Happy New Year, my lovely Substack peeps. 🤍

The time for renewal and springing forth into new beginnings is upon us.

Speaking of peeps, I will never tire of hearing the birds sing me awake. They just can’t keep themselves from singing their beautiful songs, can they?

They feel the air, they feel the sun, they feel ALIVE while they are alive….

….and seemingly celebrate each moment by claiming the voices they have and singing joyfully with exuberance at the mere fact of being.

It’s all too easy for us humans to fall into a routine of sameness that practically lulls us into forgetting that being alive is a freakin’ miracle.

It’s truly an astounding wonder that anything exists at all. But, alas, even the biggest, deepest, most confounding marvel of all can be taken for granted. We go to bed assuming we will awaken in the morning. We awake assuming that we will live through the day and into the next. The truth is- one never knows when it’s the last day, the last hour, the last breath.

We are each in fact, at least in the physical sense, temporary.

Some may squirm at such a thought but I personally find this to be both liberating and quite the motivator for action. It’s a powerful reminder to take the reins of the Now and live deliberately in accordance with what evokes joy and fulfillment.

What brings me joy happens to be singing like the birds.

And instead of falling for the illusory trap of ‘perfection’ or waiting to be ‘good enough’ (both false narratives propagated by the stupid ol’ voice in the head that is to be ignored and over-ruled! LOL) I’m going to sing and share from my heart as if it’s my very last day to do so.

I wrote this song, Feeling Temporary, in 2018, around the theme of agency and in knowing that the future is not yet written. We each hold a pen, aka an imagination. And to me there is nothing more exciting than that fact. I have a couple recorded versions in the works, one piano-based and the other synth-beats-based. I’ll be sure to share here when they are ripe and ready to ingest.

In the meantime, here is the song as I performed it on a live stream on my YouTube channel a couple of weeks ago.

Enjoy!

with love,

Jacqueline

Leave a comment

the words

I am feeling temporary

watching time fly in a hurry

taking stock of all automatic behaviour

Blessed with agency to do so

Blessed with every right to choose so

the reins are in my hands for the remainder

There’s a million little ways

for a life to go unnoticed

There’s a million little ways

to live one to the fullest

Life is like a picture movie

Starring roles and exciting stories

Writing all the words for your own adaptation

So be your dream or be your nightmare

Going some or going nowhere

The rest is up to your imagination

There’s a million hidden ways

for a life to go unfulfilled

There’s a million hidden ways

to live it so you fill it…

So I’m gonna search far and I’m gonna search wide

Gonna do all I can to live while I’m alive

I’m taking a breath because I’m taking a leap

I’m gonna dive down because I wanna live deep

Deep, deep, deep…

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Thank you so much for being here and for listening!

Your support for my art-making is deeply appreciated.

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Hello, my lovely ones.

You immortal souls disguised as human beings.

You might want to sit down for this one.

Close your eyes.

And travel inward….

Deep under winter’s hibernatory spell, I am seduced to stay in one place.

To sit, to breathe, to be without the need for doing.

Connected to breath, the ever-spiralling conduit

and temporary tour-guide for my eternal spark,

I am.

Creating my existence from the inside out,

reborn from a stillness that moves me beyond boundaries.

To sit and yet travel far is the paradoxical gift of aether made audible.

I do recommend headphones.

Mostly I recommend you follow your own bliss to wherever it leads you.

with love,

Jacqueline

Thank you for being here. 🤍

I appreciate you.

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My piece today is directly inspired by the always thoughtful and refreshingly insightful writing of . It was this post of his in particular that did it:

A Convict's Perspective

Stress and the Citizens Grindset

“Coleman! Get back in line” the Indian River juvie-jail roller barked at me as I wandered out to talk to someone in the hallway. I ignored him, I had fresh squeezed juice to gossip. “Coleman!” “Keep my name out ya mouth!” I yelled back over my shoulder. This wasn't my first time doing a baby-bit and I learned long ago these guards couldn't put hands on me…

Read more

2 years ago · 161 likes · 56 comments · Coleman

While reading it with my morning coffee, I felt the stirring of a response deep within me. It was that all too familiar and wonderful feeling born of welcoming in an entirely new perspective and way of seeing the world. An expansion of consciousness by way of looking through the eyes of another.

Coleman’s post was at heart a beautiful acknowledgement of those who have chosen to take the higher, harder road. For those who are busy juggling all of life’s demands while continuing to show up every day as responsible citizens and highly functional members of a society and just keep grinding. In his eyes, we are “walking through fire”. He writes:

Yet here you are choosing every day to be good people. You make a conscious decision to do the right thing over and over and over even though it's almost never easier. You choose the stress and hardships over being a dirt bag. That's fucking mind blowing.

I appreciate the acknowledgement and I love his message. And I have no doubt that to all his readers it will be a lovely surprise and will be well-received.

the context

Once I read and understood the point he was making, I began to comtemplate how it applies specifically to me and the arc of my life. I reflected on my relationship to the ‘grind’ of our society and the expectations that we all must work 40+ hours a week just in order to survive and get by. I’ve certainly done my share of what I would consider to be ‘grind’ jobs. I’ve been a dish-washer, a full-time cashier at Costco, and I’ve pounded the pavement on non-stop 13 hour serving shifts at a busy waterfront Toronto restaurant patio during tourist season. I am a great employee, have never been fired, and have worked countless hours in support of other people’s dreams while suffering the burning need to tend to my own. This has been my fire to walk through.

