Musings Podcast

About Musings Podcast

Amusing Conversations For photos and scribblings https://substack.com/@charisselouw charisselouw.substack.com (https://charisselouw.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast)

Publisher

Charisse

Category

society & culture · society & culture

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

18 Apr 2024

Latest episode

21 Oct 2026

Latest episodes

15 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   21 Oct 2026

   Opening a window before we reach for the matches

   This weekend Burning Down the House: A Feminist Appraisal of Space (https://karavanpress.com/2025/08/20/karavan-press-title-burning-down-the-house-a-feminist-appraisal-of-space-edited-by-mbali-mazibuko-shakeelah-ismail-charisse-louw-ijeoma-chidi-opara-stella-viljoen/)’s Cassidy Robinson, Ché Adams and I were invited to chat to Blown Away By Books (https://www.instagram.com/blownawaybybooksza/?hl=en)’s Sarah Prince (https://substack.com/@sarahcollinsprince) at Fish Hoek Library. Sarah has been a great champion of the book and its centering of powerful new voices. The recording is attached to this post, and we’d love you to listen. What follows is some of what we spoke about, and a bit of what I’ve been thinking about since. If you haven’t come across our book yet — it’s a collection of personal essays by South African feminist writers, each of whom took a room in the house as their way in. The bedroom, kitchen, bathroom, stoep, garden, the library, attic and maid’s room. The idea was to take the familiar architecture of home and start pulling apart the gendered, racial and cultural histories we keep in it. Part manifesto, part love letter, part act of resistance — we warmly invite yo to join seventeen arsonists under one roof. Thanks for reading Musings! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work. The foundations Sarah began by asking how the book first mapped itself out. It grew quite organically, out of conversations we were already having in our Honours classroom at Stellenbosch University about feminism, visual culture and the politics of everyday life. The editors had already shared a panel on kitsch at Woordfees in 2023. In April 2024 we held a symposium and invited people to think about the house and its rooms as a way into questions of gender and power. More than twenty-five papers came in from emerging scholars, and the energy in that room was something else. What drew us was the chance to do feminist scholarship differently. We wanted to treat personal experience as a legitimate form of knowledge, and to leave room for the mess of actual lives, where our politics and our practices don’t always line up. We also wanted a book that someone outside the academy could pick up and recognise themselves in. Clever, yes, but also intimate, funny, angry and vulnerable. Feminist thinking doesn’t only happen in seminar rooms. It happens around kitchen tables, in bedrooms, and in the sometimes very uncomfortable business of living together. Why images matter Sarah asked me to explain what visual culture actually is. It’s the study of how images shape our understanding of the world. Films and art, of course, but also advertising, social media, family photographs, architecture, everything we take in through our hungry eyes. Images help us see that we’d otherwise walk straight past. A film can make something completely familiar suddenly look strange. I don’t think images automatically change anyone’s mind. But they can disturb our habits of looking, and they can make us feel something before we’ve found the words for it. That discomfort is often a very good place to start thinking. Many voices in one house Some of the essays in the book are deeply scholarly. Others are playful, poetic, confessional or confrontational. Sarah wanted to know how we held all of that together, and the answer is that the house did a lot of the work for us. Each writer chose a room, and that gave us a loose architecture inside which very different conversations could happen. The encouragement of our publisher Karina and the writing retreat at fellow editor Stella Viljoen (https://substack.com/@stellaviljoen)’s house helped enormously. We read our drafts aloud to one another, sometimes through laughter and sometimes through tears, and we helped each other out of our comfort zones. One of the things I’ve come to love about feminist collaboration is that you don’t have to agree with everyone. The differences can be generative. We weren’t trying to produce one tidy feminist position, instead we wanted to make space for the tensions inside feminism itself. Cass and the things that live in the attic Cassidy’s essay, “Houses Aren’t Haunted, Women Are”, opens with her father warning her and her sister to be wary of horror films because “things could get inside” them. As she writes, what he didn’t know was that there were already things inside them he couldn’t understand. After watching Relic, I cried not only for the realisation of their fate but also for the realisation of my own grief, which I have forgotten to feel. I cried for my nana, who now lives alone, for my mom, who no longer has her dad, and for my dad, who no longer has a best friend. Perhaps even more profoundly, I cried because only my sister and I know what this particular feeling is and seeing it so beautifully portrayed by someone else, with no attic or basement to contain any of it, releases me from my own shadowy depths. Cassidy is a researcher and educator working where psychology, visual culture and art meet, she’s training in Play and Art Therapy, and her master’s research uses clay-based creative conversations with young men to explore the impact of #MenAreTrash rhetoric. Her essay ends with a line I keep returning to: “we women are all burning houses, our attics and basements blooming with embers.” Ché’s liberation on a budget Ché Adams describes herself as a ghetto feminist from Cloetesville, which she calls the Cape Flats of Stellenbosch, the place that raised her and still runs through everything she makes. Her essay, “Liberation on a Budget”, begins with a line Sarah rightly called brilliant: “I have been a feminist from a very young age. Feminism kept me safe when I thought being in community wasn’t meant for me.” Her room is the bedroom, and she traces it through three generations of her family. Sarah asked her what that room means to her now, and she read from page 160: I am aware that this sounds like a form of liberation, and it is, but it is liberation on a budget. To me, the bedroom is not a space where I get to disengage, it does not function as a space where I cede control. It is where I execute precision and agency, it is an intellectualised space. The bedroom, although hidden from an audience, always functions as a reflection of the outside. For me, the bedroom is a ritualistic space. Her essay closes with that ritual written out as a kind of protection spell. Skincare, ginger beer loaded with ice and stirred clockwise, a tarot deck, a playlist. “I remind myself that the colonial project failed,” she writes. Ché’s feminism rejects the mainstream and builds instead from community and the places that made her. To dala what you must, as she says. The holes in my shirts My essay, “Part of the Furniture”, started with something mundane. I kept finding holes in my shirts, always in the same place, just below the navel. Eventually I realised they were being worn through by my stomach rubbing against the kitchen counter as I cooked and cleaned, cooked and cleaned. That became my way into thinking about domestic labour, and in particular the contradictions of being a white South African feminist who employs a Black woman to do work I know is exhausting. I grew up during apartheid, and the people who first made me question that world were often the Black people working in our home. There is a terrible intimacy to that arrangement. People can become indispensable to a household while remaining almost invisible within its social order. I am keenly aware that nobody needs white tears, especially not in response to black pain. I own no land that I can return. In fact, I have never felt at home, not in my parent’s house, not in mine, not in this country that is nevertheless my only chosen home, not in this unchosen skin. It comes from recognising that my discomfort doesn’t absolve me of anything. White guilt can so easily become one more way of centring oneself. I wanted to acknowledge my own complicity without pretending there’s some simple act of personal redemption on offer. And belonging is difficult for me. South Africa is the only place I consider home, but I’m acutely aware of the history through which people like me came to occupy space here. I suppose the essay is an attempt to sit with those contradictions without rushing to resolve them. Home is not always a safe place Sarah asked how the book challenges our idea of home as a place of safety and comfort. I think we start from the uncomfortable recognition that it often isn’t. In South Africa especially, domestic space carries an enormous amount of historical baggage. These are profoundly political spaces, daily reminders of who belongs, who serves, who is protected and who is kept out. And home can also be a place of great tenderness, memory and belonging. Cass’s grief, Ché’s rituals and Ramsey’s head resting on her leg in front of the television all live in this book too. The essays hold that ambivalence beautifully. Burning down the house isn’t really about destroying our homes. It’s about asking which inherited arrangements of power have become so normal that we barely see them any more, and what might become possible if we start to question them. How do we burn it down without burning ourselves? Sarah’s last question was the one I’ve thought about most since: How do we burn down the house without burning ourselves down? We’re all implicated in the structures we’re trying to dismantle. We live in these houses and depend on them. Sometimes we love the people and things that have also hurt us. I don’t think anyone can sustain a politics of perpetual outrage or purity. We will contradict ourselves and we will fail one another. That’s part of being human. What I love about this collection is how much humour and pleasure sits alongside some very painful material. Feminism has to make room for joy, friendship, for the possibility of living differently. Perhaps burning down the house is less about one spectacular act of destruction and more about the slow, ongoing work of recognising what we’ve inherited, deciding what we’re no longer willing to reproduce, and finding the courage to make something else together. And we might occasionally need to open a window before we reach for the matches. Thank you to Sarah for such generous, careful questions, and to Cass and Ché for their honesty and warmth, on the day and on the page. Shakeelah Ismail, fellow editor and contributor surprised us by attending and also contributed to the conversation, but the end of the session was unfortunately not recorded. Thanks to Kian Payn for supporting us and filming it. A reminder that none of us was speaking for all people or all groups. We were speaking from our own lives, which is the only place any of us can start. Burning Down the House: A Feminist Appraisal of Space is published by Karavan Press (https://karavanpress.com/2025/08/20/karavan-press-title-burning-down-the-house-a-feminist-appraisal-of-space-edited-by-mbali-mazibuko-shakeelah-ismail-charisse-louw-ijeoma-chidi-opara-stella-viljoen/). ALL proceeds go to Women for Change (https://womenforchange.co.za/). I’d love to hear which room you’d have chosen, and what you’d find in it? Thanks for reading Musings! This post is public so feel free to share it. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit charisselouw.substack.com (https://charisselouw.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1)

