[This giveaway has ended and a winner has been chosen.]
Hello sweet souls,
Today is 5 Aq’ab’al—a beautiful day to be sharing this and my first giveaway with you.
Aq’ab’al is the energy of dawn and dusk, that luminous threshold between darkness and light. It is the moment just before the sun rises—when night hasn’t fully released its hold and the day hasn’t yet declared itself. It is the bridge between worlds, the space where mystery lives, where what has been hidden begins to reveal itself. Aq’ab’al holds dreams, transitions, new beginnings, and the quiet courage it takes to bring what lives in the dark into the light.
✨ The Self-Devotion Giveaway
I’m so excited to share a pair of my favorite Elise Pearl Earrings from designer Kate Winternitz with one of you. To enter, simply scroll to the bottom for the prompt and the entry details.
Five is the energy of effort, of work, of the active turning toward something. It is the number that says: this matters enough to try.
And so on 5 Aq’ab’al, I find myself thinking about all the ways we work to bring our own light to the surface. Not the grand gestures—the meditation retreats, the ceremonies, the breakthrough moments—but the quiet, daily, embodied acts of devotion that say: I see you. I choose you. I am here. The way we dress in the morning. The jewelry we reach for. The ring that carries our mother’s memory. The earring that makes us feel entirely ourselves. These small acts are not separate from the spiritual work. They are also the spiritual work—the effort of 5 Aq’ab’al made visible, worn on the body, brought into the light.
That post is about self-devotion and includes a giveaway of pearl and emerald earrings from my favorite Austin jewelry designer.
You can also listen to this post right here:
The Body as Altar: Adorning Yourself
I have a single pair of pearl earrings I wear so often they have become part of me. Little drops, delicate, the pearl catching light just so. And lately I’ve been thinking about why I reach for them so often—and what that reaching is actually about. Because when I put them on, something settles. I feel like myself. I feel in my body. And that got me thinking about all the ways I show myself devotion and reverence—the deep ways and the simple ones—and I wanted to share them with you.
Because we’ve been talking this month about your body as the portal—in our first two April transmissions, Your Body Is the Portal and What the Body Holds—Following Aliveness. About the voices within. About following aliveness and feeling your way through this life. And all of that is true and real and sometimes it asks a lot of us.
And also—sometimes the path back into your body is as simple as what you put on it.
This is about adorning yourself. About clothes and jewelry and the quiet, daily act of choosing—with intention and reverence—what touches your skin. About self-devotion as a practice that doesn’t require a meditation cushion or a Cacao cup, though those help, too. About the small things that say: I choose myself today.
The Closet as Altar
One of the ways I worship at the altar of myself is through my closet.
I’ve been slowly reshaping my wardrobe lately—releasing pieces that belong to an older version of me and calling in new ones that reflect who I actually am right now. Not just who I am when I’m dressed up or going somewhere important. All of me. Every moment. From the gym to hiking the hills outside my door, from running errands to going for coffee, from a night out—or a date, god willing—all the way to what I wear when I wind down and what I wear to sleep.
I pay attention to all of it. Not because the clothes need to be expensive. But because they are purchased with reverence for this body. When I wear them, I feel like myself. I feel in my body.
For me, right now, that means linen and silk and organic cotton—fabrics that feel alive against the skin, that carry something, that honor what they’re touching. I walk into my closet in the morning and I ask: who am I today? Sometimes the Soul has already answered before I’ve asked. The last few mornings it’s been showing me an all-white outfit I love and feel so beautiful in. And sometimes I have to adjust for the weather. Still, I honor the vision.
This is devotion. Small, daily, embodied devotion.
The Jewelry We Carry
And then there is the jewelry.
I wear very simple pieces these days. Intentional ones. Each chosen with the same question: who am I, and what does this mean to me?
There are two things I wear almost every day without fail.
The first is my college class ring. I wasn’t sure I wanted one when I was graduating—it didn’t feel particularly alive for me at the time. But I was the first in my father’s line to graduate from college, and that mattered to him enormously. I studied journalism, literature, magazine design, philosophy—so many things that shaped who I became. When I put this ring on, I bring him with me. I honor him and I honor me in the same gesture.
The second is my mother’s wedding band—the one she bought for herself once she started making her own money. Platinum, with diamonds that go half the way around. When she passed, we divided her jewelry, and this one came to me. I wear it on my right hand. I often wear alongside it another ring she loved—gold, lined with garnets, her birthstone. When I have these two rings on, I feel held by her. I feel her in my body. That is what devotion to lineage looks like for me.
