Hello there,
It feels like it’s been a while. I’ve missed you. Thank you for waiting for me.
I begin writing to you in the evening. In the northwest corner of my view, the setting sun glows between cedar silhouettes, the sky a gentle gradient fading slowly into twilight. A layer closer, across the street, a mother and her fawn emerge from the woods, walking freely through the barbed wire fence we cut in the middle of the night. Closer more, a hummingbird zooms from the clothesline to the crocosmia before darting off into the distance, perhaps back to a miniature nest tucked in the elbow of a nearby branch, the image of which fills me with complete awe and “awwwww.”
I love ending my days on the front porch, my body leaned back in the creaky glider, bare feet on the baby blue railing. It is here where I take it all in; where I take stock. I remember to remember that I am living what I imagined not so long ago, what I never could have imagined years ago. I remember that everything I’ve asked for is already on its way.
As the wise Sheryl Crow reminds us in her classic summer anthem, “It’s not having what you want. It’s wanting what you’ve got.”
As per usual, I had an original plan for July’s issue, which now feels forced to bring back into the fold. I love how this writing practice demands my adherence to the present. If I don’t harness the flow as it’s happening, it will leave. I let it. Like so many things, it will likely come back around—it might even do so before I end this essay—but it is my duty as a writer to respect the sovereignty of the idea.
My new plan is the one of least resistance. Dear reader—I am tired. Adherence to the present means acknowledging and accepting this. It means practicing what I said earlier—that my new metrics for this newsletter are truth, integrity, and joy. In other words:
Did I say what I really mean?
Did I stay grounded in my core values and beliefs?
Did I enjoy myself?
I know my readers will not abandon me if that means a shorter or a more spacious frequency of newsletters during an exceptionally and unexpectedly busy time. If you leave, I let you. It is my duty to respect the sovereignty of your subscription.
Be it the workplace, the workshops, the election year, Mars moving into Gemini, the SECOND full moon in Capricorn, or the other dozen spinning plates and forces that I balance from my unicycle, it all just feels a little too full tilt. And with the sun now reigning from Leo, the heat only continues to build.
We find ourselves in the heart of Tammuz, the Hebrew month whose name literally means “heating.” Tammuz carries one of the most intense energies of the year, known ancestrally as a time to embrace grief and sorrow.
Each month of the Hebrew calendar offers a rich, multi-layered terrain of history, astrology, symbolism, and energies through which to explore the layers of Self. Within any one of these lanes lies an entire cosmos of discovery. Lately, I’m finding myself drawn into the mysticism of the Hebrew alphabet as a way of engaging with the season.
“The [letters of the Hebrew alphabet] have been around since before the creation of the world and are mysteriously linked with the creation process itself…the [letters] are more than just signs for sounds. They are symbols whose shape and name, placement in the alphabet, and words they begin put them at the center of a unique spiritual constellation. They are themselves holy. They are vessels carrying the light of the Boundless One.” – Rabbi Lawrence Kushner, The Book of Letters: A Mystical Alef-bait
The month of Tammuz is symbolized by the letter chet (ח), best known as the letter of life (chayim, in Hebrew). I find this an incredibly potent paradox—the month most known for loss, symbolized by life. This is the question Tammuz asks us to live.
The chaotic energy of the last few weeks has been no stranger to many. In disparate conversations with friends, themes across online social media chatter, or just the general unfolding of events, the universe seems to be speaking through the collective in various ways. I find it’s usually best to just listen, and work with it as an ally. Resistance begets cortisol.
Sometimes I even work with it unintentionally, as was the case with the latest workshop series. As part of my residency, I’ve been offering a movement and creativity workshop rooted in Gabrielle Roth’s 5 Rhythms framework. These five rhythms—flowing, staccato, chaos, lyrical, and stillness—form a map to the center of our being. Their effect can only truly be understood by being felt, rather than intellectualized.
If you are reading this in Port Angeles, come to The Hub this Thursday, 6–8pm, and see for yourself! Respond to this email for more details.
When we dance the rhythms, it’s normal that some feel more natural than others. Thus, our dance tells a story of our inner world. To me, the rhythm of flowing—feminine, watery, and continuous—often feels divine. Staccato—a rhythm of precision, heat, and percussion—feels empowering. Chaos, on the other hand—a rhythm of total surrender, asymmetry, and primordial movement—can feel awkward. It all depends on the day, really. Nonetheless, when we let our body speak, the truth reveals itself.
