Greetings Good Listeners,

To welcome you into this application portal, I want to read a snippet from an instagram post I wrote a while back. Imagine:

a music album that comes with a set of plant and tree teachings, that grows into a modern-day mystery school for visionary abolitionist coalition building.

a stage play about the five outer planets where each scene comes with a book of research on the intersections of astrology, erotic storytelling & ancestor healing, specifically for survivors.

a children’s picture book about animal companion loss, with a b-side parallel universe alternate ending YA graphic novel, that grows into a village funding project for queer and trans chosen siblings.

a living room concert series that creates an oral history mapping project of how nature spirits are collaborating with one another across turtle island, couched in a larger mission to convert country clubs and golf courses into afro-Indigenous centered intergenerational music camps and safe houses for liberation building.

an abolitionist journalism school that comes with a set of teachings on flower medicine and an accompanying grief coaching service, which spills into a grand mythical saga of multiverse memoir writing across multiple artistic genres, life stories that encompass our relationship with ancestors, descendants, gods and goddesses, and you can only really get the full picture of the entire story if you follow the breadcrumbs between books, plays, music albums and keynote speeches.

(oh hey, that’s my friend, Ravyn Wgnz aka special guest artist that you’ll find popping in and out of our core curriculum!)

When I think about connecting with people who have this kind of creative fire spilling out of them, it is the thing that makes me happy to be alive at a time like this.

Because I can see the bigger picture. I’m seeing us do the thing that marvel comics and marvel movies do.

We are each carrying sovereign, self-sustaining worlds and yet…where are we creating cross-over episodes without realizing it? Where are we becoming each other’s alternate endings and parallel timelines? Where are we leaving easter eggs in each other’s stories and bodies of research? Where do our visions and medicine practices interweave and overlap? Where do we add puzzle pieces to a larger mosaic?

I want to tell you about the project I’m planning to focus on while I host this residency. Because, if you are thinking about applying, I want you to feel how your work may be already be in conversation with mine.

So, speaking of feeling happy to be alive, the project I’m working on is called, I FEEL DEAD INSIDE.

I was sitting on my couch one day and I heard myself say those words out loud, like a truth dropping on the floor that I had been going in circles with and it just needed to be said. “I feel dead inside.”

But, as soon as I said it out loud, everything clicked. Oh…I’ve been feeling this way for so long, and yet I suddenly understand who this is about.

This is about the water.

Lake Erie, specifically. The middle child of the Great Lakes…was pronounced dead in the 1960s and 70s. A dead lake. I’ve been living near the Great Lakes for the last 20 years. This is where I came alive as an ancestral healer, an energetic surgeon, a storyteller whose stories are altars for great world transformation…and as a Planet Whisperer.

I come from a long line of Water Protectors, who gathered around the shorebanks of the Bay of Bengal…and even older Ancestors who circled around the Arabian Sea. We always knew how to talk to the water. She always spoke to us in our bodies. And we were always artistic collaborators.

As soon as I said, “I Feel Dead Inside” I knew Lake Erie was talking to me. She said that while yes, restoration efforts were made – in 1972 via the Clean Water Act the water was revived, and she is no longer considered a dead lake…she said to me, it wasn’t enough. It’s still not enough. I need more than just a clean-up. I need you. The Storyteller.

The full title of this project is: “I FEEL DEAD INSIDE: a planet whispering restoration project // for queer and trans alivelihood // for the storyteller in all of us // for the great water giants // and, for the small things.

Lake Erie continued, now listen up Shaunga, I’m going to give you your instructions:

During this artist residency, I want you to create a spec for your animated TV series in development.

I want to see an outline for a 3-5 episode mini series that includes:

• real time planet whispering with the great lakes and your specific conversations with them about big and small questions in front of humanity

• include conversations with the sovereign alive spirits of some of your favourite and infamous fictional
• throw in samples from your accompanying sound healing music album, a medicinal tincture for grieving mothers, including mothers of communities, of libraries, of animals, of gardens, and of entire land masses

All of this will be weaved in with highlights from your alive memoir: the core curriculum for this ancestor dreaming apprenticeship: involving adventures in alternate timelines, conversations with your future self, your future partner, your future friends, and a future version of a thriving earth that is available for us all to live into.

And, actually that’s the real title of your story: “for us all to live into”

But you’re not just writing a TV series spec to sell to hollywood. Getting this picked up by netflix is not the goal.

