There's what it is. 

Then there's what it seems.

Recently most of my concerns shows up as what it seems like initially.

It's as if my actions seem futile.

It seems like like I'm losing it. 

My body, my business and my life seems like they're in their flop era.

Witnessing the age of the neocolonial internet where those who hold power actively outrightly censor untold stories of the oppressed and when allies share their activism, how shadow banned their accounts can become.

Here's what they don't want you to know!

How to access what it is and has always been:

In my community, folks whom I've been reaching out to are helping me to be able to call out all the ridiculous moments it has been seeming like to get to what it actually is.

Oppressive systems are built to prime and gaslight us to feel ‘what it seems’ like. Like we are fraud, or that nothing we do will help and we should just look away…
 

…when it is actually a healthy sign of your humanity if you have been feeling dysregulated, feeling the rage from the grief of witnessing.

Your felt sense of discomfort, grief and rage is living proof of the practice of unlearning and decolonizing. Indigenous teachings tell us that our bodies carry the knowledge, wisdom, pain and wounds from 7+ generations. Rage is our embodied wisdom. 

 If you feel like you are in the smack middle of your ‘flop era’, 
you are in the right place.

The place where there is:

• collective healing towards liberation

• unlearning and resistance from oppressive systems and practices

• access to what it is and to your lineage's wisdom

• emotional healing instead of spiritual bypassing

• creative ways to validate your experiences

• bravery to share wisdom, advocate and call up reps because you're a badass human who cares.

“We know too well that our freedom is incomplete without the freedom of the Palestinians” 

- Nelson Mandela

The essence of our shared humanity and collective healing is to build a container for one another until all of us are free.

Bearing the weight of the thousands of lost dreams and the lifetimes of deep sorrow that will follow won't be possible if we don't come together, continue to call and email reps for a ceasefire NOW. 

Since reading ‘Rest is Resistence’ by Tricia Hersey in the wintertime, this era has been an opening for new portals for Rest.

 I've been feeling the Abundance!

I’ve been unlearning that treading on the hamster wheel is not how I can continue keeping up, but a response I feel from internalized individualist, capitalist and patriarchal messages I’ve been taught all my life.

And when I compulsively convince myself that I can’t ask for help, that I have to fend for myself to soothe the anxiety around my mental health or business side of things… a big chunk of this burden comes from individualism and historical experiences of scarcity from my family lineage that I have often heard about and witnessed growing up…

When your body has been activated in this state for this long, you may begin to mistaken this as the norm. 

Abundance is pretty new for me, and it's the opposite of capitalism's agenda, so it is supposed to feel ‘different’ and ‘not like myself’.

Being able to recognize that ‘not being able to rest’ has its roots in internalized messages of cultural legacy burdens from racism, capitalism, ableism, materialism, individualism and other -isms has been so helpful.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

One July night when I felt Abundance, I had to capture the moment. Here is what Abundance felt like that night:

”When Abundance is felt in my body, it’s the most satisfying, fulfilling sensation ever. Like the best nap I’ve ever taken. Or watching the prettiest sunset beaming through a landscape.

I feel myself put value and pride in the work I do, even when the workload seems invisible.

Abundance is noticing the space, expansion and openness to receive, being myself, not taking myself so seriously. 

Tempering my body to live a bit more courageously and authentically everyday.

I’m writing down these words immediately because I am still welcoming in Abundance from a culture struggling with scarcity.

I want to learn to embody Abundance.

I want to be Abundance.”

Here is the story of Ubuntu (credits to Abby who introduced this in our monthly peer group).

That’s what culture/community in Abundance can be like. 

And it exists already!

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

I appreciate each and every one of you who resonates with some of these experiences: having complex feelings around slowing down, trying hard to unlearn and smashing the encoded messages around scarcity, capitalism and all the other -isms.

Investing in Relational Justice for our sacred bodies and minds. 
Collective Abundance and Rest is what will sustain us and help us survive this climate.

I often think about the similarities of interweaving in different activism work I am part of.

