Hello all! Firstly, apologies for the delay in getting this newsletter out the door. Tomorrow is my birthday, and instead of getting the newsletter prepped and ready to go on Saturday, like we normally do, we spent the entire day prepping for a party, then partying, and finally collapsing into bed. A honkingly good time was had by all (it was a Silly Goose party), and I’m sure we’ll get the mess cleaned up eventually. 😅 

This week David shares with us some insights gained by working with affirmations and plant medicine, the first of a series of excerpts from a letter he wrote to our 19-year old son, sharing insights and tools he’s found most helpful along his path of growth and healing over the past few years.

Thanks for joining us!

-Mindy

A STUDENT OF THE GAME

I played football as a teenager. I was ok. I won 2nd string all-state on a losing team, which gave me access to play at smaller colleges and universities if I had wanted to. I didn’t want to.

It wasn’t because I didn’t enjoy playing. I really did. I enjoyed playing and REALLY enjoyed training. Powerlifting became an obsession and I trained assiduously three hours a day, four days a week. My coach was impressed with my dedication and physical skills and talents but he saw that I lacked something: “You know Gonzalez, you could really make something of yourself in this game if you took the time to become a student of the game. Natural talents and skills will only take you so far. In the end, it’s about loving that game that drives players to greatness.”

But I never loved the game. The reality is that I started playing football at 12 because my father told me that I was either going to keep playing the violin or play football: “Faggots play the violin. Real men play football. What are you going to be?” So, that was the end of the violin. It was truly a sad day. I started playing football but I hated it and what it represented to me. I soon ended up loving my teammates, training, and I really liked a number of my coaches. By the end of my High School years I also loved game day. But I never loved the game. 

When my teammates would get together on the weekend to watch football I hung out with my little skater friends making mischief or getting ready to go to a punk or ska concert.

It wasn’t until I found entrepreneurship that I started to find a game that I wanted to really learn and study. More recently I have become a serious student of the game called Feeling Good Being Alive.

My life is to be enjoyed

I had planned to do a mushroom trip on the night of the solar eclipse because it happened to be a new moon and I like taking time once a month to reflect on ways in which I can let go of the habits, routines, and worn-out paths that no longer serve me—and a new moon holds a beautiful natural cadence. I had prepared my intentions with the help of a tarot reading on myself, a thing I quite enjoy doing because, while I do not believe in magic, I do believe in the power of self-inquiry and pattern interruption. (See Something to Try for more details.)

I drew the Five of Cups in answer to the question/framing: What energy or perspective will I need to get into alignment? The internal or external action needed to shift your energy to match my desire. 

The Five of Cups is associated with grief. I don’t know that I was expecting anything, but I didn’t have to sit with the idea of grief very long to see the wisdom and relevance of grief for processing what’s been coming up for me. I used the reading to frame my next conversation with my therapist and he offered a list of twenty-five transformation prompts for Enneagram Type 8 as a jumping off point.

I tweaked a few and added some for a total of twenty-nine “release” and “affirm” framed transformations that I would thoughtfully consider during my journey. I’d been preparing for almost a month and had journaled (written and spoken) to better know my own mind and yet I was still caught short when I came to the night item during my mushroom meditation:

“I now release my fear that others are trying to control me.”

I said it outloud and it didn’t stick. I said it again and again. Up until that point it had been pretty easy to move through the energy of old beliefs I felt no longer served me but this one wasn’t releasing.

I continued to repeat the prompt and feel into what was coming up for me. 

Then, suddenly, I was three or four years old in one of my childhood homes in Blanding Utah. We were in the family room and the local Mormon missionaries were over for a chat. My father had been teaching religious school, think Hebrew school/Bible study, on the neighboring native reservations and this gave him access to quite a bit of Mormonism esoterica and mysticism. He could always share a tale or recall a legend that very few modern Mormons at the time knew about and I think this made him popular with the missionaries. 

“You know, I met David before he was born!” This was the first time I remember my father telling this story, but it would go on to be shared surprisingly often with other church members and sometimes complete strangers.

“He came to me in a vision, in the Temple, a grown man, dressed in Priesthood Robes. He told me his name would be David and that when he was born he would heal the family.”

I still remember how I felt. The heat in my chest and in my cheeks and the chill down my neck and shoulders; the experience of being embarrassed. This was too much attention and something felt off about it.

I was still reciting the prompt: I now release my fear that others are trying to control me.

But then it started to feel like a call and response with different parts of me engaged. 

My voice was steady but I was getting angry saying: I now release my fear that others are trying to control me. 

Another part of me spoke clearly in my head: I was not born to this world to be an offering or a sacrifice. I was not born to this life for a sacrifice. I am not an offering or a sacrifice here to make up for generations of people who won’t do their own work.