Instead, Shaunga, I want you to create a MOCK-UP VILLAGE RAISED ARTIST GRANT as an example of how we fund a project like this, that will also highlight the Featured Artists in your Butterfly Sanctuary and the miraculous interweaving projects they are working on too.

This Mock-Up Grant is a B-Side education and advocacy source Abolitionist Ancestor Theatre as a pathway to restore our water – on the planet, in our lineages, and in ourselves. We’ll link that restoration to lessons animal companions teach us about loss and living, and the power that queer and trans alivelihood has to change the world.

The grant will include key lessons from what we learned through opening our hearts to the great mystery of unlocking ancestor dreaming together. This will be a place to note down our key recommendations, insights, relationship lessons, village protocols, planetary directives and best practices that we discerned and re-membered by studying sovereign village funding models. It’ll include details on how our recommendations can transform disenfranchised labour into cherished village roles and new paid positions, anchoring the building blocks of grief-centered economies.

It’ll be a place to highlight and promote the offerings, the off-shoot projects, the world building in development of each Featured Artist that came spilling out of our process.

Eventually I FEEL DEAD INSIDE will grow into a tour around the Great Lakes with my specialized practise called the Storyteller’s Astro-Cartography – I listen to the primordial stories that live in the land, as expressed through the rocks, trees, birds, the natural world, in conversation with the celestial ley lines that run through that land, and I make up my set list accordingly. I create this show in collaboration with local Afro-Indigenous land stewards, where we ask that lakes what they want. We tie in our show with some aspect of ecological advocacy, and social political advocacy that benefits the local community.

At the beginning and end of the day, I create this project in collaboration with the Water. She is who gave it to me, she is who I’m giving it back to. We exchange this love in a language that we both speak and share – the language of ceremony, of ritual, of song, and through thriving village acts of devotion still live deep in the body, completely untouched by eras of witch hunting and genocide and annihilation. There they are, dancing like nobody ever took it away from them. Loving, like they’ve never been hurt before. How did they survive like that? How did they make it out, unscathed? Only by the protection of a witch from the west, a mother like water.

The Water keeps reminding me that we have the power to move large amounts of money for whatever we want, as long as enough of us want to, and that’s why I’ve been so headstrong about bringing my vision forward.

Lake Erie reminds me that restoring our waters is not just about cleaning them up, it’s about changing the way we live.

We can’t do that without a collective investment in sovereign village funding models.

When we put our dreams in conversation with each other, our sleep dreams, our day dreams, our oracle visions, our dreams for our lives, and the dreams for our planet unfolding through our stories…we will inevitably be continuously mind blown by all the wild synchronicities, unseen places of collaboration and that’s so crazy it just might work ideas…it’s not just really cool – this IS what opens the doors to realities we couldn’t imagine before. Unprecedented organizing efforts, activating the masses in refreshing ways, inspiring money moving strategies that don’t feel so heavy and guilt ridden and dependent on horrific crisis…but offering each other important things because it truly makes us feel alive.

I want people to apply as Featured Artists who listen to me speak about my work, and you can feel that what you are creating is part of the same interweaving multiverse. I want people who have gone as deep into an abolitionist healing journey on a political and spiritual level – which are two very distinct things. You’ve gone to the depths to retrieve the medicine you hold, and you have likely taken your fair share of hits and blows for this life path, and you know what I mean when I say that.

If you feel connected to what I’m talking about, but the Featured Artist position isn’t right for you, I’d love for you to join the outer circle of Good Listeners, where you get access to our core curriculum which is for all levels of experience, and I’ve kept it as low cost as possible.

As you consider this application, I want you to think about what a Village Artist Grant Ecosystem could serve in your life and practise. What kinds of disenfranchised labour are you holding that you want resourced? If we could fund x y z what would make a huge difference in your life or matters that you care about?

Some of my priorities include, village artist grants for the end of life phase of the creative process and soul’s journey, which doesn’t always include supporting loved ones through physical death, but often does. Village artist grants for writers, just to write, doesn’t have to be tied to a book deal or project or hustling on substack, just for the labour of writing. I want that for the labour of reading too. Of studying stories and talking about what we learn from them. The labour of working on yourself. The labour of working through relationship conflict. The labour of spending hours working through the energetic density of survivor trauma before you even get to your desk. The labour of dismantling and unraveling your lineage. The labour of Elders and young people learning together. The labour of sitting still and allowing grief move through your body and back into the water. What do you want to see funded?

