On Silos, Polycrisis, and Wayfinding Through It All
Overview
It’s been three months since my last newsletter, but I’m back. Today, I’m sharing what’s shifted and what’s coming.[1]
When I went dark on July 2nd, I knew that something needed to change, though I didn’t know what. And I knew that clarity would emerge on its own time, should I create space and stillness for it.
And clarity came. My 22-year-old self — the budding wayfinder — resurfaced; my vision board asked me to really look closely at it; and a few powerful books crossed my path. This combination (and other things) opened my eyes to the places where I wasn’t in integrity with my Self and invited me to course correct.
Course Corrections
The most striking course correction has been the decision to focus my energies on helping kind, awake folk navigate hard things — most notably (but not exclusively) polycrisis and collapse.
This is the path I’ve known since 1998. Polycrisis isn’t going away — it’s accelerating — and even those of us who have been buffered from its effects thus far are recognizing what others have known for a long time: that humanity must change course.
As polycrisis deepens, it will become painfully apparent just how interdependent we are and how much we’ve put our faith in unstable structures. For example, fragile supply chains, knowledge-sector employment, and democracy, to name but a few.
On silos
And as uncertainties mount, we need a way of navigating hard things in hard times. While so much of our world attempts to put polycrisis in one silo, work in another, and our personal lives in yet another, we cannot silo the many facets of our lives effectively for very long while the world around us burns.
Wayfinding isn’t a magic potion, but it is the most life-affirming way I know of to navigate the uncertainties of polycrisis, collapse, and the many facets of our lives.
Wayfinding as a way of being
By wayfinding, I’m referring to a way of being in and navigating our world even more so than to the variety of coaching that I offer.
Case in point: I’d been wayfinding on my own for 23 years before becoming a wayfinder coach. What sparked my journey was community, Think on These Things (by the late Jiddu Krishnamurti), and profound restlessness. Ultimately, I couldn’t not follow my inner compass. And so I did; I only became a wayfinder coach after my own piecemeal wayfinding journey radically altered the trajectory of my life.
Polycrisis: then and now
At the turn of the century, much of what I experienced (and navigated) is what we’ll collectively witness more of as polycrisis deepens: food and housing insecurity, lack of due process and increased brutality towards targeted groups, inhospitable climate shifts, etc. What got me (and many other activists) through those hard times was deep community, curiosity, spiritual connection, resourcefulness, and integrity. And it’s what will help us get through the hard times that await.
This is wayfinding. Your wayfinding journey may look very different from mine, but the tools are the same:
Tuning into your inner guide
Moving into deeper integrity with who you are
Nourishing your spirit
Getting curious and creative
Iterating
Building strong connections with real humans
On feeling good when times are hard
It's so easy to go down despair rabbit holes when we doomscroll, feel overwhelmed, and/or get bombarded by messages that this is just how things are (or there’s no turning back).
But when we wayfind, we dissolve these narratives by embracing our creativity, challenging our thoughts, and being the change. We choose life-affirming, integrity-driven actions and responses rather than energy-destroying reactions. And we feel more alive, good, and connected in the process.
Wayfinding asks us to be ourselves, and one of the most intuitive ways to do this is to move towards the things that inspire us. Hardly a grim or glum task, wouldn't you say?
Reflection time
Now, let’s circle back to you:
How does your inner guide communicate with you? Alternatively, how does your gut communicate with you?
What is it that you truly long for?
What kind of nourishment is your spirit seeking?
What is something small or simple that inspires you?
In closing
What’s shifted for me these past three months has been the awareness that my work is less about intentionally seeking fulfillment (though fulfillment and contentment tend to be byproducts of living as a wayfinder) and more about navigating polycrisis and other hard times in ways that move us into deeper integrity with who we are.
If you’d like to explore wayfinding with me, I invite you to view my offers and submit an inquiry.
That is all.
Hi! I’m Kristi.
I help women & genderqueer folk liberate themselves from capitalism’s self-blaming hamster wheel of “mindset work”, bootstrapping, and “never enoughness” while navigating life’s day-to-day challenges. This work is, ultimately, about helping humans move into deeper integrity with who they truly are so that they can flourish and contribute meaningfully to our collective liberation. Click here to learn more.
A note on AI: despite my love for em dashes, I promise you that I do not use generative AI to organize, write, or edit my posts…or anything else. I encourage you to read my AI Policy to learn more about how and why I don’t use generative AI.
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