My grind has always been how to balance working day-jobs with nurturing my soul.

Through many changes and chapters, I’ve had to stay in listening distance of the calling of my dream, and to be the one who keeps pushing herself forward.

I am the heroine coming to save me.

Once upon a time, I was living in Forest Hill on Spadina Road in Toronto with my boyfriend. We had moved from Vancouver to Toronto and were starting a new life together. Needing employment ASAP, I quickly landed a retail sales position at RK, a lady’s clothing store around the corner from our new apartment. Perfect. I could walk to work and avoid the commute that most other Torontonians see as a natural and necessary part of their lives. Me being me, I can’t stand manouevering around the subway tunnels during any kind of rush hour. I always feel like a cow in a herd and can often be heard ‘moo-ing” aloud until I’ve ridden the escalator up and back out into the freshness and freedom of solitude again.

I digress.

This day-job was easy to take at first because like ALL of my jobs it was just there to support me so I can do what I really love to do: make music. For the most part, the clientele were very wealthy women shopping for new things to adopt and I simply functioned as a pleasant chaperone for their shopping experience. Easy peasy. Most importantly, I got to listen to whatever music I wanted in the store. And because I worked alone I could play and sing songs as loudly as I wanted. Bonus.

Eventually, as with all of my expendable jobs, something started to shift. Where once this job was bearable it soon elicited feelings of great unease. Being there was so un-enlivening and un-expansive that I began to feel suffocated and smothered by the oppressive air of that space. I was a lion in a cage. Safe, secure, but not free.

It was the worst when business was slow. There were days during winter where the door wouldn’t open even once all day save for me going out to get yet another coffee to keep me company. My soul was slowly crushing as my heartbeat was the second-hand ticking off the passing time with every breath. I had to walk through the fire that was put there for me to come out the other side a warrior.

So I started to bring my guitar to work. I HAD to. And I started to write.

I soon wrote a song called Tidal Wave. It was born of my growing need to break out of my current shape and obliterate myself into the wide open expanse of the ocean of possibilities. And it was born in the very shop that led to its conception.

The lyrics explore the idea of duality, the necessity of contrast to inspire growth, and the recognition that “shit grows roses”. Breakdown to breakthrough. My current reality was an uncomfortable one because pain is a messenger. A signal meant to draw my attention. Taking the action of writing the song was the answer, the remedy. It aligned me back with my purpose, empowering me with my mojo, and accelerated my ability to make a new choice. To take the leap and re-pot myself in new fertile soil where new wisdom lay buried, awaiting excavation….

….fast forward twenty years and I am now living by making my own way. No more ‘day-job’ needed. It seems obvious now as to how to do it but I didn’t have the tools back then that I have now. As I said in my note to Coleman, entrepreneurialism was my chosen path to making a good living while captaining my own ship and maintaining my creative freedom. I am proud of myself that I am still writing music and performing live. I am excited for each day new because now I just surf the waves.

the song

I present to you two versions of Tidal Wave.

The first is a live performance from a residency night I had at C’est What. I really like this version as I had recently made the switch from acoustic guitar to performing it on my hollow-body electric and was excited about the gritty bluesy flavourings added to the song due to playing it through my tube amp. They beautifully match the mood and emotion of the song.

This second is a version my band-mate Rob produced. It was the version my band and I would play live for a short time. Guitars, double-bass, keys, percussion make it a fun little recording. It was released on a CD produced in 2005.

The 2005 We Are Rich album recording:

I hope you enjoy! Let me know what you feel think in the comments.

the words

When it’s good it’s great

When it’s bad it’s always gets bettter

It’s the shit that grows the roses

the downs that take you through

Every story told

is the same old story

About a hero trying to free himself from his self

It’s the tidal wave coming around again

teaching me to break and not just bend

It’s the tidal wave coming around again teaching me to break

Well I’m designed to be resigned to stay the same and never change

I’m designed to be resigned to play it safe and never change

When it’s good it’s great

When it’s bad it can only get better

It’s the shit that grows the roses

the breakdowns that break you through

Every story told

is the same old story

About a heroine who will free herself from herself

Well I’m designed to be resigned to stay the same and never change

I’m designed to be resigned to play it safe and never change

I’ve decided not to hide it and I’m jumpin on that wave

I’ve decided just to ride it so I’m breakin like that wave….

It’s the tidal wave coming around again

teaching me to break and not just bend

It’s the tidal wave coming around again teaching me to break

So I’m making my own way….

Thank you so much for popping by to read and listen. I so appreciate your time and welcome any comments or thoughts you have.

be great,

love Jacqueline xo

This post is entirely spontaneous as it has just been inspired by a comment posted on my most recent offering by .

I think it’s so lovely that he listened to my art and then took the time to give me some feedback and suggestions. It’s really cool of him. And I like what he has to say:

I listened to the last 3 of your posts.

The two latest show you have the expertise to record.

I would like to hear your vocal a bit more in front of the tracks.

You obviously have a lot of listeners feed them a wider variety.

Happily, I’m feeling inspired to oblige him.

