Tonight’s episode won’t be a normal episode. I flew to LA on Monday for a last-minute trip, witnessed the Emmys, learned so many amazing things, and met many amazing people. Then later, flew to Hawaii for a much-needed mental reset.
At the moment, my rear end is sitting on the beach of Honolulu, my toes digging into the sand, and the birds of the beach wondering if my laptop tastes good. Where once only the Hawaiian royalty were allowed on this beach—it was their playground. So as gate-kept as this beach once was, unfortunately tonight’s episode will also be rather gate-kept from our usual time slot of Wednesdays at 9/8 Central Chicago. A much-needed vacation. Here we are, the next day, Thursday at 9 PM Oahu, HI time.
I have some exciting news to share with you all. I have several new episode drafts, but they aren’t the right fit for today. This is what seemed most fitting to send out.
I haven’t slept much this week. We can attest to a total of ten hours slept throughout the past five collective days. My mental stamina has been rather depleted.
I’m hearing whispers this week is the witches’ week, the week of transformation, and for those like me that have lain wide awake with their brain still pulsing on random facts and problems I need to solve, I browse through what others might have to say on social media—those that are also unfortunately still awake at 6 AM on a Tuesday night as I.
According to the Internet, it’s witches’ week. Lilith just moved into the sidereal Sagittarius house and is working with the deity Nirriti, who is known to soothe the throat chakra of silenced spiritual women, the vulnerable truth-tellers.
In astrology, Lilith refers to Black Moon, rather than a planet. It’s the focus on the empty side of the Moon’s orbit. It’s a place of exile, raw appetite, and the self that refuses to submit. In Abrahamic folklore, she is Adam’s first wife, who left Eden, leaving him alone. She’s known for representing the part of you that can’t be tamed, an appetite you are ashamed of, the woman who would rather run away than obey. Lilith moving into Sagittarius just means the points have aligned in Sagittarius’s flavor for blunt truth-telling and wanting it all. (If you can’t tell, I’m a Sagittarius.)
Nirriti is the Vedic Goddess of decay and dissolution, the underside of order. She comes from some of the oldest Hindu scriptures, and she’s not the nicest one by far. She personifies things falling apart, the rotting, the bad luck, the grief, the sharp edge you forgot was still inside of you. Those who practice and pray to Nirriti, the deity, most of the time it’s for her to leave them alone.
I’ve never considered myself a witch, a rock practicer, an avid churchgoer, or even a fully committed Christian, but I have always considered myself a “woo woo.”
Growing up, I was surrounded by one religion, one way of thinking, one sense of life. As a young girl finding new routes, discovering new religions, new practices, new cultures, and ideas, I’ve always tried to consider everyone’s beliefs, “woo woo” or not, to try and have a better understanding of myself, my mind, my body, and the world around me.
To give credit where credit is due, our computers cannot operate without a quartz crystal rock. That’s right—a rock. The ocean is the largest mass of anything accumulated on this planet, and yet the moon, the stars, and the alignment of the galaxy tell her, the ocean, exactly where she can go.
Manifestation, when done right, is only Newton’s law. Saying a poem, then lighting a candle, or taking a sip of wine, is a form of that.
In all three Abrahamic religions, we have interchangeable stories—the same people but with a different outlook on it, the same mantra for peace, and forever the human evils that turn a mantra for peace and light into control and ego.
In Hinduism, chakras are a higher topic of conversation, which I find wildly interesting. It was the first thing that I studied that showed true evidence that mental and physical health are deeply interconnected. Through the connection of spiritual practices and black-and-white science, over the past decades we have learned that a bruised chest can mean a bruised identity, a stutter can mean stress chooses to sit at the throat, an anxious person has their paranoia choose their host in dizziness and perhaps nausea, and guilt makes your cheeks red hot.
There are seven chakras: the root of your spine, lower abdomen, upper abdomen, center of the chest or your heart, between your eyes or more commonly known as the third eye chakra, the top of your crown, and my topic of conversation, the throat chakra.
The body, the mind, and the soul are deeply interconnected. Those who question Christianity’s baseline often argue that the Holy Trinity—God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit—acts simply as a mirror for creating peace throughout your body, mind, and soul, your own personal Holy Trinity.
If you’ve had emotional strain, stress, any type of mental block, or unnecessary bridge this week as I have, I want you to pay attention the next few days to each of your seven chakras. Do you feel tension at the top of your crown, or a flustered feeling at the bottom of your stomach? Which chakra points light up, tighten, or become more rigid when you’re depleted, stressed, or anxious? Have you developed any habits or vices like I that are subconsciously targeting that exact chakra?
