FIRST book group!

an introduction + details on our first book group in may

Hi everyone!

I know that I kinda already said this, but I just want to take a(nother) second to thank everyone who’s signed up to the Radical Dreamers Book Group. It’s been a looong time coming. It’s delightful to see so many people interested in this book group! Whether you’re intending to join us in the meetings, or just wanted to keep tabs on what we’re reading.

As this is the first ever newsletter, I wanted to take this opportunity to introduce myself and tell you a little bit about the story behind the formation of this book group. If you want to just skip ahead to see details about our first book/meeting, then scroll on down. I won’t be offended or anything 🥲

hi, i’m tika! 👋🏼

Wow, talking about yourself is difficult to do. I find introductions to be a bit tricky because I am still not sure how I feel about how we always introduce ourselves with what we do for a living or what our role is in relation to other people.

So anyway, I wanted to first say that as a human being, I am creative, mystical, curious, compassionate, silly.

As a human doing, I spend most of my days reading tarot for myself, clients and my community on Twitch & YouTube, coaching clients who wanna break up with their parents, crocheting wonky beanies, writing, pestering people to hang and spill their heart & guts out to me over coffee/wine, and being my cat’s pillow.

What gets me out of bed is my mission to help tender souls break inter-generational cycles, as I spent basically most of my life being in a toxic relationship with my parents, and living with a dark cloud following me around wherever I go.

So… wbu?! How would you introduce yourself without mentioning your job or your role in relation to others? What keeps you going? If you’d like to head over the comments or reply to this e-mail, I’d love to hear from you! Or we could also just wait ‘til our first meeting, as this will be one of the questions I will ask 😉

a bit of the story behind the book group

I first joined Pages of Hackney’s book group in January 2023. It was quite bold of myself and a few others, joining our first meeting talking about The Transgender Issue 🙃 At the time, my leg was still healing from a pretty bad ankle fracture, and my heart was still wounded from the terrible isolation that it has lead me. I didn’t have much of a support system here in London. Most of my friends and loved ones are spread across the world, mostly in South East Asia. But really, I was (and still am!) going through a Hermit phase in my life ever since 2020, where my whole life and being was shaken. I was a huge extrovert, but somehow learned to grow scared of connection. In December 2022, I thought, enough was enough and I needed to do something to help me feel more connected. Not only to myself, but to community. So why not join a book club?

After a few meetings, I wanted to create my own too, specifically to read about non-fiction. But I kind of just let it live in my bucket list on Notion as I was focusing on growing my services as a Tarot reader and reparenting coach. Because capitalism and we need money to survive and thrive, but nobody needs me to explain that.

In the summer, we read Radical Intimacy by Sophie K. Rosa, and that was when I reaaaally realised the importance of community and living amongst our fellow humans. So when Eleanor asked if anyone wants to potentially host a break-out group, I raised my shy lil’ hands up… and here we are!

details for our FIRST book group!

Okay, now onto the exciting bit!!

After much rumination, I have decided on our first book: Your Silence Will Not Protect You by Audre Lorde.

We will be meeting at the (cosy) Pages of Hackney basement on Wednesday, May 15th, 2024, at 7pm. So if you are interested in coming, do RSVP by simply replying to this e-mail. Leaving a comment on the Substack post works too.

Oh and btw, don’t worry, moving forward, we will totally have a discussion and/or vote on what books we want to read. I do want this to be a space for us, after all. I thought I would just get the ball rolling by selecting the very first one!

final notes…

I really hope that through this book group, we can cultivate connection and community, learn to how to hold different perspectives and have a curious discussion with like-minded folks as well as people we don’t totally agree with. I see us reading different ideas and sometimes even stories, especially those of marginalised groups so that we can create a new, more compassionate world.

I am in no way the most well-versed person on social / political issues, but that’s kind of why I wanted to start this group: a friendly place where we can all learn, no matter how much or how little you know.

That was longer than anticipated. I won’t keep you any longer. Looking forward to hearing from you all! Don’t forget to reply to this e-mail to RSVP!

Tika