i’m dreaming of better futures
i’m dreaming of better futures
while honouring the pain of the past & present
a couple days ago, i spoke with my friends mckenzie and SP for SP’s podcast about having a scorpio moon. one of the things i mentioned that i haven’t addressed here is this idea of existing in a world where i’m constantly grieving futures that haven’t happened. we currently live in a world that is on fire, burning itself to pieces because of imperialism, colonisation and capitalism. to live with this scorpio moon means understanding that pain provides a foundation towards liberation. (and while i do not wish this was a necessity, it ignites the flame for revolution.) and with that, i can embrace the sadness and grief i feel and channel it into action.
i think about the opening eclipse during this season, and how brutal and devastating it was to watch the israeli-palestinian conflict escalate into war. i mourn the friendships i lost the day i spoke up ar regainst the genocide of palestinian people, but i mourn the lives lost and the western response more. my pain is not greater than the ones felt by those in the middle of the action.
i understand that this war is bigger and more nuanced than an outsider can fathom or provide context. i know the ways i navigate through this are not ideal, and i will lose followers and potential clients the way i lost nourishing friendships. but i need to put a voice to the conflict, and i would feel awful if i had this platform and didn’t use it to vocalise about keeping up with the war here. please skip ahead if you’re not equipped for this.
so, before writing the rest of this post, i want to provide a list of resources so that we can free palestine 🇵🇸 :
i admire my colleagues and friends who teach others to build steps towards meaningful futures. astrology provides a framework for conceptualising time as cycles; the transits we experience will come back around. we are in a state of rehashing our pasts while living in the present, as we anticipate futures yet to arrive. and if you belong to a marginalised group, you’ll understand how anxiety-inducing this is.
as you might hear once the episode drops, embodying a fallen planet means that I’m familiar with struggling. for a planet to not have access to the required resources it needs means that the individual becomes accustomed to making do with what is. i am constantly trying to make the best out of a bad situation. which is why i’m always spouting advice or holding space for others. it feels more meaningful to me to meet others where they are, to guide them through the transitions of life into death, to love them dearly as we work towards better futures for the collective. how can i dream up a better, more just world without acknowledging the harms of the past and present?
❝
Nobody is afforded the luxury of consistent knowing.
Mimi Zhu
the simple answer is that i cannot. we need to acknowledge all of these things in order to move forward. we must contend with the reckoning of the unknown, to sit with the discomfort and pain and integrate it into our lives before we can in be not afraid of love, mimi zhu writes about anxiety, mentioning that “nobody is afforded the luxury of consistent knowing. our knowing shifts in every moment that we are present, which is why we so often latch on to what is familiar… to come out of these toxic cycles, we must prepare ourselves for the periods of unknowing that are awaiting us.” for those who are marginalized, especially those who identify as disabled, we often contend with facing the future in a world that continues to erase us and ignore our existences.
in alison kafer’s feminist, queer, crip, she writes about how looking at disability from a strictly medical perspective is harmful and reductive. modern medicine is constantly looking for ways to cure the dis-ease instead of offering comfort and hope to live with it, because that is the reality of most crips. instead, she offers up a political and relational model for “collective reimagining,” for which she hopes for more systemic change. a crip future means a more inclusive one for all of us.
so here i am, dreaming of a better tomorrow while simultaneously gripping with the traumas of the past in the present. i sit with my past pain so that i can further integrate it into the person i am now, so that i can be better equipped for the unknown futures that i have yet to experience.
i hope you all can too. here’s to sitting and holding each other, meeting the other where they are at, and dreaming up potential futures together.