What is the FPJ Life Spiral? Vocab Pt. 1
The Basics
The Full & Plenty Joy Life Spiral is an Emergent Strategy created by me, Solasta Lucky McIntyre, a Multi-Passionate Visionary with a special interest in Humanity. It is a coaching framework, therapeutic process and Queer-Futurist belief system meant to serve rebel healers and magic humans in drawing down The Dream into The Body.
The Dream is the life we all imagine for ourselves and the world. The Dream is being able to live a joyful, connected, resourced and authentic existence. The Dream is liberation for All. The Dream is being in harmonious mutual respect and celebration of all beings seen and unseen. The Dream is not a capitalist militarized empire-of-control, categorization and hierarchy.
The Body are all the bodies within our body - physical, emotional, psychological, spiritual, communal, relational, ancestral, and the list goes on. The Body is the laboratory for change. The Body is the source of wisdom and Future Visions. The body is the landscape of our existence.
The Full & Plenty Joy Life Spiral is a synthesis of everything I have experienced, learned and practiced, both personally as a Wounded Healer, Gaelic Witch, and Lover of Life, and professionally as a Somatic Psychotherapist, Open Styles Dancer, Grassroots Organizer, Ancestral Researcher and Intuitive Business Owner.
The Spiral (shorthand for FPJ Life Spiral), is the curriculum for Full & Plenty Joy: a School of Life, Death and Rebirth. A school rooted in experiential, service-based, embodied, and creative learning philosophies. A school inspired by Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Emergent Strategy, and Cultural Somatics.
A School inspired by all the schools that have shaped me, such as but not limited to
Horace Greeley’s L.I.F.E. School - Learning Independently From Experience
University of Vermont’s Environmental Studies, Dance, and Community Development and Applied Economics programs
The School for International Training’s Grassroots Development Semester Abroad Program
The California Institute for Integral Studies’ Somatic Psychology Program
And many esoteric schools and teachings such as, but not limited to
Lindsay Mack’s Tarot for the Wild Soul
Renee Sill’s Embodied Astrology
Michelle Pelizzon’s Intuitive Business School
Yandara Yoga Institutes Yoga Teacher Training and Reiki certifications
Scarlet and Sage’s Herbalism for the Magickal Witch
The Spiral is what I teach through a variety of modalities, container and approaches throughout the year that allows me to do-my-thing as a Multi-Passionate who is:
A Visionary Creator
A Transdisciplinary Teacher
A Luminary Healer
The Context
The FPJ Life Spiral was channeled through me from September - October of 2023. I had verbalized and written down a basic “Theory of Healing” when I created Full & Plenty Joy in 2021. That first-go at a synthesis detailed the process of how I have healed since starting therapy in 2014 after accepting I needed help for an out-of-control relationship with food, exercise, and my body categorized in the medical world as An Eating Disorder. My personal Recovery Journey and how it led me to Becoming-A-Therapist, devoting myself to Somatics and founding a nonprofit called No Mirror Movement, was the catalyst for thinking about how I think healing happens.
As such, the first draft detailed the process as:
Choosing Recovery
Getting Embodied
Becoming Radical
Orienting to Pleasure
Allowing Creativity
Re-membering Magic
I had also been holding a Theory of Change that I began experimentally working with from 2016-2020 with my dance collective: No Mirror Movement. This framework situated the work at the Self, Relational or Community levels and utilized mindfulness, dance, storytelling, body acceptance, peer support and performance as the means to Healing Change.
The Self, Relational and Communal levels are integrated into the FPJ Spiral, but some additional levels I realized needed to be there when I was channeling down My Healing Framework in the Fall and Samhain Season.
The Fall coincided with my return to my weekly Full & Plenty Joy Newsletter that I had taken a break from for six months while healing from Top Surgery and starting my Psychotherapy Private Practice: S.L. McIntyre Psychotherapy. I knew in my gut back then that it was time to really dive in and commit to a Theory of Change to guide my community work which is World Building Work. But I felt overwhelmed by all the questions in my head, specifically where are my people at? What is going on in their lives? What are they needing", how they are doing, and do they have any feedback for me on the learnings and sharings I had been doing for those two years.
