Meet Alix Klingenberg

We recently connected with Alix Klingenberg and have shared our conversation below.

Alix, we’re thrilled to have you on our platform and we think there is so much folks can learn from you and your story. Something that matters deeply to us is living a life and leading a career filled with purpose and so let’s start by chatting about how you found your purpose.

6 years ago:

It’s 4am. It feels like food poisoning and two cups of strong coffee combined, a jittering, nauseating combination of bad decisions. My heart is pounding, and I can’t believe I let myself do this again. For the thousandth time I vow to never drink again.

I get up and take two Advil and make myself eat something. I hope the dizziness will stop before I have to do anything physical, like take my son to school. Shame, regret, and most of all, fear. What if I can’t stop. What if I can… and it means I never get to drink again. I pull myself together as best I can when my son comes out, smiling through pounding head pain. The pain-killers kick in and I’m functional again, but my inner voice is louder than I’ve heard it in a long time. “You have to quit. Now.”

My inner voice had been telling me to quit drinking for years. “Quit drinking, start writing,” it would say, gently at first, and then with an escalating tremor of fear. It’s funny how things change, both slowly and suddenly; the signs you see in retrospect showing you that you’d been on the path all along. In every journal, in every list of New Year’s resolutions, in every life-plan I’d created for the past 10 years, I had some version of “quit drinking, start writing.” I often wonder why it took me so long, while simultaneously I am simply grateful that I listened and acted when I did.

And the truth is, I don’t miss drinking at all, nor do I miss the fearful inner chatter of the voice that led me here. Once I quit drinking, my inner voice and I began the harder work, the work of creating a life from which I do not need or want to escape.

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This is how I found my purpose, by listening to my inner voice. I am not very motivated by money or fame, so my work comes from a deep desire to connect with other people and make a difference in the world. As an artist and a writer, I believe I see the world through a unique lens, one that I have a limited time to use.

I have a natural, internal engine of creative drive within me and if I don’t use it to create, I tend to do less good things with it (like drink). It wasn’t until I quit drinking alcohol 6 years ago that I really found my creative purpose. I began getting up early and writing every day, and with that consistency, I found my voice. I began posting to Instagram, found my audience, and the rest came with relative ease. I am very grateful.

Thanks for sharing that. So, before we get any further into our conversation, can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and what you’re working on?

I am a poet, a guide, a mother, a lover, a shapeshifter, a listener, and a story-weaver. I am a seer. I am a writer, a photographer, and a lover of archetypes and personal growth.

I have been studying Celtic druidry and shamanism for many years, in addition to being a Unitarian Universalist spiritual director. One of my primary spiritual practices is connecting with my internal guides through deep meditation, many of whom come to me in the form of animals or ancestors.

As I finished my most recent poetry collection,“Hermit Season,” I realized I had completed a kind of accidental trilogy. When I look at my three books together, a larger narrative began to form. Each collection has its own narrator of course, but the narrators share a history, like siblings or the archetypical developmental stages of the self.

“Secrets and Stars” is the Maiden, full of magical thinking about love, driven by lust and a desire to be completely consumed by passion. She must find ways to break free of the need to please her parents, to win her father’s affection through repeating that pattern in her love life. Her lesson is to choose herself in the end. Though it’s only mentioned a couple times, this book is also about sobriety, and the ways we must completely upend our identities and begin again.

“Bread Sex Trees” is the Mother, wrestling with the inevitable loss of freedom that comes with commitment and caregiving. But also finding the real joys of creating family, mothering, partnering, and finding home, in both literal and metaphorical ways. This book was written in a season of profound personal and collective grief, and speaks to parent death, the pandemic, and that time when so many terrible things were happening that any singular event couldn’t fully be processed.

“Hermit Season” is the Mage, turning inward for wisdom and reassurance. Our narrator has gone through a lot and returned home with some wounds that need to be healed through rest and self-acceptance. This book is a conversation between the narrator and her inner guides, who show up as ancestors, animals, seasons, memories, and dreams, to remind her that simply existing is enough sometimes.

All three collections are rooted in a deep love of the world, of animals, nature, and the infinite hope I have for human beings. They each try to address the main themes of my own life; how to love myself as well as others, how to be an adult, how to parent well without losing my own identity as a creative and philosopher, how to stay sober, how to make positive changes in the world, and how can I live with the agony of only having this singular form while being able to see so many paths and ways to live.

This is why I write; to live as many lives as possible in this one life. To love as many people as I can with this limited time. To know myself as deeply as possible, and to somehow make other people feel less alone in the Universe.

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?

I am a huge nerd. I love school and learning so I take as many classes and workshops as I can!

I have a Bachelors degree in Visual art from Oberlin College. I studied both studio art and art history and have a concentration in photography and film studies. I went to New York University film school for a semester as well and learned how to make films on the old WWII cameras and literally taped film together in the editing room. I learned photography on film as well, and spent about a thousand hours in the dark room, forgetting to eat, having no idea what time it was.

Later, I learned theology, community organizing, anti-racism tactics and strategies, volunteer development, fundraising, writing, and management. I have a Master in Divinity from Meadville Lombard and am an Ordained Unitarian Universalist minister. I also have special certification in Spiritual Direction.

In addition to these big credentialing institutions, I have taken countless classes and workshops in poetry and creative writing, psychology, counseling, facilitation, and online course creation.
I’ve worked for myself for 15 years and have been leading online creative arts classes since 2017.

I believe in mentorship, I believe in constantly learning, I believe in passing on what I know to the best of my ability. And I believe there is no substitute for experience. When it comes to creativity of any kind, the best teacher is time and practice.

How can folks who want to work with you connect?

I love leading writing retreats and I am so excited to be with people in person more often again. I would love to collaborate with movement and somatic practitioners, artists, other writers, musicians, anyone who would enjoy creating a magical, creative weekend together.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.alixklingenberg.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/alixklingenberg/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/alixklingenbergwriter
• Other: https://alixklingenberg.substack.com/
  

Image Credits

Gina Brocker
Alix Klingenberg