when clients try to shame you for asserting your price or terms

note: this post is directly pulled from my 7/16/21 email newsletter without edits. if you would like to receive my weekly note in your inbox along with additional sections and features not included here, you can join my email community.

in my view, shame is most often— if not always— a manipulation tool we’ve inherited from our oppressors. as a tactic, it functions to defer our own weight onto others when we see no other option, when we know no other way; so out of desperation, we adopt a way that is reckless, impulsive, and uncompassionate. a reflection on the various ways we employ and experience shame is a note for another day, though. in the meantime, holler at brené brown, whose research also happens to indicate that shame is an ineffective tool for long term change.

today, i want to continue the conversation from last time on honoring our contributions and being unabashed in naming our price. this time from the perspective of when people try to shame you for stating your price or outlining your terms because they think it’s too much or that you don’t deserve it.

for those of you who may be experimenting with asking for more at work or asserting any variety of your needs and wants in life, your journey may well include people who inadvertently project their limitations onto you in interest of “teaching” or “protecting” you. these people may include friends, family members, clients, colleagues, acquaintances, public figures, teachers. they may want to instruct you on:

• the extent of your personal worth

• the ceiling of your work’s value

• what you should or should not ask for

• what you are and are not ready for

• where you should be more “humble”

• where you should expect less

• where you should put your head down and be grateful

• where you should be silent

• where you should limit your needs and wants

while often well intentioned and perhaps even holding grains of truth, these are not assessments others get to make for us. and to be real, a lot of workplace and industry norms are toxic as fuck. so bye.

yes, be actual humble. yes, don’t be an entitled ass. yes, some things take time and experience.

but also, i’ll take my standards without shame, thank you. and— don’t prescribe your reality onto mine.

then! then there are the people who are somehow threatened by you standing in your worth— often subconsciously. and they will knowingly or unknowingly be very mean as a result.

what follows are four vignettes from across my ten years as a photographer when people tried to shame me for asserting my price or terms.

2009. the party promoter friend.

within the first year of me shooting, i became a regular photographer for a friend’s party. after successfully shooting their first two or three parties for free or no more than $50 (my memory isn’t the best), i had a meeting with him to discuss making me the party’s resident photographer and to negotiate a new fee.

when i stated my price, which i felt was reasonable— probably something like $200-300 for four or five hours of shooting— my friend scoffed. he said they could get a photographer from the fader magazine to shoot the party for free or very little.

i honestly can’t remember if i agreed to his shit price and if i kept shooting the party or not. but i do remember that i smelled the manipulation from a mile away; if he loved the fader photographer so much, why wasn’t he talking to them instead? i also knew that he was name dropping a photographer from a popular magazine in attempts to shame a newbie photographer like me who he thought shouldn’t have dared to ask for more than a few more pennies.

i remember leaving that meeting thinking less of that friend instead of myself. 

2012. the musician.

i was elated when someone whose music i loved happened to catch wind of my photography and said he wanted to work together one day. a couple years later, he came to my town to shoot with me. because he didn’t have a financial budget, we agreed on a barter situation with somewhat of an open-ended timeline for his part.

when something like a year passed and we hadn’t had as much as a follow-up meeting to discuss his end of the barter (after a few attempts on my end), i reached out to ask about his planned timeline to publish the photos as the project he initially wanted to use them for kept getting delayed. since we hadn’t made traction on completing our exchange, i was hoping to at least be able to use the images in my portfolio sooner than later and emailed to ask what he thought about that.

after radio silence from him for several months and assuming i’d been brushed off, i emailed him again to let him know that i’d be publishing a few of the photos to my website. while understandable that he was upset about me making a unilateral decision about the photos, he took his frustration as an opportunity to tell me how long he’d been in business and that i didn’t have the resume to dictate the terms of an agreement. more than anything, this felt like a hollow, cheap blow.

he also made a point to offer character assessments about me and tell me that he ‘didn’t like me anyway.’ kind of like when a child gets mad and then tells the other person, “well, you’re ugly!”

regardless of any merits his side of the story may have held, i remember being so put off by the idea that one has to have a certain kind of resume or seniority in order to have a right to assert their standards, terms, or needs. it’s antiquated bullshit that i’ll never get with.

my work was good enough to take his photo but my resume wasn’t good enough to assert what i wanted? does not compute.

2017. the girl boss startup founder.

i met this brilliant lady founder at a women’s community space; she looked at my work on her phone on the spot and was immediately impressed; making a point to emphasize how picky she was, her history in advertising, and how exceptional my work was. i appreciated being seen in that way and felt we had really established a mutual sense of respect and good will. so when she later suggested we shoot her new campaign together, i was all about it.

early in our meeting, it became quite clear that she didn’t have much of a budget. and because i was such a fan of her, her brand, and her creative direction, i was down to do the shoot as a portfolio project and to help build a relationship with her.

i told her to not worry about budget and to just walk me through the parameters of the project. throughout, she kept trying to press me about price and i kept telling her that even if we did the shoot for free or at cost, i’d be down— i just wanted to build and collaborate.

finally, when she kept pushing, i relented. i told her that my actual fee would be in the tens of thousands of dollars, but that i could give her some sort of stipend rate if she was insisting on paying me something. i probably gave her a figure anywhere from $1000-5000.

just like my friend in 2009, she scoffed and said something like, “i have a photographer who’s shot for vogue do my campaigns for $500.” never mind that vogue is known to rarely pay their photographers or often pays shit when they do. also, when i researched later, i came to find that said photographer shot for teen vogue (which is an incredible publication, but that’s besides the point here).

this woman went out of her way to try and make me feel ashamed for naming a heavily discounted rate that she repeatedly insisted i offer. after i’d already said i’d shoot for free. what are people— really? don’t take the bait, bb’s! sometimes people who you think should know better, people you think are comrades, people you look up to— are also supremely basic.

2019. the artist.

this one was avoidable and definitely a lesson for me. a client wanted some portraits for an upcoming project. simple enough. but their usage needs for the photos were new for me and required that i research the appropriate licensing fees. because the client had limited information available on some usage parameters i’d requested, it became harder to come up with my fee and delayed my pricing process.

in the meantime, because i was really excited about this person and was really rooting for their work, i began planning conversations about the shoot with them in good faith— before finalizing the price. i also gave them much more of my time than i normally would have because i felt a certain kinship with this person and really wanted to support them.

where i really messed up is when i agreed to schedule the shoot without having finalized the price. i made clear over the phone and also in writing that i’d take a deposit to cover the shoot time and then be in touch about the per image licensing fee asap. they agreed.

because i wanted to— i took my time with the shoot (more than they’d paid for), offered them food, and even chatted with them in my home for a couple hours after the shoot.

when i ultimately sent over my per image licensing rates, they were appalled and told me they’d already paid in full. they informed me they’d spoken with a lawyer friend and seemed to be threatening legal action. somewhere in there was also a phone conversation where they basically yelled at me and insulted me. and, naturally, the legal information they obtained about copyright was false— photography copyright law is much more nuanced than people, including lawyers, realize.

nonetheless, they decided to use their working understanding of copyright to slight my work—insinuating that a photo was just a photo and not actually art. and that therefore i didn’t have an artist’s rights over my own work. cute.

the way this person went from 0-100 felt like a trauma response related to something much deeper. something that had nothing to do with me. so i decided that de-escalation and removing myself from the situation as swiftly as possible was the wisest course of action. so that’s what i did. i think i might have even refunded them their money because i wanted a clean break from their energy.

my lesson: never start on a project before fully confirming the rate and terms. even if you think you’re friendly.

the takeaway.

interesting to note is that each of these people held at least one, if not several marginalized identities— some of which we shared— and yet still felt compelled to try and knock me down a couple notches. our internalized oppression and trauma responses are really something, y’all.

even though these folks tried their best to pull me down, i never let their manipulations convince me that my work was worth less.  despite being someone who often questions myself, i tend to hold the line when i’m in business mode. i don’t fully know why, but it is what it is. maybe it’s an exercise in trying to remind myself that i am worthy, even if i don’t always believe it— an attempt to work from the outside in.

these instances, instead of being about me, are about the limited imaginations and/or insecurities of others. they illustrate how people will sometimes resort to consciously or unconsciously causing harm to others in order to preserve their own egos and maintain a certain sense of security.

people can have a hard time seeing others win in ways they deep down question they ever could; the audacity to stand in your worth can feel like an affront, so they project their shame and unresolved sense of inadequacy onto you.

some people can only feel up when others are down, as they say.

