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Becoming the People Podcast with Prentis Hemphill
From Prentis Hemphill, the host and producer of the Finding Our Way podcast comes a new podcast: Becoming the People.
Prentis is in conversation with the thinkers, creators, and doers who are exploring some of the most relevant questions of our time: What will it take for us to change as a species? How do we create relationships that lead to collective transformation, and what will it take for us to heal?
We hope this podcast helps us uncover the path of how to become the people of our time. Find out more on www.prentishemphill.com
Producers: Prentis Hemphill & devon de Leña
Sound Engineer and Editing: Michael Maine
Original Music by Mayadda
Becoming the People Podcast with Prentis Hemphill
[Bonus] W. Kamau Bell interviews Prentis about What it Takes to Heal
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
In this bonus episode, the seats are turned as W. Kamau Bell interviews Prentis about their book What it Takes to Heal.
These two dig into the complexities of being a middle child, why healing is often dismissed as "soft" or seen as an individualistic pursuit, and make the case that real healing is rooted in community. They also talk candidly about shame versus guilt, actual accountability, and how belonging has to remain intact for real transformation to happen.
This conversation was recorded in July 2024 at the California Institute of Integral Studies - you can watch the full book tour on our Youtube Channel.
Check out Prentis’ book: What It Takes to Heal: How Transforming Ourselves Can Change the World
The Becoming the People Podcast Team:
- Producers: Prentis Hemphill & devon de Leña
- Sound Engineer and Editing: Michael Maine
- Original Music: Mayyadda
Hey everybody, this is Prentice. Um, one thing I wanted to share with you really quickly is that uh some of you may know, some of you may not know, but a couple years ago I had a book come out called What It Takes to Heal, which is a really awesome book that you should still get. And I went on a tour around the country for that book, um, which was wonderful. I got to meet so many people, it was really incredible. And I got to have, importantly, a lot of really great conversations with writers, organizers, artists all over the country about what's inside of that book. And if you weren't there, you just missed it. If you weren't in that city, you didn't get to see it. And now, the ones that we recorded, we are gonna share right here so that you can experience also that book talk. Um, there's so many exciting people that we talk to, too many to really name right here, but we're really um, yeah, looking forward to to sharing this with you, sharing it more broadly, seeing what you think about it. I haven't revisited these in a while, so I'm excited to revisit them with you. Um, but as I'm taking a bit of a break, we're gonna share some of this footage and would love to yeah, hear what you all think and feel um once you hear it. And yeah, what it takes to heal if you haven't gotten it. What what the hell is going on? Please get it. All right, thanks, y'all. See you soon.
SPEAKER_06How was that? Sweet. Okay. Are you used to people cheering when you walk into rooms? No. I think you have to get used to that. It seems like it's gonna happen more and more now that the book is out. Thank you. Thank you. Yes. Um, so first of all, I feel like I your book is amazing. I listened to it. Uh it's hard. I feel like we talked about this. Hard to say I read your book, but I listened to it. So I really know you now. I'm saying what people say to me when they listen to my book. Now I really know you. And I think we have we have a few things in common, some obvious, some not obvious. One of those things is we both seem to have faces that people like to talk at. So you talk about in the book about how even though people you'll sit on a plane, yeah, and people start to divulge personal deep information, yeah, just on a plane ride. Yeah. And if I'm guessing the way I feel, it's like, I'm just trying to get to Detroit, you know. What is it like to be have the gift and maybe the uh curse of having a face that people like to share things with, even though it's your job, but you're not always on duty.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's not the question. I love that question. My my sister talks about it because I have always been like that. Even as a kid, I would just be talking to people and listening, oh, that's so interesting. What about this? What about that? And she's she thought I was pretending for a long time when I was a kid. She'd tease me and she'd be like, You always pretend like you like to listen to people talk. I was like, I actually do like to listen to people talk. I get really curious. I hear a lot of stories, so I think probably it's my curiosity that's coming through my face. But sometimes I am deeply not curious, and I'm trying to be internal and still somehow my face, and I don't have I smile a lot, but you know, I also have a very extreme, serious face, but it doesn't seem to stop anyone from talking to me.
SPEAKER_06No, and I think there's like you said, I think there's something about our faces because I feel the same way that like I've always had this face. Yeah, people have always talked to me about things, yeah. But now that I'm known to talk, people feel it more invited. But then I also find myself in situations where people I know don't know who I am. You're talking about things that happen to you on planes, yeah. And it reminded me of a story that I've never told. I was on a plane one time sitting next to uh the kind of white woman you'd not expect me to get along with. A Fox News white lady.
SPEAKER_03Sure.
