“You do not have to be me in order for us to fight alongside each other. I do not have to be you to recognize that our wars are the same. What we must do is commit ourselves to some future that can include each other and to work toward that future with the particular strengths of our individual identities. And in order to do this, we must allow each other our differences at the same time as we recognize our sameness.”― Audre Lorde, Sister Outsider
Dear Dreamer,
If you've ever described yourself as a fighter, you probably don't mean someone who loves conflict. You mean someone who learned early on how to face the cruelties and indignities of the world. Someone who keeps fighting for their dreams, even when each day feels like another test of your stamina, patience, or resolve.
Perhaps mornings begin with an assessment of what's happening in your life and the world: What now? What do I need to brace myself for? What's broken today?
What do I need to fix?
And with so many expectations resting on your shoulders, it's easy to neglect caring for yourself in the endless push to just keep going.
So, it wouldn't be surprising if words like "mending" or "healing" aren't exactly the first words that come to mind as you prepare for another day of battle. And yet, maybe they're words you long for.
Not in a "let's treat myself to a bubble bath" kind of way, but in the deeply human desire to be seen, understood, appreciated, and allowed to recover before facing the world again.
But like any great hero's journey, there is a descent into some kind of hell before finding the road to self-discovery.
“If our history has taught us anything, it is that action for change directed only against the external conditions of our oppressions is not enough. In order to be whole, we must recognize the despair oppression plants within each of us - that thin persistent voice that says our efforts are useless, it will never change, so why bother, accept it. And we must fight that inserted piece of self- destruction that lives and flourishes like a poison inside of us, unexamined until it makes us turn upon ourselves in each other. But we can put our finger down upon that loathing buried deep within each one of us and see who it encourages us to despise, and we can lessen its potency by the knowledge of our real connectedness, arcing across our differences.”― Audre Lorde, Sister Outsider
So, when you think back to life's trials, what comes to mind when you hear "mending"?
A body trying to recover?
Stitching and bandaging wounds?
A mind reshaping itself after learning painful truths?
Finding a new way forward when life is turned upside down?
The difficult conversations you know can't be avoided forever?
You've kept charging ahead, meeting challenges as they come, hoping to do some good in this world. But the hard questions and realities have shown you that life just never seems to get any easier.
And during difficult times, mending can feel impossibly distant. Many people are carrying fear for their own safety or for the safety of those they love. We're watching families continue to get torn apart by ICE, communities destabilized by state violence, and protesting US citizens getting harmed or killed while exercising their rights. Disinformation and deliberate cruelty from the Trump administration continue to erode trust within cities, across the country, and around the world.
But even so, many are still standing up and fighting against these injustices.
The desire and journey toward mending things also carries grief.
“And true, sometimes it seems that anger alone keeps me alive; it burns with a bright and undiminished flame. Yet anger, like guilt, is an incomplete form of human knowledge. More useful than hatred, but still limited. Anger is useful to help clarify our differences, but in the long run, strength that is bred by anger alone is a blind force which cannot create the future. It can only demolish the past. Such strength does not focus upon what lies ahead, but upon what lies behind, upon what created it — hatred. And hatred is a deathwish for the hated, not a lifewish for anything else.”― Audre Lorde, Sister Outsider
Maybe the kind that comes from realizing how much you didn't know before and recognizing the gap you need to overcome. Or from wanting to help more and seeking ways to support loved ones and communities who are hurting.
And for those who have never fully fit within the dominant cultural "norms" shaped by patriarchy, heteronormativity, whiteness, and rigid ideas of who is deemed "acceptable" in western society, these times may not feel new at all. The grief here may feel like the rest of the world is only beginning to catch up or notice the injustices you and/or your communities have been suffering for years, if not decades.
So yes, you've faced a lot. You're still facing a lot. And yet, you're still here and maybe asking:
How can we continue fighting for ourselves, our loved ones, our communities, our futures within a fractured world?