Lucky for me they did, and the survey I sent out to my most engaged subscribers helped me begin the process of channeling down The FPJ Spiral. So really, The Spiral is community sourced. Yes it is highly sourced and influenced from my life and my brain, but it only exists and is only useful in relationship to Others, to The People.
At the time of completing the survey, I had a huge notepad of Newsprint from Staples and a lot of clarity as to my Visionary Self and my Ultimate Dreams from listening to the Multi-Passionate Mastery Podcast, so I got to work channeling. This typically happened at night, after work, unplugged, with candles and ADHD focus music on. I would just allow myself to start.
That is really it when it comes to channeling or really getting anything “done.”
Allowing yourself to start.
Imperfectly and without distraction.
I would try and “figure it out” with these big hand drawn prototypes of a sort, Designs for sure, and stopped only when I started to get frustrated. As a Generator, that’s my cue to stop, take a break and let is be for a bit. Until I am next called.
Channeling does not involve pushing.
This process continued for about two months and coincided with the October 7th Attacks in Israel and the Ongoing-To-This-Moment-Most-Likely-[I-Think-Definitely]-Genocide of the Palestinian People. The first month of which, coincided with the High Holy Days, both in the Jewish diaspora with Rosh Hashana, Yom Kippur, Sukkot, and the Gaelic-Celtic-Irish diaspora with Samhain season. All New Years type Holidays.
[Breathe. I know it’s so activating <3 )
While there was [and is] much complexity in my body and those of the rest of the world with this time period and layered context, I did my best to lean into honoring the spiritual time, the ancestral time, the liminal time, the beginning of death time of the year and told myself I need to keep channeling. Amongst the calls and the grief and the horror and the rage and the numb and the broken. Ancestors said keep channeling. I leaned into a framework that feels like a Mentor to me. The Social Change Ecosystem created by Visionary Change Shaper Deepa Iyer.
One of my roles in the Ecosystem is The Visionary.
[You can read all about my journey wit this role here]
So Visionary I was and thus was birthed The Full & Plenty Joy Life Spiral. Something I know, something I’m learning, and something I’m growing.
Something I’m really excited to share.
A Something I haven’t felt since The Pandemic began.
The Details
So let’s go over all the components of The Spiral, because The Spiral is many things, 13 Layers of Experience that lead to the four Treasured Experiences:
The Experience of Being Connected
The Experience of Being Resourced
The Experience of Being Authentic
The Experience of Being Joyful
Plus the 13 Layers of Experience:
The Circle of Self
The Relational Circle
The Communal Circle
The Expansive Responses
The Need to Embody
The Need to Grieve
The Birth - Death - Rebirth Sequence
The Fool’s Journey of the Tarot
The Mind-Body-Spirit System
The Astrological Archetypes
The Anchors
And the Key Channels of Change
These layers can also be considered at the same time in relating to what you’re experiencing right now or what needs to happen in order to experience the treasure of that Channel of Change, like Joy or Connection.
The Spiral is anti-capitalist in that it believes true treasures are experiencing Joy, feeling Resourced, being Authentic and being Connected. The 13 layers of experience provide different flavors, sides of a lesson, and resources to tap into for the journey.
By working through these 13 Layers of Experience and five Key Channels of Change, you have a gentle, non-hierarchical, anti-dogma, collectively sourced compass for life. For life. Like there are literally so many lessons to learn and pass through the 13th layers of experience you will learn that a Full & Plenty Joy life is about constant change. Constant growth. But as a spiral, and not as a substitute for worth. It will help you know your inherent worth though.
The Key Channels of Change
All of the Key Channels of Change help you know and feel, and yes eventually, trust this. Your inherent worth as a being. As all beings. As this Spiral is wrapped up in all Spirals, and your Spiral too. In fact, in each of the Channels of Change, especially Aligning Dreams, you are asked to channel this wisdom of your “Theory of Healing” through your body and into physical form in this life.
Everyone is a healer. Has the capacity to heal. Has that ancient wisdom in their bones.
