Embracing Grief & Repair as part of our Holiday Celebrations
I wanted to share a bit about some practices I will be engaging with next week to honor the holiday. I share these thoughts & resources in loving service- if they do not feel supportive or aligned for you, please feel free to stop reading and take care of yourself.
This year, I am leaning into my sadness and grief about the restrictions around gathering with family and friends (one of my favorite things to do). Sometimes, I feel a strong sense of urgency to escape the sadness and grief, and I notice myself trying to avoid it. Sometimes it takes everything I’ve got to sit with it. I feel similar feelings of escapism and avoidance when I encounter knowledge and remembering of the devastating impact of colonialism on native populations on Turtle Island (a name that some Native American tribes call what we now call America/the US) and around the world. I’ve made a commitment to myself to recognize that these patterns of freezing, avoiding, and escapism are qualities of white supremacy culture (and a privilege afforded to me by my whiteness), and that they are a critical part of the cycles of harm towards BIPOC folx and communities, and in turn, towards myself, as these patterns keep me from accessing wholeness. I am committed to lovingly and tenderly unfreezing around these difficult topics and emotions, and learning how to be patient and gentle with myself as I face painful emotions related to my current life, my ancestry, and the legacy of white supremacy culture I am swimming in.
My partner, my child and I will be spending some time this Thursday in ritual to recognize and remember the historical and present-day devastation and genocide of Indigenous lives and ways of life that happen alongside the advantages, privileges, expectations (entitlement), and ease of access that I and my family have to our relationship to home, land, safety, and freedom. We will also spend some time next week articulating and documenting our family’s plan for reparations (immediate/ongoing & long-term visions) as descendants of white settlers on this land who are presently housed, educated, employed, safe, and financially secure. I am reminded of this sentiment- crafted by a group of Aboriginal rights activist group in Queensland, Australia in the 1970's: "If you have come to help me you are wasting your time. But if you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us work together.”
And, we will celebrate! But with such deep social restrictions, what is there to celebrate? Well, so much, in fact.
White folx: In your rituals//celebrations this week- you may consider that this upcoming holiday can be an opportunity to envision and create, for yourself/family/community, new culture around this internal, national, and global conflict (of white supremacy & colonialization, and the pandemic) that we face. Lack of culture is a defining feature of white supremacy. That's why its called "white supremacy culture". We all have indigenous (definition: of/relating to land or place, native) roots, some more recent or more accessible than others. Instead of shaming/denying/blocking/punishing BIPOC for access to their own indigenous roots (then stealing them); how can we reclaim culture, and CREATE culture, so that we do not feel like we need to appropriate others' cultures to find meaning and connection? With your self, your family, and whoever you’re spending this holiday with, consider and talk about small (and big) ways that you and your family or community experience, create, and celebrate culture that are non-exploitative and non-appropriative- and celebrate those! For me, this includes cooking & eating, making sourdough bread, bone broth, sauerkraut, & yogurt, dancing & moving my body in tune to its own rhythms, walking in the woods, building fires for warmth and fairy houses for wonder, laughing, crying/grieving, collecting interesting stones, magic, singing & sounding, listening & intuition practices, gratitude, resting, playing with my child, intimacy & snuggling, self-massage, plant medicine, bathing…. the list goes on!
Facing and reckoning with the legacy of destruction and devastation of colonization, white settler-ism and WSC is overwhelming for sure. And this is not something we can unravel in one day. I invite you to consider one way that you can practice embracing the pain and constriction of your current experience- with love and tenderness- and one way that you can learn about - and one way you can ACT- in solidarity with Indigenous struggle and resistance for LIBERATION.
Below I have listed some ideas and resources, to spark this exploration. I am currently living (and I own land) on unceded Sokoki/Ozogwakiak Abenaki territory, so some of the resources below are focused on this native/INDIGENOUS origin of my community.
"Teaching our Culture" - a resource to learn more about Abenaki history
Abenaki Artist Association- a resource to connect, learn about, and support Abenaki artists
Elnu Abenaki Tribe - a site for the Southern VT Elnu Abenaki Tribe
Thanksgiving is a Time for Reparations: Article by Winona LaDuke from 2019
LANDBACK: Landback is an initiative to cede/seed land back to Indigenous peoples and communities
Land Reparations by John Stoesz
Research and try out naming the Indigenous origins of the land you are on- for me, I am practicing saying that I live on (and own!) "unceded Sokoki Abenaki land" (southern Vermont)
Practice ABUNDANCE mentality when activated into SCARCITY mentality (for me, this happens daily). When faced with the fear response of scarcity thinking (also known as "either/or thinking", “right/wrong thinking”), consider affirmations of abundance ("I belong here and so do every body who is here". "There is enough space for all of us". “I can honor my feelings.”) Consider the possibilities of being loving and gentle and honest with yourself, instead of shaming and blaming yourself, as you awaken to and reckon with this reality.
Consider, honor, and celebrate some indigenous, non-appropriative practice/rituals that you already have in your life, and/or ones you'd like to grow.
Cave at the Center of your Heart- a 15 minute guided meditation (in my voice) intended to support nervous system regulation/“drop” & to practice holding parts of yourself/difficult emotions in love & tenderness.
<3 With Great Heart <3
Emily