Admittedly, many of my sonic paintings, aka recordings, are born of my taste for shoegaze/trip-hop/industrial vibes, where noisy layered guitars and effects strive to out-shine the vocals, and there is nary an acoustic guitar in sight.

I know this flavour of music I make is not for everyone.

However, I do compose a variety of music. And in the spirit of the kind gentleman’s request, I am choosing to share these two sweet, organic love songs with you.

These songs are ones I wrote as gifts for people I love. Dedications and devotionals born of my heart. I never thought I would ever share them with anyone but the people I wrote them for.

I hope you enjoy.

Song for BenBen

My friend Ben is a musical genius of a keyboard player. And a wonderful human.

I call him BenBen. He calls me JacJac.

We met on campus at Western University in London, Ontario and we became fast friends. I had my first mushroom trip with Ben, before I turned 20 and we still refer back to the adventure we had wandering the streets all day in the sun, blissed out and happy.

We both left London for Toronto at different times in our 20’s. Ben eventually got married and landed a job at Yamaha- a dream job for a keyboard player and a gigging musician. For a time, Ben was a member of my band adding beautiful, souful piano and percussion. When Ben was offered an opportunity for a raise and a transfer to California, he wisely said yes. BenBen flew down south to upgrade his life.

One day, I found myself missing my friend so I wrote him this song to tell him so.

Song for Lucy

When my niece Lucy turned one year old, Auntie Jac naturally chose to write a song and make a video to gift her as a celebration of her first birthday.

I think the lyrics and melody are super sweet. It was all recorded on Garageband on my iPad.

My sister and her family live in New Zealand. Verrrry far away. We see each other when we can.

In the meantime, there’s music….

more love songs

I have also written songs for other people. I wrote about those here:

Thank you for inspiring me to share these songs,

Have a beautful night, friends!

I attended my very first Landmark seminar in 2002.

For those of you who have never heard of Landmark, the simplest way for me to describe it is as a highly effective training modality and set of courses designed to break people free from the ‘matrix of their minds’ and out of their programmed way of existing in the world.

Over an intensive 3 day weekend-long session, attendees undergo what is essentially a ‘de-brainwashing’ process. By being guided to recognize patterns of thought and using the stories of others to reflect to you your own blindspots, you begin to discover your unconscious beliefs- the ones that have been hidden from view, lurking in the shadows and captaining your ship for your whole life. You can finally see the puppet-strings you’ve been dangling from. They are so obscure and deeply rooted that we easily live without even knowing they are there. That is until Landmark hands you the flashlight, the scissors, and the motivation to look into your shadowy corners and snip them, forever untethering yourself from a past that need not become your future.

Most of us have been living the same way, day after day, on auto-pilot, without even noticing. And there’s a reason for this.

Think about it. Go back to the very beginning of you…a baby in a womb, existing in a place that is warm, dark, and safe for the process of your gestation.

Suddenly, one day you pop out into what is typically an overly bright room filled with strangers who are making noises and doing busy things. It’s quite the contrast to the place you’ve just been for the first nine months of your life. And so you learn to adapt and adjust to this new sensory overload. You are soon placed into the hands of your new guardians who are probably overwhelmed, if not overjoyed, at your brand spanking new existence. They may be young, they may be old, they may be in love, they may be in shambles but, in any case, chances are good that they themselves are still learning how to grow up and survive in a challenging world.

The truth is many of us find ourselves born into the hands of perfectly imperfect humans who have not yet healed their own wounds and traumas from their childhood experiences. This means we are bound to learn that our new world is not as safe as the womb from which we just came. For each one of us, there is always a very first time we feel a threat to our survival, to our lives. Whether the threat is real or not, it inevitably makes a permanent emotional and cognitive impact upon us.

The initial recognition that we are living inside of an unsafe world causes a pivotal shift in our being.

The guard goes up. Protection is turned on.

Most of us were so little when we first initiated our built-in defensive mechanism that we don’t even remember it’s there and still turned on. We live out our lives from inside our survival-mode, with our defences up and fully engaged. This quickly becomes our new normal. It becomes the lens through which we perceive everything. And soon we forget that there’s any other way to be.

Safety, however, is not freedom. Operating on auto-pilot is not really living.

We do not know what we don’t know. And we can’t change what we aren’t aware of.

Landmark powerfully grants you an awareness of and access to your embedded programming. It is in becoming aware of your current belief system that you can choose to install a new one. You can upload any software you want.

You learn how to choose for the very first time.

In freeing your mind from the barriers of old beliefs, you can open up your mind and perception to consider new outlooks and new ways of being It is with this ability to choose who you want to be and how you want to act that you are gifted with a brand new world full of possibilities.

the context

I was 27, living in Vancouver, and heading into the year of my Saturn returning. Right on schedule. “What am I doing with my life?” was the theme of the thoughts running through my mind, as I found myself continually struggling to satisfy my monthly financial obligations while also trying to fulfill my heart’s desire of being a free-spirited song-writer. At the time and in my mind, the only pathway to becoming a successful musician was the one that would lead me right up to the door of a major record label exec who would then invite me in, sit me down, and ask me to sign over ownership of my soul. From the second my pen lifted back up off the page, I would thereafter be molded into becoming what they wanted me to become, into wearing what they wanted me to wear, into making music that was “radio-friendly” enough to get me air-time, and to be heard by the masses.

