Hello friends!

Last week, I had the privilege and honor of speaking on two different panels about how the systems we find ourselves in are hard on every one of us. They are hard on us emotionally, physically, socially, and spiritually. Yet, we continue to fight to make our workplaces, communities, and society more just and equitable.

Navigating these exploitative systems, norms, and beliefs can keep us passive and stuck, they can harden our hearts, reduce our empathy, make us numb and desensitized to violence and oppression that we see around us daily.

The systems are failing us and these structures want us to fail each other.

But we won’t let them.

I recently read that it’s not about the survival of the “fittest,” those of us who can and are expected to carry the pain, heartache, and grief that systems of oppression generate within us, but rather it is the survival of the nurtured. Nurturing, not just surviving, is a deep necessity for all of us. We are not meant to carry the weight of these structures and their impact on us by ourselves.

How we meet, how we build, how we struggle, and how we survive all matter just as much as where we meet, when we build, what we struggle with and who survives.

What we protect, love, and allow to flourish are just as important as what we dismantle as we push back against the systems destroying our planet and our souls.

We will only make it if we are hard on these systems but deeply tender and caring with each other. This means we need to name and recognize the insidious nature of these systems which weaponizes individuality and our humanity against each other. We need to build stronger and deeper relationships hinged on trust and reciprocity so we can articulate our needs in ways that hold folks accountable but with care.

We are saved by the way we nurture and are nurtured.

To nurture one another means to be intrinsically invested in each other’s emotional, mental, physical, spiritual, and social well being. It means supporting, caring, and loving each other deeply, tenderly, and relentlessly. Nurturing ourselves and our communities is what will fuel our fight with systems of domination and oppression.

Nurturing protects our humanity and cultivates trust, compassion, empathy, and connection.

In the spirit of nurturing I want to share some upcoming programs and workshops with y’all:

On March 13th we’re running a FREE 2-hour interactive workshop, Friendship and Freedom. Friendship is where we get to practice liberation! Registration includes a one month pop-up online community so participants can connect with each other! You can learn more and register HERE. 

Throughout the spring I’ll be co-facilitating a program with Holly Truhlar called Liberating Grief: Finding Freedom through Sorrow & Soul. We’ll gather two Sundays a month March-May to explore the Gates of Grief together with a systemic analysis, a grief practice, and a liberation practice offered for each session. You can learn more and register HERE.

Last up, through our program Whiteness at Work we’re hosting a 90-minute workshop centered on bringing an anti-colonial and anti-imperial lens to DEI and race equity work. Anyone enrolled in w@w gets access to this workshop in addition to live quarterly sessions plus all of the 15+ hours of training content and resources in the portal.

May we show up for ourselves and each other. I hope you have a moment for a deep breath this weekend.

Let’s get free y’all.