Five and Nine: Tarot, Work and Economic Justice

This is Five and Nine, a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. We're in the midst of Season 5, on the theme of Generation, but we wanted to take a brief look back at Season 2 with a “retro” episode originally published September 2022.SummaryHow can everyday magic helps us navigate change?Five and Nine talks with artist, designer, and witch Helen Shewolfe Tseng. They share their work on growth spells, drawings made over an extended period of time for personal healing and transformation, and their Coyote Portals series, inspired by the fission-fusion adaptations and mythos of these often misunderstood animals. We also talk about what we learned in nature during lockdown and how to find grounding in uncertain times, from petting our plants to working with free ballpoint pens.Season 2 is about transitions. As fall sets in in the northern hemisphere and spring int he south, Five and Nine looks at change in all its forms — leaving jobs, changing industries, starting new paths, and the wisdom that tarot and magic have to offer in a world that seems to be ever in flux.ResourcesFrom Our Guest* Helen Shewolfe Tseng* Growth Spells* Coyote Portals (prints available here!)* The Man Who Could Move Clouds, by Ingrid Rojas ContrerasMusic* Episode: Bow Wow Blues, performed by the Original Dixieland Jazz Band, 1921.* Outro: Ain't we got fun, composed by Richard A. Whiting and performed by the Benson Orchestra of Chicago, 1921. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit fiveandnine.substack.com/subscribe

Season 5 returns with a conversation between the Five and Nine co-founders, long-time collaborators, and friends, Xiaowei, AX, and Dorothy. While AX was in Jordan for Season 4, Xiaowei and Dorothy were in their metaphorical caves completing their dissertations and transitioning out of one academic realm into another while balancing commitments and obligations, but we survived and have become Dr. Xiaowei Wang and Dr. Dorothy R. Santos!This season, we ask our guests about generation(s) and not only in terms of silos (e.g., Gen X, Gen Z, Millenials, etc.), but about what it means to view generation as a verb and how we might think of building from crisis and ruins of ideologies and beliefs that no longer collectively serve us. In this episode, we talk about love, grief and what it means to be fully oneself.The deck used in Season 5 is the Mixed Signals Tarot, designed by Season 3 guest M Eifler/BlinkPopShift. Music is written, composed, and performed by Anna Luisa Petrisko.Five and Nine is a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — around the new moon and full moon — , and we provide an ongoing critical discussion through readings, reflections and debate. Five and Nine is produced by Five and Nine Futures Lab, a research, design and strategy consultancy that helps organizations and companies build better futures through the lens of work, care and magic.In this new world, we're all rethinking the meaning of work and justice in our lives. Our lives and livelihoods are more essential than ever in identifying ways forward for society that can be grounded in care, compassion and sustainability. Learn more at thisisfiveandnine.com This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit fiveandnine.substack.com/subscribe

Season 5 returns with a conversation between the Five and Nine co-founders, long-time collaborators, and friends, Xiaowei, AX, and Dorothy. While AX was in Jordan for Season 4, Xiaowei and Dorothy were in their metaphorical caves completing their dissertations and transitioning out of one academic realm into another while balancing commitments and obligations, but we survived and have become Dr. Xiaowei Wang and Dr. Dorothy R. Santos!This season, we ask our guests about generation(s) and not only in terms of silos (e.g., Gen X, Gen Z, Millenials, etc.), but about what it means to view generation as a verb and how we might think of building from crisis and ruins of ideologies and beliefs that no longer collectively serve us. In this episode, we talk about love, grief and what it means to be fully oneself.The deck used in Season 5 is the Mixed Signals Tarot, designed by Season 3 guest M Eifler/BlinkPopShift. Music is written, composed, and performed by Anna Luisa Petrisko.Five and Nine is a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — around the new moon and full moon — , and we provide an ongoing critical discussion through readings, reflections and debate. Five and Nine is produced by Five and Nine Futures Lab, a research, design and strategy consultancy that helps organizations and companies build better futures through the lens of work, care and magic.In this new world, we're all rethinking the meaning of work and justice in our lives. Our lives and livelihoods are more essential than ever in identifying ways forward for society that can be grounded in care, compassion and sustainability. Learn more at thisisfiveandnine.com This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit fiveandnine.substack.com/subscribe

For the Season 4 finale, we break out a new format: Desert Residency Discs, inspired by the popular BBC show Desert Island Discs. We listen to music recorded on location in the Wadi Rum Desert, and we talk about some of the major themes from the residency, including crisis, bearing witness, why sound and music hold us through difficult moments, and how to be present, whatever the circumstances. We close with a tarot reading that builds on our reflections around the elements of air, water and fire. Also: tune in as we learn to sing like camels.Music performed by Hashim Bin Muaitiq, Nour Batyne and Britt Pham, recorded live in Wadi Rum.Tarot Cards in This EpisodeThe cards discussed are The Tower, Six of Cups and Two of Wands. The deck used in this episode is the Mixed Signals Tarot deck designed by M Eifler.Images of the cards are available at thisisfiveandnine.com.Season 4 is co-presented with One of Many Studio (OoM), an experience design studio at the intersection of healing and justice work, connecting people with what it means to be a Future Ancestor.Five and Nine is a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — every new moon

Introducing Five and Nine Live!Following up on Episode 4.07. Awakening the Healer, we present our very first live podcast recording — a special episode for Season 4 recorded live at the Center for the Enlightenment Arts in Bushwick, Brooklyn, at Gathering Future Ancestors: a meditative experience of immersive storytelling, participatory art, and sound — exploring water as an entryway to our shared humanity.In this discussion, host AX Mina and guest Helen Banach talk about multihyphenate life, the practice of healing and the difference between holding space and holding pain. They close with a tarot reading for the collective using the Mixed Signals Tarot deck designed by M Eifler, with insights on how to navigate grief, cultivate care and tend to the fire within all of us to build differently in this time of deep crisis.The Season 4 finale will be coming out in the next few weeks. In the meantime, check out our most recent episodes with the 2023 residents of One of Many Studio's Wadi Rum residency:* Azad's Kite: Art in a Time of Crisis* Learning to Trust the Gut* It's More Clear at the Bottom* PLUS a bonus minisode of our Embodied Water PracticeTarot Cards Discussed* Five of Cups* Seven of Cups* Eight of Wands* Queen of Swords (aka Maker of Swords in the Mixed Signals Deck)Images of the cards are available at thisisfiveandnine.com.Season 4 is co-presented with One of Many Studio (OoM), an experience design studio at the intersection of healing and justice work. We envision a movement of Future Ancestors built through transformative, intentionally curated experiences. Connect with OoM on Substack.Five and Nine is a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — every new moon

“I was always the busy one,” says our guest Hana of her life before COVID lockdowns. In this final interview of Season 4, we talk about the power of being by oneself, how it feels to jump back into a familiar line of work, and the importance of intuition. We look at present-day Petra, the famous city of stone nestled in southern Jordan, and we close with a tarot reading that captures the essence of acceptance in the face of change. Also: remembering to look up.Five and Nine Season 4 is about crisis. It's our first season recorded on location, with the majority of our episodes produced in the beautiful Wadi Rum desert in Jordan, thanks to a special artist residency hosted by One of Many Studio (OoM). Music performed by Hashim Bin Muaitiq, recorded live in Wadi Rum.Season 4 is co-presented with One of Many Studio, an experience design studio at the intersection of healing and justice work. We envision a movement of Future Ancestors built through transformative, intentionally curated experiences.Five and Nine is a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — every new moon

Symbolic language is at the heart of magic and also at the heart of human expression. In this minisode, Five and Nine joins Adelle Lin, an artist and technologist who explores the poetry of water and the Arabic, Chinese and Hebrew languages in the desert. We talk about time, displacement, and what it feels like to roll a 160 foot scroll down the side of a hill. Also: Ana offers a reflection on deep time and where water comes from.Five and Nine Season 4 is about crisis. It's our first season recorded on location, with the majority of our episodes produced in the beautiful Wadi Rum desert in Jordan, thanks to a special artist residency hosted by One of Many Studio (OoM).Music performed by Hashim Bin Muaitiq, recorded live in Wadi Rum.Season 4 is co-presented with One of Many Studio (OoM), an experience design & consulting studio connecting people with what it means to be a Future Ancestor. OoM works at the intersection of immersive experiences and social change, elevating critical conversations to transform the way we relate to ourselves, each other, and our legacies.Five and Nine is a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — every new moon

This is Five and Nine, a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. We're in the midst of Season 4, recorded online and on location in the Wadi Rum Desert in Jordan, but we wanted to take a brief look back at Season 3 with a “retro” episode with One of Many co-founder Nour Batyne.Futures thinker, artist and creative producer Nour Batyne reminds us to slow down to the speed of presence. The future is not just space travel and new technology but the legacy we leave as future ancestors. We'll hear from Nour how she decided to make the leap from the nine to five life into starting her own studio, and we'll learn about the influence of her teita, or grandmother, on her life and practice, and why land acknowledgements are so important.Nour offers a meditation that helps us face the climate crisis by honoring our interconnectedness, and we'll hear her and her cousin sing an Arabic Galilean folk song in honor of her grandmother. Also: why the smell of jasmine means freedom.Season 3's focus was about rest. In a time of extended crisis, permacrisis and polycrisis, taking time to decompress is not just a benefit but a necessity. Learning to slow down, reflect and make space for expansive thinking is part of what makes rest so sweet but also so elusive. Grab a blanket, turn down the lights, and turn up Five and Nine this season to hear new perspectives on the age old practice of reflection, rejuvenation and recovery.About Our Guest* One of Many Studio, co-founded by Nour Batyne and Britt Pham* Wadi Rum ResidencyTarot Cards Discussed* Two of SwordsResources* Umm Kulthum* Levina Li* Seven Generation PrincipleMusic* Episode: That soothing serenade (Was just written for me), composed by Harry De Costa and performed by Henry Burr, 1918.* Closing: يما مويل الهوا (Yamma Mweil Al Hawa), performed by Nour Batyne and Bushra Batyne at Bars for Thought, an open mic poetry night in Brooklyn, 2023. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit fiveandnine.substack.com/subscribe

It's the still of winter here in the northern hemisphere as the solstice arrives, and we just have a few more episodes of Season 4 left.In this bonus minisode, Season 4 co-hosts Britt Pham and Nour Batyne of One of Many Studio offer a meditation that helps us face the climate crisis by honoring our interconnectedness.“We are gathering among unceded waters,” they offer. “These waters hold the legacy and the souls of ancestors who stewarded them with humanity in the face of violence and inhumanity. We honor them.”Related episodes:*

What does it feel like to awaken to a new calling? Artist, art producer, and art historian Helen Banach sits down with us to talk about embodying these multiple labels alongside her newest one — healer. We travel to March 2020, when she became a full-time caregiver just as lockdowns began, and we discuss the multihyphenate life, making mistakes and embodiment. A tarot reading takes us back generations, with a message from Helen's ancestors. Also: we get a visit from camels, birds and even a few buzzing flies.Five and Nine Season 4 is about crisis. It's our first season on location, with the majority of our episodes recorded from the beautiful Wadi Rum Desert in Jordan, thanks to a special artist residency hosted by One of Many Studio (OoM). We ask our guests what's changed since the beginning of the COVID-19 emergency, and how to think about our relationship to the world, the earth and the people around us.The deck used in Season 4 is the Mixed Signals Tarot, designed by Season 3 guest M Eifler/BlinkPopShift. Music is performed by Hashim Bin Muaitiq and recorded on location in Wadi Rum.Season 4 is co-presented with One of Many Studio, an experience design & consulting studio connecting people with what it means to be a Future Ancestor. One of Many works at the intersection of immersive experiences and social change, elevating critical conversations to transform the way we relate to ourselves, each other, and our legacies.Five and Nine is a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — every new moon

Following up on Episode 4.06. The Turtles and the Stars: An Interview with AX Mina ✨

In this minisode, One of Many Studio's Britt Pham and Nour Batyne interview a familiar voice — AX Mina (Ana), your host for Season 4 and a co-founder at Five and Nine. They discuss the meaning of stars, the many jackets we wear in our professional lives, definitions of magic, and the Buddhist concept of precious birth. As night descends on the desert, we look back on the Jupiter-Saturn Conjunction of 2020 and what we learned in the quiet of lockdown. Also: Aja Monet's newest album.Five and Nine Season 4 is about crisis. It's our first season recorded on location, with the majority of our episodes produced in the beautiful Wadi Rum desert in Jordan, thanks to a special artist residency hosted by One of Many Studio (OoM).Music performed by Hashim Bin Muaitiq. The music was recorded live in Wadi Rum.References* Comfortable with Uncertainty, by Pema Chodron* when the poems do what they do, by Aja MonetSeason 4 is co-presented with One of Many Studio, an experience design & consulting studio connecting people with what it means to be a Future Ancestor. One of Many works at the intersection of immersive experiences and social change, elevating critical conversations to transform the way we relate to ourselves, each other, and our legacies.Five and Nine is a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — every new moon

In this minisode, Five and Nine joins Azad, an artist, healer and “forever cheerleader,” who's working on a kite to fly in the desert winds of Wadi Rum. We tune in to the element of air in particular, an important one in tarot, which shows up in both the cards we draw and in the environment around us. We travel back in time to the quiet, haunting streets of New York City early in the pandemic, discuss the value of rest, and the explore the role of the arts in times of crisis.Five and Nine Season 4 is about crisis. It's our first season recorded on location, with the majority of our episodes produced in the beautiful Wadi Rum desert in Jordan, thanks to a special artist residency hosted by One of Many Studio (OoM).Music performed by Hashim Bin Muaitiq. Both the music and the kite flying audio were recorded live in Wadi Rum.Season 4 is co-presented with One of Many Studio, an experience design & consulting studio connecting people with what it means to be a Future Ancestor. One of Many works at the intersection of immersive experiences and social change, elevating critical conversations to transform the way we relate to ourselves, each other, and our legacies.Five and Nine is a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — every new moon

When it feels like everything is lost, how do we find guidance? In this incredibly difficult and painful week, we've been seeking wisdom, prayer and spiritual guidance. As we get ready to return to Season 4, we wanted to take a step back with a “retro” episode, pulling from our archives from Season 2.In this episode, Five and Nine talks with Angela Mictlanxochitl Anderson Guerrero, who runs Lideramos, a Latino leadership organization in the US, and who is a practicing abuela, or grandmother, in the Danza de la Luna lineage, a transterritorial Mexica ceremonial practice.Angela Mictlanxochitl talks about the four components of her thoughtful engagement framework—intention, responsibility, reciprocity and care—, the role of prayer and spirituality in leadership, being authentic in the workplace and how we care for our physical, psychological and emotional health. She closes with a sound and prayer offering in collaboration with artist Enrique Arriaga Celis.ResourcesFrom Our Guest* Angela's bio on Lideramos* Bless Me, Ultima, by Rudolfo Anaya* Gloria Evangelina AnzaldúaTarot Cards Discussed* The Tower* The Lovers* Next World Tarot, by Cristy C. RoadPrayer Text(audio developed in collaboration with Enrique Arriaga Celis)As I hold my round obsidian mirror, the black magic mirror.My fingers are around the edges. I lift up the black mirror to my face. As I look into the mirror, I see the reflection of my face in the mirror. I feel myself.I invite each of you to look back via the other side into the black magic mirror.  Close your eyes and feel -- sense the darkness of the condition of possibility. With the permission of Nana Metzli, our Moon,  with the permission of Tonantzin, our Mother, with the permission of the cosmic energies,  and the permission of Tonatiuh, the Sun.I ask all the directions to invoke the loving energy of this sacred space we occupy to activate the black magic mirror.May we feel embraced in its stillness wherever you may be, and however you may be. May you honor your thoughts. May you honor your insecurities. May you honor the genius of all the movements in your life.In the beauty and the tragedy of our relations, I ask that you are shown the depth of your love. I ask the reflective black light to shine on each of you.As you feel it tingle, ask yourself, “Who am I and who do I wanna be?”Listen. Listen. Listen to yourself. Claim your sacredness, embrace your medicine to heal, and trust in your unique value and gifts. Now listen and repeat: My path is open. I am guided by my ancestors. The magic of the elements and the sacredness of life wants me to survive. My reflection is my life force. I dance with the weaving of life so I may come into union with the person I am. Listen. Listen. Listen to yourself. As we close, black magic mirror, Please shower the you in me and the me in you with love and kindness. In the light of the black magic mirror, I am you and you are me, We are never alone. With heart over our heads.Walk with confidence in the black light. Ometeotl.Music* Episode: Oh for the wings of a dove, performed by Geraldine Farrar in 1911 and composed by Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy.* Outro: Ain't we got fun, composed by Richard A. Whiting and performed by the Benson Orchestra of Chicago, 1921. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit fiveandnine.substack.com/subscribe

We're going on vacation here at Five and Nine, and before we do, we wanted to share an offering in the form of a bonus episode.“Just notice what's alive in your body today.” These wise words will guide you in this beautiful meditation from Britt Pham, co-founder at One of Many Studio. It's the opening to a conversation that we'll be publishing in September, when we continue Season 4.We hope you have a restful and restorative summer in the northern hemisphere.Five and Nine Season 4 is about crisis. It's our first season on location, with the majority of our episodes recorded from the beautiful Wadi Rum Desert in Jordan, thanks to a special artist residency hosted by One of Many Studio (OoM). We ask our guests what's changed since the beginning of the COVID-19 emergency, and how to think about our relationship to the world, the earth and the people around us.Season 4 is co-presented with One of Many Studio, an experience design & consulting studio connecting people with what it means to be a Future Ancestor. One of Many works at the intersection of immersive experiences and social change, elevating critical conversations to transform the way we relate to ourselves, each other, and our legacies.Five and Nine is a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — every new moon

In this minisode, Five and Nine joins One of Many Studio's Nour Batyne and Britt Pham to sit in on a Bedouin coffee ceremony. Sipping from their cups around the virtual campfire, we talk about the magic, work and economic justice of the little bean we call coffee, whose roots extend to the Rift Valley and whose impact goes as far afield as Vietnam and Brazil. And with every gulp comes a long story of capital, colonialism and ceremony — and maybe a little space for future telling too. Also: stay till the end for a special announcement about a new futures workshop from Five and Nine and One of Many.Season 4 is co-presented with One of Many Studio, an experience design & consulting studio connecting people with what it means to be a Future Ancestor. One of Many works at the intersection of immersive experiences and social change, elevating critical conversations to transform the way we relate to ourselves, each other, and our legacies.References* The Invention of Hydration by Slate's Decoder Ring.New Workshop: The Embodied Futures LabIn a time of significant change and re-emergence in our communities, we need restorative spaces for reimagining futures more than ever. Embodied Futures Lab is a special online experience facilitated by Five and Nine Futures and One of Many Studio. We integrate yin yoga, sound meditation, guided writing, and intentional connection to create space for slowing down and reinvigorating the creativity & inspiration that fuels organizing, justice, and culture work. Learn more at thisisfiveandnine.com.Five and Nine is a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — every new moon

What does it mean to live through a crisis? Season 4 continues in the heat of day, when the desert falls to silence.Writer and artist Cher-Wen DeWitt talks about her many careers, the allure of other people's problems, and the changing nature of philanthropy. Along the way, we travel back to the early days of 2020 and discuss burnout and finding the fire again with the tools of creative practice. Also: why hell is other people's cooking knives.Five and Nine Season 4 is about crisis. It's our first season on location, with the majority of our episodes recorded from the beautiful Wadi Rum Desert in Jordan, thanks to a special artist residency hosted by One of Many Studio (OoM). We ask our guests what's changed since the beginning of the COVID-19 emergency, and how to think about our relationship to the world, the earth and the people around us.The deck used in Season 4 is the Mixed Signals Tarot, designed by Season 3 guest M Eifler/BlinkPopShift. Music is performed by Hashim Bin Muaitiq and recorded on location in Wadi Rum.Season 4 is co-presented with One of Many Studio, an experience design & consulting studio connecting people with what it means to be a Future Ancestor. One of Many works at the intersection of immersive experiences and social change, elevating critical conversations to transform the way we relate to ourselves, each other, and our legacies.Five and Nine is a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — every new moon

What waters do you come from? Why is Season 4 set in Wadi Rum? And what does it mean to be a future ancestor? In this minisode, we sit down with One of Many Studio (OoM) co-founders Nour Batyne and Britt Pham to learn more about their ambitious vision: to create the greatest cultural shift of our generation by transforming the way people relate to themselves, each other, and our legacies through the elevation of critical conversations.Five and Nine Season 4 is about crisis. It's our first season recorded on location, with the majority of our episodes produced in the beautiful Wadi Rum desert in Jordan, thanks to a special artist residency hosted by One of Many Studio (OoM). Music is performed by Hashim Bin Muaitiq and recorded live in Wadi Rum.Stay tuned for Episode 2 in the coming weeks. Subscribe at thisisfiveandnine.com and on Apple, Spotify, Google and Instagram. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit fiveandnine.substack.com/subscribe