“how dare this rookie make demands when i never did? when my idols and mentors never did?”

that’s on them— not you.

their shame is not yours. cancel that noise.

asking is the first rule of negotiation: women, femmes, creatives, and people of color need to do it better.

NOTE: this post is directly pulled from my 7/1/21 email newsletter without edits. if you would like to receive my weekly note in your inbox along with additional sections and features not included here, you can join my email community.

a couple weeks ago, i spoke on holisticism’s money & spirituality panel for their summer solstice festival. while i don’t have the most to say about the relationship between money and spirituality, i can sometimes have a lot to say about the variety of ways that creatives, women, and femmes— particularly those of color— grossly undervalue themselves. and that hits me on a spiritual level.

as a creative who is fortunate enough to have some solid business skills, witnessing how we often play ourselves and get played at work tends to bring up a lot for me. so let’s go ahead and get this part clear up front: unabashedly claiming your space and worth in this world, including at work, is actually spiritual as hell. and that’s what we’re touching on today— specifically from the perspectives of negotiation and monies.

i shared on the panel that while accessible pricing is one important mindful money consideration, so is making sure that overall you’re getting paid well for the value you offer— and not underestimating what that might be worth in dollars. if you don’t assert your worth, no one else will do it for you. as i first learned in business school and later confirmed as an entrepreneur who hires other creatives, women and femmes often settle for way too less, way too often. add to that if you’re a person of color? that “play small” program, which itself is a machination of systemic oppression, is a tough ride.

but we're not going to hold onto that shit. we are throwing that shit in the trash and taking back our agency wherever we can, the best we can. please and thank you.

after observing how my college negotiations class interacted with each other, i developed a hunch that women negotiated differently than men and decided to write my class paper on the topic. come to find out, there was a whole ass book about it called women don’t ask. the essential premise is that women are generally conditioned to be agreeable, deferential, polite, unburdensome, etc— and for that reason, women often don’t even think to ask for what they want.

the first rule of negotiation? ask. if you don’t ask, you can almost count on not receiving what you’re looking for. the bigger find: you’d be surprised how often simply asking results in you getting what you want— or at least something close to it. though the book is fairly redundant, i recommend the read if you feel like you need a pep talk to build up your courage to ask for what you want and need in any area of life. and with that, here’s a personal anecdote to inspire you to ask for what you deserve more often:

a couple years ago, i was asked by a women’s community space to host a 5-6 hour event meant to celebrate the season premiere of a major network tv show. i was also to devise and lead a mini workshop and introduce a big name keynote speaker for the event. there would be food and drinks and sound baths, too— the works. they offered me $500.

understanding the scope of the event, that there was a major brand partner and speaker involved, and various frills to make the event fancy, i knew there had to be more money involved. given that they reached out to me last minute, i knew there was a possibility they had potentially tried to go for a more well known host than me and ran out of budget to afford them. i also knew they probably thought that the average person would be thrilled at the opportunity alone and that the $500 would just feel like icing on the cake. 

even though i hadn’t done a gig quite like this before, i knew i’d do it well and used my general sense of hourly rates across industry to come up with a figure. an aside: as someone who works across functions and industries, i’ve found that to a certain degree, any kind of high quality skilled work when you’re a contractor or solopreneur can be roughly distilled to a broad median hourly rate; offhand, i’d put that range at $200-1000/hr. you can also use these figures as a consideration when calculating a flat rate or any kind of rate. so, straight-faced, i sent them an email countering with $3000. they came back and offered me $2500— five times the initial rate.

though such a stark jump in rate is rare for me, this was not the first or last time i received a multiple of what i’d initially been offered after simply asking. i’m talking 2x and 3x. on the smaller but still very significant side, after politely countering with a higher fee range, i recently received about 40% above the initial client offer for a project i’m currently amidst. and for y’all in college, i took an initial $15/hr offer for a summer internship and made it a $30/hr offer after demonstrating my case for why i thought my credentials and experience warranted a higher rate. in the end, undergrad me ended up beating out MBA students from prestigious institutions for the gig, too.

it’s important to note that sometimes our ask needs to come with some client education; for example, a thoughtful explanation of everything you’re offering and pulling back the curtain on all that goes into your work can often be helpful. but for that hosting gig i shared about, i didn’t need to explain— the client probably knew they were being cheap and they also knew i’d been a great facilitator for other events in their space.

the morals of this story:

• trust that many clients and employers will try to play you on rates and wages because they’ve gotten away with it many times over with other folks who didn’t know what they can and should be paid.

• if you’re a person of a marginalized identity of any sort, it’s often likely that at least some sort of implicit bias is going to come into play with what kind of offer you get. the same applies if you’re working with private clients who may also be subconsciously primed to believe your work is worth less (even if the conscious part of them totally doesn’t believe that!). i say: let’s un-prime ‘em and recondition folks who have the means to, to pay us better.

• allow yourself to imagine something bigger and/or better for yourself, even if it feels foreign or awkward. step outside of yourself and play a role if you need to. pretend your work and the value it offers were ascribed to a friend; witness the exquisite magic of that work and really meditate on the time, effort, and wisdom that was required to bring that work forth. how much could or should that friend (that is you!) charge?

• don’t believe whack ass quotes as a reflection of what your work is worth; *you* know the real answer here. even though it can sometimes take time to get paid what you believe you deserve, don’t let anyone decide that amount for you.

• don’t be afraid to ask! don’t be afraid to be brazen! particularly when you feel you have a well reasoned rationale and when that big ass number feels right to your spirit and settles nicely in your gut.

i hope you’ve found some medicine here. <3

re-emergence anxiety

NOTE: this post is directly pulled from my 6/10/21 and 6/16/21 email newsletters with light edits. if you would like to receive my weekly note in your inbox along with additional sections and features not included here, you can join my email community.

re-emergence anxiety, part one.

we are on the cusp of a great post-vax re-emergence. and there are thoughts. many, many thoughts.

in a recent instagram survey i held, 74% of people reported initially feeling relief (vs. panic) when forced to slow down because of the pandemic. i think: we’ve been waiting to catch up to ourselves. and i believe this marks one reason why re-emergence feels so scary: we don’t want to give up our relative peace. and oh, how i relate.

i find myself experiencing two kinds of re-emergence right now— getting back on social media after experiencing the majority of this last post-pandemic year off it, and for the first time in a long time, considering some sort of existence that includes in person hangs and life (once i finish my vaccinations). to note, i’ve been extra strict about quarantining so i haven’t hung out with any friends. at all. aside from a few brief occasions where a friend came to literally *just* pick up or drop off something at my house, i haven’t even laid eyes on a friend in the flesh. what a world.

add to that that i’ve been unusually quiet and inward for most of the last year— on and offline.

for one, i haven’t really been working, which meant even less people and “regular life” exposure. many of you may not know this, but until pandemic, my main gig for ten years was as a photographer. the pandemic effectively laid me off from that work. and i got the message: to dive deeper into other work i’d been wanting to explore more for some years now.

and with that transition came the invitation for some deep healing and big life changes. to move forward healthfully and with integrity, i knew i would require lots of quiet and lots of space. i had to turn off the barrage of inputs and pause my reflexive habituations. and frankly, i’d been meaning to take a break from my often toxic and addictive relationship with social media for a minute. this whole multifaceted life overhaul? i am still very, very much in it. yep, even a year later. no overnight success stories over here.

so i went silent. even though i knew the implications that being MIA online could have on my social health and thus my mental health to a degree— especially during a pandemic. but the mental health impacts of staying on social were wearing on me more. above all, spaciousness and silence were what i needed most.

as expected, without the convenient reminders that i existed, people generally stopped checking for me— clients, acquaintances, friends. it was a weird and sometimes shitty feeling to feel absolutely irrelevant and near forgotten; did i matter if i wasn’t producing, wasn’t visible? it’s almost as if my existence itself had fallen victim to “pics or didn’t happen.”

in a way, i felt like because i stopped “happening” for the world and my community, i’d stopped existing for them. my sense of social invisibility seemed exacerbated tenfold by the fact that i chose to be offline during a time of physical isolation. and the isolation really, really got to me at times— especially in a world where our only connection had become the internet.

