In recent weeks, friends have been asking about my experience with the government shutdown. I’m feeling and experiencing a lot, living in DC, or “America’s lightning rod” (thanks to Katharine Weinmann for this language from a recent comment). Certainly, the city feels on edge and reminds me of the urgent need for resistance, for visioning, and for choosing alternative paths, if we are ever to stop the perpetuation of injustice. I look to everyday life for direction, ... Read more ...
Emotional Literacies
What emotional literacies—embodied awareness, recognition, intelligence, courage, and response-abilities—are needed for everyday living for justice? These posts offer emotional insights through storytelling and investigation into daily life.
My New Year’s Resolution = Self-Love for Countering White Fragility
The days leading up to this new year have been bumpy for me, pushing me to recommit to radical self-love. I’ve had some really tough conversations with family around everyday injustice, and these conversations have reminded me why we need a deep well of emotional literacies for confronting complicity. In the midst of one of these tough conversations—in which I was speaking aloud my embodied responses to white supremacy—I shared that my heart was throbbing, and I ... Read more ...
Parenting Myself 101
Over the past few months, I’ve been learning more about how to care for myself—a sort of self-care that I’m calling “parenting myself 101.” After a career change, cross-county move, and intense internal work “inside the chrysalis,” I’ve recognized the need to put good self-parenting into place. The language of “parenting” has been helpful for me to break from “self-care” focused on relaxation as an escape from everyday life. Rather than experiencing self-care as ... Read more ...
My Heart Hurts on Election Day
Election day morning: I join a line that snakes around my new polling place. Like others, I pull my raincoat tighter against the cold and damp morning air, as kids squirm, jump, and cry around us. After 40+ minutes and only few feet of movement, I step out of line, knowing that if I stay, I’ll miss a hard-to-reschedule doctor’s appointment. I feel frustrated, disappointed, and angry. Election day evening: I re-join the line and, again, wait outdoors in the rain. ... Read more ...
Hurting and Hollering in the Wake of This Week’s Violence
Bombs sent, guns shot. And I cry. Histories hidden, truths buried. And I ache. Hateful laws, escalating harms. And I mourn. White terrorism, everyday violence. And I rage. Black folks targeted. Jewish folks targeted. Native folks targeted. Latinx folks targeted. Migrant folks targeted. Trans folks targeted. Femme folks targeted. Marginalized folks targeted. Targeted, passive voice. Failing to name the assailants. Failing to name white supremacist, ... Read more ...
Blessed Change
What does it mean to turn our lives upside down? How might looking at the world differently inspire new perspectives? What new perspectives are needed to enact more equitable relations? In recent weeks, I’ve been pulling this “Blessed Change” card whenever using Doreen Virtue’s “Marginal Mermaids and Dolphins” oracle deck as part of everyday divination, a meditation practice for grounding and interpreting lived experience. I started pulling divination or oracle ... Read more ...
Inside the Chrysalis, or Experiencing Mess, Mess, and More Mess
It’s not uncommon for me to ride emotional roller-coasters with swings from sweet to sour as I go about my days. More and more, I’ve noticed these swings as I’ve tuned in with my emotions and embodied self through Reiki, yoga, and other contemplative practices. The more I do inner work and the more I embrace mess, the more the messiness of being an always-incomplete, imperfect human inevitability shows up. Still, if I’m being honest with myself, the past few weeks have ... Read more ...
Do It Scared
“Do it scared.” I have Docta E (Dr. Elaine Richardson) to thank for this mantra that I keep close at hand. A couple of years ago, Docta E talked with my “Writing for Social Justice” class about her book PHD to Ph.D.: How Education Saved My Life, and students asked Docta E to share advice for writers. Similar to the advice Luvvie Ajayi shares in the TED talk “Get Comfortable with Being Uncomfortable,” Docta E talked about pushing through fear and showing up for the work ... Read more ...
Against the Tyranny of Positivity
On this day of the lunar eclipse in Aquarius, may we allow ourselves to feel. To feel whatever comes up. To feel deeply, expansively, expressively. To feel a fuller range of emotions than we’re typically taught is appropriate or agreeable or allowable to feel. To grieve for Nia Wilson, for Markeis McGlockton, and for many people whose lives are deemed expendable. To rage against white supremacy, patriarchy, colonization, and oppression. To push past easy, ready, ... Read more ...
The Pain and Pleasure of Moving
My cross-country move from Milwaukee, Wisconsin, to Washington, D.C. has stretched over weeks turned into months. From traveling to find an apartment to now unpacking boxes, I’ve upturned almost every aspect of life. In the past weeks, I’ve sold my furniture, driven hundreds of miles, lost and found items shipped through Amtrak, lived out of suitcases in a temporary residence, and now moved into the apartment-to-be-home (hopefully for some time to come). This moving ... Read more ...
![Heading into #MLKDay2019, here’s a reminder that niceness won’t lead to racial justice: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/jan/16/racial-inequality-niceness-white-people
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From the article by Robin DiAngelo, speaking to white folks: “We can begin by acknowledging ourselves as racial beings with a particular and limited perspective on race. We can attempt to understand the racial realities of people of color through authentic interaction rather than through the media or through unequal relationships ... [Cont.] These efforts require that we continually challenge our own socialization and investments in racism and put what we profess to value into the actual practice of our lives. This takes courage, and niceness without strategic and intentional anti-racist action is not courageous.”
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If you’d like to pursue more courageous and contemplative action, consider joining the 40-day practice I’ll be offering during Lent (beginning March 6th): “Strengthening Emotional Literacies to Counter White Fragility.” I’ll be sharing more information about this e-course soon. For now, if you’d like to know more, feel free to contact with your interest or with questions about the course.
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#mlkweekend #committedtojustice #racialjustice #socialjustice #whitefragility #whitesupremacy #whiteness #bias #emotionalliteracy #courage #love #unlearning #unlearningracism #antiracism #antioppression #feminism #ecourse #community #communitylearning #communityeducation #bloggersofinstagram #notnice #realrelationships #conversation #action #activism](http://scontent-lga3-1.cdninstagram.com/vp/bf389ae911a0451e72c7605cef72b359/5CC4401A/t51.2885-15/e35/c0.6.516.516/49998212_2210762159004274_3044998623218524569_n.jpg?_nc_ht=scontent-lga3-1.cdninstagram.com "Heading into #MLKDay2019, here’s a reminder that niceness won’t lead to racial justice: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/jan/16/racial-inequality-niceness-white-people
…
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From the article by Robin DiAngelo, speaking to white folks: “We can begin by acknowledging ourselves as racial beings with a particular and limited perspective on race. We can attempt to understand the racial realities of people of color through authentic interaction rather than through the media or through unequal relationships ... [Cont.] These efforts require that we continually challenge our own socialization and investments in racism and put what we profess to value into the actual practice of our lives. This takes courage, and niceness without strategic and intentional anti-racist action is not courageous.”
.
If you’d like to pursue more courageous and contemplative action, consider joining the 40-day practice I’ll be offering during Lent (beginning March 6th): “Strengthening Emotional Literacies to Counter White Fragility.” I’ll be sharing more information about this e-course soon. For now, if you’d like to know more, feel free to contact with your interest or with questions about the course.
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#mlkweekend #committedtojustice #racialjustice #socialjustice #whitefragility #whitesupremacy #whiteness #bias #emotionalliteracy #courage #love #unlearning #unlearningracism #antiracism #antioppression #feminism #ecourse #community #communitylearning #communityeducation #bloggersofinstagram #notnice #realrelationships #conversation #action #activism")
