Touched Before Touch

The Hood Moved With Me

The Grocery Store Glitch & The Paperwork of Trauma You know what’s crazy? You can get yourself up out the mud, right? Get your money right, get your credit right, move in a spot where the hot water actually works every single time you turn the knob… and your nervous system will still be back on the block, checking the locks and waiting for the lights to flicker. Like, your life changes, but your mind is still stuck in old conditioning. At least, that’s what I’ve been on lately. I was driving the other day, just thinking about my people. Family, friends. And I realized… I don’t even care about wishing luxury on the people I love anymore. Luxury is whatever. It’s cute. But I want them to have relief. Those are two completely different things. Luxury is a bag or a trip. Relief? Relief is the real luxury. It’s being able to sleep at night without waking up at three in the morning doing frantic math in your head, trying to stretch pennies into dollars. It’s answering the phone without immediately assuming someone’s locked up or in the hospital. It’s opening the mailbox and not getting that little shot of adrenaline like you’re about to get tackled by a collections notice. I’ve always believed in a little bit of magic, but I also know that we are the ones holding the pen. We create our own reality. Things don’t just manifest out of thin air; they happen because you align your energy and your focus to make room for them. And I’ve been aligned. I’ve built that relief in layers over the years. I put myself in positions where the right people entered my world. The lights are on. The fridge is full. Nobody is trying to pull the rug from under me. But tell me why, literally last week, I’m out to dinner, the bill comes, and I slide my card across the table knowing darn well the money is there. The transaction goes through, the receipt prints, and my stomach still does a backflip. I’m checking my bank app in the parking lot like I just committed a crime. That’s not budgeting. That was my nervous system making sure peace didn’t scam me. I’ve been preparing for a disaster that isn’t even on the calendar. That’s when that old saying popped into my head: You can take the girl out of the hood, but you can’t take the hood out of the girl. For years, I thought that was just about how you talk, or the music you blast, or how you carry yourself. Now I know it’s about your nervous system. Because the hood isn’t just a geographic location. Sometimes... it’s just where your body lives. The hood packed its bags and moved right into my new chapter with me. The Trap of Peace & The Armor We Wear Some of us have blasted Drake’s “Started From the Bottom” [https://open.spotify.com/track/5DI9jxTHrEiFAhStG7VA8E?si=CgJf5DddTLa3iryVz84DmA] at one point, right? We scream the lyrics in the car, we love the come-up story. But nobody ever talks about what happens after the climb. What happens when the thing you’ve been working for and visualizing finally shows up? When you finally get the house, the safe neighborhood, the good partner… can you actually sit still in it? Or are you so used to running that peace feels boring? Or worse, peace feels dangerous? When life gets quiet, some of us don’t rest. We investigate. Nothing’s wrong, but our body starts whispering, “Give it a minute. Wait for the crash.” Sometimes we disturb our own peace just to make life feel familiar again. Why is this? Well, calm feels suspicious when chaos raised you. When you come from chaos, stability feels like a trap. We quote Biggie: “Mo Money Mo Problems [https://open.spotify.com/track/4INDiWSKvqSKDEu7mh8HFz?si=MkK1VZX9Tg2L2UcL0fppjg]”…..Back in the day I thought that meant money literally creates the drama. Now that I’m older? I think it’s a little deeper than that. Money doesn’t create the problems; money reveals them. Money doesn’t change you; it just turns the volume up on who you already are. If you’re secure, it gives your security room to breathe. But if you’re carrying fear? A bigger bank account just gives your anxiety a bigger playground to mess with you. A nice house solves real problems. It keeps the rain off your head. But it cannot buy you peace of mind. That’s an inside job. If you don’t fix the internal programming, you’re just gonna bring your old survival habits into your new sanctuary. The scenery changed, but the software didn’t. And I say all of this because I see it happening everywhere. I drive through our neighborhoods and I look at our sisters and brothers who are struggling out here. Some don’t have a place to lay their head. Some don’t have a car to get to work. And the world thinks the only solution is to just throw a check or a resource at the problem. But real talk? You can hand someone the keys to everything they’ve been praying for, but if you don’t help them heal the survival mode first, they will end up right back where they started. Survival mode is