As we sat around the fire, talking about the most recent white supremacist violence in the U.S. and all the world’s ills, a childhood friend asked earnestly,
“So what am I, one person in Nebraska, supposed to to do?”
It’s such a well-intentioned question. And for me, it contains three ideas we have to interrogate as the intersecting crises of late stage capitalism, patriarchy, and white supremacy appear to flare and deepen around us.
Let me start by declaring my first thought, my impulse to answer that question for her, to use all of my do-gooder dictionary to explain social change as I see it from my 45 years on the planet. Shaped by a white dominant worldview as I am, I had to actively resist proffering a definite, linear, step-by-step answer. I took a deep breath. I decided how I wanted to relate, not advise, and with the second thought, my revised and more honest reply was,
“I don’t know.”
Still I’m thinking about the first idea of “I.” Of course no one person, no one leader, no one idea or solution will be the change.
I’m thinking about the second idea of “supposed to” in that question even more. Throughout our lives, we are taught to outsource our inner authority. As we are parented, educated, and employed, in each of these experiences, obedience and fulfillment of others’ expectations are what is deemed as success. So it’s not surprising when it comes to transforming our society (let alone our communities or ourselves), we still seek to align ourselves to “supposed to.”
And that “supposed to” in my white, Western culture is so attached to third idea to be interrogated, the “do”. We are always meant to be taking action, moving forward – never connecting, never reflecting, never resting – which ultimately serves the status quo.
That’s why “What happens if we…?” has long been a favorite question when it comes to transformation. It allows for more shared responsibility and discernment. It makes space for additional possibilities to emerge.
And this “What happens if we…?” was the basis of last year’s Healing Solidarity 2021 Conference: #MakingDifferentChoices. The Healing Solidarity’s Advisory Circle (of which I’m a member) wanted to create a space where people could experience something different that the typical online conferences now being offered across our sector. Each day, we were transparently “experimenting” because:
- Everyone and their dog (!) is now having online conferences, which was not the case when Mary Ann Clements first organized the conference in 2018.
- These “flat” experiences offer such passive listening and learning opportunities, all while tempting us to check our email – so people are not really present.
- So much of the presentational model of conferences reinforces the “expertise infusion” model of global development, which we are expressly trying to disrupt.
- People offer so much (!) wisdom when they’re invited into deep listening and dialogue.
- We wanted to practice together and make visible what it means to nurture relationships and trust, and demonstrate how shared knowledge arises from emergent processes.
We didn’t know what was going to happen in the “in between conversations” or main stage sessions each day, and that was the point! We were experimenting with building our tolerance for not knowing, as well as those who joined us. We wondered, what will happen if we offer sessions that build on each other, to weave a collective thread, spark new ideas, and tease out new threads and practices?
What happens if we just talk about one main topic or theme the whole time, in this case – making different choices? What happens if there’s not just a few people we are hearing from on that topic, but 20+ people from as many countries, and then invite anyone else to jump in? What if the only instructions given to the invited guests were to simply, “show up as the person you are and say what comes to you”? What if we talk about the topic for a total of over seven hours? What if we prioritize collective care in order to reconnect to ourselves, each other, and the places we are so that we can relate to our innate and shared wisdom? What if we create spaces and disciplines where we are not generalizing or assuming a single universal lived experience, given differences in race or ethnicity, gender, wealth, class privilege, etc.? What if people receive and respond to the invitation or permission to be unprepared, un-rushed, imperfect, deliberate, authentic, messy, courageous?
This is the world I know I want to be a part of – one where we can all experiment, where we can stop performing, where we can connect and belong, where we can heal, where we can show up for each other, where we can relax and celebrate and grieve and be confused…together. I can only speak to my experience of our experiment, but for me the conference was nourishing. So much connection, affirmation, challenge, hope, energy, listening, building. There may not be easy “results” to point to when it comes to our conference experiment this year, but ultimately I hope we demonstrated that our humanity and our professionalism need not be at odds.
More than ever, I am sensing that the “solutions” were are taught to find and pursue can be another subtle and not-so-subtle way of detaching from ourselves and each other, in addition to all the other ways oppressive systems disconnect us. So many of the most powerful “solutions” I’ve witnessed lately have been rooted in and are a result of ancient technologies – sitting around a kitchen table or a fire with old and new friends, honoring ancestors, lineages, and teachers, singing together, breathing and being together in silence.
Each of these ancient technologies allows our truths and our connections to be affirmed. They give us a firmer place to stand – for whatever comes.
Which embers are you tending? Maybe the most important things to “do” in these times are simply to make sure none of us are going it alone.
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