2. 

   7 May 2026

   Read Between the Covers

   I had the profound honour of being invited to converse with the very keen mind of Mfundo Mpepuka (https://substack.com/profile/431601833-mfundo-mpepuka) on his podcast Read Between the Covers about some of what is preoccupying me at the moment. In this conversation we reflect on African cinema, ancestral presence, elemental world-making and forms of knowledge that survive despite attempts to erase them. So much gratitude to my magnificent supervisor Prof Lize Van Robbroeck (https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=C2M4rY8AAAAJ&hl=en) who set me on this path with her life changing course on New Materialisms. And my work wife Prof Stella Viljoen (https://researcherprofiles.sun.ac.za/11741-stella-viljoen) for gifting me carte blanche over many years to follow my creative impulses in the classroom, first at the University of Pretoria and now for many years at Stellenbosch University. This semester’s debut post-grad course on Afropresentism (https://www.findingneema.online/afropresentism) has been a particularly nourishing joy. Our beautiful book, Burning Down the House (https://charisselouw.substack.com/p/spring-things?r=1ri2vx), is available here (https://karavanpress.com/2025/08/20/karavan-press-title-burning-down-the-house-a-feminist-appraisal-of-space-edited-by-mbali-mazibuko-shakeelah-ismail-charisse-louw-ijeoma-chidi-opara-stella-viljoen/). Thanks to all my beloved students for their keen curiosity — it’s all for you. The conversation is available on:🔗Apple Podcasts: https://lnkd.in/dqXqMEq8 (https://www.linkedin.com/safety/go/?url=https%3A%2F%2Flnkd%2Ein%2FdqXqMEq8&urlhash=A5An&mt=4ITsVEtq4TunQEll7z6jUQoDQH1Tu5uOEbk1YhVkapfiFsY_J8ol_gt6fqnH_MfaIEeTwnIRZYndDsl6riHTykq75161wzKdsTv172fpuZ0ODbe6qooYqfYT-Q&isSdui=true)🔗Spotify: https://lnkd.in/dKMVRJ_e (https://www.linkedin.com/safety/go/?url=https%3A%2F%2Flnkd%2Ein%2FdKMVRJ_e&urlhash=LqI4&mt=_9LyP5vpCwnsm6EErVIl9V7ZHrLELBA8WVFzHFZfa-eSg5ukbPgvsai6gqCwRda-94zqjnbTr2w9RbUsyJKf2vnwiPnDBGjRNKJbDVJqSYRc5CZV_GyOLFwcNw&isSdui=true)🔗RSS Feed: https://lnkd.in/daVGGHA4 (https://www.linkedin.com/safety/go/?url=https%3A%2F%2Flnkd%2Ein%2FdaVGGHA4&urlhash=gguJ&mt=T-IVTim07KlX9E5HjNFU4E-BgNu-rvny-t6DnPeEZAyjJjz_adaLMMAkQkTrQ4lok1Jh4aP8Q-wNnMYG9Vgrw5EJ9WYPvo5p1ZH9JvkDP-U8ej1xYSGri88ZgQ&isSdui=true) This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit charisselouw.substack.com (https://charisselouw.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1)

3. 

