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Eating for Justice? Why Explore Relationships with Food

Filed Under: Everyday Feminism, Racial Justice, Why Vegan? By Beth Godbee January 23, 2020 Leave a Comment

Relationships with food are tricky at all times of year, but this is especially the case in January. From the pressures of new year resolutions to weight-loss goals and fitness challenges, January highlights the swing from decadent December eating to body-shaming that’s associated with “getting in shape.” Or, in the words of a recent article by Zoe Fenson: “January is the month of body shaming. I’m tuning out.”

In recent years, January has also been fashioned as “Veganuary,” which has tied vegan eating with the body-shaming, fat phobia, and the weight loss goals of January. This conflation marginalizes bodies not associated with the “mythical norm,” centers whiteness in veganism, and undercuts the potential of veganism to counter injustice. (And let me add that of the many reasons I’m vegan, weight loss hasn’t and won’t make the list.)

So, this January—within this messy context—let’s talk about our relationships with food.

This ad shares the webinar’s name “A Conversation about Our Relationship s with Food,” the date “Tuesday, January 28th at 8pm EST,” and the websiteaddress “Heart-Head-Hands.com.” Colorful foods are arranged along the bottom, and the background shows light gray wooden planks.

Upcoming Webinar: A Conversation about Our Relationships with Food

Next week (January 28th) I’m offering a new webinar: “A Conversation about Our Relationships with Food.”

The goal is to use contemplative practices and freewriting to ground and guide a conversation about our relationships with food. During the hour-long webinar, we’ll prioritize storytelling, reflect on lived experiences, and set intentions.

Instead of providing answers, we’ll together explore a series of questions:

  • How do we describe and understand our relationships with food?
  • What relationships do we each want to cultivate? And why?
  • What brings us closer to “right relationship” with food and all that food is connected with, including humans, non-human animals, and the earth?
  • What relationships support “everyday living for justice”?

What Guides This Conversation about Food?

Though many sources are influencing my thinking and desire for this conversation, here are three key influences:

1. I feel especially energized by Robin Wall Kimmerer’s Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants, which shares the idea of the honorable harvest as a form of ethical reciprocity. Here’s an introduction to the honorable harvest explained by Kimmerer:

2. I continue to learn from books like Veganism of Color: Decentering Whiteness in Human and NonHuman Liberation (edited by Julia Feliz Brueck) and Sistah Vegan: Black Female Vegans Speak on Food, Identity, Health, and Society (edited by A. Breeze Harper) and from films like The Invisible Vegan (directed by Jasmine and Kenny Leyva). Check out this trailer for the film, which gets into historical, social, cultural, economic, and structural issues around eating:

3. My own relationship with food includes struggles with sugar, work with naturopaths and acupunturists, and coming to veganism through ecofeminism and antiracism. My values for eating include countering perfectionism, relating with food as nourishment, and inquiring into my body’s signals with greater curiosity and mindfulness.

This work, therefore, involves interrupting internalized sexism and whiteness. And it means that relationships with food are also about embodied experiences in the world, constructed through settler-colonialism, white supremacy, heteropatriarchy, capitalism, and interlocking oppressions.

How Will I Keep Exploring My Relationship with Food?

Beyond this webinar, I’m planning to read the book Racial Ecologies (edited by LeiLani Nishime and Kim Hester Williams); to learn more about the history and continued harms of sugar; and to invest in daily practices like drinking veggie broth and composting—practices likely to support a more life-giving relationship with food.

I’ll keep asking the questions that guide the upcoming webinar toward working to establish a more honest, ethical, and consistent relationship with food. Knowing that it’s not possible to eliminate harm, I’m asking: “How can I minimize harm in this moment, with each food choice?”

And, truly, I’d love to be in conversation with you about our relationships with food and how eating can interrupt injustice and instead be part of everyday living for justice.

—
This post is written by
Beth Godbee, Ph.D. for Heart-Head-Hands.com. For related posts, you might be interested in the series “why vegan?” and in simple vegan + gluten-free recipes. You can also register for the webinar here.

Become a subscriber via Patreon to receive ongoing support for your efforts of striving to live for justice (social, racial, and environmental justice). And consider subscribing to the newsletter and liking this blog on FB. Thanks!

