusion has burned away.

This is a month of sobriety.
Of reckoning.
Of choosing what you will carry forward and what you will no longer tolerate.

Kabbalah: Anger lives in the liver; when honored, it becomes strength.
TCM: The Wood element seeks movement – anger must circulate and be released to activate its medicine.
Ayurveda: Cold and dryness increase – routine, warmth, and grounding are essential.

Sacred Plants & Scents

• Dandelion root: liver cleansing, bitterness that clarifies

• Milk thistle: protection and repair after long stress

• Frankincense: moral clarity, prayer, spiritual authority

Practices

• Support the liver: warm lemon water in the morning, bitter greens.

• Establish one non-negotiable daily ritual (Saturn loves consistency).

• Move anger through the body and do not spiritualize it away.

• Speak one truth you’ve been withholding from yourself and others.

Feng Shui | Structure, Boundaries, Strength

Colors for Tevet: charcoal, bone white, evergreen.

• North (Career/Path): a stone or mountain image – commitment to your long road.

• West (Creativity/Children): remove clutter; rage needs clear channels.

• Center (Health): earthenware bowl with salt – absorption, purification, grounding.

Rituals for Tevet | Rage as Devotion

Sacred Anger Ritual:
Write down what you are no longer willing to carry. Burn it. Say aloud: My anger protects what is holy. I choose integrity.

Boundary Blessing:
Stand barefoot outside. Place one hand on your liver, one on your heart. SCREAM a clear NO. Let your body feel it land and settle in your aura.

Ancestor Alignment:
Call in the elders who survived, built, endured. Ask for their spine and their guidance.

Journal Prompts for Tevet (Capricorn)

• Where is anger living in my body and what truth is it revealing to me?

• What structures in my life are no longer just?

• What responsibility am I now ready to claim?

• What legacy am I shaping through my choices?

Tevet reminds us:
Sacred rage is self honoring that refuses to abandon itself.

I’ve been living with questions of (sacred) rage for the last few years – where it resides in my body and ancestral memory. Perimenopause, turning forty, raising daughters — each has delivered me to the same threshold: What is this rage and how might I bring reverence toward it?

Patriarchy taught us to fear feminine anger because feminine anger ends false hierarchies.

According to Lurianic Kabbalah, rage is elevated. When anger is metabolized through Binah and Gevurah, it becomes moral clarity. The Shechinah herself is said to withdraw when injustice reigns, as an act of protest.

Sacred rage is the body saying: this is not aligned with life.

Teresa of Ávila understood this intimately. She challenged Church authority, reformed monastic life, and wrote with unapologetic confidence in a time when women were expected to be silent.

She writes as a mystic grounded in discipline, prayer, and action. Saturn would recognize her immediately as kin.

A few weeks ago, Zach was on his pull-up bar, I was sprawled on the floor near the wood stove, and we were talking, as we often do after the kids go to bed and the house settles. I may have shared a persistent myth from my childhood: the feeling that my choices always left me “outside.” Like when I did a yoga teacher training in my twenties and my mom called it idol worship, or when I started dating a non-Jew named Ian and was uninvited for Sukkot, or when I was in second grade and the teacher asked, Who here celebrates Thanksgiving? She knew I was the only one who wouldn’t come in on Thursday. She knew I was the only one who celebrated. Well, Jews don’t celebrate Thanksgiving. I put my hand down.

Closer to me often felt like a sacrifice of familial ties. One more string severed.

I probably told my mom about the teacher’s comment — maybe not. She was already in prep mode: turkey brined, pie ingredients out, stale bread gathered from the local bakery. Thanksgiving was her holiday. The one she treasured from childhood. The only one neutral enough to include all of our identities —Norwegian, Iranian, Jewish, agnostic, Chassidic. The table long, the conversation mellow.

I loved every minute of it, mostly because my mother loved every minute of it. Apple pie, pumpkin pie, turkey stuffed to the brim. Everyone seemed happier, mostly because she seemed better. My parents married young; my mom had a lot of anger, a lot of passion, a great desire for stability. She worked, she went to school, she cared for four children. I am second to last, the true middle of the girls. You never knew what you were going to get with my mom — joy, rage, silent treatment. I admired her, but I was also afraid of her. I worried, will she be okay? Her tears seemed endless.

But Thanksgiving was different, predictable. She would wake early, put on an apron, and get cooking. She greeted us with joy as we woke. She hummed to herself out loud; add the butter, don’t forget the salt, the turkey has two more hours. Part of me believes I learned to cook just by listening to her instruct her inner cook. I don’t remember her sitting much during dinner, she danced around the table with glee. Want this? Need that? It brought her immense joy to hold onto that morsel from her own childhood with Grandma Johnson. Everything else was different — but on the third Thursday of November, the roots were laid bare.