   30 Nov 2025

   Menopause We Didn’t Know Existed

   At 38, menopause arrived in my life like a crazy cyclone I didn’t yet have a name for. I thought I was losing my mind — panic attacks, sleepless nights, wild anxiety —except none of it was ‘in my head.’ My body was speaking in a new dialect I had never been taught to understand. No one had prepared me for this particular curriculum of becoming. It was as though every fault-line in my life lit up at once, a crackling map of grief and transformation. Thanks for reading Musings! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work. While medical professionals are trying their best and research is finally being done, they don’t really have the language for it either. So I found my own: through endless solitary hikes, journaling, meditation, and basically cracking open over and over again. Through rupture and revelation, a slow remembering took place… that my body is not a machine but kin. Early menopause didn’t end me. But it definitely rewrote me. This conversation is part confession, part guide. A way of making public what so many women endure privately. Because silence nearly cost me my life and it has cost generations of us more than we know. Welcome to the conversation we were never invited into, but desperately need. The Silence Around Menopause is Loud We inherit silence. Our mothers whispered it; our grandmothers swallowed it. Menopause became the punchline to a joke shaped by patriarchy. It’s the moment (which isn’t a moment but a years long process) that a woman becomes less desirable, less fertile…less useful. In the biomedical gaze, menopause marks a ‘decline.’ But the truth is more complicated.And far more mystical. Feminist new materialists like Karen Barad remind us that bodies are not fixed entities— they are intra-active, continually becoming in relation to the world. Rosi Braidotti calls midlife a ‘threshold of new subjectivity,’ a point of intense generativity. Indigenous cosmologies treat life transitions as portals, rather than failures. Menopause is not an ending, but a crossing. A shift in rhythm and a rearranging of the internal weather.It rewires perception, intuition, and truth. The Symptoms No One Talks About Before my cycle changed, my mind changed. The panic was wild, anxiety feral and insomnia an endless trial. Later I would learn these were hormonal surges — nighttime cortisol spikes, estrogen fluctuations — but at the time, it felt like an unravelling without a witness. Research shows: * Emotional and psychological symptoms often appear years before physical ones. * Early menopause affects 1 in 100 women globally. * Many women are misdiagnosed with anxiety or depression for years. * Women of colour face added layers of weathering— the cumulative impact of racism, trauma, and generational stress. My body wasn’t betraying me.It was alerting me. But without language, we often interpret these signals as failure instead of initiation. Myths We Must Release Here are the myths I’m burning down: Myth 1: Menopause is just hot flashes There are over 30 documented symptoms, including intense emotional, cognitive, and sensory ones. Myth 2: It only happens around 50 Perimenopause often begins in your late 30s, and early menopause is real. Myth 3: Menopause = decline Anthropologist Kristen Hawkes suggests post-menopausal women were evolutionarily central to human survival. Many women feel more creative, courageous, and purposeful after the shift. I’ve come to embrace the Crone archetype, not as a caricature of age, but as a rebellion against the capitalist anti-aging machine that feeds on our insecurities. Myth 4: Hormones tell the whole story Menopause is a biopsychosocial-spiritual transition.Trauma, race, stress, environment, ancestry… all shape the experience. Menopause as Portal Menopause forced me into a different relationship with my body ~ less control, more curiosity; less pushing, more listening; less performance, more presence. Qigong, yoga, and mindful movement weren’t supplements to my life, they became survival strategies. Evidence-based, yes, but also deeply intuitive. The kind of knowledge our great-grandmothers would recognise. Bayo Akomolafe writes, ‘The cracks are not where things break down, but where the world leaks through.’ Menopause cracked me open. And through the fissures came clarity, courage, and an unflinching honesty I had long postponed. What Helped (and Might Help You Too) From both research and lived experience: Movement – Qigong, yoga, walking, dancing, shaking out the stucknessMindfulness – breathwork, sleep hygiene, slowing the nervous systemCreativity – journaling, art-making, voice reclamationCommunity – shame-free circles, women speaking openly, daily validationInformation – accurate, non-fear-based, not just HRT-centricSpiritual frameworks – rites of passage, thresholds, archetypes, ancestors This transition asks us to stop asking,What’s wrong with me?and start asking,What is my body trying to teach me? What Women Need Most Evidence shows that community support dramatically reduces symptom burden. We need spaces without judgment, representation for younger women in menopause, alternatives for those who can’t or don’t want HRT; cultural, spiritual, and embodied interpretations; honesty, softness, and sisterhood. The ‘good girl’ persona doesn’t survive menopause.And that’s a blessing. If Menopause Could Speak… She would say every so gently: Slow down.Listen.Shed what no longer serves.Even if that means shedding entire personas. You are not ending.Rather becoming… again, and again, and again. Be humble in the face of this transformation.Be in awe of your own turning. An Invitation This is a beginning. A way to break the inherited silence and make meaning together.Let’s hold this transition as a sacred, embodied shift,not a pathology or a decline, but a powerful re-becoming. If you’ve moved through menopause, are moving through it, or suspect you’re standing at the threshold ~ You are not alone.Your story matters.Let’s un-silence and honour it. Thanks for reading Musings! This post is public so feel free to share it. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit charisselouw.substack.com (https://charisselouw.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1)

4. 

   8 Oct 2025

   This is not a Burial

   This Is Not a Burial, It’s a Resurrection begins with a grave and ends with refusal. I was invited to give this lecture by the lovely Prof Nick J Fox of the BSA New Materialisms Study Group (https://www.britsoc.co.uk/events/key-bsa-events/materiality-society-and-the-more-than-human-this-is-not-a-burial-griefwork-through-film-and-flesh-workshop/), in collaboration with the BSA Death, Dying and Bereavement Study Group, and the Centre for Sociodigital Futures at Bristol University, with very special thanks to my fairy godmother Debbie Watson. Let’s explore grief not as pathology, but as a methodology. A way of knowing-with the dead, the land, and the more-than-human world. Thanks for reading Musings! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work. Through Lemohang Jeremiah Mosese’s haunting 2019 film, I trace how African cosmologies, New Materialisms, and somatic practice converge to form what I call a Zombie Methodology — an embodied, relational, affective response to collapse. Mantoa, the film’s 80-year-old protagonist, prepares for death only to discover her village will be drowned by a dam. The graves of her ancestors, the umbilical cords buried in the soil, memory of kinship… all face erasure. Her grief becomes a form of governance, a refusal to let the living or the dead be dispossessed. In Sesotho thought, seriti is the life-force, the invisible vitality that connects humans, minerals, ancestors, and soil in vibrational coexistence. As Mary Twala’s luminous performance reminds us, grief is not inert. It is a somatic relation. A threshold between body and world. Drawing on thinkers such as Nina Lykke, Sophie Strand, and Bayo Akomolafe, I explore grief as vibrant, composting, generative. It opens the secure and the settled, inviting us to live-with ruin rather than rush toward repair. As Akomolafe writes, “Grief is generative. She opens up things that were once bound up and secure… and therefore facilitates change.” This lecture sits within a larger research project on African cinema, new materialisms, and Indigenous epistemologies. Together, they suggest that mourning can be a method, one that resists the “god of progress,” honours the dead as active matter, and reworlds from the ruins. Please join the upcoming workshop (27 Oct, 4pm SAST, online). Free but registration (https://britsoc.co.uk/events/key-bsa-events/materiality-society-and-the-more-than-human-this-is-not-a-burial-griefwork-through-film-and-flesh-workshop/)required. If this resonated, share it or leave a reflection below. Your grief and your body is an archive. Together, we might compost something new. Thanks for reading Musings! This post is public so feel free to share it. PS If this tickles your fancy come along to a scintillating discussion on Afropositivism and Digital Culture at Woordfees (https://woordfees.co.za/en/program/ongehoord-digitale-kultuur-afro-optimisme/), Thursday 16 October at 9:30am. Free, so just rock up at the lovely Oude Leeskamer (https://oudeleeskamer.org/) in Stellenbosch. I’m also very delighted to be part of this Afro-presentist Assembly on Tuesday 28 October at 1pm… rsvp to graduateschool@sun.ac.za — Free, online and irl … with lunch… who said there’s no such thing as a free lunch? And let’s not forget a chance to hang out with the tremendously cool contributors of Burning Down the House (https://booklounge.co.za/product/burning-down-the-house/) at the Book Lounge Book Club on Wednesday 29 October at 5:30pm. See you there! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit charisselouw.substack.com (https://charisselouw.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1)