SPEAKER_06Not that she was that, I'm just saying that's the kind of person and she was nervous about flying the plane. And before I realized it, we were holding hands. Oh, so I could like help her because I was like, it'll be fine, it'll be fine. Next thing I know, it's like, oh, okay.
SPEAKER_00That's quite profound. Yeah, so yeah.
SPEAKER_06So I just think there's I just realized there's something about me and you, yeah, where people just feel like I can be close to this person, yeah. With in in even the even if it's not a person that I that you would think I would want to be close to.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it seems to surprise them sometimes. People be like, I don't know why. I've never told anybody this. I don't know why you're doing it either, but here we are.
SPEAKER_06Does any of do you think some of that comes from because you also write about uh being a middle child?
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_06Does any of that come from being a middle child and being in a position of having to listen and having to sort of like navigate, you know, that middle space?
SPEAKER_00Probably. Probably. I think I think being a middle child, being a queer middle child, I think there's all there's kind of a bridge thing about my way of being and my personality. I always feel um like I can relate to people across a lot of differences. I don't assume that I can't relate to a lot of people. Even when I travel, I don't assume that I can't relate to people. And then I always end up making a friend.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00My partner always talks about whenever we live somewhere, we go somewhere, I always find a coffee shop and make a friend. I'm always I will sit in a coffee shop and I will make like a lifelong buddy. Um yeah, and I think that has something to do with being a male child. But a male child also to me is I'm both the person that listened and the one that kind of said the thing that no one wanted to be said. I'm like, shut up. Why are you why are you saying that? So it's it's that experience too.
SPEAKER_06Uh this question is selfish for me. The rest of these are for you, but this one's just for me. Uh I had I'm an only child, which I have like I loved being an only child when only children are like, I wish I had, I don't relate to any of that. I wish I'd had I didn't wish I had nobody. I currently live in a house with too many people. I have three daughters and my wife. So that's like it's five people. When I was growing up, it was just me and my mom.
SPEAKER_03Right.
SPEAKER_06Uh, and so I had my daughter, I have three daughters, one of whom is a middle child.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_06What advice can you give to my middle child? So you thought it was gonna be easy. You thought.
SPEAKER_00Well, I also have advice for the parents of a middle child.
SPEAKER_06I'll take that too. I'll take that too.
SPEAKER_00Which is listen to them, listen to them, and give them space to be themselves and acknowledge the specialness of their space. So I think that's what I longed for as a middle child to be like, oh, you're a middle child. The attention is always kind of like shifting away from you. Um, I want to give you space. So I would mostly give that to the parents. I think to a middle child, you know, I the thing I'm learning as I get older is is how many concessions I make. I was just having this conversation with my partner about who in our house, like who who can have the office? Like who's gonna she's like she's in, she's I hope she's not watching this.
SPEAKER_06She's not, she's not, she's not. She definitely is.
SPEAKER_00Um but I turn this part off. Yeah. But as a middle child, I think I'm always like, no, no, no, no, you do that. And then I'm like, you know. Um, so learning to be like, no, I I want to take up space and I don't have to kind of concede it as something I'm still learning. So take up more space, take up more space, and then as a parent, allow more space to be taken.
SPEAKER_06Well, it's interesting because as an only child, I feel like I relate to my middle child because I'm like, I had the exact opposite experience you had.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_06So I so when you feel like there's nobody's like you're not you don't have enough space, I can be like, you don't have enough space. Right. I used to have all the space. Like I had every ounce of I I see what so it's not in your head. I sort of often like there, no, no, no, you're you're feeling correctly. That's right. There are other ways to be, and you and you and and let's take a walk. Yeah. And get away from all these people. That's lovely that you can see that. Yeah. No, I think it's uh we well, to be fair, also I call my middle child Kamal Jr. That's just a thing we do. Uh because we both brood. Uh so thank you, one person. Um it's appreciated. Yeah, no, I like to acknowledge the one laugh. I'm gonna read you a text I got from a friend of mine and see what your response is about this event. This is all mostly about meeting. This is hilarious. I told you it'd be different. I'm into it. Let's go. So, my friend Yolanda, you know Yolanda Hippostillo? Yeah, I do.
SPEAKER_00Hi, Yolanda.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, uh, so I got a text from Yolanda. I love that you're interviewing Princess tonight at CIIS, and I wish I could be there. She's not here. Uh, and then she said, kind of surprised to see you in the touchy feely somatics orbit, though. And then this emoji. And then it says, New jam, two question marks. Oh, what did I get myself into here? So, first of all, for people, since there's not a lot of people from this school, I feel like it would be helpful for me. I'll put myself on the line to say what is somatics by definition, and then what is it for you? Sure.
SPEAKER_00How many people here are therapists? That increase the number of hands. Okay, great. How many people know what somatics is? Oh, well, yeah, because you're like, why else would I be here?
