Do Not Despair. Hope Is Not Lost.

Hi Friends,

Well, here we are. Are you exhausted yet from drinking from the firehose of bad news? Are you starting to find a balance between staying informed and active and finding joy and rest? Do not let the panic of constant new developments paralyze you or sap your valuable energy. Protect yourself for the long haul and trust that others are acting while you are resting.

I have been bolstered by the idea of social progress towards the world we want to live in as a train, inexorably and inevitably moving forward, however slowly, but never stopping. Those who have come before us in this essential work can be seen pushing it along, encouraging its progress, our ancestors in this work never tiring or wavering. Under the wheels of the train are challenges of the past — Jim Crow, enslavement, witch burnings, and the Red Scare. Those who engage in backlash to progress, which we are seeing very intensely right now, are in a futile battle to stop it from moving forward.

This is not to say that they will not cause damage, because they already have and harm will continue. It is simply to say that progress will keep moving forward. And each one of us can help it along as we are able. This image brings me hope because when I step back far enough to see the forest, I can see where we have been. Even though we feel like many backwards steps are being made right now, we are still making progress. I have to believe that Martin Luther King, Jr. was right when he spoke of the arc of the moral universe bending towards justice. Even though it is slow and long, it is still happening.

My hopeful image might seem sanitized — slavery isn’t over, for example, it’s just taking other forms like incarceration — and I don’t mean it to be so. Clearly, there is much work to do. But for me, at least, when it comes to hope, the power lies in the simplicity even as I hold all the nuance and complexities of reality in mind as well.

Another example is when we hold the humanity of everyone as sacred, despite any of the complex or nuanced details of their lives, actions, values, and dreams.

Things are being broken right now, suddenly and quickly, some of which have been breaking for some time already: our relationships with each other; our willingness to tolerate discomfort; our institutions and organizations and structures that uphold patriarchy, white supremacy, capitalism, and elitism; our trust in politicians; and our Earth’s climate. This is a time of intense upheaval and significant change, much of which we want to resist, deny, or prevent. To be clear, we must resist, deny, and prevent much of what the oligarchy and autocrats are attempting to do. We must do what we can to limit the harm done to our communities and to all of the life on Earth.

And.

While we consider which things are worth preserving or rebuilding, I would invite each of you to see this time (and the many years that come after this) as an opportunity to build the world we want to live in. Dream of what that world could look like. Share your dream with others. Start building those dreams in the ways in which we connect with each other, in the ways in which we build community, in the ways in which we support each other and honor each others’ humanity. This work can happen simultaneously with the resistance work, and must, in order to start filling the void left by the destruction to make a smoother path for the train.

I recently finished reading The Women by Kristin Hannah, which I highly recommend. It’s about nurses in the Vietnam War and it was so impactful on me partially because I needed to be reminded how divided the country was then (not very long ago!), how much upheaval and unrest and violence there was, how challenging it was to live during that time. Our time now is not the same and there are still similarities that can inform us. This is not the first time our country has faced significant challenges. Good things will come out of this and we must start building and planning for the new world we create after this particular moment has passed. Because it will pass.

Do not despair. Grieve, let the pain and fear and anger flow through you. Do not let it consume you. Use it to fuel your determination to fight and to rest. Remember that caregiving and community building is all part of this work. Everything you are doing matters and counts. Do not let the narratives of “never doing enough” prevent you from contributing. Those are capitalist narratives that make us feel like we are worthless if we are resting, we are negligent if we take care of ourselves, we are unproductive if we are not doing all the things.

Make space for healing. For grief. For dreaming. For connecting.

I have diversified my news sources lately and I’d love to hear about any of your new favorites. Some of my essentials are now truthout, Prism, Waging Nonviolence, and The 19th. Whatever sources you use, maintain a critical eye for what the publication wants from you (more panic = more eyeballs = more ad revenue) and who owns them and who controls their perspective. Sources I have formerly relied on have been compromised.