5. 

   13 Jan 2025

   River of Feelings

   Author Charisse Louw reflects on her journey through South Africa's wilderness, finding peaceful presence and flow in the natural world, much like a river, and shares the wisdom she gathered along the way.

6. 

   2 Dec 2024

   Natural Grace, Effortless Joy

   The Long & Winding Road Back to Ourselves 2024 kicked my butt. Not gonna lie, it felt relentless. There were plenty of personal struggles and who can deny that the global scene — political & environmental — has felt particularly fraught. I arrived with some trepidation at the Buddhist Retreat Centre (https://www.brcixopo.co.za/) via ‘a lovely road that runs from Ixopo into the hills. These hills are grass-covered and rolling, and they are lovely beyond any singing of it’ (Alan Paton’s Cry the Beloved Country). What would happen when I stepped off the mad mad merry-go-round? Thanks for reading Musings! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work. The first time I visited the BRC, 13 years ago, my children were little and my parents were living in Umdloti on the North Coast of tropical Kwa-Zulu Natal. Just about every holiday growing up we spent in neighbouring Umhlanga. My grandparents had a wonderful holiday home and our Christmases were made so special by them and their unmatched hospitality. So I left my little ones with my parents and borrowed my mom’s car to give myself three days self-retreat at the famed BRC, voted top amongst the world’s best retreats, and rightly so. It is also one of the few places in South Africa that truly runs on Buddhist principles. Those three days were important, but not necessarily easy. I hiked a lot, something I missed as a mother of small children, and made some peace with my new reality. Give up to grace. The ocean takes care of each wave 'til it gets to shore. You need more help than you know — Jalal ad-Din Muhammad ar-Rumi As a visiting teacher, the generosity shown by the BRC knows no bounds. This, my third time facilitating there, I was gifted 10 days to slowly allow my knots to untangle themselves and my mind to become more tranquil. As I gazed at the mist rolling in, basked in the sun, watched the darling troop of monkeys doting on their batch of tiny babies, listened to the birdsong, relished the delicious food, my days started to feel measured, my nervous system began to simmer down. I do not understand the mystery of grace – only that it meets us where we are and does not leave us where it found us — Anne Lamott Every morning I woke with the dawn chorus around 5. Then enjoyed a walking meditation in the lovely labyrinth, followed by a sit in the zendo. You can have the other words — chance, luck, coincidence, serendipity. I'll take grace. I don't know what it is exactly, but I'll take it — Mary Oliver Breakfast brought fruit salad and the world’s most delicious chai along with porridges and cooked goodies served with the mouth watering farm baked breads. The kitchen fairies are tremendously skilled and clearly love their work. All human nature vigorously resists grace because grace changes us and the change is painful. — Flannery O'Connor Meditation Medicine My days were spent practicing yoga, qi gong, hiking, reading beneath a tree and meditating, which comes from the same Latin root word (medeor) as medication meaning ‘to heal or to make whole.’ Meditation triggers a self-repair mechanism in our bodies — studies show cortisol and adrenalin production slows while endorphins and serotonin increase. Meditation beside the dam, strolling the rolling hills, circumnambulating the stupa, walking from one sacred site to the next on this blessed land, often while chanting mantras, helped me leave behind a whole helluva lot of mind clutter. There have been times when I've been so angry or so hurt that I thought my love would never recover. And then, in the midst of near despair, something has happened beneath the surface. A bright little flashing fish of hope has flicked silver fins and the water is bright and suddenly I am returned to a state of love again — till next time. I've learned that there will always be a next time, and that I will submerge in darkness and misery, but that I won't stay submerged. And each time something has been learned under the waters; something has been gained; and a new kind of love has grown. The best I can ask for is that this love, which has been built on countless failures, will continue to grow. I can say no more than that this is mystery, and gift, and that somehow or other, through grace, our failures can be redeemed and blessed.— Madeleine L'Engle All of life is a meditation, in that it calls us to pay attention. In curious mindfulness we find our playful connection to Life itself. I hiked out to a waterfall the one day and then up to a village where I met friendly children and grannies hard at work in their kitchen gardens. I met the founding mamas of Woza Moya (https://www.wozamoya.org.za/), created by the BRC in 2000 to provide the local community with support. I simply adore their sock monkeys of which we have a little family that grows every time I visit. Last year’s retreat on Joy had a bright pink monkey sporting a wild afro as mascot and this year we welcome Grace into the fold. The Retreat As humans we live here amongst the ‘family of things,’ yet somehow separate. This illusion of separation the Tibetan Buddhists term Maha Bekandze – the Great Suffering. The Peace of Wild Things When despair for the world grows in me and I wake in the night at the least sound in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be, I go and lie down where the wood drake rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds. I come into the peace of wild things who do not tax their lives with forethought of grief. I come into the presence of still water. And I feel above me the day-blind stars waiting with their light. For a time I rest in the grace of the world, and am free. — Wendell Berry When you make a pilgrimage, which is what coming to the BRC entails, it requires that you give yourself the gift of REALLY being present. I turned my phone to airplane mode and within 24 hours my monkey mind had quietened significantly. The invitation is to do less, to slow down…all our habitual ways of doing doing doing…and invite in more presence. Mindfully walk, brush your teeth, eat, speak (probably the most challenging). In pairs we shared the quotes on Grace you find littered throughout this piece and tied a white thread around our partner’s wrist in the Thai Buddhist tradition of Sai Sin, as a mindfulness reminder. Then took to our journals, ever a kind listening ear. Why am I afraid to dance,I who love music and rhythm and grace and song and laughter? Why am I afraid to live,I who love life and the beauty of flesh and the living colors of the earth and sky and sea? Why am I afraid to love,I who love love? — Eugene O'Neill Journal prompt: I am afraid to… because… The most common form of despair is not being who you are — Soren Kierkegaard Journal prompt: Who am I? The Medicine Buddha Mantra Mantra helps soothe and focus the anxious mind. This particular one is for clearing negativity and helping us heal. Since I first did the Medicine Buddha puja with dearest Lindi (https://healingsounds.co.za/), South Africa’s OG sound medicine mama, at Kagyu Samye Dzong (https://capetown.kagyu.org.za/) while grieving the loss of my grandparents (http://charisselouw.blogspot.com/2021/03/only-love-ike-edwina.html) (and so much else) during the Covid pandemic, it has proven a balm. TAYATA — ‘like this’ — carried beyond samsara & nirvana, samsara meaning ‘wandering’ or ‘world,’ meaning the cycles of birth and death, the suffering caused by karma that ends in nirvana when we gain insight into impermanence OM BEKADZE BEKADZE. MAHA BEKADZE BEKADZE — Bekandze means ‘the elimination of suffering’ and is repeated three times for the removal of suffering on the physical, emotional and Maha Bekandze, the great suffering, which stems from the illusion of separation RADZA (Divine King) SAMUNGATE (wisdom as wide as the ocean) SOHA (so be it/ pure devotion & intention from which all manifestation arises) The Medicine Buddha Mantra comes from the Mahayana Buddhist tradition. For more on the different schools of Buddhism (https://tricycle.org/beginners/buddhism/whats-the-difference-between-theravada-mahayana-and-vajrayana/) here’s a lovely article in Tricycle Magazine. If you like, you can visualize Medicine Buddha sitting, looking at you. He is depicted as having a dark blue (lapis lazuli) body, this being an archetypal color of healing. It also happens to be my lifelong favourite. With his left hand he holds a bowl of healing amrita, purported to be produced by the body during deep states of meditation. With his right a medicine plant called myrobalan. In your visualization, he is at about the height of your forehead, a few feet in front of you, gazing at you with so much love. Buddha (the Awakened One) is everything beautiful gathered into one. We had Deva Premal and the Gyuto Monks support us in chanting 108 rounds of the mantra. Gyuto was founded in 1475 and is one of the main tantric colleges of the Gelug tradition. In Tibet, monks who had completed their geshe studies would be invited to join Gyuto to receive