I would no longer be an individual. No longer an artist. I would become a commodity.

This loss of life and freedom was not an option. I knew myself well enough to know that I’d be much happier living as I was: a poor musician on Commercial Drive renting rooms in shared houses with other artists and creatives who were walking the same road I was. Living with the mystery of not knowing how I’d ever earn enough to get ahead was less uncomfortable and way more desirable than the possibility of one day looking in the mirror and not recognizing myself in the reflection.

Instead of succumbing to the safety of a 9-5 paycheque, I was determined to walk my road less travelled. I just needed some empowerment. Some more tools in my tool-belt. Borrowing money from a friend who had just completed The Forum and was ecstatic about his life-changing experience, I signed up for my first Landmark session. I can vouch for the veracity of the common saying that is well-known to and oft-spoken by graduates of the course:

If you show up fully and do it right, ‘before’ and ‘after’ become two totally different chapters in your life. You stop putting your past in your future because you stop living on repeat. Each day is wide open to be something completely new and different from any lived before.

The inherent truth to this existence is that there is no meaning in it save from what we ascribe to it. Everything is a story. And you hold the pen. So what are you going to write with it?

We live, we perceive, we think, we create, we believe in narratives.

You can create any story you want. And if you believe it to be true, then it is.

This is where true power and freedom and creativity lie.

I came away from my weekend, smashed apart, broken out of my old mold.

I was released from the fear that had held me trapped in survival-mode and I was born anew….inspired by the truth that anything is possible.

It wasn’t scary at all. It was deliciously exhilarating.

I was finally free to re-invent myself.

Free to choose.

the song

the words

I am creative

I can write stories

I can make meaning out of anything

I am a machine

Know how to self-clean

Just turn me on and off I go

Well it’s just one big long day

If you know that there’s no someday

It’s just one big long day

If you know that someday will not come

I am on my knees

At the foot of my beliefs

Trees from seeds planted long ago

I am a tender

Care-taker

The more I give to you the more I grow

Well it’s just one big long day

If you know that there’s no someday

It’s just one big long day

If you know that someday will not come

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Thank you so much for popping by and reading my words and listening to my music.

I appreciate you so much!

be great,

love Jacqueline

I have to be honest.

I’ve had this idea for a song- this exact recording I’m posting- kicking around inside my head and my Garageband files for well over five years now. I have long thought that I would add a second verse to it some day, and just…well…MORE to this recording, but I woke up today with a strong cup of clarity.

The fact is, that is not going to happen.

Today, my song and I both grew up a little. I came to terms with accepting it exactly the way it is, a little short but definitely sweet and most certainly punchy.

And it grew up out of the darkness of its digital dormancy and out into the light.

Today, I celebrate the release of Never Had A Reason.

Enjoy…..xo

the context

When I record digitally, in a DAW like Garageband or Ableton Live using midi and plugin’s, etc, I often end up writing a song in reverse. Rather than writing a complete song with lyrics and a mapped out arrangement FIRST, and then recording it, I will often sit down to just play with sounds, having no set agenda or destination. This free-wheeling and experimental approach to ‘sonic painting’ often inspires the birth of a song, that I then have to write lyrics for and impose a structure upon.

Never Had A Reason is one such song.

Once I have a nice hook happening, I look to add a vocal line next. The lyrics are sometimes improvised in the moment to formulate ideas for various melodies. But most often, they are inspired by randomly flipping open a journal and singing what’s written there. Magic often intervenes at this stage. My hand opens the book to the right page and my eyes land upon the right words.

A song is born.

Around 2017-2018, I was doing a lot of journalling about the damage of collectivist thinking. Group think. Not my cup of tea. And at that time, I did a lot of writing so I could work through why these ideologies are so unappealing to me.

I came to the conclusion that the kind of worldview that asks me to make assumptions about people I’ve never met is one that I reject.

Call me crazy, but I’m not going to hate groups of people (read: individual living breathing Humans) just because it’s trendy to do so.

the words

When you jump across a river

passing through

I’ll wait for you

If you get stuck in the middle

Keep reaching through

I’ll wait for you

I don’t really know you

And that’s OK

I’ve never had any reason

To manufacture hate

I don’t really know you

And you don’t really know me, too

And that’s OK

I’ve never had any reason

To manufacture hate

Leave a comment

Thanks for popping by and reading and listening!

I’d love to hear from you, so please consider leaving a comment.

If you want to be a guest on my Post Post Podcast, please email me

jacquelinerendell@gmail.com

be great,

love jacqueline xo

I mean, what’s not to love?

This one boy in particular, the one who features in this story, was a bass player. A dynamo at both electric and upright. He was a phenomenal musician- one of those ‘musician’s musicians’. Skilled at theory as well as all the execution…from sheet music to improvising to writing originals unlike any I’d ever heard.

One fine day, smack in the middle of our honeymoon period, he was asked to go away on tour with an increasingly popular Vancouver-based band, The Be Good Tanyas.

While I was most certainly thrilled for the boost in his career, it was a bit of a blow. We were still swirling in that exciting sliver of a chapter wherein you’re barely existing as physical matter at all, but instead are vibrating more and more as electrified sparks of light.

Falling fast and hard into translucent, transcendent love.

