Living Open | Modern Magick and Spirituality for Mystics and Seekers

Jeanna Kadlec (she/her) is a writer, astrologer, former lingerie boutique owner, and recovering academic. Her writing has appeared in ELLE, NYLON, O the Oprah Magazine, Allure, Catapult, Literary Hub, Autostraddle, and she's the creator of the New York Times-featured newsletter Astrology for Writers. A born and bred Midwesterner, she now lives in Brooklyn. HERETIC is her first book. In this episode, Eryn and Jeanna talk about: Jeanna’s journey with Christianity & deconstruction Grieving the loss of religion Not just replacing christianity with cut/copy/paste spirituality but actually figuring out what we believe Navigating having conservative, evangelical families Believing in people’s capacity to change Having hard conversations with family The particular loneliness of strained and estranged relationships with parents Reparenting ourselves Check out the blog for this episode at erynjohnson.com/blog/jeanna-kadlec   Check out my recent essay in Insider. Subscribe to Joy Notes and check out the Religious Trauma workbook. Connect with Jeanna on her website, social media. Read her book, Heretic, and check out her substack Astrology for Writers.

Victoria Albina (she/her/ella) a Functional Medicine Nurse Practitioner, an herbalist, and a nervous system expert.  In this episode, Eryn and Victoria discuss: Her journey with health and healing How the stories we tell about ourselves and the world impact our somatic experience of life Vagus nerve and polyvagal theory! Different nervous system states Perceiving threat Finding safety in the nervous system slowly and steadily Allowing your body to complete the energy of what it wanted to do in a challenging moment  Hypervigilance after trauma Self-love The fawn response, codependence, and people pleasing Attachment theory All of this existing in context of oppressive systems Blog for this episode: www.living-open.com/blog/maria-victoria-albina  Connect with Eryn on their substack, Joy Notes. Explore the Religious Trauma Support workbook. Download Victoria's free suite of meditations and nervous system orienting exercises.  Tune into Victoria's Feminist Wellness podcast and connect with her on Instagram @victoriaalbinawellness.

Laura (she/they) is a writer, editor, and book coach who works with intuitive and magical writers who want to unearth their own writing stories and create a sustainable writing practice. In this episode, Eryn and Laura talk about: Laura’s journey with creativity, writing, magic, and spirituality Using frameworks and support for our writing (and not) Pinning down key emotional moments and using them as a basis for fiction writing Unearthing and softly excavating our deepest stories Collaborating with the parts of you the story is coming from Figuring out the story you’re trying to tell Being open to the nonlinear creative writing process Rituals Laura uses in their writing process Different stages of the creative process where feedback may be more or less helpful Experiential learning through the writing process The inner work that goes along with writing Identifying learned myths in creativity Writing the true book that you’re meant to write Creating a sustainable writing practice Blog for this episode: www.living-open.com/blog/laura-ellen-joyce  Connect with Eryn on their substack, Joy Notes. Explore the Religious Trauma Support workbook. Connect with Laura on their website and their new Substack!

Chelsey Pippin Mizzi (she/her) is a writer, tarot reader, and the founder of Pip Cards Tarot, a tarot consultancy helping creatives unblock, generate new ideas, and connect to their inner artist through tarot. In this episode, Eryn and Chelsey talk about: Chelsey’s journey with creativity, writing, and tarot Images in the process of writing Using your tarot deck to have conversations with your creativity Using tarot to write better stories and better-developed characters Doing tarot spreads for your characters Holding the cards loosely! Lessons from Chelsey’s book-writing process Blog for this episode: www.living-open.com/blog/chelsey-pippin-mizzi Connect with Eryn on their substack, Joy Notes. Some of their writings on creativity and creative process over there: devotion to creative transformation telling the story that wants to be told play and nourishing the creative self a mini creative reset  the next thing leads to the next thing scent-sual creative aliveness with Mary Adelle Connect with Chelsey on Instagram, her website, or her Substack, The French Dispatch. Mentioned in this episode: The Querant by Alexander Chee Character development tarot spread Chelsey's Tarot for Novelists ebook Chelsey's book, The Tarot Spreads Yearbook