“We can learn to work and speak when we are afraid in the same way we have learned to work and speak when we are tired. For we have been socialized to respect fear more than our own needs for language and definition, and while we wait in silence for that final luxury of fearlessness, the weight of that silence will choke us.”― Audre Lorde, Sister Outsider
I want to be clear about something. Those of you who have been here a long time know that I'm not interested in a version of "healing" that skips over reality. Mending doesn't happen by pretending the horrors aren't there or by disengaging with what's happening in the world because it hasn't reached us (yet).
When life feels unsafe and trust feels fragile, the last thing anyone needs is empty positivity or recycled platitudes. Being told to "stay hopeful" without recognizing the pain can feel like another form of erasure. Many of use learn to swallow our fear, mute our anger, and save our truth for the few people we trust if we're lucky enough to have them.
At the same time, there are folks who may carry fear of being the source of harm themselves in their ignorance. Fear of saying "the wrong thing" or "not knowing enough." But sometimes, that energy put into the fear of "not knowing enough" would be better off being redirected to thoughts like:
"What can I start learning to feel less lost and afraid?"
Over the years, I've been unlearning and relearning history through lenses that center Black, Indigenous, immigrant, queer, and other marginalized experiences and histories. Not as an academic exercise, but as a way to understand how to continue to survive and thrive together in the complex world we live in.
And to seek out my own place in life as a queer American-born Chinese woman who is hyper aware that my loyalty will always be questioned since my Chinese-ness makes me a constant existential threat to the US.
After all, there is no single-issue struggle in a world when race, gender, disability, class, and citizenship are deeply intertwined.
“So we are drawn to each other but wary, demanding the instant perfection we would never expect from our enemies. But it is possible to break through this inherited agony, to refuse acquiescence in this bitter charade of isolation and anger and pain.”― Audre Lorde, Sister Outsider
Even with the continuous learning, there is still so much I know I don't know. Like anyone else, I'm a flawed human being who makes mistakes, but wants to learn and grow to be able to do some good in this life.
But growth doesn't come from demanding perfection or waiting for everything to fall into place. It comes from staying open, accountable, and allowing ourselves to change as new knowledge reshapes how we understand ourselves in relation to others.
I share this because fear of "getting it wrong" must not stop us from learning. You already know this if you create, experiment, or build anything at all. And recognizing what we don't know isn't a weakness. It can be the beginning of knowledge, growth, and mending.
And for a long time, one of the largest gaps in my understanding was around disability.
"Because the truth is, every American is just one bad day away from becoming disabled, and everyone should hope to live long enough that they eventually gain some sort of disability. Our laws should reflect that." ― U.S. Senator Tammy Duckworth, combat veteran and double amputee
Sure, looking back in 2014, I was involved in a prosthetic leg project for Natasha Hope Simpson. But back then, my understanding of what she went through was framed only as tragedy, not as disability. I didn't yet have the language or awareness to recognize how deeply able-bodied privilege shapes the way many of us move through the world.
So often, I have taken stability, mobility, and health for granted without realizing that any single moment can change everything. As Cindy Li once said, "We're all just temporarily abled." But in my ableism, that realization still didn't click yet.
That started changing around 2021, when I released the Descendants of the Dragon armor rings. This was during a period of heightened anti-Asian violence and COVID-19 scapegoating against anyone perceived to be Chinese. It was my first serious leap into jewelry, and I put my all into it. That same year, I posted a few videos on Tiktok, and one unexpectedly went viral.
With that attention came things I hadn't anticipated. One of them was that my armor rings crossed into the Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome (EDS) community. EDS is a group of connective tissue disorders that often involve joint instability, chronic pain, fatigue, and injury. It remains widely underdiagnosed and misunderstood with many people living with it for years without answers.
Suddenly, my comments were filled with questions I never thought to ask myself:
Would these rings be comfortable for people with joint instability? With swelling? With pain? There was also excitement at the idea of potential armor-like EDS splint rings that offered artistry and expression. But I didn't yet have the language or knowledge to fully respond.
And then I met Amber Roth, creator of Anxiety Zebra, a space dedicated to stories of survival through anxiety, depression, disability, and chronic illness.