The employees of our local grocery store chain are on strike. Unions may be one of the most powerful ways for democracy to survive and thrive. Find ways to support union activity in your community, at your workplace, in your purchasing decisions. Make sure that your unlearning includes understanding class in this country and how it, like race, has been used to divide and control us (some resources below).

One of the ways we have power is to be thoughtful about how we talk about things that are happening and things we want to change. For example, this guide on Dismantling Antisemitism is very clear about the power of words and the intersections of many forms of oppression and how important it is to recognize those connections. ASO Communications has messaging guides for many topics. I’d like to call your attention to “Here to Stay: How to Talk About MAGA’s Authoritarian Agenda on Immigration” as an example.

If you’d like some additional resources to help inform or inspire you, here they are:

- David Dean is a great person to follow, particularly this post about the Race-Class Narrative

- Valarie Kaur’s latest book, Sage Warrior and her Revolutionary Love Toolkit (focused on the LA fires, but relevant for any crisis)

- Jennifer Harvey’s latest book, Antiracism as Daily Practice

- Loretta J Ross’s latest book, Calling In: How to Start Making Change with Those You’d Rather Cancel

- An article about people who have recovered from being conspiracy theorists and what helped them out of the rabbit hole

- Dorcas Cheng-Tozun’s latest book, Social Justice for the Sensitive Soul

- Heather Cox Richardson is my go-to person for historical context of what is happening. She wrote about historical events in our country that challenged us on July 28, 2024. She wrote about Obama’s argument for pluralism, to connect over what we have in common, on December 7, 2024.

- Normalize Grief shares writing prompts for processing your feelings and understanding grief.

- Sarah Jaffe’s latest book, From the Ashes: Grief and Revolution in a World on Fire

- Garrett Bucks and his confident belief in community building include an article about what would happen if the most caring members of your community all knew each other. Another about how to love your neighbors when your houses are on fire (about the recent LA fires). And another about Bishop Budde’s message of mercy.

- The Indivisible Guide

- Derek Seidman’s article about the larger system of corporate rule laid bare by the UnitedHealthcare CEO’s killing and how collective resistance campaigns can help.

- Cherise Morris’s article about the need to connect anti-racism and class-consciousness into building stronger coalitions for change.

- Kelly Hayes’s article about showing up for each other and allowing our friends to make mistakes and not confuse them with our enemies. She also wrote about how to refuse fascism and a podcast about how our relationships are how we move forward.

- David Bacon’s article, “A Working-Class History of Fighting Deportations”

- A guide called “Looking for what to do? Some Actions to Stop Authoritarianism”

- One of my favorite organizations, White Awake, has changed its name to Comrades Education. Check out their new offerings.

- A reminder from adrienne maree brown that “it is our turn to carry the world”

Find a path of resistance that works for you, build your relationships and connections to people in your community, grieve and hope. You are not alone.

Emily
Listen. Amplify. Follow. In Solidarity.

Bolster Your Energy

Hi Friends,

I hope this holiday season you can take an intentional moment to look at the sky, the moon, a bird flying overhead, a squirrel chattering in a tree, anything to take you out of the whirlwind of this time of year and into something bigger and calmer around you.

I’m not going to ask more of you right now because I know your plate is already too full. I do want to share some resources and encouragement for when you find a quiet moment or need a gentle arm around your shoulders, to feel less alone in so much uncertainty and overwhelm.

I do want to take a moment to acknowledge two things that are keeping my attention right now.

First, while traditions and holiday celebrations can be rooting and joyful and a way to connect with others, when they become such a burden that you lose yourself or you just can’t wait for them to be over, notice that. All of these things that we do are made up — some for good reasons, some less so — and we get to CHOOSE what we do, what we keep, what we let go of. Please consider your values (not just others’ expectations) and make conscious choices about what you do and do not do with your time and energy.

And I don’t mean this as one of those trite “self-care during the holidays” messages. My hope for you with the new year (or because it’s Saturday, whatever), is that you take the time to set some intentions about what you value and how you are going to live into your values going forward. Not because our capitalist society said so or because you feel obligated by patriarchal norms, but because you see the systemic oppression all around us and you are pushing back against the “rules” that other people have created to keep us divided, in competition, and apart from each other. See the structures around you and choose what you comply with or resist, with eyes wide open.

