Hi,  Earlier this year, I had a period where all I read was Brené Brown.  I feel... not great about this. But I think at the heart of a lot of what she says that I find compelling is that shame is not that helpful, and keeps us from doing what we are most useful for — the things we actually want to do when we are our best selves. she says it in a way that, for better or worse, reaches a lot of people who otherwise are not engaging with their emotions. This is not me making a lot of assumptions about who watched her TED talk: we know this because everyone who comments on that freaking video writes THANK YOU I NEVER THOUGHT ABOUT THIS BEFORE.   Of course, where Brene falls short is on the things that we need to do to heal from our own experiences of how oppression shows up in our lives + worlds. Or really, when it comes to any complicated unpacking of white supremacy, capitalism, or other intersection of oppression. Or even, what do you do to survive the end of the world?  “Does this exist for social justice work?” I would ask people, “with a different vibe maybe? A little less wine mom and a little more… I don’t know, deal with your trauma and your burn out?”  Of course.... it does. It’s called cultural somatics.  My Grandmother’s Hands: Racial Trauma and the Pathway to Mending Our Hearts and Bodies, Prentiss Hemphill, and most notably maybe, adrienne maree brown (Sci fi writer + cultural somatics practitioner). Who literally has a podcast called how to survive the end of the world.  Of course, all of these writers bring lots of nuance to this work. My grandmothers hands in particular has a very large section on “law enforcement bodies.” I am interested in how this author writes about this now in 2020. And no, I havent listened to the on being episode abt it.  I had read things by adrienne maree brown before — but for whatever reason, it didn’t land. It felt abstract, intangible, not necessarily like some thing I could visualize in my own day today. Maybe it was me, my burn out level, my inability to slow down, my own internalized white supremacy. Maybe it just… wasn’t the right time.  But while I’ve been on hold a lot with the SBA, I listened to an interview w adrienne maree brown about why this work matters to her + what it means in the pandemic.  maybe you will like it. Maybe not. Maybe you’ve been a diehard fan forever, and this is all old news to you.   Either way I am grateful for people working hard to change how we experience and interact with each other for the better, towards a different type of society, and even more grateful that I am finally in a place where I can hear what they’re saying.   Stay safe, h  PS — heres the interview — https://open.spotify.com/episode/7HJzEhki2RUIwj8VRassxu?si=DIsej91nTamt9xCBnfy5xA