i know my decision would be unbearable for many to go through with. it sounds almost unfathomable to self-select becoming so isolated during the pandemic. but having overdone it with the “lone wolf” isolationist identity over the years, aloneness is not necessarily new for me. and yet still, that doesn’t mean i didn’t experience crippling loneliness at times. the kind that put me into some of my darkest periods. the kind where i marvel that i made it out.

even so, this aloneness was different than that which i’ve previously self-imposed due to mental health, friendship traumas, insecurities, dark nights of the soul, and social anxieties.

this was aloneness with true quiet. aloneness without mundane-yet-soul-crushing internet noise and largely junk food social media “connection.” an aloneness centered on and enriched by intentionality, carefully curated inner and outer space, mindful awareness, and fluid pace. in many ways, i didn’t want to let this ecosystem i’d created for myself go.

but then, you know: work. money. and the pockets of beautiful connection you do sometimes find on the internet.

i knew i was eventually going to come back. generally because i knew that social was the primary way most folks besides my closest friends were going to remember i existed. so while part of me enjoyed the simplicity of an anonymous life, another part of me wanted to be remembered. and though the idea of emerging from my cocoon overwhelmed me considerably, i wanted to be in mutual exchange. also, kind of depressingly, i recognized that by not keeping up with my closer friends on social, i was missing out on certain parts of their lives.

although a part of me wanted to take my perceived forgottenness personally, i recognize that in the age of the internet, we all “know” far too many people on and offline— more than our brains can actually hold; it’s unrealistic to keep track of everyone.

truth be told, for years i’ve made lists of my real-life friends and acquaintances to help me remember who i want to stay connected with most. and so when i inevitably got caught up in whatever flurry of life i’d created for myself, i don’t absentmindedly forget who matters to me (also because my memory seriously challenges me sometimes). i realize i’m extra, though, and that people are not out here making lists so they can remember me. i also understand that scientifically, people can hold only so many social contacts in their brains at a time. so, unfortunately, becoming some version of forgotten is a byproduct of the passively hyper-connected world we live in.

despite knowing this, the perceived erasure of my existence and relevance was still a bizarre phenomenon, and really made me think about the commodification of our humanity via the capitalistic constructs we are basically forced to exist in. i found myself often revisiting existential questions like these and these, with no real answers. i also thought a lot about the beauty of quietude, slowness, true presence— and how much we’ve become disconnected from these values as a culture. 

so the question begs itself: what is balance inside of the technological environments (read: cages) we inhabit? does it even exist?

in certain ways, choice feels starker— with more perceived trade-offs and a greater sense of impossibility and powerlessness; to do any one thing might mean certain significant losses in other areas:

to be on social and be addicted or to not be on social, feel more peace, and be forgotten?

to produce regular content and feel like you’re on a hamster wheel or to only follow you’re purest, often infrequent, creative impulses and be deemed irrelevant?

to be boundaryless, so not to lose out on available connection or to create tech boundaries only to be excluded, judged, and/or dismissed?

on a level, our desire for true connection is held captive by our own tech-degraded connection habits— mine, yours, theirs; it’s a vicious cycle that keeps most of us miserable to some degree. thankfully, our complicity also means that we have space to exercise some agency.

i think a big question for this time is: how do we recognize tech for the amazing tool it is while also taking an unflinching look at the ways it is essentially devolving and dehumanizing us?

from these acknowledgments, i believe, must arise a way and will to collectively commit to more intentional connection and gathering— 1:1, in small groups, in larger groups— on and offline.

even if we move inch by inch, small friend pod by small friend pod, community by community— we must radically commit to changing the collective agreements we’ve made in order to overcome the overwhelming sense of isolation and loneliness we feel; we must invest in connection, in community, in exchange, in time, in energy, in intentionality. we must prioritize this and put in the work. lest we become forever beholden to the puppeteering of an increasingly sophisticated and rapturous autopilot system bolstered by our technological proclivities that are sure to strip us bare until we’ve become completely undone.

a mouthful. but for real.

also: now might be a good time to remind you to take what resonates and leave the rest. i haz strong tech feelings. in the words of the great monica: don’t take it personal. baby-baby-baby-baby-baby, don’t take it personal. 

anyhoo. such inquiry feels particularly salient as we land upon this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to rediscover connection and redefine what it means to be in relationship, in community, and in society;

might we be able to build something new for and with each other as we re-emerge? might we resolve to hold onto the slowness, intentionality, and mindfulness we may have deepened during this time? bring it into this new world as an offering, a gift, a portal? might we resist the urge to get swept back up? i very much hope so.

reflections like those from my friend allison give me faith that there are others out there who really hope so, too. i imagine many of you are those people.

but how will we do this when the typical breakneck speed of life will ruthlessly try to pull us right back into the dizzying fold that we know so well? again, we try. we really, really try. for those of us who want a different way, we will create it with unwavering focus and commitment to meaningful space and connection, loving mirroring in our relationships, and community accountability.

you down?

re-emergence anxiety, part two.

despite the challenges being offline posed for me, i am still so glad i did it. really, a good part of me wishes i could just stay offline. i gained so much in this time: way less time with my phone, less worrying about what other people were doing or thinking, less stressing about who i needed to be, less rushing, more finding my own peace and center, more walks, more meditation, more presence, more ease, more simple joys, and way more cultivation of self-compassion. in many ways, my time away was exhilarating and freeing— it gave me beautiful, brilliant S P A C E. it gave me back intentional choice.

a couple weeks into me being back on social, i suddenly began receiving work inquires, a few more texts than usual, and requests to catch up. but the way my pandemic walden period has fucked up my ability to keep up with communications?! yeah. i have never been shittier with email and text and calls and catching up with people in my life. 

while i am so grateful for the increased connection and opportunities, personally and professionally, i also became overwhelmed as fuck. how to reintegrate myriad functions and connections and tasks back into my life? how to manage all my “stuff” that came back up from being out in the (online) world again? i got so overwhelmed, so anxious, that my eye started twitching, my heart would race at times, and at one point i felt so much nervous/anxious tension that my body was on the verge of physically shaking. i could feel the shaking inside my body. it’s like i was about to erupt.

i’ve since calmed down notably-ish but still have my work cut out for me. the question for me now has become one of integration: what are the ways i can bridge my quiet world with my connected world? in a way that is uncompromising of my peace?

so, together with last week’s note, that’s the social media part. one part. one not-so-small part of this whole question on what it means for me— and for us— to re-emerge. then there’s the whole in person thing. that. how do we do that?

didn’t you know i was already socially awkward *before* the pandemic?

like, i might not know how to >>>talk<<< when i see you.

i might laugh at the wrong things.

i might start crying.

i might just stare for a really, really long time.

i might be even more intense and weird than i already was.

i might change what i want in the next five minutes. actually, right now. i've changed my mind right now.

i might just turn my ass around and go right back home.

but also, maybe: can i just hug you for an hour?

add to awkwardness that for many of us, our run-of-the-mill social fears and anxieties are on twelve:

• fear of getting hurt again

• fear of rejection

• fear of being judged

• fear of vulnerability

• fear of getting it wrong

• fear of being unworthy

• fear of being uninteresting

• fear of not truly being seen

• fear of abandonment

• fear of not being held as you are

• fear of codependency

• fear of betrayal

• fear of being misunderstood

• fear of discomfort

• fear of unpredictability and lack of control

• fear of things not working out or falling apart

• fear of not having the space and boundaries you’ll need

• fear of not knowing how and where you fit in anymore

it. is. a lot. but we are not alone. i’ll have you know that this list was effectively written by a few dozen actual humans— shout out to my instagram community! so if you feel any of that? they feel you, too. and so do i. being in this re-emergence together— honestly, meaningfully— that is also connectedness.

further respite: the way the pandemic has invited the queering of spaces— making them more fluid, intersectional, and blurred. think of restaurants spilling out into the streets, facetiming in your pajamas with new friends and coworkers alike (deemed “inappropriate intimacy” before), and more upfront candor on dating apps becoming normalized; we are mashing shit up, breaking norms, fucking up taboos. queered space allows us a novel freedom to explore more courageous intimacy and relational creativity. it will probably give us more space to be awkward and human, too.

another silver lining of this time comes in the form of increased perspective and gratitude for everything we took for granted before; we now get to bring that presence to all we’ve realized we appreciate and who we’ve realized we appreciate; turns out acquaintances, bodega guys, coworkers, and passing strangers mean more to us than we thought.

