What Air Teaches Us About Creative Liberation: Following Your Heart

"The wound is the place where the Light enters you." – Rumi

This was my last class of 2025. My final teaching of the Creative Liberation series. And it was just me and one student in the room.

When I designed this series, I thought I was teaching the first four chakras through their elemental correspondences:

• Root chakra = Earth
• Sacral chakra = Water
• Solar Plexus chakra = Fire
• Heart chakra = Air

But what I discovered—what the elements themselves revealed—is that I wasn't just teaching four chakras.

I was facilitating the entire seven-chakra system.

• Because Earth doesn't just ground the root—it grounds ALL of you.
• Water doesn't just flow through the sacral—it moves through your entire being.
• Fire doesn't just transform the solar plexus—it alchemizes every identity you hold.
• Because the Heart is the bridge between the lower and upper chakras, Air is the element of integration.

Air, specifically, is the element of the heart chakra.

And the heart chakra isn't just about love or compassion.

It's about having the courage to follow your heart because you finally trust your whole self.

That's what this series has been building toward. That's what Air completes.

The Chakras as Embodiment Practice—Why I Needed a Cosmology Beyond Catholicism

I need to tell you something about why the chakras matter to me.

When I was in college, I experienced a fracture.

I was studying astrophysics, learning about the cosmos—about galaxies, black holes, the vastness of space and time.

And I realized: Catholicism could no longer hold what I was learning.

The cosmology I'd inherited—the one that centered Earth as a unique and special planet, that humans were God's special creation, that salvation was linear and singular—couldn't account for the vast Universe I was discovering.

It felt too small. Too rigid. Too concerned with obedience and not concerned enough with wonder.

And I felt the split: my mind expanding into the cosmos, my spirit still tethered to a religious framework that told me women like me—childfree, marriage-free, intellectual, sexual, creative, questioning—were fundamentally wrong. That we had no purpose.

I needed a different map. Not to replace the divine, but to find a way to embody myself when my ancestral religion said I, as I am, shouldn't exist.

That's when I found the chakras.

I've been doing chakra work for three years now.

I study them with reverence, alongside yoga (I've been practicing for 15 years), Buddhism, and various contemplative traditions.

I go to temples, meditation centers, spaces of contemplation—not to convert, but to learn how to inhabit my own body as a woman who falls outside the religious paradigms I was raised in.

The chakras aren't "from my ancestors" in the way that Catholicism, Taíno, or even African diasporic practices are.

But they've become my embodiment practice. My way of understanding energy, alignment, liberation in the body. My technology for integration.

Queen Mindset Leadership®: The Framework Underneath Everything

Here's what I haven't said explicitly in this series yet: Creative Liberation is the second orbit of my Queen Mindset Leadership® framework.

Queen Mindset Leadership® has three orbits, and each one maps to a chakra. The second orbit—Creative Liberation—is where we learn to:

• Embody the self (through practices like the chakras)
• Attune to cosmic cycles (moon phases, seasons, elements, eclipses)
• Integrate ancestry (lineage, land, reclamation) 

The elements are part of this. They're not separate from the chakras—they're how the chakras express in the material world.

• When I teach Earth, I'm teaching: how do you ground your entire system, not just your root?
• When I teach Water, I'm teaching: how do you navigate the depths of your entire being, not just your sacral creativity?
• When I teach Fire, I'm teaching: how do you transform every fractured identity you carry, not just reclaim your solar plexus power?
• And when I teach Air, I'm teaching: how do you integrate all of it—root to crown—and trust yourself enough to follow your heart?

Air and the Heart Chakra: The Courage to Trust Your Whole Self

The heart chakra sits at the center of the seven chakras.

Three below (root, sacral, solar plexus). Three above (throat, third eye, crown). The heart is the integration point.

And Air is its element.

Air is breath. Air is voice. Air is the space between—the pause, the clarity, the perspective that comes after transformation.

But Air at the heart chakra is also courage.

Not the courage to do something despite fear, but the courage to follow your heart because you trust your whole self now.

• You trust your root is grounded (Earth).
• You trust your sacral can navigate depth (Water).
• You trust your solar plexus has transformed (Fire).

And now, Air asks: Will you breathe life into what you've become? Will you speak it? Will you move as that integrated self?

That's what this final class was about. That's what Air completes.

Past, Present, Future—Integrating All Versions of Your Creative Self Through Time

In this intimate container—just me and one student—we moved into the deepest work of the series.

I wanted to honor that Air, as the final element, is about wholeness.

Not just "who are you now?" but "who have you been, who are you becoming, and how do all those selves breathe together?"

So I pulled from my own years of therapy, where my therapist helped me map my past, present, and future creative self.

And I pulled from quantum physics and Indigenous cosmologies, which understand time not as linear, but as spiral. Simultaneous. Overlapping.