Even just talking about my throat chakra, I feel it tighten, yelling at me not to say another word, allowing only carbon dioxide to leave my tongue. My battles with kicking smoking nicotine, the harsh Diet Cokes I crave early in the morning and right after my 2 pm slight downhill. My recurring nightmare of not being able to scream when I need to the most. I mean, hell, I was a full-blown thumb sucker for the first thirteen years of my life. In honor of soothing my throat chakra, I’ll tell you such an embarrassing story of mine. It took me years to connect all of these memories, habits, vices, and soothing techniques I’ve used throughout my life. This utterly embarrassing one screams that my chakra of choice has been, and may always be, my throat.
I’ve always been rather anxious until I lap to a feeling of competence. My social skills, my friend circles, still could use a few more laps. At the young ages of 12 and 11, I had a few friends, but I wasn’t one of the “townies,” so I felt anxious making new friends, wondering if I even did fit in, and what that may even look like. Times I would get so anxious I’d want to run and hide, and as a closet thumb sucker, maybe just one hit would make me feel better. Just around the corner of the hallway, past my class and the next teacher’s class, and make the right-hand turn, you’ll see a little door, usually unlocked. “Janitor” read the sign just outside the door. I opened it just a crack so I could slide in, kept the lights off, and crouched down in a tiny janitorial closet next to the mop and buckets of cleaning materials. I’d pull out my thumb, take a hit, take a few breaths, and return back to class.
Imagine if I were to get caught. Brittany or Meredith opening the janitor’s door to find little Sheridan crouched down, anxious, scared, getting just one hit of her thumb in so she can calm back down and return to class. Thank Jesus I was never caught.
But I did that. I snuck into the janitor’s closet so I could suck my thumb for a second when the day got too loud for me.
My throat chakra has tightened this week, the witches of online spooking with me that I may truly be a part of this community, the eerie fortune cookie that was a thousand percent differently printed than every other fortune cookie at PF Chang’s—no numbers, no logo, no little TM, nothing. Inside the fortune cookie was a little piece of paper, blank on one side, with a slightly too-small font on the other reading in Times New Roman, “How you connect business and art will impress your colleagues and bring you into the next light.”
Did I cry at PF Chang’s? No, almost. I blinked the one tear away and tightened my posture before it became a reality on my cheek; I definitely put too much blush on.
I’ve always been rather woo-woo. I saw my first ghost in a church service and burst into tears. I won the flat-screen TV at my prom raffle because I was repeating in my head, “The TV is mine, I have it in my hands.” Then it was. I have a certain pattern of dreams that arrive to me telling me the future. I know when someone’s staring at me from behind with ill thoughts, sexual, or just simply looking. I understand energy, frequency, and feel these at depths I can’t truly explain.
I’m not going to transcend this series into teaching you how to astral plane, or other magical whimsical shit, but I think I need to talk more about these practices, how they helped me better understand myself, and how you can take practices from different “woo woo” things to a practice or habit that feels right for you.
My throat chakra hates me right now. But this is because I need to jump; I need to scream at the top of the hill with all my lungs, and let the world know I am here. I’m still trying to kick the nicotine, and after going a few days without it, my sanity, the throat chakra, scratched and scratched until I gave it what it wanted.
It’s not another vice I need, but to understand how my body will allow my throat to soothe without smoking. So I thought this episode would be sharing the honest journey I’m on right now. I’ve studied chakras, read too deep into pagan practices, I respect the rock girls, and I feel a sense of peace when looking over the three Abrahamic religions of the world. But my research has just been picked back up, as my personal Holy Trinity is craving a new sense of direction.
The discomfort I’ve been describing—the throat tightness, the thumb sucking, the nicotine pull, the urge to scream—all are clear telltale signs my throat chakra is in need of new techniques, new practices, a new healthy way to be soothed. Over the next few weeks, I’ll be exploring what this means to me, what works, and what is just plain silly. If you’re interested, I’d love to share the journey with you.
Please let me know if you enjoyed this episode. I know it’s different than what we usually see from my feminine poetic rants, but as I’ve continued to grow within this series, I’ve been searching for what value, lesson, something I can give back to you. I think maybe this is it.
More next week.
xo,
Sheridan Guerrette
WhatSheridanSaid.com
Life Behind the Artist: Wed at 9/8C