Thinking of him made my heart ache all day with the thrill of yearning and knowing we’d meet face to face again. And soon.

As I’ve said before here, I use song-writing and music-making to face what I’m feeling and, in doing so, I’m empowered to transmute it through aligning and marrying the frequency of the emotion with the frequency of sound and breath.

It is undoubtedly my favourite healing modality in the entire freakin’ universe.

It was after hearing the news of his upcoming plan to be away for six months touring, and upon being left with a sharp pang of loss, that I took myself into the garage/studio and plunked myself down with a Zoom digital 8-track, cello and violin. Plus the many necessary mood-enhancing effects to run everything through.

The beautiful thing about alchemizing emotions into art is that you’re always left with a souvenir for your adventure of transmutation. Something to hold onto as a memento of a time, a touchstone, a gift.

Please enjoy this one called Leavin’.

Note to

This is the song I mentioned to you during a live-stream. The swirly windy sound that swooshes up and down is a violin through effects. I’d love to perform this live with a violin player one day. :)

the words

Sooner or later

I am awakened

To the facts, to the facts,

To the facts

One day

It all comes to realization

That you’re leavin’, ya you’re leavin’

Here, oh here

Here I am

Here I am smiling yes I am smiling

Can you hear

In the void

in the room

That you’re leavin’

Doesn’t make me feel so good

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Thank you for popping by and listening to my music.

I appreciate you.

be great,

love Jacqueline

Over decades of cohabitating with my own recording gear (starting with a TASCAM 4-track, then a Zoom digital 8-track, Garageband, and now Ableton) and being prone to sketching out ideas & emotions with notes & chords, I’ve amassed quite the extensive collection of ‘not full songs but tracks I like well enough to use for something creative one day’.

Well, the day has come for this little guitar thingy I recorded to finally find a home.

I spent a couple hours with Canva to craft a video for it to soundtrack.

Surrounded by greys in the midst of winter, I felt moved by the muse of colour and a sense of freshness in the air. Knowing it’s right around the corner, but still yet out of reach…

…here is my ode to spring.

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Thank you for stopping by!

As always, I appreciate you being here.

be great,

love Jacqueline

I am currently melting into a puddle of bliss.

The big beautiful sun is shining inside a wide open cloudless blue sky for the second day in a row. I almost forgot what this looked and felt like. Almost.

I can feel my skin cells, as tendrils on a plant, awaking from their slumber and stretching toward its life-giving warmth. It truly feels like anything is possible.

In honour of the light, today I am sharing a song that reflects rays of musical vibrance.

the context

Back around 2018, I was living in the east end of Toronto in a neighbourhood called Leslieville. It was small enough and self-sustaining enough to be a pocket of community in an otherwise large and unfriendly city. Over the 16 years I lived there, I grew many friendships I would call family. One such friend was an ambitious and creative creature named Rachel.

Rachel was heavily into community action, often guerilla-gardening by planting flowers around the hood where some colour and life was needed. She was also imbued with entrepreneurial spirit and had opened 3 bars that quickly became cozy gathering hubs, over the time I knew her.

Always equipped with a beautiful smile and a helping hand at the ready.

She was a ray of light.

One random day, I received a letter in the mail from her~ handwritten & artful~ expressing her appreciation of our friendship. I was stunned into silent awe at the thoughtfulness, at the gesture of love, at the power of reading such a message written with her hand in ink on paper, as compared to reading words on a screen.

Instead of reciprocating the gift by writing her a letter back I wrote her a song.

This song is it.

the words

There’s a star rising in the east

as warm and bright as the sun

If you should want for anything

She is the one to get the job done

Ray of light

She’s a ray of light

Full of thought

and she’s full of care

Radiating joy with laughter everywhere

If you should need to be uplifted

She is the one to bring all the fun

Ray of light

She’s a ray of light

Those who know her know they’re blessed to know her

Those who know her know they’re blessed to know her

tech deets

For those of you curious about such things, this entire song was recorded using only my i-pad, including the mic for vox and effects. I prefer using Ableton Live as my DAW, but at this time I was between computers and only had Garageband at my disposal. It’s actually quite the impressive software if you have tiny enough fingers to play the digital keyboard!

Thanks so much for popping by to read and listen.

It means so much to me.

Feel free to share, subscribe, leave a comment, make a donation, and consider a paid subscription to fund my music-making addiction.

be great,

love Jacqueline

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buy me some time

In honour of this powerful full moon that is bringing with it a portal of possibilities, inviting an opening of our hearts into experiences of deeper joy and of love, the setting of life intentions towards fulfilling our soul’s truest desires, I am sharing with you this love song that I feel aligns with this time of expansion and magic.

Lena from the Power Path writes:

Also known as the wolf moon, this moon inspires expansion as well as triggers a need to find your inner spark, passion and courage to go for it. The key is to open your heart wide to your personal joy so you can experience  wonder and awe from the place of childlike innocence as if you are seeing the world for the first time. This will ignite a certain level of focus that can help you anchor new dreams and intentions. You can spend some time making a list of the things that inspire you and that you love to do, big and small, as well as working with your imagination to stretch beyond your limitations around what could be.

the context

I made this recording few years ago, when a classic clash between the fears couples carry created an emotional rift between us, one that felt impossible to mend with mere words.

