Why Real Transformation Requires a Funeral


Hi Reader,

Birth, death, and rebirth are the natural order of life.

They’re not optional.
They’re not metaphors.
They are Reality—with a capital R.

Everything that lives follows this rhythm.
People. Plants. Animals. Ecosystems. Beliefs. Movements. Organizations. Even economies.

And yet, we’ve built a world that clings to only one part of the cycle: birth and growth.
The rise. The expansion. The illusion of limitless “more.”

We try to skip the death part entirely.

We pretend endings are failures. That contraction is weakness. That decay is avoidable.

But when we cut death out of the cycle, we also lose the possibility of true rebirth.

We lock ourselves into stagnation, collapse, or numbness—because we’ve refused to do the sacred work of letting go.

Nowhere is that clearer than in the way corporations operate.

In the context of neoliberal capitalism, corporations are designed to pursue one thing: endless growth.
Expansion with no limits. Maximum profit with minimal cost. Winning, scaling, dominating.

And we’ve normalized it.

But what’s really happening is this: corporations are chasing immortality.

They are structured to avoid death at all costs—literally.
They absorb, acquire, colonize, consolidate.
They offload harm onto the planet and people.
They avoid transformation because to transform would mean facing limits, loss, and accountability.

They hoard energy without ever releasing it.
They refuse to compost.
They reject the sacred cycle.

And in that refusal, they become monstrous.

Not because growth is bad—but because growth without death is unnatural. It’s anti-life.

We’ve built economic systems that mirror this same dysfunction.
We reward “success” that exploits people and the earth.
We punish slowness, rest, grief, and endings.
We act like the only direction worth moving in is up and to the right.

And all of this is deeply spiritually disconnected.

Because the truth is:
You don’t get rebirth without death.
You don’t get real change without loss.
You don’t get a better world if you’re still clinging to the one that’s falling apart.

When Silicon Valley Bank collapsed in early 2023, it wasn’t just a corporate failure.

It was a mirror.

A bank that fueled an entire culture of growth-at-all-costs—pouring money into startups that had no profit models, only vision decks, vibes, and velocity.
No one wanted to slow down.
Everyone believed the good times would last forever.

But that’s not how life works.
That’s not how energy works.
And it’s definitely not how transformation works.

Mystics, witches, and scientists all agree:
Rebirth is not optional.
But rebirth only happens when we allow what no longer serves to die.

Our systems—economic, political, cultural—are built to avoid death entirely.
They double down. Rebrand. Outsource harm. Call collapse a “dip.”
They fear endings more than they fear being out of alignment with truth.

And we suffer for it.

Meanwhile, Nature continues doing what she does.

She reminds us—gently at first, and then with escalating force—that she runs the show.

The fires. The floods. The heat. The collapse.
These are not punishments.
They are symptoms of imbalance.

They’re what happens when we collectively forget we are not above the cycles.

The Earth is trying to shake us back into remembrance:

Everything that lives must also die.
And everything that dies becomes something new.

This is not just an ecological or economic truth.
It’s a spiritual one.

Rebirth is inevitable.
But only if we let death do its job.

And that’s the part we resist.

We want the transformation without the loss.
We want the results without the work.
We want the new life without burying the old one.

But that’s not how the spiral works.

You don’t skip the underworld.
You descend.
You surrender.
You come out changed.

This is what we practice inside Bruja School.

We learn how to live in rhythm with what’s actually real.
We don’t bypass decay—we honor it.
We don’t worship growth—we respect the full spiral.
We learn how to transmute, how to let go, how to make space for what’s truly alive.

If you’re ready to stop resisting the sacred cycle—and start living from a place of power, clarity, and alignment—come join us.

Courage, truth, and infinite love,

P.S. If you're ready to stop bypassing and start building a real spiritual practice—one that holds you through death, rebirth, and everything in between—Essentials of Spiritual Wellness is your next step.

It’s not fluff. It’s not surface. It’s a toolkit for your real, everyday magic.

Get it here.


I don’t believe in magic, but I know that it works!

Magic is not a belief system, it’s a practice that works. Don’t believe me? Come try it out. If it doesn’t work, you lose nothing. But if it does… your dream life is about to begin!


“El poder está en la acción.”

— Maritza Schafer

4083 24th St #460861, San Francisco, CA 94146
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Maritza Schafer

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