Spreading the Seeds — July 2022
Here’s what’s happening at Pollinate Magazine
(Forgive our tardiness this month — our amazing EIC, Kathryn Dickel, has been struggling with Covid since the beginning of the month. Send her a note of love if you have a chance: hello@pollinateritual.com.)
Hi, everyone! It’s summertime, which means lazy days at the pool, adventures in nature, and plenty of time to work on all those creative projects we’ve been setting aside for when we finally have some free time. This is our moment!
POLLINATE MONTHLY SPECIAL SERIES — July 2022
Each month, we host a series of stories focusing on a central, topical theme. We present this theme to our writers and challenge them to consider this topic as it applies to their lives. Last month, we focused on the theme of Ritual. This month, we’re going to explore the theme of Creativity.
What makes you feel creative? Why is creativity important to you? What are your favorite ways of expressing your creativity? How do you want to explore, expand, and challenge your creativity in the coming months?
Share your thoughts with us!
The deadline for submissions is Wednesday, July 20th. Please use the tag “CREATIVITY 2022.”
Everyone’s articles for this month’s theme will be published on Monday, July 25th. (See the note below to learn more about how our series publication process works.)
If you aren’t already writing for Pollinate but want to submit for consideration visit here and then contact Yael Wolfe at welcome[at]yaelwolfe[dot]com to ask to be added as a writer.
If you just want to read this series, join us by following along all month long. Be sure to follow along with the series on Instagram as well.
A note about the monthly series:
Typically, we will publish all the articles on the third or fourth Monday of each month. This way, we can capture readers as they are engaging, giving them a chance to continue exploring the theme with other articles in the series. In other words, they can “binge” the material.
We find this attracts and retains readers more than a daily release of each article, and it allows us to publish as many articles as we can, whereas a daily release would limit that.
Each writer will be featured individually on Pollinate’s Instagram account, so every article gets its own “day in the spotlight.”
Our Month in Review
JUNE SPECIAL SERIES: RITUAL
While some might find this an unusual writing prompt, if you know Pollinate, then you understand why we chose it. Ritual is a core value in the Pollinate community, and with good reason: so much of what we value in human life can be uncovered just by examining the rituals of our lives.
We’re so excited with the stories people contributed for this series. You’ll learn about a ritual of morning coffee that keeps two lovers connected, juxtaposed with a story about the rituals of a breakup. There’s the ritual of staying alive each day (an incredibly poignant piece), the ritual of letter writing, and the ritual of silence that brought someone into a sense of community most unexpected. There’s the ritual of sex, a suggestion for the rituals that mark men’s rites of passage, a ritual of reclaiming one’s spiritual sovereignty, and a beautiful poem about embracing the ritual of chaos.
You can read everything here.
Looking Forward
Upcoming August Special Series: SEX & EROTICA
That’s right, folks — our steamy summer is going to heat up even more when we dig into sex and erotica next month. Are you ready?
Start brainstorming now. Yes to erotica. Yes to poetry. Yes to sexy stories. Yes to fantasies. Yes to sex positivity. Yes, yes, yes!
The deadline is Wednesday, August 17th. (To be published the following Monday.)
Pollinate always welcomes submissions that don’t fit into the monthly series, but that focus on one of our regular topics: Spirituality, Relationships, Sexuality, Culture, or Nature. Please be sure to use the appropriate topic as a tag.
Pollinate Magazine Special Series: The Year Ahead
AUGUST 2022 — Sex | Erotica
SEPTEMBER 2022 — Nature
OCTOBER 2022 — Forgiveness
NOVEMBER 2022 — Death
DECEMBER 2022 — Prosperity
Pollinate Scribes’ Hive
Just a quick reminder about our Facebook group, Pollinate Scribes’ Hive. If you haven’t joined this private group yet, send a request. If you haven’t posted recently, let us know what you’re working on, what’s teasing your brain, what life looks like for you. We’re interested.
More About Pollinate Ritual
Pollinate Ritual helps humans create and maintain soul-centered communities. There are infinite ways to achieve this and we are exploring many of them at Pollinate Ritual with intentionality, ritual, and heart. We host a variety of events in localized communities throughout the year, ranging from hikes and forest adventures to soulful retreats, such as the upcoming Pollinate Women’s Weekend. Whatever we do, we try to bring forth the true nature of community.
Pollinate Magazine is one of the ways we have created community, by bringing together writers as they share their thoughts, visions, and experiences on the page. The ritualistic nature of writing makes this a natural extension of the Pollinate experience — every writer, after all, goes through a similar process that leads them from inspiration to the finished product. Our monthly series allows us to create a community space around shared themes, harnessing the power of the ritual of writing.
Thank you so much for reading, thank you for writing, and thank you for being a part of this beautiful, soulful community. Each one of our voices contributes to this space and we are so grateful for each and every one of you.
With love,
Kathryn & Yael
Pollinate Editorial Staff
© Pollinate Magazine 2022