Season 4 starts off with a desert quest: find the Lovers Cave, a special cave in Wadi Rum fabled to heal relationship ills. We join photographer Farah Foudeh, whose photo illustrates this podcast, in her yellow Jeep for an off-road drive around the desert to find the perfect spot for a tarot reading. Our discussion looks at global tourism, how images shape and define our understanding of different regions of the world, and what it means to travel today. Also: two little birds come to visit.Five and Nine Season 4 is about crisis. It's our first season on location, with the majority of our episodes recorded from the beautiful Wadi Rum Desert in Jordan, thanks to a special artist residency hosted by One of Many Studio (OoM). We ask our guests what's changed since the beginning of the COVID-19 emergency, and how to think about our relationship to the world, the earth and the people around us.The deck used in Season 4 is the Mixed Signals Tarot, designed by Season 3 guest M Eifler/BlinkPopShift. Music is performed by Hashim Bin Muaitiq and recorded on location in Wadi Rum.Season 4 is co-presented with One of Many Studio, an experience design & consulting studio connecting people with what it means to be a Future Ancestor. One of Many works at the intersection of immersive experiences and social change, elevating critical conversations to transform the way we relate to ourselves, each other, and our legacies.Five and Nine is a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — every new moon

Happy Solstice, everyone.Five and Nine Season 4 is about crisis. It's our first field studio season, with the majority of our episodes recorded from the beautiful Wadi Rum desert in Jordan, thanks to a special artist residency hosted by One of Many Studio (OoM).We ask our guests what's changed since the beginning of the COVID-19 emergency, and how to think about our relationship to the world, the earth and the people around us. We talk global tourism, the quiet of the pandemic, the art of healing, and the world of international development.Five and Nine is pleased to present this season with OoM, an experience design & consulting studio connecting people with what it means to be a Future Ancestor. Stay tuned for Episode 1 in the coming weeks. Subscribe at thisisfiveandnine.com and on Apple, Spotify, Google and Instagram.Enjoying the show? You can support us in three ways:* Become a paid subscriber now for just $6 per month and get access to our paid programming. This podcast is always free, but paid subscribers will get access to special content, like discounts on our classes with The Shipman Agency, free listens of our standalone meditations, and a monthly tarotscope we produce in partnership with Ignota Books.* Recommend this show to others. Do you know anyone who you think might enjoy this podcast? Send them a link. Ask them to tune in. You can send them snippets of our shows on Instagram, at @fiveandnine_podcast.* Leave us a review on Apple or Spotify. Reviews help bring visibility and credibility to indie podcasts like ours and help people know what to expect when tuning in. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit fiveandnine.substack.com/subscribe

A month ago, artist and creative technologist M Eifler was laid off from their job, one of nearly 200,000 layoffs this year alone. M discusses the uncertainty and anxiety they've experienced since the layoff and shares how they have been using art and LinkedIn to document their journey. From ritual to song to visualizing the experience of stress, they share wisdom on navigating the ups and downs—while also finding a new path forward.M is the creator of Art School From Bed, an online series that explores how technology can be used to solve problems around disability. They discuss their work in disability and access, including their role as a lay leader in a Jewish community in San Francisco. The episode ends with a tarot reading using their very own deck, the Mixed Signals Deck, and we close with an offering from M on the theme of rest, which feels particularly relevant given the new moon, solar eclipse, and Mercury Retrograde cycle happening at the time of recording.Season 3 is all about rest. In a time of extended crisis, permacrisis and polycrisis, taking time to decompress is not just a benefit but a necessity. Learning to slow down, reflect and make space for expansive thinking is part of what makes rest so sweet but also so elusive. Grab a blanket, turn down the lights, and turn up Five and Nine this season to hear new perspectives on the age old practice of reflection, rejuvenation and recovery.As an experiment, we generated this summary using ChatGPT and then edited it heavily.ResourcesAbout Our Guest* BlinkPopShift* Art School from BedTarot Cards Discussed* High Priestess* Three of Wands* Maker of Stones (aka Queen of Pentacles)Resources* The Upside of Stress, by Kelly McGonigal* Mixed Signals Tarot DeckMusic* Episode: Golden Dreams (Mazurka), performed by Chris Chapman, 1907. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit fiveandnine.substack.com/subscribe

Please note: This episode contains slightly more adult content than usual. Listeners should also be advised of an inordinate amount of puns, giggles, and wisdom about human relationships.As a sex worker, community organizer, and public health researcher, Danielle Blunt thinks a lot about community, consent and comfort. She discusses the ways she brings ritual into her work as a professional dominatrix and as someone who practices tarot, and what it means to work outside of capitalist structures while making time for rest. We close with a discussion of the power dynamics in a few tarot cards, including an interpretation of the Four of Pentacles that we'll never forget. Also: the best way to make a comfortable bed.Season 3 is all about rest. In a time of extended crisis, permacrisis and polycrisis, taking time to decompress is not just a benefit but a necessity. Learning to slow down, reflect and make space for expansive thinking is part of what makes rest so sweet but also so elusive. Grab a blanket, turn down the lights, and turn up Five and Nine this season to hear new perspectives on the age old practices of reflection, rejuvenation and recovery.About Our Guest* Danielle Blunt* Hacking//HustlingTarot Cards Discussed* The Lovers* The Devil* Four of Pentacles* The FoolMedia* Sex Work as Work and Sex Work as Anti-Work* Black Innovation Alliance* Sexuality Beyond Consent: Risk, Race, Traumatophilia, by Avgi SaketopoulouMusic* Episode: Golden Dreams (Mazurka), performed by Chris Chapman, 1907.* Outro: I'm a 12 o'clock fellow in a 9 o'clock town, composed by Harry Von Tilzer and performed by Byron G. Harlan, 1917. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit fiveandnine.substack.com/subscribe

Futures thinker, artist and creative producer Nour Batyne reminds us to slow down to the speed of presence. The future is not just space travel and new technology but the legacy we leave as future ancestors. We'll hear from Nour how she decided to make the leap from the nine to five life into starting her own studio, and we'll learn about the influence of her teita, or grandmother, on her life and practice, and why land acknowledgements are so important.Nour offers a meditation that helps us face the climate crisis by honoring our interconnectedness, and we'll hear her and her cousin sing an Arabic Galilean folk song in honor of her grandmother. Also: why the smell of jasmine means freedom.Season 3 is all about rest. In a time of extended crisis, permacrisis and polycrisis, taking time to decompress is not just a benefit but a necessity. Learning to slow down, reflect and make space for expansive thinking is part of what makes rest so sweet but also so elusive. Grab a blanket, turn down the lights, and turn up Five and Nine this season to hear new perspectives on the age old practice of reflection, rejuvenation and recovery.About Our Guest* One of Many Studio, co-founded by Nour Batyne and Britt Pham* Wadi Rum ResidencyTarot Cards Discussed* Two of SwordsResources* Umm Kulthum* Levina Li* Seven Generation PrincipleMusic* Episode: That soothing serenade (Was just written for me), composed by Harry De Costa and performed by Henry Burr, 1918.* Closing: يما مويل الهوا (Yamma Mweil Al Hawa), performed by Nour Batyne and Bushra Batyne at Bars for Thought, an open mic poetry night in Brooklyn, 2023.New Paid Supporter Benefit: MeditationsFive and Nine is pleased to roll out a new benefit for supporters: meditations. This section includes standalone meditations pulled straight from Five and Nine episodes, with contributions by Dorothy R. Santos, AX Mina, Kai Stowers, Angela Mictlanxochitl, Kim Acebo Arteche and Nour Batyne.While the podcast is always free, Five and Nine's Meditations are designed to support your practice with standalone recordings any time you need a moment of pause and reflection. They're part of a larger subscriber package that includes tarotscopes we publish in partnership with Ignota Books and discounts on workshops and classes. We hope you enjoy them.Enjoying the show? You can support us in three ways:* Subscribe now for just $6 per month and get access to our paid programming. This podcast is always free, but paid subscribers will get access to special content, like discounts on our classes with The Shipman Agency, free listens of our standalone meditations, and a monthly tarotscope we produce in partnership with Ignota Books. Your generous support also helps cover our costs, which include honoraria for our guest speakers, software subscriptions and our time. With enough support, we'll also be able to bring back written transcripts for the show.* Recommend this show to others. Do you know anyone who you think might enjoy this podcast? Send them a link. Ask them to tune in. You can send them snippets of our shows on Instagram, at @fiveandnine_podcast.* Leave us a review on Apple or Spotify. Reviews help bring visibility and credibility to indie podcasts like ours and help people know what to expect when tuning in. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit fiveandnine.substack.com/subscribe

What lessons does the dream world hold for each of us in our waking lives? Artist and dream explorer Amira-Sade Moodie takes host Xiaowei R. Wang on a live dream exploration, teaching us along the way how to build dream circles of our own. We learn about Amira's early career explorations, taking them from the streets of New York to an organic farm in Hawai'i, and the wisdom of listening to spirit as we build our livelihoods. Also: why drama is part of the human condition.Season 3 is all about rest. In a time of extended crisis, permacrisis and polycrisis, taking time to decompress is not just a benefit but a necessity. Learning to slow down, reflect and make space for expansive thinking is part of what makes rest so sweet but also so elusive. Grab a blanket, turn down the lights, and turn up Five and Nine this season to hear new perspectives on the age old practices of reflection, rejuvenation and recovery.About Our Guest* Amira-Sade Moodie (Delicate Chaos)Books* The Happiness Hypothesis, by Jonathan Haidt* Many Lives, Many Masters, by Brian L. Weiss* Indigo Som (dream work teacher)* Robert Moss / Way of the Dreamer* Awe: The New Science of Everyday Wonder and How It Can Transform Your Life, by Dacher KeltnerMusic* Episode: Golden Dreams (Mazurka), performed by Chris Chapman, 1907.* Outro: A rag-time episode, composed by Paul Eno and performed by Fred Van Eps, 1911.Enjoying the show? You can support us in three ways:* Subscribe now for just $6 per month and get access to our paid programming. This podcast is always free, but paid subscribers will get access to special content. Your generous support also helps cover our costs, which include honoraria for our guest speakers, software subscriptions and our time. With enough support, we'll also be able to bring back written transcripts for the show.* Recommend this show to others. Do you know anyone who you think might enjoy this podcast? Send them a link. Ask them to tune in. You can send them snippets of our shows on Instagram, at @fiveandnine_podcast.* Leave us a review on Apple or Spotify. Reviews help bring visibility and credibility to indie podcasts like ours and help people know what to expect when tuning in.Five and Nine is a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — every new moon

Five years ago, technologist, artist and financial analyst Victoria Ku suffered a period of burnout that left her medicated and emotionless. By finding rest and setting new boundaries, she started building a life for herself that's both nourished her creative spirit and enabled her financial security—summoning magic through the combination of both logic and emotion. Victoria shares her perspectives on how to prepare for the inevitable ups and downs of the economy, and we conduct a tarot reading to help her determine how to foster the artist within. Also: why Star Trek's Spock is such a dream dude. Season 3 is all about rest. In a time of extended crisis, permacrisis and polycrisis, taking time to decompress is not just a benefit but a necessity. Learning to slow down, reflect and make space for expansive thinking is part of what makes rest so sweet but also so elusive. Grab a blanket, turn down the lights, and turn up Five and Nine this season to hear new perspectives on the age old practice of reflection, rejuvenation and recovery.About Our Guest* Victoria KuTarot Cards Discussed* High Priestess* Page of Swords* Six of PentaclesMusic* Episode: Money Blues, composed by Hugo Frey, 1916.* Outro: A rag-time episode, composed by Paul Eno and performed by Fred Van Eps, 1911.Starting Wednesday! Tarot for Writers: Unlocking Creative Pathways Through Intuitive ToolsA new Five and Nine class series starting at $100.00. Listeners can use code TAROT for a 10% discount on the full course.Learn more about us here. Get full access to Five and Nine: Tarot, Work and Economic Justice at fiveandnine.substack.com/subscribe

This is Five and Nine, a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. Welcome to Season 3, Episode 1.You can find us on Apple, Spotify, Google and Instagram.Enjoying the show? Consider buying us a virtual cup of coffee. Subscribe now for just $6 per month, to get access to our paid programming.SummaryWe talk about this season's theme, which is about rest, and why it's so hard to make time for it. We also share our favorite yoga poses and our love for Everything Everywhere All At Once — even if not everyone understands the movie. And we highlight our new class on tarot for writers, and why you need to help us take our first skiing trip.This is the Season 3 premiere of Five and Nine, and this season is all about rest. In a time of extended crisis, permacrisis and polycrisis, taking time to decompress is not just a benefit but a necessity. Learning to slow down, reflect and make space for expansive thinking is part of what makes rest so sweet but also so elusive. Grab a blanket, turn down the lights, and turn up Five and Nine this season to hear new perspectives on the age old practice of reflection, rejuvenation and recovery.ResourcesFrom Our Hosts* Rest is Resistance, by Tricia Hersey* Craft in the Real World, Matthew Salesses* Turn Down For What music video, directed by the Daniels* Ocean Vuong on being unfathomableTarot Cards Discussed* 10 of Wands* 4 of SwordsMusic* Episode: A rag-time episode, composed by Paul Eno and performed by Fred Van Eps, 1911.New Class! Tarot for Writers: Unlocking Creative Pathways Through Intuitive ToolsA new Five and Nine class series starting at $100.00. Listeners can use code TAROT for a 10% discount on the full course.Did you know that the Rider Waite Smith deck, one of the most popular tarot decks in the world, was designed by a struggling artist, editor and writer, Pamela Colman Smith? Tarot has been a guide and tool for creatives for hundreds of years to help unlock new pathways of thinking and making.In this 4-part class, we'll look at the history of tarot; workshop how to use tarot for creative production, from exploring the history of characters to identifying the best way forward in one's writing career; and do a few practice readings with each other.This course is meant to be practical, and participants should bring a chapter- or article-length work that they can hone in on for the course. Participants will come out of the course with a beginner's writing practice and finessed piece, along with a tarot writing toolkit that includes a series of monthly and daily spreads they can use, a short overview of tarot, and readings for future self-guided study. Join An Xiao (Ana) Mina, Xiaowei R. Wang and Dorothy R. Santos of Five and Nine, a podcast and media production collective operating at the intersection of magic, work and economic justice for this class designed to help you unlock creative pathways. We're proud to be working with The Shipman Agency, a full service literary agency for writers.If you are unable to attend the course live, a recording will be made available to you afterward. All participants  who sign up for the full four-course class (including those who are only able to view the recordings)  get:* A sticker for Five and Nine, a podcast about magic, work and economic justice produced by the course teachers* A printed Five and Nine moon calendar for 2023* PSST Quaranzine, artist Helen Shewolfe Tseng's participatory workbook zine of prompts, rituals and tarot exercises* A complimentary subscription to Five and NineEnjoying the show? You can support us in three ways:* Subscribe now for just $6 per month and get access to our paid programming. This podcast is always free, but paid subscribers will get access to special content. Your generous support also helps cover our costs, which include honoraria for our guest speakers, software subscriptions and our time. With enough support, we'll also be able to bring back written transcripts for the show.* Recommend this show to others. Do you know anyone who you think might enjoy this podcast? Send them a link. Ask them to tune in. You can send them snippets of our shows on Instagram, at @fiveandnine_podcast.* Leave us a review on Apple or Spotify. Reviews help bring visibility and credibility to indie podcasts like ours and help people know what to expect when tuning in.Five and Nine is a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — every new moon

Creative Director and Co-Director of Magic Xiaowei Wang returns for our season finale!We talk union solidarity, life in a time of crisis, and our upcoming class on tarot and writing with The Shipman Agency. Dorothy breaks out the Modus Operandi Deck for a confessional tell-all with the three hosts that touches on what we can't let go of, the value of money, the role models and safety we wish we had when we were younger, and why we have a grudge on Timothée Chalamet.Five and Nine Season 2 is about transitions. As falls sets in in the northern hemisphere and spring in the south, Five and Nine looks at change in all its forms — leaving jobs, changing industries, starting new paths, and the wisdom that tarot and magic have to offer in a world that seems to be ever in flux.This is the Season 2 Finale. Paid subscribers will begin to receive our paid programming shortly. Our podcast returns in winter 2023!From Our Hosts* Robin DG Kelley* Tech Workers Coalition* Black Workers Alliance* Change Everything: Racial Capitalism and the Case for Abolition, by Ruth Wilson Gilmore and Naomi Murakawa* Modus Operandi Deck* Ethical Rainmaker Podcast* Five Mindfulness TrainingsPrevious Five and Nine Episodes Mentioned* 2.02. Magic in the Everyday, with Helen Shewolfe Tseng* 1.07. Burnout, Biases and Body Mindfulness, with Kai StowersTarot Cards Discussed* Hanged One (Hanged Man)* Page of CupsMusic* Episode and Outro: Ain't we got fun, composed by Richard A. Whiting and performed by the Benson Orchestra of Chicago, 1921.Enjoying the show? You can support us in three ways:* Subscribe now for just $6 per month and get access to our paid programming. This podcast is always free, but paid subscribers will get access to special content, including how-to's, journaling exercises, tarot suggestions and more. Your generous support also helps cover our costs, which include honoraria for our guest speakers, software subscriptions and our time. With enough support, we'll also be able to bring back written transcripts for the show.* Recommend this show to others. Do you know anyone who you think might enjoy this podcast? Send them a link. Ask them to tune in. You can send them snippets of our shows on Instagram, at @fiveandnine_podcast.* Leave us a review on Apple or Spotify. Reviews help bring visibility and credibility to indie podcasts like ours and help people know what to expect when tuning in.Five and Nine is a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — every new moon

Over a year ago, Chicanx futurist artist Ruben Briseño Reveles grappled with a choice: either his job or his mental health and well-being. He decided to make a leap into a new life when he left his restaurant job of 20 years. His is one of many stories of great resignations in the face of the events of 2020 and 2021, and we talk with Ruben about what he's learned during this time — about his art, his spirituality, and his relationship to his family.In this episode, we conduct a live tarot reading with Ruben during the portal of Dia de los Muertos, or Day of the Dead, which occurs this year between the solar and lunar eclipses of the latter half of 2022. The reading touches on the practicalities of making a living as an artist and the role that prayer and ancestry have in keeping us steady in periods of change.Five and Nine Season 2 is about transitions. As falls sets in in the northern hemisphere and spring in the south, Five and Nine looks at change in all its forms — leaving jobs, changing industries, starting new paths, and the wisdom that tarot and magic have to offer in a world that seems to be ever in flux.ResourcesFrom Our Guest and Hosts* Ruben Briseño Reveles* Being Peace, by Thich Nhat Hanh* Tarot DoulaTarot Cards Discussed* Two of Swords* Four of Pentacles* Queen of Swords* Queen of PentaclesMusic* Episode: Shine on, harvest moon barn dance, performed by Arthur Pryor's Band in 1910 and composed by Nora Bayes and Jack Norworth.* Outro: Ain't we got fun, composed by Richard A. Whiting and performed by the Benson Orchestra of Chicago, 1921.Enjoying the show? You can support us in three ways:* Subscribe now for just $6 per month and get access to our paid programming. This podcast is always free, but paid subscribers will get access to special content, including how-to's, journaling exercises, tarot suggestions and more. Your generous support also helps cover our costs, which include honoraria for our guest speakers, software subscriptions and our time. With enough support, we'll also be able to bring back written transcripts for the show.* Recommend this show to others. Do you know anyone who you think might enjoy this podcast? Send them a link. Ask them to tune in. You can send them snippets of our shows on Instagram, at @fiveandnine_podcast.* Leave us a review on Apple or Spotify. Reviews help bring visibility and credibility to indie podcasts like ours and help people know what to expect when tuning in.Five and Nine is a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — every new moon

When we talk about diversity, equity, and inclusion work, where do ancestral lineages fit in? What does wellness look like in a culture that celebrates overworking ourselves at the expense of our bodies? Five and Nine talks with Kim Acebo Ateche, who supports BIPOC organizational leaders to get in touch with their ancestry as a form of healing.In this episode, Kim shares about her own personal experiences with healing and being disconnected from her body, a framework she called intuitive leadership, and why carrying for one's full mind, body and spirit is an anti-racist act. She offers listeners a meditation for wayfinding and reconnecting with our ancestors.Season 2 is about transitions. As falls sets in in the northern hemisphere and spring int he south, Five and Nine looks at change in all its forms — leaving jobs, changing industries, starting new paths, and the wisdom that tarot and magic have to offer in a world that seems to be ever in flux.ResourcesFrom Our Guest* Kim Acebo Arteche* Ilaya* San Francisco Filipino Cultural DistrictFrom Our Hosts* Rest is Resistance: A ManifestoMusic* Episode: Life's a funny proposition after all, composed and performed by George M. Cohan in 1911.* Outro: Ain't we got fun, composed by Richard A. Whiting and performed by the Benson Orchestra of Chicago, 1921.Enjoying the show? Consider buying us a virtual cup of coffee. Subscribe now for just $6 per month.This podcast is always free, but paid subscribers will get access to special content, including how-to's, journaling exercises, tarot suggestions and more.Each paid subscription helps support our production costs and honoraria for our speakers. With enough support, we'll also be able to bring back written transcripts for the show, provide stipends for our producers and hosts, and more.Five and Nine is a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — every new moon