a firm grounding in vajrayana practice. These monasteries used to be in Lhasa, Tibet, but they have been re-established in Dharamsala, India. Today, there are nearly 500 monks in the entire order. The Gyuto monks are known for their tradition of overtone singing, also described as chordal chanting. Grace means something like: Here is your life. You might never have been, but you are because the party wouldn't have been complete without you — Frederick Buechner Why 108? According to Vedic teachings, there are 108 nadi or lines of energy that extend from the heart to the rest of the body. Each repetition is of a mantra is said to flow along one of these lines. Although there are some differences in how the Sanskrit language is standardized, many experts say there are 54 fundamental letters. Each of these letters have a masculine and a feminine component, bringing the total to 108. The letters of the Sanskrit alphabet are said to correspond to the petals on the lower six chakras. Reciting the Medicine Buddha mantra 108 times would stimulate each of the petals for these chakras: root chakra, sacral chakra, solar plexus chakra, heart chakra, throat chakra, third eye chakra. The number 108 is also said to have astronomical significance. For example, the average distance from the earth to the sun is 108 times the diameter of the sun. The average distance of the earth from the moon is approximately 108 times the diameter of the moon. Because of the significance of this number is Eastern spiritual thought, many temples have 108 steps. Many deities are given 108 names. There are said to be 108 gopis or attendants for Lord Krishna. The measure of the internal angles in a pentagon (considered to be a holy shape) is 108 degrees. In numerology, 108 is called the Universal Number. The 1 stands for consciousness, the 0 for completeness and the 8 for infinity. If you are using mala beads to count mantra repetitions, going around the beads a single time is 108. The Western rosary has 54 beads, exactly half of a set of mala beads. The Practices Mantras operate in the realm of energy, vibration and transformation – so on our way into the Meditation Hall we graced one another with the gift of a healing sound bath through some of the BRC’s many gorgeous chimes and gongs. Then we entered the zendo in silence, donned a saffron robe and found a comfortable seat. Their zendo is equipped with zafus, the round cushions, on thick rectangular mats called zabutons. Your hips should sit high so your knees can relax downward and your spine remain effortlessly long. If sitting cross legged on the floor is not comfortable for your body, try the kneeling bench, seiza, and sit in vajrasana (thunderbolt). If that doesn’t work for you, please sit on a chair. There is no reason to suffer unnecessarily. Please don’t. Then Noble Silence. A sacred opportunity to slow down, pay attention, stay curious and become ever kinder. We eat breakfast in silence at the BRC, what a wonderful way to appreciate food and gain insight into our eating habits. Eating, like breathing, is one of those things we simply cannot avoid in life, so we had best make peace with it and retrain ourselves to do it better. I’m so grateful for these ten days that helped me break out of some unhealthy emotional eating I’d been stuck in as a soothing strategy during stressful times. Love takes off the masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within. I use the word ‘love’ here not merely in the personal sense but as a state of being, or a state of grace — not in the infantile sense of being made happy but in the tough and universal sense of quest and daring and growth. — James Baldwin (The Fire Next Time) A lovely silent meditation started our second day followed by Qi Gong with the Big Buddha and after brekkie a check in at the Buddhaboma followed by the gift of Walking Meditation from the Labyrinth. We each found a rooted friend (flower, tree, bush, weed) whom we visited throughout the weekend. Slowly, after the initial falling in love at first sight, through Goethean observation, possibly sketching this friend, we became more intimate with the plant kingdom. You can use mantra as you practice walking meditation. Initially counting and breathing helps, then inevitably the mind gets bored, so mantra can be useful to keep the quality of mind pure rather than spiraling into stories. A hand on the heart helps to remind us that we can always get kinder, kinder still, ever kinder. A Buddha smile helps the medicine go down. 无为 Wu wei means – in Chinese – non-doing or ‘doing nothing’ the noblest kind of action according to the philosophy of Daoism – and is at the heart of what it means to follow Dao or The Way. According to the central text of Daoism, the Dao De Jing: ‘The Way never acts yet nothing is left undone’. It doesn’t mean not acting, it means ‘effortless action’ or ‘actionless action’. It means being at peace while engaged in the most frenetic tasks so that one can carry these out with maximum skill and efficiency. It is the art of being natural if you will. Here we are, as much a part of nature as anything, but full of mind interference. What if we were to allow for Natural Grace? After resting and lunching we played through art making. Creativity requires a state of grace. So many things are required for it to succeed — Magda Szabó A process of found poetry and collage proved revealing. The consolation of fairy-stories, the joy of the happy ending; or more correctly of the good catastrophe, the sudden joyous "turn" (for there is no true end to any fairy-tale): this joy, which is one of the things which fairy-stories can produce supremely well, is not essentially ‘escapist,’ nor ‘fugitive.’ In its fairy-tale — or otherworld — setting, it is a sudden and miraculous grace: never to be counted on to recur. It does not deny the existence of dyscatastrophe, of sorrow and failure: the possibility of these is necessary to the joy of deliverance; it denies (in the face of much evidence, if you will) universal final defeat and in so far is evangelium (Evangelium is a Latin word that translates to "good news" in English and refers to the gospel in Christianity), giving a fleeting glimpse of Joy, Joy beyond the walls of the world, poignant as grief. — J.R.R. Tolkien (Tolkien On Fairy-stories) Journal prompt: If you were to allow for natural Grace & effortless joy…what would your happy ending look like? Dinner was followed by dancing cheek to cheek with Joy & Grace — sandwich yourself between them! Let loose. Howl. Sweat. We had a cathartic ball shaking our sillies out. When someone mentions the gracefulness of the nightsky, climb up on the roof and dance and say, Like this. — Rumi A cosy fireside chat turned into a burn ritual at Mark’s instigation. And then a sing-along at the suggestion of Amanda, our neck rub angel (bless you!). Christel, who will also be facilitating at the BRC soon, shared an original song (https://youtu.be/T3HU8tHnEJ4?si=bBZlTS5b7AfwA5WK) that picked up on Tania’s beautiful art/ life process on her incredible wild land (https://mimimoya.com/en/home-english/). Morning brought gentle Yoga. For those who were requesting a recorded class, here’s one dating back to those hard lockdown days: And here’s my Yoga playlist that floated some boats: By request we enjoyed more lekker qi gong. Here’s a link to some of what we covered during our sessions: http://charisselouw.blogspot.com/2022/08/qi-gong-playshop.html (http://charisselouw.blogspot.com/2022/08/qi-gong-playshop.html) Stand and face me, my love, and scatter the grace in your eyes. — Sappho We then sat with a new friend, someone we hadn’t connected with yet. Found a bench, looked up, lingered longer. Allowed our attention to become wide as the sky. Just sat and breathed together. We told our new friend about our other (rooted) friend, engaging all our senses. Then let the speaking/listening meditation take us where it wanted to. Till Tea time. In the end, only three things matter: how much you loved, how gently you lived, and how gracefully you let go of things not meant for you —Jack Kornfield, Buddha’s Little Instruction Book And just like that our weekend came to a close with some heartfelt insights shared and after Isabelle (https://www.facebook.com/corastrology5) enlightened us about this particular New Moon, we committed to one small change that could allow for more grace & joy in our lives. For Equilibrium, a Blessing: Like the joy of the sea coming home to shore, May the relief of laughter rinse through your soul As the wind loves to call things to dance,May your gravity be lightened by grace. (…) As water takes whatever shape it is in,So free may you be about who you become. — John O'Donohue (To Bless the Space Between Us: A Book of Blessings) As always, we closed with the essential thing — Loving Kindness Meditation — and the BRC’s fab Sunday Lunch. My heartfelt thanks to the lovely circle and of course to this unparalleled sanctuary for holding us with such compassion. It’s simply the perfect place to befriend yourself. Thanks for reading Musings! This post is public so feel free to share it. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit charisselouw.substack.com (https://charisselouw.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1)

