Cycle One: The 8th Thread

May 31
4 min read

Updated: Oct 16

For context, I'm connecting ideas from these earlier blogs:

1. Twerking Is Spiritual

2. You Are In Control Of You

3. Imma Take The Passport, But Fuck You!

4. Take Me To Outback, then Hit It From The Back

5. Feed The Flesh, and….

6. When Love Is Simple, But Loving Is Hard

7. She Turns Your Vision Into Reality

Alright, now let’s get tricky.

Seven pieces. Seven explorations. Seven invitations to see the world differently.

As I sit here reflecting on these interconnected thoughts I've shared with you, I was fascinated on how all these blogs, seemingly separate conversations that, when viewed together, reveal a more complete picture of what it means to be fully human in a fragmented world.

The Body as Sacred Ground

From the spiritual dimensions of twerking to the neurological connections between food and sex, a consistent theme emerges: the body as a site of wisdom, not shame. We've been taught that our bodies hold us back spiritually, but I'm finding that's not true at all.

When I wrote about twerking as spiritual practice, I wasn't just defending a dance. I was reclaiming an understanding of the body as a sacred vessel; one that holds ancestral memory, processes trauma, and connects us to divine energy through movement. This same embodied wisdom appears when I explored how feeding the flesh actually nourishes the spirit, contradicting centuries of Christian doctrine that treats the body as enemy.

The blues musicians knew this. The West African women in sacred circles knew this. Our ancestors encoded this knowledge in their hips, their voices, their very beings. The question isn't whether this wisdom is real, it's whether we're brave enough to remember it.

Sovereignty in an Interconnected World

My exploration of emotional sovereignty that "no one has the power to make me feel any kind of way unless I give them permission," initially seems to contradict my critique of borders and nationalism. How can I advocate for individual control while simultaneously calling for collective liberation?

The answer lies in understanding sovereignty not as isolation but as conscious choice about connection. When I take my passport while saying "fuck you" to the border system, I'm exercising agency within constraints I didn't create. When I choose my emotional responses to difficult people, I'm not withdrawing from relationship - I'm engaging more skillfully.

True sovereignty isn't about building walls; it's about having enough internal stability to engage authentically with an interconnected world. It's the difference between reactive participation and conscious collaboration.

The Sacred in the Secular

The biggest idea connecting all these pieces is that there's no real difference between spiritual and everyday life. Whether it's seeing the power in twerking, finding God in blues music, or understanding how food feeds both body and soul, I keep coming back to the idea that everything can be sacred if we approach it the right way.

This isn't just feel-good spirituality; it's old wisdom seen through modern life. The club and the church aren't enemies; they're both about human longing. Soul music came from exactly this idea, refusing to separate Saturday night from Sunday morning.

When Muni Long sings about love being complicated while Samoht celebrates its ease, they're both accessing something sacred: the full spectrum of human connection. The complexity isn't a bug—it's a feature.

Integration vs. Division

Every single blog pushes back against false binaries:

Body vs. spirit
Individual vs. collective
Sacred vs. secular
Desire vs. devotion
Local vs. global identity

These divisions aren't natural; they're constructed, often for the purpose of control. Real liberation happens in the integration, in the "both/and" rather than "either/or."

This is what Gloria Anzaldúa meant by "border consciousness"—the ability to live in multiple worlds simultaneously without losing yourself. It's what the blues teaches about holding joy and sorrow in the same breath. It's what my sister, Joeyannie, demonstrates when she turns vision into reality through her lens.

The Paradox of Authentic Living

Living authentically in an inauthentic world requires what I'm beginning to recognize as sacred contradiction. We take the passport while rejecting borders. We practice emotional sovereignty while staying open to connection. We honor ancestral wisdom while creating new possibilities.

This isn't hypocrisy. It's the complexity of being human in systems we didn't design but must navigate. The goal isn't purity but integrity: acting in alignment with our deepest values while staying responsive to changing circumstances.

Creating New Frameworks

What comes from putting all these ideas together is a new way to live. One that:

Centers the body as source of wisdom
Practices sovereignty as conscious engagement rather than withdrawal
Recognizes the sacred in all aspects of human experience
Integrates apparent opposites into dynamic wholes
Embraces paradox as pathway to authenticity

This isn't a philosophy you can learn intellectually. It has to be embodied, practiced, lived.

The Ongoing Conversation

These seven pieces aren't conclusions – they're invitations. Invitations to:

Move your body like it's sacred (because it is)
Take responsibility for your inner reality while staying connected to community
Find the divine in unexpected places
Live the questions rather than forcing answers
Trust your deepest knowing even when it contradicts conventional wisdom

As I finish this reflection, I'm reminded of something James Baldwin wrote: "Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced." Each of these blogs has been an act of facing—facing the complexity of embodied existence, the challenges of authentic relationships, the difficulty of living with integrity in compromised systems.

The threads are woven. The pattern is emerging. But the tapestry isn't finished—it never will be. That's the point. We keep weaving, keep creating, keep integrating the fragments into something more whole.

The body remembers what the mind forgets. The heart knows what the head cannot grasp. And in the spaces between certainties, something new is always being born.

Until next time, and through all the threads that connect us,

Tricky Sol

This marks the completion of my first cycle of seven. Next round, we go deeper. *winkwink