This is Five and Nine, a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. Welcome to Season 2, Episode 3.You can find us on Apple, Spotify, Google and Instagram.Enjoying the show? Consider buying us a virtual cup of coffee. Subscribe now for just $6 per month. This podcast is always free, but paid subscribers will get access to special content, including how-to's, journaling exercises, tarot suggestions and more.SummaryWhen it feels like everything is lost, how do we find guidance? Five and Nine talks with Angela Mictlanxochitl Anderson Guerrero, who runs Lideramos, a Latino leadership organization in the US, and who is a practicing abuela, or grandmother, in the Danza de la Luna lineage, a transterritorial Mexica ceremonial practice. Angela Mictlanxochitl talks about the four components of her thoughtful engagement framework—intention, responsibility, reciprocity and care—, the role of prayer and spirituality in leadership, being authentic in the workplace and how we care for our physical, psychological and emotional health. She closes with a sound and prayer offering in collaboration with artist Enrique Arriaga Celis.Season 2 is about transitions. As falls sets in in the northern hemisphere and spring int he south, Five and Nine looks at change in all its forms — leaving jobs, changing industries, starting new paths, and the wisdom that tarot and magic have to offer in a world that seems to be ever in flux.ResourcesFrom Our Guest* Angela's bio on Lideramos* Bless Me, Ultima, by Rudolfo Anaya* Gloria Evangelina AnzaldúaTarot Cards Discussed* The Tower* The Lovers* Next World Tarot, by Cristy C. RoadThoughtful Engagement FrameworkPrayer Text (audio developed in collaboration with Enrique Arriaga Celis)As I hold my round obsidian mirror, the black magic mirror.My fingers are around the edges. I lift up the black mirror to my face. As I look into the mirror, I see the reflection of my face in the mirror. I feel myself.I invite each of you to look back via the other side into the black magic mirror.  Close your eyes and feel -- sense the darkness of the condition of possibility. With the permission of Nana Metzli, our Moon,  with the permission of Tonantzin, our Mother, with the permission of the cosmic energies,  and the permission of Tonatiuh, the Sun.I ask all the directions to invoke the loving energy of this sacred space we occupy to activate the black magic mirror.May we feel embraced in its stillness wherever you may be, and however you may be. May you honor your thoughts. May you honor your insecurities. May you honor the genius of all the movements in your life.In the beauty and the tragedy of our relations, I ask that you are shown the depth of your love. I ask the reflective black light to shine on each of you.As you feel it tingle, ask yourself, “Who am I and who do I wanna be?”Listen. Listen. Listen to yourself. Claim your sacredness, embrace your medicine to heal, and trust in your unique value and gifts. Now listen and repeat: My path is open. I am guided by my ancestors. The magic of the elements and the sacredness of life wants me to survive. My reflection is my life force. I dance with the weaving of life so I may come into union with the person I am. Listen. Listen. Listen to yourself. As we close, black magic mirror, Please shower the you in me and the me in you with love and kindness. In the light of the black magic mirror, I am you and you are me, We are never alone. With heart over our heads.Walk with confidence in the black light. Ometeotl.Music* Episode: Oh for the wings of a dove, performed by Geraldine Farrar in 1911 and composed by Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy. * Outro: Ain't we got fun, composed by Richard A. Whiting and performed by the Benson Orchestra of Chicago, 1921.Enjoying the show? Consider buying us a virtual cup of coffee. Subscribe now for just $6 per month.This podcast is always free, but paid subscribers will get access to special content, including how-to's, journaling exercises, tarot suggestions and more.Each paid subscription helps support our production costs and honoraria for our speakers. With enough support, we'll also be able to bring back written transcripts for the show, provide stipends for our producers and hosts, and more.Five and Nine is a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — every new moon

This is Five and Nine, a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. Welcome to Season 2, Episode 2. We are now on Instagram! You can also find us on Apple, Spotify and Google. Enjoying the show? Consider buying us a virtual cup of coffee. Subscribe now for just $6 per month. This podcast is always free, but paid subscribers will get access to special content, including how-to's, journaling exercises, tarot suggestions and more.SummaryHow can everyday magic helps us navigate change? Five and Nine talks with artist, designer, and witch Helen Shewolfe Tseng. They share their work on growth spells, drawings made over an extended period of time for personal healing and transformation, and their Coyote Portals series, inspired by the fission-fusion adaptations and mythos of these often misunderstood animals. We also talk about what we learned in nature during lockdown and how to find grounding in uncertain times, from petting our plants to working with free ballpoint pens.Season 2 is about transitions. As falls sets in in the northern hemisphere and spring int he south, Five and Nine looks at change in all its forms — leaving jobs, changing industries, starting new paths, and the wisdom that tarot and magic have to offer in a world that seems to be ever in flux.ResourcesFrom Our GuestHelen Shewolfe TsengGrowth SpellsCoyote Portals (prints available here!)The Man Who Could Move Clouds, by Ingrid Rojas ContrerasMusicEpisode: Bow Wow Blues, performed by the Original Dixieland Jazz Band, 1921.Outro: Ain't we got fun, composed by Richard A. Whiting and performed by the Benson Orchestra of Chicago, 1921.Enjoying the show? Consider buying us a virtual cup of coffee. Subscribe now for just $6 per month.This podcast is always free, but paid subscribers will get access to special content, including how-to's, journaling exercises, tarot suggestions and more.Each paid subscription helps support our production costs and honoraria for our speakers. With enough support, we'll also be able to bring back written transcripts for the show, provide stipends for our producers and hosts, and more.Five and Nine is a podcast and newsletter at the crossroads of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — every new moon

Five and Nine opens Season 2 with author and ballroom expert Sydney Baloue. Season 2 is about transitions. As falls sets in in the northern hemisphere and spring int he south, Five and Nine looks at change in all its forms — leaving jobs, changing industries, starting new paths, and the wisdom and that tarot and magic have to offer in a world that seems to be ever in flux.Sydney is a former academic, a writer and producer for HBOMax's Legendary and proud member of the House of Xtravaganza. He talks to us about his many career and life changes, the importance of his network in helping him navigate change, how ballroom helps queer and trans people in particular relate to their bodies in new and empowering ways, and the importance of making room for joy and rest.Enjoying the show? Consider buying us a virtual cup of coffee. Subscribe now for just $6 per month. This podcast is always free, but paid subscribers will get access to special content, including how-to's, journaling exercises, tarot suggestions and more. Each paid subscription helps support our production costs and honoraria for our speakers. With enough support, we'll also be able to bring back written transcripts for the show, provide stipends for our producers and hosts, and more. Learn more at thisisfiveandnine.com Get full access to Five and Nine: Tarot, Work and Economic Justice at fiveandnine.substack.com/subscribe

This is Five and Nine, a podcast newsletter at the intersection of magic, work and economic justice. This is an excerpt from Season 1, Episode 7.This is a standalone episode that features a guided meditation by Kai Stowers, an integral coach and mindfulness practitioner and our special guest for Season 1, Episode 7. For the full episode and more context on the role of mindfulness in the workplace, be sure to visit thisisfiveandnine.com.If you've been tuning in this season, we'd love to hear from you! You can fill out a 2 minute survey here and help us grow:Kai: There's many versions of body scan. And this one I like for people who may be newer to meditation or even experienced meditators. If there's a time where the mind is really busy or there's a lot of agitation, this style of meditation can be more accessible.And so the invitation is to sit in an upright and comfortable position with the feet flat on the floor. And your hands in a comfortable position on your lap and bring a sense of uprightness to the spine along with a sense of ease.And we'll begin by allowing our awareness to fill the feet from the inside out, really dropping into the sensations where the feet meet the floor, noticing sensations of pressure or temperature, or even the tingling and vibrating of aliveness.And then allow your awareness to fill the legs from the inside, out, dropping into the sensations where the legs meet the chair, noticing sensations of pressure of temperature, or even the tingling and vibrating of aliveness.Now take one breath, expanding the chest and belly on the inhale and softening and letting go on the exhale. And then in your own rhythm, begin cycling your awareness from the feet to the seat, and then through one breath before returning the awareness again to where the feet meet the floor, to where your legs meet the seat of the chair, and then taking a full inhale and long exhale before returning your awareness to the feet again.And this is a practice you can do one cycle of, when you're in a meeting or in a stressful situation, or you can do as a longer formal practice for three or five minutes, or even 15 or 20 minutes.And the goal of this practice isn't to fix anything or to push away any difficult sensations or emotions, but to allow the mind to rest as much as possible in the sensations of the here and now, sensations of the feet, sensations in the seat and the sensations of just one breath.And whenever you're ready, you can open your eyes to end the meditation. We hope you enjoyed this episode! Episode 7 closes out our pilot season, and we're regrouping while we prepare for Season 2 (in the autumn/vernal cycle). We wish everyone a safe, healthy, and restful summer in the Northern hemisphere and winter in the Southern hemisphere.These are times of great change and difficulty, and we hope you're able to find rejuvenation, grounding and healing, and that the conversations at Five and Nine have helped bring a spot of clarity in your life. Be well and take good care.If you've been tuning in this season, we'd love to hear from you! You can fill out 2 minute survey here and help us grow and improve:Five and Nine is a podcast newsletter at the intersection of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — a newsletter every new moon

This is Five and Nine, a podcast newsletter at the intersection of magic, work and economic justice. Welcome to Season 1, Episode 7.This episode closes out our pilot season, and we're regrouping while we prepare for Season 2 (in the autumn/vernal cycle). If you've been tuning in this season, we'd love to hear from you! You can fill out 2 minute survey here and help us grow:ResourcesMusicInternational Rag, composed by Irving Berlin and performed by Pietro Deiro in 1913.Our Guest's WorkOn kaistowers.com, Instagram, LinkedIn and MediumOut of Sight, Out of Mind: Mitigating bias in the age of remote workingThe Focus CycleOther ResourcesWhy meditation is worth doing badly (Headspace)Five and Nine 1.06 Part 1. Speaking Up at Work as a Quiet PersonTranscript007 Podcast: Kai StowersDorothy: We have a special guest! We are so thrilled to introduce you all to Kai Stowers, an inclusion builder, a mindfulness practitioner and integral coach. He started his career as a chemist, working for small labs and Fortune 500 companies doing research in the pharmaceutical sciences.In 2007, while working at Genentech, he started a regular mindfulness practice. He began attending, teaching and inevitably leading the mindfulness through meditation group that started out with 200 people and grew to 800 members. I mean, that sounds like influencer to me!So this experience served as a catalyst for coaching individuals and teams. He earned his Professional Coaching Certification (PCC) in 2015, and in 2018, he earned an Executive Master's Degree in Organizational Psychology & Change Leadership from Teachers College, Columbia University. So at present, he works full-time in organization development and DEI [diversity, equity and inclusion], empowering leaders who have a commitment to transforming their organizations by building self-awareness, changing the environment, and leading teams through the most difficult and challenging conversations. Welcome, Kai. We're so happy to have you.Kai: Thank you so much for inviting me to the podcast.Dorothy: So let's just start off. You've lived a number of lives — obviously scientist, coach, mindfulness practitioner and in this time of Great Resignation or what is being called the Great Resignation or Reshuffling, at the very least Reevaluation.Can you talk about how you've reevaluated your own work and career trajectories?Kai: Yeah, let me talk about who I was when I graduated college. So I graduated college. I had this chemistry degree. I was all about the sciences. I was like, “I just wanna be in the lab doing cool stuff. Why do we have to do this people stuff? I don't even understand why HR is interviewing me for this job because they can't assess my technical skills. Like they gave me a bunch of easy questions”Time passes, and I worked for different leaders, and I did work for different organizations. I got a sense that maybe this people stuff, organizational culture, this leadership thing, actually made a really big difference in the kind of science people could do.One significant turning point was when I had the opportunity to work for a leader who had both a mindfulness and a coaching background. And then I got to see the personal and professional growth that I was able to achieve and go through under his leadership, as well as how the entire team and how all the other people had room to grow and develop.I was really hooked on this new space, and it took a while to make the transition out of the lab and into doing organization development and DEI full-time, but it is really exciting.Xiaowei: So I'm hearing you talk about these career pivots and changes, and there's a sense of ease about it. But did it ever enter into your mind that kind of scary feeling like, “oh wait, I'm starting to drift really far from the realm of chemistry or the technical stuff. Am I doing the right thing? Is this the right choice?” Did doubt ever enter into your mind as you were going through these pivots?Kai: Absolutely. And I don't think you can make big changes in your life or your career without having doubt at some point. One thing that really helped me through that is to just scope things down. So if the idea of making a complete career change felt too overwhelming, it was like, okay, what is it about my current job that I enjoy? And can I do more of that? That's actually how I got into leading mindfulness at my organization. And that was a really helpful piece to help me know that I was moving in the right direction. And maybe I wanted to take a bigger step later, but I didn't have to take a huge leap. And the other thing that helps is part of my master's degree is change leadership. We know that change is just hard for people. We might want the end results of change, but going through change, where we wanted this part of the change, but we didn't realize that it was gonna make this other thing harder. Or we were gonna have to figure out this new thing, and I had to remind myself of some of the tools that we learned. I could use those tools to manage my own change. And one of my favorite ones, when I was really in the midst of big changes — when I left my last corporate job to start my new company — is just to remind myself of one thing that didn't change and was staying the same. Even when everything else around me felt like it was topsy turvy.Dorothy: I need to remember that on a daily basis. So yeah. I think that that's a really great question from Xiaowei because I feel a lot of people feel that. I've heard this from artists being kind of skeptical of authenticity. People are always ever evolving. So you can't really say to yourself, “I need to stick to this one thing all the time, because this is what I studied, or this is what I told myself that I would do at one point in my life.” Not to put Xiaowei on the spot, but Xiaowei, and I, we're both in education. We see our students suffer from that. That I need to do this thing, I need to do what I said I would do, because also my parents told me to.This leads me to the next question we had for you, which was considering all of that, on top of a global pandemic, what are some of the trends you're seeing about attitudes towards work and career in 2022?Kai: I think burnout is just ever present in people. Many people worked so hard during the pandemic. Boundaries between work and home life sort of dissolved. There's studies that show people worked longer hours during the pandemic than they did before. And I think people still really care about their work.They care about the difference they make in the world, but this fatigue, and then this time of the pandemic forced a lot of self-reflection. I think it forced the reflection of, “Why am I putting up with all of this extra stuff?”And maybe it's bad leadership, maybe it's bad time management, maybe it's unproductive conflict that organizations don't know how to work through. And I think that's one of the trends that's really driving the Great Resignation. I might still enjoy the work, but I'm tired of putting up with X, Y, or Z at my job.Xiaowei: I've been having these conversations with a lot of friends. Like how do you know that you're burnt out versus you just need an entire career change? I think a lot of people they're like, maybe I don't want a job on the computer at all and I wanna become a farmer now. Do you have any advice?Kai: I would start with, if you're really burnt out, don't make a decision right then and there. Take some time to get your feet back under you. Take some time off, so you can actually think clearly. And sometimes you'll find that yeah, my decision to become a farmer that is right on, and I'm still gonna do it. And other times with some more time and space, it's like, okay, I just have some more bandwidth there are things that might be fun about being a farmer, but there's still these parts of my job or my career that sound pretty good. It's just the way I was working or the organization I was working in was not sustainable.Dorothy: Okay to that, because we're on a roll here, one of the things that Xiaowei's question actually reminds me of is, what's the difference between reevaluation and romanticizing a career, because one of the ongoing conversations that Ana, Xiaowei and I have is sussing out the difference, if there is one — which I think in a lot of ways, there are differences between labor, work and and career.Kai: Mm-hmm.Dorothy: And this is a reoccurring theme.So people oftentimes don't think about the labor involved in a particular job that they romanticize, essentially. So then what is a concrete example or a concrete strategy or tactic that you would suggest between someone reevaluating. I know you just gave us one — taking time. But reevaluating versus romanticizing, that's a really blurry space between the imagination versus what is practical and pragmatic.Kai: I would really advise people to talk to people who are in that field. You wanna go and find out, what do they love about their job? What do they hate about the job? What are the skills they use everyday? What do they need to be good at that? So that way you can build a more concrete picture of what the work is, and maybe it's gonna align with your fantasy, in which case you are good to go.Let's take the farmer example. I thought I would be, you know, living in an idyllic place with sheep dotted over the landscape, but actually, here are these practicalities of getting up really in the morning, never having a day off, feed lots. I don't know, are you gonna be able to slaughter your animals? Are you gonna be okay with that? Right? Like what are the realities of this career? I feel like I got a little dark there.Dorothy: We love that here, please.Xiaowei: I mean, that's real because I'm like, I could talk about farming all day and how people often romanticize it. But I think to pick up on the romanticization thread, I mean, in some sense, there is no perfect workplace, right? Like, we're all just humans with our own and insecurities and visions. And we bring that to work a lot of the time. And so, to that end, for people who take this break and then they go back into the workplace, and maybe they start seeing some dynamics. At this time of the Great Resignation, there's a lot of worker organizing and union unionizing too. And I'm curious, how on one end, there's a Great Resignation, but how much do you also see workplaces shifting and really trying to accommodate and transform as a result of the pandemic?Kai: I think there's different trends. I think there are some organizations who really are saying, okay, the way that we have worked in the past has fundamentally changed, and we need to be on top of that. We really need to look at what remote or hybrid work looks like. And how do we do that?Well, , how do we tool up our managers and our leaders to navigate in this new environment effectively? And there's other organizations that are like, if you are not here 40 hours a week, you need to look for a new job. Part of what we should be doing when we're looking for our next move is ask, what companies fit our philosophy? Are we somebody that does well in the office? When someone says you have to be here 40 hours a week, you're like, great. Like know which organizations would be a good fit for you. And if you're somebody who's like, I am never again doing a two or three hour commute in my life, and it needs to be remote first, look for those organizations.[13:18] Diversity, Equity and InclusionDorothy: So Kai, you wrote this article in 2020 titled Out of Sight, Out of Mind: Mitigating Bias in the Age of Remote Working. So you provided some concrete examples of how team members, but much more specifically leaders within an organization, what they can do to ensure that they're not prioritizing the loudest, the most talkative. Having written that piece in 2020, I'm curious how some of your strategies and perspectives might have changed.But first before you answer that, could you give a little bit of a preview as to how you started the article, because you play hockey.Kai: Yeah. So I am a white person. At that time, I had learned about unconscious bias. I had realized I am a human, I have unconscious bias, and my assumption at that point was, oh, if I know what my biases are, I'm good to go. I just need to be aware, and it's not gonna play out.And at the time, I was captaining a team in hockey, and whenever somebody couldn't make it, we would be able to ask somebody else to step in as a substitute player. And when I reviewed my choices over time, knowing that I had these unconscious biases thinking I was perfectly aware of them, I noticed that I had biases towards other white players and players who are more extroverted. And I realized that just awareness isn't enough. And what I recommended is some sort of process if you were somebody who was doing selection in any sort of activity. And what I found is when I would look at the list of all of the available substitutes, I would be reminded of the people who were just out of sight, out of mind. And then I could make more fair selections because it had nothing to do with someone's skill or ability. There were really good players who were maybe more soft spoken, more introverted, often who were Asian. This wasn't on my radar when I took a really quick minute to be like, okay, who should I ask?Here's the more extroverted person. Here's the person who's always sending me an email saying, Hey, I wanna play. So it was a moment of humility, which I think we need in order to do this work, and it resulted in a better process.Xiaowei: I think so much of what we think about leadership, or just generally being in the workplace, even if you aren't a leader, is just being like, “Oh no, I'm right.” You don't wanna admit that you made a mistake, right? Because it's scary. And also you're like, maybe I'll get fired. I think, especially for leaders, how do you see mindfulness playing into supporting leaders and maybe being more vulnerable or admitting their mistakes?Kai: Yeah. I think one of the really important things mindfulness can support us with is our own reactivity. And so if those waves of reactivity aren't so big, they're easier to navigate. So a lot of times we don't wanna be vulnerable because it feels scary or there's fear or there's shame.And when that fear and that shame gets really big, it's hard to work with. It's hard to choose a different path than whatever our habitual response is. But if our body and our mind and our hearts are a little bit more settled, we might be like, “Oh, this is shame, and I don't have to believe what this story is telling me. Maybe there's other options available. Maybe I can be more vulnerable even though events in my past have told me that maybe that's not a good idea.”Dorothy: We oftentimes get questions from our community members, and in a previous episode, we were asked by a member of the community or our audience, “I wonder how we who have a harder time trying to feel entitled or confident could communicate our needs effectively so it does not make us feel uncomfortable.” This is someone that asked who was a part of an international team. So obviously this is culture. This person was talking about more Western modalities of being a part of a team, essentially. And we welcome how you might answer that question.Kai: So I would actually start with, being comfortable isn't the goal. One of the goals is to spread out the discomfort evenly across the team. Cuz what happens often is, whoever the dominant group members are feel really comfortable. If it's a culture where everyone's happy to interrupt and throw their voice into the room, everyone else who is not comfortable with that holds all the discomfort in the room.So having those difficult conversations surfacing, what are all of the different communication patterns in this group? This isn't work that just one person should have to do. This should be part of the normal process of team building and setting norms.Dorothy: I always say a thousand percent, a hundred percent. Well, I just said a thousand percent. Agree! I think that's something, Ana, Xiaowei and I have talked about when we received this query, actually the different ways of navigating how we might show up, not just for ourselves. And I say this as someone who is talkative, and so how might I step back, and enable an opportunity for someone to step up. But we also know that that's not easy. Everyone has a different working style.Let's go back to the article. In your article, Kai, you give concrete examples of how people in a team might actually help facilitate this redistribution. Maybe it's not even redistribution, but this dispersion of discomfort that inevitably leads to maybe a stronger working environment that actually welcomes dissent, or generative dissent maybe.And if you could speak to some of those strategies that you actually mentioned in the article, that would be great.Kai: So when we're assigning work, if we just make one decision and never reflect on it, we will not see patterns. Bias can show up in one decision, but it's much easier to see when we can look at a pattern. And so to move leaders out of this reactive mode of, “Oh, this needs to be done. Here's this person I know who can do it already. I'm just gonna give it to them every time.” If you can sit back and look at your org chart and start asking questions like, “Who would like to do this work?” Not just who has the skills now, but who would really like to learn those skills and develop over time? We can sit back and look at the types of work we have. So what is the really glamorous work that's gonna get us visibility and get us promoted. And what's that housekeeping work that has to be done for us to be productive? Is that getting evenly distributed across the team? A lot of times we know that women and minorities wind up with a lot more of the housework, a lot less of the glamorous work that leads to promotions, and white people and men tend to wind up with the work that's gonna get them the visibility to move up the organization. So checking these common biases, like is this happening in my group? Oh, if it is, then now I can do something about it. If I don't know about it, I can't do anything.[20:44] What is mindfulness?Ana: I'm wondering if you can define mindfulness for the Five and Nine audience.Kai: So mindfulness is a really broad category. And what mindfulness means is we are aware of what we are doing in the present moment. We are aware of emotions or sensations in our body, and we're not getting completely carried away by them. Or even if we are getting carried away by them, we're like, I'm getting really carried away at this moment.So it's just some awareness of what is happening in this moment as we're moving through the world. So mindfulness can be the informal practice that I just described, but it also includes meditation where we intentionally practice things like attention or focus or kindness towards ourselves or others. It could include practices where we practice compassion.Dorothy: It seems like we're in this twin environment of both mindfulness taking off in business spaces. So on the one hand it's absolutely necessary. But then on the other hand, it's often framed as a tool for productivity.So what are the risks you see, and what are the ways forward?Kai: I think that's a really good question. There are different ways to approach mindfulness. So there are some people who really wanna go deep in their practice. They wanna invest in long periods of meditation. Maybe they have a Buddhist faith, and they wanna work towards enlightenment.And then there's other people, maybe they're a busy leader or maybe they've got a family. And what they've realized is even if they spend five minutes meditating each day, they're a little bit less reactive. They yell at their kids less. They can roll with the inevitable challenges of work a little bit better, and sure, maybe they're using it for a productivity tool, but without knowing a specific person, I'm not someone who likes to judge how somebody is using mindfulness. I will say that mindfulness can be so much more than a productivity tool, and I would hope that we don't lose sight of that. But if somebody is using mindfulness in a way that benefits them and the people in their lives, I say, go for it.Dorothy: I really appreciate you saying that you don't want to judge how people use mindfulness practice, because oftentimes it is couched in this, well, you should just meditate because it will make you operate at a speed or at a level that produces more.Ana: In previous workplaces, we had a meditation room. I guess physically, whether in the office or the home, is mindfulness practice usually done in a special place or is it just done at the desk? What does that look like practically for a lot of workplaces?Kai: Yeah, I led mindfulness programs at two different companies. One, there was a meditation room that people could go in, they could reserve time and they could practice in a special place. When we were still in the offices before the pandemic, it would just be a conference room. People could either join in person or they could call into a Zoom or Skype meeting.A lot of people do well when they have more of a routine or a place to practice mindfulness, but that's not necessary. Like you can practice mindfulness anywhere. Some people would call in from their cubes. I think you would need a quieter place to do that from if you had a lot of people walking up and talking to you while you had your eyes closed and your headset on. That might be more challenging, but yeah, you can practice mindfulness anywhere.It could be that if you arrive to work a few minutes early — I knew one person who was like, yeah, whenever I get to work early, I sit in my car and I meditate until it's nine o'clock and then I walk in.Ana: Same when I'm on a commute, but on public transit, I'll just put on my headphones and just sit — if I can sit — in the crowd. Putting on a meditation and guided meditation has just been — it's such a powerful practice for me, to make that time, to either start the day or just in the middle of the day to do this, because then I find for me personally that during meetings, during stressful situations, that mindfulness, for lack of a better term, that energy or that, that way of being returns, even when I'm not doing the kind of formal practice set that I have in a designated space. So it's been quite powerful for me.Xiaowei: I remember when I first started off trying to practice mindfulness and meditation, and I've heard this from, having meditation circles with a lot of tech workers, actually that it's really hard to like be self forgiving. It's kind of like, “Oh my God, I can't even sit still for a minute without wanting to open my eyes or like, I just can't.” And then being like, “I failed horribly.” Do you have a pro tip for folks who are just starting off?Kai: Yeah. And this is a really important question. So a lot of times we think that the goal for meditation is we're gonna close our eyes. We're gonna meditate and we're gonna have this peaceful, Zen-like experience, and it's gonna be awesome. And then what happens is, we sit down, we have a busy mind. Our mind is busy planning.Our mind is busy remembering. Our mind is thinking about all the other people in the room — do they all know that I'm not doing this right? Like we can spiral off into judgment. So let's just state right now that the goal of meditation is not to have a quiet mind. Sometimes if we practice, and if we practice over time, our mind will quiet. But whether our mind quiets down or not, we can still have an effective mindfulness practice. So what we're actually doing when we practice mindfulness is we sit down, and we focus for some period of time. Maybe it is two seconds. And then the mind will wander. Our minds are designed to wander. This is going to happen to all of us. So our mind will wander for some period of time and eventually, maybe it's during the meditation, maybe when the bell rings at the end of the meditation, but eventually we will notice, oh, my mind is wandering, wandering. That is your moment of mindfulness. You just observe what is happening to the mind in the present moment: “My mind is wandering.”And once you have that moment of mindfulness, then you have a choice. You might say, okay, I'm gonna continue on down this train of thought, or you might choose to bring your mindfulness back and then you focus again. And so that's our cycle that we go through. It's focus, mind wandering, mindfulness, noticing that our mind is wandering.And then bringing it back to focus. And so a lot of times we'll decide that if we spent a lot of time in the focus cycle, that was a good meditation. And if we spent a lot of time in the mind wandering part of the cycle, that was a bad meditation, but either way we practiced something. Maybe it was only once we noticed the mind wandered, but we got one rep in of noticing, oh, this is what it feels like when my mind is wandering. So there is a lovely article that I think Headspace wrote, and it's about why mindfulness is worth doing even when you do it badly. And so we can actually get the benefits of mindfulness, of having less reactivity, having more space, even when it feels like every time we sit down and meditate, all the mind does is run all over the place.[28:16] Guided MeditationAna: We'd love to have a guided meditation from you, for ourselves and for the audience.Kai: All right. There's many versions of body scan. And this one I like for people who may be newer to meditation or even experienced meditators. If there's a time where the mind is really busy or there's a lot of agitation, this style of meditation can be more accessible.And so the invitation is to sit in an upright and comfortable position with the feet flat on the floor. And your hands in a comfortable position on your lap and bring a sense of uprightness to the spine along with a sense of ease.And we'll begin by allowing our awareness to fill the feet from the inside out, really dropping into the sensations where the feet meet the floor, noticing sensations of pressure or temperature, or even the tingling and vibrating of aliveness.And then allow your awareness to fill the legs from the inside, out, dropping into the sensations where the legs meet the chair, noticing sensations of pressure of temperature, or even the tingling and vibrating of aliveness.Now take one breath, expanding the chest and belly on the inhale and softening and letting go on the exhale. And then in your own rhythm, begin cycling your awareness from the feet to the seat, and then through one breath before returning the awareness again to where the feet meet the floor, to where your legs meet the seat of the chair, and then taking a full inhale and long exhale before returning your awareness to the feet again.And this is a practice you can do one cycle of, when you're in a meeting or in a stressful situation, or you can do as a longer formal practice for three or five minutes, or even 15 or 20 minutes.And the goal of this practice isn't to fix anything or to push away any difficult sensations or emotions, but to allow the mind to rest as much as possible in the sensations of the here and now, sensations of the feet, sensations in the seat and the sensations of just one breath.And whenever you're ready, you can open your eyes to end the meditation. [00:33:25] ClosingDorothy: Before we conclude, we wanted to ask if there was anything that you wanted to promote, any words of wisdom or additional projects, whatever you'd like to share with the Five and Nine audience.Kai: Absolutely. So you can find me at my website, kaistowers.com. I'm also fairly active on LinkedIn, and I'm not as active on Instagram, but you can find me there. And some of the work I love doing is I love coaching individuals, especially when they are navigating transition and change.I love doing DEI work and building that capacity in individuals and leaders. I see a lot of people who are really interested in being more inclusive in leading more equitably, and they've never received training in this. So that is a really rich opportunity. That can be really rewarding, not just for the individual, but for all of the teams they lead.I also help organizations with larger strategies, and one space I love working in is LGBTQ inclusion, and especially inclusion for the transgender and gender non-conforming and non-binary communities. So if these are areas that you are interested in doing work in, I would love to speak with you.We hope you enjoyed this episode! Episode 7 closes out our pilot season, and we're regrouping while we prepare for Season 2 (in the autumn/vernal cycle). We wish everyone a safe, healthy, and restful summer in the Northern hemisphere and winter in the Southern hemisphere.These are times of great change and difficulty, and we hope you're able to find rejuvenation, grounding and healing, and that the conversations at Five and Nine have helped bring a spot of clarity in your life. Be well and take good care.If you've been tuning in this season, we'd love to hear from you! You can fill out 2 minute survey here and help us grow and improve:Five and Nine is a podcast newsletter at the intersection of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — a newsletter every new moon