a magnet. If your mind is still programmed for scarcity, you will accidentally manifest scarcity just to make the world match your internal comfort zone. We have to get ourselves ready for the abundance before it even shows up. We have to practice peace right now, while we are being taken care of, so that when the next level opens up, we actually have the capacity to hold it. True help isn’t just changing someone’s zip code. True help is giving a person the knowledge to rewrite the software, so they don’t fumble the very thing they’ve been praying for. And it leaks into how we love. Somebody treats you right, and instead of basking in it [https://open.spotify.com/track/6aP0g8rV0Vs3WsuQFNaOhA?si=R9-lCScPQiG3OrmBH5ANZw], you start looking for the hidden cameras. You’re waiting for the trapdoor to open. That’s not protection; that’s trauma acting like a security guard. We mistake our shields for our identity. You think, “That’s just how I am.” No, that’s just how you survived. The shield protects you, but it also blocks the good stuff. You can’t feel love clearly when you’re braced for impact. You can’t feel a real hug when you’re wrapped in layers of steel. What protected you in your past will absolutely limit your future if you don’t learn how to take it off. Pacing in Boots & Finding “Me” I caught myself the other day literally rehearsing an argument in the bathtub that hadn’t even happened. Arguing with the wall, getting my heart rate up, getting mad at what somebody might say to me if they decide to cross a line. Like… look at that. The sky is blue outside, I got food downstairs, and I am in the bathtub manufacturing a war. Some of us treat alignment like trial subscriptions. We enjoy them with one eye open, just waiting for the chargeback. If that is you right now… if you are catching yourself packing bags for a trip to a disaster that isn’t even happening, I’d like you to take a breath. Stop. Look around the room. Take an inventory of what is actually happening right now in this exact second. Hear me when I say this: The storm passed. There is no other shoe dropping from the ceiling. You are safe in your house, but you are still pacing the hardwood floors in heavy combat boots. Take ’em off. Let your feet touch the carpet. Relax your shoulders. You aren’t running anymore. This isn’t then. This is now. You are safe. For real though, that’s how my new song, “Staircase,” got written. People may think artists learn a lesson, get completely healed, and then sit down to write a song about it. Nah, not me. I write songs when I’m in turmoil. Most of my songs are written in the dead-center of confusion, when I’m still trying to figure out why I’m waiting on a ghost to pop out the closet. There’s a moment in the song where it just says three words: “There you are.” The first time those words came out of my mouth in the studio, I had to stop. Because it didn’t sound like I was celebrating making it to the top. It sounded like recognition. Like you’ve been looking for someone in a packed room for three hours, and you finally spot them through the crowd. You’re gonna yell… “There you are.” I realized I wasn’t trying to become some brand-new, fancy version of myself. I was just trying to find the girl I lost while I was busy trying to survive. I wanted to find the me buried under the armor, the high alert, and the constant hustle. I had to realize that the girl who survived was a hero, but I didn’t need her to fight a war that was already over. Survival was never meant to be a permanent address. It’s just a campsite. Some seasons are just meant to teach you how to endure, but you gotta know when that season is over. There is nothing more sad than life opening a brand-new door for you, and you’re still standing on the doorstep, holding the rusty keys to a room you left five years ago. Every mistake, every broke month, every fake friend, every tear… it was all just a step. I just couldn’t see the climb because I was too busy staring at the bruises from the fall. Staircase [https://open.spotify.com/track/3Y4yd1KhQOeNHYB3quoeCB?si=jdZ3XuV8SdmFCON4eXY3Ag] So listen. If you’re driving right now, or doing the dishes, or walking through your neighborhood... and your life has been getting better but your mind hasn’t got the memo yet? Be patient with yourself. You are learning how to live somewhere you’ve never been before. That takes time. I’m leaving you with “Staircase.” I didn’t write it from a perfect place. I wrote it while my own software was glitching. Music is crazy because the same song will hand ten different people ten different keys. I hope this one opens up whatever door you’ve been scared to walk through. Stop fighting old ghosts. Look around. You made it. Take those boots off. You’re safe. I love you! Get full access to The Soul Behind It at imaginemeinnovation.substack.com/subscribe [https://imaginemeinnovation.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]