7. 

   27 Aug 2024

   Visionary

   My friend Stella (https://www.instagram.com/stella.viljoen/) Viljoen and I co-teach a very cool Honours seminar on Visual Intimacy at Stellenbosch University (http://www0.sun.ac.za/visualarts/academic-offering/undergraduate/visual-studies/). The gorgeous exhibition she curated with our dreamy colleague Ernst Van der Wal for The Slow Intimacy Conference in 2022 was an outgrowth of that work. Thanks for reading Musings! Subscribe for free. As part of the exhibition I chose to interview Ghanaian filmmaker Nuotama Bodomo (https://www.instagram.com/mothertongue.mp4/). I’ve been teaching her Afronauts to my first year students for the past 5 years and feel deeply indebted to her visionary work. Recently my colleague-supervisor Lize and I were chatting about Afrofuturism and I remembered this conversation with Nuotama. Then her latest film collab with Solange Knowles popped up on my Insta feed yesterday. So I cheekily asked her if I could share our interview and she immediately agreed, because that’s how generous she is. I love that this new piece is interested in exactly what I’m writing on for the ol’ PhD (https://charisselouw.substack.com/p/begin-again) (the reason I’ve been a bit quiet on this platform)— object oriented ontology. It’s just been one synchronicity (https://charisselouw.blogspot.com/2018/05/lets-call-it-synchronicity.html) after the next of late. And I’m alllll about that. I want to thank Adriaan de la Rey (https://www.adriaandelarey.com/) who filmed and edited the interviews for the exhibition. Through the process we became good friends. While he was briefly visiting from Zambia earlier this year, he jumped in and covered a seminar on documentary for me when I had to dash to my dad (https://charisselouw.substack.com/p/mother-tree)’s hospital bed. His work is so beautiful. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit charisselouw.substack.com (https://charisselouw.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1)

8. 