SPEAKER_06For the record, there are a few people whose hands did not go up.
SPEAKER_00So yeah, yeah, for sure. Um wow, you know, I I always say I've been doing this work for so long and it never gets easier to talk about. And I I think in part that's because of what we're talking about is so obscured in the world that we live in, and is also trying to give language to something that is almost unlanguageable in a way. Um, but we can start with somatics, which to me is um uh a canon really of practice and thought and uh teachings that uh are about understanding the body. You know, Thomas Hanna, who kind of coined the term somatics, used this soma, the Greek word for the body in its wholeness, to talk about our bodies not as kind of just these fleshy instruments that walk our brains around for our lives that we try to make pretty or try, you know, use our bodies to do things, but the body as a a whole place that we are and live from, that we act from, that we feel from, that we interpret from, that we're created from, the body as um flesh and bones and and everything and ideas and all of this. So think about the body more broadly and all these practices that bring us more deeply into our feeling, our felt sense, that because our bodies can carry our stories, they carry our histories, our bodies sort of shape to our stories in a way. You know, we we come in the world with bodies, our bodies we have very different bodies, and our bodies are also then shaped by the things we experience. And so we can uh carry stories through our behaviors, through the things we do and don't do. Um, I talk about with folks that I've worked with the way you might move your mouth or the way you move your hands, what you think is possible. Like how wide can I move, how small do I need to move? All of these things are um can be shaped by the experiences we have. And trauma is one of those things that can also um inform how we live inside of our bodies. So somatics is a whole host of I mean, there's dance and somatics, there's neuroscience and somatics, but kind of interrogating what a lot of us call this mind-body split, which I don't, I don't really use that language. And to me, you know, I use more the term embodiment these days because um I love somatics and everything that has kind of been cultivated and created inside of somatics. But I also think this piece around culture and where we come from, you know, when I really look at culture and all the things we do, dance and and sing and eat and love and worship and rejoice and all of these practices and rituals and ceremonies that humans have done across time. To me, that is what embodiment or somatics is. People are uh have created rituals or use the technology of rituals and practice over time to move things through their individual and collective bodies, to ready themselves for transition, for seasons changing, for birth and death, that we've always done these things. But we what we call the mind-body split to me, I say it all the time, a mind-body split to me is just a kind of enforced way of living in our bodies, to um say that feeling, emotions, uh, sensations are less important than what we can think or produce. And that that causes us, and that kind of societal way of being, causes us to be in our bodies and in our lives in particular ways, to discount what we feel and to discount what others feels, others feel, and that a lot of domination and exploitation is really built on the necessity for us not to feel and not to be seated deeply into our bodies, which I think is kind of the beginning of sovereignty and liberation. So, in short, that's what schmatics is to me, and I could say a lot more, but that well, we we can get into a lot more.
SPEAKER_06No, I appreciate that. Um so so for me, when I hear that, I think about the ways in which I like I am my body and I feel my body, and I I everything you're saying makes sense to me. And then I think about the ways in which the world often reflects differently who I am in my body, yeah, and how I have to navigate that difference. Yeah, you know, absolutely, yeah, and and so however you feel, like how you feel when you how I feel when I close my eyes and I'm just me, or if I'm in a room by myself, yeah, versus when I'm out in the world, and how people is that a part of this too?
SPEAKER_00Absolutely, and it's an indicator. I mean, that feeling that I think maybe we have in different ways too, is also an indicator that something is deeply wrong.
SPEAKER_06Because wow, that really resonated over here. That was a deep mmm. Almost got churchy. We almost got an amen over there.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, because if and I think that's important information for you to go, oh, this world is actually not constructed in a way that allows me to live safely in my body. Um, it's not the world is not built for me to take a deep breath. The world is not built for my nervous system to settle. That's an indication that something is deeply off. And I think that's you know, to me, I think that is the design of oppression in a way. I think it is a structural thing. And the impact is that certain bodies have to live slightly outside of themselves. And that seems uh deeply troubling.
SPEAKER_06It is deeply troubling to me. It's funny, I was having a conversation with uh uh a black man for the purse of the story. I need to identify his race, although I don't have a problem identifying people's races, it's basically my career. Um but like, and he said, Yeah, like you know how in the pandemic people moved, some people moved to other places, moved away from they found other places to live where they're like, Oh, I don't need to be here anymore, I can be here. And it was a black guy, and he said, Yeah, I actually moved to Utah. And I was like, Good for you. He's like, Why'd you say that? Like every other black person doesn't say good for you when when they say when I say I moved to Utah. I was like, because I envision you having a lot more land and space, yeah, and not having to engage with America the same way you had to engage with it when you were in Los Angeles, yeah, yeah. So I'm like there. That's yeah, not that there's no racism in Utah, right? But you have space, yeah. But you have this, yeah, but you have a buffer between you and the racism. Yeah, which is some money, so I'm like, you probably got a pretty big buffer, right? You know, so yeah.
