Just in time for spooky ooky season

Did you hear? A good friend crafted a rich and thoughtful reply to my previous newsletter and you can check it out here.

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**Note: discussions of suicide and depression in this newsletter**

Hi all. I meant to send this newsletter out at the last full moon, but to be honest, I was scared and unsure about what the hell I seemed to be sharing when I sat down to write this. In my previous letters, I discussed the grief of letting my tatu practice go and the ways in which I connected to grief I saw around me (colonial history + presence) and how I’ve experienced grief in other ways (“coming out”). I decided it was time to explicitly share about the work I’m doing now and what does doing “spirit work” mean to me? When I did my initial brainstorm for this newsletter, two truths came out. The first was that I felt afraid to out right discuss my spiritual practice in depth (ironically). I have many colonial blocks when it comes to discussing this work with the general public versus people who are already understanding of what my practice is. The second was contemplating sharing the origins of when this specific spiritual journey began. Spoiler alert: it began when I was recovering from being extremely suicidal. It was a dark and blurry time in my life and I wondered if it was something I wanted to share.

Well, now that you’re reading this, it seems I have decided to share both these truths. Does sharing that I’m fearful of discussing my spiritual practice undermine the services I wish to offer people? Maybe in some ways… but, also maybe not. You decide. When I’m in a session with someone using my gifts, I don’t feel this fear. Maybe a touch of anxiety at the very beginning when meeting a stranger, but this dissipates once we begin. This colonial fear comes through in other areas of life, in other discussions. This colonial fear dances down my spine when people ask me what’s next for me? I think this newsletter is practice on deciding how I speak about what I want my work to be now.

***The paragraphs below discuss suicide, suicidal contemplation, and hospitalization. Feel free to skip this section if need be and resume at the marker below***

I first began exploring and coming to terms with my spirituality and gifts when I was in my life recovery era. For most of my childhood and teen years, I dealt with a heavy cloak of depression. It got to a point where I never truly imagined I would be alive and living beyond each day. And when each day came, it felt like I was just going through the motions expected of me. I had no imaginings of a future and any thought about it seemed truly and utterly pointless to me. All this depression seemed to come to a boiling point when I was about 21. I couldn’t handle living in so much pain and numbness and truly felt ready to cut this life short. However, I remembered one of the counsellors at my school, at the time, saying that when I felt ready to off myself (definitely not verbatim, but similar vibes to what they said) I should go to emergency at the hospital. When I first heard this advice, the thought seemed ridiculous and laughable - what would/could the hospital do for me if I truly and definitely wanted to die? But, it seemed like a part of me stored that info away for when it would inevitably come in handy. When the day came where I was ready to end my life, some part in me remembered what the counsellor shared and I found my way to the emergency at a hospital in the city. I remember the process being strange and comedic:

The nurse doing intake: “Why are here today?”

Me: “I’m ready to end my life and my school counsellor told me to come here when I feel this way.”

Nurse: types on computer, nods, “I love your sweater :D”

Me: “Thanks :-D”

There’s a level of humour and comedy when I remember these memories and to be honest I’m not sure why. Maybe a coping mechanism for the moment. Sometimes the feelings hits me harder and other days it feels far away. Either way, I was admitted to the psychiatric ward at the hospital and the experiences I had there truly gave me a different outlook on life. It was nothing the hospital explicitly did. It was the conversations and experiences I had with the people in there that helped move through some of the mental sickness within me. I’m forever grateful to this one older woman I met in there who made me feel seen and grounded. I still cherish our conversation and her grace, despite the circumstances that lead to both of us being in there.

I remember being in the psych ward was also the first time I experienced a true sense of what the removal of freedom is like. No matter how much I asked the nurses to let me out, they would all assure me, but not address my desire to leave. The environment of the area was constructed in a way where there were no handles, knobs, doors to be closed, and windows that couldn’t be accessed. In hindsight, these were all most likely safety precautions for people in various states of being and safety for the staff, but at the time it felt like further isolation and confirmation that I needed to get out. The whole experience gave me the motivating thought: “if get out of here, I swear I’ll live, I’ll live, I’ll live.”

Upon finally leaving, something in me did change, did shift. But more medicine came to me upon having conversations with my sister. The same sister I quoted in the poem of my last newsletter. The talks we had helped move the dark cloud within me. I wish I could remember the words we shared and discussed, but all I remember was that the hospital experience left me open to hearing what my sister was saying and, in turn, I was able to digest her words. There was no coddling, just real and honest truths. It turns out the medicine my soul was seeking was just honesty. For someone to be real with me and I with them. The honesty grounded me and made a clearing for me to really get to know myself. Me, without all the mental fuckery and sickness, but to the essence and honesty of what being carah meant.

***resume here if you skipped the section above***

The journey of getting to know myself and actively choosing life, felt like I was seeing myself for the first time. Being in my body with new eyes. Seeing the world so differently. Along with this came the re-awakening of my spirituality - experiencing the mysticism and magic of life. The last time I felt connected and entwined with my spirituality was when I was a kid. When the magic of life felt like it was at my fingertips and in every moment. When my tiny hands were in the earth and finding earthworms to call friends. Somewhere along the way, this cord felt severed and the magic lost. Joy lost. In choosing to be grateful for life, I found this magic returning. I was finding so much beauty in the earth around me, in the books I was reading, in the conversations and experiences I was having. It was slow progress, but I kept my goals and reminders close to my heart.

