How I Lost My Wallet and Crashed Out in the Name of Alignment

Picture it… Sicily, 1922.

Just kidding. It was New Orleans, late on a Wednesday night, and I was convinced I was walking under a personal halo of divine favor. I had just left work, my spirit was flying high, and to put the absolute cherry on top of my spiritual alignment, I had a free three-topping Domino’s pizza waiting for me. I was thanking the Ancestors, praising the Orishas, and practically floating down the street. Life was good, cher.

Then, the bottom fell completely out.

Somewhere between leaving work and heading toward that pizza, my wallet vanished into thin air.

Just like that, the party turned into a second line without the brass band. The halo evaporated, the Domino’s ceased to matter, and my nervous system went from zero to full panic mode. I was standing out there on the concrete doing frantic mental gymnastics, trying to figure out how I went from peak spiritual alignment to having zero dollars and zero IDs in a matter of five minutes.

Right on cue, our resident trickster and master strategist Eshu stepped up to the crossroads of my mind. He leaned in with that classic New Orleans grin and said, "Eddrick, look here beyyyby, I got two options for you. You can keep pretending to be strong, holding all this in until you inevitably blow your lid next week… or you can just take the wheel and crash out right now, get it all out of your system, and reset. What’s it gonna be?"

And you know what? I took the second option. I gave myself full permission to crash out.

I was mad. I was heartbroken. I was exhausted from carrying the weight of past baggage, family friction, and two straight years of trying to be an untouchable, enlightened spiritual teacher. I walked into my space, let the frustration rip, and finally admitted that being human is messy, chaotic, and sometimes downright unfair.

For a long time, old religious conditioning taught us that if you get angry, sad, or overwhelmed, you've somehow failed a divine test. We think we have to grovel for forgiveness just because we had a bad night. But real spiritual alignment isn't about walking around like a stoic statue pretending life doesn't hurt. Yemaya understands when the emotional tide gets too high, and Obatala doesn't abandon the building just because the weather got stormy.

The secret isn't never falling down—it’s knowing how to get back up.

I let the storm pass, put a perimeter around the grief, got some actual sleep, and woke up the next morning ready to do the practical work of getting my affairs back in order. And once the air cleared? The road opened right back up. Synchronicities started dropping, lagniappe blessings showed up out of nowhere, and the peace returned stronger than before.

If you’re out here trying to balance your higher calling with late-night transit schedules and everyday life stress, give yourself some grace. Feel the shadow when it hits, vent the pressure valve before you explode, and then dust yourself off and reclaim your ground.