The ‘mock up’ grant is our chance to unearth, workshop and put down in detail, what revolutionary things could a Village Artist Grant Ecosystem fund in our own lives and practices, and how could others in our wider communities directly benefit? What is the financial organizing strategy that comes along with it? What are the abolitionist relationship values that make that organizing possible? What spiritual work is required? What thriving village protocols can we invite people into, that are exciting and deeply moving?

We put everything that we learn here in this ‘mock-up,’ including the unexpected twists and turns. In the end we have something that is a learning tool, a possibility model, a training kit that many people can study and apply to their own situations.

You will leave the process with a rich body of work to draw upon as you move your practise forward. With tons of clarity and time to develop designs and models that work for your next chapter, or meet whatever goals your heart wants to see come to fruition in this 8-month period.

At the end of December, our process is complete. At this point I want to take some time to reflect and integrate, and decide what I want to do with the Village Artist Grant Ecosystem and its next phase of development. Everyone has 100% freedom to diverge and go our separate ways from here.

But we also might find that hey, this mock up grant is pretty damn good, let’s just do it. I might decide that the vision and design of my system needs another round of workshopping, or I might decide to put it in action. In this event, Featured Artists will get first priority to become co-producers of our next cycle of development, and core stakeholders of our first Giant Village Raised Artist Grant, meaning, we use the system we workshopped to raise money for our projects, livelihood and village dreams.

Lastly, you may have noticed this application portal is designed a little differently, in true ancestor theatre fashion, it is a dreaming tincture. You’ll get a sneak peak of the fire and earth class, the water and sky class, background info on my research, and instructions for a choose your own adventure dream time excursion. I want you to take in the application like this because, this will show you in real time what it’s like for you to receive and experience my medicine. What does it unlock in you? Where does it take you?

If you have any questions don’t hesitate to email me. I also encourage people to take in this application portal, and go through the dream ritual, even if you know the Featured Artist position isn’t for you, because there’s so much food for thought here for anyone to learn from. And please do send this to people and share it with people you think are looking for this exact thing! Alright, I’ll see you in the rest of the application.

When I think into your question, what is an abolitionist friendship? I have this desire to describe first, what I believe abolition is, and where it comes from. Abolition is the abolishment of enslavement in all its forms, right?

Abolition is holistic and full in scope. It’s hopeful. It’s desirable. It’s kind and generous and compassionate. Abolition is creative, strategic, artistic, imaginative. Abolition is speculative fiction. It’s irresistible sovereign futures. It’s Ancestor Veneration. It’s Ceremony and protocols. It’s right relations. It’s honouring and dedication. Abolition isn’t easy, but it’s necessary. Abolition is justice. It’s love. Abolition is love.

And when I think of an abolitionist and why I identify as an abolitionist, it’s because lieve it’s my job…no my duty to finish the project that my Ancestors fore bearerers elders and comrades began. Abolitionists are architects of sovereign futures, abolitionists are collaborators and people who understand the need for Rainbow Coalitions. Abolitionists are people who want to live in the free.

And then I think of an abolitionist friendship I think of someone or many someones, who come together to support each other to be the greatest version of humanity that we can be. Someone or many someones who reminds you of your commitment to our more than human relatives, our commitment to practice community, to steward a world our children can be safe in. Someone who is invested in knowing you to the very depths of your deepest darkest oceans.

Someone or many someones who give you hope and who inspire trust and love. I think of my friends. I think of you in the big moments but mostly int he small ones, right? The quiet ones where we sit by Lake Ontario’s edge and watch the water sway. Or we sit front row at our favourite musical movie. We sit in front row at each other’s events and each other’s triumphs. We sit front row at each other’s failures.

We sit in the front row and support each other when we pick up ourselves up and start over again. We don’t hold each other in place. We understand that growth and change is a beautiful part of our relationship and to witness that growth, to be a part of that growth is the gift. You know, my friendships don’t demand my presence in any particular way. I get to show up how I am, who I am, in the state that I am. And I’m held in that compassionately, honestly, truthfully and respectfully. My friendships don’t demand that I become a different person in order to earn their love or communion. You know? My friends see me for who I am and support me for who I want to be. Not who they think I should be or what they believe I should be doing. But who I say I want to be. That to me is true friendship. And Abolitionist friendship is partnership. Yeah, that’s what I believe.