5-8-2025

Written By Haylin Belay

Hi friends,

Seven weeks ago, I left an unsafe living situation and became functionally homeless overnight. I’ve been crashing with friends and scraping together what I can while applying for jobs and benefits left and right. In short: it’s been a hell of a year, and it’s not half-over yet.

To tell you the truth, I’ve been in crisis for much longer than seven weeks. Around this time last year, I had to move out of a different unsafe living situation on very short notice. (Out of the frying pan, into the fire.) And before that, I spent about a year and a half watching everything I tried to build dissolve and wash away in the surf, wave by wave. 

Something I’ve been saying often, lately: “When you have things, it’s easy to build things. But when you don’t have anything, it’s like everything is covered in oil. It just slips out of your hands.”

I was accepted into grad school this spring and haven’t felt pride or joy because, as of this moment, I don’t know if I’ll be able to attend. I’m afraid it will turn out like the many other opportunities that I worked hard for, gripped tightly, and watched slip away from me these last three years.

All of this compounded by an unpleasant but not unfamiliar fact: When you are suffering, when you are vulnerable, there are many people who will find this deeply off-putting. (Most of them are, themselves, suffering and vulnerable, and unable to accept that horror.) They may reject or belittle you in ways that compound your suffering and vulnerability. 

And beware, dear reader, the person who is not deterred by your suffering: there is a chance they are, in fact, profoundly attracted to it, to the vulnerability it implies, and to the control that it gives them.

The truth is, I can’t keep going like this. I need stability to heal, work, and create again. (To avoid more frying pans and more fires.) I know that I have so much to offer this world - but what can I offer when I myself don’t have my most basic needs met? 

I need a safe place to live, and I need to be able to show a minimum monthly income of $3,000 in order to secure housing on my own.

So I’m reaching out with a request: If my work has ever supported you, moved you, taught you, or helped you feel less alone, would you consider helping me find the stability I need to offer that gift to others?

The Uncoven is a future-facing project: a digital membership space where I’ll be offering low-cost and donation-based access to my services, workshops, writings, and teachings. As of this moment, it contains nothing. This summer, my focus is survival and stabilization - but once I’m housed and steady, I plan to use this space to share exclusive content, archived resources, and new offerings rooted in healing, embodiment, justice, and pleasure.

I’m asking folks to sign up now not because there’s a ton of content waiting, but because your support today will literally help make it possible for me to create anything again. I’ve spent a long, long time being too embarrassed and scared to ask for the help I need to get back on my feet, paralyzed by guilt and shame. I am challenging myself to put out this request for help without exchange because I would like to prove to myself that people want to help. That even if I am not productive or helpful, there are people who believe I should be well.

So, I will be sharing updates in the coming weeks with how the UnCoven might take shape - or, rather, how it might benefit you. But for now, I am challenging myself to hold back from making promises or offers. For now, I am simply opening my hand.

I know this is not a “business as usual” update. (I have gone back and forth on sending it for many, many months now.) But I’ve spent the last several years fighting to survive in circumstances that made it impossible to build. I’m still here. I’m still trying. I still believe in what I’m here to offer the world, and I still believe in asking for help when it’s needed.

This weekend is Mother’s Day. I can’t tell you how many times in the last two years I have sobbed the words I wish I had a real mother. I wish I had a family I could move back in with. I wish I had a safety net of people who cared for me regardless of what I did for them. But the reality is, I don’t. And if you’ve been following my work for long enough, you know that for me, witchcraft is in large part about not being in denial of my reality. If I wish for a safety net, it is my responsibility to do what I can to make my wish come true.

If you’ve read this far, thank you. If you can support or share, thank you even more. I’ll keep you updated. I look forward to bringing The Uncoven to life, from a place of safety, creativity, and care.

With pleasure,

Haylin

How You Can Help:

Haylin Belay https://www.haylin.co
Next

3-28-2025