Writing While Black

In this episode, I talk about a sentence I’ve written in editorial letters more times than I can count: I wasn’t pulled in. I break down what I actually mean when I write it — and why it has nothing to do with showing versus telling. If you haven’t listened yet, start there. These notes pick up where the episode lands. Once you settle the question of showing versus telling — once you accept that t...

Nobody taught us to listen to our bodies. For a lot of Black and Brown people — particularly women — the opposite was true. We were taught that the body is to be beaten into submission. The thing you override. The thing you push past on the way to wherever you’re going. We were told: Don’t cry. Stop being so sensitive. You’re too emotional. Toughen up. Strength looked like not feeling. Or more acc...

James Baldwin didn’t mistake comfort for clarity. He loved America. He said so plainly. And because he loved her, he insisted on the right to criticize her perpetually. That’s not a contradiction. That’s integrity. In this episode, we move from silence to something more difficult: refusal. The Worthiness Wound doesn’t silence you. It negotiates you. It convinces you to pre-soften your truth before...

There is a kind of silence that looks like wisdom. It shows up as restraint. As discernment. As knowing when not to say too much. For Black and Brown folks especially, silence has often been a strategy — one that kept us alive in rooms that were never built for our truth. But there is another kind of silence. The kind that lives in the body. The silence that tightens your chest right when you’re a...

This reading happened kind of spontaneously. Empress Theadora and I were on FaceTime, winding down at the end of the workday like we usually do, and she mentioned needing to do her full moon reading. I just happened to be shuffling my cards at the same time — which I don’t usually do when we’re just talking — and she asked me if I wanted to do the reading with her. And I said, “I’m down for that.”...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit thestorytemple.substack.com Shoutout to everyone who tuned into my live video with Empress Theadora . We had such a good time (like always), and truly enjoyed y’all! Our initial plan was to make the live publicly available to everyone. But once we got into deeper spiritual territory and people started asking vulnerable questions and sha...

Pull up a chair, beloved. Let’s talk for a min. Editor to writer. Somewhere along your writing journey, you learned that the problem was you. Not the system. Not the feedback that was really just assimilation dressed up as craft advice. Not the workshops that called your voice “unprofessional” or your specificity “unmarketable.” Not the productivity culture that told you to grind until you crashed...

Hello, temple friends. Pull up a chair. Pour yourself some tea. I want to share something that came through this morning during my shower, which is where Spirit likes to find me most often, apparently. I was planning to pull cards for myself like I usually do, but the moment I sat down with my decks, it became clear this reading was meant for all of us. So here we are, gathered around the new moon...

Happy October and happy autumnal vibes. In this voice note, I wanted to share the story of how The Story Temple came to be. Because it wasn’t planned. It kind of happened by accident. A couple years ago, I was sitting in meditation, frustrated with my own writing and equally frustrated with a client’s manuscript I was evaluating. Both of us had the same problem: we couldn’t figure out what the hel...

How many times have you been told to “tone it down” or “make it more universal”? How many times have you thought: man, f**k that. Who are you to tell me how my voice should sound? If you've ever felt that frustration — that exhaustion of watching someone swoop in with "well, actually" every time you celebrate your work — then you need to hear this. What The Creative Code Switch Is Really About As...