Gina Badger (they/she) is a clinical energetic herbalist. They offer care through their private practice, Long Spell, and collaborative projects such as Wet Coast mutual aid kits. Gina is a queer nonbinary femme of mixed Western European ancestry born in Treaty 6 territory and currently living on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh nations (Vancouver, Canada). In this episode, Eryn and Gina talk about: Gina’s journey with plants! Building an embodied relationship with plants Personal healing-oriented plant communication Looking to the plants as teachers Orienting toward plant relationship Ways to give plants attention What relationship with plants looks like for them in the winter Blog for this episode: www.living-open.com/blog/gina-badger  Subscribe to the Joy Notes substack here and get a copy of the Religious Trauma support workbook here. Connect with Gina on their website, Instagram, or over email at gina@longspellherbs.com. Footnotes from Gina: Episodes from KPFA radio show the Herbal Highway: “Herbal Energetics” (15/Feb/2023, originally aired 1/May/1999) and “Honoring our Elders: Karyn Sanders,” (2/Nov/2022) Joanna Macy’s Work that Reconnects Chani Nicholas’s Week Ahead Podcast for the week of 30/Jan/2023

Sherry Shone (she/her) honors her Black, White, and First Native heritages using hoodoo work. She has two books on the subject and working on her first divination deck.  In this episode, Sherry and Eryn talk about: Sherry’s journey with spirituality and hoodoo Doing hoodoo before even understanding what she was doing Intention, faith, and direction The roots of hoodoo What sherry means when she says hoodoo is for everyone Healing lineage wounds and not arriving to other practices with no connection to your own Hoodoo for liberation Simple and effective magic How it can scare people around us when we’re changing and becoming more of ourselves Connecting with ancestors and shared ancestors Her relationship with the bible now Simple hoodoo spells CW: brief mention of physical violence Blog for this episode: www.living-open.com/blog/that-hoodoo-lady  Check out the Religious Trauma workbook, a 110-page digital workbook full of prompts, reflections, meditations, rituals, and somatic exercises to support folks on a journey of deprogramming and healing from dogmatic religious backgrounds. Subscribe to the Joy Notes substack for upcoming writings like: TELLING THE STORY THAT WANTS TO BE TOLD, I’LL NEVER WRITE SOMETHING AS GOOD AS MELISSA FEBOS AND THAT’S OKAY, BOOKS I LOVE, GETTING INTO YOUR BODY WHEN YOUR BODY CAN FEEL LIKE A STRANGE OR UNKIND PLACE. Connect with Sherry on her website and Instagram. Get a copy of Hoodoo for Everyone. Tarot for Top Surgery.

Grace (they/them) is an artist, a quilt maker, and a writer. Their work falls under the broad canopy of “women’s work” and they are intentionally digging into what it means to look at that work through a queer, non-binary lens. They’re self taught and often work in unconventional methods and reclaimed materials to achieve pieces that represent their experiences and interests as a German-American midwestern lesbian. But sometimes, too, they just make socks because they have cold feet. In this episode, Eryn and Grace talk about: Grace’s journey with creativity, quilting, writing! Getting into quilting Family histories of quilting Making wonky weird quilts! Working with reclaimed and recycled fabrics Queerness & quilting What it means to do women’s work through a queer, non-binary lens Home-making without heteronormative gender roles Grace’s connection to their German ancestry Queer culture and how we create it by living it! Grace’s writing practice Telling stories with words and textiles Blog for this episode: www.living-open.com/blog/grace-rother  Check out the latest joy notes and share your creative intentions for the year here. Subscribe to access an archive of writings on creativity, healing, aliveness, beauty, and grief. Connect with Grace on their Substack, Instagram, and website.

Jasper Joy (they/he) is a white genderqueer witch, tarot scholar, community chemist, Venusian writer, and elder-babe residing among the rightful homelands of the Eastern Band of Cherokee people, both past and present. In this episode, Eryn and Jasper talk about: Jasper’s journey with healing & tarot Queer conjuring Coming into their own spirituality from a Wiccan background Spiritual integration! Manifesting “bad things” Queer witch as an embodied archetype Honoring Medusa as a queer witch! Tarot for top surgery The queens of the tarot and water Blog for this episode: www.living-open.com/blog/jasper-joy Read the latest joy notes: THE NEXT THING LEADS TO THE NEXT THING. Subscribe for a free 7-day trial to read paid essays! Join Virtual Solstice Breathwork for Grief, a gathering on Tuesday, 12/20 at 7 pm EST to be with and tend to grief. Connect with Jasper on Instagram, and their website. Find Tarot for Top Surgery here!

