Manifest Monthly: Embrace the 'Woo'

P.S. There’s a meditation, BIG news, events, and more at the end of this post.

I started this year by cleansing all the crystals in my house in water my husband and child prayed over. I am committed to cultivating rituals, and this one felt like a ceremony that would allow me to enter the year with intention. There must have been something cosmic about this ritual, because January came, not only with a newness, but with an intensity. January became one of the hardest months I’ve had in a very long time.

This past January, I struggled with such intense anxiety that I could barely sleep. I had not experienced anxiety like that in at least 5 or 6 years. It was a rough time and I think I knew where the feelings were coming from. At the end of 2024, it became clear to me that my current way of working (more specifically my day job at a nonprofit) wasn’t conducive to my well-being. I actually knew this for a long time, but I have become so well-versed in overriding what my body, mind, and spirit tell me. Yet, even amid my usual overriding, some changes at work led me a GLARINGLY evident truth, one in which it was clear that if I continued working the way I was, my body might not survive it.

Illustration By Dominique Ramsey

While this realization came forth, I was also greeted with other things. Opportunities, partnerships, collaborations, and projects that sparked my curiosity and creativity. These pathways kept forming, almost as if it I was being divinely guided to let go, in order to follow these paths. And although the paths were there, they weren’t completely clear. I could not see the end of them, yet what was being laid before me felt orchestrated with good intention. As if there were beings and spirits along these paths, calling me to walk toward them. And what were these paths? Well one of them, was a career shift. One that has always felt scary, a shift I never thought would be possible for me.

Through these first three months of the year, I kept thinking about my beginning of the year ritual. Something about cleansing my crystals felt like a spiritual invitation for a radical shift in my life. I was inviting in a new year, hoping for goodness, yet sometimes the goodness that awaits comes through intense upheaval.

Around this time, I came across a content creator named ayana zaire cotton and a post where she discussed how some folks are discussing the concept of manifestation while removing the spiritual or faith-based approach to manifestation. She refers to it as the “woo” referencing the term “woo-woo,” a term often used to discredit alternative or “unconventional” ways of believing. Her point in the video is that we NEED “the woo” and that “the woo” is the WHOLE POINT. We need a sheer belief in something unseen to transform our lives into something we have not yet lived.

It could be the algorithm but I kept getting other messages like this in more posts, like this one from deltavenus, in which the creator writes that “the next octave of your life is going to feel like dying first.”

And perhaps this is what I experienced at the top of the year. An end of a cycle. One in which I was encouraged to let go of something that I always felt I needed to hold onto. One in which, even through fear, I had to offer up something for what was to come.

And what is to come? Oh yes, the news:

I’m now a FULL-TIME BUSINESS OWNER!

I’ve been working freelance, on and off, ever since I graduated college (over 13 years ago). I always did this freelance work while maintaining a 9-5 full-time job. I thought that maintaining this way of working would offer me stability and for the most part it has. I’ve been able to gain privileges and security through working in this structure, that have ultimately made it so I could have more of a safety net in making this change.

What started out with me providing creative services like photography and videography for events, organizations, and small businesses has now evolved to a strategic communications and marketing consultancy rooted in creativity, anti-racist frameworks, and community-driven principles. I work with clients to develop narratives, messaging, campaigns, and more to grow their impact, while also working with creative individuals to reach their artistic potential. Right now, I travel to facilitate workshops and convenings, build narratives for mission-driven organizations, and teach creative writing to students of all levels. On top of all of this, I am investing the time to further hone my craft as a writer and write into my most recent writing project. It’s A LOT of work, but it’s fulfilling and mine, and, although all my stress hasn’t gone away, most of it has. Overall, amid the challenges, this leap has felt incredibly liberating.

With that said, I am officially turning on the “paid-subscriber” feature on Substack as a way to allow any subscribers, who feel inclined to also support financially. Yet, most of my content will continue to be free, so please keep reading and hanging out with me! Anyway, let’s move on to this month’s meditation!

Meditation

What would it mean for you to embrace “the woo,” or the unconventional, or the unbelievable. What would this type of faith in yourself grant you? What would this type of believing ask you to give up? What are the fears that will accompany you as you face the unknown? For this meditation you can try two things:

1. Write a story about yourself in which what you desire for yourself is actually true and present. Write in the present-tense. Set a calendar invite for yourself to revisit this story about yourself once a month for at least three months. On your last reading, reflect on what has changed in your life to bring you closer to the story you’ve written about yourself.

2. Make a vision board. I know this can sound hokey, but I made one and I hung it up somewhere where I can look at it every day, even if it’s just a glance or in passing. I think this is the most important part of the vision board creation process. What you’ve created needs to be front and center in your life. Set aside a time three months from the creation of your board to think about how far you’ve come in moving toward what your vision for yourself.

You can repeat any of these meditation activities in whatever timeframe or with any alterations that work for you.

Be free. Be scared. Be undeniably faithful of what’s to come.

News & Upcoming Events

I’ll be at #AWP2025 this year in Los Angeles on my first-ever panel called:

From Dusk ‘til Dawn: Exploring Nocturnes and Aubade

If you’re in LA, I’d love to at least say “hello!”

I have the honor of participating in a virtual reading with Paige Lewis, Summer Farah, Myles Taylor, and others to raise funds for Oisín's gender-affirming surgery. I hope you can join and donate!

I’ll be in conversation with the wonderful Sarah Kersey, author of "Residence Time" at JustBookish in April. It’ll be a lovely time!

And don’t forget to mark your calendars for Sundress Publications’ Poetry Retreat happening in June! I hope to see you there virtually.

Beautiful Work in the World

I be, but I ain’t by Aziza Barnes is an incredible and transformative collection of poems with the line “I am blue damage. Mother gut & tower” haunts in the poem “self-portrait as a lily white fist:”

“isn’t it so?” by Christian M. Ivey is a poem reckoning with identity through sharp and delicate introspection. My favorite line is: “death skips me over, i have a heart that beats throughout the day into the night.”

A Future with Bromeliads by Grace Massey a collection where the lightness of languages enraptures and the lines: “Here a hummingbird unwinds // a forked tongue into syrup where a wasp // flails and drowns. I would free her // but this garden is not my own” appear in the poem “Woman in a Borrowed Garden”

Prayers for my 17th Chromosome by Amir Rabiyah is an enchanting collection of poems with one of my favorite lines: “how you create from rock bottom, the dirt under// your nails, half moons, the scars in the night sky” hums in the poem “YOUR BODY BURNS IN YOUR ROOM.”

Thank you for reading.

Feel free to share these opportunities with a friend, or encourage a fellow creative to subscribe. Until then connect with me via Bluesky, Instagram, Email, and/or leave a comment below!

P.S. If you’re wondering if I moved Manifest Monthly to Substack, the answer is “yes!” Learn more in my first Substack post!