SPEAKER_00I think that is actually a really important point because a lot of our work and the work that we do with the embodiment institute, you know, there's a for us, embodiment is about being embodied in our physical bodies, but it's also being embodied in relationships. That is a lot of us have to relearn how to be in relationship with one another. And I think we are inherently relationship, we are created through relationship, we are representative of relationship, and that also includes relationship with land and ecosystem. And um, we have a land project where we're actually doing some of this healing work on land and with land in partnership with land. But one of the things, you know, when we first got this piece of land, we had folks come out, and so many folks are like, I haven't actually been on land that I felt like I could relax on ever before. I've been in rural places and I felt like I had to be more on guard. This is one of the first places where I felt like I could settle. And that is a deeply transformative experience, especially for people, all sorts of people have been displaced or been exploited on that particular land, which is where my ancestors come from. So uh that's a part of what we're talking about when we're talking about for me, when we talk about healing or somatics or embodiment, it has to also be thinking about the ways our relationships have been severed and we can't inhabit them in the ways that we might.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, it's we before we came up, we were talking a little about how you used to live in Hawaii, how we had met there years ago. Um and I remember when I first I grew up on the East Coast, so I did not, or Midwest and East Coast, so I didn't go to Hawaii because I wasn't in California. And so when I moved out here, my wife who grew up out here was like we finally went to Hawaii, and I remember going there and feeling like this isn't doing for me what people I didn't feel relaxed and on vacation. There was something about it that I didn't feel like, uh yeah. And then I did a couple of United States of American Hawaii, and the first one we did was about how the land had been stolen and they never agreed to be a state and how native people are exploited. I was like, Oh, that's what I was what you feel, yeah. That's why I couldn't relax because my blackness is too attuned to exploitation, yeah, yeah. And so that idea about the being the land and where you are on the land and whose land it is and what your connection is to the land really resonates with me. And and that's what we were talking about. I wanted to talk to you about that because that's a place that you have lived. And if you I feel like if you're on Hawaii and paying attention at all, you can't help but feel that at every turn. Absolutely, and especially someone who's not who's like you're not from there, but you want to live there and be a part of the community, then you have to be actively letting the community know I'm on the right side of history.
SPEAKER_00Well, you yeah, you gotta show up. I mean, my partner's from Hawaii, which is how I got there in the first place, is I had never been, and then some love happened, and then I was like, oh, okay, well. Um, so I was not one of those people that had fantasized about going. I wasn't like, and then one day I'm gonna go to Hawaii. I had no idea that I would live in Hawaii, and then I did, and I actually felt, I feel um it's actually such a special. I'm going to be there doing a book event next in a week or so, community there. My friends, we organized this event, but it's um a place where I feel so much love and gratitude. It changed me profoundly. And I always felt unsettled, and it felt like that was the way that I was supposed to feel. If I lived there, it's to live with that on and it kept me kind of agitated. And and when I came back here, I was like, oh, this agitation. Um I'm I'm not numb to the agitation as much anymore. Though the history is different here. I mean, my my ancestors, I live in North Carolina, my ancestors are in North Carolina for many generations, a long time. But you can feel the unsettling. But it was it was a place, you know, when I talk about connection to land, every friend that I had, every homie I had had a place where they were in reciprocal relationship to land. They'd be like, Oh yeah, I go here, or I'm here, or I'm at Uncle Such and Such. Everybody had a place where they were working and offering. And if you didn't have a place, it was weird in my social group. You know, it was weird to be like, oh yeah, I don't do anything.
SPEAKER_06I'm just here. Yeah, enjoying it.
SPEAKER_00Unacceptable. Unacceptable.
SPEAKER_06But there's a certain responsibility you have to the land. You have to, yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, uh one of the big things that came out of your book for me, and uh, you know, it's funny, I even when I bring it up, I feel like I want to frame it in the right way. But there's a way in which healing can be seen in certain communities as being soft, yeah.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_06Uh, and how that if you are engaged in healing, somehow that's not a strong practice.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_06That you're seen as like, oh, you you gave up.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_06Or you or you're not really, you're not, you're not hard. Right. You need help.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_06You talk about, and especially writing a book about healing, knowing that there's an audience of people from maybe your community who will read that book and be like, that's not a that's not a strong thing to do, or to or it's or it's a little bit, or it's even like there's ways in which healing uh in this country can become like a whitewashed activity.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. You know, and I think it can be untrustworthy for reasons for a lot of reasons. I think one, where you're pointing to of being hard, it's it's sort of like letting your guard down.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And can I afford to do that? You know, yes, we're making these assessments. Can I actually afford to let my guard down? Um and I think the other part about it being whitewashed is that I think the way that we try to make healing this solely individual thing. You know, that we can experience all these things, all these collective harms and traumas and that individually I'm somehow going to heal the wounds of massive traumas that my ancestors have experienced by myself and I'm going to be able to complete that.
