love's invitation.

The next time you get an idea,

Notice Love’s invitation.

How loving would I have to be to honor this vision?

Ask your heart this question,

Then get quiet.

What if —

This idea was sent

To help you heal and heal

To help you:

Enough to believe your worth

Transcends the perfectionistic standards of your society

Enough to honor your efforts,

Without reducing them to your “results”

Enough to be kind and loving to yourself

Throughout the process of making

Instead of cruel and self-negating.

Enough to believe

we want (to receive, support, and uplift) you.

We want to learn from you

We want to experience the ripple effects

of your expression.

Just as it is.

We want to resonate with your creation

This resonance will return us to a oneness

So many have been made to forget.

Enough to not only channel the wisdom that flows through you

But share it

To help create heaven on earth

to surrender to the mystery of not knowing — how, why, when

to refuse to hide

the gifts you are here to provide

I believe in magic.

I believe in an enchanted existence.

So much colonial, capitalist, and patriarchal effort has gone into disenchanting the world.

Re-enchanting the world will

Grow collective joy, liberation, pleasure

Re-animate our relationship to earth and spirit

Reconnect us to our bodies, and each other

Replace the obsession with white-man-made technologies

With something more loving and generative.

Love is enchanting

All the lovers know this.

Everything is brighter in love

More dazzling, more profound

Your creation wants you

To find the magic in all of this.

In fact,

Don’t take it from me —

• Will you love yourself enough to be willing to feel embarrassed, annoying, be judged or criticized — in order to honor your vision and voice?

• Will you love the collective enough to be generous? To share loving wisdom beyond the desire for approval? Will you love the collective enough to believe in the highest possibility in terms of how it/we might receive your work (with love) vs. the lowest (with cruelty)? Will you help co-create collective utopia? Or hide from your gifts in fear?

• Will you love the divine enough to honor what seeks to be expressed through you? To honor the humility of what is true to your soul, rather than the egoic desire for perfection, recognition, or approval?

There will always be more

Words you could have said,

Edits you could have made,

Exceptions you could have laid out, but —

Don’t reduce yourself to all you could have said,

it betrays the wholeness of all you did say.

Don’t define yourself by all you could have created,

It minimizes the generosity of all you did create.

with love and gratitude,

Ayanda