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Tagged with: activism, commitments, community care, conversation, countering perfectionism, environmental justice, gluten-free, habits, healing, learning, mindful eating, racial justice, reading, self-care, social justice, systemic oppression, vegan

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Updates to the new offering “Pathways Through Bu Updates to the new offering “Pathways Through Burnout: A Cohort Experience”:

For the past year, Candace and I have been listening to requests for an offering around burnout (or, more precisely, being burned up), and we launched a new cohort experience August 1st. We are deeply grateful for the range of responses we’ve received since then, and we’ve been prioritizing time to listen and discern what people want and need.

Through a lot of conversation and reflection, we’ve decided to slow down further and to reshape the offering. 

We’ll continue offering interactive workshops on practices for navigating burnout—with new dates announced for November 3rd and December 15th (and more to come in 2024). 

Starting in January, we’ll hold a few one-day retreats with time for art, play, contemplative practice, conversation, and coaching. We hope the retreat will feel like something that’s possible now (with so many pushes and pulls on time and attention).

All of this is leading to a 12-week version of the cohort experience: a season of connection to match a season in life. We’ll reopen applications in the spring and hope that a small group forms well ahead of our start date in September 2024.

The details of all of these experiences—and an invitation to join the workshops in Nov and Dec—are shared online here: https://heart-head-hands.com/pathways-through-burnout/ 
✨✨link in bio✨✨

And we continue to appreciate all sorts of feedback (questions, suggestions, affirmations), so please reach out anytime. <3

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With @dr._candace_epps_robertson_ #burnout #update #practice #contemplative #meditation #writing #art #retreat
I am slow to edit and share photos, but I want to I am slow to edit and share photos, but I want to share these from the Beyond Granite public art exhibit that just left the National Mall here in DC. I wish this installation was staying long-term. How I struggle with visiting the Mall in the best of conditions. And how these pieces helped me appreciate what could instead be done in this space. 

Also, Jonathan and I got really lucky that the night we visited was the most spectacular sunset! Scroll through for photos of how "America's Playground" appears against an orange sky (no filter).
In case you missed it, here again is the new inter In case you missed it, here again is the new interview with Candace Epps-Robertson @dr._candace_epps_robertson_ :
https://heart-head-hands.com/qa-with-candace-epps-robertson/
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This photo shows Candace at a BTS concert, Permission To Dance LA, December 2021.
 
Among the wide-ranging subjects Candace addresses are her experience with #BTSARMY fandom and her current work with museums.
 
Read to the end, where Candace talks about the importance of listening for pursing justice. :-)
New blog post (this one has been a long time comin New blog post (this one has been a long time coming)!
 
It’s an interview with Candace Epps-Robertson -- “On Seasons of Life, Writing, and Career” -- https://heart-head-hands.com/qa-with-candace-epps-robertson/
✨✨link in bio✨✨
@dr._candace_epps_robertson_ 
 
I am incredibly excited about this interview because Candace speaks to a wide range and depth of curiosities. Her related work ranges from reflecting on her journey as part of the BTS global fandom ARMY to curating museum exhibits to teaching writing with visual art and music to caring holistically for ourselves as writers and to navigating burnout. Candace describes the underlying motivations—the deep why—behind the range of questions she asks about social justice, cultural rhetorics, literacy, and writing. It’s clear that this range speaks to the importance of everyday, integrated living for justice: for striving toward justice in all ways of showing up and being in the world—relating, listening, and living.
 
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If you (like me) feel like you can't keep up with If you (like me) feel like you can't keep up with the posted speed, consider joining this Saturday's writing retreat. There will be guided meditations, time to connect in small-group and one-with-one, and time to write or journal or create on your own. Retreats are certainly one way to claim "me time."

Here's the link (with multiple registration options): https://heart-head-hands.com/product/writing-retreats/
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About Beth Godbee

I'm an educator and former writing studies professor who believes our fully embodied selves matter in the world. We can’t just think our way out of the incredible injustices, dehumanization, violence, and wrongdoing that characterize everyday life. We must feel and act, too. [Pronouns: she/her.] Read more ...

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