SPEAKER_06I'm the chosen one. Right. Like the Neo Matrix way.
SPEAKER_00Right. And then we just like keep buying things okay I'm going to keep buying maybe this will do it. Maybe this will do it. Maybe this will do it. I need to find the perfect water bottle. Right. Yeah exactly. I think that makes it untrustworthy a lot of times because we can see you know you talk about feeling that unsettled feeling we can go like something's not right about this kind of healing that people are talking about. Something is missing there. So in a way you know I I really trust that suspicion. Because I think the way that we have practiced and conceptualized healing has been in ways that really are easily maintain a certain status quo. And even when I was becoming a therapist I mean it was like the profession was I'm like 85% white women at the psychotherapist level and then it was like 85% white men at the psychologist level. And then you're like hmm who is defining wellness and then they ask why don't black people go to therapy right exactly um so I think it's uh and I think that we can get into these habits around I you know it's not safe to look in or look back um perpetually and so I never will and that's when it becomes like okay now we're actually stuck in our habits and we're stuck in this assessment. And I was there I mean the fact that I am here writing I said the fact that I wrote a book called What It Takes to Heal if we went back 20 years that person would be like are you so for real right now what are you talking about? Yeah I did not want to be soft. I did not want to be vulnerable and I am so squishy soft now. But at the same time when I became softer or I will say when I knew how to soften in the places that I wanted to I actually became much more powerful in other places. So it became this thing that I could there's more flexibility and movement. And you know one of my somatic teachers was a martial artist and he would say to us all the time the most powerful body you have is a relaxed body because from a relaxed body I can do many things. I can do what's appropriate. From a tense body I have a a a a smaller range of things I can do I can only do the thing I'm sort of bracing to do. But from a relaxed body I have a lot more options. So there's something about my softening that made me actually feel much more powerful than the kind of habitual tension I was locked in.
SPEAKER_06I mean do you find it true? I mean or can you talk about the idea that like for a lot of impacted communities which is a word I never thought I would use but I feel like I'm trying to I know what you're saying. Yeah it feels like there's not time to heal because you got to get through the day. You know I gotta I gotta I gotta work this job that isn't paying me enough and go to the other job that's not paying me enough and then get home to take care of my family and put kids you know and da da da da but there's not like you know there's a I mean I've I would put myself in this category I don't got time to meditate. Right. You know what I mean of like I don't have I got I got these three kids you know they don't want to pay for no groceries you know what I mean at all at all at all get no get annoyed when you ask them to kick in for something but like so there's there's a type person who feels like I would love to have the luxury to heal. Right but this system has been designed so I don't have the time to even think about it.
SPEAKER_00Absolutely yeah first that's real I think it's real and I think it's again um designed that that way you know when I talk about oppression is for me the concentration of trauma into certain bodies in certain communities and the removal of the resource of time, space, whatever you might need in order to heal from those same traumas that is the tension we were in. And at the same time there are things that we do and have done that that to me I think that's why it's important to say healing is not the necessarily the expensive retreat you know where you go and have a whatever people be having organic such and such and you know when you go to Hawaii. Right. Yeah yeah um but that healing is also the way that my grandmother touched my back healing is also um gosh I saw this TikTok yesterday of this grandmother just going walking through the field just praying over her whole family she had land I guess their family I don't know the story because it's TikTok yeah but it was 11 seconds I made up a whole story and the story is you wrote a screenplay. I wrote a screenplay starring this person's grandmother but she was um it was their it was land it was their land it was land and she was just praying for her whole family and I was like in in that and I I write too in the book about having a child and how my own experiences growing up kind of moved me away from intimacy and connection with people like when someone would come close to me I'd be like retreat you know and in so many ways I would pull myself back I would kind of harden my eyes tighten my chest I'd move myself away from connection and when I had a child I really wanted to be available for that connection and just in a moment I softened my chest I softened my eyes I left I let myself stay open and kind of trembling under her looking and that stopped the transmission of an intergenerational wound back to the next generation. So I think time is a real consideration and it is we are constrained in that way. And at the same time if we the the for me the reconceptualization of what is actually a healing act to me heal a healing act is connection to me a healing act is bearing witness it's um feeling something that's real and time is a factor and a non-factor in that is both and I I think we have to contend with that complexity it it does take time sometimes for us to circle into presence to drop into presence but once you're in presence that's the thing and it takes no time at all.