I created this piece with the intention to send soothing frequencies his way, embedded with the frequency of my intention to foster trust and heal our hearts.

Sometimes, all we want to know is that we’re safe.

the words

You should know

that I love you

your mind and your face

I just want

you to be happy

and to know your heart’s safe with me.

Leave a comment

Thank you so much for reading.

And thank you for listening.

be great,

love Jacqueline

xo

Like the creatures in the video below, I believe we already have all we need to get through this labyrinth of life- to morph, to adapt, to transform. We’re disconnected from our nature in many ways and suffer from a bad case of amnesia, but it’s not terminal. Our wisdom lies dormant. Sometimes we need a reminder, a tool, a trick to plug back into Source and wake it the heck up.

I thought I’d share a method I’ve employed over the years to self-soothe on those occasions I feel “over-zoomed in” and too focused on the minutiae for my own good.

I choose to choose my thoughts.

The amazing thing about playing with perspective is it grants you instant peace and calm, like a deep gulp of oxygen, if only you choose the correct thought to think. You may need to try a bunch out until you find it. And when it pops, it really POPS. There is no mistaking the visceral feeling of clicking yourself back into alignment. It’s like a jumper cable sparking a dead battery back to life.

Fusion with Source. Electric. Connected.

Your higher self always knows all is well. When you don’t worry, you know that too. Our higher self inhabits us like a patient friend awaiting our visit, hoping one day we’ll just move in and stay. It is holding the ground, eternally attuned to love.

We are born with the ability to adopt Source perspective. We can choose to.

No matter how hard it gets, life always makes sense in retrospect.

I say, why wait til then? Trust that now.

Cultivating an acceptance of what is- no matter how unwanted, or confusing or scary- is the epitome of faith. It is to root deeply in the knowing that all that occurs must be. Up close, it’s not easy to see the big picture clearly. We just see bad things happening and wonder what it’s all for. But when we stand far enough back, we can see how the individual strands of colourful threads weave together to forge the tapestry of life.

Over time, it all comes together in the most appealing way.

One day, it all makes sense.

What’s more, when we tend to our frequency by actively soothing worry or anxiety we are aligning ourselves with the creative power to determine what that ‘one day’ looks like. We pave our own road with each thought we choose to think.

In the meantime, we each have all we need to move forward and travel the road of our destinies that lead us to the fulfillment of what we came here to do.

In fact, I reckon, in many ways you’re already there.

Now just get there.

What else is life for?

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the context

I narrate audiobooks for a living, and have been busy working away on a fun mystical fantasy fiction about a group of female Sixters who attend Element School to learn the powers of their particular element (and to learn about themselves). In order to graduate, they must complete the Element Trial. If they pass the test, they each attain a power staff with a power gem to more powerfully wield their magic and take their shizzam up to the next level.

It took me one month to narrate 43 chapters. And then another two weeks to edit, process and upload all the files. Today was officially my first day off (or ON I’d rather say) in a long while to get to step outside time and just play and make art.

Today, with the magical story still running through me, I was inspired by the appreciation I feel for my kindred warrior sisters who I am so honoured to be meeting here on Substack. I wanted to make something to give back to you.

I am so proud of us all for continuing to grow, to heal, to be honest with ourselves and others, to practice self-care, learn boundaries, and to keep our hearts open during this wild ride of a metamorphosis we are all on.

We sure are earning our power staves.

And I am honoured to be growing, shedding, shining alongside of you.

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the words

You’re already there

Now just get there

It all comes together in the most appealing way.

Thanks for listening. Seriously.

If you wish to donate, here’s a button:

buy me time for making stuff

be great,

love Jacqueline

A day of deeper breathing, of crosswords and maybe two cups of coffee instead of just one.

In fact, I love doing the NYT Sunday crossword puzzle so much that I have a little song I sometimes sing when I get my hands on one:

“Crossword Day, it’s Crossword Day!

Everybody knows it’s Crossword Day!”

Yes, I’m an absolute geek. I also happen to love scrabble which leads me back to the content of this post.

One day in the recent past, I caught myself daydreaming good dreams about my two beautiful nieces Lucy and Eva. They live far away from me on the other side of the world in New Zealand. Since it’s so rare that we are together sharing the same space, I recorded this music and made this video to tell them that…

I am always thinking of you.

Enjoy…xo

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Thank you for being here. It’s my sincere pleasure to host you.

If you love what you hear and want to hear more, please consider a making a donation through a paid subscription or buy me time to make more music.

Many thanks & much love.

be great

love Jacqueline

buy me music time

And as each day passes, I realize more and more that I am a proud alumni of “The Old School”.

The curriculum of said school imbued in me the idea that

“sticks and stones may break my bones

but words will never hurt me”

It also taught me that disagreements do not necessitate the end of a friendship.

No two people look through the exact same lens to see the world in the exact same way. This is the flavour and spice of life. When we discuss and share and listen and synthesize our differing worldviews, we create a magical soup greater than the sum of the ingredients that went into making it.

Such is the logic & compassion of “The Old School”.

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This song has been shared by my friends here at Substack by Sol Luckman and The Freedom Scale. Sorry (but not sorry) for anyone seeing this for the third time. ;)

I’ve since grown my own Substack and wanted to share with it with my peeps.