The Full & Plenty Joy Spiral helps you know this truth too - the Tending Spiral Channel of Change.
Your Truth is what’s needed in this world, so we can align all our truths into The Dream. The one, the world, that we know in our bones is possible. Channel of Change Freeing Expression help you share this truth in creative form, in your relationships and out into the world when aligned.
Your voice, that is so needed in this world, comes from your body. Your uniquely powerful divine body. The one you’re reading this blog from. This world needs it’s wisdom, it’s truth, which is yours, because in truth you are you’re body. Your body is you. This is the guidance of the Becoming Embodied Key Channel of Change. The one that brings you to your home home. You.
Which is also all of us. One connected.
But we have so many parts and past memories that keep us from connection. So many conditioned belief systems teaching separation. Categorization. Binaries. Polarities. The future we need is a Nonbinary one, full of expansive interconnected, interdependent wisdom and gifts and strengths. Breaking Cycles Key Channel of Change, helps us to catch our brain in action of these untruths.
These automatic thoughts and core beliefs that come from the parts of us that don’t care if we thrive. They solely are wired to survive. This becomes our evolutionary practice. Taking the wheel back so we can thrive, prosper, and have survival kick in when only truly necessary. A safety net of our human physiology to be grateful for.
In short, the Key Channels of Change in the FPJ Life Spiral are the foundational journey’s that lead to a Full & Plenty Joy Life, which is a life bound up in the liberation of all other life, and is a life that is Connected, Resourced, Authentic and Joyful (the Four Experience Treasures).
The Five Core Layers
(sometimes referred to as levels)
Self
Relational
Communal
Embody
Grieve
These are each dimensions of human experience. Our experience of ourselves as individuals, our experience of ourselves in relationships and our experiences in relationships, our experience of ourselves in community and our experiences in community and our experiences of our relationships in our communities or in community, our experience of embodiment - again on all those layers previously mentioned (Self, Relational and Communal) or as its own, and finally our experience of grief and grieving and loss and the transformation that comes from it, every time. At every layer that comes before it. And that it must be embodied to fully move through it.
Each of these Five Core Layers can be worked with specifically in the Five Channels of Change. For example, This upcoming Strength Card Year: 2024, I will be working on the Relational Level of Freeing Expression as I prepare to show up more vulnerably in relationships of all types as a Polyamorous Relationship Anarchist, as well as learning to share the art I have been hoarding in 1:1 - 1:3 relationships.
This year, 2023, I am completing a Self Level of Aligning Dreams. I completed major milestones in my career, such as passing my clinical exam and getting my state license to getting Chest Reconstruction Masculinization Top Surgery a month later, and then taking three more months off from all work to heal on multiple levels, then launching my business, which I later that year learned was really two businesses, and from this one, Full & Plenty Joy birthed The Spiral, which you are reading about right now. This article itself is very Aligning Dreams. The wall in my office full of “2024 Archetypes” and “This Is the Moment” post it notes, along with my Values map and “Cost of Doing Business” sheet is very Aligning Dreams. My Self way of Aligning Dreams, has been building my life back up to hold the life I dream of. This has meant making sacrifices like moving back home with my family away from community and only doing virtual telehealth indefinitely. So that I can heal my finances, start my business and recover with help from surgery. It has meant. It has meant learning my values, my worth, going slow and building for the long-haul.
I’m excited for the year where I can work through the Aligning Dreams Channel of Change again, but from the Communal Layer.
The Five Anchors
The Anchors are the layer of the FPJ Spiral that you keep coming back to over and over and over again as if it were the only thing you actually “had” to do in order to move yourself through transformation. That’s how deep of an aquifer they are - a resource, a well, a gift, something that is going to help you survive too.
These Five Anchors are each associated with one of the Five Key Channels of Change. However, they can also be applied to other Key Channels of Change because each layer of everything is in a relationship of its own kind with everything else. In short, The FPJ Life Spiral embodies a relationship archarchist principle of non-hierarchy, as well as many spiritual traditions that teach the truth of Oneness - the illusion of separation.