Mina Hiebert (she/her) is an art therapist who believes in the power of making art with intention, connection, and the spirit of play. She currently works as a counsellor in elementary schools and with adults online through the therapeutic art group “Oracle Lab”. Mina’s main method of creative practice is garment sewing, through which she explores expression, colour, and her body. She lives on the unceded, traditional and ancestral territories of the Lekwungen/Songhees and Esquimalt peoples, also known as Victoria, BC. In this episode, Eryn and Mina talk about: Mina’s journey with art, creativity, and healing Making art but not feeling like an artist / feeling like an artist! Untangling the idea of only being an artist if you’re producing something not just if you’re experiencing The identity of artist Queerness & art making Giving our own meaning to our art Permission to play, make mistakes, make a mess, use your nice supplies! Mina’s journey with textile arts! The transformation her sewing practice has gone through Making garments as a political statement Slow creative magic! Being open to being touched by what’s happening around us Blog for this episode: www.living-open.com/blog/mina-hiebert  Read the latest joy notes: THE NEXT THING LEADS TO THE NEXT THING. Subscribe for a free 7-day trial to read paid essays! Join Virtual Solstice Breathwork for Grief, a gathering on Tuesday, 12/20 at 7 pm EST to be with and tend to grief. Connect with Mina on her website and Instagram.

Rebecca Scolnick (she/her) is an emotional witch, forever seeker, and queer human lady, who uses magic and storytelling to support unlearning work and inspire new meaning-making. In this episode, Rebecca and Eryn talk about: Rebecca’s journey with healing & spirituality Evolving our spiritual practices & why neither of us read tarot for ourselves very much anymore Spirituality as part of capitalism world The responsibility of both facilitator and participant to do Hierophant work Abandoning ourselves and calling it spirituality! How we embody & interact with surrender Numerology magic! Angel numbers exist & don’t exist! Working with these systems and tools (like tarot and numerology) intuitively Lineages of numerology Life path numbers and what you can learn from them Entry points to learning about your own numerology Blog for this episode: www.living-open.com/blog/rebecca-scolnick Get the Religious Trauma workbook, a 110-page digital workbook full of prompts, reflections, meditations, rituals, and somatic exercises to help you deprogram, heal, and reclaim who you are after religion. Read the latest edition of joy notes: DEVOTION TO CREATIVE TRANSFORMATION Read Abandoning Myself and Calling It Surrender. Connect with Rebecca on her website and Instagram. Get a copy of her book, The Witch’s Book of Numbers!

Today I’m reading you the October Joy Notes essay for paid subscribers as a little freebie, called THE LINEAGES WE CARRY IN OUR BODIES: thousands of ghosts, emergent ancestor ritual, and remembering who we are in our grief. Joy Notes is my twice-monthly publication featuring writings on being stretched wide by beauty, grief, and the full spectrum of aliveness. I want to invite you to subscribe to joy notes for $5/month - there is also a free tier - but paying helps support a working writer & makes writing sustainable! Click here to subscribe and get access to other pieces including: SCENT-SUAL CREATIVE ALIVENESS WITH MARY ADELLE ABANDONING MYSELF AND CALLING IT SURRENDER INSTRUCTIONS FOR BEING ALIVE LETTING OURSELVES CHANGE & TRANSFORM

Christina Carlson (she/they) is an Embodiment and Intuitive Coach, and the Host of the Podcast Bitches, Witches, and Queers. In this episode, Eryn and Christina talk about: Christina’s journey with healing and spirituality coming from evangelical Christianity Following her body’s lead Finding a space of internal safety Being with parts of yourself that are difficult for you Not dominating yourself into being the “best” version of yourself Cultivating compassion and kindness to accept yourself Going back to church experiences (weddings, funerals, etc) as ex-Christian people How harmful religious ideas can be replicated in spiritual spaces too The basic human need to belong Creating new community and relationships after religion Blog for this episode: www.living-open.com/blog/christina-carlson Get the Religious Trauma workbook, a 110-page digital workbook full of prompts, reflections, meditations, rituals, and somatic exercises to help you deprogram, heal, and reclaim who you are after religion. Read the latest edition of joy notes: abandoning myself and calling it surrender. Connect with Christina on their website and Instagram. Listen to my episode on their Bitches, Witches and Queers podcast!