As we grew up, we flew home. Then we took turns, brought partners, and eventually our own children. And then not at all through the pandemic. Now my mom invites us all and usually ends up with her sister, her mom and husband, her stepfather - my grampa, and one of us. I miss Thanksgiving mornings in Minnesota. Sometimes it would be snowing, other times unusually warm.

I’ve hosted Thanksgiving, too, some of my favorite memories. In a gorgeous home in the Berkeley Hills where I was housesitting, an hour out of the city with my previous partner, and later, here. A few weeks after Zach and I got engaged on his birthday, 11.9.14, I was invited to his Aunt Leslie’s Thanksgiving in DC. Everyone would be there, a meet and greet. I was excited; it turned out to be a mess. A foretelling of family dynamics, and inexplicable mother-love — his mother’s, not mine. Toward him, not me.

This year we gathered at an Airbnb in Hudson. His parents are moving out of the apartment they’ve called home in NYC for the last two decades. Money, proximity to grandchildren, and a desire for something new factored into the choice. I wanted so much to feel joy, but all I could feel was sorrow and mourning. The genocide of Indigenous people, the continued erasure, dancing on lies. Pretending it’s okay, just this one day. When you are a child of sexual abuse you learn how to lie to yourself and to others to protect your shame, to protect the person (system) who harmed you. It’s confusing. I hid it away, even from myself for many years. I would lie about little things and wonder why that was my reflex. With each step toward integrity I was unknowingly thawing my own trauma, and making space for the suffering and lies of the world. As within, so outside.

I sat at the table, Zach’s siblings and parents speaking gratitude. My gorgeous children jumped about — less like my mother’s elegant dance and more like caffeinated clowns. A voice: You don’t have to do this anymore. You don’t have to participate. I knew it was my last Thanksgiving. Relief, a tinge of sadness — but mostly relief.

I went home and scrolled through Instagram — beautiful photos of friends gathering with their loved ones, eating turkey or whatever else was on offer. Looking happy, bright. Rituals are so important, gathering is essential. I believe this with every fiber of my being. Communal celebration is a place of depravity for the modern person, it filled something in me to see their joy.

I wrote a post, sharing my thoughts — an invitation. Way opens. Let’s try something new next year. A seed planted. Many likes, a few DMs, and messages of me too, I’d like to join.

My mother wrote the next morning: I don’t even know what to say. I love Thanksgiving, it reminds me of Grandma Johnson, and it’s the one thing I was able to carry over after becoming Jewish. Your post makes me beyond sad.

I felt her sadness and my own — a grief for what I continually sacrifice on the altar of integrity. Last night Zach knelt at our bedside as I lay there, book in hand and heating pad on my belly. Choosing my inner compass keeps taking me further from my family. It hurts. I don’t know what to do. When I told my family about the abuse they listened well, compassionately, and never wanted to speak about it again. We don’t go there.

I fell asleep with my mother in the kitchen, the memory of her there filling me with a quiet joy. I drifted into thoughts of my first Thanksgiving with Zach— Freud would have had a field day at the absurdity. And beneath it all, I felt the weight of what I’ve learned: the small and large violences, the white-washing, the erasures. Once you wake to them, the world’s injustices press too close to ignore.

And yet, I slept. Deeply, for the first time in years.

We are under the moon of Kislev, aligned with Sagittarius — mutable fire, deep trust, fierce illumination. Where Cheshvan carved its chambers below, Kislev rises, gathering kindling from the dark and breathing it into flame. The archer teaches us: before the arrow goes into the great unknown, the bow must be drawn close to the heart. Only through intimacy with our inner aim can direction be true.

Kislev is keeper of light, whose holidays like Chanukah and Yalda honor the embers and the first pale return of day. It is the threshold where protection meets vulnerability, where miracle becomes fortitude. We carry the tenderness of our shadow work and the knowing that something new is emerging. In Kabbalah, this moon is the Divine womb — a sanctuary for rest, to let what has been broken rearrange itself in our favor. Here, we hold the arrow to our chest, steady the breath, and trust her aim as we release control.

Kislev is also my daughters’ moon — children born in the long night, carrying their bright sparks. Their births have taught me that being true to one’s light illuminates the home, the community, and, in its way, the greater world.

Kabbalistic Wisdom | The Mystical Map of Kislev

The Sense is Sleep (שֵׁנָה): Dreams as prophecy. The body laid down becomes a vessel of revelation.