“Advocacy is not just a task for charismatic individuals or high-profile community organizers. Advocacy is for all of us; advocacy is a way of life. It is a natural response to the injustice and inequality in the world. While you and I may not have sole responsibility for these inequities, that does not alter its reality.” ― Talila A. Lewis, Disability Visibility: First-Person Stories from the Twenty-first Century
Amber lives with hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, along with Raynaud's Syndrome, PCOS, migraines, and GERD. She asked something along the lines of, "Hey, does your armor allow your fingers to bend backwards?", and I'm not sure how I responded, but we got into a discussion.
She could have left her comment and moved on. Instead, when I asked about her ring splint experience, she chose to make Tiktok videos expressing what living with EDS and ring splints is like.
Tiktok felt chaotic to me, but her videos felt like it was just one human warmly reaching out to another with the hope for connection.
Personally, I felt the weight of her making that choice. I know what it feels like to be turned into a representative, a spectacle, and a walking explanation for your existence or perceived identity.
It's exhausting to constantly educate, especially when you're unsure whether the listener truly cares or even sees you as fully human or an equal. Intent matters. And I quietly hoped Amber felt I was worth her energy.
And that exchange about EDS challenged how I think about adornment, wearability, protection, and what "armor" means in modern life.
“There is so much that able-bodied people could learn from the wisdom that often comes with disability. But space needs to be made. Hands need to reach out. People need to be lifted up.
The story of disabled success has never been a story about one solitary disabled person overcoming limitations—despite the fact that’s the narrative we so often read in the media. The narrative trajectory of a disabled person’s life is necessarily webbed. We are often only as strong as our friends and family make us, only as strong as our community, only as strong as the resources and privileges we have.” ― Alice Wong, Disability Visibility: First-Person Stories from the Twenty-first Century
However, life pulled us in different directions. Personal losses and tragedies forced me to step back and question whether I was still moving in alignment with myself.
We reconnected in February 2025, after I returned from my hiatus and shared my letter, "For the Dreamers Who Feel Lost." Amber reached out after reading it, sharing that she had been on her own journey back to herself as well. A journey riddled with surgeries, pain, and the realization that pushing herself to meet "normal" standards was costing her everything she loved.
She wrote about choosing adaptability over burnout. About redefining success not as output or productivity, but as sustainability. It was about learning to create in ways that honored her body, even if that meant producing less, turning down opportunities, or walking off the expected path altogether.
In doing so, her work began reaching exactly the people it needed to. Others living with EDS and people searching for the freedom to live and thrive on their own terms.
Her words reminded me that mending isn't about returning to who we were.
It's about adapting new ways forward when the old ways harm us, and trusting that stepping off the path can sometimes lead us to the most honest, life-healing art we'll ever make.
“The communion in love our souls seek is the most heroic and divine quest any human can take”. — bell hooks, Communion
Amber's decision to quietly reach out, asking for nothing, and simply offering empathy brought me back to our 2021 conversation about EDS. As I sat with her words, I was confronted with the question:
Would I adapt and expand my design thinking to be more inclusive of disability or continue on unchanged simply because I could within this extremely ableist society? Would I learn to acknowledge the differences in their lived reality or gloss over things (as many often do) to avoid discomfort?
Of course, I could not close my eyes or my mind to what I had learned, nor could I go back to "the way things were before."
So, it was time to build new dreams with Amber and the first step was making a commitment to centering EDS in the design process with the hope of creating rings that abled and disabled folks could enjoy together.
I knew I wanted to call this the "Celestial Eye" ring splint, but I quickly hit my first major hurdle the moment I started designing.
Despite their seemingly simple appearance, EDS ring splints are deceptively complex. These are not just two circular loops of metal welded together. Every angle, curve, and point of contact affects comfort, movement, and function.
Just as the Sovereign Dreamer Armor in 2016 and the Phoenix Gauntlets in 2018, it wasn't enough to simply make something look good. It also needed to move well. Back then, with the guidance of armor educator Ian LaSpina, I created designs that were mainly suitable for fantasy performance and photoshoots, not daily life.
Sure, those projects began with a desire to bring armor into everyday wear, but I quickly learned that doing so required entirely different thinking. Designing EDS ring splints became a potential answer to that long-standing desire.