I dedicate this song to those who have lost friends to the madness; to those who remain true to their punk roots; to those who cannot be labelled or boxed in by irrational rules or dogma; to those who truly have their own wings and fly free.

The story behind the song

Back in 2017 I joined a cool post-punk band as the keyboard player. Prior to my joining, I had been taking a break from music to focus on my upholstery business, Uplift Upholstery, that I had started to get me out of bartending for my supper. Living in the expensive city of Toronto required that I hustle day and night to make my ends meet, so sadly my music had taken a backseat to work that actually paid me.

It was in this band that I met my friend, who six years later, became the subject of this song. For the sake of this piece, let’s call him Jonny.

So grateful to be provided with an opportunity to reawaken my dormant musical self, the friendships and experiences born out of this band were a gift to me. We rehearsed and gigged regularly. We discussed many topics in between jams. Before long, it became clear to me that I was the only one truly anti-establishment. I was the punk-ass rebel in this post-punk band.

Their left-leanings took them all towards collectivism.

But none of this mattered to me.

In a world of diversity, a blending of different notes into harmony is the goal~ not a forced hammering out of individual frequencies into the boring unison of homogeny.

Fast forward a few years….

I left Toronto in 2021 to start a new life in a new city and Jonny was the one to help me move there. Right up until June of 2023, he came to visit me every 6 weeks or so, happily driving the 45 minutes to arrive at my studio for a catch-up hang and a jam. Over this period of two years, he was a witness to my experiences in a Canada I no longer recognized, one in which the divisive rhetoric of politicians & media outlets did their best to conquer us and confuse us into submission. It was upon my stating this (what I thought was) obvious fact on our last visit in June that Jonny’s brain exploded all over me. He had caught a case of cognitive dissonance. And it was terminal.

I received a long and nasty email from him a week later detailing why he could no longer be friends with me. It took me by surprise. At first it was painful to read. But because it was so insanely long and so incredibly nasty, it became easier to not take personally. It wasn’t about me.

He was clearly writing from pain. And that pain was there long before we met.

Two things to note before you listen & read the lyrics:

1. He referenced Star Trek a lot. So I did the same.

2. His nickname for me was Butterfly.

Enjoy…..xo

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the words

Like Jekyll hid his Hyde

You kept your monster locked inside

‘til a trigger tripped your rage

and he flew out of his cage

You’re woke, no longer alive

Lost to the Borg hivemind

Assimilated, your resistance was futile

And I can’t see a way past this impasse…

I can’t look you in your ideology no more

You can’t look me in the eye

You’re seeing everything in black or white, my friend

And I am living in colour, I am living in colour

The line in the sand

Has been drawn by your own hand

You think you’re better than me

But your grass ain’t greener

There’s no left or right

Just classic conquer by dividing

So rise above it~ join the human tribe

You’ve lost your rock, you’ve lost your roll

You’ve lost your heart, you’ve lost your soul

You’ve lost your mind, you’ve lost control

Your cult of misery

Thrives on homogeneity

True diversity is in individuality

You can’t put this Jac in a box

I’ll be dancing on the lid as I’m singing my songs

I’m not what you label me~

I am a butterfly and I’ll fly freeeeeee!

We’re all living colour.

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Thank you so much for listening and reading my story. If you have an inkling to share and comment please do….I’d love to hear from you.

If you’d like to support me by buying me some time to make some more music, please do so here:

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be great,

love Jacqueline

I’m feeling super extra frisky on this Friday afternoon and so I’m about to reveal to you a page out of my musical sketchbook, if you will.

It’s not perfect~ but it is REAL. And it’s true. I really, really mean it.

In fact, I mean it so much that I can’t not share it!!

There’s just something a little tingly, a wee exciting, and a lot magical in the air.

And I’m in the mood for celebrating.

the song

Unless you’re existing as a blade of grass or a twig on a tree, you’ve probably noticed the encroaching control-freak monster clamping down on our sovereignty from all directions.

Coming at us in waves, after waves, after waves….

Though we’ve never met in person, I’m the kind of woman who believes that the fact that you’re reading my words right now means we are connected deeply, beyond the letters on the screen.

We are kindred.

We’ve been challenged and tested.

We’ve found a lot of hidden things.

And we’ve lost a lot, too.

The road ahead is truly unknown. But we have each other.

I wrote this song to be an anthem, to be sung in the vein of drunk Irish pub-junkies. Arms around one another, belting at the top of our lungs.

To one another. For one another.

Thank you for holding the ground.

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the words

Strange days are upon us

Reason is going under ground

Learning how to tread water so I don’t drown

Following the horizon

All the way to the sea

Where I’m walking on water so wave after wave won’t catch me

We’re moving forward into a dark unknown

But there’s a light at the end of every tunnel

I will be that light for you, baby

And you can be that light for me

Surfing tides of the pressure

To conform to the norm

Through all kinds of weather we’re still standing tall in the storm

Following the only thing I can trust

The sound of my heartbeat

All the way across the water where wave after wave won’t catch me

Though we’re moving forward into a dark unknown

There is a light at the end of every tunnel

And I will be that light for you baby

And you can be that light,

Oh, you can be that light for me!

Wave after wave, wave after wave

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Thank you as always for listening. If you feel inspired to support me with a like, or a comment or a subscription, or buy me a coffee, I thank you in advance.

