I sit alone in the darkness; the only sound is the wind and my heartbeat. I look up into the vastness of the night sky and bear witness to the powerful presence of the blood moon. The familiar glowing light transforms into a copper-red orb suspended in the infinite darkness. I feel a profound connection washing over me: to spirit, to my ancestors, to something larger than myself. My breath steadies as I pray for courage to face what comes, for compassion that doesn't waver, for clarity when the path seems uncertain, and for peace amid turbulence. Then, I simply listen, allowing the silence to speak its wisdom as I contemplate what is to come and what I must do to prepare. This celestial communion feels like an ending and a beginning, another turning point in a spiritual journey that has carried me through profound loss and unexpected revelation.
I am suddenly reminded of that exact moment eight years ago when the white feather appeared before me—not with my eyes, but in that deeper space where visions arrive with a truth your body recognizes before your mind can form the words.
It was 2017, twenty years after my mother's death. I was sitting in the back of an open-air truck in South Africa, dust clinging to my skin, the scent of wild hanging in the air. Zukhara, the white lion, had been watching me with those penetrating blue eyes that seemed to look straight through the careful walls I'd spent decades building. My heart hammered in my chest from the unsettling sensation of being truly seen.
At that moment, something cracked open inside me. Zukhara gave me a vision, perhaps a prophecy; the world was bleeding, and I was being called to not only notice but to stand in my fear, to be a leader in a different way forward. At the conclusion of the vision, a white feather hovered between us, luminous and impossibly light. I'd never felt anything so powerful yet gentle, profound yet simple. I began to cry as I went inward and tried to make sense of what had just occurred.
That moment marked the beginning of a spiritual journey that would carry me through profound loss and unexpected connections. In the years that followed, I would heal past wounds, navigate grief, and open myself to new wisdom and guidance. The white feather remained a touchstone, a symbol I couldn't yet fully interpret but that somehow anchored me through life's storms.
"Light, not heavy," Lao Shi would often say during our video calls. Lao was a Daoist Abbot who became my spiritual teacher and mentor for nearly five years. His wisdom helped reshape my understanding of presence and surrender. Over the summer of 2022, cancer took his physical strength, but his voice, resolve, and passion remained steady, embodying the very teachings he shared. When he passed away a few months after diagnosis, those three simple words became my mantra and a mechanism to get through.
That mantra sustained me again when I lost my dear friend Cathy last summer. Reverend Dr. Cathy Bristow was a force of nature disguised as a seventy-something "fierce Black woman" with a laugh that could fill cathedrals. We met at the seminary, where she became my friend, my sister, and not just a fellow student, a teacher. "Get off your white ass and fight," she once told me when I complained about how I wanted to quit working in DEI when it got too hard, her voice carrying equal parts love and challenge. From her, I learned that transformation requires action, not just contemplation. When cancer took her too in July 2024, the world seemed to dim, as if someone had turned down the brightness on everything.
I've spent my life trying to make sense of loss. My father died when I was just two, my mother died when I was 18, and I have lost countless friends and beloved animal companions. While I understood that loss is part of our earthly journey, something that connects us all, it still felt heavy as each new loss unearthed the unresolved heartache from the many losses before it.
Four months after Cathy died, I was struggling to fully re-engage with my spiritual practices. The accumulation of grief and the growing worldwide tension hollowed something essential in me. It's as if I had forgotten Zukhara and the wisdom that had been imparted to me. I would sit in meditation and feel nothing but the weight of absence. I went through the motions of practices that had once filled me with purpose and connection, but now they felt mechanical, disconnected.
I began to worry that this emptiness was permanent and wondered if the growing sociopolitical conflict had become more than I could bear. How could I possibly fulfill my purpose while everything I am was about to be under immense threat? How could I stand in courage when the danger no longer seemed theoretical?
It was during this period of anxiety and disconnection that an unexpected opportunity arose. One of my spiritual mentors, a Priestess from a beautiful indigenous tradition, reached out to let me know she was offering divinations for the New Year. Six years had passed since my last divination, and though part of me yearned for guidance, another part wondered if I had the emotional energy to receive whatever messages might come. I said yes, booking it for late in January, assuming I'd be more ready by then.
As the date approached, I found myself wondering whether I should go through with it or if it would just waste her time. I was still feeling disconnected and even more disheartened by the state of things in my country. I felt like I wasn't worthy enough of such a sacred gift.
As I contemplated, I sought guidance from yet another one of my teachers, my spouse Kel.