SPEAKER_06And certainly I I certainly hear you when I think about like my family and my even my when you say grandmothers like there are ways in which black communities have done healing work and a lot of that was through like this through the church. Yes and not even the church as far as the religion part of it but the community part of it exactly like it was a place to go yeah and to not have to and to sort of be have a community that was not ruled by the system a separate like a separate like a little decompression zone.
SPEAKER_00And it and it was community absolutely and it was the transformative principle at the heart of I mean I think about I grew up going to church and what's the whole premise in in a Christian I grew up in Baptist and Pentecostal churches the whole premise is you can change yes you know yeah yeah you change yeah you're reborn yeah it's a transformative you know alchemizing thing um and I think just having a place where that is possible where we can bring something and change and we can tap into something larger in order to source that transformation and we do that collectively and together that to me is the magic of those spaces that how I've experienced it.
SPEAKER_06Yeah you talk about in the book and I feel like I don't think we went to literally the same church but like the the churches where like there are people who are being affected and yeah suddenly they you know I feel like in my grandmother's church every week some black woman stood up caught the Holy Ghost fall out fell out got carried to the back yeah the fans that had like MLK and JFK on them. Yeah it was old school you are not lying it was before Obama our two black heroes were MLK and JFK oh my gosh yeah but like this this idea that people got taken over and that's somatics. Yes oh I guess I do know what it is then yes you do yeah yeah I mean when I started doing somatic body work I was like oh yeah oh okay we've seen this before yeah we called ourselves when I seen this yeah you fall out or when you just when it hits you it still hits me you might babble a little bit or speak in tones yeah yeah yeah that's embodiment yeah how is it not yeah uh I the one uh one thing I want to definitely talk to you about uh in your book because I feel like we have different ways of looking at this and it's it's I and I would love to talk more about shame as a bad thing. Uh-huh like why is shame bad I don't think I said that but no no no no okay okay what I did say okay I'll say here's my here's my feelings that's what I want to hear yes here's my feelings by shame I and let me be clear I'm always available corrected so I'm not here to say this talking yeah we're just we're just chalking yeah uh I just don't want to feel like I'm not here's what I'm not building a case against you is what I'm saying. If I misunderstood then please tell me that I got a problem uh I feel like shame gets a bad rap sometimes or all the time because people who feel shame then often say you made me feel shame you're shaming me yeah and sometimes I'm like yeah yeah I am like just because what you have done you need to feel that this is a bad thing. Yeah but hopefully thank you again over here hopefully just like any intense emotion it can be a motivating factor for you to do better. Yeah like I'm not saying you should feel shame all the time just like you shouldn't feel anger all the time you shouldn't feel happy all the time. Absolutely but shame like I feel like what we had in this country for a long time specifically thinking about like racism is a lot of white people felt shame. And that meant we could walk a little more free for a little while. Right. And then they were invited to stop feeling shame.
SPEAKER_00Right because it didn't okay so here okay that's important I do think something is happening there around definitions too and how words are changing. And so I think what you're talking about around feeling bad for taking an action and the collective's like that sucked and we don't like it and feeling bad about that I actually don't see anything wrong with that. I think that can be a deeply transformative thing. I think the part around shame is the um absoluting that happens of like you are fundamentally this person that's one element of shame you are fundamentally this kind of person you are fundamentally a bad person. And so while that may coerce people into certain actions for a certain period of time they won't stick because shame ultimately impedes change if I am fundamentally bad then I cannot grow I can't you can't be born again. No, you can't be born again. And in a way you know there's a part of it is that some people will retreat into shame so that they do not have to change also it's a familiar place to go to so I don't use it only as like a neutral like we're shaming and that's bad. I think shame is a place where change cannot happen. That is what if you sit there. Yeah and if we try to if if in how we're like we're trying to create change or make change a course change in someone where we're kind of tugging on your fundamental I mean it's around belonging and exclusion you cannot belong here fundamentally nothing will change. Yeah and I'm not saying I you know I wish it worked in a way I wish it was like yeah I'm gonna say this and then you'll suddenly go right I should change it just doesn't seem to work that way. No no no I haven't seen it work but I do think there's some it's a tension between naming the action being willing to name the action the impact even our our frustration our anger all of that and there has to be a thread of belonging that remains. Yes and sometimes that is really painful for us to allow that thread of belonging because it hurts or it sucks. And so there always has to be that thread of belonging in order I think for the transformation to even be possible doesn't mean that people will do it.