This is Five and Nine, a podcast newsletter at the intersection of magic, work and economic justice. Welcome to Season 1, Episode 6, Part 2. We have one more episode to go this season, and we are pleased to share we are now available on Apple Podcasts.Listen to the podcast now, or read the transcript below, or both!ResourcesMusic and WordsRum tum tiddle, composed by Jean Schwartz, lyrics by Edward Madden and sung by Al Jolson in 1911Tarot CardsEight of CupsFive of SwordsTwo of PentaclesThe HermitTranscriptAna: This is a special edition at Five and Nine. We wanted to hear Dear Abby-style discussions about work and career. And this is part two of a two part episode where we respond to guest queries with a live tarot reading and conversation. In part one, we discussed the Gate, Lock and Key spread that we're using, and we talk a little bit about the purpose of readings to get the full experience. Be sure to listen to part one of this episode at thisisfiveanine.com.Dear Five and Nine,I am a writer and trying to work on a big project that I often feel overwhelmed by. And in the face of looming deadlines, I find myself staying in the overwhelm and anxiety spirals or research rabbit holes instead of just doing the next little granular thing, for example, even just creating a messy draft of a tiny chunk of text. This is probably so common as to be cliché, and it's not exactly that I feel blocked or stuck. It's just hard to get the actual small step done that would ease all the rest. I'd be grateful for any advice or insight.SignedToo Often Distracted.Cany of you relate to this? Any writers here?Xiaowei: Ah, that's like every day of my life.Ana: Yes.Xiaowei: Oh, so real.Ana: This is a tough one. I think any big project — it's really that feeling of overwhelm that causes so much anxiety.Xiaowei: I deeply to like the depths of my soul resonate with your question, Too Often Distracted. I will say something that my therapist has often been like, well, in these instances, what do you feel like you're avoiding? She asked me that, and I'm just like, wow, why are you such a good therapist?Ana: I received a great piece of advice early on in my book writing, which is that you have to project manage yourself because no one else is going to do that for you.In an office environment, so often there's a project manager, and there's the person doing the production. There's someone who's keeping everyone on task, and there's the people doing the tasks. When you're an author, especially if you're working alone, you're both of those people.One thing that I do, when working on a big project, is I turn on project management brain. And then I turn on writer brain, but those brains are not the same person. They're not the same time of day. They're not even the same day of week. And in most workplaces, those are often two different people.Dorothy: I think one of the things that surprisingly has been effective for me — this isn't effective for everyone — is having an accountability buddy. Or people that you know that you're going to meet with, whether it's a writing group, whether we're going to send each other text messages.I used to do that, actually, when I was working on my master's thesis. One of my really good friends, Emily K. Holmes, who's also a writer, would actually text me in the morning of a day that she knew that she had to meet a certain word count, like, “Okay. I promised myself that I would write a thousand words by Friday. Could you text me on Thursday and just ask how's it going with that piece?” Very informal. And it actually was effective for both of us, but you know, you, it doesn't work for everyone.Sometimes the small things don't feel like they add up and that's something we actually need to be reminded of constantly. People don't see all the behind the scenes stuff, all the quiet work, all of the ways that you have met a deadline or freaked out and wrote 2000 words, scrapped 1500 of those 2000. Nobody sees that.And I think when we think of all of those things put together, the actual small steps, they themselves become equally daunting to the big task at hand. And I'm saying that from experience where I am oftentimes scared to write out my to-do list. So I have to make separate to do lists because I need to compartmentalize my life that way.Xiaowei: You know, I've been thinking about this recently, especially because we live in a culture that has so emphasis on productivity. Oftentimes we give ourselves such a hard time about our inability to do something. And I'll just put it out there: writing a book that is a huge project. It is hard and it is scary and — I don't know if this is true for you, Too Often Distracted, but when I write short pieces that I'm like, oh, if I don't like how it turned out, it's on the internet. It's short, it's fine. It kind of falls away from memory. A book feels like a different ball game.So I think maybe also think about what is that emotional response that is weighing in.Ana: You kind of pointed to that, Xiaowei. A book just has so much weight, literally. It'll be cataloged with the Library of Congress. It goes into libraries. People keep it on their bookshelves. That's a big thing.Dorothy: Okay. But wait a second. Listen. So yes, I agree, Xiaowei and Ana, that there's weight to it, but it's also a marker of time. Like, I don't want anyone to feel that they are beholden to being the thing that they wrote because you change and evolve. Too Often Distracted, I hope that you remember that. I think it's because you care, that's why this matters to you so much, but I think that also what can be stifling is the block or the stuckness comes from that understanding that this is a project that matters so deeply to you. And at the end of the day, yes, there's weight, and yes, there's gravity to it, but you're also ever evolving.[7:44] A Reading for Too Often DistractedAna: Should we do a reading?Dorothy: And it's, only fair that Too Often Distracted also gets two keys.Ana: Okay. The gate. The gates that I've drawn for you, Too Often Distracted, is the Nine of Pentacles. It's a feminine figure wearing a beautiful dress, a golden dress, and has a falcon in their arm. On their hand, they have a glove that's holding a bird , and around them is a beautiful garden with nine pentacles, or coins, distributed throughout.Many people interpret the figure as pensive or as joyful. It's often seen as a figure that is looking at their successes, the things they've done, and admiring it.Xiaowei: For the lock, I drew the Knight of Swords, and it depicts someone who is on a gray horse, holding a sword. And there's a lot of energy, just like intellectual force, that's rushing into the frame. Actually, in the position of being next to the Nine of Pentacles, it's almost like Nine of Pentacles, it's like a pensive, flowy garden vibe, and the Knight of Swords is kind of rushing in with the sword wielded at the Nine of Pentacles.Dorothy: Ooh, these cards. Okay. So here, let's pick two keys then. Yeah. Okay. That's some big sword energy right there. So let's see, what's the big key energy here? Oh, so your first key, Too Often Distracted, is the Hierophant. And then your second is, jeez, it's a Ten of Swords.So the description here for the Hierophant in the Gorgon's Tarot — it's a round deck. So it is a feminine figure, actually, that has their left hand raised, pointing to the sky. It's two fingers, often very Catholic, but I see it as pointing towards the heavens. And then in the right hand, folded over the body is pointing a sword down, and we see a fish, a very symmetrical card in that there are fish at the bottom of The Hierophant and skulls, and the backdrop is that of a garden. And we see two moons behind them as well. And then there are keys actually on two pillars. I should say that that's very important since it's two keys. And then the Ten of Swords is a figure in the foreground. The body is facing down, and the arms are in a very vulnerable position over the head like that of resignation, like the posturing as the resignation, and instead of the swords being in the body, the swords surround the body, and r the background is that of a night sky. And it almost seems that there are these very abstract shapes that kind of look like flowing leaves in the sky. There's a strong light that's coming through. Those are the visual descriptors for the Ten of Swords and The Hierophant for the Gorgon's Tarot.Ana: I can't tell you how many times, when working on a book, I feel like the Ten of Swords is just like my life.Xiaowei: I literally texted Dorothy yesterday: “I had a terrible day of writing. Bury me.” Which I think is a good summary of the Ten of Swords. Bury me.Dorothy: Oh, my gosh. I mean, it's funny, I really love, Xiaowei, your visual description for the Knight of Swords was really apropos, that there's this kind of intellectual force that is just like charging ahead. It's this figure that's just like all systems go. And what is interesting is it shows up in the lock position, Too Often Distracted. I feel that this is the energy that you're trying to summon. You're wanting to conjure this intellectual force. I know it's in me. I've done this before. I've done this so many times, maybe not in this particular form or format, but enough so that it can be a catalyst for this big project, but because it is so gargantuan, perhaps in your mind, you're just like, Oh, how do I just get on the horse? What horse also? Well, what armor do I need? It's just that, instead of embodying that energy, we're thinking about all of the accoutrements and what's the right outfit instead of charging ahead. And that takes energy and time, but I really loved that description, Xiaowei.Ana: And it's so interesting it's in the blocker position. There's a big difference between writing an article, even a well-written thoughtfully researched article, and a book. An article is so often on deadline, you have to really embody that Knight of Swords energy. It's like a sprint. A book is a marathon. It just is. And when you're running that marathon, you have to accept that you're going to get those cramps, your legs are going to hurt, it's going to be hot, there's going to be bugs.It's going to be a lot of swords, a lot of Ten of Swords. So you just have to be present with those, be mindful of those. What is it that you're turning away from? What is it that you're ignoring? Sometimes we have to allow for that pain to exist, to be okay with it, because that's what makes for a powerful book.But it looks different because it's not the kind of hard charging energy of a tight article. It's actually longer and meditative and takes just that much more time to produce. And I see that in dialogue with The Hierophant. I was talking with someone who's facing blockers with their book. They're just getting started in the research phase. As we were talking, I was like, this book is a spiritual project for you. It's not just intellectual. It's not just emotional. This is something deep. And when I talk to most authors, most of the act of wanting to write a book, because it's so hard, is often coming from a really deep place for you. And you don't have to express all of that in the book, but sitting with that and kind of accessing that, what is the bigger story you want to tell?What is the calling that has brought you to this book in a spiritual sense — whatever spirituality means for you, you can be atheist but serious spiritual. And then again, it looks just so different from that hard charting energy of the Knight of Swords.Xiaowei: Absolutely. And I love that you pulled in The Hierophant, Ana, because you know, I think that the two that the Hierophant is pointing to it's like one, which is the worldly knowledge, right. The stuff that's like, oh yeah, if we just know more, if we just continue to research more, there's that kind of knowledge.And then the other form pointing above, there's that spiritual knowledge or that creative part of your soul that's just like this needs to exist in the world. This book needs to exist. It's almost like posting the mission statement in a very visible place for yourself, where it's like, I am writing this book because… just like two sentences or an object or something that is just going to anchor you so that when you see that thing in your office or field of vision that you're reminded and you're kind of grounded and pulled back down to be like, is this piece of research, this rabbit hole that I'm starting to feel myself go down — is it actually part of this anchor? And so, yeah, exactly what Ana said. I think for every author, it is very spiritual.Dorothy: It's funny because I think in Casandra Snow's Queering the Tarot, the way that they write about The Hierophant and its difficult relationship for many queer people that actually associate The Hierophant with patriarchy. And I think the way that we're reading The Hierophant is very different because as Jessica Dore reminds us, it's also about benediction. Helen Tseng and I were talking about that, and how they really appreciated that observation of The Hierophant as being one of what you brought up, Xiaowei. What is the anchor? How are you devoted to this project? What need does it fill, but most importantly, what need does it fill in your life?And I think with the Ten of Swords, a lot of people freak out when they see the Ten of Swords, but it is completion. It's a type of acknowledgement that there's an epiphany that's happening, and there's this intellectual journey that's occurred for that epiphany or those epiiphanies to come to the forefront, to be top of mind.And I actually see the keys being maybe what helps us think about getting the small steps done. So going back to the practical, going back to the pragmatic, what would it be like to give yourself that homework of, okay, I'm going to revisit why I'm doing this big project. That's all on the wall. We put painter's tape, so it sticks on the wall. It's not falling down, you can even frame that thing. Whatever gets you to remember on a daily basis or on a weekly basis, why this project is very important to you, but then also understanding that there's milestones that you probably want to meet on a daily, weekly, monthly basis.Who's also going to help with that? I just really want to overemphasize that, especially in the times that we are living in. Because being a writer is such a challenging, tough job. It really is that you are alone in that endeavor.There are people in your circle. in your ecosystem, that probably want to help you. And that's okay to ask for that. It doesn't have to be big, and it could be small, such as a text to check in, or it could be as big as what I mentioned, having a small writing group of two or more.Xiaowei: I think everyone writes differently. I think being generous with yourself about that as well. I was reading this great interview, I forget where, with the writer R.O. Kwon. And something that R.O. Kwon said really resonated with me where, you know, she was saying for them writing is this very solitary activity that has a lot of ritual, which reminded me of The Hierophant. She has like the one cup that she can only use if she's writing. The one shawl.For me, I struggle. When I'm writing I'm in my own world and I feel totally different than my day to day life person, where everything's a mess and I'm like, smoking cigarettes and just have all these emotions and I have my ritual and I have my special things, which I am totally not like in my day to day.Ana: It's such a beautiful kind of encapsulation of the spirit of the Nine of Pentacles and being generous, celebrating, recognizing what an incredible accomplishment it is as a writer to get to this stage where you're working on a book. And maybe that's a place to start, with that generosity.Dorothy: The thing I wanted to add about the Nine of Pentacles is I learned something interesting about falconry on a research trip. And that is, it takes a lot of trust for the falcon, or the bird, to actually come back to you on command. Birds fly, for goodness sake. They don't have to come back to a human, especially a human. If I was a bird, I would not come back. But I mentioned this because on the Knight of Pentacles, the figure has learned how to command the bird. And the reason why the falcon is hooded is because the hood changes the perception of the bird's distinction between night and day. So when the bird is hooded, it just automatically believes, oh, it's night. And so you can't do that unless you have built the trust of the falcon. So when you think of the Nine of Pentacles, you actually have so many resources at your disposal. You have a command that no one else does, and it's only you that can really speak to what you're doing in this big project, in the way that you are doing it. [22:08] Reading the CardsAna: And just a reminder is that in tarot, this is not a prescription. These are not predictions. These are just insights and ultimately we have free will. You all know your context so much more than we do.These are just perspectives that we hope to share just to challenge thinking, bring perspectives to our audience, but ultimately these decisions that have needed to be made are ones that you make. And we wish you the best, and we thank you so much for your queries.Dorothy: But that's what tarot it. It's this friend that doesn't have to say much. But it's also not prescriptive. It's never going to tell you what to do. It kind of allows you to see that you have the answers inside yourself.I almost feel like I'm saying everything and nothing at all, but that's the best way to describe interpretation, like reading generously and also reading from a place that is for the highest good in your life.Xiaowei: I many ways, tarot is like a good therapist. You know that moment when you're talking to your therapist, and you just kind of see the slight eyebrow raise.And your therapist is like, So you're telling me that you want X. But you've been doing Y, and Y seems very…going in the opposite direction of X. How do you feel about that And I feel like tarot is just that.Ana: We have just one more episode before we close out, Season One of Five and Nine, and go on our summer break. Thanks to our audience for listening to this pilot season. Our closing episode, Episode Seven will feature Kai Stowers, a mindfulness practitioner and integral coach who will talk to us about diversity, equity and inclusion, navigating career in a time of change, and leading us in a guided meditation. Subscribe now and be sure to tell your friends to visit thisisfiveandnine.com.

