Begin Again

Thoughts on a New Year — Accompanying Jamie Tworkowski for an Online Speaking Event | Saturday, December 30th & Tuesday, January 2nd

Last week, my buddy Justin McRoberts posted this prayer to his Instagram feed:

May you have time to grieve.

May you have friends
who let you feel.

May you have grace for yourself
if you know the part you played
in breaking it.

Then…

May you have the ears to hear
a whisper of resilient hope
deeper in your soul
than the grief goes,
saying…

”Pick one up;
let’s see
what we can make.”

The New Year is always weird. Like, what are we doing? Today’s a new year since this time last December 26th, but nobody’s talking about that, are they? Are they? [I return again to the latest Pete Holmes special — I Am Not For Everyone — and his skit on NYE countdowns.]

The poem speaks to my moment. Perhaps it speaks to yours, as well.

There are certain friends in my life who do let me feel. Jamie is one of them. I’ve been feeling a lot lately. Too much, one might say (though, some of us who have a harder time feeling anything other than that which prevents us from feeling might say: “something, finally”). When he asked me if I wanted to join him for this week’s “Begin Again,” a little nudge in my spirit said, “Yeah, I have to do that.” It turned into “I want to do that,” but I’m just being honest with you: it was a have to before it was a want to. Maybe you’ve got that going on in you, too. But there is a thing in me that knows — for the both of us, despite “the voice of giving up” — we still get to hold on to the hope that we are, rather, on our way, and we get to Begin Again, too. (Y’all see Scott The Painter’s “Say Yes” if you haven’t already, or follow his Substack to go on a nice Visual Pilgrimage in 2024.)

Perhaps that’s the whisper of resilient hope, however tired I admit that I can grow of resilience. So we Begin Again, again, again, again, again, again, again, again…

Maybe you know the feeling, or lack thereof. I’ve quoted — many times over, over the years — Jamie’s words in the introduction to his book: “May these words find you like a friend.”

I’m still interested in words that do that. Both finding and writing them. In spaces that do that. People who do that. The Persian poet and lyrical mystic Hafiz writes:

“Your heart and my heart
are very, very old friends.”

Perhaps you’ll find those kinds of words, hearts, souls, spaces in this invitation to Begin Again. Perhaps that can mean something as simple as “show up and see.” If you’re interested in the risk, you’ve two opportunities to join us for an evening wherein Jamie will be speaking on the “new year, change, wonder, bullshit and possibility.” I’ll be contributing poetry and storytelling, with a little b.s. of my own thrown in, I’m sure.

This isn’t a small-group conversation. You don’t have to say a word. Begin Again is happening online. Jamie’s gonna be at his desk, and I’ll be in a guest room at my mom’s place — where I came to surprise her for Christmas (truly, priceless). I’ll perform 25-30 minutes, and then Jamie will speak for about 45-50. Q&A happens after that, meaning we’ll both stick around to answer questions. After a lot of years of doing these types of events, I can tell you that Q&A is often the highlight. 

We’re selling tickets, here, because this is our job, and both of us have dogs to feed, so you know… if you care about animals… ;-) It’s twenty bucks, and a ticket will give you access to both the live presentation and the video playback (to both dates, and both recordings).

Wherever you’re at (North Pole, Atlantis) and whatever you feel like (pure bliss at the highest levels of available consciousness, like Scarlett Johansson getting CPH4 kicked into her bloodstream in LUCY, or, you know — melting in Dante’s Inferno) this holiday season, consider this a formal welcome. We’d love to see you there. We’re all trying to “pick one up and see what we can make,” and it’s no small task in a world on fire (be it you-as-a-world or the world, and oh how one-in-the-same they are).

Listen to Death Cab For Cutie in the meantime. See you Saturday.