In this journey, I found myself exploring the old ways of connecting to the body and what it meant to be energy. I found deep healing in exploring my chakras, my connection to my maternal grandmother whose death I was too young to understand the night she died. I found deep comfort in the writings of bell hooks, of Thích Nhất Hạnh, of James Baldwin. My sister introduced me to the tarot cards and vedic astrology as methods of communication and understanding. Suddenly a lot of things were clicking for me. I was beginning to weave my own new spiritual viewpoints, all the while connecting and joining with other ancient ones along the way.

Growing up, I was raised with the pillars of Islam. My parents both were, and still are, devoted to this religion. They both access their spirituality through this religion. For me, I remember realizing I did not believe in god by age 13 and did not find comfort or understanding in this particular religion. As I got older, I read and researched other religions to see what was going on in the world around me. I found no religion felt quite like it was for me, but I definitely enjoyed many for their stories and teachings. For me now, in this moment, I definitely do believe in a higher/creative/universal life force. I don’t subscribe to any particular belief, but an amalgamation of various teachings and truths that resonate with me. I believe many people are gifted in ways that can’t quite be explained with the rational or logical mind. I know this way of seeing and thinking is squashed by the iron firsts of colonial thought in western society. I find comfort in reading and remembering that many ancient (and very much still present) cultures embraced the knowing of a connection to those before, beyond, and to come.

I have found comfort and like-mindedness in ways of world building, connecting, and seeing the world through many writers native to Turtle Island. Leanne Betasamosake Simpson and an instructor I had while at university, Peter Morin, are two major influences that come to mind when thinking of my shaping and understanding of native thought and being. I find learning about indigenous thought to be a meaningful way to sidestep the constant imposition of colonial ideology, by respecting and learning ways of being from people who are actually from these lands I consider home. When I was in university, I found out too late in my time there that the indigenous knowledges classes felt like the only classes where I was really learning anything real.

I deeply value writers who are connected to their indigeneity or committed to decolonial ways of being. In many ways, writers with this clarity and intention have helped me connect to the collective understanding of spirituality and, therefore, my own personal journal as well.

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In tuning into this shift that called to me to change my focus of work, my desires to work with the public now want to go deeper than ink on skin. I want to work with people to connect to their spiritual team, decipher dreams, understand life blocks from a spiritual angle. I want to challenge myself to lean into this spiritual healing, work, and calling. To challenge the colonial fears and hesitations. To know my time here is tied to helping people connect to a deeper part of themselves. Writing this makes me feel excited for the future. It also excites me for the day I do feel called to return to tatuing because I know it will be in a completely new way. I feel excited for the new ways I want to work and connect with people. I’m hoping these things I’m sharing inspire and awaken something in others.

I want to share this to clarify a bit with everything I shared thus far. Divination is not therapy. It should not be substituted. It works well alongside therapy, but I am not your therapist and I am not qualified to help you process all the various traumas that life has sent your way. Divination is a spiritual tool. My role as a diviner is communicating the messages that are coming through to you from your spiritual team. Whether you believe in god, angels, spirit, source, loving ancestors, nature elements, etc… the role of the diviner is to relay information from the “other side” to you. I am essentially interpreting messages. I am not diagnosing or able to provide the same level of knowledge sharing as a registered therapist/social worker/psychotherapist etc… This is also why each person who feels calls to this work delivers messages in their own unique way.

This is a big pivot from the work I use to do. There is some overlap. I know some clients I had from tatuing were into the spiritual element of the work and some were not. I understand that this work I’m doing is a big shift in understanding the type of work I want to do now (for some). I use to offer a tangible art form and now I offer a service that is spiritual at it’s core and not necessarily tangible.

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If you would like to book a virtual session with me and support my new practice and explore your own spirituality, here is an overview of what I’m currently offering:

20 minutes is for quick and straight forward inquiries i.e. general check-in, insight into a situation, a yes/no situation … etc…

1 hour offers more time for a deep dive into a complex or layered situation, or if you just want more time + space to check in with yourself.

1 hour with candle divination is an opportunity for me to practice a new divining technique I’ve learnt in which I use candle wax and water to discern messages about a situation happening in your life.

Feel free to use this link to book a virtual reading with me and you can read more about my tarot practice here.

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Have you seen…? My ad in the paper! Page one of the latest issue by The Grind Mag.

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Thank you so much for reading. If you enjoyed what you read here, feel free to forward it to someone who may enjoy reading these types of emails in their inbox. You can reply to any of these newsletters.

Below are other independent or local writers who I enjoy getting emails from to avoid being chained to socials:

• Friday things by Stacy Lee Kong (smart & compassionate pop culture analysis)

• The Grind Mag (radical independent mag and offers free physical copies avail all around TO!)

• SapphSociety (journal-like observations and stories from a great trans/black/caribbean mind)

• Bonesthrown (deeply mindful thoughts or interviews about the body and our relations to earth and each other)

much love,

carah (care-rah) ♡