Kaitlyn (they/them) is a queer, non-binary trans* Espiritista, psychic medium, diviner, and occult educator in Los Angeles, California. Kaitlyn specializes in facilitating conscious connections between the mortal and spirit realms, uncovering authentic, ancestrally guided spiritual practices, spiritual healing through mediumship, and exorcism. In this episode, Kaitlyn and Eryn talk about: Kaitlyn’s journey with spirituality and healing How Kaitlyn’s kids are part of their spiritual practice Becoming the parent their kids need Loneliness Espiritisma and how they connect with spirits, how the spirits move through them Working with troubled spirits Helping spirits pass over to the next realm What spirits are motivated by The healing work that their spirits do What they’ve learned about life from the spirits Blog for this episode: www.living-open.com/blog/kaitlyn-grana Subscribe to Joy Notes, Eryn's new twice-monthly Substack newsletter about being stretched wide by beauty, grief, and the full spectrum of aliveness. Join HOLY, a seven-week reclamation circle for ex-religious folks who want to create community and healing together. Connect with Kaitlyn on their website, Instagram @spiritgardentarot, and TikTok @crynowcrylater. My Broken Language by Quiara Alegría Hudes.

Lisa Fazio (she/her) is an Irish/Italian American herbalist, astrologer, writer, mother, grandmother, and educator. In this episode, Lisa and Eryn talk about: Lisa’s journey with plant magic, astrology, and spirituality Secure attachment through plant relationship and physical & somatic anchors with plants Being in service to plants Working with plants on indigenous stolen land Finding home with plants Animism She reads us her poem, “how to love a polluted river” Lisa’s relationship to poetry Poems as living things How her spiritual practice has evolved from growing up Catholic Italian folk medicine! Plants and ancestral connection Simple ways to start to reconnect with ancestral lineages How ancestral work can disempower white supremacy Blog for this episode: www.living-open.com/blog/lisa-fazio Subscribe to Joy Notes, Eryn's new twice-monthly Substack newsletter about being stretched wide by beauty, grief, and the full spectrum of aliveness.  Book a sliding scale breathwork session with Eryn. Join the waitlist for HOLY. Connect with Lisa on her website. Stay tuned for her book, Della Medicina: Plants of Italian American Folk medicine - out next year.

Yana Tallon-Hicks, LMFT, (she/her) is a sex therapist specializing in LGBTQQ+, kinky, and non-monogamous relationships. She is also a consent, sex, and sexuality columnist and educator. Her work centers around the belief that pleasure-positive and consent-based sex education can positively impact our lives and the world. In this episode, Eryn and Yana talk about: Yana’s journey with pleasure, queerness, kink, polyamory Integrating sex education facts with making our dreams about sex and sexuality feel real and settled Working with shame and other barriers from moving towards the sex lives and relationships with sexuality we want Talking about sex with your sexual partners Shame monsters! Attachment & sex Getting comfortable with our desires Shattering myths about good sex! Meeting and not meeting our own personal ideals of sex Dealing with our own personal baggage around sex in our bodies How to set big and small sexual goals that are aligned with your values Integrating sex into your daily life (if you want to) Blog for this episode: www.living-open.com/blog/yana-tallon-hicks  Subscribe to Joy Notes, Eryn's new twice-monthly Substack newsletter about being stretched wide by beauty, grief, and the full spectrum of aliveness.  Book a sliding scale breathwork session with Eryn. Join the waitlist for HOLY. Check out Yana's book, Hot and Unbothered. Follow her work on Instagram @the_vspot and connect with her on her website.

Kris (they/them) is a radical black queer Jamaican Obeah Enby and Olorisha in the Lukumì tradition. They are the owner of the Spiritual Abolitionist and the creatrix of The Spiritual Abolitionist Oracle Deck, the only handmade, black-centric, ungendered oracle deck in existence (currently available for preorder). They provide spiritual wares, “twerkshops”, and services that center the safety of black, queer, trans and intersex folx in spirituality and believe that there is no revolution without ancestral healing. In this episode, Eryn and Kris talk about: Kris’ journey with spirituality, creativity, and ancestral connection What started Kris’ deconstruction from Christianity Ancestral healing as liberation, especially for Black queer & trans folks Connecting with queer & trans ancestors who aren’t going to reject you the way your living families may have Reparative care with ancestors Decolonizing our notions of ourselves Returning to spiritual pre-Christian roots Faith & doubt The process of creating The Spiritual Abolitionist oracle deck Poetry as a spiritual through line of their life Not being stuck in versions of yourself that don’t resonate anymore Blog for this episode: www.living-open.com/blog/spiritual-abolitionist Connect with Eryn on their Instagram. Book a sliding scale breathwork session with Eryn. Join the waitlist for HOLY. Connect with Kris on Instagram and their website. Preorder the Spiritual Abolitionist Oracle deck.

