This week’s processing group asked the question: “How do we build more accountable lives?” In the past few months, I’ve been inspired by and drawn into this question, using it to reflect on how I act on (and fall short of acting on) my commitments. I’m greatly influenced by community organizer Mia Mingus whose work focuses on transformative justice and disability justice. During Wednesday’s group, I read aloud a recent Instagram post by Mia Mingus, and I want to share ... Read more ...
learning
Q&A with Rasha Diab: Pursuing Peace as Everyday Practice
Since starting this series of interviews, I’ve wanted to highlight Rasha Diab, because she’s one of the most important people in my life. More than a co-author and friend, Rasha is truly an accountability partner: the first person I turn to process experiences, to understand emotions, to grow into new understandings, to repair harm I’ve done, and much more, including to laugh and cry and rage. Rasha has a way of holding potential—visualizing the best self—while staying ... Read more ...
Writing a Commitment Statement
What commitments (deep dedications and priorities) drive everyday living? This question feels essential for everyday living for justice. Too often, though, it remains unanswered or even unarticulated. Without knowing what matters to us deeply—so deeply that it mobilizes, energizes, and guides decision-making—it’s too easy to be on autopilot and to feed the status quo, even when it undermines professed beliefs. To interrupt the autopilot conditioning that preserves ... Read more ...
Career Discernment for Academics: An Interview with Self-Compassionate Professor
I’m grateful to Danielle De La Mare of the Self-Compassionate Professor for inviting me to do an interview that’s become “Episode 19: Career Discernment with Dr. Beth Godbee.” This interview relates both my career discernment story and how I understand career discernment as a lifelong, ongoing process of finding and following the “strong yes.” Here’s what Danielle says about the interview: “Former professor, Dr. Beth Godbee, joins me for the first episode of Season 2! ... Read more ...
Summer 2020 Is Calling for Change, and Processing Groups Can Support Change-Making Reflection and Re-Commitment
Among the many needs of this time, holding spaces—that is, spaces for processing, reflection, somatic awareness, and grounded re-commitment—feel particularly important. With this need in mind, I’m continuing to hold lunchtime processing groups: “Processing the Pandemic with Heart-Head-Hands.” Throughout the spring, these groups felt supportive for me—like I’d learn or remember or release something new with each session. So, this summer, I'm continuing to facilitate ... Read more ...
Resources for Sustaining Momentum and Doing Everyday Racial Justice Work
We’re in a time of urgent and important work for racial justice: lots of action alongside lots of learning and unlearning. I’m deeply grateful for the leadership, actions, and visions offered through the Movement for Black Lives Matters. I’m deeply grateful for people reaching out, being in the streets, organizing actions, holding space, and diving deep into hurt and rage and grief and more. And I’m deeply grateful for being called to this work: both in this moment and ... Read more ...
Unraveling Whiteness: A Call for More Courage
I’m thinking about whiteness—the structure, ideology, and everyday enactments—as I try to process (yet again) how white people weaponize whiteness. My heart is hurting with rage and grief from recent events, explained in these articles from The Root: “‘There’s an African-American Man Threatening My Life’: Karen Calls Police on Black Man for Asking Her to Leash Her Dog” “Outrage in Minneapolis after Black Man Dies in Custody Following Brutal Police Arrest: ‘I Cannot ... Read more ...
7 Strategies for Soothing Aches and Pains During the Pandemic
It’s been weeks since I’ve had acupuncture, and old aches and pains are now resurfacing during the pandemic. In this week’s session of “Processing the Pandemic with Heart-Head-Hands,” I realized I wasn’t alone in having these sensations. Our conversation turned to shared back pains and how we’re supporting our bodies while staying at home and missing bodywork. Because many of us are dealing with similar questions of how to soothe aches and pains, I’m sharing what’s ... Read more ...
Heart-Head-Hands: A Journal Prompt for These Times
On this last day of March, I’m reflecting on what times we’re in. Truly: what times we’re in! I’ve written this sentence no fewer than 30 or 40 times in the past few weeks, but I’m still writing it, as I find myself at a loss for words. We’re certainly in times that are asking a LOT of us: from recognizing structural violence and witnessing wrongdoing to grieving through a full range of emotions and caring for ourselves and others in deep and sustained ways. My ... Read more ...
What Matters to You Most? Career Discernment for YOUR Career Path
Welcome to this page of handouts and resources for the workshop, “What Matters to You Most? Career Discernment for YOUR Career Path,” facilitated by Beth Godbee, Ph.D. (consultant and founder of Heart-Head-Hands.com). This workshop is sponsored by the Graduate School of the University of Minnesota and offers graduate students tools for ongoing career discernment. Workshop Information Tuesday, March 17, 2020 3:00 PM – 4:30 PM CDT Meeting via Zoom (Link Shared with ... Read more ...