If we are Breaking Cycles, we must Choose Recovery (Anchor One).
If we are Becoming Embodied, we must Orient to Pleasure (Anchor Two).
If we are Freeing Expression, we must Allow Creativity (Anchor Three).
If we are Tending Spirit, we must Re-member our Magic (Anchor Four).
And if we are Aligning Dreams, we must Become Radical (Anchor Zero and Five).
To The Root the Anchors take us.
They are foundational lessons for catalyzing connection, resourcing, authenticity and joy.
The Astrological Archetypes
The Spiral, when followed in a more rigid Gregorian Calendar year-long flow, aligns itself with the 12 Astrological Signs of the Zodiac to add more depth to the lessons (area of the spiral) being worked through, as well as to align with the present and real energies of our solar system as experienced on earth by the collective. Each of the Key Channels of Change is represented by 2-3 Astrological Signs (such as Capricorn, Aquarius and Pisces for Aligning Dreams), but in reality, these Channels of Change are not time bound, or rather, can run on multiple calendars.
Many of the themes/lessons of the Key Channels of Change overlap with one another, adding to the richness and nuance of the experience. For example, when you look at the detailed spiral (as pictured at the top of this article) it will appear as though each Channel of Change is about 2-3 months long. Which is many ways is accurate. But when not constrained by graphic design, these Key Channels of Change overlap many times. For example, Aligning Dreams really begins it’s energetic field at the end of October with the start of Samhain season - the Gaelic New Year, but it’s “main” season of energy spans Capricorn - Pisces.
The Mind-Body-Spirit Model (layer)
The Anchors support the Channels of Change and the Mind-Body-Spirit system supports the Anchors. These are 15 micro lessons that support the five macro lessons. There are three of these micro lessons from the MBS-S Model per Anchor / Channel of Change. Such as Mind of System, Mind of Mind and Mind of Body for the Anchor Choosing Recovery and the Channel of Change Breaking Cycles. This particular example helps to catalyze our ability for resourcing, one of the Four Experience Treasures that can be cultivated after moving on from Breaking Cycles into Becoming Embodied.
Here are all the micro lessons:
Mind of System: Explore how your mind has been shaped by systems - family, education, empire
Mind of Mind: Befriend your Mind - practice Mindfulness
Mind of Body: Accept your Mind is part of your Body - they are actually One System
Body of Mind: Work with sensations then emotions then thoughts/images - this is real work of trauma healing
Body of Body: Integrate Mind and Body together as one, because they ARE One in reality - every part of your body is you and your mind can inquire into its messages
Body of Spirit: Develop your intuitive felt sense - the ability to feel into something more, through the body, that is unseen but is present and part of you
Spirit of Body: Use your bodies felt sense to allow your creative spirit to be channeled through into form, especially Movement
Spirit of Mind: Channel all the thoughts and images you have swirling in your mind into writing and painting
Spirit of System: Channel the stories of the collective - what it's like for your Mind-Body-Spirit System to exist in societal systems. Your stories matter
Mind of Spirit: Learn about ancestry, spirituality, religion, astrology, tarot - all the esoteric meaning making systems out there that could benefit you and reconnect you to who you are and where you come from
Spirit of Spirit: Actually practice your magic, your rituals, your spells, your whatever you call them. DO the magic making and be with Spirit
System of Spirit: Take what you've learned and bring it into the space of community. Learn how to commune with spirit with others. You are building the new world now
System of Body: Resource Yourself: your ideal set up and schedule
System of Mind: Organize all your ideas and desires
System of System: Create your own life cycle system - discover your place in building a new world - build that new world today
These are all the 15 combinations of the Mind-Body-Spirit System inspired by the Tarot’s Court Cards (ex. Queens are waters so Queen of Wands is a Watery-Fire) and The Living Altar’s Witches Wheel (ex. Fire of Earth, Earth of Earth, Earth of Water etc.)
People often refer to the MindBody system, but it misses out spirit and the system with exist in relationship to. I also don’t love how mind always comes first, and yet I’ve still kept in my own language. I use a dash to show the link of them together and I add in System to demonstrate it is both our individuals system but also the systems we are in relationship to like Capitalism and Compulsory Heterosexuality.
