For The Worldbuilders

For The Worldbuilders

By Seeda SchoolBusinessArts
Download on the App Store

For The Worldbuilders episodes

  • 044. Your Journey of Transformation

    The fire of our surrender brought down the walls and created a clearing. We all have our own field guides to teach from inside the clearing we will turn into a classroom. How will you shape your journey of transformation into lesson plans all about love? How has love transformed you?

    Resources:

    • Register for the Worldbuilding Workshop Series
    • Download the ⁠Creative Offer Questionnaire to Oneself⁠
    • Subscribe to ⁠Seeda School Substack⁠ for weekly essay and podcast releases straight into your inbox
    • Follow Ayana on Instagram: ⁠@ayzaco⁠
    • Follow Seeda School on Instagram: ⁠@seedaschool⁠
    • won’t you celebrate with me By Lucille Clifton
    • Cover Art: Rachel Jones, SMIIILLLLEEEE, 2021 Material: Oil pastel, oil stick on canvas Source: Thaddaeus Ropac
    • 49 min
    • 043. Teach What You Want to Learn

      Our breath is the new syllabus. Our survival is the new curriculum. But where is our classroom? This critical geography we must carve out to practice the dis-order that our new world calls for. Black feminist pedagogies have always been critical to my practice. It wasn’t enough to inhale black feminist research — I had to lick it — I had to play with it — I had to stir it — I had to serve it — I had to perform it — I had to breathe it. This was the desire that seeded Seeda School. Inspired by a character that could breathe when I couldn’t seem to catch mine.

      Resources:

      • Register for the Worldbuilding Workshop Series
      • Download the ⁠Creative Offer Questionnaire to Oneself⁠
      • Subscribe to ⁠Seeda School Substack⁠ for weekly podcast and essay releases straight into your inbox
      • Follow Ayana on Instagram: ⁠@ayzaco⁠
      • Follow Seeda School on Instagram: ⁠@seedaschool⁠
      • 3 Body Problem Scene (Youtube)
      • Alexis Pauline Gumbs, “The God of Every Day” published by Topical Cream on December 22nd, 2021
      • Cover Art: Beverly Buchanan, “Three Familiar (A Memorial Piece with Scars), 1989 [courtesy of the Chrysler Museum of Art, gift of David Henry Jacobs, Jr.] Source: “Beverly Buchanan, Life on the Line” published by Art Papers. Image Description: Three, small, shacks collaged with wood, paint, nails, metal and fire — leaning, grieving, singing, dancing.
      • 41 min
      • 042. Just Because You Can Doesn’t Mean You Should

        There’s a consistent theme I’m noticing on the other side of my season of surrender. When I’m not being particularly nice to myself I’ll notice myself get frustrated with my capacity. Trying to figure out why I’m not able to lock in like I use to, put in the same amount of hours as I used to, produce as much or as quickly as I used to — both inside my job (stewarding Seeda School) and my art practice (writing science fiction in the bathtub). When inside this frustration, I have to remind myself, before my season of surrender, I was operating in complete misalignment with my desire and the pace of my body. The fuel that was charging me was external validation so I was operating in self-sacrificing ways. Exerting domination over my creative spirit and body — it’s no wonder I was more productive. I was constantly dissociating and ignoring my needs, working through meals and feasting on praise instead.

        Resources:

        • Download the ⁠Creative Offer Questionnaire to Oneself⁠
        • Subscribe to ⁠Seeda School Substack⁠ for weekly podcast releases straight into your inbox
        • Follow Ayana on Instagram: ⁠@ayzaco⁠
        • Follow Seeda School on Instagram: ⁠@seedaschool⁠
        • Revisit Newsletter & Podcast: Season of Surrender
        • Letters to the Future: Black WOMEN/Radical WRITING, edited by Erica Hunt and Dawn Lundy Martin
        • The Wild Beyond: With and For the Undercommons by Jack Halberstam
        • Cykofa: The Seeda Origin Story by Ayana Zaire Cotton
        • Cover Art: R.S.V.P. sculptures activated by Senga Nengudi and Maren Hassinger in “Performance Piece—Nylon Mesh and Maren Hassinger,” (1977) (Photo by Harmon Outlaw, Pearl C. Wood Gallery, Los Angeles. Courtesy RedLine Gallery.)(Source: Hyperallergic)
        • 54 min
        • 041. Why Worldbuilding?: Permission to Actualize Audacious Desire

          This week I want to return to the Seeda School newsletter originally published on December 4th, 2023 titled, “What is Your Creative Offer?”, subtitle: “A Questionnaire to Oneself”. In it I share why worldbuilding has been such an essential method for me. But “Why Worldbuilding?” is a question I’ve been getting again lately so I wanted to revisit the question inside this podcast in order to invite you to join me in building worlds as containers for actualizing our audacious desire. How? Stay tuned for the strategy, tip and affirmations to remember towards the end of the episode.