Then suddenly I was in a dream. I was a little goat, a true “kid” with brown and white fur. I was happily scampering about the desert landscape with my herd. The warmth of the dust and musk filled my nostrils and I felt calm. Then, suddenly, an old man in Levite robes snatched me up and began to carry me to the Tabernacle that Moses built. I was terrified, the man was trying to bind me and I felt powerless to stop him, he was too strong. I struggled and cried out. Indifferent to my plight the old man only held me tighter and soon only my neck was free to move. I didn’t know what else to do so when my cheek brushed against a fleshy part of his arm I turned my head and bit down with all my strength. 

He cried out, relaxed his grip, and tumbled to the ground where wriggled free!

Then, I ran! I ran, bleating with joy. I’m free! I’m free! 

Then this thought: I am not a scapegoat!

I found my herd and I hid; staying out of sight of any humans, even our goatherd–they were never to be trusted again. 

As the dream dissipated I felt something shift within me and heard my own voice in my head assert:

“I now affirm that my life is to be enjoyed. My life is to be enjoyed! By me, first and foremost, and also by anyone else who would like to enjoy my life. Those that do not wish to enjoy enjoy my life can fuck off.”

For freest action formed under the laws divine

Over the next few weeks I will be sharing excerpts from a letter I wrote to our 19 year-old son. The letter contains the things I’ve learned about enjoying life and the tools I’ve found to help me when I struggle to do so. 

I never really made peace with that one prompt about others trying to control me but I have released the fear. 

I had 29 items on that list, only four were affirmations. So it goes. So much of the space in me has been cluttered by so much fear. With those out of the way, there’s room for showing up how I want to. The final affirmation on my list borrows from one of my favorite poems by Walt Whitman–as a teenager I was given a copy of Leaves of Grass that once belonged to my maternal grandfather:

Affirmation: I now affirm that I will live a life immense in passion, pulse, and power, Cheerful, for freest action formed under laws divine!

I was expecting it to feel great to get to that affirmation and that’s why I saved it for last. I was not prepared to be so moved by it. With the vibrant memory of my triumph over those who offer my life as a sacrifice for their ill-efforts, the words rang through every part of me like a beam of pure light and joy.

May you also live a life immense in passion, pulse, and power, Cheerful, for freest action!

I’ll return in a couple weeks with my next installment.

—David/Gonzo

NEAT!

• I’ve listened to this song easily a dozen times since first hearing it a week ago. It resonates so much with how I feel about life now. My flavor of my life today is nothing I could have predicted a couple of years ago, but it is so rich and joyful. Still Wandering by Bronze Radio Return. 🎵✨

• It has been a few years now since I first discovered that having a goose on your porch and dressing it up was a thing, but immediately upon learning this, I ordered my very own. David was not thrilled. Now mine has a dozen plus outfits and I even got a second one for traveling & shenanigans. David took the travel goose with him to Burning Man back in 2022, so it’s safe to say Goosey and I won him over. ✨

SOMETHING TO TRY

LAW OF ATTRACTION 5-CARD SPREAD

It’s so easy to get stuck in the same narrative about our life and finding a productive way to challenge my narratives can be tricky. This is why I like using tarot readings to shake things up. I can’t predict what card I will draw nor can I be “prepared” for what it will bring up. It’s kind of a vulnerability hack. The spread I did in preparation for my mushroom meditation is a 5-card spread called Law of Attraction in Guided Tarot for Seamless Readings by Stefanie Caponi.

I shuffled my tarot deck and then fanned out all the cards in front of me. Then I picked one card at a time after considering the prompts:

1. Where would I like to go? Queen of Cups, Yes, this is the most feminine card (It’s the chalice holding a chalice) and what came up for me is how much I would like to make room for my intuition/gut and emotion. I’ve got good brain and I can turn to it to help me figure out how to follow my intuition/gut.

2. What is my current energy or the old energy that no longer serves me? Ten of Swords, honor the experiences that shaped me without feeling their burden. As I felt into this I felt appreciation for the time and energy I’ve invested over the past couple years to thoughtfully revisit my past in ways that have helped me to feel less burdened by it.

3. What energy will I need to achieve my desired state? King of Swords, leadership with action, passion, and wisdom. In the past I lacked wisdom and felt burdened rather than buoyed by my intuition–Queen of Cups and King of Swords is beautiful pairing of energies I can rely on.

4. How do I get into alignment? What internal or external action is needed to shift my energy (make room) for where I would like to be? Five of Cups, grief and sadness. Grief is a process of letting what was once alive now only live in memory and it is a means of metabolizing the sadness of loss of what was or what I hoped would be. Grief has been a powerfully healing perspective.

5. Let go of the How, what must I let go of to remain open to the unlimited ways my desired state could take root? Eight of Swords, Let go of and release self-imposed restrictions. Between this and the Five of Cups I was inspired to draft twenty-nine transformative statements about what I wish to release and what I now affirm. 

PARTING

WORDS

PIC

That’s all for this week! If you’re into this, share this newsletter with all your friends. Connecting with new subscribers is magical! 🧚🏻‍♀️ We so appreciate the kind and heartfelt reviews. If you feel so moved, please take a minute to share, they really bring us joy and they help others to find our newsletter.

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