The second thing is the underlying current of grief that I feel, especially during this time of year when we are bombarded by messages of togetherness and love and consumerism. There are many people for whom the holidays are particularly challenging because they have recently lost loved ones, because they are not living the life they thought they would be, because they can’t afford the gifts they want to give, because they are chronically ill, because they are unhoused, because they just got laid off, because of so many things that don’t magically get solved because it’s the holiday season.

The contrast between the social messaging we receive (everyone is joyful and kind to each other!) and the reality that we do not yet take care of each other enough as a society, as a country, is jarring to me. I keep this feeling close to my heart because I would rather feel the pain and grief of reality than to pretend that everything is fine and I just need to smile and buy more stuff.

If your grief has turned to despair, take heart in Clarissa Pinkola Estés’s “Letter to a Young Activist in Troubled Times” (originally written in 2001). Please also check out a recent offering from David Dean called “Solidarity in the Face of MAGA” that I highly recommend.

If you’re looking for organizations doing the work of building the world we want to live in and for uplifting and empowering news, please check these out:
- The Redress Movement
- The Revolutionary Love Project (for an example, check out this update from November 2024)
- Indivisible and their “Practical Guide to Democracy on the Brink”
- This article on Truthout from Mark Engler & Paul Engler of Waging Nonviolence and this article about ways to be prepared.
- This article about ways communities affected by Hurricane Helene are rebuilding and supporting each other.
- For a deeper dive, check out this interview with Cornell West.
- And especially for those who are parents or caregivers, check out this interview with Maya Schenwar and Kim Wilson about their book, We Grow the World Together: Parenting Toward Abolition.

And, a quick reminder that my new endeavor, Reconciling Our Roots, is taking new clients!

Sending love,
Emily

Listen. Amplify. Follow. In Solidarity. 

Elitism, Precariousness, and Resisting Hate

Hi Friends,

Once again, I am likely one of many messages you’re reading about the election last week and the multitude of feelings we’re grappling with as we understand how this could have happened. Like many in my own news feed, I am not interested in hot takes or blame games or anything else that feels petty and unrooted and surface-level. So, I have been seeking depth and humanity and compassion.

This is not to say that I’m not worried or fearful or angry or numb. However, because I know that our ability to survive hardship, whether it is social upheaval or natural disasters, is strongest when we are part of a connected community, that is my focus. I am most concerned about our ability to connect with each other, our ability to work together, and our tendencies to cancel each other when we disagree, that I am exploring a path of connection and love.

I am gaining a greater understanding of the ways in which our political systems are not serving a majority of Americans and how experiences of being dismissed, tokenized, and/or ignored can lead to dangerous political choices. I am seeing more clearly how elitism in American politics by both major political parties has alienated so many people AND continues to divide us from working with each other and seeing each others’ humanity.

We are being intentionally divided from each other, and our individual tendencies to sever relationships over voting choices is playing into these efforts. We are being encouraged to hate each other, to see each other as less than human, for our voting choices, for our lived experiences, for our desires to belong and to be included and valued and heard. Overcoming this division is the way we survive whatever is coming.

This is likely skimming the surface, but what Karen Tumulty shared in The Washington Post resonated with me:

“But I think the main thing that happened Tuesday was an expression of frustration and impatience with a political system so wrapped up in itself that it no longer hears the concerns of ordinary Americans, much less addresses them. For too long, Democrats have been in thrall to their educated, affluent elite. They denied that there was chaos at the border, until the impact began to be felt in blue cities. They told less fortunate people that they were imagining the economic stresses in their lives; the statistics, after all, said otherwise. They kept businesses and schools under lockdown during the pandemic, taking a toll on the working class and their children that will not be overcome for years, maybe decades. They refused to see past group identity — race, gender, sexual orientation — to individual circumstance.”