          Resources:

          • Download the ⁠Creative Offer Questionnaire to Oneself⁠
          • Subscribe to ⁠Seeda School Substack⁠ for weekly podcast releases straight into your inbox
          • Follow Ayana on Instagram: ⁠@ayzaco⁠
          • Follow Seeda School on Instagram: ⁠@seedaschool⁠
          • Revisit Newsletter — ”What is Your Creative Offer?: A Questionnaire to Oneself”
          • Audre Lorde, “Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic As Power” (1978)
          • Toni Morrison’s Nobel Lecture from December 7, 1993
          • Cover Art: Wangechi Mutu, In Two Canoe, 2022. Bronze, 180 × 68 × 72 in (457.2 × 172.7 × 182.9 cm). Courtesy the artist and Gladstone Gallery. © Wangechi Mutu
          • 38 min
          • 040. How to Breathe Fire, Watching Discipline Melt into Devotion

            I’m watching the sharp edges of the second hand turn into a feather here. Here in the space between the real and the infinite, feeling real infinite these days. Working alongside you, body doubling — I am elsewhere, I am here, WE ARE HERE. Emphatically here and the air is heavier. Our breathing is heavier. Our breathing is like fire now. Weightless and heavy with life. Tune into this episode for a strategy, a tip and invitation to remember how to breathe fire.

            Resources:

            • Download the Creative Offer Questionnaire to Oneself
            • Subscribe to Seeda School Substack for weekly podcast releases straight into your inbox
            • Follow Ayana on Instagram: @ayzaco
            • Follow Seeda School on Instagram: @seedaschool
            • The quote, "If I can't dance, I don't want to be part of your revolution" is by Emma Goldman
            • Cover Art: A screenshot from HBO's Love Craft Country created by Misha Green. In this still from "Rewind 1921" (S1:EP9), at the 42:40 timestamp, Hattie grabs Leti’s hand to pray as she holds the Book of Names and the house around them burns. During this scene there is audio of Sonia Sanchez ⁠reading⁠ "Catch the Fire" amidst the backdrop of the Tulsa Massacre.
            • 38 min
            • 039. Reclaiming The Power of Our Belief, Faith, and Trust

              Okay so I’m making twice as much as I was making with much more control over my income but I still don't feel as secure as I felt with my salaried position, when I was working for a company I had no control over. Why is that? Because I am so used to, have been taught to, have been socialized and expected to relinquish the power of my belief, attention and faith to sources outside myself.

              • Creative Offer Questionnaire to Oneself: Download Here
              • Subscribe to Seeda School Substack: https://seedaschool.substack.com/
              • Follow Ayana on Instagram: @ayzaco
              • Follow Seeda School on Instagram: @seedaschool
              • Mariame Kaba in an interview on the Seizing Freedom Podcast with Kidada E. Williams
              • 46 min
              • 038. Choose the Role You Can Sustain Not the Role You Think We Need

                Instead of the “What should I do?” question, here are 3 questions I want to leave you with:

                1. Which role will you choose?
                2. What container will your practice it in? Will it be through a creative offer, the garden or the 2 hour container in the morning you have before the house wakes up?
                3. Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, who will you practice this role WITH?
                4. These are questions we ask in the Seed A World Retreat and I want to pose them to you here. Let me know by responding at [email protected].

                  Resources:

                  • Download the Creative Offer Questionnaire to Oneself
                  • Slow Factory's Roles & Callings for Collective Liberation
                  • 30 min
                  • 037. The Grief Work of Composting Past Selves

                    Suddenly, my job no longer worked. I put in my resignation letter September 2020. Suddenly, my romantic relationship no longer worked. I ended it the spring of 2021. Suddenly, the non-existent boundaries in all of my relationships, family, friends, community members had to be reflected on and invented. This is because my job, my romantic relationship, my lack of boundaries were all oriented around me trying to get my unmet needs from childhood, met externally.

