This is the transcript to episode one of our podcast drama mini-series, titled: “THE ANCESTORS WRITERS ROOM: for you, for your stories will heal the world.” This first episode is called “the crazy planet.” You can listen to the full episode here.
Welcome to the Ancestors’ Writers Room! This is a podcast drama mini series hosted by Otherworldly Giants, weaving together the big movements with the small things. This is episode one, and it’s called, “the crazy planet.”
Let’s jump right in. Let me take you to a story about Mama Bird.
One day Mama Bird yawned and stretched, waking with the sweet morning glow. Gifted with another day to tend to the nest, she performs her sunrise rituals, never taking a moment of devotion for granted. She enters the heart of her home. And then —
“What the hell?”
Mama Bird stops in her tracks, taken aback at the sight of Little Bird lounging around in the kitchen.
“What are you doing here?”
Little Bird gives her that all-too-familiar who me? mischevious false innocent look, like the way you do when you get caught eating a sandwich that doesn’t have your name on it.
“Girl, how many times are we going to do this old song and dance before you actually leave? Just give me a ballpark number at this point.”
It was exactly like that time I was 21. (You know, “the world” tarot card.) My cousins threw me several surprise goodbye parties that summer.
(Okay, fine, I planned them all myself, but my official stance is that I was shocked – shocked! – when one of them popped out of the closet, and another gracefully summer-saulted out of a rolled up rug.) To the point where one evening a cousin says to his parents:
“No, I cannot help with chores this evening. I have an important event. It’s Shaunga’s goodbye party.”
His parents, exasperated, say: “What? Another one? Hasn’t she left yet??”
Mama Bird grabs a nearby stick, swatting at Little Bird.
“All I’ve been hearing from you for years is how you don’t wanna be here anymore. You wanna see the world, you want love, you want to find new friends. You’re sick of doing this chirp-chirp baby shit day in and day out.
“Now the funny thing is that you’ve already done the hardest part. Twice! You’ve already let go of your dearest most painful selves that needed to die, even if you were certain you wouldn’t survive, but you did it. With grace and courage and choice. You chose to live.
“And yet…!
“Every time I turn around, there you are. Hangin around my nest in your PJs. Shootin the shit with your brothers and sisters. Talkin’ shit. Stirrin’ up shit. Reading everyone left, right and center til they downright filthy. Cleaning up like nobody around here ever learned how to take a bath other than you. Complaining. Cackling.”
Little Bird Cackles.
“I’m seriously sick of you!” Mama Bird says, blinking back tears. “What do I gotta do to get rid of you? Stop wasting your talents down here where nobody can see them. Go! Fly! GET. OUT. OF. MY. NEST!!
“Get outta here before I boot your ass out,” Mama Bird chases Little Bird, yet Little Bird just makes a game out of it, dancing, fluttering, dodging the kicks.
“I’m too old for this,” Mama Bird concedes. “Go get a Dog if you want someone to rough house with.”
One mention of The Dog (and inevitably, The Cats) washes a contemplation through Little Bird. Little Bird perches on a nearby branch hovering over the nest, but her eyes are on the horizon.
Hers is a soft, quiet, grieving contemplation. Some may call it peace of mind, body, heart and soul. Some may call it maturation. Some may call it Love.
From here, Little Bird sings a song from her aching, unbroken heart. A song for the Sun and the World. A Story of Life.
For You.
For Your
Stories Will Heal
The World
Welcome Good Listeners. How you doing?
What is an Ancestors Writers Room, you ask?
Well, of course we know in the entertainment industry, if you’re producing a television show for example, you hire a group of writers, and they became the Writers Room – that’s the industry name – and everyday those writers get together in the Writers Room, and they go through the creative process to birth the series. And who runs the Writers Room? Who directs it? Who guides it? That’s the Showrunner.
That would be me! Hi, I’m Shaunga. Now I don’t work in Hollywood, or what you might call “the industry” but I am a writer, and I am a showrunner. I do have a Writer’s Room, but it’s an Ancestors’ Writers Room. We run things a little differently here.
Now, what’s the difference between a regular Writer’s Room and an Ancestral one? That cannot be answered in just one episode. For now I’ll say that the Ancestral Technology of writing that we collectively work with here is called Open Heart Surgery Storytelling. This is a form of abolitionist energy healing unique to storytelling and the creative process. Unique to us.
Some of the Ancestors in my Writer’s Room, refer to themselves as “The Mighty Revolutionaries.” And I wanted to give them the chance to share with you today, a little bit about who they are and why they are here.
Oh wait, what’s that? You want to know what’s up with that story about Mama Bird and Little Bird, and what that has to do with revolution? Oh, nothing. It’s just a cute little thing that I – whatever – it’s not important.
Let’s hear from our Mighty Revolutionaries. They say:
We are elders. Older than most elders you know. We want to help the world liberate and heal on a global scale. We can provide guidance, inspiration, tools, strategy. Most of all, we want the people to open up to possibility, truth and heart.
We want the people to both remember and invent.
