Integrate. Metabolize. Compost. Leaving nothing to rot in vain. Let it all lead to deeper transformation. Deeper feeling. Deeper listening. Deeper connections, entangled at the roots. What we need is not a ‘fresh start.’ What we need is a refusal to forget. A commitment to remain with. A promise we will grow with and for each other from the soils of this year’s life and death. Animated by intimate memories. Agitated by mass betrayals. Alive to the holy thread of this cosmic web to which we all belong.
m jade kaiser
Maybe we try something queerer this year. Far more strange. Not mere counter-resolutions. But odder intentions all together. Ones that disturb predictable patterns. Problematize all the collective routines that keep us in destructive loops – year after year.
Let’s toss out the colonizing life-maps, of our bodies, lives and lands, histories and futures. Choose to wander in weirder directions. Give up the old, tired scripts. Speak in tongues of flesh. Squawks and grunts and howls and moans. Ancient animal utterances bubbling up from within. Angry and tired. Hopeful and alive.
Language unintelligible to all deadening rationality.
Yes, it is a peculiar suggestion.
But ‘Normal’ is severing us from our humanity.
‘Success’ is destroying life on the planet.
‘Hustle’ is running us into the ground.
The last thing we need is more Winners at this game.
Let us be people who strive to fail the tests of domination.
Companioning each other in the consequences of non-conformity
and unearthing the joy of a more feral way.
This year, may we trust in the wisdom of the fierce, free, and freaky.
Too creative to be contained.
Too bizarre to fit standard molds of exploitation.
Too unusual to lead us toward the familiar dead-ends.
Cheers to a year of unhinged dreaming,
absurd acts of solidarity and care,
and an utterly foolish faith
in the mysterious love of a wild world
that desperately wants us to live.
m jade kaiser
10 intentions to enflesh in the new year
- I will disrupt the destructive stories and beliefs I have internalized, and cultivate habits of body, mind, and spirit I wish to grow in the world.
- I will remember we are of the earth, and pay attention to how I/we can (re)align with the earth’s rhythms, seasons, and cycles.
- I will seek out, savor, and share food that brings me pleasure, nourishment, and connection.
- I will approach other human and non-human animals with curiosity and respect, honoring and learning from their unique embodied wisdom.
- I will pay attention to habits of thought and action that are rooted in individualism and separation, and actively seek collaboration, cooperation, and solidarity.
- I will shed aspects of religion and spirituality that diminish collective aliveness, and turn toward, reclaim, and open to practices and beliefs that enliven.
- I will say yes to generative desires and ordinary pleasures, and no to pressures and prejudices that stifle.
- I will prioritize care–collectively and intimately–in how I relate to every body’s unique vulnerabilities, limitations, and needs.
- I will cherish and celebrate that which transphobia, racism, misogyny and other forces of oppression demonize.
- I will resist exploitative expectations and invest in endeavors that serve the common good.
anna blaedel and m jade kaiser