There's a secret whistle sounding in the Inspired Inquiries forest. Can you hear it?

Hey 👋. I appreciate you. Thank you for walking with me. This is an invitation for some of you and not others. So as you read this email please let the words tug you toward or softly turn you away. Yes?

Okay, I’m gathering myself to share about something that is hard to put into ordinary language. I’ll start by lobbing this over 👇

Have you had the experience of suddenly finding a {key} that absolutely and fundamentally shifted the way you operate in the world? Maybe the shift was as simple as a new viewpoint that made all the inner pins tumble open. Maybe it was finding just the food /practice /medicine that pivoted your health in much needed ways. Maybe it was one of those spontaneous slipping into the vastness of the very fabric of reality brought on by nothing more than staring at the waves of the ocean. Maybe it was the grace of finally stopping doing *that* - whatever that thing is that was a toxic load on your system. 

In our human lifespan we get rolled and rumpled, lifted and softened, nudged and tugged. Some harder chapters stretch like a dusty endless road and require perseverance and plodding while other chapters are a haphazard fingers-crossed surfing of tsunami waves.

And throughout it all, we are ever seeking ways to wipe the metaphoric window. Wiping off the accumulated dust and debris so that we can see into ourselves, remember who we actually are. Wiping away the obscuring so we can look out with lightness and clarity, so we can navigate what’s coming with grace and kindness and connection. 

I want those window wiping moments for all of us. And by some wild grace I actually have a helpful (if kinda…okay definitely, woo) way to do it.

You see, quietly behind the curtains, I’ve been intensively studying with a remarkable teacher to learn a talismanic process that - speaking as a rebellious skeptic with a LOT of new age experience- is seriously effective. 

I’ve learned five different basic-level talismans… each with their own gorgeous approach. The simplest one stands as is regardless of who wears it, the others shift and adjust depending on what you need. 

Over the last two years as a student of the work I’ve received dozens of talismans from classmates and more than anything else I’ve done in my 25+ years of seeking and studying, these seemingly simple strings or stones or pouches? They delivered. 

Some came in like bunny feet gently turning me towards something I’d forgotten or softening my view just so. Some brought external miracles: like a substantial check just as we were about to go under financially, or the grace of finding an answer to a decade long health issue.  Some leaned their strength into breaking bad habits and ending incoherent relationships. One of them lifted the lid to reveal a lie about who I thought I was more effectively than all the hallucinogens I tried in my twenties.  Some were subtle and some so not-subtle it sounds like hyperbole. But the long and short of it is that I had dozens of talismans from dozens of my cohort and all of them produced a shift of one type or another.

How do I explain that in public without sounding like a snake-oil salesman? I guess I can’t. Except to say, it is really freaking cool. 

The effectiveness of these Soul Restoration Talismans - especially created by folks just beginning training- speaks to the depth available in a living lineage. By which I mean it isn’t *me* that imbues a talisman with its oomph but a vast current that stretches through me by permission. My teacher fábẹkú is, first of all, a solid, good, kind, generous human who also happens to have the most ridiculously impeccable ability to see and say what’s so with a level of clarity I haven’t encountered before. He’s extensively trained in Ìṣẹ̀ṣe, actively connected to his own system of teachers and elders and profoundly beautifully grounded in deep animism. 

You know how you can make up your own prayer or ritual or process and there’s definitely goodness? But then if you contrast that with stepping into a ritual that’s been done for thousands of years somehow when your mouth makes the sound (or your body makes the motion or you recreate the symbol), every mouth and body and eye that’s engaged it before you lends gravitas to the moment? That’s the difference between me sending you something I made myself versus sending you a talisman rooted in this lineage.  

All of which is to say: Yay Talismans! And to say it would absolutely be my honor and pleasure to sit down and do the ritual work required to make you one so that you can have something that nudges, or rumbles, and gives you something you maybe didn’t even realize you really really needed. 

How would you even know you need this talisman process? Honestly, everyone alive for more than 5 minutes could benefit because life has a way of slowly (and sometimes quickly) obscuring our natural potency. In this lineage we call the obscuring “soul eclipsing” rather than soul loss because nothing is lost, there’s just stuff built up between you and your essence, blocking the view. So maybe that feels like life is muted or foggy. Maybe it feels like confusion or slogging through mud. Or like you can't find the brakes. Maybe it’s a quiet truth that you just don’t totally feel like yourself or recognize yourself in the mirror. Maybe you haven't been feeling joy like you used to. Or maybe even feeling much of anything. In my personal experience, sometimes I knew there was something off with me and sometimes I only could see it when it was lifted. So if you aren't sure why but you're feeling the tug, you don't have to know any specifics.

I could say, and I certainly feel deep in my bones, something about how this offering intersects with the times we are in. Those would be a lot of words so I’ll say more simply that at the core of these talismans is hope. Hope that things can shift. Hope that our trajectory can open. Hope that what is ours but has been misplaced along the way will be found again. And while I’d love to wave a magic wand and make it *all* better right now, this is a way I can confidently support you in *something* getting better. 

Between now and the end of September I’ll be looking for six volunteers so that I can participate in a round of supervised practice.  Then starting in November I’ll be able to offer Talismans to everyone.

I don’t need to explain to you that regardless of how solid and clear I am that this offering is badass and powerful, it is uncomfortable to be public about sharing woo. Too many witch burning life times. Too many scarlet letter lifetimes. Which means this email is the equivalent of a secret whistle through the woods. And if you are hearing it, and if you’re interested, then please fill out the form. I’ll likely be corresponding primarily with that list going forward. 

If hearing this whistle doesn’t tug you, perfect- it did it’s sorting hat job. I’ll continue to show up in your inbox with Storywalking and Inspired Inquiries. And I still invite you to take a moment to close your eyes and feel into the bravery of sharing about something that’s fringe. What do you have to share that is only allowed on the outskirts of the village? May we all find ways to share those things safely and with just the right people.

I’ve been teaching and walking this path with you all for over fifteen years. Some of you have been steady companions. Some of you step on and off the path and I’m always glad to see you. Some of you are new and still getting to know me. I appreciate you and I don’t take your attention for granted. Thank you for giving me a spot in your inbox and running your eyes over these words. May the mycelial roots of this community continue to lift us all and bring you just what you need. 

If you’re forming your lips right now to deliver the secret whistle back to me, fill out the form below to let me know you are interested.