Nothing is going back to normal. We said this in 2020, during the height of Covid and Black Lives Matter protests. It was true back then, that nothing was going back to normal. Although we did enter a temporary holding pattern, that allowed many to sink back into the comfort of how things used to be, and cozy up to the illusion that any of us could just go back.
We can’t.
And if everyone were to reach deep into themselves, so deep to find their own Mighty Revolutionary Ancestors, they would realize, none of us want to go back to the kind of normal we are coming from.
A long time ago, when some of us ancients were small children, a great sadness descended upon the Universe and everyone in it. A heavy sadness that circled and spiralled and tangled itself into many lifetimes and timelines, many collectives lives and it held us like a world. It’s been around for so long, this sadness, and we got used to it. At first getting used to it was a very intelligent survival mechanism. But after a while we got so used to it that it did indeed start to feel like a cozy security blanket.
But it’s not a blanket. It was never a blanket. It’s a cage.
This sadness is so much older and deeper than any of you can really comprehend in your current realm of personal and collective consciousness. Like we said, we’re older than any elders you know and we were children when it first started. It took a long time for us to forgive ourselves for getting used to a cage and even we called it a blanket. We blamed ourselves for “letting it happen.” We had to learn how to stop blaming ourselves for things that happened to us when we were children. Because it really did happen TO US, and we didn’t know how to stop it.
Today these things that you call capitalism, colonization, patriarchy, a terrorism unleashed onto the land and all Earth Stewards, cultures of extraction and supremacy. We all got used to this, and made homes within it, for the sake of survival, but none of it is a blanket. It’s a cage.
…That has been broken open today, at the end of this calendar you call 2023, with the Mighty Revolutionary force of the FREE PALESTINE movement, that is in no uncertain terms powered by Mighty Revolutionary Ancestors of the World.
We are here for you and with you. We want you to understand that this time…
It’s different.
We have seen so many revolutions come and go, not just on your planet, but across time, space and dimension. You’re right to be asking those big questions – what is the root of how and why all of these genocidal systems function, and what are the small every day ways we can dig up those roots and plant something new.
So many revolutions have come and gone, everywhere in the multiverse. But this time, it’s different.
Why?
Because of her. Planet Earth.
We’ve never had a Leader, quite like her.
She has quite the reputation in the Universe. She’s infamous you might say. Everyone talks about her a lot, and they have all sorts of conversations, not always positive.
In many circles she sure is known as “the crazy one.”
When looking through the multiverse catalogue of where to incarnate next, many souls see Earth on the list and their elders are like: “Oh don’t go there, that place is crazy.”
Planet Earth, she’s fine with whatever you call her. She embraces and reclaims the title of “the crazy one.” She knows what it looks like on the surface. She knows what she’s trying to pull off is unprecedented. Not just what she’s trying to do, but how she’s decided to do it.
She knows she’s risking complete annihilation as much as she risks overwhelming success. She decided to do it anyway, and she won’t let anyone else’s opinion change her certainty, not even her own elders.
Why don’t we go ahead, peek in and take a look at what her elders are saying about her at this very moment. Her elders names are…ugh, you won’t be able to understand their names in the human language, for your sake, let’s just call them Alexis and David.
David says: Look at what she’s doing. Alexis, look at what she’s doing today. It makes no sense.
Alexis: I know, David.
David: Like, do you even have any respect for the natural order of things. Why are you allowing those humans to do that on your body. It’s just ignorant at this point.
Alexis: I know, David. I mean, I kind of get it, like I understand. I understand like, the big picture. It’s just that small part I don’t get. Just like change that little thing, which might be like a huge part of your personhood and identity, but like just change it, it’s fine. Change it.
David: She won’t just change, she’s obviously out of her mind. What she needs is an intervention.
Alexis: Omg, David I know. She’s totally moving from a wounded place. She’s traumatized.
David: She’s upset. She’s sad. She’s lonely. She’s isolated. She doesn’t have any real friends.
Alexis: Omg I know! But I mean, like, what about those planets that orbit around her, they seem to maybe like her fine enough.
David: I don’t trust them.
Alexis: And what about those like constellations on the ecliptic. What do you call them?
David: The zodiac?
Alexis: Zodiac, David. Zodiac.
David: Whatever. I don’t trust them either. What are they doing every week? Sending out memos to those suffering humans, telling them their future. It’s just, it’s just…INCORRECT.
Alexis: I mean, I don’t know. It’s kinda cute. They seem like they’re kind of helping people, those 13 signs.
David: There’s 12 of them. 12 zodiac signs.
Alexis: Um, No David, there’s 13.
David: Um, No Alexis. There’s 12.
Alexis: David!! There’s 13 ZODIAC signs, 13. 13.
David: Omg, just shut up.
Alexis: OOGHH!
David: It doesn’t even matter. The point is, Planet Earth, She’s lost. She is one crisis away from excusing herself to live in a closet for god knows how long.
Alexis: She’s flailing. She’s totally flailing.
David: It’s time, Alexis. We have to intervene.
So the Earths’ elders, Alexis and David, they sent a few memos. Telling her to quit with with those humans, just quit it. Some were written in a very stern tone. And the Earth got every memo.
