Soul Salon with Ayandastood

today’s episode is all about embracing POSSIBILITY as an abundant energy that can unlock itself even further. possibility, and moving through the world with the openness, expansiveness and abundance mindset it invites us into, is a beautiful self-fulfilling prophecy. unfortunately, impossibility works the same way. i discuss some of the ways the energy of possibility has affected my friendships, a...

if toxic, eurocentric beauty standards won’t let you rest: this episode is for you. i made a tiktok (620K views) about this idea in June that people resonated with, and so I decided to make an episode about it. let’s unpack how Beauty is a form of alienation from ourselves — and from each other. i hope you enjoy this episode, made with love. 🤎 ADVICE COLUMN: ☎️ seeking advice and want to PHONE IN...

many of us feel plagued by a deep-seated unworthiness ingrained in us by society and culture. at a fundamental level, we are convinced there is a lot wrong with us. part of this suffering comes from a society that reduces us to the level of its own distorted and violent view of reality, rooted in colonial and capitalist imaginations. in today's part 2 of our conversation on our infinite worth and...

we all face a deep unworthiness and are convinced there is something (or a lot) fundamentally wrong with us. this episode unpacks why you can’t be reduced to any one given aspect of your being or experience, or what society projects onto you and you in turn internalize as your own (eg, Beauty according to the colonial paradigm). you are infinite, complex, and multi-dimensional. you are love. you a...

if you’ve ever felt that the same sensitivity that makes you drawn to creative work also makes you TERRIFIED of starting, finishing or sharing yours — this episode is for you. the irony of this episode is more than i can express to you — throughout this process i faced so much shame, fear and avoidance (particularly in the editing phase). i feel there’s so much more to say and so much i wish i had...

Congo is currently undergoing a silent genocide. We are lifting our voices for the people of DRC. This episode is my imperfect attempt to amplify the ongoing situation in Congo, and share the 5 greatest lessons I learned from a book I read in light of the moment we are in called Cobalt Red: How the Blood of the Congo Powers Our Lives by Siddharth Kara. In this episode, I also read an overview of w...

hi my loves. i recorded this episode a few weeks ago. it’s all about prioritizing sustainability in your creative and life pursuits, rather than burning out on impossible demands of yourself. what’s the easiest and smallest version of this goal or dream or desire i have, and how can i make promises that feel sustainable to keep? i hope you enjoy this episode, made with love

as a Black South African, my existence and freedom today are only possible because of the liberation efforts of anti-apartheid revolutionaries like Steve Biko, Winnie Mandela, Chris Hani, and Nelson Mandela. all of these people were labeled terrorists by the apartheid government and international community. like Israel, the USA and UK financially supported the South African apartheid government (u...

welcome to ACT 2 of our convo on longing for a romantic relationship and what wisdom we can learn from this longing. In this episode, I read you a love poems, invite you to define romance for yourself, and share my pov on what romance means to me, and how it can be accessed through friendship. I am sending you love, today and always. 🤎 ADVICE COLUMN: ☎️ seeking advice and want to PHONE IN with a...

today we are talking about longing for romantic relationship and what wisdom we can derive from this longing. how can we integrate rather than suppress our romantic longing? what else can it be channeled into? what does our longing have to say to us, and are we listening? we'll be leaning on works like bell hooks' Communion and Audre Lorde's Uses of the Erotic. This is part 1 of a 2 part series. s...

if you’ve ever desperately tried to prove yourself to others or to yourself, this episode is for you. today we are discussing the underlying paradoxes and unmet needs at play when we are in the zone of trying to prove and justify ourselves. tldr: you deserve to pursue things irrespective of the outcome; the people meant for you will love you irrespective of your "success" (which itself is a cultur...

