A new moon journal

Expecting the best of the next 10 years requires our bravery, and our biggest dreams

Mimosa (albizzia julibrissin) whose blooms and branches inspired my Pleasure Practices class

If you’re in a rush and plan to read later, here’s the big takeaway: I wrote a journaling guide, my free gift to you as we all navigate this moment, and below I talk about why it’s so important to me to share this particular gift now. I’d love to hear how you like it!

On creating

Others have written much more eloquently and expertly than me on the current state of the world, from climate change to genocide to institutionalized racism to unsustainable food systems. This is not a time to remain small, or silent.

There are a thousand places I can look and see something that scares me, that I want to change, that maybe leaves me feeling hopeless. It’s easy to feel overwhelmed.

I write/teach about food, and I help other creative folks tell their stories, and frankly, sometimes I question it: Is this work really what’s needed in this moment? Is it just extraneous? Is it meaningful?

This feeling passes quickly, and here’s why:

I recognize that our society assigns meaning based in part on privilege, and in part on how much your work contributes to the status quo (there are more complex, other layers re: meaning-making by groups, but for this exercise, we’re just focusing on these two).

We all know about privilege, but it’s not just about identity and individuals: the activities currently and/or historically associated with the privileged are also given a higher value socially. And those associated with less privilege? Less value. Again, this is not revolutionary thinking, but it applies to us as creatives, food writers or otherwise:

Cooking and domestic activities, not by and large being the realm of white men, are devalued not because of their inherent properties but because of who they’re associated with (women, people of color).

So when I write about food, I’m writing about a topic that’s pretty intricately layered with class, race, and gender dynamics (which goes a long way in explaining some of the dynamics in food media, and the way recipe production as labor is treated, but those are conversations for another time).

Likewise, any creative output has the potential to shape and enrich lives, but because that output isn’t measurable in the ways we’re accustomed to measuring things, the real value of the work risks getting lost in sales figures, class enrollment, and profit margins.

Finding our creative voices moves worlds

We live in a capitalist society and we need money to live, yes, but what if we start by remembering what the real impacts of our work are or could be? What if we start from a place of trusting ourselves, and starting with our biggest ideas (rather than the safest ones?)

What if I create with the inner knowledge of my own abundance over scarcity: That I’ll always have new ideas, that I can reach the people I want to reach and support and inspire them in the ways I want to, and that I’ll always have the resources I need to do this work?

Beginning with belief in the possibility makes the path to that as reality much clearer: But we can’t imagine the future we want at all if we don’t allow ourselves to dream big.

As creatives, we have a responsibility not to just describe the world as it is but to offer some guidance on the path to what it might be.

Even if that light on the path is just a faint glimmer, even if the path shifts, even if we reach an entirely different audience than we expected, or we impact them in ways we didn’t imagine, or whatever else: by writing about what can be rather than just what is, we help others imagine it too. And, just maybe, to bring their own gifts to bear to shape that reality.

We’re at a moment where we really, truly need every creative voice in the mix, whatever your creativity looks like (writing? engineering? painting? activism?) and we need all our voices as full volume.
I made the guide below to help me find the full, rich tones of my own creative voice over the next 10 years, and I hope it will help you do the same.

It came about when I reflected on what I wanted the next 10 years to look like: Not just in nebulous terms like “I want to sell more books!” (yes, I do) or “I want to get paid more for my writing!” (yes, please) but in actual, practical terms with boundaries around them.

I know what impact I want to have, and the kinds of things I want to be doing, but the shape of each in practical terms? Not quite as clear.

So, I meditated and reflected, and came up with these journal prompts which use abundance and your biggest impact and greatest work as guideposts for future planning.

In order to reflect on the practical, we have to make space for the imaginative: By putting voice to my biggest dreams, to what I most want to happen, I can begin to identify the steps to get there, and that’s the intent behind this journal.

Change requires me to identify what I want, in order to allow the change to emerge.

So, my hope for you my fellow creative folks is to commit to your own growth and self-awareness, but most of all, commit to sharing the stories you’re here to write as best you can, with the most courage you can, because not everyone serves the world in the same way and we need you to serve the world in the way you do best (and only you can do).
Start by writing out the world you most want to see: The world you’re running towards rather than running away from.
Then together let’s all start taking the steps to get there.

I plan to dip into answering these prompts myself this week: The new moon (May 7) is the perfect time to work with intentions and future plans, but these prompts will serve you well whenever you decide to use them. Enjoy!