With Amber as my advisor for this new chapter of Lumecluster's everyday armor journey, I began to understand that EDS ring splints (while visually minimal) were uniquely demanding.
I wasn't only studying existing EDS ring splint standards. I was also learning how to modify essential elements without compromising function, while ensuring durability for daily wear, and still infusing the piece with artistic meaning beyond utility alone.
It had to allow comfortable movement while preventing hyperextension, be strong and adjustable, adaptable to EDS swelling and fluctuating joint conditions, and able to accommodate a wide range of finger shapes and sizes. I also learned that creating the ring splint's larger sizes required careful readjustments (in the pattern and amount of metal) that wouldn't throw off the proportions of the design.
All of this led to one unavoidable realization that too much guesswork wasn't an option for the number of requirements within this ring. Amber offered an incredibly generous solution with detailed video explanations.
Their partner even recreated versions of their prescription splints using coat hanger wire so I could better understand the structure and movement.
The Celestial Eye ring splint required not just prototypes, but months of real world wear testing, constant feedback, and trust.
During testing, Amber put the Celestial Eye EDS ring splints through everyday life.
Like crafting, using rotary tools, typing, repairing items, cleaning, hair brushing, and navigating routines that require hand use.
And despite initial concerns about adjustability, the ring splint's three points of adjustment allowed for far more precise responses to swelling and discomfort, which offered both stability and flexibility without sacrificing support.
Amber also brought in friends for broader testing, and consulted their occupational therapist, Mickey Calhoun OTR/L at Island Hand and Upper Body Rehabilitation. He reviewed videos, examined the splints in person, and provided valuable medical feedback. Amber has documented this entire testing process in much greater depth on their Anxiety Zebra site, which I highly recommend reading.
As for my own testing as someone without EDS, it also involved daily wear...and aggressively swinging my hands around to make sure they didn't fly off. Don't laugh, it was important!
The year spent planning, prototyping, and testing the ring splint also reshaped the stacking rings in the Mending Collection. Originally, the stacking rings were closed bands, but that just didn't seem to make sense to me anymore.
As I looked at my hands and at Amber's, I couldn't stop thinking about everything our hands carry.
“I would argue that ‘disability justice’ is simply another term for love. And so is ‘solidarity,’ ‘access,’ and ‘access intimacy.’ I would argue that our work for liberation is simply a practice of love—one of the deepest and most profound there is. And the creation of this space is an act of love.”― Mia Mingus, speech at the 2018 Disability Intersectionality Summit
The people they've reached for, the love they've held, the injuries they've endured, and the risk they take every time they reach out again to others we hope to find connection with.
Creating the Celestial Eye ring splint became a way to connect our scarred hands and hearts, opening new ways of seeing and understanding. And I wanted that love and care to extend into the stacking rings as well.
To design them to allow for greater safety during handiwork or unexpected swelling, while symbolically resembling bandages for battle-worn hands. Metal bandages that carry protection and reminders that our injuries and scars are proof of our survival. That we are still here fighting for what we believe in even if the world tries to cut us down.
So, as a fighter, a warrior, a Dreamer, I know you have survived many battles. But these armor ring bandages are not only asking you to keep fighting. They are also meant to remind you that you deserve rest, care, healing, and love. That tending to your wounds is not weakness. It is what allows you to keep fighting, loving, and standing up again for a better tomorrow.
Now, let's explore the meaning, symbolism, and story behind each ring in the Mending Collection:
Celestial Eye ring splint
“These are the times that try our souls. Each of us needs to undergo a tremendous philosophical and spiritual transformation. Each of us needs to be awakened to a personal and compassionate recognition of the inseparable interconnection between our minds, hearts, and bodies; between our physical and psychical well-being; and between our selves and all the other selves in our country and in the world.” —Grace Lee Boggs, The Next American Revolution
The Celestial Eye ring splint mimics the folds of skin around our scarred knuckles, while echoing the knuckle armor in 14th-century German Gothic gauntlets.