It is worth noting that while the US economy has improved in drastic ways by many measures, these improvements were not felt by a significant portion of Americans. Lyz Lenz called this out in her blog last May, “But it’s more than just the price of groceries and the financial hole we are all crawling out of. It’s that everything is so precarious. We are like spiders floating over the edge of a cliff. One small gust of wind and we are gone. One medical tragedy, one unexpected pregnancy or hospitalization, one bad diagnosis, one car accident, and the detente between us and our finances goes out the window.”

She goes on to say that “The economy is doing well for people who can afford to put money in the stock market, who can buy homes, who don’t have to check over their receipts at the grocery store or the gas station, who are lucky enough to hold the kinds of jobs that help pay for health care (and allow time off to access it). For everyone else, ‘Actually, the key economic indicators show you are wrong’ is not a convincing argument or a helpful one.”

Chris Walker’s article in Truthout points out that “The stock market, of course, is not a proper indicator of how well the economy is doing, especially for the half of all households in the U.S. whose members do not own any stock, including 401K retirement plans, and are therefore not impacted by positive performances on Wall Street the same way the ultra-rich are.”

The economic disparities in our country are having impacts across our lives, including in the ways we vote, in the ways we want to be valued, and in the compromises we are tired of making for little actual progress. We cannot discount the lived experiences of so many Americans and the validity of their concerns and desires, even as we know that the incoming administration threatens so many of us.

Alberto Toscano’s thoughts in In These Times are relevant as well: “In a deeply unequal society in which most peoples’ everyday life is wracked by precariousness, anxiety, debt or inflation, the forces of authoritarian populism always have an advantage. Making the vulnerable responsible for the hardships of the many or stigmatizing some elites to enshrine ever greater inequality is an old game.”

The biggest question in my head right now is how to build solidarity and connection in my community. How do I reach out with love in my heart to understand my neighbors and learn about what they worry about most and work together to address those concerns?

Garrett Bucks from Barnraisers shared a thought-provoking scenario — “What if the most caring members of your community all knew each other?” Can you identify any of these people in your community? Do they know each other? Are you the person who can connect them?

Bucks continues: “When I imagine the networks we have to build in every single American community at this moment in time, I don’t just want to re-create the same activist clubhouses over and over again. I do, in fact, want to look for the helpers, because that advice isn’t just a Mister Rogers cliche. ‘The helpers’ don’t exist merely as abstract reminders of human kindness; they’re the actual people who we need to connect together if we have any hope of digging out of this cursed political moment.”

If we believe that, as Bucks says, “We have everybody that we need already. We just need to find each other,” what role can you play in making those connections? Please revisit the Social Change Map if you’re unsure about your strengths and where you are most needed. Reach out to me if you want to explore the ways you want to show up in this movement.

I am encouraged by Valarie Kaur’s message about “The Long Labor” — “We need to hold fast to each other in the dark, now more than ever.” She continues, “And in our hardest moments we will remember: In every turn through the cycle of human history, people have been thrown in the darkness. And they have a choice — we have a choice: Do I succumb to my despair, or dare lift my gaze and sing a song of love? Do I free only myself, or do I refuse to leave anyone behind?” Building and maintaining relationships with each other is hard, even when we love each other. Fortify yourself with your connections, rest when you need it, plan for the long road ahead.

Please remember the important role of grief and mourning as we move towards action. As Nicole at Reimagined shared, using grief and mourning can be resistance: “The process of acknowledging and processing grief has the capacity to change much about who we are, and what we know about ourselves. And that’s true on a collective level, too. Many of the moments that have shaped policy, shifted institutions, and reshaped communities were sparked by loss — the deaths of everyday people and political figures, the heartbreaks in mass shootings, the turmoil of elections lost. Without giving them space to be seen, felt and acknowledged, we couldn’t transform today to tomorrow.”

Take care of yourselves, breathe and push, pause before severing a relationship that has been meaningful to you in the past, resist hate, and find your role in your community. You are needed.

Emily

Listen. Amplify. Follow. In Solidarity.