the Muse
the muse is a portal for inspiration.
Here, you will find self-portraits of living muses (artists, witches, dreamers) following their golden threads, profiles of + interviews with inspiring artists and visionaries, and notes from me. Stay up to date by subscribing to the newsletter.
field notes:
Notes from the Underworld
Notes on Doubt
Notes: What is Magic?
the archive:
Self-Portrait: Sammy Kanofsky
I have created a self-portrait series featuring witches, artists, visionaries - really anyone following their golden threads in this lifetime. I have selected questions from the Proust Questionnaire (which I discovered through my dear friend Gwen, who I hope to feature soon) and have added a few of my own. These questions are potent in that they invite deep self-reflection and become a self-portrait of sorts.
Notes: What is Magic?
Lately, I have been thinking about the otherworld. Well, actually, I am always thinking about the otherworld (which is, for those who are not as strange as I am, the invisible world, the imaginal world, the world that exists outside of what we typically think of as “reality”). However, I have been thinking about it lately from more of a zoomed out and technical perspective: What is it? Where is it? How do we access it? And what is this thing called magic that we have decided as a western society does not exist except in fairytales? So, I have decided to start a “what is magic” essay series, starting with this first installment. This one is about manifestation, and the beliefs we hold that shape our realities.
Notes on Perception
Where is the center of pain?
In my experience, and according to experts, pain is pulsing rather than static. If you really pay attention, there are gaps between the pulses. If you put yourself right there, in the gaps, it can help make the pain feel more like what it is. A signal. I’ve learned this from my migraines.
Notes on Doubt
Two weeks ago, in Paris, I walked by a storefront that had been converted into a space for piano lessons. Over the piano in the window a large sign read, “le doute est le commencement,” meaning “doubt is the start / the beginning.”
Since I first set out on my soul path, doubt has been an almost constant companion. It has gnawed at me, slowed me down, asked me to retrace my idealistic steps and become a banker, and curled me up in the fetal position, sobbing, at 3pm on a Tuesday… No one has ever, as efficaciously and plainly as this sign did, told me that this is a natural part of things.
Notes from the Underworld
Recently, I wrote in a note on my iPhone: “I will not pause at the brink of darkness. Instead, I’ll stare it in the face so it can’t pull me under.”
What does this mean?
Sometimes, darkness feels like a willful entity; one that wants to pull us underwater.
For the third time in my life, I am in the dark.