For the first five years of my daughter's life, I told her a story every night. Cuddled in bed, I would invent new story after new story, all with the same narrative arc: a tender young person, guided by a magical community of stars, plants, flowers, and animals, discovering her superpowers and joy.
I later realized that this time together was creative practice -- conscious, intentional daily action -- for me, and for her.
I believed then, as I do now, that one of our greatest responsibilities to our children is to help them imagine a story of the future. In my night time stories with my daughter, I paused often, presenting her with narrative choices about key details: the color of a room, the direction of a path, the type of animal that was about to appear. Like an improv troupe soliciting prompts from the audience, I wove her input, however improbable, into our co-created tale.
I'm thinking back to those nights now, on this September new moon, as I make a leap to (re)structure my life around collaboration, community, and deeper relation to land. I'm moving with vision, intention, and trusted relationship, guided by the magic of stars, plants, flowers, and animals, imagining a future of collective superpowers and joy.
I'm so grateful for all those years of practice in my bones, and hers, as I step into a future of our most improbable and deeply necessary co-creation.
New Moon New Video Story!
Check out New Moon's latest video capturing the powerful voices of California leaders who took part in visioning and designing a future grassroots organizing infrastructure for California, called the i-Center. New Moon was honored to support the work of building intergenerational leadership, sustainable organizations, power and strategy, in an effort nurtured by the i-Center Lead Team: Miya Yoshitani of APEN, Alex Tom of the Center for Empowered Politics, Anthony Thigpenn of CA Calls, Olivia Araiza of the Othering & Belonging Institute, Joseph Tomás Mckellar of PICO CA, and Elly Matsumura of Power Switch Action. Click to the Executive Summary of the Blueprint for more about the i-Center!
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