greater presence to the gift of simply being alive and the beauty of the mundane is pretty sweet, too; when other people or i myself felt unavailable, i tried better to immerse myself in the aliveness that surrounds me and emanates from within me at all times; i brushed through the low hanging leaves on trees and made friends with them. i laughed at baby lizards. marveled at the faint aromas of flowers in the evening. 

i already mentioned not seeing any friends. but i didn’t tell you that aside from my neighborhood walks, i also hadn’t been going out at all. so a few months ago when i had to go to the apple store to get my computer repaired, i decided to bask in more mundanity: to walk around the outdoor shopping area and get a coffee. i swear to you everything was basically in technicolor and like mary poppins. i was so glad to see life, to see people, to talk to someone, to have a treat outside of my house. i was floating.

came back home elated and ready to take on the world. because of the genius bar and some cold brew. y’all. some version of this joy can be life most days— when we are present and in gratitude. that’s what i’m trying to do, where i’m trying to be.

and that loneliness we’ve been feeling? it’s actually nothing new. we’ve just been feeling it worse and have had the time to pay attention. loneliness is a pre-covid epidemic (read: public health concern). and it has become an issue so great, that out of all health topics one could choose to write about, united states surgeon general dr. vivek murthy has dedicated an entire book to loneliness and the significance of meaningful social connection. for those unfamiliar or curious for more, i’ve included a podcast episode with dr. murthy in the “on my radar” section below. definitely a top recommendation of the week.

so the other week, i was like: “blergh, disconnection.” and out of frustration with our past and present social norms, took to instagram to ask folks how they felt about connection. turned out 81% of people who reported wanting more connection in their lives also felt afraid or anxious about connecting.

in another very professional survey i did, 66% of respondents said they felt freaked out about re-acclimatizing to some sort of “regular-ish” life in a post-vax world, while the remainder reported feeling excited. more than half of these same folks felt some mix of freaked out and excited. sounds about right. we want connection, we like connection, and at the same time: many of us have lots of feelings about connection.

my initial survey led me to begin fast-tracking a long held plan of mine to create community conversation experiences, evolving on models i’ve created and facilitated in the past. when i posed the idea on instagram, lots of folks expressed interest— and many of you are here in this newsletter community! in case you missed it last week: the sessions will launch in july and i will keep you posted about them in this space. for now, here’s a flashback to a bit more background on my inspiration behind the conversations.

an important thing i’ve learned is that loneliness does not stem from a lack in amount of connection but rather from a lack in meaningful connection; even if someone experiences lots of connection, loneliness persists if the connection doesn’t match the type and depth of connection they deep down desire. this kind of loneliness can be just as devastating as any other.

this is why learning to be in intentional relationship and community with one another, and learning to untether from our devices, will be crucial as we practice reconnection. as british journalist johann hari powerfully posits: ‘the opposite of addiction is connection.’ this includes our tech addictions. johann’s podcast conversation with tristan harris (of social dilemma fame) on this topic was incredibly illuminating and shone a guiding light for me. a highly suggested listen (further topical highlights of this talk under the “on my radar” section below).

as we explore what this time away from the familiar world has meant for us and will mean for us, priya parker recently offered some valuable contemplations on intentional connection and gathering on prentis hemphill’s podcast. on re-entry she shared, “doing this well means taking time to process, to make meaning, to mark, and then to choose the ways we want to enter and choose the ways we want to leave.”

my deep hope, i’ll say it again: that we’ll use our re-entry to build on what we’ve learned about our values during this time. that we’ll prioritize exploring more meaningful connection, more often. and that we will exist simultaneously more spaciously and more fully than before. when the opportunity arises, i hope you’ll join me— and each other.

in the meantime and always: may you be guided by the wisdom of your own pace.

non-black people of color are not exempt from anti-racist due diligence

non-black people of color:
just because we fall outside
of the black/white binary
does not mean we are exempt
when people drop knowledge
or calls to action
directed at white people
about racism and anti-racism.

you can still be a benefactor and perpetrator of white supremacy even if you are not white. yep, even as a person of color. this is why we need terms like “anti-black racism”— to signify the expanse between this phenomena and racism in general. this is why we must name, explicitly, that black lives matter.

anti-racism is a practice that nbpoc must fervently adopt.

a few years ago, i spoke to former LAPD— a black man— who served on the police force in the 80s and 90s; this all has been happening. state sanctioned lynchings and violence against black people has always been rampant— since before smartphones and the internet.

“all lives matter” is a given, but “black lives matter” is something society apparently needs to be told— over and over and over and over again. the black lives matter movement was started in 2013. their calls for humanity and action have always been the same— calls that somehow largely continued to fall on deaf ears. by some weird pandemic grace, the world is now listening.

for non-black people of color who think they are exempt— we should be listening just as keenly as white people; we are in a unique position to be allies to black folk and are in just as unique a position to cause harm if we don’t appropriately assume our responsibilities. in certain ways, the harm we’ve caused and can further cause black people is worse than the harm caused by our white counterparts— it is betrayal. in sharing an oppressor, black people are our siblings in struggle— whether or not we are even consciously aware of all the ways in which we, too, are oppressed.

white supremacy is a system, an ethos, a virus that’s woven itself into our very fabric; though we benefit from it in different ways and to a lesser degree than white folk, white supremacy makes nbpoc instruments of oppression in our own right— whether or not we realize it;

by being a “non-racist” nbpoc, your silence and inaction aids the oppression of black people via passive complicity, which activates and perpetuates harm; when non-black people of color think they are exempt from their responsibility to be anti-racist, we become de facto weapons for white supremacy;

whether or not we intend to, we become proof for white systems of power: “hey, these other browns aren’t really saying or doing anything, so looks like they probably agree with us; whatever those black people over there are up in arms about must not really matter— they’re probably just being extra.” in general, white people know that nbpoc are also oppressed; so when we are problematic, even out of our own ignorance, they co-opt our shittiness to buoy their own conscious and subconscious anti-black agendas.

it can sometimes feel complicated to also call out non-black people of color when naming the work white people need to do. so, when you see white people being called out or called on about racism and anti-racism, particularly by black folk and nbpoc, do an honest check in; you might find that you need to call yourself out, too.

i regularly quietly take notes, check myself on my internalized shit, and make adjustments to my racist thoughts, beliefs, and behavior. i invite you to do the same.

anti-blackness is the root of all racism and white supremacy. so i do not stutter when i say that our collective liberation as human beings is inextricably tied to the liberation of black people; none of us are free until all of us are free— there are so many levels to this, that i can’t even begin to articulate them. white people? prisoners of their own racism, ancestry, and enculturation— they, too, are not free.

though our essential nature is freedom, the history and current climate of this earth do not support such an existence at present. none of us are truly free in this human form right now. none. of. us.

though our current reality is bleak, it is not static; we can raise our vibration, our speech, our thought, our beliefs, our actions— all of it. this is anti-racism work. liberation work. non-black people of color have remained silent, inactive, and complicit in regards to anti-black racism and white supremacy for too too long.

my people. feel me, get with me: let’s create new norms that mean something. tell your socials, tell your mama, tell your cousin, tell your coworker where brown folk stand, and let's get to work.

remembering your light.

lightbeam
sunstream;
yes, you.
yes, you.

lightwork is shadow work. shadow work is lightwork.

in oneness, we are not separate from seemingly dual concepts or from one another; all exists at once simultaneously in wholeness— a continuous flow of becoming and unbecoming.

choose your light. even in shame, even in anger, even in fear.

use it to offer yourself perspective, including a reminder of your true essence and why you exist.

allow its sweetness and gentleness to enrich and fortify your journey ahead.

and just the same— allow it to illuminate your shadows and ours.

there is joy in truth, even when it hurts.

note: this post is far from an invitation to spiritually bypass— please read carefully.

learn to become a self-starter with your self-inquiry

an explanation is
not always a service;
some things
are best discovered inwardly.

inner work, deeper work, honest work, more rigorous work. based on our consumption habits and devolved attention spans, sometimes receiving highly abbreviated educational tidbits can in fact be a disservice to our actual development.

caught in the flurry of our manic scrolling and app-ing, our illusion of education exists in transience; we often take things in intellectually and then file them away somewhere to essentially be forgotten— failing to deepen our awareness and understanding, failing to put anything into actual practice.