The Tribe is Benjamin: The beloved youngest, protected by all — the energy of sanctuary, home, and refuge.

The Organ is the Womb/Belly: Seat of intuition, generativity, gestation. The place where future lives grow in darkness.

The Letter is Samekh (ס): A circle of support and protection. The divine arm that holds us when we cannot hold ourselves.

Kislev’s medicine is TRUST. It takes lot of trust to see the bare earth and know it is being rebirthed below our feet, to fall asleep each night and give our spirit over to the Divine.

Kislev’s Medicine | Faith, Fire, and Vision

Sagittarius is the sacred wanderer, mutable light that extends toward the horizon. She is ruled by Jupiter – planet of blessing, abundance, and the courage to imagine something new.

Where Scorpio purified through depth, Sagittarius liberates through possibility. She reminds us that prophecy requires play, that wisdom begins with curiosity, that spiritual life must widen to include joy.

Her fire is the lantern flame, the traveler’s torch, the flicker that says: go on.
Her devotion is to learning, to faith, to the arrow shot toward future possibility.

During this season, we reclaim our right to hope.

The Emotional Arc of Kislev | Light in the Dark

The darkest nights of the year allow for greater truth to emerge.
Light is most luminous when everything around it is quiet.

This is a month of slowness, nesting, dreaming.
Of candles and soups, wool and warmth.
Of trusting that life is gestating where we cannot yet see.

Chanukah’s miracle is not that the oil lasted 8 days, but that someone was brave enough to light the entire Menorah, not knowing what would come next.

This moon whispers:
Do not underestimate the fire you carry.

Body Wisdom | Sleep, Fire, and the Inner Womb-Flame

Kabbalah: The womb is where miracles take shape. Let warmth return to the core.
TCM: Fire supports spirit (Shen), Water holds fear — the dance of courage and rest.
Ayurveda: Vata still rules so the body desires fats, oils, and warmth.

Sacred Plants & Scents

• Cinnamon: fire, circulation, protection – burn sticks like incense

• Mugwort: dreams, prophecy, moon-magic – I prefer tea to tincture

Practices

• Keep a dream notebook at your bedside; Kislev dreams are known to be oracular.

• Warm the belly with castor oil packs or hot water bottles.

• Let yourself sleep more; revelation requires rest.

Feng Shui | Inviting Light, Warmth, and Protection

Colors for Kislev: saffron, gold, the whitish-blue of a candle flame.

In the North (Path): place a candle to honor divine guidance.
In the Center (Health): a bowl of pomegranates for vitality and blessing.
In the East (Family): cedar or juniper branches to honor ancestral protection.

Rituals for Kislev | Fire, Faith, and the Return of Light

Fire Invocation:
Learn to start and tend a fire of your very own. As within, so everywhere.

Dream-Communion:
Before bed, rub your temples with mugwort or lavender. Pray for guidance as you sleep.

Motherline Blessing (for our children):
With permission, place your hands on your child’s heart and speak:
Children of winter light, may the world make room for your fire, your vision, your joy. May the darkness be gentle toward you, and may your dreams lead you to ever greater truths.

Solstice Vigil:
Sit for ten minutes in darkness. Notice what you fear. Name it.

Journal Prompts for Kislev (Sagittarius)

• What dream or vision is gestating inside me right now?

• Where is my faith asking to expand?

• What light do I carry that I’ve been hesitant to share?

• What protection or support do I most need this season?

• What miracles have already occurred this year — small or large — and what do they teach me about trust?

May the miracles of this season gather at your doorstep and illuminate the way forward.

He was coming to town with his young wife and their new baby, her first and his 10th(?). He was in his seventies; she was in her early twenties. He’d gotten her pregnant on retreat and they married before the baby arrived. I felt a spark of excitement at the idea of the night – a reason to get dressed up, to network, to glimpse myself beyond the fog of early motherhood. We would hire a rare sitter, go into the city after dark. I would stand beside my husband and be “Rebbetzin Zivar”.

I grew up with a guru, my guru. The Rebbe. He was my north star. A large framed portrait of him hung on my bedroom wall as a child. The walls were light blue and the clouds billowing behind him made it seem as if he floated through air. I talked to him constantly: please don’t let my parents fight tonight. Please let my nightmares go away. I see Nazis outside my bedroom window pacing back and forth – I’m so scared. After my own molestation, I turned to him again, confused and overwhelmed with sadness. We sang to him and with him through broadcast equipment. I met the Rebbe once on his birthday with my father and brother in Crown Heights. His eyes were bright blue; his presence grounded in goodness. I adored him.

