The power of your imagination
Plus: "Light a Candle for Democracy" 2024 edition
It’s one thing for someone to take your power. It’s another thing to just hand it over.
Which is why I deleted my Twitter account this morning.
Because when I woke up, I realized that my fears about the election had gotten the best of me. And the reason for that was because slowly, over the course of this stressful election cycle, I had been returning to Twitter more and more in order to “keep abreast” of the latest.
But really, I was just drinking the poison.
I often joke about how I voluntarily drink the poison on Twitter because I always think I’ve “got it all under control.” (Doesn’t that sound like an addict? Eek!) Yes, Twitter constantly tries to outrage-bait users by showing them the worst comments by the “other side” to roil everyone into a frenzy, but I just scroll on by. So I thought I was fine.
However, what I did slowly succumb to was the inundation of fear-posting from “my side.” Fears about fascism, about the neck and neck polls, about millions of Americans who seem willing to hand over their rights—and everyone else’s—at the voting booth.
Now, I understand that these issues are real, frightening, and quite possible, but when they begin to control the way I imagine my world, it becomes fear porn, and I know I’ve surrendered my sovereignty.
What the hell was I doing? My imagination is precious territory. I can’t just let anyone in.
The Sacred Imagination
As an artist, I love my imagination and have long considered it one of my greatest allies. One of the reasons I love being a part of Lorian, my spiritual community, is that we treat the imagination itself as sacred. Exploring the imagination in this light has opened up my perception of how it also helps us evolve as a species, which also means becoming better partners to Gaia, the soul of the world.
Our imaginations are our portals to Source itself.
Because of my fascination with the imagination, I’ve been spending months working toward a Pink Teacup podcast focusing on the imagination in all its facets, and yet, there I was, wasting precious hours on toxic social media, handing complete strangers the keys to the car of my imagination and letting them drive!
Oh hell to the no.
That was the moment I thought I better delete my account. And then, when I realized I was actually a little afraid to do that, I knew that I must. So I “deactivated” and felt a huge sense of relief.
Now let’s see if I get the DTs. I’ll keep you posted.
Imagining Goodness
Nothing is easier for most humans, really, than to imagine the worst. And we do it, I think, to protect ourselves from being blind-sided by fate—like some weird but totally unhelpful mental preparation.
I say “unhelpful” because if the worst does happen, it won’t help that you imagined it beforehand. It’ll still be hard—whatever it is.
Which is why we need to really appreciate that our imaginations are our superpower—one that most of us barely use. Or take for granted. Or leave totally unchecked to run amok.
Or, most often, some strange combination of all three.
But we can cultivate our imaginations for good. We can recognize all the wonderful ways we already use our imaginations without consciously perceiving them as acts of imagination: For instance, when we empathize, we imagine how someone else feels and turn that into compassion, which is an expression of love. Or when we believe in someone else’s ability to succeed, or heal, or achieve their dream, we’re augmenting their imagination with ours and creating courage—so beautiful.
So for the next 8 days of what’s left of this election, I’m focusing on what’s possible, what’s beautiful, what’s courageous, and what’s unifying. I’m going to imagine the outcome I believe is most loving, most compassionate, and most respectful. I’m going to dwell on civility, the beauty of the rule of law, human rights for everyone, and all the secular values about democracy that I was brought up to believe in—even if, as a nation, we fall short of living up to them—sometimes desperately so.
Because I’m interested in how we can imagine our collective way into truly living up to those ideals—not throwing the baby out with the bathwater just because we haven’t managed it so far.
My Inner Thomas Paine
For the past few weeks, I’ve also been feverishly working on my first “zine” for my “Founding Member” subscribers. And—speaking of flawed expressions of our national ideals—this zine is about the legacy of unfairness in the Electoral College system and a solution I find exciting called the “National Popular Vote Interstate Compact” (I know, it’s a mouthful).
I’ve been obsessed with this topic for a few years now, but to write this zine, I really had to do more research. Let me tell ya, those founders were walking contradictions in big, weird ways. They made some serious mistakes and did some ugly compromising for the worst of reasons (slavery, of course.)
But they also did some great imagining and dug down into the best of themselves to offer up a new kind of democratic republic to the public imagination of late 18th century America, which is pretty darn amazing really.
However, what is probably most amazing, imagination-wise, is that they managed to write something expansive enough in its thinking and structure to be able to morph and modernize over time—truly a “living document.”
No. Small. Feat.
Get Your Zine On
I was hoping to get these zines done before the election, but as I’ve been channeling my inner Thomas Paine to make this zine, it’s evolved into a bigger project that’s now a full-on little handmade book. I’ve printed all the covers by hand and am now sewing in the signatures.
I’m gonna make a whole video about it for next week’s post, but if you think you want to get one too, you can sign up here to become “Founding Member.” (That’s what Substack calls it, which is the platform this newsletter lives on.) “Founding Members” will get a zine every quarter from me until at least the end of 2025. (But maybe not quite this elaborate.) I might make up a new thing to offer in 2026, who knows.
(Also, if you are already a paid subscriber (thank you), and you want to upgrade to “founding member” to get a zine, Substack will actually prorate your subscription.)
Here’s a few pictures as a preview:
Political Goodness
I have many readers here who found me when I did an art installation called Light a Candle for Democracy in 2020. And there are other subscribers whom I met even earlier during my Vote Poster project in 2018.
This morning, when I needed a reminder of political goodness, I re-watched the videos I made about those two projects. So I thought I’d share them here because many of you don’t know about these projects. I hope you enjoy them.
2018 Midterms Vote Poster Project:
I did this project with my older sister, and I couldn’t believe how life-affirming it was from start to finish:
Light a Candle for Democracy: 2020…and now 2024!
In 2020, over 700 people signed up to participate and literally scores of people sent me photos of themselves with their lit candles from all over the U.S and a few other countries as well:
Light a Candle 2024—Join Us on Monday 11/4
I’ve actually had many people ask me if I would do Light a Candle for Democracy again—and it actually happened again just today as I was writing this. While I cannot recreate that installation, I’ve decided to set up a zoom call where we can all come (with a candle) and I will lead a meditation similarly to what I did back in 2020.
If you’d like to be a part of that, please let me know. It will be on Zoom on Monday November 4 at 6:30 Mountain Time (5:30 Pacific, 7:30 CT, 8:30 EST.) Just leave a comment or hit reply and I will send you all the details!
And of course, feel free to leave a comment on any other part of this essay as well—I always love hearing from you.
Thank you, as always, for reading all the way to the end. It means the world to me.
I'm glad I drafted my blog for tomorrow (scorchedeyebrowstudio.wordpress.com) before I read this. I can claim my fear as my own and not anything suggested by you, my friend. I agree that we need to stop drinking the stuff that serves only to make us sick. Love you!!!
Yes to sacred space that honors our values. Thank you! Peace to you