this is one of the reasons that with my typical poem/quote thingies on instagram, i originally did not put captions and have slowed down on doing that again.

there is immeasurable value in rigorously engaging self-inquiry on your own; learning to develop your own discernment about when to self-trigger a self-inquiry is straight-up invaluable. in order to be productive agents of change, within and without, we must learn to self-inquire without prompting, directing, or instruction.

yeah, it’s a tall order and everybody won’t get there. but for those who would like to meet me in community, self-inquiry and self-accountability is what imma be dishing. that’s what i am calling in for you— for us.

for me— know that helping you connect more deeply with your own self-inquiry journey + your truth, and bringing our individual reflections into community dialogue (to help better understand and serve our collective), is becoming revealed to me as part of my purpose.

this is the deepest work: awareness work. tuning yourself to know what kind of questions to ask and knowing when to seek out more robust sources (beyond social media) when you need to better understand something (intellectually, energetically, physically, emotionally, or otherwise).

thinking that following mad accounts on instagram and watching all my ig stories all day is good enough for your knowledge intake and reflection is a gross miscalculation.

it is essential to prioritize your personal journey towards a certain sovereign wisdom. without really really learning to tap into, flex, and strengthen our inner inquiry muscle, we can never truly understand or shift anything; we’re just always looking outside, following like robots— turning one machine into another. note: machine = the system.

step into your wisdom, step into your power. from here, you may seek out the wisdom of others with a greater and more meaningful intention. let’s do work, bb’s.

on checking in with your black friends during highly charged times

“check in on your black friends” is often a top listed action item on certain anti-racist response graphics. respectfully, i’d like to offer some insight here— insight that is largely gleaned from listening to my black peers.

white folk and non-black people of color (nbpoc)— i'm talking to us.

to preface, please forgive me for any errors and know i am clear that i do not speak for black people; i am simply doing my best to be an advocate when black folk, including those i know and love, are very very tired.

firsthand accounts from black women

upon publishing this piece, a few firsthand narratives from black women on this same topic have landed on my radar. these pieces offer context into the lived experiences, which inspired me to write this blog post in the first place;

hearing from me on this topic will never be the same as hearing about it directly from black people. read these pieces and take them in. also, let this serve as friendly reminder that we need to be much, much better at listening to black women.

priska neely: i don't need your check in texts on the cut really paints a picture and tells a story of what it can feel like at a time like now, guides the reader on the type of self-inquiry required to make more empathetic decisions, and addresses the nuance of the workplace.

kat vellos: how to help your black friends and non-black friends today on we should get together. the first part breaks down, in detail, how to do the work by having tough conversations about racism. the second part gives incredible detailed insights and sample scripts for checking in with your black friends.

many thanks to destiny arturet and jillian richardson for bringing this work to my attention.

checking in irresponsibly & thoughtlessly

it seems as though many people are taking the invitation to check in without considering nuance or context; black people are not a monolith— everyone needs something different. checking in without careful consideration of individual needs can quickly spiral into virtue signaling— trying to fulfill the “activism due diligence checklist” so you can look and feel good; by checking in thoughtlessly, you’ve now just weaponized this tool to help soothe your white/non-black person of color guilt.

out of the blue check in's

firstly, go ahead and do not “check in” with the one black person you know but never talk to, or someone from way back like high school. at best, ask said person for their venmo or paypal so you can send them some reparations along with your love. note: "it's a bit taboo in much of europe to send money," says my comrade, amelia ideh.

otherwise, you are engaging in a highly insensitive ego massage that defers your discomfort and required labor onto a black person who is quite possibly in great pain. rather than a thoughtful action, this kind of out of the blue “check in” is violent and tantamount to abuse; many folks are physiologically, psychologically, energetically, and spiritually in trauma response. in the current climate, “beyond spent” doesn’t even quite cover it.

guilt-driven & inconsiderate check in's

now, for a conversation about your actual black friends and black folk who are part of your present day life in some way— colleagues, coworkers, neighbors, acquaintances, etc.

i’ve been hearing about black folks, including my own friends, receiving lots of random, guilt-driven, and/or well-meaning-but-a-lot “check in’s.” these kind of check in’s can be exhausting and aggravating as fuck. so before you check in, take several pauses— especially if you aren’t in someone’s life like that.

how are you?

do not message, “how are you?”— this is often a triggering, heavy, and complicated question with mixed, ever-changing, still-in-process answers. and if someone does desire to express their feelings, i imagine that the preferred domain for this is often black-only safe spaces— understand and respect that. further, know that the answer to this question is typically some version of “not well.” it should be obvious that black people, in general, are not well these days. please realize that “how are you” can feel incredibly disrespectful in our current climate— or just overwhelming.

many black folks don’t want to do the labor of answering ‘how they are’ just so you can feel complete— they’re trying to understand their own feelings and keep their own peace by any means. think survival mode, for many folks.

our inner alarm system: threat processing & survival response

just because people are in their homes does not mean that the very real biochemical and energetic reactions associated with an imminent threat to one’s actual life are not there; think cortisol, adrenaline, biochemical alarm system, fight/flight/freeze, trauma, ptsd. that is all extremely present for many people right now. by the way, breonna taylor was murdered at her own home while in bed. safety eludes black life in america, entirely.

feel free to look up the “amygdala hijack” and how our bodies respond to challenging thoughts and feelings as simple as, “she doesn’t like me;” something that feels like a perceived threat to our identity and worth can ramp up our whole system— to varying degrees, depending on the intensity of the trigger— with the same flood of chemicals that are produced when our life is actually in danger. though dated in certain respects, this is an evolutionary protection mechanism inherited from our ancestors (who more often experienced threats to their lives, like being eaten by a bear).

so now, imagine this inner alarm system when there is an actual threat on your life. imagine the threat is unrelenting and ever-present— so much so, that the inner alarm becomes part of your default state of being in some way. that's what it is to be black in america— constantly in fight or flight, constantly re-triggered, constantly ramping up, constantly defending your right to live.

sorry

do not message, “sorry”— most black folks i know don’t want or need a sorry; they are looking for deep personal inquiry, real action, and tangible transformative change. your best "sorry" is doing the work.

i'm so angry

do not message, “i’m so angry”— congrats. many people don’t care for your sudden rage (they wonder where it was all this time); and regardless, they often don’t have the space or desire to center your feelings and hold your frustration, too— black folks got plenty of their own.

what can i do?

do not message, “what can i do?” or “how can i help?”— that is your job to find out. there are currently so many anti-racist resources online that it’s overwhelming. google, social media— it’s quite easy. one option: sign up for nicole cardoza’s anti-racism daily action email newsletter.

i'm in shock

do not message, “i’m in shock” or “i can’t believe this is happening”— this usually feels like an insult, and quite clearly demonstrates that you haven’t been paying enough attention to the world around us, since maybe, forever. this message is particularly abusive.

offering messages like those above can feel like you’re looking for a black person to offer you absolution from your guilt and personal responsibility— and maybe, unconsciously, you are; get clear on your ego and where you might be centering your own discomfort under the facade of concern.

some loose analogies to consider before reaching out

it can be difficult to digest what it’s like to be black in america at times like this— in truth, white folk and non-black people of color will never really know. some loose analogies for additional perspective:

consider the sensitivity and mindfulness you would use to determine your words and actions if the same friend’s parent or child had just died. depending on who you’re talking to and the particulars of your relationship, this might be the kind of energy you need to come with. also recognize the possibility that these state sanctioned killings feel deeper and more layered than familial loss for some people— at least in a sense.

i also invite you to look at black reality in america as the slow, calculated genocide of black people. does “how are you?” or “sorry” sound appropriate here? does it seem kind?

at the end of the day, there are not going to be any clear answers or absolutes in such situations, but i hope that these analogies will help offer further insight into how carefully you need to consider your actions and words prior to possible reach outs during sensitive times. allow these perspectives to serve as an additional filters in your decision making and discernment.

intuition is king, space is awesome

above all, use your intuition: every relationship is different and each person has different needs. listen to the nuance. also know that sometimes, for some people, giving lots of space is the best course of action— at least for a period of time.

saying "i see you" by doing the work

possibly the best “i see you” we can offer our black friends is to visibly show our genuine support and advocacy, educate our communities about anti-racism and progressive action, and publicly demonstrate how we are engaging the work in our personal lives and our communities. especially in a time like right now, when all we have is social media and the internet. that said, humble quiet learning, rich dialogue, and meaningful action in our private time is paramount; everything in its right place.

