we can be there for each other, in spite of being told otherwise. we don’t have fend for ourselves in this capitalist world. we can be there for each other.
1. remember being a child and the challenges that came with being small and relying on others. this is our common ground in the reality of oppression. we were all once small, we were all once told to obey in some way and although we are programmed to forget where we once came, our skin wrinkles will replay how age is our common thread of oppression. meanwhile in the in-between of youth and Elder, our bodies remember.
2. deprioritize pride. make your need to love greater than your need to be right. choose solidarity over notoriety.
3. make room in your body for the uncomfortable, and if you hear it demanding for you to return to not seeing the truth; calm it with revolution stories of surviving. survival stories of the people who you may know from your bloodline. they fought and some vowed to pass on to their kin story in hope to not repeat the horror of the past. that fight still makes you. calm the uncomfortable with lullabies of hope songs, you are meant to liberate yourself from the programming of oppression and assist liberation struggles. choose solidarity over notoriety. it is not your struggle always but if it is your privilege then see it as a responsibility to solidarity.
4. listen to the sadness and anger: even if it means you do not understand, listen. feel how the words sting the parts of your body that holds privilege like a prize, feel how the words make your tension rise and see this is a sign of forgiving yourself for believing that liberation ever meant telling others how to make it comfortable for you. if we are in this together, we gotta feel the sadness and anger and let it be as real as the love.
5. practice believing before denying: practice believing. go back to number 1, the time we were children and believed what we were told because it was part of growing. believe again. hear people when they say they are forgotten that by their skin, their size, their disability, their undocumented status, they are forgotten. believe them when they say that playing nice is just playing invisible, that our bodies are used to boost egos and prove supremacy, believe them, believe us, believe me.
6. celebrate the small victories because there is plenty of hurt, there is plenty of anger, there is plenty of sadness and reasons to give up. and if you placed hope on one side and reasons to give up on the other, you would have given up a long time ago. so celebrate your survival, treat yourself like a gift. stop the hope genocide, see yourself and your skin, your kin as enough. replace hope scarcity with abundance. remember that you pass your dreams to your kin and if you don’t believe, will we ever be free?
7. forgive yourself: because using guilt to motivate change only works for so long and healing begins with forgiveness.
8. choose solidarity over notoriety: being there for each other shouldn’t require fame or awards. think of the work that goes unnoticed, the people whose work is underpaid or devalued. choose solidarity over notoriety.
9. identify with privileges in the same passion as your oppressions. hold onto them for the learning and opportunities they have for you to create change.
10. we can be there for each other, in spite of being told otherwise. we don’t have fend for ourselves in this capitalist world. we can be there for each other.
(Originally published in Mountains of A Different Kind chapbook)
1. remember being a child and the challenges that came with being small and relying on others. this is our common ground in the reality of oppression. we were all once small, we were all once told to obey in some way and although we are programmed to forget where we once came, our skin wrinkles will replay how age is our common thread of oppression. meanwhile in the in-between of youth and Elder, our bodies remember.
2. deprioritize pride. make your need to love greater than your need to be right. choose solidarity over notoriety.
3. make room in your body for the uncomfortable, and if you hear it demanding for you to return to not seeing the truth; calm it with revolution stories of surviving. survival stories of the people who you may know from your bloodline. they fought and some vowed to pass on to their kin story in hope to not repeat the horror of the past. that fight still makes you. calm the uncomfortable with lullabies of hope songs, you are meant to liberate yourself from the programming of oppression and assist liberation struggles. choose solidarity over notoriety. it is not your struggle always but if it is your privilege then see it as a responsibility to solidarity.
4. listen to the sadness and anger: even if it means you do not understand, listen. feel how the words sting the parts of your body that holds privilege like a prize, feel how the words make your tension rise and see this is a sign of forgiving yourself for believing that liberation ever meant telling others how to make it comfortable for you. if we are in this together, we gotta feel the sadness and anger and let it be as real as the love.
5. practice believing before denying: practice believing. go back to number 1, the time we were children and believed what we were told because it was part of growing. believe again. hear people when they say they are forgotten that by their skin, their size, their disability, their undocumented status, they are forgotten. believe them when they say that playing nice is just playing invisible, that our bodies are used to boost egos and prove supremacy, believe them, believe us, believe me.
6. celebrate the small victories because there is plenty of hurt, there is plenty of anger, there is plenty of sadness and reasons to give up. and if you placed hope on one side and reasons to give up on the other, you would have given up a long time ago. so celebrate your survival, treat yourself like a gift. stop the hope genocide, see yourself and your skin, your kin as enough. replace hope scarcity with abundance. remember that you pass your dreams to your kin and if you don’t believe, will we ever be free?
7. forgive yourself: because using guilt to motivate change only works for so long and healing begins with forgiveness.
8. choose solidarity over notoriety: being there for each other shouldn’t require fame or awards. think of the work that goes unnoticed, the people whose work is underpaid or devalued. choose solidarity over notoriety.
9. identify with privileges in the same passion as your oppressions. hold onto them for the learning and opportunities they have for you to create change.
10. we can be there for each other, in spite of being told otherwise. we don’t have fend for ourselves in this capitalist world. we can be there for each other.
(Originally published in Mountains of A Different Kind chapbook)