The Point
Now remember, each of these 15 micro lessons that make up the five macro lessons (anchors and channels of change) can be worked through EACH of the five layers of Self, Relational, Communal, Embody and Grieve. If someone worked on each of these year by year, it would amount to 50 years of self healing and growth work. That is one of the key lessons of The Spiral - that self development doesn’t end, it is a practice and continual experience if we allow it and hold some intention with it.
You are not supposed to finish the whole spiral per say. It doesn’t work that linearly. Especially when there are just as many (50) lessons from moving “backwards” through The Spiral, as well.
Instead, it’s meant to be a frame, a guide, a set of principles, an anchor, a Compass to help you
Orient to where you are
Choose where you want to go
This si the basis for the trope “live your best life.” However, FPJ’s principles ground us instead in “live our best life.”
We cannot be free until all life is free.
We cannot liberate others without liberating ourselves.
The Full & Plenty Joy Life Spiral is a conceptual framework based on the
layered complexities of an astrological chart (ex. signs, houses, planets, aspects, etc.)
non-linear Spiral Journey evident across indigenous cultures
archetypal Fools Journey of the Tarot
Astrological, Gaelic Fire Festival and Astronomical Celebrations, and The Living Altar’s Witches Wheel of the Year interpretation
therapeytic process of recovery and healing informed by my lived and clinical experience such as The Survival Responses, The Expansive Responses, and the Five Layers inspired by my framework from No Mirror Movement
The Expansive and Survival Responses
The Expansive Responses, originally referred to as The 5 C’s [Courage, Curiosity, Consciousness, Compassion, Commitment] are the baby steps, the moment to moment mantras, the day to day invitations to live the lessons in real time. They are “The Work.” The behaviors or responses we can practice choosing instead of the The 5 Survival Responses [Fight, Flight, Freeze, Submit, Attach] as theorized by PhD Janina Fisher through TIST (trauma informed stabilization treatment).
The Expansive Responses are the alternative responses to our Five survival responses. Each of these survival and expansive responses have a minor tarot inspo card because the Minors in the Tarot are very much the small seemingly mundane moments of our life that make up our day to day dramas, breakthroughs, and invitations into relational behaviors.
The responses - the ten in total, are meant to be worked through at every level in every Channel of Change in The Spiral because they are essentially the levers of change. They are the physical steps we take up a mountain to our goal like in Aligning Dreams, they are the breaths we breathe when trying to Get Embodied, they are the risks we take with our art and our relationships and communities.
You will notice in The Spiral that these two layers are situated between the three most inner Layers: Self, Relational and Communal, and the two outer Layers Embody and Grieve. This is to illustrate how in order to really be embodied and grieve (which is essential for our wellbeing and likely to come from being embodied) we must be in touch with how we respond to our internal and external environments. We must become partners with our survival responses so we may respond with more expansive responses and evolve, transform, alchemize towards the four Experience Treasures: being Joyful, being Resourced, being Connected and being Authentic.
In short, in order to Be, we must become good friends with these responses and apply them to all the layers of The Spiral. They are in many ways, how we experience The Spiral.
So now what?
All of Full & Plenty Joy’s products and services are associated with at least one of the Five Key Channels of Change and their Anchors. For example, Big Cap Energy: Masterful Planning for Multi-Passionate Visionaries drawing down The Dream is a host of offerings available during the Aligning Dreams seasons of the calendar year / astrological year. They are intended to help folks get the Visioning and Planning support they need to Align their Dreams with The Dream of collective liberation.
Each of Full & Plenty Joy’s offerings throughout the year serve as an experimental experiential container for learning and growth.
Each of the offerings are guided by Wounded Healers of the Sacred Trinity, like myself.
The goal is an integrative experience that helps you recover and repair your Wholeness in this Web of Life.
The Vision is an interconnected, interdependent, transdisciplinary community committed to celebrating our infinite differences and similarities while riding the wave of life and creating the world where We Thrive.