honest action— online and offline— can often mean much much more than an “obligatory” check in that a meme instructed you to do as an action item.

a carefully considered check-in

time & place

if a check in feels right, then move on to considering appropriate timing and venue (text, email, phone call, voice note). sometimes, tracking your friends’ socials and seeing where they’re at mentally and emotionally can help determine the right time and place. normally, i prefer texts or voice notes in such situations because they are more personal than social media while also giving people lots of space to choose how, when, and if to respond.

sample message

in your message, you might offer something like, “no response expected: i am thinking of you. if you want, please let me know how i can best support you.” this is by far not a one size fits all message, but allow it to offer some inspiration.

a rough checklist

a working checklist you can play with when crafting your message:

• be brief
• be loving, kind, and compassionate
• offer something specific
• don’t center yourself
• don’t defer labor (would you want to spend your time answering a bunch of questions in a raw state?)
• don’t be overzealous (it comes across fake / performed / wanting to be seen as “good”)
• give the person an out (so they don’t feel pressured to respond)

but seriously, do the work

i’ve also heard some black folks say that if a white/nbpoc person is going to “check in” with them, they want to hear about the anti-racist work they’re doing; this sort of “reporting” may apply more in a case where the relationship isn’t as close and/or if you haven’t previously said or done much to instill faith in your commitment to being anti-racist. i imagine this most often applies to certain acquaintances and colleagues. but also, close friends who don’t really talk about race is definitely a thing— be mindful if you’re in that boat.

honoring individual needs & getting out of the way

before you send any message, think and feel. i know my community likes feelings and intuition and things! determine and then honor your friend’s individual needs— like actually, actually. as a person who likes a lot of space, i hate feeling put upon by someone trying to “help.” so my default in life is to give people lots of space, especially at a time like right now when black people might feel more safety, ease, and understanding with their black kinfolk. don’t let that hurt your feelings. and if it does, work through why it has to be about you even when it’s black people who are being executed.

varying dynamics & understandings

dynamics across relationships and even within a single relationship vary— they can also shift and change over time. a cataclysm (like now) can also entirely alter the fabric and course of a lifelong relationship; what you thought your bestie needed— and what might have even worked at another time or for another circumstance— might not apply at all right now. that’s how great the chasm between the white/nbpoc experience and the actual lived black experience can be. that’s how much understanding we lack— which makes anti-racist study and practice further critical.

read signals & take their lead

you must use your intuition— and communication skills, when appropriate— to understand signals and take the lead of your black friends; when reading people’s social media to see where they’re at, you’ll find that some folks are outright saying what they need and what they don’t need in plain language.

varying, ever-changing, & overlapping needs

• some folks want a check in (even repeated ones)
• some folks want a distraction or a momentary break (spoiler: black people never get an actual break from being black)
• some folks want hella space and to be alone
• some folks only want to talk with black friends
• some folks only want to talk with bipoc friends
• some folks are waiting to hear even a peep from their silent white friends
• some folks want funny animal videos (c/o: amelia ideh)
• some folks seek joy as both healing and resistance
• some folks are looking for any semblance of normalcy
• some folks don’t know what they want
• and some folks don’t have the energy for anything (there can be a lot of naps and sleep in this case)

many folks traverse amongst these different wants and needs across time and even in a single day; carrying unrelenting trauma as a seeming prerequisite for your existence is not a predictable thing.

black people are not a monolith

i cannot stress enough that best supporting our black friends means treating them as individuals, case-by-case— it requires deep listening as well as the openness and ability to constantly adapt.

be easy & don't press

like i said, i know what it feels like to be put upon by others when you are going through it. and it is one of the most burdensome and aggravating things in life. aggressively trying to check in or pushing a conversation that someone doesn’t want or isn’t ready for in the spirit of “helping” is pure egoism and saviorism. it is not about the person you are trying to help at all— rather, you’ve made it all about you. it is extremely frustrating and a boundary violation. allow people to be the experts on themselves. saviorism is tired— let’s let that die, k?

love on people without being extra & weird

as my beautiful friend vasha said, perhaps one of the best ways we can show up for our black friends and colleagues is by “loving folks without being weird and excessive. just love on people.” i’ll leave the interpretation up to you and your inner wisdom— i know you got it.

who do you believe in?

do the people you believe in,
believe in you?

friends, community leaders, colleagues, bosses, family, your fave celebs, politicians, mentors, role models, coaches.

they out here batting for you, for real? or just themselves and their circle?

scarcity, competition, hyper-individualism, and ego have narrowed our perceptions of power, potential, and community.

kinship and leadership will continue to be redefined in favor of true humility and interdependence.

true power is grounded, peaceful, creative, fluid, open-hearted; it does not fear the luminosity of others and instead seeks it, revealing it at every opportunity.

when you rise, i rise.

when i rise, you rise.

taking credit for our gifts

my virtues
are not merits
i have personally derived;
they are gifts.

people have often told me how they admire how self aware i am and how committed i am to “doing the work.” sometimes as they marvel in awe. there was a time where i pridefully took all credit for this. but as i evolved in my overall awareness, i realized that self awareness and doing the work are largely not a choice for me— it is how i am wired. these are tools and gifts that i have been given.

it dawned on me that the way “ignorance is bliss” for some, ignorance usually results in sheer torture for me; my hyper self awareness persists through all seasons, regardless of what my ego wants. being aware and tuned to the vibration of truth— often painfully so— is my default.

and so, my self-work is often the result of my desperate attempt to resolve some ever present suffering i’ve been unable to silence and suppress. and even when i do succeed at some version of suppression, the truth remains in the back of my mind along with deep unhappiness.

simultaneously, i recognize that i get to take credit for rising to the challenge and making the decision to do the work. because even despite my nature, i can still decide to opt out; there is plenty of work i trade for the familiar comfort of my suffering; these are my edges, i’m working on them— also often by eventual force and compulsion.

the universe ultimately always kicks my ass out of my limiting habituation— just as it is in this new decade. much death is happening to make way for a rebirth i’ve been hiding from for the last few years.

all this to say: often what we pridefully claim as our self-derived virtues are actually gifts. these gifts are here to help us realize our full potential so we can be of service. not so we can be delusional, self-important, holier than thou assholes. i ain’t special. i just got some tools (that i have a complicated relationship with) for the purpose of my soul mission, which, by the way, isn’t even about me— it’s about us.

less. less. less.

on one hand, you could say our vices and unhealed conditioning have become further activated.

on the other hand, our opportunities to engage in fuckshit have simultaneously decreased.

less polluting
less rushing
less obliging
less escaping
less consuming
less posturing
less pretending
less avoiding
less wasting
less codependency
less excess
less fucks

low-key: what a load off.

what other lesses shall we acknowledge and welcome into our lives?

slow suicide

chronically delaying gratification
is akin to waiting for death;
if you're still breathing,
remember that you deserve happiness
right now.

i’m really good at this.

“i’ll be happy when…”

“i’ll let myself have fun after…”

“i’ll hang out with people once…”

“i’ll give myself some credit upon the completion of…”

…this ever-elusive constantly shifting benchmark.

i certainly don’t have this figured out but fuck this whole entire shit, really. i can’t remember how she put it, but in her memoir, shonda rhimes basically described not really living life as ‘slow suicide.’ sadly, i relate. it’s been a challenge i’ve had most of my life.

inevitably, i think about this idea in relation to now. it feels even more relevant. but there’s probably a split-mindedness for a lot of us:

“right now is the time to put in work to survive, it isn’t the time to find joy. i don’t have the space or the luxury.”

“i don’t know what’s what, so maybe all i can give myself right now are little joys. wait, is that frivolous and privileged and irresponsible?”

i’m going to get morbid now, so bear with me if you can, because i’m going to bring it all together for our higher good.

in the beginning, i followed the news for covid a lot and then mostly stopped because it got overwhelming. one thing i found in my initial research that has become increasingly clear along the way is this: the virus is unlike anything we’ve seen and as much as we think we understand it, in many ways we don’t. we are constantly learning new, often paradoxical things about the virus, who’s at risk, its prevention, its treatment.

‘it’s spread by respiratory droplets. uh, it’s also airborne. oh yeah, so, you can also bring it inside with your shoes.’

‘build up your immunity— wait— but not too much because your immune system might attack itself while fighting off the virus (cytokine storm).’