I sometimes imagined the Rebbe as the good parent the world had failed to be – maybe he’d envelope me in grandfather spirit to protect my personal power. I will not take it, I will not abuse you. I will treasure your power and help you grow your own seeds of sovereignty.

I would eventually leave the boundaries of the community he founded and one his wife had resisted. On my own spiritual journey, I would encounter many self-declared gurus. Some tried to lure me in; others sensed I knew the blueprint. Meditation instructors, New Age rabbis, yogis, healers, even professors. I know what true wisdom feels like, I’d think. I would reach for books by the Rebbe: save me from this nonesense.

A few years ago, dulled again by motherhood with our second child, I went on a creative retreat. I expected it to be led by a woman of color, but for the summer session she invited a white man to co-facilitate. From the moment he opened his mouth, my body recoiled. Ego-forward, invulnerable, blatantly tormented. Parasitic. He claimed to channel the Messiah, maybe implied he was the Messiah. I left early, a storm in my chest on the dark seas of sacchrine spirituality.

The following week, over coffee in Rhinebeck, my little sister looked at me and said, “Maybe it’s time to stop looking for yourself in spiritual communities. Maybe it’s time to be with a community of artists you actually desire.”

On that dark autumn evening, I anticipated his arrival as we admired her weavings and recent awakening – Meditating with him has changed my life forever! A chef who would later open a celebrated Queens restaurant cooked for us. Half an hour late, the guru stomped up the stairs with a car seat slung in his grip, his beautiful wife trailing behind. He appeared weathered, singular, and energetically heavy. Anytime someone asked her a question, he answered. He folded every moment back to himself, as if afraid she might say something true. He challenged my theology and I refused the bait. We left as dessert was served. I took his wife’s number. It’s still in my phone.

In the week that followed, I felt nauseous. Strange. Outside myself. As if a sorcerer had scrambled my clarity. A wizard for the dark side. Later I learned more: the lies, the women, the predatory use of his platform. Still, many stayed. It didn’t happen to me, they say. I get so much from him. I can’t leave.

The Epstein files read like an atlas of hunger – men and women desperate to graze the heat of power, to borrow its voltage, to matter. Power-over is not just a system; it’s a contagion. A virus. A possession. You can feel the sickness of it in the body: the slight nausea, the flattening of breath, the silencing that slides over one’s throat. The psychic static that tries to pry intuition from its root. It’s insidious because it doesn’t start in language, it starts in the nervous system. The body registers the architecture long before the mind names it: the tightening, the shrinking, the hypervigilance that rehearses the shape of harm.

And the more I listen to that internal recoil, the more I understand: these false gurus, these spiritual predators, these Epstein orbiters are not separate stories. Different costumes, same blueprint. Power without accountability. Sexual assault isn’t peripheral to these ecosystems – it’s the shadow currency that keeps them humming. Sometimes acted, sometimes only implied, hovering like a threat in any community that worships a single person. Don’t disrupt the energy. Don’t challenge the teacher. Don’t break the lineage. Don’t ruin the spell. And so compliance becomes devotion, and devotion becomes estrangement from the Self.

We like to imagine these figures as fringe – eccentric mystics, rogue billionaires, fallen healers – but they are emblems of a culture that confuses proximity to power with protection. The fantasy whispers: if I stand close enough to their power source, I won’t be devoured. This bargain tears us apart. The vulnerable are sacrificed. The aspirational hollow out their center. And the rest of us breathe in the toxic fumes of someone else’s cravings.

But something is shifting in the collective body. You can feel it astrologically with Pluto leaving Capricorn’s rigid hierarchies for Aquarius’s insurgent horizontality; Uranus in Taurus rattling value, money, embodiment; the nodes pulling us toward liberation and away from the karmic scripts of dominance. But you can also feel it in the spine, in the fascia, in the subtle trembling under the skin: a refusal to be coerced into submission.

The exposure of these culturally appointed “holy ones” is not an apocalypse. We are in the midst of intense contractions before our collective future crowns. The collapse of toxic structures so a new model of leadership might rise: relational, embodied. rooted in ritual, ancestral wisdom and collective protection.

If the age that is dying worshipped proximity to power, the age that is arriving devotes itself to integrity. Proximity to care. Proximity to those the old world tried to discard. Proximity to the truth-tellers dismissed as “too.. emotional, porous, demanding” – whose bodies refuse to ignore what was always there.

The new earth is not an escape; it is an initiation. We do not ascend, we descend. Into the body, into the wound, into the rooms where harm was done. Only by naming the texture of the past in our own flesh can we promise not to recreate it. Only then does anything truly new begin. Amen.

“Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.” Audre Lorde

In the days after encounters like these – false teachers, distorted charisma, the energetic smog of power without integrity – I’ve learned to return to practices that anchor me back into my own field. It begins with breath.

Essential Oils:
Rose to soften without losing boundary, to remind the heart of its dignity. Lemongrass to settle the nervous system and release toxicity.

Feng Shui:
Opening windows, even in winter, to circulate stagnant chi.
Candles lit with intention to clear outside forces.

These are rituals of discernment, not spells of avoidance. Ways of telling the body: You are here. Your intuition is intact. Your field is sovereign.

In this moment of cultural exhaustion, where everything feels overstimulated, over-optimized, and under-examined, we’re watching a spiritual crisis unfold in real time. The wellness world, once a place of refuge, has begun to mirror the systems it claimed to resist. It has become glossy, monetized, and aspirational in the same way fast fashion or celebrity culture is: everything must be branded, purchased, manifested, improved. Even our spiritual lives now sit on the auction block.

Late-stage capitalism has woven itself into our inner lives so thoroughly that even our spiritual practices now mimic productivity hacks. The culture of rugged individualism, Oprah’s hustle-adjacent uplift, Glennon Doyle’s self-liberation narratives, Gabby Bernstein’s magnetic manifestation ethos, offers a sacchrine freedom that reinforces the same logic of “more, better, optimized.” More healing. More expansion. More self-work. It frames our inner worlds as a startup, forever raising capital, forever pivoting, forever scaling. Our lives become a game to be won, not a story to inhabit.

In this system, wellness becomes commodity, spirituality becomes branding, and rest becomes a luxury good. The psychic cost is obvious: people move through life feeling like spiritual underachievers, convinced they have failed some invisible test. Instead of locating the Divine in community, ritual, or reciprocity, we are told the Divine exists at the end of our discipline, something to earn, and something that will be lost if we underperform.

And then there is the exodus trend, people who spent years building personas, businesses, or entire belief systems rooted in the logic of the market, only to flee the very conditions they sell. We see the rise of trad wives romanticizing retreat, influencers moving “back to nature,” and wellness gurus who sold spiritual salvation leaving behind followers who invested not just money, but identity. The retreat from these constructed lives often comes without accountability for the ways these choices shaped communities, relationships, or the emotional economies of their audiences.

This is the shadow side of individualism: the freedom to reinvent oneself without reckoning with the consequences. People long to exit the capitalist spell they once cast, but disregard others who remain entangled in the web. They yearn for simplicity while leaving behind those who bought the dream they were selling, those who are now spiritually foreclosed and materially emptied.

There is another way emerging — a collective awakening and refusal. A reclamation. A tenderness. A recognition that spirituality is not a path of acquisition but of unlearning and surrender. It is about returning to right relationship with ourselves and each other. It is about refusing the myth of the self-made soul. We need each other; we belong to each other.

To live well in the truest sense is to remember that peace is welcoming mystery. Meaning is often communal. And nourishment thrives in the quiet spaces capitalism cannot monetize and hustle culture cannot script.

Below is the original instagram stories I wrote, that sparked this post.

I wasn’t shopping. I was attempting to self-medicate.

It hit me as I looked at myself in the mirror, a trench hanging on my slight shoulders, fluorescent light buzzing overhead. I’d gone in out of habit, not desire — just a quick stop before groceries in the same complex, the flicker of dopamine from endless options and familial comforts.

A jolt of recognition moved through me. This isn’t for you. This isn’t you at all.

Retail therapy promises novelty and worth. It says: you deserve something new, you’re still someone. It swallows the complexity of feeling with infinite choice. The jacket wasn’t just fast fabric — it was a spell for belonging, a costume for composure. Wear this, I promise you’ll be fine.

I shook my body for a second, hung it back up, and left right away.

In the car, I called my husband and cried. I told him how tired I was, how my daughter’s rage that morning had rubbed against old wounds in me, how buying something had almost tricked me into bypassing all the grief. He listened well.
You look great in everything, he says.
I just want to feel it, I say.

That morning had been brutal. My nine-year-old daughter unraveled; a stormy meltdown of tears and trembling. Within minutes she was laughing again, playing with her sister, while I was wrecked, my nervous system fried. I didn’t want to blame her for how undone I felt, but her outburst had exposed the subtle truth behind my exhaustion.

I remembered my childhood home and the rage that filled it, the shame that followed, the silence that swallowed everything. My mom didn’t know how to handle her anger, so we learned to hide ours. I carried rage inward and let it sour into sadness, anxiety, and self-hatred.

Parenting my daughters is a constant mirror. I see the ways I was parented, parentified, and how I try — and sometimes fail — to do it differently. It takes presence to let a child rage, to stay steady instead of rushing her toward ease. It takes a lot of fucking maturity, too.