                    • Subscribe for weekly love letters: https://seedaschool.substack.com/
                    • "We Will Not Innovate Our Way Out Of White Supremacy: A letter to my 19 year old self" newsletter mentioned in episode
                    • How to Start Working for Yourself, with Bear Hebert podcast episode
                    • Pre-order: "Survival Is a Promise: The Eternal Life of Audre Lorde" by Alexis Pauline Gumbs
                      • Codependent No More: How to Stop Controlling Others and Start Caring for Yourself by Melody Beattie
                      • 43 min
                      • 036. But…"I’m Scared": Being Unafraid Isn’t a Prerequisite for Transformation

                        Enrollment closes on January 29th at midnight! Enroll in the Seed A World Retreat Here: ⁠⁠https://www.seedaschool.com/program⁠


                        Your creative desire makes space for our collective imagination. Join us inside this creative retreat and attend 9 weekly workshops and 9 weekly office hours based on Seeda School's worldbuilding framework. You'll be developing your creative offer alongside a committed community of fellow worldbuilders who will offer feedback and accountability. Seeda School's Worldbuilding Framework consists of nine critical action steps with three major milestones: Deciding on your creative offer, developing the framework for your offer and releasing your offer. Leveraging the worldbuilding power of storytelling the framework takes the form of a story circle, invoking a circular practice you can return to for years to come.

                        47 min
                      • 035. But…"I Don’t Want to Monetize": Public Practice Beyond Capitalism

                        What irresistible portals are the people you dream of serving waiting on? Offers as containers that might bring the two worlds spinning away from each other a little closer, if only for a moment, but just long enough for us to experiment with inventing new models of belonging, cooperative economics and mutual aid that build on the old ones. Generating money that will go to mutual aid request flyers and loved one’s Venmo accounts instead of the stock market and the distance between the two worlds spinning away from each other decreases little by little. Using our time, art, ideas, sweat, tears, spit trying to pay back a social debt that can never be repaid we dream up creative offers with the full hearted belief that this is just one strategy of millions to help us collectively divest and make more space for our liberatory quilting.

                        • Register for free upcoming workshop: ⁠https://www.seedaschool.com/workshop⁠
                        • Enroll in the Seed A World Retreat: ⁠https://www.seedaschool.com/program⁠
                          • Read this week's newsletter: ⁠https://seedaschool.substack.com/p/making-goals-for-a-future-we-dont⁠
                          • Follow me on Instagram & Threads: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/ayzaco/
                          • 43 min

                          About For The Worldbuilders

                          From the publisher's feed

                          Dispatching from Seeda School, the world's first black feminist business school, with your host Ayana Zaire Cotton.

                          More shows like For The Worldbuilders

                          StarTalk with Neil deGrasse Tyson by Neil deGrasse Tyson

                          StarTalk with Neil deGrasse Tyson

                          14,339 Listeners

                          The Read by Loud Speakers Network

                          The Read

                          27,355 Listeners

                          Tara Brach by Tara Brach

                          Tara Brach

                          10,522 Listeners

                          Embodied Astrology by Embodied Astrology

                          Embodied Astrology

                          963 Listeners

                          Marsha's Plate: Black Trans Podcast by Diamond Stylz

                          Marsha's Plate: Black Trans Podcast

                          518 Listeners

                          How to Survive the End of the World by How to Survive the End of the World

                          How to Survive the End of the World

                          2,205 Listeners

                          Ghost of a Podcast: Astrology & Advice with Jessica Lanyadoo by Jessica Lanyadoo

                          Ghost of a Podcast: Astrology & Advice with Jessica Lanyadoo

                          4,242 Listeners

                          Anatomy of Murder by Audiochuck

                          Anatomy of Murder

                          18,919 Listeners

                          We Can Do Hard Things by Treat Media and Glennon Doyle

                          We Can Do Hard Things

                          41,351 Listeners

                          Normal Gossip by Normal Gossip

                          Normal Gossip

                          5,779 Listeners

                          Navigating Narcissism with Dr. Ramani by iHeartPodcasts

                          Navigating Narcissism with Dr. Ramani

                          1,731 Listeners

                          Culture Study Podcast by Anne Helen Petersen

                          Culture Study Podcast

                          713 Listeners