   9 Jul 2024

   Seance

   I only learned her age after her death. And I only learned of her death last night. Hella was not a fan of ageism and certainly never let her growing blindness and unsteadiness in the wake of a stroke and a whole heap of years (almost 80 of them, shhh, don’t tell her I told you) get in the way of adventuring. I’ve been missing my dear friend a lot lately. https://charisselouw.substack.com/p/3aaaf433-cfcc-4e69-8209-537b74a8add6 (https://charisselouw.substack.com/p/3aaaf433-cfcc-4e69-8209-537b74a8add6) (Thanks for reading Musings! Subscribe for free) The last time we spoke was in December when she dropped a tantalizing invitation. Have a listen and please let me know if you have any idea who this Moroccan Sufi Mystic might be. You can bet your bottom dollar I’ll be making a pilgrimage for Hella at the soonest opportunity. We met at the beginning of April 2021 at Medicine Buddha (https://charisselouw.blogspot.com/2020/11/meditation-medicine.html) puja, held every month at the Tibetan Buddhist centre here in Cape Town by my beloved Medicine Buddha Mama, Lindi (https://www.healingsounds.co.za/). In the sharing circle Hella mentioned that she was delighted to be there as a longtime Zen practitioner who hadn’t managed to find a Zen (https://charisselouw.blogspot.com/2021/03/zen-meditation.html) sanga in the Mother City. I whispered in her ear at tea time that I belonged to just what she was looking for…and so began our honeymoon. We met just about every weekend after that. She offered me Alexander Technique (https://www.facebook.com/p/Alexander-Technik-Schule-100028473167710/) in return for my lifts to Zen practice. Her knowing hands were just what my sad body needed. I was grieving the loss of too many people. Four friends (https://charisselouw.blogspot.com/2021/04/we-rise-from-ashes.html) had just been felled by Cancer and my grandparents (https://charisselouw.blogspot.com/2021/03/only-love-ike-edwina.html) passed at the height of the second wave of the Covid pandemic in December 2020. You’ll hear her speak of a Congress that she’d attended in Germany a year or so ago. This was her wonderful quest to always deepen her practice. She made documentaries about Alexander Technique, the San (she grew up in Angola and visited her beloved Namibia often) and recorded her experience sitting sesshin with Sekkei Harada Roshi (https://www.lionsroar.com/the-key-to-zen/), abbot of a Soto Zen monastery in Fukui Prefecture, Japan. Hella’s sharp mind and great enthusiasm for life was just the tonic I needed. She had studied widely and had degrees from several universities (BA from UCT in Philosophy, Library Science at Stellenbosch University, in Munich a MA in Art History and German followed by years of teaching) but was more interested in the wisdom of the body, in travel and her art practice. Our paths were intertwined. She injected me with some hope about how to forge ahead in this sea of troubles. She generously introduced me to her people and really touched my heart by inviting me to her birthday luncheon just a month after meeting. During my long lonely trek (https://charisselouw.blogspot.com/2022/10/nepal-ahoy.html)over the Himalayas she offered a warm regard via voice note that I sorely appreciated. When I couldn’t reach her this year I thought that it might just be that she was in a farflung spot. Besides, she had messaged me from Berlin, the Arctic circle, Greece and then planted the seed of a quest to Morocco in her last words to me. But on her birthday last month, after I failed to reach her by any means, I began to fear that she was no longer within telecommunicative range. Last night a google search pulled up that thing you hope never to see, her obituary (https://hahn-bestattungen.gemeinsam-trauern.net/begleiten/hella-linkmeyer). Hella graced quite a few of my circles (https://charisselouw.blogspot.com/2021/05/healing-mother-in-me.html) and retreats (https://charisselouw.blogspot.com/2021/05/retreat-reflections-in-still-water.html) and I know that all who met her, lay on her therapy table, sat Zen with her, will miss her dearly. She never married or had children, but they say friends are the family you choose and I really do feel that dear Hella is that. A soul sister. It seems she may have died in Germany on the day we experienced magnificent bioluminscence here. After a day of Song Church and Sound Medicine with my friend Ames (who is half my age), I found myself splashing in the mysterious waters on Muizenberg beach. Laughing, growing quiet. Ever since I read Lord of the Flies as a young teen, I have associated bioluminescence with the death of sweet Simon. This scene had me sobbing on my green Girls High uniform in my bedroom. Along the shoreward edge of the shallows the advancing clearness was full of strange, moonbeam-bodied creatures with fiery eyes. Here and there a larger pebble clung to its own air and was covered with a coat of pearls. The tide swelled in over the rain-pitted sand and smoothed everything with a layer of silver. Now it touched the first of the stains that seeped from the broken body and the creatures made a moving patch of light as they gathered at the edge. The water rose further and dressed Simon's coarse hair with brightness….Somewhere over the darkened curve of the world the sun and moon were pulling; and the film of water on the earth planet was held, bulging slightly on one side while the solid core turned. The great wave of the tide moved further along the island and the water lifted. Softly, surrounded by a fringe of inquisitive bright creatures, itself a silver shape beneath the steadfast constellations, Simon's dead body moved out towards the open sea.― William Golding, Lord of the Flies (https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/2766512) I would say rest in peace, but knowing Hella, she is exploring the furthest reaches of whatever unfathomable energetic space-time-mattering is unfolding. She touched so many lives with her vivacious inquisitive energy. Thank you Hella for your example of how to be truly alive. Thank you for reading Musings. This post is public so feel free to share it. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit charisselouw.substack.com (https://charisselouw.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1)

9. 

   15 May 2024

   Negligent Mother

   The first time I met Izzy she was a 15 year old student of mine at Imhoff Waldorf (https://charisselouw.blogspot.com/2017/09/flow.html) High School and reading one of the classics…for fun! In other words, not your average tenth grader, but exactly the bookish creative soul that I was at that age. We went on to have oh so many adventures together — trekking in the mountains, grabbing all the accolades on stage, navigating the rich waters of the Waldorf Main Lessons together. After graduation she was a regular at my Flow (https://charisselouw.blogspot.com/2018/03/connecting.html) circles. And those early days of moving, meditating and making together are probably my favourite memories of my entire life. The tremendous healing that took place in those intimate sessions are very dear to my heart. Our Izzy moved to England, studied Eurythmy (this was Izzy’s Grade 11 Eurythmy performance as choreographed by Sandise Richie Lingani Ngxumsa (https://www.instagram.com/richie_sandz/?hl=en)).… …met a guy and came home for a last hoorah before becoming an exceptional mom. Getting to meet my godstar Juno (https://charisselouw.blogspot.com/2020/06/a-letter-to-my-godstar.html) and his lil bro Judah this last December was a life-light. So grateful for this precious time together. Gallery hopping wasn’t quite as seamless as in the past, but what fun we had! Artists like Izzy help me feel happier about being alive. Or as Wendy Cope puts it in The Orange: The rest of the day was quite easy. I did all the jobs on my list And enjoyed them and had some time over. I love you. I’m glad I exist. If you prefer listening to your podcasts, rather than watching them (as I most certainly do) they are available on all platforms. Your subscribing, rating, sharing is greatly appreciated. Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/7gxXrYB0P1qdz95Ig0NeVj?si=b3647076f2d34fbf) Apple (https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/musings-podcast/id1742005657) Youtube (https://www.youtube.com/@charisselouw/podcasts) & Pocketcast (https://pca.st/sz1z9kka)too. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit charisselouw.substack.com (https://charisselouw.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1)

10. 