Below are some thoughts that I've been reflecting on in the world and lens of social justice, environmental justice, animal rights justice, that I adopt and aim to pursue collective liberation for us all:

Disclaimer: below are current self-reflections, learnings from activists and colleagues away from an institution (some days I wish I had to chance to learn from a program in undergrad and other times I’m honoured to learn at my own pace) to work towards transformative justice. FYI, there is no guarantee I will stay with these same ideas in the future: I may shift or grow out of these thoughts and ideas, which is all part of the process! I also don't expect you as the reader to agree with all that I write below. However if you resonate with any of these thoughts, that's awesome! :-)

Punishment and censorship from activism work is totally a thing.

“People get pleasure, validation, and even build community out of punishment.” - Mariame Kaba

I am practicing acknowledging that punishment can be ‘rewarded’ and at times even ‘pleasurable’ in our humanity. And as justice-practicing folks, we are not exempt from this humanness. When someone or something hurts us, we may also want to hurt them back. We are not perfect beings.

Perfectionism and activism don't work well together.

I have been unlearning the harmful effects of perfectionism the long and hard way through first dipping into 'white veganism' when I turned vegan half a decade ago. I was experiencing constant shame and guilt from this space: like judgements if you aren't vegan for the ‘right reasons’ etc. (don't even get me started!).

'Cancel culture’ in the social justice space is something I witness often too. Spending our precious efforts and time judging and hating on others can be exhausting and unsettling.

This work is a WIP. People are all in different stages and come from very different spaces. It usually takes group improvisation and nurturing, not isolating and cornering. If you are hoping to steer away from ‘cancel culture’, check out what transformative justice is all about.

Transformative justice gives us opportunity to “transform” through learning, growing, which can help us even in healing through discussions. I aim to sprinkle in transformative justice praxis in different spaces I enter. Join me if you're up for this challenge too!

Failures helps us grow! Failures provide movement!

It’s not always your role to educate those who aren't in the collective.

You don’t have to care about opinions from voices that are not in the collective. I experience exhaustion and insecurity around spaces dominated by white fragility, folks who shame and punish others for making mistakes and the like. Give yourself the permission to distance and disengage so you can spend your energy in spaces that make you feel empowered and sustained.

Deepa Iyer’s work on The Social Change Ecosystem Map helped me find that I don’t have to do and be everything; that I can take on roles for social change that sustains my energy while doing important, charged work.

Where does your passion lie?

My activism work is currently leaning towards healing justice work, connecting with folks who are hearing about these ideas for the first time (in their ‘awakening’ stage or contemplating on pursuing this kind of practice). I imagine adopting play, creativity, art into spaces I enter. I hope to create digestible content for those who are thinking of coming closer and maybe joining this community!

"Hope is a discipline” - Mariame Kaba

Hope in this context is not an emotion or something we hold onto. Hope is something we do. Hope sustains us in this work. Your role no matter how ‘small’ it seems is valuable. Instead of narrowing in on the dread of the current system and the state of the world, I am practicing on choosing to commit to something else that is possible.

Accountability in community.

There is deep yearning for a space that gets me and these values I care about. That provides me with a vision of where we can go. I have been reading and reaching to books, articles, podcasts by transformative justice advocates and learning from the roots, from BIPOC folks, from stories, from family, searching for communal care that have been passed down and ideas on liberation.

I am currently helping out on a really exciting project with a fellow therapist friend. ROJ will be an offering for justice-oriented practitioners (students, therapists, coaches, social workers, HR or DEI workers, SJ activists etc.) or those who are curious in adopting justice into their practice. If you are in need of an accountability community when pursuing collective liberation and would like to unlearn together, ROJ may be the community for you!

PS. I will be posting on @reflectingonjustice on IG, you are welcome to follow us if you are interested!

I don't know about you, but I've been searching and dreaming for a space like this for quite awhile now. I can’t wait to share the launch with you folks in the near future!

Healing and activism work is and will always be interwoven.

The symbiotic relationship of stories, emotions, feels that oscillate in and out of the humans we get the chance to witness and connect with. Collective healing and mutual aid can shift difficult and unbearable moments.