When Love Comes Back Online

Mother’s Day can feel beautiful and heavy in the same morning. One person wakes up excited to make reservations and buy flowers. Somebody else wakes up already trying not to cry. A woman somewhere is standing in the kitchen making breakfast before she’s even had a second to sit down. Somebody else is in the grocery store with their calculator pulled up and a cart half full, trying to make sure everybody eats this week without letting the stress show on their face. Whew. That is a lot to carry before noon. Life can hold beauty and pain in the same hand. Somewhere in the middle of all that, this song started making even more sense to me. This is the Mother’s Day edition of The Soul Behind It, and I wanted this episode to feel like a real conversation about love. The kind that makes you feel a little less alone. That “did you make it home?” text. A plate fixed without twenty questions. A softer voice on a complicated day. You can be in survival mode so long your body starts acting like tense is normal. Bills. Parenting. Work. Grief. Disappointment. Heartbreak. You keep moving because you have to. Then one random moment catches you off guard. Folding laundry. Sitting in the car after work before going inside. Hearing a song at the wrong time and suddenly your chest feels heavy for reasons you can’t even explain. I know that feeling personally. I lost my mother at 19, so Mother’s Day has carried different meanings for me throughout my life. I also know what it feels like to be a single mother, loving your kids with everything in you while trying to keep the bills, food, emotions, and your own exhausted body from falling apart. There were seasons where life hit me so hard I questioned why I was even here. I was tired. And not in a way sleep could fix. Heartbreak can do that. Financial stress can too. Feeling unseen over and over can slowly wear down your self-esteem and your relationship with yourself. Folks smiling in brunch photos today might still cry in the shower tonight. Social media hardly ever posts that part. Somewhere in the middle of my harder seasons, I started noticing something. The more I learned how to love myself with actual care, the more strength I had when life got rough. I mean feeding myself properly when my mind was racing instead of stress-eating a sleeve of Oreos. Resting without guilt. Choosing not to become my own enemy on top of everything else already going on. Those little shifts helped me more than I realized at the time. Self-love goes way past cute quotes and spa days. It’s how you treat yourself when life gets ugly. It’s catching yourself before your mind starts dragging you somewhere dark. It’s giving yourself enough patience to breathe, regroup, and keep going without mentally tearing yourself apart. That’s why music feels like medicine to me. A song can sit beside you without asking you to explain your pain first. A voice can enter a space and soften the air a little. Music reaches places regular conversations sometimes can’t. I kept thinking about that saying, April showers bring May flowers. It sounds sweet until you’ve lived through enough rain to understand what it really means. Some Aprils feel endless, with bills stacked on the counter, your nervous system worn out, and reality testing you while you’re still trying to stay hopeful. Then May shows up with color anyway. The rain wasn’t easy. Something underneath the ground kept growing while everything looked crazy on the surface. When writing Love Still Knows the Way, I had all of this in mind. And yes, I’m talking about romantic love too, because let’s not play. Most of us want to be held, cared for, touched with tenderness, and loved without all the confusion attached to it. But I also mean everyday love. Sharing food when you can. Noticing when somebody who usually talks a lot gets quiet and simply asking, “You good?” A lot of us need tenderness way more than we admit. That’s why this song carries so much weight. It carries the energy I want moving through this world… love showing up in how we treat ourselves and each other. I want love to find its way into homes, conversations, and our character. Even in ordinary moments. A shared plate. A little patience with somebody having a rough day. That alone could bring change. So when you listen to this song, give it a few minutes without multitasking. Let it find the part of you that’s tired and still wanting love to feel safe. And if somebody came to mind while you were listening, send this to them. Just as a little, “Hey, I thought about you here.” Sometimes love sounds like a shared podcast and a simple text. Before I play my song, I want to say this with my whole heart… I’m really glad you’re here. Still choosing another day and letting life have another chance to meet you with love. Remember now, somehow… love still knows the way. Get full access to The Soul Behind It at imaginemeinnovation.substack.com/subscribe [https://imaginemeinnovation.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]