‘it’s really only affecting folks 50-60+ and people with pre-existing health conditions— younger folks, children, and pregnant women should be cool. jk, this virus could put anyone in critical or fatal condition and we’re not sure how or why.”

‘take ibuprofen to treat your symptoms— actually, hold on— it could make things worse.’

‘liquor stores are an essential business. so yeah, alcohol might aggravate the virus.’

we’re all vulnerable. this virus could quite literally kill any one of us and there’s only so much we can do about it from a physical standpoint. with all the incomplete and shifting information, we’re somewhat left to our own intuition and devices when deciding on appropriate care for ourselves. science is crucial but it’s got its work cut out for it at the moment.

the material realm is showing us its limits. for me personally, there is no greater signal to tap into the unseen for strength and wisdom. there is no greater call to surrender control while simultaneously reclaiming our sovereign power as truly magical beings.

part of that magic is practicing expanding our view to transcend the 3d reality sometimes, if we can. not in a spiritual bypass kind of way, but in a grounded and self-empowered way: holding the severity of this situation in sight while also knowing that you are a miracle— periodT— and contain infinite possibility.

it’s beyond heartbreaking right now. but here we are. still here. we are the lucky ones. let’s not take that for granted, if at all possible. part of our magic is that we can create more magic, joy, love, health from dust. from nothingness. because it is what we are. we are allowed the magnificence of ourselves at anytime, every time, regardless of the circumstances of our lives. you are allowed to be happy right now— even if a split second is all you can muster.

some version of the same very specific thing at once.

it’s so surreal to me that we are all going through some version of the same very specific thing at once.

i know it might sound weird to say, but there’s something poetic about that. really distills us to our common humanity, co-existing in this fragile, precious life.

some prompts for us to consider at this time:

• with the opportunity to stand still, what’s been revealed to you about existence? yours, ours, the planet’s?

• with this extra space and time, what could you gift yourself more spaciousness and presence with? what does thinking about that feel like? is there discomfort there? if so, talk to it gently and ask it why it’s there and what it needs.

• in what ways has this experience reminded you or taught you about our common humanity? did any illusion bubbles burst for you? how does it feel to not live with that illusion anymore?

• is there a part of you that is relieved that you might not *have to* live your life as you had been? what are you relieved about maybe not having to deal with anymore? what might life look like if you found a way where you could choose to opt out of those things?

• does the possibility of your life blowing up and starting over fresh simultaneously terrify and excite you? why excited? dig into that. look for versions of starting fresh that warm your heart, create ease within, and light a spark.

• who are the first people you wanted to call? who makes you feel seen, safe, loved, considered? who do you feel most compelled to do that for in return?

so many more. will leave us with that for now. much love <3

oxygenating the source

if your devotion live

outside of yourself

tell me

how does it breathe?

if you place all your devotion, attention, and energy outside of yourself, your top priorities and commitments (devotions) have no reliable energy source. if your devotion is not inside of you as the focal point, it is not connected to you and therefore is without oxygen or life force.

any energy that happens to be available to expend will be finite in supply and rapidly dwindle. eventually, your devotion and what you are devoted to will wither away— in one way or another.

an extension of ‘putting on your oxygen mask before helping others.’

this does not mean myopia, darwinism, selfishness, competition, egoism, exceptionalism, or self-centeredness. in many ways, we sustain ourselves so that we can be truly interdependent.

interdependence is our truth and our balm. i see we are and will continue to be challenged by this call & fact of life. will we step over each other to self protect or for a quick come up— or will we invest in humanity, integrity, and the long game? at one point or another, we are all going to need each other.

so it’s very interesting to witness the decisions and stances people are taking in these last few days.

crisis can unearth our unresolved shadow in many ways. i had to pause before almost writing that crisis shows our “true nature,” because that’s not true— our true nature is love.

i’m not standing here from some high horse; there are thoughts that have crossed my mind that don’t make me feel very proud. but i am doing my best to hold myself accountable and try to be the person i want to be.

while some still think preparedness and vigilance are alarmist and have some stuff to sort out within themselves, there are many folks who are forced to make precarious decisions because they are backed into a corner. because of survival. because our system fails us.

i think about shows like survivor, a film like hunger games, and societal periods of extreme hardship and chaos. challenging times are what test our character most. they show us where we are out of alignment. where we don’t trust. where we are in lack. what we fear.

there are always choices we get to (and are forced to) make.

so i ask again: who will we choose to be?

much love and ease to hearts <3

holistic immunity amidst the unknown

• echinacea: immune support, active responder

• elderberry: immune support, active responder

• astragalus: immune support, system builder

• ginger: system restoration, gastrointestinal

• turmeric: system restoration, anti-inflammatory

• valerian: nervous system, calming & relaxing

in addition to lots of hand washing, disinfecting, and social distancing, keeping our immune system in order is important.

i ordered these herbal tinctures today to help support me right now. the brand is @herbpharm and you can find it at various health food stores. the descriptions are off the labels, though these incredible herbs also do so much more.

something like valerian, though not directly impacting our immune system, is still significant for immune strength because stress and anxiety compromise our immunity and make us more susceptible to illness. so does lack of sleep.

what are your favorite herbs? i know there are many many more for immunity alone!

whatever you can do to help create ease within you, gift that to yourself. twirl around your home, exercise, rock out to your favorite music, write a poem, meditate, practice reiki or qigong, do some eft, turn on those isochronic tones or binaural beats, give yourself a sound bath, laugh, get in on a virtual breathwork group, wash some dishes (some people love that shit), chop some vegetables, sleep, pet your doggy or kitty, pet your baby, facetime your fam.

meditation is endless things. right now is several more things. conversations happening all over my internet and messages about what this contains. it’s real and all encompassing. systemic inequity is being both felt and seen. many of us are in it. a reckoning is upon us.

the road ahead is only partially predictable. much unseen and unknown. how will we show up— both for ourselves and others? what will we prioritize? what do we have if what we thought we had— both figuratively and literally— goes away? who will we decide to be? will it be who we promised we’d be? what will our ancestors say? what is true peace of mind?

be good to you and to others. be gentle. be well. wishing us all abundant health, compassion, and courage. <3

on surviving.

those who survive

are given grace

not by accident;

with survival

comes responsibility.

been on my mind heavy for something like a year now. still relevant. there are many meanings here.

one: we all still get to be here for a very specific reason. a purpose, which in some way includes service to humanity. do not squander your blessings, your gifts, and the responsibility that comes with.

holding duality for my birthday.

you can. i gotta keep telling myself.

yesterday, i turned 36 and took a stroll around the city as i have over my last few birthdays. people watching, practicing mindfulness, popping into shops, and eating some great food along the way. the simple things that allow presence and gratitude fill me up.

after a beautiful lunch honoring south asian women, i walked into the lush and wonderfully curated rizzoli bookstore. almost immediately, i became emotional; all the books were people’s stories and hearts all around me— all the labor, love, tenderness, pain, fervor, triumph, quirks and imperfections of all these human journeys. all these individual truths laid out to be witnessed.

it felt sacred. i found my fingertips grazing the covers, soaking in the simple profundity of this recognition and reality; wanting to intentionally sit and be with all that was in front of me.

one of the first titles i stopped to pick up was dark money by jane mayer— a book that had been recommended to me about a year ago when canvassing for the midterm elections. it’s about how a few billionaire families have been puppeteering american politics and what we should know + perhaps do about it. that shit heavy.

as i was putting that book down, a guy walked up and reached around me to drop back a book he had been browsing— homo deus by yuval noah harari, a renowned oxford educated historian. harari’s titles had also been recommend to me, one of which happens to be the top book reco of mark zuckerberg and bill gates. homo deus, which postulates on the future of humanity, is the second in a triology— first is sapiens, a history of humanity, and third is 21 lessons for the 21st century, a prescription for moving forward in light of the dystopia harari predicts and maps out in homo deus. based off the book jacket, let’s just say that the future feels awful bleak and inhuman.

i felt myself buzzing and lightheaded, hoping to take flight outside of my body somewhere— a place where i didn’t need to make sense of things.

i generally try to shield myself from consuming much at all about the state of the world because it quite literally makes it near impossible for me to function. i largely know what i need to know about what’s fucked up. i’d like to focus on the part where we heal it.