SPEAKER_06It's not a guarantee but it's the only thing that makes it more possible no that makes sense I mean I feel like so I'm of sort of of two minds about it like first of all I have known times in my life where I felt shame but the people the person who was sort of inviting me to my shame hey Kamal your shame's right here has done it in such a way that made me feel like now that I've shown you your shame let me help you get through this. Yeah you know uh one of my best friends I've told the story many times she actually is attending school here right now uh is a person who very key in my life was like you're not doing a good job like your your actions aren't matching yeah your stated goals. Yeah. And I was like I feel shame you must be wrong if I feel shame. Yeah no no no I'm gonna sit here in this kitchen and work you through this. And she did. So I know that like in my life I've seen shame and then there's the other part of shame that is like at least if if a if a person who's doing bad actions feels shame at least for a little while I can get through the world why they are shame. You know what I mean? Yeah yeah absolutely I feel like maybe you know the greatest thing that Martin Luther King Jr did was made some white people feel ashamed.
SPEAKER_00Right. But they made us feel ashamed for a long time too yeah for sure for sure so that they can move through the world in a particular now it's your turn but I but I also recognize that that's not transformative. It's not transformative.
SPEAKER_06But then there are white people like I know there's the group showing up for racial justice which to me feels like you know that group? Yeah of course okay of course sorry yes I do I don't mean to be like what are you talking about um yeah maybe I but the idea of course you're from here but uh the idea that like that to me felt like white people who felt some level of shame about how they were relating to and responsibility yes that's the key part yeah I think they feel responsibility and the um willingness to transform.
SPEAKER_00Yes which yeah I I'm willing to yeah there's some people that use the word shame and then toxic shame to talk about the part that is totalizing. But I think it I think what we're talking feeling guilt or feeling that's so yeah I feel guilt. I feel bad about things I've done I feel shame. Yeah um but I know when I feel like oh I'm not I'm I'm sh I'm I feel so ashamed that I cannot belong I don't actually end up changing anything. Yeah I I feel such shame that I can't move yeah or I can't move through this shame and I say I just don't belong I kind of stay in this freeze state. Yeah and a lot of us feel shame for things that are actually about power you know feel shame for our skin tone our size our hair texture how much money we do or do not don't have um sometimes there there's a that kind of shame that that blankets people like I actually can't belong because of these things because to belong would mean that I were different. So there's there's a way that shame is used as a kind of social um it's like a threat and an organizing principle.
SPEAKER_06Like I mean I feel like one of my big jobs as a parent is to uh teach my kids how to not let other people put things on them yeah. You know what I mean that are like sort of like sort of the idea of like if somebody says this about you then it's true.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_06So how to sort of like in you know how to sort of like let that stuff roll off of you or just let it go past you. Yeah. And I and because I took martial arts as a kid what you're talking about I think about it as like to sort of like the idea is to like it's better to not be there for the punch than it is to have to confront it. You know yeah so I and so I feel like a lot of so when I hear my kids tell stories about things that somebody said something like I as I've told my both my oldest kids this my youngest is sick she's feral you can't really tell them much but like the the 13 and the nine year old I'm like you're never gonna get in trouble for standing up for yourself yeah or for one of your friends. Like you're never gonna get in trouble with me.
SPEAKER_03That's right.
SPEAKER_06So the idea being that like I don't want you to be in position where somebody like tries to you know whatever that is tries to attack you with words or something and you feel like I'm supposed to behave. Yeah. Especially raising girls. Right. You know I don't want you to feel like that that I'm wanting to behave in all situations. That's right.
SPEAKER_00That's such a great lesson my grandmother told me uh get them low, get them on their ankles take them down when I was young. So anybody messes with you go low. You're short so you're close to the ground got low center of gravity. Yeah.
SPEAKER_06Yeah and I think that sometimes we think of this healing work as turning not we but there's a way in which this healing work is talked about that it turns you into sort of like like you said so squishy that people can just sort of that it feels like you might be taking advantage of more often you know what I mean or that you won't ever that it doesn't also it's not about standing up for yourself.
SPEAKER_00I think a lot of people in the so-called healing space sometimes think that too they're like I just have to always let things go by okay yeah and I actually don't I I think going back to that point I think it makes us available for intimacy and connection and then it makes us great fighters too where we need to fight.