"I don't know if I should do it," I said as I took a resolved breath. We sat next to each other on the couch, and Kel could see that I was conflicted. "I just don't think it makes sense right now. After losing both Lao and Cathy, I don't know if I'm ready to open myself up again."
Kel's eyes held that quiet understanding they'd carried through our sixteen years together. "You've always found clarity after divinations in the past," they said, their voice gentle but confident. "Even when you didn't get what you expected, you've always seemed more grounded afterward."
Their words settled something restless in me. Kel has always been able to see patterns that I miss and recognize my readiness for growth before I do.
So, I chose to go through with the divination, and I am so glad I did. During the process, she identified the guiding deity that was energetically with me at this time. "You should wear more white," she explained and went on to share more ways to connect with and respect this deity's presence in my life. She reminded me to trust, to connect with my spiritual practices, with my ancestors, and with this energy that is one of my guides.
Immediately following the divination, I began researching everything I could about this deity: a creator and "King of the white cloth." An energy source of compassion, purity, patience, peace, and ethical clarity. A warrior who enforces justice and protects the vulnerable. As I read, something inside me went utterly still. The kind of stillness that feels like recognition.
Early the next morning, I pulled out my old journal, the one where I've documented every significant dream and vision since that day in South Africa. Flipping through the pages, I found my hastily scribbled notes about the white feather vision. My breath caught as I read my own words from years earlier: "It felt like being unmade and remade at once."
The connections were unmistakable: the white feather and his white cloth. The patience I'd learned through loss and his measured wisdom. The journey toward authentic service and his concern for human welfare. The way I'd been slowly reshaped through grief and love, molded by experiences I couldn't control but somehow survived.
I'd spent so much of my life running – from pain, from rejection, from my own truths. I've been molded by experiences both gentle and harsh. Through each transformation, whether chosen or thrust upon me, I've gradually learned that surrendering to the process often reveals more wisdom than resistance.
It's only been around six weeks since that divination, and I'm still sitting with what it means for my spiritual journey forward. Each morning, I contemplate in meditation, allowing the questions to surface without rushing toward answers. This exploration feels both new and somehow familiar, like remembering something I've always known.
The white feather makes sense now in a way it didn't before. Not just as a symbol of transformation but as a thread connecting me to something larger than my own story. To this deity and ancient wisdom, to my ancestors, and to a way of being that values clarity and compassion above performance and achievement.
What I do know with absolute certainty is that I've been called since I was five years old. That first tug in my heart while sitting in my parent's church, that inexplicable warmth spreading through my chest when the choir sang, was the beginning of a spiritual thread that has run through my life. And while I no longer walk the path of my childhood, that calling has never gone away. Sometimes I've tried to ignore it, sometimes I've embraced it, but it has always been there, steady and patient.
Now, as I continue deepening spiritually, that call has grown louder, stronger, and more difficult to ignore. It vibrates through every cell in my body. No longer a gentle nudge but an undeniable summons to step more fully into whatever purpose has been waiting for me. It means creating space for questions, listening deeply, and allowing myself to be a vessel rather than a virtuoso. Sometimes, that feels terrifyingly inadequate, and yet, somehow, it's exactly what's asked of me, what I've prepared for.
There are days when doubt arises when I question whether these modest offerings matter against the backdrop of global division that haunts Zukhara's vision. In those moments of uncertainty, the white feather appears in my mind's eye, and I remember: light, not heavy. The path isn't about perfection but presence, showing up with whatever wisdom or weariness I carry that day.
Zukhara revealed what will happen if humanity continues to spiral down a path of self-destruction. Lately, with the growing political divide and worldwide conflict, that vision has felt terrifyingly possible. His urging of me feels like a calling I can no longer ignore.
As I sit beneath the blood moon, watching its transformation mirror my own, I feel that same certainty that first arrived with the white feather. The cosmic alignment overhead seems to echo the alignment I've finally found within - between my calling and my courage, between ancient wisdom and present purpose. In this sacred space of communion with my ancestors, to this guiding deity, to the cosmic consciousness, I recognize and accept the path forward. It isn't about having perfect answers or knowing exactly what to do. It is about remaining open to the guidance that arrives in unexpected forms - a lion's gaze, a teacher's words, a feather's presence, a moon's transformation. It is about trust, about following that guidance into places that are threatening. It is about showing up.
And so I will listen; I will remain open to any wisdom being offered. And I will honor the vow I took when I graduated seminary: to lead with love.
One thing I know with absolute clarity - I walk with the quiet certainty that I'm not walking alone. I never was.
Thank you for this wonderful story. It echoes in my soul.