Your child self isn't "back there." She's still creating within you.
Your future self isn't "out there." She's already informing your choices.
And your present self? She's the breath that holds all versions at once.

PAST: Your Creative Child Self (Before Judgment)

We started by asking: Who were you creatively before the world told you who to be?

What emerged: Perfectionist, introverted, eccentric, loved, beauty, imaginative. Studious, gifted, nerdy, hungry to learn, adaptable. Responsible, kind, trusting, careful. Telling truth, afraid. Rich inner world, adored unconditionally, observant.

Creative self before judgment.

This is the self that knew how to create without asking permission.

The self that was curious, playful, unguarded.

The self that hadn't yet learned that productivity equals worth, that creativity must be justified, that expressing too much makes you "too much."

Psychosocially, this is your pre-socialized creative identity—the one that existed before systems told you what was valuable.

Air asks: What did that child know that you've forgotten?

PRESENT: Your Creative Practices Now

Then we answered: How are you creating right now? What practices anchor you?

What emerged: Menus, morning yoga, morning pages, sending self emails/texts, creating meals, gardening. Creative curiosity, questioning, blog, social media content creation. Going to the theater, walking to generate ideas. Piano, digital art, playing with AI, teaching at Creative Arts Center. Walking dog, quiet sunrise space, praying to elements, Rosary.

This is the self that's actively practicing. Not waiting. Not "someday." But now—even imperfectly, even inconsistently.

Psychosocially, this is your integrated adult self—the one who takes what the child knew and what the systems taught, and consciously chooses what to keep and what to release.

Notice: creativity isn't just "art." It's how you make meals, how you walk, how you pray, how you send yourself messages from your morning self. It's how you breathe life into the ordinary.

Air asks: What practices are you already doing that you haven't named as creative?

FUTURE: Who You're Becoming

Finally, we asked: Who is the creative self you're becoming?

What emerged: Courage to be seen/heard, embodying dignity, brave, interconnection. Responsibility to self, creative, in integrity, edginess. Non-dual, expansive, peaceful, life of discerning curiosity, magnetic. Clear channel, gracious, chakras open, reverent, observation.

And then: "What creative commitment will you make?"

My student committed to:

• Masterclass in poetry, one poem per week (quiet poetry in her office)

I committed to continue doing morning pages in colored pens, to match the chakras that I've aligned my daily with this year.

This is the self you're calling in. Not performing. Not proving. Just becoming.

Psychosocially, this is your aspirational identity—but not in the toxic "I'll be worthy when I achieve this" way.

This is the self you're already being in moments when you let yourself. Air asks you to sustain her. To breathe her into continuous existence.

Air asks: If you trusted that self is already here, how would you move differently?

Air as the Breath That Holds All Three

Here's what I want you to understand: Air isn't just "the present moment." Air is the element that holds past, present, and future simultaneously.

Every breath you take contains:

• The child who knew how to create freely (past)
• The adult who practices daily despite systems (present)
• The sovereign self who's already emerged (future)

Air integrates them. Not by erasing the past or rushing toward the future, but by breathing coherence into all of it.

When you breathe, you're not just "in the now." You're spiraling through all versions of yourself at once.

That's the quantum truth. That's the Indigenous teaching. That's what Air reveals.

The Elements as Earth + Cosmos Integration—Reconnecting What Religion Severed

[Image: Air mind map showing its qualities]

One of the surprises of facilitating this series was realizing: the elements help us root back into the earth.

And for many of us—especially those raised in institutional religions like Catholicism—that reconnection is necessary healing.

Because here's what institutional religion does: it separates you from the earth and tells you that separation is holiness.

• Don't worship the earth, worship God
• Don't track the moon, follow the Gregorian calendar
• Don't trust your body, trust doctrine
• Don't ask questions, have faith
• Don't explore the cosmos, stay within the text

Religion—specifically institutional religion like the Catholicism I was raised in—was created as one paradigm to help us understand why we're on this planet. And for many people, it works. It provides meaning, community, structure, connection to the divine.

But for those of us who fall outside its paradigms?

For those of us who are too curious, too embodied, too disruptive, too childfree, too questioning, too liberated? It becomes a cage.

And if you want a personal relationship with divinity outside that cage? It requires questioning.

Questioning the systems. Questioning the paradigms. Questioning the beliefs you inherited. Questioning what you've been told about your body, your desires, your worthiness, your right to explore.

And then learning to trust your intuition and your soul more than what anyone else says about them.

The Elements as Reconnection Technology

This is where the elements become sacred.

Earth, Water, Fire, Air—these aren't just metaphors.

They're technologies for reconnecting with the planet and the cosmos that institutional religion tried to sever.