From the side, it resembles a Chinese Phoenix feather. Phoenixes were seen as a symbol of strength, good fortune, and associated with warmth and the sun. In Chinese mythology, it was said that the Phoenix only appeared during peaceful and benevolent times. And from the front view of the ring, it resembles an open eye, inspired by the ancient eye motifs found in Sanxingdui, a Bronze Age archaeological site in Guanghan, Sichuan, China.
As a warrior for peace and unity, may this ring serve as a reminder to always elevate our understanding and empathy by keeping our eyes, hearts, and minds open.
With three points of refined adjustments to accommodate the changing needs of your hands, this ring is for everyone whether or not you live with Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome (EDS). For a deeply detailed account of the testing and experience with wearing the Celestial Eye ring splint, I encourage you to visit Amber Roth's Anxiety Zebra.
Lucky Horseshoe Ring
“When it is all too much; when the news is so bad meditation itself feels useless, and a single life feels too small a stone to offer on the altar of Peace, find a Human Sunrise. Find those people who are committed to changing our scary reality. Human sunrises are happening all over the earth, at every moment. People gathering, people working to change the intolerable, people coming in their robes and sandals or in their rags and bare feet, and they are singing, or not, and they are chanting, or not. But they are working to bring peace, light, compassion, to the infinitely frightening downhill slide of Human life.”― Alice Walker
The horse is the seventh animal in the twelve-year cycle of the Chinese zodiac, long revered in Chinese mythology as a symbol of strength, vitality, and freedom. Horses appear as celestial beings and loyal companions in epic tales such as Journey to the West, where the dragon disguised as a horse faithfully carries the monk across perilous lands.
The horseshoe itself is also a widely recognized symbol of protection, prosperity, and good fortune. While meanings vary, the inverted horseshoe can be seen as allowing good fortune to pour outward, pouring luck upon others while protecting those within. The shape also evokes the shape of a rainbow.
Worn upright, the horseshoe appears cradled by clouds. Worn downward, it becomes a rainbow between mountains with a sunrise at its center. reminding you that luck, like light, can both be held and shared.
Mountain River Ring
"I want to love more than death can harm. And I want to tell you this often: That despite being so human and so terrified, here, standing on this unfinished staircase to nowhere and everywhere, surrounded by the cold and starless night—we can live. And we will." —Ocean Vuong
Inspired by traditional Chinese scroll paintings, this ring shifts between looking like mountains and rivers depending on how it's worn and how you look at it.
Throughout Chinese art and history, mountains have long been seen as sacred vessels of nature's vital energy. They summon rain clouds to nourish crops, shelter rare herbs and alchemical minerals, and promise longevity and renewal. When paired with water, mountains become especially auspicious. Mountains were also places of reflection during times of political upheaval, where scholars and artists sought solitude for moral self-cultivation, contemplation, social critique, and resistance.
This ring honors the strength found in stillness and the wisdom gained when we step back, observe, and reconnect with nature, the world, and ourselves.
Auspicious Ribbon Ring
“I tell my students, 'When you get these jobs that you have been so brilliantly trained for, just remember that your real job is that if you are free, you need to free somebody else. If you have some power, then your job is to empower somebody else. This is not just a grab-bag candy game.” ― Toni Morrison
Ribbons and sashes appear throughout Chinese art as subtle but powerful symbols of auspiciousness. Though often overlooked, they serve as visual cues that the object they surround is blessed, miraculous, or imbued with divine meaning.
Ribbons were used to emphasize the sacred nature of immortals, gods, goddesses, apsaras, and other ethereal beings. Wrapped around your finger, these flowing ribbons are a reminder of your own power and inner light.
Let this ring remind you that your dreams carry magic and that even small acts of hope can illuminate the darkness.
Good Knight Chainmail Ring
“We live in a world in which we need to share responsibility. It's easy to say ‘It's not my child, not my community, not my world, not my problem.’ Then there are those who see the need and respond. I consider those people my heroes.” ― Fred Rogers
If you've ever imagined yourself as a brave and courageous knight, standing up for justice, protecting the vulnerable, and choosing compassion over fear, then this ring is dedicated to you.