Retail therapy is its own kind of inheritance. My mother did it, her mother before her; perhaps buying things when they couldn’t bear to feel, when they craved touch, attention, or recognition and had nowhere safe to place those needs. Esther Perel writes that modern women, starved for intimacy and permission, often redirect eros into productivity or consumption. When desire has no language, we speak it through our credit cards.

So many of us live in this quiet starvation. We serve everyone else’s hungers — children, partners, work — and forget our own. We forget to dance with life, to feel awe, to court joy. We mistake newness for aliveness.

Last week, we celebrated Taylor’s birthday… a kind of feast for women learning to reinhabit themselves. She’s in the midst of a metamorphosis, reclaiming the parts she once deferred. She wore her wedding dress again, not out of nostalgia, but as a vow to herself, a recommitment to her own aliveness.

Her sister-in-law and now friend, Sarah, planned the evening with me. Both are grieving their beloved mother-in-law, a woman who spent her life caring for everyone else first. They’re learning a new devotion: to love without self-erasure.

Sarah wore a lace negligee that had belonged to her mother-in-law, tags still attached. She had never worn it. Slipping it on was an act of reclamation; to honor her body, her lineage, her right to feel beautiful and safe.

The day before the party, the three of us sat around a bed. They were trying on clothes. Should I wear this? That? We passed fabrics across our laps, laughed, turned toward the mirror and toward each other. Sexy Mama. There was a sacredness in the air, the quiet hum of women seeing one another. It felt like church, the kind one seeks when stepping into a retail space.

Watching them, I thought about what it means for women to adorn ourselves with intention. To honor the body as sacred, the garment as prayer. It’s a different kind of beauty – born from presence, not avoidance. Generative, not exploitative.

That evening, I opened my closet doors. I sifted through what I own – pieces bought in moments of striving, of wanting to be someone else, somewhere else. Each garment carries a residue: the shirt after heartbreak, the dress for a past part, parisian flats whispering escape. I ran my fingers across each of them, said thank you, and began to make a pile nearby.

To let go of some pieces and the pattern that accumulated them is to say: I trust in a better way.

Rumi teaches me this daily. When she’s angry, she’s enraged. When she’s happy, she’s radiant. She doesn’t perform composure. She feels everything.

I am not the good mother who keeps things perfect and happy. I am the real mother who holds them through all manner of weather.

Tara Brach often says, “We don’t meditate to feel good. We meditate to feel everything.”

Parenting our children and our small selves is the same. It’s the practice of staying with whatever is here — rage, joy, grief, love — and trusting that we can hold it all.

So I didn’t buy the trench coat. I came home, dropped my grocery bags and cozied up with my husband. We watched the sunlight swim across the wood beams above us. I heard my daughters’ laughter across the river. I sifted through stories and made a pile of giveaways from my closet. I took a hot shower and put my barefeet on the cold, autumn grass.

I stayed with it.

And I felt everything.

I’ve long been devoted to the spiritual and very practical art of Feng Shui. Every object holds chi, every corner a whisper of memory. Releasing what we no longer wear clears not only space, but karmic residue, allowing new energy and insight to enter. The late Grand Master Lin Yun of the BTB School taught that shifting our physical environment can transform our fate, because matter and spirit are one continuous current. His teachings have shaped how I approach both my home and my interior castle. (Bagua Map by Meghan Wallace James)

We are now in the month of Cheshvan, aligned with the sign of Scorpio — fixed water, the realm of mystery, eros, and transformation. After the grandeur and ascent of Tishrei’s festivals, the lunar calendar falls silent. Cheshvan carries no holidays, no prescribed rituals. It is the empty cup — the space where our sacred awareness becomes a living well.

Astrologically, Scorpio takes us into the underworld beneath superificiality and appearance. It rules death and rebirth, sexuality, and power. This is the moment on the wheel when leaves fall to the ground and rot into soil, when what was abundant begins to return to alchemical darkness.

Cheshvan is called Mar (bitter) because it is void of holidays; the mystics teach that bitterness itself is medicine. The sweetness of Tishrei ripens only through digestion, integration, and grief. In Scorpio’s domain, the fortitude cultivated through the High Holidays is exercised in the underworld of mystery where much of the unseen lives and takes shape.

Kabbalistic Wisdom | The Mystical Map of Cheshvan

The Sense is Smell (רֵיחַ): the most subtle of senses, a reminder that decay carries its own fragrance.

Tribe is Menashe: to transform pain and memory into wisdom.