If you obsess over planning things instead of letting them unfold naturally, this episode is for you! Join me as we explore the notion and paradox of Becoming. Let’s release the illusion of control, and let the seed of your ideas and your relationships grow into what they wish to become. Nourishing the seed is meaningful and necessary — trying to control and define its possibilities may not be. Se...

today we are digging deeper into my own creative fear — why and how I fear cancellation, my experience with it thus far, and what I tell myself in the face of this fear. ADVICE COLUMN: ☎️ seeking advice and want to PHONE IN with a question? ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠submit a voicemail here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. 📩 OR WRITE IN an advice question anonymously at the ⁠⁠⁠⁠ASK Ayanda form⁠ here⁠⁠⁠. 🎥: Watch the video of this episode on...

if you ask yourself, who am I to do this thing I want to do? to write a book, start a podcast, become a songwriter.... this episode is for you. as insecure and fearful creatives, we ask ourselves, who am I to do the thing? but we don’t think imaginatively about how to answer that question. we look to other people and institutions to qualify us as what we already know ourselves to be, or what other...

pov: the shame you feel for avoiding a creative project is keeping you from returning to it. let’s discuss why we need to embrace recommitment as a key part of the creative process. the constant decision to return and recommit to our projects and to our relationships, without shaming or blaming ourselves, is fundamental to the human experience. contrary to what we are taught to believe, our rest a...

This is for anyone who is struggling to stay consistent with their creative project or goals in life. I am with you! And so are  the sunsets, the fruit trees, the weather, the harvest, the ocean waves. You are made to believe you are separate from and “above” nature. But we are all nature. A peach tree does not produce a peach every Monday on demand. So if you’re struggling to do the same, this is...

Today we unpack the prevalent myth of inclusive beauty. This episode is part of my Beauty Bites *insert chews* series, where we think against the Beauty hierarchy. I give 7 reasons why Inclusive Beauty is a myth, including: the way it functions is selectively inclusive which is not genuine inclusion, it leaves the underlying power structure of Eurocentricism untouched, and ultimately it's a profit...

Today I expand on a recent TikTok I created about overcoming creative resistance. The idea of resistance is based on Steven Pressfield's book The War of Art. If you are an insecure creative like me — terrified of bringing your ideas to life because of self-doubt, perfectionism, avoidance, anxiety, how can you overcome your creative resistance? By leaning on forces much greater than you, such as sp...

Today we are redefining and reimagining the Erotic. What is it, why is it so powerful, and how can we bring more of it into our lives? We will hear clips from Audre Lorde’s seminal essay, The Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic as Power, as well as words of wisdom from adrienne maree brown, and Esther Perel. I hope this makes you feel enlivened, and invites more Erotic experiences into your life. I dre...

Welcome to a new series within my podcast called Beauty Bites *insert chews*. This is an ode to and a home for the very many thoughts I have on Beauty politics and breaking the colonial Beauty paradigm. In today’s episode we discuss an idea I learned from Jessica DeFino’s Substack, The Unpublishable. It is the idea that the beauty we are sold (industrialized beauty) is not the beauty we actually y...

If you're like me you have a bunch of scary projects or tasks or responsibilities or texts you are currently AVOIDING. you keep telling yourself to "just face them". but hard things are not meant to be faced alone! in this episode I discuss a community event called Showing up together⁠ on Sunday Jul 23 at 11am-2pm EST. if you can't make it or are listening to this after this date, no worries, this...

This one is for my fellow creatives facing self-doubt, insecurity, resistance, fear, anxiety. If you know you want to start, complete, or share your creative project — this episode (and the last one) is for you! I recommend listening to Part 1 first but also you can dive in right here. Sending love!  ADVICE COLUMN: ☎️ seeking advice and want to PHONE IN with a question? ⁠⁠⁠⁠submit a voicemail here...

If you are experiencing creative fear, resistance, or anxiety, this is for you. We are on the same journey, because I face this daily as an insecure creative myself. In this episode I read an essay I wrote for my Substack on the wisdom I rely on to overcome or move through creative fear and resistance: to create content on TikTok, to write on Substack, and to create episodes for you right here. Pl...

Why did I change the name of the podcast from "Reimagining" to "Paradigm Shifts"? Let's talk about it! An episode where I basically profess my love to paradigm shifts, why I'm ok with the fact that the podcast name is not unique to me, and how paradigm shifts are connected to pleasure. Key quote: "Paradigm shifts are embodied experiences of learning. They make us GASP, pause, stop walking, scream,...

in this episode, I read an essay I refer to often in this podcast, Audre Lorde’s “On the Transformation of Silence into Language and Action”. This episode was initially meant to be my original “return” to the podcast. I ended up cutting some of my reflection down to let the essay stand on its own, but my reflections on it will continue to be peppered throughout the podcast.  ADVICE COLUMN: ☎️ seek...