Inspired by the fluted details of 14th-century German Gothic gauntlets and chainmail armor, this ring honors the timeless archetypes of the hero who fights not for glory, but for peace and harmony. But these legendary heroes were never invincible beings. They were ordinary people who chose courage, integrity, and kindness despite the odds.
Like all true heroes, they lived by a code of honor. This ring is a reminder that heroism lives in everyday choices and that the Dreamer Creed begins with how we life each other up.
Memory Keeper Bookshelf Ring
“As we grow up, as we end up understanding the world more, we collect more stories. And eventually, at some point, our own personal journeys take us to these places where we are no longer merely the recipients of stories. We begin to become heroes and demigods in other people's stories, you know, our children's stories or our friends' stories and those who we mentor and teach and lead.
That's how the generations go on. We pass on these stories from generation to generation. We love others as we were loved. We are courageous for others as they were courageous for us. To me, that's how culture is built." ― Ken Liu
Memories invite you to pause and reflect on the story you are living. After all, life is a treasure trove of memory to pass on to your future self and those around you.
In the rush of everyday life, beautiful moments may often slip by unnoticed, meaningful connections may be lost, and lessons may be overlooked in the hurry to move on to the next thing.
This ring is a promise to yourself to gather your memories with care, like beloved books, vases, and objects on a cherished shelf. Wear it as a reminder to honor the challenges you've survived, the big and small joys you've experienced, and the quiet moments to recollect each day so that life never becomes a blur.
Lifelong Learner Book Ring
”From childhood on, I found many of my angels in favorite authors, writers who created books that enabled me to understand life with greater complexity. These works opened my heart to compassion, forgiveness, and understanding.”—bell hooks: all about love (new visions)” —bell hooks, All About Love: New Visions
While there are lessons to be learned all around us every day, reading remains one of the most powerful gateways to new ways of seeing.
Books allow us to peek into lives unlike our own, challenge what we think we know, and expand our capacity for empathy. Reading widely, especially voices that expand our world view, is how we grow.
This ring is for those dedicated to the life of being a lifelong learner who continues to choose knowledge, empathy, wonder, and transformation.
Vessels of Renewal Ring
“Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.” ― Audre Lorde
In Chinese, the word for vase or bottle, píng (瓶), shares a homophone with píng (平), which means a sort of calm peacefulness / stillness. To gift a vessel is therefore to wish peace upon the recipient. Or, of course, you can gift some peace to yourself.
In a world that constantly demands more from you, finding moments of peace and renewal can feel difficult and sometimes impossible. This is why finding peace and time for yourself is absolutely vital to renew your fire.
This ring is a gentle reminder to make space for rest, healing, and restoration. Even small moments of renewal can sustain us as we prepare for another day of battle.
Mending isn't about erasing damage or the past. It's about noticing it, sitting with it, learning from it, and choosing to tend to the pain we experience within and with others.
“When it looks like the sun will not shine anymore, God put a rainbow in the clouds…I’ve had a lot of clouds, but I have had so many rainbows…..and one of the things I do when I step up on a stage…I bring everyone who has ever been kind to me with me. Black, White, Asian, Spanish-speaking, Native American, Gay, Straight, everybody. I say come with me — I’m going on this stage…So I don’t ever feel, I have no help. I’ve had rainbows in my clouds and the thing to do it seems to me is to prepare yourself so that you can be a rainbow in somebody else’s cloud.” — Dr. Maya Angelou
It's about knowing when to lay your armor down and risk being vulnerable as you grow, just as much as knowing when it's time to reshape your armor so that it finally fits you better.
I know I feel happier in my new armor. And reflecting on my years since founding Lumecluster in 2012, these first eight rings mark only the beginning. They represent pillars I've learned through my own experiences of falling, standing back up, and continuing forward. I hope they offer you comfort in dark times and help guide you back to your light within.
Because this world needs both your fighting and loving spirit.
Keep on fighting the good fight,
<3 Melissa
P.S. I had so much fun making the video for the Mending Collection rings. Check it out here.
Join my Dreamer's Circle Newsletter to get early access to magical designs, special gifts & uplifting letters to help you stay inspired on your journey.