In this year, some of my favorite psychospiritual nonfiction essays were published either through my blog or Gods & Radicals, as well as an essay in Witches & Pagans magazine.
Alchemizing the Lead of Masculinity
A piece of writing reflecting on both the poisons and the healing gifts of masculinity. I understand many masculine folks in queer and Leftist circles found this validating and speaking to their experiences. Some readers were upset by Part 1 and had some hard words for me, while some readers who were upset by Part 1 but read through to Part 2 found they appreciated the essay more than they expected. Perhaps if I started with the “good stuff” and then moved to the “hard stuff” it would have been more palatable, and yet the purpose of the work was that alchemy, in which we must confront the Lead before gaining the Gold.
“There is room for all of us to continue growing and integrating more of our wholeness—both the strengths and the places of shame. Those who say that calling men to reflect on our capacity to cause harm gives us an unhealthy vision of humanity are those who want men to be emotionally fragile and isolated. If we have power, we are capable of causing harm. Period. If we are unable to be accountable in our relationships, then we cannot have relationships.”
The Prison and the Key: Pagan Perspectives on Suicide – Part 1 ; Part 2
This writing was a few years old by the time of its publication, but I’m grateful it found a place to be. The roots of this essay run all the way back to an assignment I had in high school to analyze a moral issue from religious perspectives that supported it and condemned it, and I chose suicide. Finding a religious perspective that supported or condoned suicide was challenging. When a beloved friend and coreligionist died by suicide, I felt called to take up the assignment again from my new spiritual home.
“When life feels like a prison, it is tempting to imagine the key that will release us, and to seek out all the possibilities for that key. We might imagine the key to be a perfect job, a perfect lover, the right medications, the right diagnosis. We might imagine the key to be something we know to be impossible, like a different childhood. In the greatest moments of despair, suicide might look like the key. I will not begrudge anyone their choices, but my belief is that the key is within the prison walls, within our hearts. We become free when we stop seeking the key and stop viewing our lives as a prison. “
In the Midnight Hour: On Mattering, Will, and Hope
This essay is both about my surprisingly existential crisis following a break-up but also in the context of collapsing empire and the threat of a collapsing ecosystem. In a way I feel like it’s part three of a trilogy of essays, which may have more to come, that began with “The Innocent Heart,” which was me attempting to kindly and rationally beg Americans not to choose Fascism; and then “The Cresting Wave,” which was me coming to grips with the reality that this historical moment would be us replaying the turn toward reactionary politics that has occurred cyclically in modern history, and figuring out how to be in the midst of that.
“In the face of the most existential of existential dilemmas—the potential that our civilization, if not our species, could be in its final decline within my lifetime—I who had at times struggled with the depressive belief in the meaninglessness of my life now found even that familiar groove lacked comfort. In the past I found comfort in reincarnation and the hope of being born into a better future. Now I’d begun revisiting the belief in transcendence and the hope of leaving this hell world to a saner place. But none of these beliefs brought true comfort or meaning. They were, fundamentally, coming from a place of resignation and escape, not courage and liberation.”
The Ripening of Grief and Loss
This has been a year for grieving, though for many of my people grieving has been extending back to at least 2015. Grieving what is lost and being lost seems necessary if we are to envision what is to come that will transform and outlive the current tensions of our age.
This piece is a poetic contemplation on grief.
“There is no shame in loving and no shame in losing. We journey together until we no longer can. Some seasons of growth are longer than others, but in the end this is a world of ripening, harvest, and decay. Blessed are the ones who taught us with their hands, their mouths, and their hearts how to love more deeply and more courageously. Blessed are the ones whose absence still marks our hearts.”
We Heal When We Feel Our Guilt
Perhaps unsurprisingly, this was not a widely shared article, but it’s one I feel that is important, at least it was important for me to write in thinking through the meaning and implications of guilt. I’d forgotten that 2019 included the dissolution of two important relationships, with people I’d looked to as mentors who I then felt hurt by, and this article begins by addressing some of my learnings from that experience.
“The seed of vengeance may simply be in the longing for having one’s hurt witnessed and validated by the person who caused us harm. An instinctive knowing that this could bring healing and relief. But so rarely are those who have caused harm able to bear the feeling of their own guilt and shame. Instead they defend against it, minimize it, reject it, or compel others to hold it. Lacking that outlet for healing witnessing, vengeance becomes that venomous instinct to cause them a hurt that will match the hurt we feel, escalating rather than healing discord. “
