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I know nothing beyond my own experience
And trusting others when they share theirs is how I learn and grow with them.
There is so much to take in around the world right now.
There is a global grief we’re not addressing. Instead of grieving, we sit in this collective feeling like we’re not doing enough - feeling guilty and powerless. And, I don't think we are.
What we're witnessing in Palestine, Sudan, Congo, Ukraine, Myanmar, Armenia, Syria, and Hawaii. The conflict and heartbreak has been constant. In Palestine, 14,000 children have been killed since October 7th.
It's not just global strife. In Florida, education and books discussing race, genocide, colonization and slavery continue to be banned. And, history continues to be whitewashed and rewritten. There's an erasure of trauma and truth. Because, lawmakers say children (white children) will feel guilty about the crimes of our ancestors.
In reality, I think it’s their own guilt they want to avoid. Because the systems still benefit white Americans.
I know I benefit from a system that harms and has harmed people, here and around the world.
And you know what I did with that knowing, that privilege, that guilt, that grief, what I do with it… I allow it to change me.
I allow the events I’m witnessing and learning about to change the way I live.
When emotion is evoked, we can run away from it or dive into the lessons it offers us.
We are conditioned to avoid heavier emotions, especially grief.
And, the thing about change is that it requires grief. It requires grieving.
Processing rage requires grieving. Processing shame requires grieving. Guilt, disappointment, anguish, betrayal all require grieving. Grief is a powerful agent of change.
Whatever that process looks like for each of us, we have to move through the emotional experience and learn from it. For me, that process is meditation, somatics, and breathwork. The result is I cry it out.
For a long time, especially as a raging teen, I thought that if I let the emotion go, I was betraying what I’ve learned and experienced.
But, you can retain what you learn and let the emotions go. As the emotions leave, the wisdom stays and the conviction strengthens. And, you can move forward stronger.
You can honor the experience more in letting it go and letting it change you.
When we accumulate too much heaviness, we can fall into despair, depression, and hopelessness. In turn, we turn to addictions, distractions, salves and sedation to soothe our emotional state. This cycle is what perpetuates the lack of change in the world.
The corruption and cruelty of this system is sustained by a lack of feeling. There is enough space to move through the emotions of our personal experiences and our collective trauma.
This world needs all of us to realize our power – and reclaim it. I don't mean power in the way we’ve been conditioned to understand; it's not this externally-driven status we have to earn through careers, money, and achievement. True power is how convicted we feel in who we are and what we stand for.
That reclamation allows us to shift into living a purposeful life.
A purposeful life doesn’t mean martyring and sacrificing our dreams. It’s actually the opposite. It means living our dreams. It means sharing what we’ve learned, especially through art and service. It’s about doing what is meaningful to us and being of service to the world.
That is what the world needs from us.
“Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.”
―Howard Thurman
That is the way that we diverge from capitalism, the militarized conflict, the consumerism, the oligarchical patriarchal puritanical systems. And, from the destruction that they create and sustain. It is the way we reclaim what is continually stolen by the imperialistic environments that extort and exploit us and the world’s resources: our autonomy, free will, sovereignty,, joy, and presence.
The children deserve better. We, as children, deserved better. All life on this planet deserves better from us.
Imagine a world that doesn't require so much healing. At some point, we are going to need to get comfortable cleaning up messes we didn't create – while processing our own grief and rage at these situations as we experience them. So those emotions don't swallow us whole, leading us to continue the cycles of apathy and avoidance.
We have to allow ourselves to be changed by what we’ve seen and learned.
Every piece of it can change us.
It’s meaningful and impactful if it changes us.
And, as we change, we can change the world.
Otherwise, we can release the pretense of surprise when history continues to repeat itself.