This is Five and Nine, a podcast newsletter at the intersection of magic, work and economic justice. Welcome to Season 1, Episode 6, Part 1. We are pleased to share we are now available on Apple Podcasts.Listen to the podcast now, or read the transcript below, or both!ResourcesMusic and WordsAll by myself, composed by Irving Berlin and sung by Aileen Stanley in 1921The gate, the key, the passage, by Little Red TarotGorgon's Tarot, by Dolores FitchieTarot CardsEight of CupsFive of SwordsTwo of PentaclesThe HermitTranscriptAna: This is a special edition of Five and Nine, with Dear Abby-style discussions about work and career with some tarot mixed in. We received some great guest submissions that we're discussing in this episode. These have been recorded in one sitting, but we had so much to say about the two queries that we split up the episode. For the best experience, be sure to listen to both parts. Dear Five and Nine,I work in an international team. People live in different places around the world, but the working style is very Western. In other words, the squeaky wheel gets oiled. We have to constantly adapt to others' work habits. I wonder how we, those of us who have a harder time trying to feel entitled or confident, could communicate our needs effectively, so that does not make us feel uncomfortable.Signed,Corner Girl Oh, Corner Girl. I really feel you. I really feel you. And it's something I've struggled with myself, even as someone who has grown up in the West.  Dorothy: I think as someone who is actually on the opposite end of the spectrum of Ana, let me just put it this way. Yes, I was that child in Catholic school that had three checks behind their name because I talked too much. I think something that other people could do who are —- and we hear this all the time, the three of us in the different environments that we work in, stepping up, stepping back, et cetera. But I think a lot of it too is having the fortitude to be able to meet people where they're at and allowing folks who admittedly have spoken to me about having issues such as Corner Girl, and almost like teaming up and collaborating in this very different way. So saying, well, what ideas do you have that need a little bit more preparatory time in a meeting and talking to those individuals and saying, would you like me to not speak on behalf of you, but to say, why don't we hear from folks who aren't as vocal? I think as someone who does historically talk a lot, I've learned to do that for other people. And it's really humbled me a lot and also taught me to be much more of a deep and active listener. I wonder if corner girl can actually find those folks, who are making it an intentional practice to be active listeners. Xiaowei: I really resonate with Corner Girl. In so many ways, I feel like I also am the person at a meeting who always needs time to think about things. I never feel like I can react to things in real time. I need some time to like, process, to understand, to really analyze and be methodical. One of the ways that — this is very Scorpionic. I was talking with someone yesterday about how we're so against classification ethically in so many realms, but when it comes to the Zodiac, we're always talking about it. As a deep listener and someone who's quiet, there's other ways of wielding power. Even just remembering when I was in middle school, I started this petition at school, but I didn't say it was from me. We ended up getting a hundred signatures or something, and I left it at the principal's door. And there was like this whole thing that like came out of it, but I never like fessed up to being the person who started the petition. And in previous workplaces, one of the issues that we had was workplace equity of all different kinds. But I started a spreadsheet where people could anonymously put their salaries and people were like, did you start this spreadsheet? And I was like, no, I didn't, but eventually it became a vehicle for people to start to have these discussions around gender equity and pay parity at the workplace. So I think there are these ways of also wielding power and trying to get change done that maybe don't necessarily involve speaking up in that way. Everyone has their different ways of approaching things. Ana: And so much seems to depend also on the move up, move back framework. If the folks who do take up more space, if they're willing to move back, if they're willing to cede space, one thing that's been interesting for me to see is, just as a quiet person myself, seeing how things like Slack and emails sometimes (sometimes!) enable different types of conversation. Or in a Zoom meeting or a Google Meet meeting, the more quiet people will actually use the chat function to get their ideas out even while people are talking. So much depends on the actual work environment, but sometimes the kind of text-based communication, just like what you do with the spreadsheet, Xiaowei, becomes a space at least a different type of conversation where people can take up a little bit more space through texts. But of course, power dynamics and cultural dynamics so often come into place. Xiaowei: Yeah. Agreed. You have to have leadership that's actually willing to listen in order for any of this to happen. Yeah. [7:23] A Reading for Corner Girl Ana: Should we do a reading for Corner Girl?  Xiaowei: I can start with the first card. So the spread that we're doing is a spread that Ana has done before that I really appreciate — Gate, Lock and Key. How would you describe the gate, Ana?Ana: I think of it as the invitation. This is the doorway that you're being invited to open. Xiaowei: Okay. So what is the doorway that corner girl is being asked to step through? Oh, interesting. I pulled the eight of cups. In the Rider Waite, which I'm using today, it is a person in a red cape, with their back turned towards eight cups. And they're journeying under an eclipse. So it's a moon that has eclipsed the sun, so intuition that has eclipsed reason.Dorothy: The lock placement in this spread is — I don't want to call it a barrier. And I too, along with Xiaowei really appreciate this spread that Ana has done with me as well, because it forces, or it has forced me to think about the lock as a way of, well — how might we confront a challenge that we're facing? Do you want share anything else about the lock?Ana: No, but I've been trying to find where I learned this. I haven't found it. I've been Googling it. It just feels important, as you all have shared with me, is to share our inspirations. And the closest I could find for the spread was on the Little Red Tarot blog, where Beth Maiden writes about the gate, the key, the passage as a spread. I think I was certainly influenced by that. I'm not quite sure where exactly, the gate, the lock, the key spread, came into my mind. Xiaowei: I will say that I actually have done a ritual before that I read, I can't remember where, that was not tarot. That was the gate lock and the key. And it was about infusing. So I literally had to take an actual key and infuse intention into three objects. And so then afterwards, I would carry the key around to remember what was the symbolic and actual key. So I feel like it's maybe a quite old witchcraft thing, maybe. Dorothy: But you know what else I thought of related to the lock. Why does it have to be just one key? Keys can be copied too, do you know what I'm saying? I'm also just being practical. When you think of when you give a key to someone that you trust, if you're giving them the power, as Xiaowei brought this up earlier, then not only are you entrusting this person and not only do they know and have the resource to unlock the lock with the key that they have. It's almost a way of honoring. I don't think of the lock as something necessarily restrictive, and it can be something that can be untangled, so to speak. And I guess I should move on to the card that just kind of stuck itself out as I was shuffling. And I'm using the Gorgon's Tarot by Dolores Fitchie. It's black and white and only a few cards in the entire deck have hints or touches of red.Corner Girl, we need to talk. Your lock card is Five of Swords. The way that the five of swords appears on the Gorgon's Tarot is a feminine figure wearing a long black dress almost as if in a crucifix position where her arms are outstretched. There are four swords that actually form a diamond around her. So they're surrounding her, but the fifth sword, it goes straight through her heart. And it is against a backdrop of mountains and land. And then there's one mouse and one… it looks a little bit like a leopard or a cheetah that are actually looking on to the feminine figure.  Ana: I'll draw the key, and to your point, Dorothy, actually, sometimes when I'm doing the spread, I'll draw two keys or three keys. Depending on my intuitions, and the key position is exactly it. I think of it as a way to work through the block to get to the invitation. And so I'm using the Rider-Waite-Smith, and I'm pulling two cards.Now, the two cards are that I've drawn are the Two of Pentacles and The Hermit. So the Two of Pentacles is a figure that looks like they're juggling two pentacles or coins in their hand. They're larger pentacles, and there's kind of a figure eight or infinity symbol that's connecting those two coins. In the background are ships, big waves. The figure seems to be dancing. They're standing on one foot and they're looking downward at the Pentacles. The Hermit is a figure that is an old bearded figure, a kind of masculine figure who is wearing a hood and a robe and is standing in what looks like the snow. And the figure is holding up a lamp, and that lamp contains a little star inside. And it's often interpreted that this person is in the night walking through a dark place. And so it seems like the the full spread here — we have Eight of Cups as the gate, the invitation. The Five of Swords as the lock, what we might think of as a blocker or something to work through. And the key, possible way forward, is a Two of Pentacles and The Hermit.  Xiaowei: I guess in the Rider Waite, the progression of the Five of Swords is the first card that's someone in a red cape journeying. And then the second, the lock, the person in red is now wearing a green tunic on top and looking off. I had these two other people in this sort of expression of like, oh, I'm just looking on at others. And then the last two keys, the person in red is now playfully juggling, and behind them is that figure of the hermit who's in this gray cape now. And I love that. It's also like this story really. It's almost like a comic. Dorothy: I think what's interesting about the Five of Swords is this idea of… you never know if you're the “winner”, or the person who's been, or people who have been defeated. You actually don't know till much later on, when you think about different life experiences and things that you might have gone through. And again, I know Corner Girl is not a student, but I think I go back to this because this is stuff we learn when we're young: you need to be bold, you need to just speak. I'm being told I need to do all these things and be all of these things, when these things aren't actually encouraged. And so sometimes when I look at the Five of Swords, I wonder if Corner Girl could look at past experiences where her perceived introversion or desire to be quiet and to be still, and to be like, let me step back and be an observer when those instances have actually served her well, because sometimes we're not asked about those. We don't seek that wisdom from our prior selves to actually inform what might help us in the current position. When I think of the Five of Swords, it's like someone can win a victory, but did they really win in the long run? You know? But again, you don't know that.  Ana: Right now, maybe that's your communication style or it could be the working environment itself. Is this the right working environment for you? Is this the place that is right for you? And of course we face so many constraints. It's not easy to just pick up and leave, but it seems to be a question here. Then are you ready for what might be some discomfort on your side as you practice a different type of communication style and of course, discomfort on the side of others, as well as they try to adapt to maybe a different side of you that they haven't seen?Maybe you're asking the leadership to make more of, if not an accommodation, then a culture shift that includes a spirit of moving back, of active listening, of giving space and sharing space. Either way, that requires a little bit of push and pull. And so to me, part of what I see with this is, there's a Two of Pentacles which will require some juggling of yourself and your own needs, but also on the part of the organization, can there be a balance, can there be a workplace shift? It's unclear. Can that workplace provide that balance for you? And if not, I think of The Hermit as maybe it's time to move on. Something that, to me about The Hermit is that holding a lamp out into darkness, unsure of where he or she is going, is a scary place to be. It's a scary leap, but sometimes our work environments are not the right place for us. Even if the work itself is nice, but if the work environment is not supportive, then it may be time to start making preparations for how you can be economically secure enough, ow you can have all your needs met, whatever it is you need from work for your material health and well being, to then make that leap, in whatever way that looks for you. Dorothy: Even thinking through and listening to Ana and Xiaowei talk about the cards that have been laid out, even though we're in three different places, actually we're everywhere, everything all at the same time, all the time. I feel, Ana, you summed it up really well about the choices that Corner Girl has, because there are choices. She could participate in the changes in a variety of ways that both Xiaowei and Ana have already stated. I just think that was a very fascinating observation of a very circular kind of reading and that's. Xiaowei: I really love what you also just said too, Ana, about culture change. And I think it's so funny because, like, sorry, I've been writing about power all day, so I'm just going to go for it. Corner Girl mentioned Western working culture. It's very contradictory, right? Because on one hand it is the supposed narrative about like, oh, if you're loud, if you're really filling up the room, that's how change gets done. But when you look at it, it's always a lot of closed doors, like one-on-one. The one person making that meeting with a CEO is like, Hey, just so you know, people are unhappy about this thing. And so it is very contradictory. Behind closed doors, things get moved, and then also this narrative of being really loud. And so I think part of changing workplace culture is also sitting with those two opposites and also thinking about how, as you shift culture, your working style may or may not fit with those two different poles. Dorothy: Yes, a hundred thousand percent to what you're talking about. And I also wanted to add, I cannot help, but think of the way that even Corner Girl is thinking about this, because I don't know if this was inadvertent. But I'd like to think of it as a beautiful slip — is the last question in the letter was, I wonder how we who have a harder time trying to feel entitled or confident could communicate our needs? And a part of me is just like, wow, Corner Girl, you're actually trying to figure this out, not just for yourself, but other people. And that's a way of showing a type of solidarity that is oftentimes unseen, because you see maybe other people having to confront this themselves as well. And I'm wondering if you've spoken to those other individuals, and what would it look like if you had that conversation about how to best have, not just your needs met.But — whether you want to call them coworkers, colleagues, comrades — what would it look like if you started to have these conversations with other individuals that have also experienced this in the workplace before you start to make a decision about whether it is the right place for you? Ana: Sometimes it's not the right fit, but there's always the question of what values have you gained from this? What have you learned about the things to ask for in a future workplace? And what to look for? There are all tough questions. Not everyone has as much flexibility with their workplace as others. And that's a question only you can answer. But often talking to other people, hearing their experiences, and learning from each other is a great place to start. [22:20] How to Interpret the ReadingAna: And just a reminder is that in tarot, this is not a prescription. These are not, predictions. These are just insights. Ultimately we have free will, and you all know your context so much more than we do. These are just perspectives that we hope to share, just to challenge thinking, bring perspectives to our audience. But ultimately these decisions are ones that you make.  Dorothy: I think the first thing that comes to mind is understanding that the tarot is a lot like that really quiet best friend that just just drops truths when you least expect it. So the language or the communication is coming through the symbology as well as the naming of the card.I think of someone like my grandfather, my maternal grandfather. When I was growing up, his people would actually ask for his opinion. And he would say just a few words. And I'm not that way. I know I'm a person of so many, oftentimes flowery words. And my students, I say, okay, one last thing. And then my students have actually said, Dorothy, you say that all the time, and it ends up being five last things. Is this really the last thing? But that's what tarot is. It's this friend that doesn't have to say much, but it's also not prescriptive. It's never going to tell you what to do. It allows you to see that you have the answers inside yourself. I almost feel like I'm saying everything and nothing at all, but that's the best way to describe interpretation, like reading generously and also reading from a place that is for the highest good in your life. Not something where you are espousing or imbuing, and people read differently. But if you know you're in a high octane, emotional state, sometimes it's good to maybe have someone that can listen. And tarot can offer that, but I think the danger, and I use that word very intentionally is that espousal of, well, this is what that means, and it has to mean that.And it doesn't. And that's what I mean by reading generously. One of my mentors always reminds me of doing that with text. How do you read this generously? Even if you disagree, even if you're like, oh, the Death card. Nope. What does it mean to read the Death card generously?  Xiaowei: Plus one to everything Dorothy said. In many ways, tarot is like a good therapist where, you that moment when you're talking to your therapist and you just kind of see the slight eyebrow raise? And your therapist is like, slight eyebrow raise, So you're telling me that you want X, but you've been doing Y. And Y seems very… going in the opposite direction of X. How do you feel about that? And I feel like tarot is just that. How do you feel? Maybe you just want to keep on going in the opposite direction.

This is Five and Nine, a podcast newsletter at the intersection of magic, work and economic justice. Welcome to Season 1, Episode 5. We are pleased to share we are now available on Apple Podcasts.Listen to the podcast now, or read the transcript below, or both!ResourcesDream of the Mountains, composed by August Labitzky and performed by the Victor Orchestra in 1906.Daring Compassion Movement Chaplaincy Training, by the Faith Matters Network and hosted on the School of Global CitizenryTranscriptThe meditation that we offer today on this new moon is a blending or connection between metta practice, which is loving-kindness meditation in the Buddhist tradition, and tarot. Before we begin, we invite you to find a comfortable place to sit, lie down, or even stand and to arrange your space in a way that is soothing and comfortable for you—that might be lighting incense, burning some candles, etc. There's an optional tarot practice within this meditation, and we invite you to keep your tarot deck nearby. But if you don't have one, it's not necessary.We'll start by taking a deep breath in for 5 seconds.And hold for 5 seconds.And a deep breath out for 5 seconds.A deep breath in.And a deep breath out.Notice the sensations of the breath in the nostrils, the chest, the belly, being grateful for this breath, sitting in this moment.If you have a tarot deck in front of you, I invite you to shuffle the deck and draw one card. Place that card in front of you, look at it, examine it. What does it bring up for you? What does it make you think of? This card represents you in this moment. Listen to the thoughts that arise, acknowledge them, and let them pass.This card before you is here to bring insight into your state of mind about yourself and who you are in this moment. The next time you draw a card, it will be a different card in a different moment and a different expression of who you are.Placing a hand on your heart center, I invite you to extend the feeling of warmth and love to your heart and to yourself. Extend that feeling of warmth and love to fill your torso, extending down your legs, to your arms and your neck, up into your head, breathing outward, breathing inward, as you extend this feeling of love to yourself.I invite you to recite these lines of metta, or loving-kindness. You can speak them aloud or just follow along in your mind.May I be happy and at peaceMay I find rest and community careMay I honor rituals that ground and center meMay I listen without fixingMay I be at ease and comfortableMay I be free from burnout and frustrationMay I build the world of justice I seekMay I know that world is often out of reachMay I be safe from harm and dangerMay I be happy and at peaceI now invite you to think of a friend, someone you've been thinking about lately who could benefit from some loving-kindness right now.If you have a deck in front of you, I invite you to draw another card. This card represents the person you're thinking of. It might be a joyful card, sorrowful card, a neutral or practical card. Place one hand on your heart center and extend the other one outward towards the card that represents your friend or loved one.Imagine your friend, this loved one, on the other side. I invite you to either think or recite these metta messages.May you be happy and at peaceMay you find rest and community careMay you honor rituals that ground and center youMay you listen without fixingMay you be at ease and comfortableMay you be free from burnout and frustrationMay you build the world of justice you seekMay you know that world is often out of reachMay you be safe from harm and dangerMay you be happy and at peace Now, if you have your deck in front of you, I invite you to draw a third and final card. This card represents something you can bring to the world right now. It might be a skill, a mindset, a perspective, maybe just kind words, maybe just sitting in silence.This is what you can bring in this moment to anyone who's suffering, anyone who's struggling. I invite you to place two hands on your heart center, as we extend metta outward to all beings.May all beings be happy and at peaceMay all beings find rest and community careMay all beings honor rituals that ground and center themMay all beings listen without fixingMay all beings be at ease and comfortableMay all beings be free from burnout and frustrationMay all beings build the world of justice they seekMay all beings know that world is often out of reachMay all beings be safe from harm and dangerMay all beings be happy and at peace Looking at this spread in front of you — one card represents you. One card represents the person that you've been thinking of. And one card represents something you can bring to the world right now.We bow to ourselves, our loved ones, and to all those who are suffering and struggling in this moment.And we bow to this moment.Ana: This meditation was something I wrote as part of a final project for a class on movement chaplaincy, or chaplaincy for social movements, hosted by the Faith Matters Network and the School of Global Citizenry.I'd like to thank the network and the TA's for giving feedback. I hope it's brought a little bit of ease and benefit to your world right now.

