Springing and Flowing
A playlist was made… the flowers will lead you to it.
Happy Spring Equinox! Ah yes, the real new year. The time for balance and renewal. I’ve been thinking a lot about cycles… about flow and exchange… and about our relationship to currency.
When we hear the word “currency,” most of us immediately think of money, transactions, or maybe even power. And there’s irony in that because, when we trace the etymology of the word, one of its root meanings is the "state or fact of flowing from person to person." Currency is about circulation. It is meant to be a life-sustaining rhythm. But that flow has been deliberately disrupted.
billionaires (and soon-to-be trillionaires) are hoarding money and governments are rationing resources. Meanwhile, we accept breadcrumbs and have bought into the idea that we must work hard if we desire something more—but we know deep down that this setup is completely unnatural. Biological cycles have been interrupted, and make no mistake—there is a war against currency, and it is taxing us greatly.
What do you mean there’s a war against Currency, Elle?! And what is Currency in this context?
Allow me to explain.
I had a conversation with my homie Will a couple of years ago that has been running circles in my mind. We were talking about how love and peace are the greatest signs of wealth, and how people pay beaucoup money for access to presence and connection. That conversation stuck with mE. I’ve since been sitting with how Money is a great distraction that keeps us fixated on accumulating material things, pulling our attention away from true wealth—The balance of the elements, and the alignment of shared values.
The five elements/Values that appear to be under attack are:
Awareness (Earth): The currency of knowing
Love (Water): The currency of connection
Peace (Air): The currency of presence
Empowerment (Fire): The currency of action
Expansion (Ether): The currency of possibility
These are our birthright. But we’ve been bamboozled—wearing ourselves Thin chasing after printed paper just to experience them. We chase printed paper that has assigned value to pay for priceless experiences that are natural to us. Doesn’t that sound insane?!
Anyway, let’s keep digging in.
Awareness (Earth)
Oppressive forces have regarded education as something only certain groups can have access to. There’s a kind of elitism that shows up in higher education that sets up a false divide between those who have “done the work” and those who were “too lazy” to continue learning in institutions. knowledge is meant to be cultivated, passed down, and shared with all who are willing to learn. When restrictions are placed on what and how much we learn (as well as who has access to learning), we become easier to control, deceive, and manipulate.
Within our own communities, we sometimes shame one another for lacking awareness in certain areas. We take on a superior position of knowing, forgetting that we, too, are forever students. Some of us even resent sharing information. We say it’s “not our job” to teach others And while I get that it may feel laborious and inconvenient to do so, we have a duty to share with those who earnestly desire to learn and apply their knowledge. Sidebar: I’ve been reading Teaching Community: A Pedagogy of Hope by bell hooks (imagine her name is written in lowercase here—don’t come for me) and she talks a lot about this. I highly recommend this text.
emotional awareness is just as important as intellectual knowing—maybe even more so. Culturally, we tend to center logic. And don’t get it twisted, logic is necessary for critical thinking… but the wisdom of the heart?! Unmatched. Emotional awareness can truly change the world.
There’s a Sacred Geometry Movie on youtube and in it, the Narrator talks about the heart being the first organ we develop and how the rest of the body folds out of the heart, pushing the heart into the center where it emanates an electromagnetic field called a Torus. The narrator goes on to say that our hearts send messaging to the brain—Not the other way around as many of us have been taught. Heart coherence is a fascinating rabbithole to fall into. If you’re scared of heart stuff, don’t click here.
Love (Water)
many of us have been thrust into a world where love is only available part-time, if at all. Most of our parents were forced to sacrifice quality time with us during our formative years, spending years laboring under capitalism to ensure our survival and provide us with a decent childhood. While this demonstrated their love and sense of responsibility, many of us were still left with a void.
Some of us have internalized this to mean that connection is something to chase or avoid—something elusive, something we have to bend over backward for or run from. And it plays out in our relationships.
The intimacy of love is one of our deepest desires, and we are more than capable of sharing it. Yet, we’ve been taught to see love as something convenient and conditional. Let’s be clear—relationships are conditional, but love is unconditional. Argue with your mama.
Love is a muscle, one we strengthen and stretch. It’s an ongoing practice of forgiveness and openness, inviting us to release expectations and practice acceptance. Through the practice of loving, we get to experience freedom.
Peace (Air)
Oh, To be present. To be still. To breathe in deeply and fully. To be with what is and to process it. To allow it to digest. To Exhale. So basic, yet seemingly so out of reach.
Some of us deal with anxiety, overstimulation, and exhaustion. We have a hard time slowing down due to urgency culture and survival mode. The imaginary value we place on productivity and external validation has us in a chokehold. Society has framed stillness as laziness, which can bring up feelings of shame if we even think about rest. I don’t know that I believe that rest is “revolutionary,” however, I will say that it provides a necessary reset that allows us to access presence.
Presence has been colonized, rebranded, and sold back to us as “wellness” & “self-care.” But the art of Being is free, all we have to do is remember.
Empowerment (Fire)
when out of balance, power can become a self-serving, dominating and even abusive force. Much Like a wildfire, it can cause severe devastation. But when it is well balanced with knowledge, love, and peace, power manifests as action, creation, and service. service Builds confidence, fills us with a sense of purpose, fosters a sense of connectedness, and is ultimately transformative.
When was the last time you embodied power? Not the kind of power that requires recognition, the kind you feel in your bones? the kind that inspires action? creation? Service? And what can you do today to tap into that fire within?
Expansion (Ether)
One of the biggest lies we’ve been told is that there is no way out of our current condition. That things are the way they are and we must accept them, even when it feels wild to do so. dreaming beyond what currently exists is not encouraged. In fact, we’re told that it’s unrealistic and even childish to consider other possibilities. But Radical imagination is the key to sparking change.
I mean, hell… we’re currently living out the delusions of people who gave us hits like patriarchy, white supremacy, and capitalism. I imagine None of those things got the party jumping right away. But them records kept spinning, and here we are in 2025, doing TikTok dances to those old-time tunes. It’s high time to dream up new ways of existing that support human evolution.
Expansion is not only possible—it’s inevitable. The ether is asking us to take up space… to bloom.
When we shift our focus to balancing the elements and aligning with our values, the essence of life itself comes into view. Anything operating out of integrity will be revealed. Those who have interfered with the flow will be exposed, rendered powerless, and left to confront the harm they’ve caused. But We get to experience spiritual wealth—currency exchange, if you will.
So yes, question everything. be willing to Learn (and Unlearn). ChoosE curiosity and compassion over transaction and convenience. Tune into your breath and let it anchor you in the present moment. Be of service to your community. Share your creations. awaken that childlike imagination that sees the world as Infinite potential. The more we do these things, the more we create ecosystems that disrupt stagnation.
Let this Equinox be a time for us to remember, reclaim and realign with the natural flow, and a time for us to restore balance within and without.