If embodying a rhythm of chaos feels uncomfortable, perhaps I need to examine what I’m gripping so tight. What is the why within my clenched fist? Where in my body does the fear live? Can I let that body part lead the dance?
The rhythms are not random. On the other side of chaos come lyrical and stillness. Lyrical embodies lightness, flight, the post-orgasmic bliss that leaves you levitating in your skin. Stillness, the final rhythm, brings you inside yourself and into oneness with everything around you.
Chaos has been my greatest teacher in dancing these rhythms as of late. Sometimes bending is not enough. Sometimes we need to break. How can we put something back together if it refuses to fall apart? Chaos asks us to surrender to the transformation, and shatter the chrysalis on our way out.We must trust that a truer, easier way awaits our arrival on the other side. In other words, chaos is the ultimate prerequisite for change.
“Chaos is not all bad. We can spend a lot of time white knuckling what has been, trying to keep things from changing. But sometimes things need to change so that new things can become possible. A lot of us can have an aversion to chaos or disruption. But sometimes chaos and disruption is exactly what we need in order to open up new possibilities and new futures, to breathe new energy into something…the key inside of chaos is that we have to remember what necessitated the chaos in the first place, and we have to remember where exactly we want to go.” – Prentis Hemphill
Heat transforms. And here we are, in the apex of it all. Breaking record high temperatures. Raging wildfire. Exploding volcanoes. This season is speaking in the language of change.
But what of Tammuz and its call to step toward our grief and our sorrow? How do its energetics fit into the chaotic fold?
“When I think of the shape of sorrow, it is formless. When we’re holding something that’s just too heavy to bear, we have no choice but to break apart. It makes sense—in the northern hemisphere, Tammuz falls during an intensely hot time of the year. The beating sun commands us to split open and melt. Tammuz is also elementally represented by water — inherently shapeless, always flowing down toward the lowest point.
To me, the letter chet (ח) perfectly embodies what it feels like to be in loss or sorrow. It’s as if the ground beneath your feet has dropped out from under you. Yet there’s still structure wrapped around three sides. In this way, I see chet (ח) as a threshold and a gateway inviting us to step into and through our sorrow. It is an invitation to let ourselves fall apart, knowing we are held.” – Yours truly, A Moon Manual For Tammuz 5784, At The Well
Grief is an inherent part of chaos—there is no change without loss.
“The truth is, each gain in life represents the loss of something else. We simply never move forward in life without losing something. No wonder most of us are resistant to change, even when those changes promise to be positive. As much as we want our lives to be different, the truth is, surrendering to change means letting go of being in control.” – Katherine Woodward Thomas, via
We may gladly throw these losses into the chasm of our becoming—outdated beliefs, aging paradigms, identities that no longer (or never) fit, relationships that do not serve. It is loss nonetheless.
All of this atop layers of compounding ancestral and collective grief—for climate and the breach of our only obligation in this world (to be a caretaker), for gut-wrenching right-wing regressive ideology, for Gaza. For Gaza. For Gaza.
As always, the energy of the cosmos works us from above as the energy of our ancestry works us from within. It’s at play whether we’re conscious of it or not—the choice to work with it is ours. Source always has Its hands outstretched.
All this to say:
Life does not happen to us.
Life happens through us.
May chaos break me open a
thousand times moreover,
I reassemble as ritual.
With my heart, which is
my hands cupped and raised
I drink—
L’Chaim. To life.
To all life.
Yours, mine, hers, theirs, his, ours,
Past, present, unborn, reborn,
All of us forever bound
in cycles and ceaseless rhythm,
Returning always,
to this hurling space rock,
just spinning round and round.
A portion of all paid subscriptions goes to Mother Nation, and the remainder directly funds my continued education.
• Email: izabellazucker@gmail.com
ICYMI: Last month’s writing covered lessons I’ve learned from a year of committing to this creative practice on Substack. We wander through the ecological ideation process, imposter syndrome, internalized capitalism, and more.
Become a subscriber and never miss and issue. REPRISE is only accessible to paid subscribers.
To your wonderful life ❤️
🤯 as always