My Voice Walked In

I never saw this day coming. Boy, am I stepping out with this one. This is the introduction of my first song sung and produced by me. Matter of Voice is live, y’all. And yes, it’s me. My style, my tone, and my personality are wrapped all through it. For about a year now, I’ve used digitally assisted vocals to bring my music to life. That has been part of my process, and I’m so grateful for it because it helped me embody and share my messages while I was still figuring out how to bring my own voice fully online. We live in a time where technology can help shape sound. There are tools that clean up vocals, smooth out rough spots, and make things easier on the ear in ways we did not always have access to. I’m thankful for those tools too. They helped me take what was in me and bring it into a form I could share. The tools helped, but they didn’t replace me. It’s my voice in there, figuring it out in real time. Music has always been huge in my life. It has helped shape moments, hold memories, and carry me through a lot of life’s challenges. Lately, when I’m going through something, I know how to turn my pain or my happiness into a song. I started all of this to help myself. Then it grew into something bigger, and I thought, “You know what? Somebody else may need this too.” That’s how the podcasts, blogs, and catalog of over 200 songs made it this far. Music is how I process life. Years ago, I had a dream so real, omg. I woke myself up singing beautifully and loud as hell. Apparently, in the dream, my voice was amazing. There was no question in the dream. But when I woke up in real life, baby, there were many questions and a little bit of sadness. I didn’t know where that dream was going or what it meant. I just knew it felt important. Never would I have imagined that one day my voice would be on a track. But here we are. And for the first time in years, I can feel why that dream stood out so much. This episode is truly for that beautiful soul who has something creative inside them but keeps sitting on the fence. Whatever that creation may be, are you waiting to feel more confident? I get that. Confidence can be funny. In my experience, it didn’t show up first. It came after I tried, fumbled a lot, and found out the world did not end. I’ve never been trained as a dancer. I’ve never been known as the singer with all those fancy riffs and runs. I’m still learning and playing with my voice. I’m still trying to figure out what flows best for me. At the same time, I know there is something in me that needs to be heard. You can have something real in you before it’s polished. You can carry something powerful before you know how to bring it forward. What matters is beginning with what is in your hands right now. That right there has been one of the biggest lessons in my creative journey. Every time I took a fearless step, something showed up. A tool would pop up on social media. An idea would hit me while I was driving. A tutorial would answer the exact question I had been thinking about. I have lived this over and over. And I call it miracles. There were moments when I didn’t have the money, the setup, or the full plan, yet I would still get guided to what I needed. I believe my angels have been guiding me through this. They have dropped clues and direction in ways I couldn’t have planned if I tried. Every time I took that leap of faith, I was met with the means to help me bring forward what I had in my heart. Faith is a powerful force, and you definitely don’t need much. You don’t need the entire plan in your hand. You only need enough faith to move that foot forward. We’ve all heard about the mustard seed. Go pull one up online and see how big a mustard seed is. That’s all the faith you need. Then comes the next part: stepping out on that faith. That’s when the miracles start showing up to help you keep moving. Now, I have a little funny story. The creative side of me has been there since I was little. Back in either third or fourth grade at Maxine Bush in Phoenix, Arizona, I had my niece and my sister in a full talent show routine like I was running rehearsals for a world tour out of the living room. My niece was kindergarten tiny, and I had us in front of the living room mirror working on moves to The Boys’ “Dial My Heart” like we had contracts on the table. We were doing the snake, the running man, the moonwalk, and a few more moves. I was serious too. I probably had an attitude if somebody missed a count. And we won that talent show too! If there is footage somewhere, somebody please come find me. I need to see it. I might cringe myself into another dimension, but I still need to see it. That little girl had no idea how life would unfold. She didn’t know creativity would have to sit behind responsibility, motherhood, relationships, jobs, bills, survival mode… shoot the list goes on, right? But that creative part of me was always there. Now I’m allowing her to step out again. That’s what Matter of Voice is to me. It’s me using what I have right now: my voice, my tools, my faith, my guidance, and my willingness to try. I want somebody to hear this and stop waiting for everything to look perfect before they make that move. Use the phone, the notebook, the free version of the app. Use whatever you have available to you right now. That’s stepping out on faith. Then watch resources pop out of nowhere. I’m a witness! And have so many stories! You can learn while you move. And guess what? You also can grow into the gift by actually using it. That’s what’s happening for me. A little faith, some helpful technology, divine guidance, and one step I finally took. So I’m here to encourage you….take your first step. Hold that faith. Then come back to me and tell me your miracle story. I can’t wait to hear it. A little insight before I play the song: I have a couple AI videos out there but I’m working on a video that will be raw and real me for this song. I’m dusting off my choreography notes because if I could win a dance talent show at 9, I can certainly pull something off now. Hmmmpph Get full access to The Soul Behind It at imaginemeinnovation.substack.com/subscribe [https://imaginemeinnovation.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]

What Y’all Don’t See

Get full access to The Soul Behind It at imaginemeinnovation.substack.com/subscribe [https://imaginemeinnovation.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]