Organ is the Intestines: digestion, elimination — the profound wisdom of the body to digest experience and extract nourishment.

Letter is Nun (נ): symbol of the fallen and the faithful; the soul that endures the depths.

Cheshvan’s gift is integration through descent — tending to the inner chambers of shadow and self. This moon invites us to metabolize what has been awakened; to let spirit root in body and dark soil.

Scorpio’s Medicine | Death, Power, and Regeneration

“Grieving is a sign of spiritual health. But it is not enough to weep for our lost landscapes; we have to put our hands in the earth to make ourselves whole again.” — Robin Wall Kimmerer

Scorpio is fixed water — depth that does not waver. Where Libra seeks balance, Scorpio pierces. Her work is truth: to move beyond illusions of fairness toward the integrity of the soul. She tends the alchemy of death and the holy art of rebirth.

Ruled by Mars and Pluto, Scorpio’s devotion is fierce and generous. She teaches us that intimacy requires risk, and all transformation demands surrender. Power, in her eyes, is transparency and presence: the courage to stay with what is raw, erotic, and real.

Cheshvan teaches us that devotion without descent is incomplete. The descent into shadow is where the rebirth begins.

The Emotional Arc of Cheshvan | Integration After Illumination

After the communal reckoning of Tishrei, this moon ascends like the darkness after a night storm. The soul turns inward. The body exhales into rest.

What has been forgiven must now be lived. What has been released must now be composted. The sacred work is tending the hearth and staying faithful when revelation fades.

The Kabbalists teach that Cheshvan holds the wisdom to embody a new future; it is within its mysterious waters that new visions form.

Body Wisdom | Gut, Water, and the Deep Core

Kabbalah: The intestines digest experience, transforming judgment into wisdom.

TCM: Water element awakens fear and courage. The kidneys and bladder govern will and faith — emunah.

Ayurveda: Vata still whispers, but Kapha begins to root. The body longs soups, warmth, and naps.

Sacred Plants & Scents

• Myrrh: devotion and death; the anointing oil of mystery

• Patchouli: grounding after spiritual ascent

• Rosemary: remembrance — bridging death and life

• Black Pepper or Clove: awakens circulation, passion, and will

Practices

• Drink hot water with lemon and salt each morning to clarify; a tablespoon of olive oil to cleanse and reset.

• Keep a dream journal; the unconscious is present and the veil is thin.

• Walk near rivers or in the rain; let grief move through breath and bone.

Feng Shui | Sanctifying the Depths

Colors for Cheshvan: deep indigo for mystery and red/burgundy for blood and vitality.

In the North (Career/Path): place a bowl of water or a shell to honor the surrendered waters.

• In the Center (Health/Integration): burn incense or cedar; let scent sanctify the unseen.

• In the West (Creativity/Depth): display dark stones or obsidian for courage in shadow work.

Rituals for Cheshvan | Descent, Devotion, and Faith

• Water Offering: Whisper your dreams into the waters, pour them on the earth. Whisper your fears into the waters, pour them on the earth.

• Shadow Work: I highly recommend this guided demon practice.

• Body as Temple: Anoint your lower belly with castor or sesame oil; honor the creative and eliminative powers within.

Journal Prompts for Cheshvan (Scorpio)

• What am I integrating from the revelations of Tishrei/Libra Season?

• Where is bitterness still alive in me — and what medicine does it hold?

• How do I relate to power, surrender, and transformation?

• What am I ready to bury, compost, or consecrate to the dark?

• What faith and truths remain when the light recedes?

A Course in Miracles offers: The journey into darkness has been long and cruel, and you have gone deep into it. May you be blessed with the courage to go deep, to move beyond your own limitations and to receive the gifts of this sacred descent.

Paintings by Margot Bergman, all other images can be found on my pin-board.

I met Imbolo at the sauna. We were immediate friends.
A writer from Cameroon, like me she is married to an Ashkenazi Jew, and lives in a neighboring town. We talk about everything and nothing. On a labyrinth-like walk behind the library, she invites me to join a club she is forming with local mothers of color. Come. I laugh nervously. I am not a woman of color. She looks at me squarely; Yes you are, Zivar.

Her words rearrange something in me. I was raised as a child of converts and refugees, of exile and devotion. For most of my life, I lived as though identity were a puzzle to be solved, a riddle to entertain others.

Wait, let me guess where you are from…

I have lived on the edge – between cultures, between languages and political divides, between the sacred and the secular. It is an honest in-betweenness, and it is also a disorienting one: the liminality can be exhausting.