my disembodied frame is standing at a display table in the middle of the bookstore. who knows where we will end up. we might perish soon. i don’t know why, but i figure i should probably try to keep hope.

i compose myself the best i can and tell myself that though i’m falling out, the wisdom of this heralded historian is likely worth the strife to arm myself with the knowledge i need for the fight ahead. i make note to start reading sapiens soon.

i scoot over one or two display tables away. i see oprah’s new book, the path made clear. i remember hearing an audio preview of the book on her podcast and feeling like i could personally do without it. the cover looked corny. nonetheless, i cracked it open to ‘see what this thing was talking about.’

i realized that the book isn’t just about life in general, but it’s about identifying and living your purpose with wisdom, insights, and advice— a companion for the various hurdles along this path. these bits are pulled from oprah’s interviews with successful folks over the years. trying to clarify and figure out how to live my purpose has been the prime focus of my life for the last 3-5 years.

i thumbed through the chapters, doing an extremely cursory skim to get a better feel of what the book was trying to do, and perhaps benefit from an insightful quote or two. i started finding bits that hit and knew this book would be peppered with reminders i really need during this time in my life. i began tearing up. then i found a phrase that almost mirrored the title of a podcast i’ve been meditating on creating for about a year, and that i’ve begun to give more serious attention to in recent weeks.

i was now on the verge of melting into a puddle of tears in the middle of the bookstore. tears streamed down my face and as i sniffled, i felt the security walk away from near me to give me some privacy.

i was crying, first, at the divine orchestration that led me to open up the book despite my initial disinterest. second, and more searingly, i was crying at the contrast of hope and despair i’d experienced just moments apart.

to traverse this wide span of converse emotion in such a short timeframe had me shook; what a wild array of stuff life is.

i came to some conclusions.

i don’t know anything, but i know that a courageously open heart will always win. in light of a dystopian future that might or might not be out of our hands, i believe that love counts for something significant no matter what ultimately happens. it does lighten the load to believe that our bodies are just one piece of the universal puzzle of consciousness.

i am thankful for the reminder of the preciousness of life; to take each moment, each sensation that we are gifted to be able to perceive as a privilege and blessing.

i endeavor to be here, actually here, the best i can with whatever i am given; to allow myself space, freedom, and permission to just be in the world with no agenda, no plan, and no to do list— on a regular basis. to exist in gratitude and intention and fullness in every moment.

in fearing for the future of material existence, i somehow can’t help but be shaken into a piercingly clear recognition of how lucky i am to be here. i consciously receive this existence. thank you. i accept the privilege of honoring this body, this planet, and its inhabitants while i’ve got em <3

empowerment makes me uncomfy

the popular usage of ”empowerment”— particularly in relation to self-development, the current women’s movement, wellness communities, and inspirational leaders— has long triggered unease within me; beyond gross overuse, i feel the way the term is often used is incorrect— and insidiously disempowering to the subconscious as a result.

some definitions i pulled across a handful of online dictionaries, including merriam-webster, cambridge, and oxford:

1. to give (someone) the authority or power to do something

2. to give official authority or legal power to

3. enable (to provide with the means or opportunity)

4. to give someone official authority or the freedom to do something

5. to enable or permit

6. to make (someone) stronger and more confident, especially in controlling their life and claiming their rights

7. to encourage and support the ability to do something

8. to promote the self-actualization or influence of

for me, definitions one through five cover the formal empowerment of someone by granting them access to execute a certain position or action of power within a given institution or system. depending on context, this can be a fair naming, particularly when operating to “correct” systemic imbalances and injustices; the privileged using their means to empower the disenfranchised rightfully exists as one tool, amongst others. though some might get it twisted, such empowerment is not a transference of actual agency, ability, or deservingness, which every person innately possesses— it is largely  functional and surface in nature.

then we arrive at definition six— the deeply troubling common usage definition in wellness and women’s communities; here, the first five definitions are rolled up to imply that one human can somehow “make” another human stronger and more confident. we can sure be deluded into this notion, but only after we decide— consciously or subconsciously— to give our own power away first. that this is a formal definition makes my head spin.

as far as i’m concerned, the only way it is possible for one person to empower another— i.e. give permission or power to— is by also giving power to systems of oppression and the victim-savior paradigm. our power is not derived from another. the power of our essential nature cannot be given, taken, or transferred— it can only be illuminated; others can inspire us to open to our truths but true empowerment can only ever come from within.

the only definitions i find relatively sound within a psychosocial context are seven and eight as they have a supportive quality— focusing instead on inspiration and promotion around self-actualization and self-empowerment.

but even then, i wonder how much we can escape the common usage assumptions embedded in our subconscious: “empower” as a subject oriented verb inherently disempowers the object by assuming its lack of agency and erasing its innate power. these subtle disempowering suggestions that have pervaded our collective subconscious require us to believe that we need something or someone outside of ourselves to be truly powerful— to “fix” us, to “heal” us, to “give us permission.” this is false, capitalistic, imperialist, supremacist, oppressive bullshit. it is quintessentially “giving our power away.” i don’t feel fucking empowered when someone suggests that they can empower me. making someone or something outside of ourselves the actor within contexts of empowerment, healing, and permission/agency is harmful, reductive, and regressive— let’s take some heavy pause here, please.

we wholly empower ourselves, heal ourselves, and give permission to ourselves— any outside influences are conduits and facilitators— that’s it. anyone claiming differently— saying they are saving, healing, fixing, allowing, empowering you (giving you power)— is quite possibly a false leader coming from ego.

even in healing modalities where say, someone performs a chakra clearing on you: your body, your energy, and your subconscious are active participants in these processes by offering permission, access, insight, and the willingness to shift— whether or not you are consciously aware of this. we are our own healers, even when we have assistance— healing fundamentally cannot happen without our consent or participation.

a quick shift back to institutional  empowerment: though technically another can empower us in these situations, self-empowerment is still the purest and truest form of empowerment at the root level— even here. for example, the act of white people empowering people of color by offering them job roles will not alone correct racist institutions— or the issue of racism; as such, this deference or assignment by a white person or “white” institution to a person of color is still a phenomenon occurring within the original oppressive paradigm; it is “empowerment” only to a degree.

as much as we must do what we can within existing constructs, we can’t take for granted the need for imagining and building new paradigms from scratch ourselves, where terms like “diversity” and “inclusion” are no longer needed because our new systems are inherently sound and of integrity.

all said, in it being a word deeply intertwined with current movements, i don’t believe “empowerment” is going away any time soon. so my hope is that we at least use it and receive it with more discernment, awareness, self-respect, and humility— and that we explore fuller, truer ways to express how we are supporting each other in collective healing and liberation.

much love <3

in allyship with anger, fear, and pain

photo // CC0

the most potent balm;
a dialogue
in allyship
with your anger
fear
and pain.

most often, our relationships with anger, fear, and pain tend to center around our reactions to the emotions themselves; themes of frustration, shame, avoidance, and overwhelm pervade. this unfortunately only compounds existing “negative” feelings and drives us deeper into cycles of misery, escapism, helplessness, and self-judgment. we begin to feel like we’re drowning.

in these instances, we have opted to merge with the challenging emotions; take them on and wear them as parts of our identity and who we are — perhaps even beginning to look at ourselves as deficient. in my view, this is inaccurate as our essential selves are always whole, powerful, and wise. our spirits are indestructible and i personally refuse to see it any other way.

what i have to come to learn is that anger, fear, and pain are messengers; they are not negative, but are rather gifts we receive to learn more about ourselves and our relationship to this world and this existence. through my own rigorous experience, i’ve learned the unparalleled transformative power of making friends with my anger, pain, and fear — as entities separate from my true self whom have come to me as my teachers.

in unpacking the underlying truths my anger, pain, and fear reflect, i have come to more deeply meet and embody my true self, what i stand for, my connection with others, and the nature of existence. committing to this process has allowed me a greater acceptance for what is (no matter what) while simultaneously equipping me with a resolve to go out and fight for who i am and what i believe in with a delicacy and strength i’ve only just met.

yes, i preach love — lots of it; but my love is not one of passivity, one that turns a blind eye to injustice, or one that withholds itself from so-called ‘lower based emotions.’ if so inclined, i encourage you to connect with your anger, pain, and fear. ask them what they have to say; layer by layer — until you have stripped down to the core — to the truth. the fire behind that truth will naturally propel you to transform both what is within and what is beyond.

with love,
seher