This is Five and Nine, a podcast newsletter at the intersection of magic, work and economic justice. Welcome to Season 1, Episode 4. We are pleased to share we are now available on Apple Podcasts!Listen to the podcast now, or read the transcript below, or both!ResourcesMusicDance of the Songbirds, composed by Benjamin Richmond and performed by Joseph Belmont (the whistler) and the Victor Orchestra in 1913.Our Guest's Workindiraallegra.comUnspooling Die Gramgewinde: Writing with Gunta Stölzl on Grief-Threads and Grief-Portals, by Indira Allegra in TextileTexere: The Shape of Loss is a Tapestry, at Minnesota Street Project, visible at Texere.Space [password: weave]Othe ResourcesB******t Jobs, by David GraeberTaking a Thread for a Walk at the Museum of Modern Art (MOMA)Mumurations Tarot Deck by AS220Seventy-Eight Degrees of Wisdom: A Tarot Journey to Self-Awareness, by Rachel PollackTarot Cards:Eight of SwordsSeven of CupsThe TowerQueen of PentaclesTranscriptDorothy: We have a special guest today. We haven't had one yet, so this is a momentous occasion for us at Five and Nine. It is the incomparable Bay Area-based artist Indira Allegra. They are a conceptual artist, but there's so much more than that. And we'll talk about that. They are also a recognized leader in the field of performative craft, which I hope we are able to get into. So, you know, obviously working with weaving, the loom and using that as a framework for exploring these kinds of tensions that haunt both non-human and human relationships. A lot of the things that they've been working on is a combination of past experiences, within sign language interpretation, domestic violence, counselor, sex worker, union organizer. And so, so, so much more, and if we kept this going it would be the whole podcast. We're not going to keeping going, but this is Indira Allegra, and welcome!Indira: Thank you, Dorothy, for that introduction. I'll try to live up to everything you've read. Dorothy: I will say — and I'll put this on record because we were on a podcast — Indira's worst day is my best day. Just to put it out there right now. Ana, Xiaowei and I, we've had many discussions regarding the differences between work, labor and career. And so, for example, when you think about something such as labor, what are the mechanisms that are needed to kind of make something come to fruition versus work, which is like the every day? Some people might even think work might be something lik, David Graeber's B******t Jobs. So work is a thing that allows us to survive as much does, but then career sometimes can be this abstract thing, this always changes for us. But within the arts, do you feel there is a distinction between those three, and how have those lines blurred, or how have they become much more clear during the pandemic? Indira: Okay. All right. Well, let's just start with the questions then! Okay, so actually, I would say that first, you've got to figure out what your calling is, and then you can mobilize your career to be in service of that. And then the labor is like all of the details which make your career possible. So I think that for me, on a much larger level, I do work of holding transformational space, holding the space of the portal, or being there with both human and non-human co-conspirators so that transformation can happen. And sometimes that transformation involves a death process. Sometimes that transformation involves the development of understanding. You know, like with my work, as a sign language interpreter, to be the body that holds the text for two people who wouldn't otherwise be able to communicate with each other easily. So I think that you can have a calling, and you can have many different careers, which are in service of that calling. You know, hence the work as a union organizer and being with people who are in this transformational place of realizing that they have work in the workplace as it exists anymore. And that there is a boundary for them internally around what they are willing to live with and what they're willing to work with. And more importantly, there is a world that they want to move into and be ushered into in terms of what their workplace could feel like and how it could operate for them. Yeah. So maybe it's even a kind of doulaing work, but I think that births and deaths and transformations of all kinds are happening all the time. I think to live is to lose and to learn how to do that. I think within the space of an art practice, what I'm able to do is to work more closely and more regularly with non-human conspirators or co-conspirators or performers. Whereas if I were to have stayed in the realm of doing interpreting or even the realm of sex work, the focus would be more on the human to human interaction. And I think it's actually really important to be thinking big picture in a way, which decentralizes human concerns, conceits, and when we can do that and kind of almost like a bit is turning the human volume down. I know that Ana's in the producer role, like at the controls. And so Ana is balancing the sound of my voice with the sound of the room noise. And what if actually the room noise and my voice were at the same level? And what if that was at the same level as the trucks going down the street outside? With the bird songs, all of that stuff. That would be an artwork, an art assignment or a sketch or something to try, to listen to one's environment where you're at the same level as everything else, which is happening around you, and how might that impact how one feels about animacy and power and also access to resource. If a bird songs as loud as my voice, then maybe it has the power to impact something in my life in a really powerful way too. I think we're used to, as humans, thinking about other sounds as being smaller than our own. And so then we're unable to connect with their spiritual or intellectual resource. Maybe there's an intellectual resource in the bird's song that I need. Xiaowei: I think you brought up transformational space and the non-human, and I'm curious, both in your art practice as well as holding transformational space, and being in the world that we live in, that we have to eat and pay bills and all these things. How do you draw these lines, like of self and non-self either in your practice or in holding transformational space? Indira: I'm smiling right now because I think that's more mutable. I'm interested in thinking of the self as maybe more mutable than — like most people, I think I like to think of the self as being fixed , finite, you know, something which is reliable and can be counted on. And I don't know, as a non-binary person, I feel like — I just feel like a lot of things are in flux all the time. How do you know who you are? I think we only know who we are in relationship to other folks, right? I know where the earth is, because I know where the sun is in relationship to that. And I know where the moon is in relationship to that. But what if the moon drops out? Where am I located now? I have to re-situate myself within a new network of relations. That's the grieving process, right? It's learning how to accept that a loss has occurred, that a death has occurred. And trying to figure out a new constellation to fit into. So I think the self is always changing in relationship to the losses we experience in our lives. I have a name which will follow me throughout the long arc of my life, but I think that there are many different selves which can exist within that name. The Xiaowei that you will be at the age of 90 will contain many different selves. I think that's really a beautiful thing. So I do think of myself as a collection, a multitude. That's where the they/them comes from with my pronouns. It's not only stepping outside of a masculine or feminine binary, but thinking about all the different ages that I have been, all the different ages I will be, all of my ancestors, all of the nonhuman parts of which I am constituted. It's a way to tip my hat to each of my white blood cells and my red blood cells and the vessels they're in, you know? Xiaowei: There are so, so many things that I feel like you have such wisdom on. I've noticed, even within birth doulaing, it's like, there's the beauty of the work itself in holding the transformational space. And then there's also the kind of realities of — in many ways you're doing client work in a lot of senses. That makes me think of art institutions. And so, I think I'm just curious about, what are the ways that you can — I would hesitate to use the phrase "stay true to your practice," but I guess I'll use that as a proxy. And also, where you are now having this capacity as a full-time artist and like supporting yourself on that? Indira: I mean, really, it is a faith-based practice. I will say that the bulk of my income comes from grants, awards and fellowships. My practice up to this point has not really been in the commercial realm so much. Yeah, and, and that's a very competitive way to get your coin. I don't know what it's like in other realms, but I think that the odds that artists have to contend with when applying for grants or fellowships of any kind are really massive. But then I think about when you have thousands of people applying for a thing, and then there's multiple rounds that you go through. And then after the round, there may be an interview and then a year later after the initial application, you'll know whether or not you got it or not. And there's letters of recommendation. There's all sorts of different rituals, which have been created around what one has to do to deserve funding, right? I think about the odds that I've had to contend with in my own life around difficult circumstances, around instances of violence or illness or homelessness or disability. And I think about, oh, you know, damn, well, if I can survive that, then maybe the odds of winning this award — maybe I don't need to be worried about that so much. Money is not the most difficult thing. It's enough to live. [14:34] Ethos and Art Dorothy: There's an ethos on your website, which I feel oftentimes is not something that people incorporate into their artistic or creative practices. I mean, this is something that people should just incorporate in their daily lives personally, but I so deeply appreciated — and I'm obviously familiar with your work and I've written about it, full disclosure to those out there. But it's one of the things that we wanted to pull, because it is a brilliant list of statements that almost serve as a type of rider. Indira: Yeah. Dorothy: Both non-human, human, institutions, organizations, collectives, and a few that we pulled out were, number one, there is no such thing as a quote-unquote blank or open space geographically, visually, or ideologically. Another line from your ethos is, build an altar to your creative and intellectual ancestors, tend to it. Please visit indiraallegra.com to really view this wonderful list. But the third one that we pulled that's related to grief and loss was loss is a normal part of the human experience, so attention to grief and loss is always timely. We pulled those three out because we wanted to kind of have a conversation around how grief and loss actually is something people need to remember when you're thinking about economic justice. Indira: That's right. Dorothy: So when we think about this ethos and some of the ones that we just mentioned right now, this is a part of the work. This is exactly what you were stating and what you said. You know, and this is also related to the abundance versus kind of scarcity ideas that Ana, Xiaowei and I have been talking about, not just on the podcast, but just even in life. And so I guess, related to the ethos, because we wanted to kind of set this up here, with your most recent project Texere. You know, it explores different types of digital weaving practices that actually encourage reflection and grief and loss and how they're woven into other participants. What in doing the project has it revealed to you about the way we need to survive? Indira: Well, first I want to say thank you for looking at the ethos on the site. It has been amazing to — when people really go there and, they read through it. It's something that I've been surprised how many people really welcome seeing that information out in the public. And I love that you use the word rider. Because it does function in that way for me. I think that my union organizer self is always concerned with the terms and conditions of any kind of economic partnership. You can go online and you can research a hundred different interviews that I've done, or like whatever. Or you can just read it right there. I'll just tell you what I'm interested in. I think it helps me to curate the kinds of folks who find their way to me. When thinking about the semiotics of cloth or the anatomy of cloth, we do typically think about the warp and the weft. I speak also of the spaces in between the threads being portals of activity. And for those of you who are textile nerds out there, there's an article that I published in the Textile journal, which is based out of the UK called "Unspooling Die Gramgewinde: Weaving Grief-Threads and Grief-Portals with Gunta Stölzl," who was a weaver for the Bauhaus. And we know that something is woven because of the pores that it has. And it was surprising to me that no one had actually ever written about that and never written about the potential of these spaces. And I remember after my last trip abroad — travel was very important to me in the beforetimes. I come back to New York from spending a couple of months in Europe. And I went to an exhibition Taking a Thread for a Walk exhibition at MoMA. One of Gunta Stölzl's wandbehang or wall hangings, was there. And I began to cry in the presence of this cloth. I began to cry because I'm a sentimental person. I began to cry because I just f*****g cry at museums because they're contemplative spaces and I am really moved in social spaces where there are contracts around thoughtfulness and silence. And I began to cry because I felt that that that cloth was pulling something out of me, that there was something in those pores that was actually like drawing a kind of grief thread along a Z axis. It's like you have your X and Y axis that you're used to thinking about. And then this other axis, which is like between the space between my body and the body of the weaving. And I got really interested in that. So I think that brings us to Texere: The Shape of Loss is a Tapestry, which is a solo exhibition of the Minnesota Street Project right now through April 30th. This is a collection of digital memorial tapestries, which honor different losses in our lives. So there are eight different categories of losses, including the loss of force to wildfire, loss of sleep, or loss of a loved one to a virus. What you can do, and all of you can do it here, and anyone who's listening to this podcast is welcome to do this as well, is you can go to texere.space online. The password that you need is weave, all in lower case. You can make a contribution to any of these tapestries. So say, for instance, you wanted to contribute to the loss of forests to wildfire. And that was something that maybe if you're here in California has impacted you. And I know that that's something that has impacted me deeply. What I might choose to contribute would be either text or an image, or even an audio recording about that loss. And then I can use texere.space to turn that text, image or sound into a thread which then gets uploaded or woven into this tapestry, which is now hanging in space. And so you're able to see your contribution woven in with other people's losses or other people's contributions to that. And it was important to me to work in this way, which can create memorials that change as we change in relationship to our losses, the same way that I felt it's important to acknowledge how the self is always shifting, right? What we talked about before when Xiaowei asked me that question. The memorials we need also need to change as we change. The prevailing way of thinking about memorial at this time has to do with something which is cast bronze in the middle of a public square, which few people care about after it's installed. The things which matter to people the most when I ask folks about memorial are the keepsakes on their dresser in a bedroom or something which is kept on the top of a fireplace or images in one's phone. So it's the stuff which is really close to you in your life, right? I think that we can use this through Texere to care for us as we move through our losses. [22:33] Tarot Reading Dorothy: D we have consent to pull a card or two?Indira: Yeah, please. Dorothy: And the three of us would love to provide our own thoughts. Is there anything top of mind? Indira: So one of the things I've been doing over the past few months is learning how to read charts. So for astro nerds out there, Neptune and Jupiter just had a big conjunction in Pisces, which means that the ancient ruler and the modern ruler of Pisces were at home together in the same sign or are at home together in the same sign. Venus and Mars are also transiting through Pisces right now, so there's a lot of activity which is happening in this very watery sign, which is associated with the 12th house, which can be a space between life and death and can also be a place where stuff is very unconscious, even within ourselves and takes a bit of work to define. All that is to say is I have been feeling tremendously emotional during this time. I feel like there's fresh grief around old grief, which has been coming up for me , and I'm always curious about other kinds of grief practices or rituals that I can incorporate into my day. That's the background to the question. How do I care for this grief that I'm experiencing right now? Dorothy: Mm. All right, so I'm going to pull a couple cards…And the first card I pulled was the Eight of Swords. It's an image of a feminine figure blindfolded with swords, kind of staked into the ground. She is bound, and there are a lot of ivy leaves in the background, as well as a panel of purple and hues that are bluish pinkish. And then the second card I pulled, it's the Seven of Cups. Indira: Oh, wow. Illusions abound!. Dorothy: Yeah. Or, you know, the imaginary liminal space, but yes, absolutely. The Seven of Cups is a masculine figure in the foreground, looking up at these seven cups in these different cups, they're golden goblets. They contain different types of figures: a dragon, a wreath, jewels, the tower that we might see in the Tower card, a serpent, a figurehead, and then a bit of a a hidden figure. Those kinds of elements that we see in the Seven of Cups. So let me hand it over to Ana and Xiaowei. Xiaowei: I'll start with the Eight of Swords. I'm actually using a new deck that I haven't used before. And it's by a series of artists from Art Space 220 in Providence, Rhode Island, the Murmurations Tarot Deck. And in the Eight of Swords in this deck, it's similar where there's like knives surrounding this feminine figure, but there's actually this latent strength, and the feminine figure, like their feet, their legs are quite muscular. And there's like one knife like in those secret agent movies where it's like, the knife is like in the garter belt. And it's like, oh, but I've got this one secret knife that I can always take out. And so I don't know, like a sword, there's the double edge of both the kind of grief and anxiety and anxiousness that pulls one back. And then there's also that sword as a kind of secret power, and so I don't know, I feel like your work speaks so much to grief and loss, but there's also this kind of latent strength and secret power. I'm curious how that resonates for you. Indira: I do feel like how I was talking about the 12th house. Right now I feel the presence of something, which is a resource. I know it's in the room. I know it's on stage with me. Yeah, but it's like, I don't have an ID on it. If that makes sense. Xiaowei: That kind of giving name to that latent power feels like a way to tend to tend to it. Indira: Thank you. Ana: To me, the Seven of Cups— there's the Rachel Pollack interpretation and in their book, Seventy-Eight Degrees of Wisdom, it's about getting lost in visions. But I like this idea — what I love about the Seven of Cups, it's such a beautiful image of many things coming together, many practices, objects, spirits, visions. And it makes me think so much of your work, Indira, of Texere. That this work you're doing of weaving together people's stories and lives. That this time of grieving is a collective one. This time of grieving is both individual stories, but we're all weaved together right now. The sadness is bringing up old sadnesses for us. It's a collective kind of action at the same time. And I always liked the interpretation of the Seven of Cups as a way to understand the visions that you're looking at, to name them, sit with them, be present with them. And to me, what's so powerful about the work you do, your calling, as you say, Indira, is that it's both highly individual, highly specific, but also incredibly collective at the same time. And it just reminds me of a Buddhist teacher who said that sometimes these moments of grief, of sadness, they remind us of how not alone we are because they connect us. That pain connects us with other people and reminds us that we need other people, we need these stories. Dorothy: Yes. Plus 1000. All the things. Thank you, Ana, for that mention of Texere. I almost see the Eight and the Seven or the Eight of Swords and the Seven of Cups as basically the warp and the weft. Eight numerologically in tarot is that of action. So what is this figure going to do to unbind herself and find her way through the swords? Because there is an opening, actually, there is a couple in the Rider Waithe depiction where she is not fully enclosed. And so think about this kind of woven nature. If we think even how, if you look at how the figure itself is painted on, there is intersections and crossing over. But then when you talked about, well, there is an opening in between the warp and the weft and those are portals. Well, that is the Seven of Cups. So I love that the two cards are showing us what we've already been talking about this whole time. The reason why I think Ana, Xiaowei, you and I believe so wholeheartedly in this magic of tarot and what it tells us and how we create and how we create, generate and bring into existence these different narratives through all these different art forms, but especially thinking about your practice and how going back to your original question of like holding the grief, processing it. And I feel these two cards are so indicative. I feel tarot always tells you what you know, on top of having a huge sense of humor. Indira: Yeah, no, definitely on the humor piece for sure. Oh my goodness. I'm very grateful. Thank you. Thank you to each of you. [31:47] Queen of Pentacles Dorothy: The other thing is just because inquiring minds want to know is — we want to know about the Queen of Pentacles. Indira: That's so funny. So for those of you who are listening, I'm using my headphones to record this interview, and I name all my devices. Yeah, which I feel like for me is a way of engaging in practical magic around the practice of address. So in the same way that I love being addressed as they/them, because it invokes so many different types of power. I love being able to address my devices in the same way. And so Queen of Pentacles for me speaks to the kinds of resource that come to me through podcasts such as Five and Nine and other music that may be — I'm a big playlist person, so music is a huge resource for me, both emotionally, and in terms of thinking about moving my body. And thinking about phone call and voice node and other forms of conversation as being such a place of resource for me. I am a hard of hearing person myself. When I put my headphones on, there's just this space of intimacy and clarity, which comes through for me through the voice. Five and Nine is a podcast newsletter at the intersection of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — a newsletter every new moon

