The "continued" from my last post

Seasoning, nostalgia, and the good kind of spiral

There’s almost nothing Rumi and sunshine can’t smooth out in my heart.

-May 4, 2025.

A great privilege and a great blessing of my 30s was getting to be prolific.

For the most part, I created whatever the fuck I wanted whenever the fuck I wanted. I got to reach thousands of people all over the world through my podcast, social media, classes, workshops, retreats, in-person gatherings + events, online courses, communities, and being invited as a guest into countless other people's spaces.

While I don't name any of that to "brag," I do name it to speak to the seasons I've been through and the seasoning I've embodied and integrated, because mama is not new to this— she's true to this.

In our current Internet age, where the barrier to entry for people to show up and fake it until they make it (or not!) is lower than ever, I believe it's important to acknowledge those of us who ain't faking it because we've made a lot of shit.

Let me pause here real quick to speak to the difference between age and seasoning. Just as in the culinary arts, where things can be aged to perfection or seasoned to perfection, so can we. Value doesn't require both, but it's myopic to pretend that one or the other doesn't add unquestionable quality.

This is not an excuse to ever be devoid of a beginner’s mind. However, it is a reason to firmly stand in our (in some cases) painstakingly carved out lanes and the wisdom, knowing, healing, experience, and training that sets us apart from beginners.

In this Internet age, where so many are more susceptible to being "influenced" by all that glitters than guided by what is golden, there's some genuine realness swelling up, begging to be claimed and reclaimed by those with the authority to do so.

And here's the thing: at every point in our journey, we each have some level of authority and experience that can serve anyone who hasn't yet reached that point. Where things get funky is when folks with overblown and or unexamined egos step into the field without the humility to locate themselves and speak to what they're actually qualified to do, teach, or speak on.

Opinions are not facts, bish.

Hot takes can also be hot garbage.

Half truths are still half a lie (h/t to my homie Dr Tee for this one).

And, and, and there are instances where it both does and doesn't matter. What is for us cannot pass by us is true. That we can get dragged around on detours and scenic routes we don't actually "need" is also true.

Younger me would have argued that it's all perfect, no matter what. She probably would have tossed in a, “people are always doing their best with what they have.”

41-year-old me agrees to disagree.

In my 20s and my 30s, I operated relatively unfiltered, which was a an important and corrective measure after growing up in an environment that was very controlling while purporting itself not to be.

Here in my 40s, it’s not that I’ve developed some miraculous filtration system. My discernment is just more refined. My unfilteredness is reserved for my most intimate circles now—both personal and professional, because an undeniable lesson I've learned is that my most tender and vulnerable material is not for public consumption.

That’s not a lesson everybody needs. To some, it’s probably obvious. For others, like me, who did not have healthy or mature spaces, places, or people to witness them in formative years, it takes some calibrating.

Of late, I’m saying yes to things you wouldn’t have caught me even considering in my 30s, and hheeeeellll to the naw naw naw to things I would've forced myself into (much to the detriment of my most sacred self).

Things that prioritize structure, stability, ease, and comfort.

Things that feel edgy to embrace when they’re out of reach for so many.

Things that my guides and my ancestors have notified me in no uncertain terms are my current and highest assignment to receive.

I've also been in a nostalgic spiral for most of this year. I don't mean "spiral" in the sense of the word that we use to describe spiraling out of control or into unhealthy, disassociated, coping, avoidant, or distressed territory.

I mean it in the healing sense.

The sense that is not linear.

The sense that describes the ways we can circle back to view things from a different, more informed and more evolved perspective. With insight, experience, integration, transformation, and fortitude under our belts, that younger versions of ourselves, the ones that faced this before, didn't have.

Baby, it’s good to be seasoned.

And from this seasoned place, I send so much love, appreciation, compassion, and admiration across time to chronologically younger me who didn't know what she didn't know.

xo,

E