And she ignored them. And they could do jack shit about it, because of free will.
David: *sigh* Alexis…I knew that free will was a mistake, I just knew it.
Yup, the Earth got all those memos. And she even has been privy to all those obsessive conversations that everyone and their dog likes to have about her. She is well aware of all the names that everyone calls her:
Traumatized. Wounded. Upset. Lonely. Isolated. Without any real friends. Sad. Crazy.
But those aren’t the names she would call herself.
Well, except for crazy. Sure. And is she wounded? Yeah. Traumatized. Mmhm. Upset, lonely, isolated, sad? Yeah. But ignorant? Nah. All alone with no real friends? That one is most certainly a lie.
At the end of the day, the earth is going to do, exactly what she’s going to do.
Because, she trusts herself.
And her friends, they trust her too.
Planet Earth, she’s my friend. She is simply one of the best that I’ve ever had.
I need you to know something about me. I wasn’t going to come this time. I was a soul. Just an Otherworldly Giant traveling out there in the Multiverse, minding my own beeswax, and you know what? I felt pretty damn complete. I didn’t have any good reason to warp myself into a body and get birthed only to wake up to all of this terror. I didn’t need to be here. But I am.
Why?
Because of her. She asked me to come. Yeah…”the crazy one”…she asked me to get myself born at this particular juncture of time, space, dimension, history, herstory and theirstory.
The thing about “the crazy planet” is that I don’t always understand her decisions or why she makes them but…let me put it this way.
If the Earth were putting on a major play. A huge extravagant musical production. A serious story about serious things. And if she asked me to be in her play, and she said:
“I have a role for you to play, in this production. And let me tell you, there are some serious, heroic, complex, flawed beloved main characters that anyone would love to sink their teeth into. And some incredible side characters that the world will just fall in love with. And an AMAZING villain who just steals the show, so to speak, with their show stopping musical number…
“But for you, Shaunga. What I want you to do in this play is dress up like a giant DUCK. And then you’ll run across the stage for a few seconds, and you’ll quack. Like: ‘quack, quack, quack, quack.’ And then leave. Exit stage left. And that’s it. That’s your role. That’s what I want you to do.”
See the thing is, I don’t care what wacky shit this crazy woman wants me to do, I’ve already said yes.
Doesn’t matter if I understand. I don’t need to get it.
Don’t get me wrong, this doesn’t apply to everyone and everything. There are a lot of beings in the Universe who I consistently say no to. In fact, these days, I mostly just say no.
But, there are some friends. Some very special friends. It doesn’t matter the day or day or what the request is. As soon as I see that memo from that crazy motherfucker in my inbox, I didn’t even read it all the way through, and I’ve already replied: “why the hell not.”
I trust her, like she trusts herself.
I trust her with my life, because I know she understands what a grand responsibility it is to have a friend that will say yes to you, no matter what you ask for.
They call her crazy, and flailing and impulsive, and reckless, but she’s actually very thoughtful. She always enters and completes a great period of contemplation and soul searching before she asks anyone for anything. Especially when it’s something as big as a birth, as ceremonial as a life.
I wasn’t going to come this time. But she asked me. And I promised her.
So I became a child again. A human. Born and Raised with Mighty Revolutionary Ancestors.
Would you look at that.
Look at those Mighty Movements for ending genocide, apartheid, occupation, colonization. Epic collective liberation. Great World Reversal. All of this shit, until its backwards.
Look at those big movements. Turns out, all of that, was really just about a mother and a child.
****
I will teaching with this ancestral storytelling technology in the ANCESTORS WRITERS ROOM 2-MONTH APPRENTICESHIP which I’ll be hosting between February 4 and March 24 2024. If you choose the apprenticeship, you will get access to beautiful writing classes, where I take you through visualization and meditation to help you connect with your ancestral stories, and unlock your own ancestral teachings, and gain closer relationship with your unique storytelling medicine, your unique ancestral artistry, that you express in your projects and in life.
By the end of the journey you will have received a wealth, and a garden of multiverse history lessons, teachings that are specific to the life path of a magically spiritually opened artist, whose are committed to abolition and revolution – believe me it is a specific life path that differs from any other, if you know you know, and then you know that we all need support and community on this journey.
If you enjoy my stories, my voice, my politics, the way that I think and share my medicine, I am confident enough to say I guarantee that you will love this apprenticeship. That you will receive deep support and guidance that you can’t put a price tag on, and that will last you a life time. I know because that’s who my ancestors are. That’s what happens when we allow ourselves to be in close relationship with them.
If you want support with your ceremonial entrepreneurship, your amazing creative babies that the world needs to protect and uplift, or just with your heart, and your very important healing journey.
I encourage you to check out the link to the apprenticeship and tune in with your ancestors, and see if you want to join. I would love to have you. There’s even an OPENING ACT, which is our version of a free trial and offerings that are open to the public. So you can get a sense of what it might be like, and then decide if you’d like to dive in. If this opportunity lights up a spark, a star or a sun in your body, trust that. Because our Ancestors already know where we’re meant to be. Check for links in the show notes. Until next time.