This is Five and Nine, a podcast newsletter at the intersection of magic, work and economic justice. Welcome to Episode 003.Listen to the podcast now, or read the transcript below, or both!ResourcesMusicThe Gondoliers, composed by Ethelbert Woodbridge Nevin and performed by Georges Barrère and the Barrère Ensemble of Wind Instruments in 1915. Lyrics available here.BooksTrauma Stewardship: An Everyday Guide to Caring for Self While Caring for Others by Laura Van Dernoot Lipsky and Connie Burk Work Won't Love You Back: How Devotion to Our Jobs Keeps Us Exploited, Exhausted, and Alone by Sarah JaffeComplaint! by Sara AhmedThe Screwtape Letters by C.S. LewisPodcasts and Articles:The Happiness Lab by Dr. Laurie SantosLessons On Moving Through Change, Loss, and Disruption by Kaira Jewel Lingo at CIIS Public ProgramsThe Wisdom of Shadows by Xiaowei R. Wang for Five and NinePeptoc, by the West Side Union Elementary School District (please donate!)Tarot Cards: The Wheel of FortuneThe DevilThe HierophantTranscriptAna: So every full moon, we're pushing out a new podcast, and it's been interesting watching that cadence now that it's been two moons. By the time this comes out, it'll be a third moon, and so much has changed, I think. I remember the first time we recorded, we were thinking about that tsunami alert in the Bay Area, which now feels like such long ago news. So much is changing in the day to day, just month by month. And when we're thinking about this with relationship to work and career, I think one thing we've all been talking about is, what is the role of career planning in a time like this? When the world is both literally and figuratively burning in such tragic and difficult ways? What does it mean to even be thinking about work and career during these times? Xiaowei: It's actually something I've been seeing a lot, particularly amongst some of my students and just like younger folks in general. This question of like, everything feels desperate. It's never enough, no matter how many GoFundMes, no matter how many fundraisers, all these things. Like, the world is still crumbling. And yet, we're still here, typing our emails and like setting our quarterly goals. And so, I think one way that I've thought about it for myself is that oftentimes the things that we want to see happen and change in the world might not happen in our lifetimes, or we might not get to see them in our lifetimes. And that change is slow. Dorothy: I really appreciate you bringing that up, Xiaowei, this whole idea of timing and how we might not be able to see things happen in our lifetime, or lifetimes — I'm speaking for myself. But it does remind me, it's all the more reason to be present, because that's the only thing that you can really — I don't even like using the word control, but having a mindfulness of the present moment and how to deal with the things that you can deal with right here, where we are.And I think that's difficult for a lot of people because a lot of people love dwelling in the future, what is to be, or what is the potentiality of a thing? So people get fatalistic or people dwell in nostalgia. We also dwell in these constructs that we grew up with amongst our families, our parents, what we see in media, what we feel we ought to be. Everything in media becomes almost an aspiration of the thing that we must attain. But the reality is, that has nothing actually to do with this. It has very little to do with our own individual experiences. Ana: One kind of interpretation of the classic three card spread that has resonated for me at least is instead of thinking of the big past, big present, big future, is: what are the conditions leading up to now? What are the conditions of the present, and what are some conditions to think about in the future? And in so many ways for me, thinking about time as a series of progressions as moments that influence other moments and effects that we won't fully understand for years and years. It helps me stay in the present in ways that at least are helpful for me personally. Dorothy: I could not help but think of the Wheel of Fortune. When I read for people and this card shows up, sometimes I notice this big sigh happen with the person. You know, even if they're not familiar with tarot, I sometimes will ask them, well, what do you see? And, you know, I use a deck that actually says what it is, and then they go, "Well, it says Wheel of Fortune, so it means that there's no answer." And this kind of goes back to being fatalistic or being nostalgic or wishing for something that was good at the time, but is no more, or wishing for something that in your mind is great. But you also don't know the conditions of that vision as well. I mean, if anyone knows these contentious feelings around making and goal setting, it would be an artist because you always have something in your mind of what something is gonna be. And then it never turns out exactly the way you wanna be. And a lot of it is because there were conditions and circumstances along the way that you might not have foreseen. And so I oftentimes tell people when the Wheel of Fortune shows up, I always see it as the universe asking you to be more present. It also is reminiscent of the Fates. You know, the spinner, the allotter, the unturnable. So these, these three, you know, entities that are spinning time and, and space and, and story and narrative. When someone applies to a job or that they know it's a sure thing — “I know the person who's getting me in, this is a sure thing.” And then they don't get it. Or an artist who said, well, this is a long shot. I'm never gonna get this grant, I'm never gonna get this fellowship. I know this feeling very well. But then you get it. So, how does that change the time space continuum? How does that change what you thought that you couldn't get, that you have all of a sudden, because that affects what you envisioned in your mind. And I feel the Wheel of Fortune is always a reminder for me of that, those things that I need to consider in the present moment. Ana: This idea that there would be linear progress, that we could set a goal and could just get there. That there'd always be these constant improvements in society. It seems like that was the illusion. It seems like that was the kind of vision that's set out for so many years is like the thing that we do, if we just set these goals, we're going to meet them. But instead, when you look at a lot of ancient wisdom, it's that time moves in cycles. Time moves in circular fashion and in waves that come and go. I was listening to this beautiful podcast and talk by the Buddhist teacher and writer, Kaira Jewel Lingo. And she uses this wonderful metaphor of the waves crashing. When I'm in the ocean the waves, they come, they go, some are big, some are small. But the one thing I've learned about the waves is that the more you try to resist them, the harder it is, you just have to ride them, you have to flow with them, you have to anticipate them. And you don't know what waves are coming. But once it's obvious, once you see it there, and once you're in it, you have to change. And it's gotten me thinking a lot about these old ideas of time, these old ideas of fate, of karma, of the wheel of fortune. And how that's, in many ways, that is the reality is that we just don't know anymore. Certainly didn't before, but now we just don't know what the next full moon will bring. And that's actually how most of humanity has lived for a very long time, and so in some ways we're just adapting to that now. Dorothy: Damn, Ana, you straight took it to, you took it to the pulpit harder than the Hierophant. You know what I'm saying? That that was fan fricking fantastic. Xiaowei because you know, the water, you know, the wave, so well, as our, our in-house Scorpio-- Xiaowei: I'm going to get hella Californian for a second. But I actually learned how to swim when I was 30. And it was really difficult as an adult, cuz you're like, here's a substance that is going to kill me. Why am I going into it? I do not trust the fact that you can put your face in it, and I won't drown. But so after learning how to swim, I got. I just fell in love with the ocean. So, you know, it's been incredible to spend weekends out in the ocean, swimming, boogie boarding, on a surfboard. And it's like that sense of going with a wave or it's like that precipice of both being active and also accepting. There are a lot of threads of New Age thinking or tarot or meditative practice that can veer into turning us into feeling like, oh, we just need to accept everything. You know, this bad thing is a teacher and ha ha everything's all good now. And I also think that's one extreme that I really don't find very helpful for myself. I think there is this kind of middle path of seeing the waves, knowing that the waves are different, knowing that the waves are always shifting. So actually, especially in the Bay Area, when you're in the ocean, the waves are always gonna be different because they're affected by the way that the sand changes, and that's constantly shifting. Just being able to accept the difference in reality of each wave, but also not be pounded in the face by it and actually move towards it or move further away or just figuring out how to maneuver and navigate in it — I think that's been this lesson I've learned from the water that I'm trying to apply more broadly. I think it applies to the goal setting in terms of the ways that we think about movement work as well. It's not just throwing our hands up and saying, “Oh, it's all useless.” But to really say, “No, there is a way navigate through these waves. How do we do it skillfully?”Dorothy: You know, and I was listening to Laurie Santos's podcast, The Happiness Lab. (No relation. I've had a few people ask me if I'm related to her.) She teaches psychology, and one of the things that she was talking about was negative thinking. So when you prepare, it's not just this toxic positivity that everything's gonna work out. It's more of, well, what if it doesn't and then what happens when that negative thing that I am preparing for does happen? How will I overcome that? Because nothing, well, most things are not wholly insurmountable, if you prepare. Shadow Work and the Moon Ana: There's this tradition of setting intentions with every new moon. And one thing I really appreciated, Xiaowei, is how you, you wanted to shift that a little bit, to shift it into the new moon as an opportunity for us to do shadow work. Xiaowei: My students can tell you. They're like, “Why do you always relate everything to swimming?” But I will relate it to swimming. When I started to learn how to swim, there were these moments of panic. And so I had to take this adult swim class called Miracle Swim, with this retired firefighter named Richard who was amazing.He was like, “Take it slow. And the worst thing that you can do is panic.” To the kind of unskillful it's like, “Oh my God, I don't wanna panic. I'm terrified. What if I panic, I'm gonna drown?And I think there's a way of realizing and recognizing that we have all these shadow emotions, and the point is to not be more anxious about them or try and avoid them or try and eradicate them, but to really work with our shadows, because that's actually like this really complex and endlessly fascinating and super helpful — at least for me — place to be. Instead of orienting moon work towards, “Oh, what's like, the thing I need to manifest in my life? I need more abundance.” It's actually like, “Let me take a step back and realize I do actually have a lot and then also actually think about the shadows that I might be running away from. And what do I make of these shadows?” Ana: There's something really poetic also there about doing this during the new moon. Because it's literally the shadow of the moon facing us. And there's a Zen saying that whether it's the shadow side of the moon or the light side of the moon, it's all moon.It's all, it's all just part of what Moon-ness is about. And this idea of doing shadow work of engaging in with the kind of these shadow emotions, that's all part of what life is about, right? It's all part of what it means to be a human. Is that there are things that cause stress and strain things that cause us panic, things that uplift us and bring us joy. Dorothy: Recently I read one of the chapters from Sarah Ahmed's book Complaint! You know, she investigates what it means to actually be on record complaining of injustice. What happens when we are thrown unintentionally into the shadow work, because shadow work is not just about ourselves. I think obviously we confront different modalities that we operate in, um, feeling anxiety, frustration, disappointment, anger, rage. This kind of goes to, Xiaowei, what you were saying about movement work and what you've always said, actually that sometimes it really is just about, you know, sometimes it's a few people and it's incremental. It's not all at once. Even though sometimes media tells us that because of the images that we are shown. But I think one of the reasons why I bring up Ahmed's book is because one of the things I found so compelling and so resonant is the fact that when you complain, the textual nature of it and the documentation that ensues after a grievance has been “filed,” you actually start to allow other people to complain as well. And what does it mean to have that buildup, that someone felt that they couldn't actually express, that they felt the need to suppress it? That's actually revisiting a trauma so that it proves itself to be a catalyst for something new and different. I feel the reason why that's adjacent or related to shadow work is because when you see injustice, the complaint is not always welcomed. And what I've been thinking about as I've been reading Sarah Jaffe's book, Work Won't Love You Back. And a video surfaced from a journalist, or two journalists, I believe, in the UK about the abusive nature of game studios. There are video game makers or founders of studios that wanna promote accessibility, inclusivity, empathy, their games are so beautiful yet the conditions at which these beautiful games that I have played myself were abusive environments. It's like, how do you grapple with that? How as a consumer or as a community, or as someone who is invested in these artistic and creative practices do we reconcile all of that? And some of these people that were harmed were my mentors and collaborators, artists that I do deeply admire. I had no idea this was going on. So these are the types of things that I think about with shadow work. How do you reconcile? How do you reconcile the injustice of someone's lived experience that they feel that they can't talk about, that they can't even complain about? And then much later on after all of the muck and the mire of having to deal with the emotional abuse and the difficulties and challenges of making something so beautiful. Xiaowei: I love what you brought up about shadow work, not just being for ourselves. Cause I think very broadly, New Age and tarot stuff can be very neoliberal, like the burden is on the individual, right? To like manifest or look in our shadows and all these things, but you're right. So many of the structures that we live under, like the social processes, the cultural processes, all these things down to the ways that in a workplace we understand, or make sense of feedback. It's a very taken for granted process. It's very easy to just keep going with the way that we've been conditioned, and as much as we say, I'm anti-capitalist or I'm feminist or all these things, yet at the same time we live in society. and we've been conditioned in so many ways. In terms of collective shadow work, this is also part of our conditioning. I look back upon even just conversations with friends or coworkers, where how many times has someone expressed their pain or something bad has happened to them? And my immediate thought is not, I am seeing their pain and sitting with it. But instead it's like reactionary. I'm like, “Oh my God, we need to do something. We immediately need to fix it. Blah, blah, blah.” To be so reactionary, it's not sitting with the shadow and first fully being with it. And I think there really is a power to be with someone else's pain in that way. Ana: What I'm finding both in readings that are read for me and readings that I do for others is that sometimes simply having that space to sit and be present with emotions, to just let them be there without reacting or trying to fix them right away are sometimes the kind of most powerful moments in a reading. Because we have so few spaces in our culture right now. Where simply sitting and being is considered acceptable or encouraged. There's just so much anxiety in the world right now. And at the same time, there's this kind of growth of as a practice of listening to one's intuition, trusting your gut. How do we, how do we sit with all these emotions in a way that is at least in some way helpful for us? Dorothy: I feel a lot of people, and I'll speak for myself, we are in our heads a lot. And I was at, um, you know, very small gathering this past week, uh, outside lunch, honoring still the, that we're, we're still in a pandemic, and someone I deeply admire Mimi Lok, who is an ED for a Voice of Witness, which is an incredible organization. (This was not a plug. This literally is just cuz I adore Mimi.) She said, “Oh, you're you're not eating,” and I said, “Yeah, I know the food looks really good, but I actually got so hungry that I just needed to get a bagel.” And then she looks at me and says, “Oh, so you really attuned yourself to your needs. That's great. Don't feel bad.” And she said, “Continue doing that.” And I bring up this story because I felt in that moment, when she asked me, I felt like I was brought back to my auntie or uncle's house. And you know, when you're in a Filipino household, if you don't eat, that's rude. So there's all these kind of cultural constructs in your mind of what you ought to do or how you ought to act when you're with other people. And I kind of let my anxiety get to me because I thought, “Oh my gosh, I better eat something, even though I'm very full.”Part of the reason why I'm bringing this up is because it serves as such a metaphor to how people function. But because it's not a somatic response, people think that, well, I can overload myself with work. I can do one more hour. I have these 10 emails I need to respond to and I didn't get to it during the day, but I could do it. I really can. It's fine. It's fine. It's fine. And it's not fine at all. And when I think about the difference between following one's intuition and anxiety. I think the intuition has more to do with it's very holistic. It's very much an embodied thing. It's not just your mind thinking this is gonna be a great idea. That's not it. It's like the magician wielding all of the elements. You can't do that without practice. So you pay attention to your body. You pay attention to your mind. You pay attention to your heart. Anxiety is not about that. Anxiety is based on — Xiaowei brought up this neoliberal aspect of our times and notions of free enterprise, bootstrapping everything. Well, you could just manifest. No, you can't. How can you manifest when you're hungry? How can you manifest when you are thinking about your aging parent that's thousands of miles away from you? You can't manifest when your body is not all right. And not to be, you know, woo woo here — I mean all for goodness sake, I'm the director of magic for Christ or for Goddess sake — see, that's my recovering Catholic there. Sorry. I guess what I'm trying to say is to me, that is the difference. Intuition and anxiety. Anxiety is a thing that capitalism feeds on. It's a thing that says, “Oh, Dorothy's real anxious right now. I'm gonna put something on that algorithm that makes her feel even more anxious or, you know, she's about to play the radio.”I think of the Screwtape Letters. And I know some people might feel a little bit weird cuz C.S. Lewis is more of like — a lot of Christian underpinnings in that. But as someone who's born and raised in Catholicism, I'm a recovering Catholic. I'm spiritual, not religious, to put that on record. I think of some of his writing, but in particular Screwtape, like the devil — there's a lot of archetypes coming up today, but how's the Devil seizing those opportunities of play with your shadow to test you, to make you feel anxious, but to not make you feel that you actually can trust your intuition almost as if you're gaslighting yourself. Xiaowei: I feel like it's related to the shadow work cuz it's like, your intuition is like, okay, how do I work with these shadows? And then anxiety is like, I am a shadow. I can't do anything. And I feel like, especially in these ever increasingly wild times that we live under, I always think of my intuition as like the voice in me that says, this is what I need to survive. And it's affirmative. It's I need rest. I need good food. I need my loved ones. Whereas my anxiety is like, oh my God, like I'm gonna lose everything if I don't do this thing. It's much less out of that affirmative I will survive voice. Trauma and Joy Ana: One of the advantages of a podcast newsletter is we can complement the audio format of the podcast with the written resources and notes, especially about all the books that we're referencing here. And speaking of, actually, Dorothy and Xiaowei, what have you been looking at and listening to that you'd like to share with the audience? Xiaowei: I guess one resource that, especially for folks during this time, this was actually a book that Yindi Pei from Logic School recommended, and it's called Trauma Stewardship. I highly recommend it for folks, especially if you're doing movement work or any sort of work out in the world, and it feels like it's not enough right now or not happening fast enough. I feel like that book has a lot of wisdom in terms of making space to have more compassion for yourself. Dorothy: Thank you so much, Xiaowei, for sharing that resource because I need to delve into the depths of that, especially at this time. I, on the other hand wanted to mention the kindergartners hotline if that's okay. Ana: Please. What is the kindergartners hotline, Dorothy? Dorothy: The kindergartners hotline is a hotline that I feel a few teachers came up with this idea where they asked their kindergartners to provide affirmation. So you call and it's literally from the mouth of the children saying things like “You can do it.”Peptoc: You can do it!Dorothy: “You are great.”Peptoc: Keep trying! Don't give up! Dorothy: You know, our younger previous selves can also be ancestors, but I feel people don't tap into those younger versions of ourselves because we always think that, well, that was an unwise or juvenile side of me or a younger version that didn't know anything, but we can still tap into that. Ana: For those listening in, you can see a link to this in our newsletter, thisisfiveandnine.com or you can just give a call to Peptoc. And give them a ring at +1-707-998-8410. Dorothy: There's projects like this out in the world that remind us to be a little less tense about what's happening. Even though it does deserve our attention, that even for two minutes, we can and allow ourselves some joy. Get full access to Five and Nine: Tarot, Work and Economic Justice at fiveandnine.substack.com/subscribe

This is Five and Nine, a podcast newsletter at the intersection of magic, work and economic justice. Welcome to Episode 002.This episode's music is The Gondoliers, composed by Ethelbert Woodbridge Nevin and performed by Georges Barrère and the Barrère Ensemble of Wind Instruments in 1915. It's part of 400,000 sound recordings made available in the public domain this year.Listen to the podcast now, or read the transcript below, or both!This guided meditation lasts just a few minutes and can be done at home, at work, or even on the train. It's inspired by tarot, mindfulness and metta (lovingkindness) practices.If you have control over your space, we recommend having your tarot deck nearby and setting an environment for yourself that will help you enter a state of mindfulness and meditation.If you don't have control over your space, a simple pair of headphones should help. Take a deep breath and find a comfortable position, which could mean sitting, standing, or lying down.Dorothy R. Santos: Although I love all 78 cards in suits, when the cups show up in any spread, whether I'm reading for myself or others, my mind goes directly to how we wade through the waters and flood of emotions. In tarot, the cups traditionally represent the element of water, which in turn represents the emotions. When the cups appear in a spread, we might be confronted with a difficult decision, or when we feel so passionate that we can hardly contain the overflow.Years ago, I was deeply inspired by a river bank meditation I heard one night at the East Bay Meditation Center. Along with the breath, mind the flow of water in your mind's eye. Let's begin.If you have a deck in front of you, shuffle through your deck face up and draw your favorite Cups card. It might be the Queen of Cups, or the Five of Cups, or the Ace of Cups. If you don't have a deck right now, that's okay. This meditation doesn't require a card.We'll start with a deep breath to ground us. A deep breath in for five seconds. A deep breath out. A deep breath in. And a deep breath out.Notice the sensation of the breath on nostrils, the chest, the belly.Imagine yourself on the side of a river. The grass is beneath you. Perhaps there's a sandy bank. Stones flow across the water.Walk up to the edge of the river and sit down for a while. Listen to the water, the birds in the air. What kind of birds are they? How clear is the water?In tarot, flowing water represents the emotions, the depths of feeling we all experience day to day. This river represents the heart, the gut, the joys and sorrows of life.Now imagine boats flowing along the river. These might be little toy boats. They might be slightly larger, perhaps colorful kayaks. Or even larger, like row boats or steam boats. What do the boats look like? Notice the color, the structure, the material. Is there wood? Plastic? Whatever boats come to mind are the right boats for this moment. Maybe next time you meditate, there will be a different set of boats. But these are the boats for you, in this moment.At this point, you may find thoughts rising up in your mind. Name them. Acknowledge them. It can be simple as labeling them: “Thinking. Thinking.” “Planning. Planning.”Each time a thought arises that you can label, place that thought on a boat that floats by. Let the boat keep continuing onward. Allow them to drift away, acknowledging that they're there. Understand that they'll always be there, traveling and returning. In the moment, the practice is just to be present.If you find your mind drifting, that's okay. Just place your attention back on the boats. Let them float by. Let them be.If you have a card, open your eyes and look at the card in front of you. What aspect of the Cups is it calling you to pay attention to right now?If you don't have a card, ask yourself, what kind of water is filling your cup right now? What aspects of your emotional life require attending to?When you're ready, place one hand on your heart and one on your belly. Extend a feeling of warmth, comfort and love to yourself.May all beings, including me, be happy and at peaceMay all beings, including me, be free from pain and sufferingMay all beings, including me, be at ease and comfortableMay all beings, including me, be safe from harm and dangerThank you.Five and Nine is a podcast newsletter at the intersection of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — a newsletter every new moon