My Persian line existed mostly as curiosity throughout my childhood — extravagant rice dishes, bosturos shesh-besh, and a subtle othering at family gatherings. My mother’s lineage was folded quietly into her conversion story, a footnote to faith. And, in our little Chabad community, Jewishness meant Ashkenazi; potato kugel, Holocaust trauma, and Chassidic folklore. I learned how to speak Yinglish and depend on Shabbes goys.

My father spoke to us in his third tongue and my mother covered her hair under tichels, there were pictures of the Rebbe in every room. We went to Gramma’s house to pick raspberries and eat Little Debbies. We went to Amu Yousef’s and had our cheeks pinched by aunties as everyone sang-spoke around us in Farsi. I learned to shapeshift between worlds and became an expert at dissecting myself.

Edward Said writes that exile creates “the unhealable rift forced between a human being and a native place.” I sometimes wonder if that rift can be inherited too, passed down like a dominant gene.

Whiteness in Jewish life is not only about appearance; it’s a structure of aspiration, a desire for safety through proximity to power. Early American Jewish communities learned that acceptance required mimicry: speak English, drop the accent, build the synagogue to look like a church.

For Persian Jews, the relationship to whiteness is more layered. We come from an empire that once colonized others and was later colonized itself. We carry the memory of both domination and exile. When we arrive in America, our brownness is often inconvenient, something to soften or disguise.

Whiteness is not neutral; it is a theology of separation. It teaches us to mistake distance for dignity, transaction for mutuality. It asks of us to flatten ourselves into a legible shape. Whiteness promises safety and delivers isolation; it teaches us to disappear politely.

Céline Semaan, the founder of Slow Factory, calls for “decolonizing identity as ecological repair.” She insists that identity is relational and is to be lived, not leveraged.

Semaan’s work, my friend Hala Alyan’s poetry, Imbolo’s writing — all of them call to me because of who they are: artists, mothers, women of color and grace. To be included in their circle is to enter a place without borders, porous and vibrant. These women gave language to what I had long felt: to live vocally in the diaspora is to refuse disappearance. It is an art form, a way of being in motion without losing coherence.

Hala’s women build homes in borrowed languages; they inherit longing as fluency. Through her work I recognize a new kind of woman – brown, sensual, haunted, carrying multiple displacements as inheritance.

“Assimilation is a trauma response,” she says in words and through her tender presence. I think about how often we confuse safety with disappearance. Whitewashing narrows the imagination; diaspora opens it again.

In 2018, we hosted a queer workshop at our home. Friends gathered to map the vast terrain of gender, its constellations, its language. I remember tightening inside with each ‘share’. I felt defensive, as though something precious were being taken from me.

It wasn’t until years later that I realized I was mourning my own unclaimed womanhood. I didn’t feel safe. My early sexual trauma had made embodiment feel dangerous, so I pushed against others’ fluidity as if protecting my own scarcity. Healing my trauma made space for others’ expression. When I found safety in my own body, the conversation around gender became different. I now see it as joyful expansion, not erasure.

American culture worships the rugged individual – heal alone, succeed alone, brand your resilience for the market. The Persian sensibility I inherit imagines the self differently: as blurry, communal, reciprocal. To be human is to be in conversation, with ancestors, with God, with the unseen. The soul is not a fortress; it is a threshold.

My grandmother, who is also my namesake, raised 10 children with her husband Amin, and housed their husbands, wives, children and others on their farm compound. She visited the dead every week to light candles and make prayers. She embodied a generosity, not of transaction but profound ecological interdependence.

Recently, my daughter had an issue at school. Her teacher insisted on reading to the class through lunch. On some days Rumi wants to socialize with friends, on other days to sit in silence with her food. I wondered whether she should self-advocate or whether I should speak on her behalf. My husband said, “She’s nine. Write them.”

I was struck by my own impulse. When did I start believing that advocacy must be solitary? When did community care become infantilized? When did interdependence become so shameful?

When Imbolo claimed me as a fellow woman of color, something in me uncoiled. I noticed how much energy I had spent seeking outside spiritual traditions because I was unsure of how to claim my own or if I was even worthy of such exploration. She gave me permission to return; this was a gesture of profound generosity.

In the end, none of my identities are pure. To live in the diaspora is to live in relation, to be many things at once.

Certainty is the promise of the empire but the soul prefers contradiction.

I no longer seek to belong to one side of the ocean.
I belong to the tide itself.

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Vivian on Disbursing her Mothers Objects After She Passed.

Laura at a wedding in her MARA HOFFMAN dress; Natalie in her black linen frock; Alexandra in a vintage one-piece from Malia’s mom; Sarah in MERIDIAN near the water; Zach in his ALDER vest leading HIGH HOLIDAYS.