The Pearl and What It Means
The name ‘Margaret’ means pearl. And a pearl is made through grit—through some small irritation that gets buffered and softened and polished over time into something luminous and bright. I think about that often when I put my earrings on.
I found them through Kate Winternitz when I arrived in Austin—a moment in my life when I was stepping more fully into who I actually was, leaving behind the East Coast version of me and meeting someone newer and truer.
Kate designs and creates her delicate line of handcrafted jewelry out of her studio in Austin, Texas, capturing beauty through simplicity, with clean and refined pieces that showcase the natural beauty of each stone. She is also committed to ethical and environmental jewelry practices—recycled metals, ethically-sourced stones. Her work is as intentional as the woman who makes it.
These tiny pearl drops felt like mine the moment I saw them. I used to think pearls were old-fashioned. Now I think they are modern, refreshing, entirely me. When I wear them, I feel like I am giving my body full reverence. I feel seen—by myself.
I’ve been buying a piece here and a piece there ever since.
The Giveaway
Kate has lovingly agreed to give away a pair of her Elise Pearl Earrings to someone in this community—pearl drops surrounded by emeralds, handcrafted and entirely beautiful.
Emerald is known as the stone of successful love—a heart-centered stone that fosters compassion, emotional healing, and domestic bliss. It is also a stone of transformation, boosting intuition and wisdom, and drawing in prosperity. And though the Soul lives throughout the body, I often feel it most strongly in the center of the chest—right at the heart of everything. These earrings feel like wearing that knowing on your body.
Here is how to enter:
One entry: Leave a comment on this post below answering this question—What is one small thing you do to show yourself devotion? It doesn’t have to be elaborate. Maybe it’s your mother’s necklace. Maybe it’s the hot pink Converse sneakers your sibling gave you in high school. Maybe it’s the decision to only wear linen. Maybe it’s something entirely your own. I want to hear it, tell me.
A second entry: Re-stack this post intentionally on Substack Notes—to share it with others who deserves a moment of self-devotion right now. Use the Re-stack function here on Substack so I can track your extra entry.
Entries close at midnight mountain time (US) on Sunday, April 19, 2026. I’ll announce the recipient in next week’s transmission!
An Invitation
If this is landing somewhere in you—if it’s touching something about what it means to tend to yourself, to honor your body, to show up for yourself in the small and daily ways—The Altar is where we do this together, in every form.
We gather for transmissions that help you see more of yourself, to see and move from the Soul. We ritual with Cacao. We sit with the ancestors. We do all of it in the spirit of radical, embodied self-devotion.
Our next Ancestor Q&A Gathering—where you can ask anything and receive their wisdom through me—is on Thursday, April 23.
And for the first five people who join The Altar after this post goes live (and before April 30): I will send you a box in the mail, the old-fashioned way, with my favorite ritual incense. When I burn it, I sit in stillness and silence with myself and I feel like I am honoring not just me but all my people. I want that for you, too.
Come as you are. Adorn yourself on the way.
Sending you love and devotion,
Maggie xx
P.S. A few details on the giveaway: entries close at midnight mountain time (US) on Sunday, April 19, 2026. One winner will be chosen at random from all qualifying comments and re-stacks. Anyone may enter the giveaway but these earrings will be shipped to a US address only. The Elise Pearl Earrings are handcrafted by Kate Winternitz from her studio in Austin, Texas. You can explore her full collection at katewinternitzjewelry.com.
P.P.S. For those of you in or near Santa Fe—I am hosting a Sacred Cacao Circle on Saturday, May 16. During this Circle, I’ll guide you through a Cacao Ritual to commune with the earth, your ancestors, and the wisdom of your Soul; and offer a demonstration of ancestral channeling. If you feel the call, details are linked right here: Sacred Cacao Circle
A daily walk is one small thing I do to show myself devotion. On Monday, I started to walk without wearing headphones. It's usually the time I listen to audio books. But I'm not doing that anymore. I want to be more present during my walks.
I used to do this more. I have a ring that was a gift and connects me with two sacred friends that I wear for strength or psychic connection. Recently I have been so hyper focused on building my sanctuary that a lot of these touches have fallen away. Also as a New Yorker I still probably wear too much black hahahaha. But for me, it feels like me. It's just my style.