This is Five and Nine, a podcast newsletter at the intersection of magic, work and economic justice. Welcome to Episode 001. This episode features a live reading and a reference to the Seed Root and Garden spread in action. As a very visual medium, the tarot benefits from being able to engage with the imagery of the cards, and we include the images from the Rider-Waite-Smith deck for reference. See our previous newsletter to learn more about the Seed Root and Garden spread.Listen to the podcast now, or read the transcript below, or both! Ana: That was "Tiger Rag," performed by the Original Dixieland Jazz Band in 1918. It's part of 400,000 sound recordings made available in the public domain this year. It felt like an appropriate tune for this month because this month marks the Year of the Tiger.  Hi everyone. My name is Ana Mina, AKA An Xiao. I'm an author and intuitive coach working from Tongva, Ohlone and Lenape land. I serve as the producer on this project.  Dorothy: Hello. My name is Dorothy Santos. I'm a writer, artist, and educator based on Ramaytush Ohlone land. And I'm one of the Directors of Magic for Five and Nine. Xiaowei: My name is Xiaowei Wang, and I'm an author, artist and scholar based in Ohlone territory. I'm one of the Directors of Magic and Creative Director on this project. Ana: So we started Five and Nine as three friends from the art and technology world and kind of realized that we are interested in also these issues around magic, tarot, how that fits in with topics around work, economic justice, and decided to put this podcast and newsletter together as a way to foster the conversation, bring a critical discussion to these topics. Especially, especially right now, during this time when there's so much confusion, so much concern around the future of our planet. Xiaowei: So I have had the privilege of working with both of you on various professional projects. And I feel like I've learned so much in terms of how to balance both doing creative work, doing meaningful and impactful work, as well as trying to pay the bills and think about student loans. And so I'm hoping that this newsletter really opens up a lot of difficult conversations that are often sidestepped about the actual process of how to do things. Dorothy: I, aside from adoring the two of you, and again, also making magic in different permutations in the world. I also just saw this as a Thundercat call, and I am really Lion-O, but I'm probably in a Snarf body. That's fine. I'm okay with that. I almost feel like working on something outside of work and academia that allows me to be much more expressive in how I want to talk about work and labor and career and the differences between those three things. It really is because I think we need paths and avenues that allow us to think a little bit more abstractly about the every day, because sometimes the banal and the mundane of something as simple, which we'd like to think is simple, like earning money, building a portfolio, having a new skill, like those, those aren't actually as banal as people think. Xiaowei: In some ways, I think of Five and Nine as — and to pull in my mom here, she always says, “I like to share my mistakes with you, so you don't have to go through them, Xiaowei.” And I see ourselves as having this circle of magic, where we share observations, mistakes, moments of failure or contemplation as we've tried to navigate this work-centric world that we live in, while at the same time balancing our values and also the amount of debt that we owe to the US government. Dorothy: So for me, it's this ongoing archive of our thoughts and observations on how capitalism has actually affected each of our practices as artists, writers, and also people that I've had an engaged in professional work in various ways. Ana: There's the very practical and the very magical, and how do you balance those things? How do you talk about those things? I think all three of us have been engaged in this conversation for years now. It's good to talk about that and to ask ourselves, what does it mean to do work in a world that's so deeply unjust? Dorothy: I remember one of the things my mom said to me when — and I was actually on TV, like the evening news, at a protest one time. And my mom said something really interesting — and I don't critique her for this, I understand it, but it is complicated, it's been over a decade — but my mom said, "I didn't immigrate to this country for you to suffer or risk your wellbeing in your life for other people."  And I didn't know actually how to respond to her. But when you come from an immigrant family, the nine to five thing actually doesn't exist. All of my life as a kid, my grandparents woke up — actually, they woke up at five in the morning, my dad woke up at four, and the workday was atypical all the time, because it was more about survival than it was about thinking about a career. And even before I had the language of economic justice, I did also have magic. And I think the confluence of all those things in my life now, decades later, is for a reason. And I feel like I'm doing so many things later in my life, and I think that's another consideration when thinking about this work that we do — is this kind of intergenerational dialogue around what these things actually mean. Xiaowei: For a long time, my mom had that attitude, and I think still does to some extent, but I realized it's because she's coming from a culture where the social safety net is there already. And oftentimes it comes in the form of family. Coming from a big sprawling Chinese family, like, say what you want, but I have cousins who are queer who are maybe not accepted in mainstream Chinese society, but it's always, the bottom line is, your family is there to provide for you and to always accept you. And then on top of that, you have this broader social safety net in China. And so in some strange way, I realized, I guess I could understand how it's a little bit perverse to like get paid just to be in a society where that kind of social support and social benefit is not the default. Ana: I kinda like where we landed with that name, Five and Nine, the symbology of five as this turning point, the nine not quite the completion, but almost there, kind of rethinking this whole thing.  Dorothy: Ana, you just read my brain. You know, numerology is, has always fascinated me. And I think one of the things that I love about the name that we chose is five in the tarot is also about conflict and challenges and how you battle something out. So even if we look at the different suits, Five of Swords, Five of Pentacles or Coins, et cetera, and as someone who comes from this background of visual and critical studies, I always look at the symbology. And the Five of Swords is always this really tricky card to talk about because it's someone walking away from — it's people walking away from one another, but are you the victor, or are you the person who has been defeated? And this is what is so freaking magical about the tarot is that you actually don't know that until much later on. And so when I think of the Five of Swords, or I think of any of the Five of fill-in-the-blank suit, I think of that, that in one way, shape or form you can explain something. I think there's a great responsibility when being a tarot reader as well, because you have to not just actively and deep, listen to someone, you also have to, there's so many other things involved, body language, context, reading the proverbial room. But then it's also Five AND Nine. It's not Five TO Nine. And I know I'm being a real semantics geek right now, but as you mentioned, Ana, Nine isn't actually about completion. It's about just getting there, just getting there. And so, I love that as simple as Five and Nine sounds, it's actually much more complex, and the tarot actually tells a deeper, broader story. And I think that's what's so beautiful about it, and why I've loved it ever since I was a teenager.  Xiaowei: I love that term, "reading tarot and reading the room," because one of the things that I think for folks who maybe have never read tarot or just tangentially know about it, it's like, where does this come from? Where does all this knowledge come from that you're spitting at me during this reading?  And I think that points to how we've really constructed these ways of where knowledge comes from. Especially in the West, knowledge comes from seeking. It comes from actively downloading comes from probing, I think of Jeff Warren's work and when he talks about microscopes and how with a lot of modern microscopes, you're like actively shooting radio waves at the object. But the very flip side of that, the tarot really surfaces is that it's about tuning in, that actually all of this knowledge, all of these reflections, all of the wisdom to be gained, it's there already. And tarot is this way of helping us tune in to the things that are already there. And, there are so many practices that fall into alignment with that as well, like walking meditation, things like that. And I also love reversals because when I was taught to read reversals by Eliza Swann from Golden Dome, she posed reversals as an exclamation point. And again, too, I think we're just so used to thinking in binary. So like a reversal — "something that was good is now bad" — but actually that's not it. There's always this Middle Way in between, which is what we have to tune into.  Ana: And so it's the “Middle Way Podcast.” Seed, Root, Garden Spread (11:25)Ana: Dorothy and Xiaowei are the Directors of Magic for this project, and they created a spread for the Year of the Tiger. Dorothy: Yes: seed root garden. It is a three card spread that looks at and asks and prompts the querent — or I also want to be very expansive here for anyone who is interested in reading for other people. The seed card is what needs to be planted. The root card is how to best cultivate, and the garden card is what environment, place and/or space — however you want to think about that — is needed to have this root bloom even further and to grow and be attuned with the seasons. And the reason why I talk about shape of a spread and that there's variations of it, that if you wanted to create a triangle, so, you know, at the bottom left of this is a seed. The top is the root. And then the lower right-hand corner of the triangle is the garden. That's one way of looking at the shape of the spread.  But you can also have the seed at the bottom. And then on top of that is the root card. And then on top of that is the garden card. For those of you that are not familiar with tarot, the basic three-card spread oftentimes represents past, present and future. Sometimes when I do three card spreads for people, and I say, "Okay, we're going to just do something quick and dirty. We're going to do past present future." It's very daunting for a lot of people because that timescale is just like, "Whoa, wait, my whole life? You mean like my whole ass past? Like, that's a lot to think about!"  But when you think about it in the context of seed root and garden, playing around with a different — not just semantics, but meaning of what a three-card spread could mean and could be for you, dear listener, I think what I'm hoping for is that there's something in particular that you're wanting to seed. So if you already know, I want to gain a skill that allows me to work with the community more. So that might mean I really love design, so I want to create flyers, or I want to help with PR or social for a campaign.  Well, that's the seed, and then you kind of have an idea of what you want to root and, you think, well, this is kind of best rooted in community. The things that I want to do. And the garden that you want to develop off of that, the environment you want to create is not just context for who else is riding with you, but what do you need? What kind of environment do you need to actually cultivate and continue cultivation of that?  And the seed root and garden spread is just one avenue and one path for you to learn even the language of the tarot. Depending on what cards you get, it's infinite, the combinations you can get. Then the tarot, albeit the universe, starts to talk to you through that and how you might understand, okay, well, you understand what your seed is, but maybe this is the thing that you need to understand. Maybe there's a decision that you need to make, maybe you're getting the Two of Cups here, so you have some type of feelings and emotions around a decision based on the seed that you actually want to plant, et cetera.  Xiaowei: So part of our work at Five and Nine is thinking about the different seasons, and being that it's both winter in North America, where we all are currently, as well as Spring Festival or Lunar New Year, it's really a time to start planning out the crops or the garden.  One of the things that really came up was a conversation that we had last year around this time. Oh God, now my brain is like, what is, what is time? 20—? No, the year before 2020, during September and October, Dorothy, you and I were talking about the fires and everything going on and kind of this phrasing of people saying, it's the end. And I think we have a very simplistic notion of the end, and we forget that it's actually like, there's a lot of other things like composting, or just a cycle of things that happened. Dorothy: I will cite Mama Dulce here, my mother, who texted me this morning saying that she was watching a UFO documentary on Netflix and how she said, well, you know, this isn't the end of humanity. This is a lesson in how we need to survive, need to change. And you do that through very intentional, slow practice.  Okay, let me pick the easiest plant. So pothos. One of my good friends, Helen Tseng, they sent me something like apartment therapy. I don't even know if it's from that, but I started getting into plants more a few years ago, and they gave me a trimming of their pothos, and it's grown considerably. I actually have different trimmings all over the apartment that I live in. But the article I think they sent me, it had the line or the headline was, “The stupid, easy plant to take care of.” And I'm sharing this because even at the rate that the potho grows, it's a reminder of duration and time and what you're doing and where you were when you first took care of the trimming when you first planted it. And, obviously, my planting skills have graduated to other plants. I'm bringing this up related to the spread because I remember my mom, she was scared for her plants when she would travel because she would say, “Oh God, I know I'm going to come back to one or two of my plant babies, and they're completely dead.”And that was the case when I took care of it, but not anymore. But I think that was one of the foundational aspects of coming up with this spread with you was if we think about this and apply it to the way we look at how we show up in the world and how we are present with other people, whether it's through our work or community organizing or artistic practice, how do we take a seed and cultivate it? And what do we do with the roots when they come in and what should we consider?  Because even before you plant a seed, you actually have to know whether that seed is going to grow in the environment you're placing it in, because some seeds just won't grow. And sometimes you learn those lessons after the fact. I think we came up with variations on how this might look for someone. And that was something I felt was very important because some people want to see the seed root garden relationship as a triangle. Some people might see it as an actual sprout, something that grows vertically, but it's pretty open. And I think that's what I love most about what we came up with.  Xiaowei: Yeah. And as an avid gardener I think there's just always a magic that I encounter when it's early morning and I get to really be with the plants, and plants just go through this. You can kind of tweak it through adjusting the environment. But it's like, they just grow. No matter what, they will grow, even if they're outside, and you're like, I forgot to water them. They will grow towards water. So this kind of magic of survival and of life and this kind of vital force is really powerful to me. I think it's also incredible how a flower, it goes to seed, it just has this kind of intrinsic lifecycle. And to me that reminds me of the power of just knowing when certain things are enough. And what I mean by this is when I first started reading tarot for myself, it was like really in my wishes. Like, “I have this wish to achieve this thing and how do I get there? And the tarot will help me do that.” And now looking back upon it, it's very simplistic. It's more just like, “How do I tune in to try and figure out this garden in this season?” And very practically, earlier this week, I was talking with a friend who was not sure if he should leave his job. He was like, "But when will I know?" And I was like, "Well, you'll know when you know." And not to sound cryptic about it, but he was kind of going on about how he didn't like this new set of managers that were hired, things like that. And he was like, "Oh, but I don't want to leave because of that." And it's like, “Yeah, exactly.” The decisions that you make have to come from that same force of a flower. It just, , blooms, it just opens up. It has to have that same kind of energy. And so I think this spread really reminds us of that in its formation. Applying the Spread (20:41)Ana: Should we do a reading for ourselves for this project? Dorothy: I mean, I am down for that. Who's gonna pull a seed card?  Xiaowei: Do you want to?  Dorothy: Sure. I'm picking one right now...  All right. Ready? Jesus, I got the Five of Pentacles. Xiaowei: The tarot has a good sense of humor.  I pulled the Four of Wands for roots.  Dorothy: Wow. Okay. Okay. Ana: The garden: I pulled the Tower. Dorothy: Oh my God. Goddess, really, actually.  Holy — so many thoughts...  Ana: Okay. Five of Pentacles. It's a seed that needs to be planted. The root is a Four of Wands, how to best cultivate. And the garden, the environment, and the place that's needed to have this fruit bloom further is the Tower. Dorothy: I don't think that the Five of Pentacles is meant to be about us. I kind of understood that as the context of what we're in. I know that that the garden is for that maybe, or it might be read that way, but I think the seed that needs to be planted being the Five of Pentacles has more to do with, oh, how have we processed, metabolized, taken in the loss and the grief that we are experiencing in our own individual lives in relation to our communities, our work, professional academic community, and what we witnessed all around us?  And this is going to sound really strange, but sometimes the most beautiful things are seeded from something that is very painful. Like when we read for one another, all we do is laugh when we pull cards, because it's just like, “Oh yeah, thanks, universe, I hear you loud and clear.” [The Five of Pentacles] is these two individuals, these two figures that are plowing through the snow literally, and one is injured, another one is forging ahead. And then you see these Pentacles at a window.  And I felt visually when I saw that, I thought, “Oh, okay, we have to take what we've been given, and that becomes the seed of the work that we do.” Because it's not just about accomplishments. It's not just about the experiences that we've gained. It's also what we've lost, and the different types of failures we've experienced in our individual lives that bring us together to not just understand one another and how we're going to be in this continuous dialogue, because — and I always tell people this, when I read for them — the tarot is probably not going to mean anything if you don't do the work. And that's what the universe is trying to tell you.  I always have this joke when I tell people, I always am just trying to be the Oracle in The Matrix. You know how she tells Neo in the original Matrix that you didn't come here to ask what to do. But you came here to figure out why you're doing it. People already know and have decisions made up in their mind. The reason why people go to tarot is they want to understand, well, why do I feel this way? Or they want to seek affirmation or confirmation. A really ethical, responsible tarot reader will always know that you can never predict things and that as painful and as uncomfortable something might be that that might be the actual thing that needs to be planted. So it becomes something different and new and evolves into something unexpected.  Xiaowei: I think one of the things that I love about spreads is that so much of the cards, there's an intrinsic meaning, but then there's also the context that they're in. And to me, there's this element of the Five of Pentacles card that is about relationships to institutions. And then also people who are these injured people, who are kind of banding together. And at least in the context of the spread that we've just done, to have the root be Four of Wands just highlights that energy for me in the Five of Pentacles even further. That's about coming together to really build this refuge for ourselves.  Dorothy: The one aspect of the card visually I don't like is the representation of disability as a type of thing that communicates loss and grief, and I wanted to just big up and put a little shine on the New World Tarot, which actually represents so many different types of bodies and ability, disability, and all different types of morphologies — human morphologies — that are of strength and a type of relentlessness. As someone who suffers from chronic pain, it hasn't actually hindered my spirit, and I deal with it the best way that I can. And I'm bringing this up because I oftentimes feel we live in a world, in a culture where those things are not factored in. But they are represented as, you're losing at the game, and the game being, capitalism or, whatever, whatever game you feel that we're all playing. And I read with different decks for different people. I really love the whole format of, sometimes, if I'm in the mood, allowing my, my querent, the person who has sought a tarot reading to, choose their deck. And that's been a really great practice for me because it really forces me to be present with the person, and to just be in the moment, because I don't know what deck they're going to choose, number one, but also it forces me to really connect with the different visual formats I'm working with, but also the different symbologies. And that's just something that I wanted to point out.  Ana: One thing that I find interesting when I'm talking with people who do these kinds of ancient practices, or old practices, I should say. There's something deep here, but at the same time, the thing that I struggle with is , yeah, the same practice that contains so much wisdom at the same time contains these problematics contains things that we may not agree with anymore as a society or as readers. I feel like we're trying to navigate which wisdom is still relevant, which wisdom is still applicable Xiaowei: I love what you two have brought up about this kind of duality between tarot and all of these practices as having this kind of ancient wisdom, but then also some problematics. And I think , for me, I always think of in Buddhism, how we talk about the moon is a symbol of enlightenment, but all of this is just pointing to the moon, right? Like, don't mistake the moon for enlightenment.  And that reminds me of reading tarot as well. It has a knowledge of a certain kind, but don't mistake the card for the precise knowledge. I think especially this image of the Tower card, like everything that we're saying and thinking, and our reflections on the tarot. You know, 20 years down the line, the stuff that we're saying now might be entirely antiquated or problematic or so different, and so of this time period. And I am a thousand percent okay with that.  Ana: I'm noticing something, looking at the spread, going from bottom to top, is it's a bit of an ascension into a tower. You have two figures outside, arguably, a building or a tower. And then at the root, those two figures are, instead of maybe struggling outside, are now celebrating it, cultivating it, building something beautiful. And then just as we've been talking about with that cycle — cycles of change, cycles of planting and rooting and gardening — those two figures eventually find themselves trapped in that tower and leap forth. So many of the people I've been reading for or talking with are finding themselves in this exact intersection right now of trying to get into the game, reaching a point of cultivating and celebrating that, and then finally asking, “Oh, this is right for me anymore?”Xiaowei: Some time ago, Ana, we were talking about David Brooks and his book, The Second Mountain, and — all my distaste for David Brooks's conservatism aside — I think the Tower also speaks to that kind of Second Mountain notion. That it's not just like you've reached the top — "There you are, enjoy your castle." But there's always more mountains to be climbed.  Dorothy: I think something that's also related, is the Tower is also about coming into a new type of consciousness. I'm kind of citing Rachel Pollack here because I always think about the ways that the bodies are depicted in the Tower and how the head is oftentimes pointing almost directly to the Earth. Yes, you can kind of posit it as a type of death, but it is a type of a forced leap maybe, or a really fast dive into a consciousness that you're not expecting. And I feel that that is so in relation to what we are experiencing now and when we're doing this project. We're starting it in the midst of a global pandemic. Even just thinking about the tower card, I often times think that what people forget is there's value in understanding and digging through the rubble of the ruins. That if you want to rebuild something, it's there for you. But the ruins also tell you that what came before it didn't last for a reason. And you may not know the reason of why the Tower has crumbled, but what does it tell you about the land that you're on, in a figurative and literal sense?What does my mom say? Oh my gosh, I want to bring her wisdom into this. My mom used to tell me like, "No one's going to build a monument for you." Nothing's infinite, and what is infinite is not tangible . Xiaowei: To me, I think the Tower in this spread, especially as we're reading for our project, also points to how there are so many ways where when we start to talk about work or career, or even magic, it really just becomes about the level of the individual and focused on like, well, what can you do? And the Tower, I think, really embodies an ethos that we all share, which is this broader one of recognizing that the ways that we experience the world, they're part of this bigger sky, this bigger context that we're all part of.  It's very much the way that it's drawn. These people falling out of the tower. It's very much a conditioning that's extremely Western in a lot of ways. There's a type of architecture in Japan, a country that has a lot of earthquakes, where the buildings are made of wood, and they're very lightweight. There's not a lot of glass that's used. And it's built so that it eventually collapses and doesn't hurt the people who are inside of it.  Year of the Tiger (33:31)Ana: So it's the Year of the Tiger. February 1, 2022 until January 21, 2023. And we have just noticed that Dorothy's Zoom profile has her wearing a pretty amazing tiger shirt. Dorothy: I actually got that thrifting and. I remember the reason why I bought it is because I used to be friends with a couple of stylists, and I remember one of the things they said to me was, "Your attire doesn't match your personality."I don't think this is going to surprise you two. When I worked at — when I had a corporate life, I always wore, what do they call it? Like, a very east coast palette for like for winter. I always wore gray, black, dark, dark, dark brown, like super dark colors all the time. And they said, "I think you need to start wearing print." And so this was my compromise when I saw this, and that's why I bought it because I said, “Well, it's still black.” I love wearing black, but I love this animal. And this animal is awesome and there's it's print, so why not?  Ana: And so somewhere in the middle is this amazing shirt that has this beautiful tiger on it.  Dorothy: I mean the one revelatory thing that came out this week when Xiaowei said that tigers sleep for like 12 hours or something. Xiaowei: Twenty! Dorothy: Twenty. Okay. And, you know, listen, that sounds amazing. Ana: That's where they get all their energy, right?  Dorothy: That's true.  Ana: How else are you going to be brave and ferocious if you don't get your beauty sleep first? Dorothy: Oh my gosh.  Xiaowei: I just love it because it's a kind of reminder of where to save your energy. I'm sure like as big cat predators, they need to eat a lot, but it's like, why spend all your energy chasing down a tiny bamboo rat, if you can sleep for 20 hours and catch something bigger? Dorothy: I mean, a hundred percent. Xiaowei: I was checking in with my therapist, and she was like, well, how are you doing on the basics these days? And I was like the basics, like, you know, writing 800 words a day?  And she just gave me this look. And she was like, "That's not the basics. That's high functioning." Literally what she said was like, "The basics is sleeping, drinking water and leaving the house once a day." Dorothy: Oh my God. Oh my Goddess. Oh, also quick question. In the Chinese Zodiac I'm Year of the Horse. What are you two?  Xiaowei: I'm Tiger. Dorothy: Oh yeah, that's right.  Ana: I'm a Pig. Dorothy: I joke around and say I'm a stallion….Five and Nine is a podcast newsletter at the intersection of magic, work and economic justice. We publish “moonthly” — a newsletter every new moon