Touched Before Touch

I want to talk about the kind of feeling that slips in out of nowhere and quietly takes hold of your whole day. You see somebody, or come across what they do, and something in your body reacts before your brain has anything useful to say. That happened to me, and it hit me fast. I felt this live vibration move through me, like my body had picked up on something familiar, sweet, and beautiful. My stomach tightened, and my chest got warm. My mind filled with wonder, and I could not settle. It felt like I had been tapped on the shoulder from the inside and told, go reach out. So I did. And when that person responded quickly, it fed the feeling even more. That is what made it so intense. It felt like my inner world leaned forward and life leaned right back. That can mess with your head a little, because now the feeling is not just strong. It feels verified. I went on with my day, but not really. Something in me had already been interrupted. The connection that followed felt deep almost immediately, and it all started moving really fast. There was ease, chemistry, and a feeling of closeness that slips in fast and has you feeling seen, wanted, and pulled in before you have even had time to think about it. It felt easy and natural. Then the energy changed. The part that had me all lit up in the beginning started losing its heat. The connection was still there, but the part that felt alive, mutual, and full of real spark was no longer there in the same way. It was strange how fast a room can change when the music is still playing. I did not know that would affect me that hard. I literally had to evaluate myself. I wrote through it, because that is how I move through things when something pulls on my heart. What became clear to me was that the first part of this story was never mainly about desire. It was about being awakened. That person stirred something in me. My body and spirit felt more awake. It woke something in me that had been lying low for a long time. I felt softer, more radiant, more connected to my own desire and inner richness. It was not just about feeling seen by someone else. It was about feeling brought back to myself. That is why the shift hurt the way it did. It was not just about someone pulling away. It was about being brought back to a part of myself I had not felt in a long time. Real closeness. Real magnetism. I moved through my days differently after that. Softer. Brighter. More open. Once I understood that, the whole experience made more sense. I was grieving what came alive in me just as much as I was grieving what changed between us. That changed the way I saw the first encounter. I stopped trying to build a home inside something that only came to open a door. It shook me awake, man. It brought my body, my heart, and my desire back into the same room. It reminded me of what I still long for and what I am no longer willing to live without. But it was not the ending. It was more like the interruption that made the truth impossible to ignore. Then the story took a turn I did not see coming. Someone else entered my life and met me in a place that had already been opened. That is where another layer of me became less distant and far more dangerous. This time, desire did not just pass through me. It took its time. This time my body was not sending a signal. It was opening a whole atmosphere. It moved from inner stirring into something embodied and deeply felt. It was physical, present, and impossible to ignore. My body answered from somewhere deeper and lower. My breathing softened, my mouth relaxed, and a rich, steady pulse moved through me, leaving me wrapped in a more lush and feminine awareness of myself. That second experience deepened my understanding in a way I did not expect. It showed me I could feel desire deeply and still be present. A lot of people know what it feels like to get carried off by attraction. Some people start writing a whole love story after one slow look and a conversation that leaves a trace, then pour far too much into a moment that never asked for all that. This showed me something different in myself. I could feel the tension, the softness, the way my body opened, and still feel held by myself. I did not have to unravel just because something felt good. That is where Stay Here came from. That song carries a grounded, embodied desire. It is about staying present in your body while longing moves through you. It is about wanting someone without slipping away from yourself. For me, that song marks the moment this story stopped being about who awakened those feelings in me and started becoming about how I hold myself once that fire is there. That is the shape of Spell Work. Spell on Arrival carries that first body-jolt, that immediate knowing that had me restless until I reached out. Easy on the Voltage sits inside that first charge and lets it breathe. Leave a Mark carries the after-effect, the way an encounter can linger in your heart. Stay Here is where desire becomes embodied and I stay rooted inside it. Cute Little Static is where the read gets clearer than the charm. That is the album. And let me clear up the title before somebody thinks I have candles lined up in a circle and I am whispering over cinnamon sticks. Spell Work is a metaphor. That first experience felt like something hit me, changed the air, and rearranged my body. It had me looking around like, now what the heck was that. The title fits because the feeling did. What this project gave me was clarity and ease. I walked away understanding my own responses better, recognizing that impact and compatibility are not the same thing, and holding that part of myself with more care than before. That distinction is a whole lesson in itself. Some people wake you up, and some meet you once you are awake. Those are different roles, and mixing them up can cost you peace. Once I saw that, the first experience stopped feeling like some big wrong turn. It did what it came to do. It brought me back into contact with parts of myself that were still very alive. Then life kept moving and showed me another layer. That is the current running through these songs. They hold the imprint of what moved through me, the spark, the wanting, the tenderness, the realization, and the quiet return to myself that followed. What you hear is not just memory. It is embodiment. If I had to put it simply: One encounter stirred me awake. Another showed me how to remain my own while feeling everything. That is where Spell Work came from. Someone listening may be sitting in the middle of this kind of experience right now. Your body caught something before your mind could explain it. You felt stirred up in a way that felt bigger than ordinary attraction. You have been trying to figure out whether that feeling belongs to the person, the moment, or the part of you that came alive because of it. Sometimes it takes a minute to figure that out. For me, it turned into music. That is one of my favorite things about art. Life hands you something intense, strange, beautiful, or painful, and instead of sitting there staring at the wall, you make something with it. You give it rhythm. You give it language. You let it teach you. Then somebody else hears it and says, yeah, I know that feeling. That is Spell Work. Just the sound of a woman learning the difference between what stirs her and what can truly hold her. *Listen to the whole Spell Work EP Album experience here: Get full access to The Soul Behind It at imaginemeinnovation.substack.com/subscribe [https://imaginemeinnovation.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]