Britta Love (they/she) weaves between the worlds of conscious sexuality and psychedelic ritual, with a through line of social justice and embodied consent. They became an advocate for sex worker’s rights as an undergraduate at the London School of Economics in 2007 and have been a writer and activist pushing for the decriminalization of drugs and sex work ever since. Britta is a certified somatic sex educator through the Institute for the Study of Somatic Sex Education, has trained with Betty Martin’s School of Consent and is a certified circle keeper with the Planning Change Restorative Justice Certification Program under the tutelage of Kay Pranis. Britta is currently completing a research-based memoir about healing and awakening through altered states induced by sex and drugs, based on her Consciousness Studies thesis at Goddard College, and is in the process of organizing a Sex Strike // Strike for Pleasure in response to the U.S. abortion bans. In this episode, Eryn and Britta talk about: Britta’s journey with healing & sexuality Navigating consent in long term relationships The Betty Martin wheel of consent - “some of the most psychedelic, life changing work” for them Getting clear on what our desires are, what we want to take, what we want to allow Allowing versus enduring Understanding our patterns within the wheel of consent Not assuming people have easy access to their choice & their voice Receiving no’s Cultivating consent in psychedelic spaces Not transferring hierarchies of power Blog for this episode: www.living-open.com/blog/britta-love Connect with Eryn on their Instagram. Book a sliding scale breathwork session with Eryn. Connect with Britta on their website and Instagram. Check out the Strike for Pleasure on Instagram and the website!

Yvette (they/she) is a somatic/movement psychotherapist focused on integrating the neurobiology of trauma into relational movement practices. In this episode, Eryn and Yvette talk about: Yvette’s journey Their spiritual initiations Trying our actual selves on in spaces where we didn’t really know anyone How they went from wanting to be a nun to finding a more fluid & open spirituality Craving community with elders and decolonizing mentorship Retraumatization in spiritual communities Rooting into our power in healthy and helpful ways The role of somatics in our empowerment & disempowerment Not putting judgements on contraction or expansion Healing together in community Blog for this episode: www.living-open.com/blog/yvette-lalonde Connect with Eryn on their Instagram and check out moon sign, officially out everywhere! Join the waitlist to get updated when HOLY is back. Check out the Religious Trauma workbook. Connect with Yvette on their website and Instagram.

Flory Huang (she/they) is a deep feeler, seeker and seer with diverse experiences and skill sets that enable her to establish containers for deep inquiry, relation and being. In this episode, Eryn and Flory talk about: Flory’s journey with spirituality & healing Holding hope, possibility, and change The space between the person you are and the version of yourself you know you can be Being perceived in our wholeness The somatics of possibility The contraction before the expansion How contraction teaches us about restedness The beloved ~ meta emotions ~ Having roots within the swirl Hot takes on the “always expanding” culture of spirituality! Blog for this episode: www.living-open.com/blog/flory-huang  Connect with Eryn on their Instagram and check out moon sign, officially out everywhere! Join the waitlist to get updated when HOLY is back. Check out the Religious Trauma workbook. Connect with Flory on their website and Instagram.

Ash Canty (they/he) is a Psychic Medium, Death Guide & Spiritual Life Coach. They support others in liberating their souls, deepening relationship with death and connecting folks with their loved ones on the other side. In this episode, Eryn and Ash talk about: Ash’s journey with healing and spirituality Deepening our relationships with death & being in connection with death in a way that makes us more alive Living in the paradox of grief and praise Living with death in mind Being fully in this life & feeling liberation Letting go and being held The invitation to continue opening up even when death is inevitable Blog for this episode: www.living-open.com/blog/ash-canty Connect with Eryn on their Instagram and download their free 7 minute breathwork meditation. Connect with Ash on their website and Instagram.