• When you work with Earth, you remember: I am made of this. I am not separate from the soil, the bones, the minerals. I belong here.
• When you work with Water, you remember: I am mostly water. My emotions are tidal. My depths are oceanic. I contain mysteries I haven't yet explored. (As I wrote in the Water blog: the ocean beneath the ocean is always there, holding you.)
• When you work with Fire, you remember: I am allowed to burn what no longer serves. I am allowed to transform. I am allowed to desire, to rage, to create heat.
• When you work with Air, you remember: I am breath. I am voice. I am connected to every living thing through the air we share. I am not alone. I am part of an interconnected unity.

The elements bring you back to the earth. And when you're rooted in the earth, you can reach toward the cosmos without losing yourself.

Paying Attention to the Cosmos: Moon Cycles, Eclipses, Seasons

One of the practices I teach in Creative Liberation—and one that's woven throughout my own life—is paying attention to cosmic cycles.

Not because it's "woo." Not because I'm trying to be "spiritual." But because the cosmos is real, and we are part of it.

The moon affects the tides. The tides affect the oceans. The oceans affect weather patterns. Weather patterns affect crops, migrations, ecosystems. And all of it affects us.

So when I track:

• New moons and full moons
• Solar and lunar eclipses
• Seasonal shifts (solstices, equinoxes)
• Planetary retrogrades and transits

I'm not "worshipping the planets."

I'm paying attention to the environment I live in.

I'm attuning to rhythms larger than my own individual life.

I'm remembering that I'm part of something vast and mysterious and beautiful.

And that deepens my exploration of self.

Because when you understand that you're not separate from the earth or the cosmos—when you see yourself as an integrated part of this living, breathing, spiraling system—you start to trust yourself differently.

You stop asking: "Am I allowed to feel this? Am I allowed to want this? Am I allowed to be this?"

And you start asking: "What is my nature? What rhythms am I attuned to? What season am I in? What element am I embodying right now?"

That's the shift. From externally imposed rules to internally sourced wisdom.

For Those Building Their Own Relationship with Divinity

If you're reading this and you, too, have left institutional religion—or if you're still in it but questioning—I want you to know:

• You're allowed to build your own relationship with the divine.
• You're allowed to study Buddhism, yoga, the chakras, the elements, astrology, ancestors, cosmology—whatever helps you make sense of your existence and feel connected to something larger than yourself.
• You're allowed to keep parts of what you were raised in (I still wear a golden chain with a charm of the Virgin Mary) while releasing what harms you.
• You're allowed to say: "This is sacred to me, even if it's not orthodox. This is how I connect, even if no institution validates it."

The elements taught me this. They don't ask for belief. They ask for relationship.

You don't have to believe in earth for it to hold you. You don't have to believe in water for it to flow. You don't have to believe in fire for it to transform. You don't have to believe in air for it to sustain your life.

You just have to pay attention. You just have to breathe.

Closing: Flying to Alma Soberana—Trusting My Whole Self

 In a few days, I'll board a plane to the Dominican Republic for Alma Soberana—my inaugural retreat, December 4-8, in Samaná. A decolonial retreat for sovereign souls who refuse to fit into one box. Priced at $4,444.

No one registered.

And I'm going anyway.

This is my worst fear made manifest: showing up for something I've poured everything into, and being the only one there.

But Air has taught me: You don't need a full room to validate what you know. You just need to show up as the person you've become.

• Earth grounded me in my body, my lineage, my land.
• Water taught me to navigate the depths without drowning.
• Fire transformed my identity—I became someone who no longer betrays what she wants.
• And Air? Air gave me the courage to follow my heart because I trust my whole self now.

I trust my root is grounded. I trust my sacral can hold depth.

I trust my solar plexus has burned away what didn't serve.

And I trust my heart to guide me—even when the path looks like flying alone.

That's sovereignty. Not needing anyone to witness you before you move. Just trusting yourself enough to go.

So I'm going to my ancestral land. To the treehouses. Under the super full moon. To embody the Four Elements and write my memoir—even if I'm the only student who shows up.

Because the work isn't about who's in the room. It's about whether you show up as your whole, integrated, liberated self.

And I am.

Reflection Questions for You

1. What cosmology are you working with to understand yourself and the universe? Is it serving you? Or do you need to build your own framework that honors all of who you are?

2. Who were you creatively before judgment? What did your child self know about creating that you've forgotten? What would it mean to breathe life back into that knowing?

3. What creative practices are you already doing that you haven't named as creative? How you walk, cook, pray, email yourself—it all counts. Name them. Honor them.

4. If time is spiral—if your past, present, and future selves are all breathing simultaneously—what does your future self want you to know right now?

5. Where in your life are you waiting for external validation before you move? What would change if you decided: I trust my whole self. I'm going anyway? 

Earth grounded us. Water taught us to navigate depth.

Fire transformed who we are. And Air—Air taught us to integrate all of it and trust ourselves enough to fly.

The elements don't end. They spiral. And so do we.

See you on the other side of flight.