(Your support means I can get back into my studio and make more music!!!)

be great

love

Jacqueline

Wherever you may be in the world, I wish for you that you are at peace and that your day feels full of promise.

Before you proceed to listen & read the lyrics, I’d like to provide some important context for this song.

The Unbearable Way

Back in 2016, my whole world flipped.

The cause was not the American election, per se. It was the collective response to it by my entire community who, up to that point, I had considered to be pretty liberal~ like ME.

Little did I know that The Nothing (aka wokeness) was beginning to spread across the land and was seeping into the bloodstream of society like a venomous mind-spell.

While I stayed where I was (and have always been)~ firmly planted in my freedom-loving-seeker-dom~ all of my friends took several steps away from me…FAR away from me…to the left. My daily state of being was one of confusion and loneliness, betrayal and loss.

Conversations on topics that used to draw seemingly obvious conclusions now became battlefields strewn with mines in the form of words waiting to explode in my face.

Like a trusty friend, I pulled my ability to research & reason out of my survival toolbox and applied it to educate myself on what the heck was happening.

During this time, I found several public figures offering up sane, refreshing voices.

One of them belonged to Owen Benjamin, a comedian who found himself banished from Hollywood due to his “extreme” view that children shouldn’t be politically weaponized or made to signal the “virtue” of their parents by permanently altering their bodies.

At this time, he was live-streaming daily on YouTube and managed to collect quite a following of people like him and me~ people who had lost connections with their friends and/or family due to differences of opinion. He named this group The Bears.

Never one to join a club for fear of losing me, I didn’t go all the ALL the way in…but I gleaned enough nourishing validation, assurance and companionship from the group to want to give back and show my appreciation for all they had given me.

So I did what I do best. I wrote a song.

The title and chorus, The Unbearable Way, is not only an obvious reference to the Bears~ it’s also a humorous jab at how unpopular, unsavoury, and downright unacceptable it is to be a free thinker and an individual in a time where group-think is the fashion. Like wearing bell bottoms in an era of skinny jeans, you better be prepared to not fit in- be prepared to stand out and stand up on your own.

One last thing.

My beautiful soul sister from Starfire Codes wrote an INCREDIBLE piece on independent thinkers. You can read it here:

The Starfire Codes by Demi Pietchell

The Power of Independent Thought In A Divisive World

The Starfire Codes produces an audience-supported publication with a stellar podcast, consciousness-expanding daily spiritual content, and well-researched articles on forbidden but crucial topics. If you love our work, please join our constellation of curious minds and venture into forbidden realms of knowledge…

Read more

2 years ago · 46 likes · 6 comments · The Starfire Codes

And now…the song

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the words:

Dare to leave the cave

To see what’s really real

Braving the unknown gives life a whole new dimension

When you’re living in the unbearable way

We dare to disagree

And speech is always free

Individuals with minds as diverse as there are kinds

All are welcome with the same goal

Of living in the unbearable way

We dare to live our dreams

Away from the mainstream

Following our hearts and coming to our own conclusions

Maximizes joy and minimizes illusions

‘cause we are living in the unbearable way,

Yes we are living in the unbearable way!

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I hope you enjoyed your entertainment sparkle for today. Please consider supporting my art by subscribing and/or leaving a comment.

It will truly make my day!

be great,

love Jacqueline

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Sunday

I am by no means religious~ unless you count my devotion to hunting down beauty & dark chocolate or my addiction to mind-blowing & heart-expanding experiences.

However, I am the first to admit there is something special about Sundays.

I have long considered and been amused by the fact that were I to lapse into a 100 year coma and (FINALLY!) awoke from it on a Sunday, I would know it was a Sunday!

There’s just a little something extra about it. An extra level of peace. An extra depth of breath.

An extra sparkle of the divine.

And so I thought today would be a good day to provide a little sparkle for you.

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Ever a sign

Last week, I wrote my second post for my newborn Substack entitled “What the eff are goosebumps?”

In it I present that there are moments in a life, a day, an hour…that put us in touch with our source; experiences that can penetrate so swiftly through the illusion of this material realm that our amnesia is swept away in an instant.

We receive “breadcrumbs”, clues to the Divine, in the form of goose-bump inducing glimpses of the world beneath the world, flashes of insight that give one pause in the midst of the mundane~ a visceral remembering of the brilliance that bred us into Being.

When I witnessed the creation of my two little nieces via a love-collaboration between my sister and brother-in-law, I was moved and in awe.

From practically nothing~ just two tiny piles of molecules~ emerged two shiny brand new minds, hearts and spirits with all the potential to change the world forever. Two new marvellous miracles that left me weeping in wonder…

In a state of embodied awe I quickly recorded this little piece of music to honour the miracles that they are, and to honour what it is to be a witness to something so powerful and humbling. I enjoyed playing with watercolours & a paintbrush to make a (very home-made) video to accompany it.

It is a jubilant celebration of the beauty and surprise of day to day miracles.

If ever there was a sign

Surely you would be mine

If ever there was a clue

It would be you

I know that many look outside and see a world full of shadows.

I dedicate this to those of you who are struggling to find some sense of peace, to see some glimpse of beauty or to feel some glimmer of hope……may this song and video be an offering of some light for you today.

May this be your sign.

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