Coffee with my younger self (actually, chai)

I meet her in the quiet hours of the morning, just as the sun spills gold over the Varanasi River, sacred chants vibrating circles over the water’s surface. She’s sitting barefoot on the earth, hands wrapped around a chipped ceramic cup of chai, watching steam curl into the humid air. She looks at me with wild, questioning eyes—the kind that have seen too much too soon yet still hold the glimmer of wonder.

I smile. “You always loved the wabi sabi of chipped pieces.”

She smirks. “It’s less about being broken, more about the beauty in decay.”

I nod, remembering. The way she clung to anything that burned—love, art, adventure, the sharp edge of heartbreak. She didn’t know yet that softness could be beautiful too. That surrender didn’t mean defeat. That rest could be just as revolutionary as running.

“You’re still wild,” she says, tilting her head. “Just… different.”

“I learned to listen,” I tell her. “To the faint breath of calmness, the ache in my bones, the pulse of something ancient calling me home.”

She exhales, staring at the horizon like she’s chasing a storm. “Does it get easier?”

I reach over and take her hand in mine—earth-stained, ink-smudged, trembling with hunger for something she can’t name. “It gets deeper.”

I tell her about the sacred spaces we will build. The women who will gather in candlelight and ceremony. The way movement will become prayer, and words will become spells. I tell her about Mary Magdalene, about trauma, loss and healing, about love so holy it cracks you open and pours light into every broken place.

She closes her eyes, breathing it in. Maybe she doesn’t fully believe me yet, but I see the way her shoulders soften, the way her hands grip the mug a little less tight.

“You’re gonna make it,” I whisper. “And not just survive—thrive.”

She opens her eyes, meets mine. A slow smile spreads across her lips.

“Guess I should finish my chai then.”