    10 May 2024

    No More Delulu

    Chelsea and I met at the Burning Down the House Symposium (https://www.instagram.com/burning_down_the_house_symp/?hl=en) at the beginning of April. It was love at first Feminist New Materialist quote. To be fair, she wasn’t just poetically patching others insights together, but very much embodying the ethos of this avenue of inquiry most eloquently. A dream of an afternoon followed where I had the tremendous pleasure of introducing my supervisor/colleague/soulmate to the enchanting Chelsea…it was, of course, a match made in heaven. Quite literally…the Dylan Lewis Sculpture Garden is an actual heaven on Earth. Chelsea is no stranger to the podcast milieu and you can let yourself be soothed by her dulcet tones at Tea Cake and the Cosmos. This podcast is available on all platforms. Your subscribing, rating, sharing is greatly appreciated. Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/7gxXrYB0P1qdz95Ig0NeVj?si=b3647076f2d34fbf) Apple (https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/musings-podcast/id1742005657) Youtube (https://www.youtube.com/@charisselouw/podcasts) & Pocketcast (https://pca.st/sz1z9kka)too. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit charisselouw.substack.com (https://charisselouw.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1)

11. 

    4 May 2024

    Mindful Resistance

    This beautiful soul and I walked together in the mountains behind my home a year ago. Rakhee (http://rakheebhatt.com/)has blessed my life ever since with her generosity. We get together to discuss the student uprisings in America after discovering that we were both studying at NYU at the same time…a different time, but also a time of war. Some of the protest action sweeping across America at this moment as shared by Rakhee on her Instagram: We wrangle with how to participate in the struggle for a more peaceful planet. After I stopped recording, Rakhee suggested that we regard mindful resistance as a relay race — rest when we need to, trust one another to keep the flame of hope alive, with our awareness ever attuned to the greater good. We agreed that speaking vulnerably about how horrified we are by the devastation unfolding and how difficult it is to know how to navigate these waters, was very helpful. We hope you find it so. I am constantly moved by the graciousness of those who help walk us home. Rakhee, thank you. Since we discuss the Tik Tok ban — here’s a lil vid I made on that app of us frolicking in our mountains, but if you prefer your Evil Empire Americ(t)a flavoured…here it is on Facebook. (https://www.facebook.com/reel/1895722770780297) Last but not least, the Carl Sagan meditation Rakhee mentions: If you prefer listening to your podcasts, rather than watching them (as I most certainly do) they are available on all platforms. Your subscribing, rating, sharing is greatly appreciated. Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/7gxXrYB0P1qdz95Ig0NeVj?si=b3647076f2d34fbf) Apple (https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/musings-podcast/id1742005657) Youtube (https://www.youtube.com/@charisselouw/podcasts) & Pocketcast (https://pca.st/sz1z9kka)too. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit charisselouw.substack.com (https://charisselouw.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1)

12. 

    1 May 2024

    Break on through

    I have an impromptu chat with embodied ray of sunshine Lili who is a skateboarding, crochet kween…and also a physicist in the making. Because apparently you can do it all! Our small talk looks a little like this, when in our natural habitat, Noordhoek beach: As usual our conversation roamed into the metaphysical. Thank you for allowing your bday brunch to be hijacked and for engaging in the unknown with such openhearted gusto. Love you Lili. If you prefer listening to your podcasts, rather than watching them (as I most certainly do) they are available on all platforms. Your subscribing, rating, sharing is greatly appreciated. Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/7gxXrYB0P1qdz95Ig0NeVj?si=b3647076f2d34fbf) Apple (https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/musings-podcast/id1742005657) Youtube (https://www.youtube.com/@charisselouw/podcasts) & Pocketcast (https://pca.st/sz1z9kka)too. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit charisselouw.substack.com (https://charisselouw.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1)

13. 

    25 Apr 2024

    Hey Bestie

    I have a lifelong friend. This is not something I take for granted. We were both born into devout Mormon families in Pretoria and were besties from the get-go. Both great lovers of the performing arts, we loved the stage and went on to teach, Natalie in Dance and me Drama. Then as teenagers we were split up when she moved to Ecuador. We were later reunited when I studied at Brigham Young University (https://open.substack.com/pub/charisselouw/p/begin-again?r=1ri2vx&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web)in Provo Utah. One of my most precious memories is of how I had but one tragic potato left on my shared kitchen shelf in smelly student housing. I was feeling desperately out of place in this new culture and waiting on my first paycheck from my legally allowed minimum wage 20 hour a week on-campus job, sucking the revolting food waste from the University cafeteria drains. I wasn’t sure where my next meal would come from and was too proud to ask anyone for help. I came limping home from another endless night shift to discover two fresh baked loaves sitting on my kitchen table with a little note from Natty who was then working at a local bakery. I sat down in the morning light and wept. My friend had my back. She didn’t know, but she knew. Isn’t that friendship in a nutshell? When I was pursuing my graduate studies at New York University she came to stay and we got to meet up one last time in person in Washington DC where she was house sitting for her eldest sister and I fell in love with her firstborn Byron, who is now 23. It is midlife that has brought us back together with almost daily conversations that are honest and helpful. We value our love so much that we wanted to share it with you. If you prefer listening to your podcasts rather than watching them, as I most certainly do, they are available on all platforms. Your subscribing, rating, sharing is greatly appreciated. Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/7gxXrYB0P1qdz95Ig0NeVj?si=b3647076f2d34fbf) Apple (https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/musings-podcast/id1742005657) Youtube (https://www.youtube.com/@charisselouw/podcasts) & Pocketcast (https://pca.st/sz1z9kka)too. I hope you enjoy our chat. We did. And if you are keen to have a little natter with me on Musings, please just let me know. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit charisselouw.substack.com (https://charisselouw.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1)

14. 

    20 Apr 2024

    When the Student becomes the Master

    I had a meeting with my brilliant student Shakeelah Ismail this morning. She had given a(nother) presentation that blew me away at our Burning Down the House Symposium (https://www.instagram.com/burning_down_the_house_symp/?hl=en) earlier this month and I wanted her to teach me her ways. In the end we spoke about so much more than that. This is a snippet of her impromptu wisdom for the benefit of us all. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit charisselouw.substack.com (https://charisselouw.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1)

15. 

    18 Apr 2024

    Musings Podcast

    I tried to start a podcast (again) at the beginning of the year. It’s now 4 months later and my bestie from childhood is egging me on. So here’s Take 1 from the first week of what has turned out to be a proper shitshow of a year (Is it the Dragon? Eclipse? Late Capitalism? or simply Life…specifically the middle passage…?) The idea is to engage in friendly conversation with my lovelies about how the hell they keep on keeping on in the face of the madness. There may be a few soliloquies, because who doesn’t love a ruminater (don’t answer that!). I’m hoping it will help. The people I love are VITAL, they are really living. So let’s let them inspire us, shall we? This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit charisselouw.substack.com (https://charisselouw.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1)

Reach and audience

Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.

Spotify

5.0 / 5

2 ratings

Podcast Authority Score: 41 / 100

A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.

Quality

58

Social presence

0

YouTube

0

Engagement

60

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Guest appearances

Books guests

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