SPEAKER_06I actually wouldn't mess with me I wouldn't is that a quote you said before no you gotta write that one down. Maybe that's the next book I wouldn't mess with me as a great uh incantation uh yeah I know me well enough to I wouldn't mess with me right yeah uh yeah uh my brain is going a million places with that uh I you know I always say that like I think about like people like you're talking about martial arts and you're talking there I'm I I call myself America's number one Bruce Lee aficionado non-Asian division oh we've got to talk about that I have a lot to talk about there with you okay good good good I'm down uh and the idea being that like people sort of have this idea Bruce Lee but really the first half hour of every Bruce Lee movies I'm going like I really don't want to fight. Right. Don't make me fight yeah I really don't want to fight exactly I'd rather not do this you don't understand. If you make me fight the next hour is going to be me fighting everybody. And I'm about to make a movie about how I whooped you yeah then you're gonna be a whole so and I think about it all the time like it's not about not it's about avoiding it but also being prepared if you have to show up yeah if you have to show up for yourself. Absolutely uh I want to talk a little bit about uh Black Lives Matter because for many people in this room that's a hashtag it's a it's a political issue it's something they were maybe afraid of at one point and they accepted and they whatever there's a lot but you were in the middle of it in a way that most people will never understand. I just want and and when I read the book because I'm friends with Alicia Garza I've interviewed Patrice Colors like I have been close and around it and so when I as soon as you talked about being there for the like the creation of the actual organization of it I was just like who like that is something that most people probably don't even understand or can imagine. You're right and it's also such a compressed period of time. You know in some sense it's like this we think of the civil rights movement as being like this long period of time but we're really we're talking about it's a really small period of time of time. Absolutely what are your thoughts on what did you and it seems like a lot of your book is about things you learned from that experience that you then were like okay I need to I've learned how to do things differently because of what I went through there.
SPEAKER_00That's true. Yeah yeah um I had a lot of theories and then I had a lot of practice um in inside of that um yeah I I I had been a somatic practitioner I had been teaching somatics I was a therapist and then I was doing it in What might be the largest social movement in human history?
SPEAKER_06And and not just a not a hashtag, an actual no, yeah. No, no, yes. That's the thing. I mean, I don't mean to interrupt, but I really want to like this is not just the people who are like hashtagging on Instagram. You're working with the founders of the movement, trying to create infrastructure, yeah, trying to create results, yeah, and also being there's this, it becomes a popular thing for a minute, you know.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and that, you know, was unforeseen in a way. Like we were doing it before we knew that that was going to happen like that, and to be doing healing justice work inside of it. I mean, it was like what that meant at that time, you know, there's there were chapters everywhere around the world, is that people were trying to address what was happening locally in their communities, and they were trying to address deaths, killings. Um, they were trying to address what was happening in their chapters, because you know, what was happening, what people witnessed, it was like a massive, it's massive, it was just massive. And so people were assembling chapters and organizing, and they didn't know each other, and then who's gonna do what? And so it was like a million organizations were sprouting and then trying to connect with each other. So um there was everything that comes with that and comes with human beings. So, you know, some days it felt like from my position doing healing justice work, it was like looking into the vastness of black pain. And it almost felt like it was almost something I could see, like I could like out of the corner of my eye was just everything, and I had to kind of start to pry my looking away from that because it was just there all the time. Um and that yeah, it changed, it changes you. It it changed me fundamentally. Um, I'm a different person after that experience, but I also there was so much beauty, like what people were creating that never got talked about in the media, the way people were holding each other that never got talked about. Um the tears, the love, the grief, the holding, the practice, the you know, I I tell people, you know, it doesn't matter to you. It's a matter of practitioner, you have an office, you see clients. I was like, I was doing practices when people were in the jail or in the streets or um with mothers who lost their children. Um yeah, and it felt like doing that, you're like, this is also a historical thing. We're here right now, and there have been many times that this has happened, and it was always felt visited by the past in those moments. So I think what I'm you know, this is not a BLM book, but I think one of the things I'm trying to offer here is that we do we don't even know that story yet. And we don't even know also the beauty and the pain of everyday people who are motivated, who were telling their stories, who are experiencing this real time. We don't even know the stories. There's so many people that were on the ground in their communities that were holding each other, that were building, and we just don't even know. And there's a beautiful story there of healing, um, of transformation, of connection, of grief, of love that hasn't been told yet.
SPEAKER_06Yeah. I mean, yeah, as you say, it's not, I don't, yeah, this is not, I don't give my impression, it's not a BLM book, but it's a it is a book about a black person who is living through history, and that was a part of the history you live through.
SPEAKER_00It's true. And trying to learn, I mean, this was me going, okay, what did I see in that last period? What kind of tore us apart and what brought us together? And these are kind of the lessons I've been like holding, yeah, carrying around in my backpack the last several years.
SPEAKER_06I mean, and you know, and I, you know, I'm not breaking any news, but I think part of what tears things like Black Lives Matter apart, I think about the Black Panthers is the system goes, we can't let that keep going. Absolutely, you know, we can't just let that what what racial justice that does not help capitalism at all, you know. So there's a part of this like when you look at I think about the Black Panthers, and you look at like the Black Panthers with 10-point program, and you're like, Yeah, that's all great. But the system is like, we can't have that, can't have it, yeah. Yeah, I think that eventually the stories get told by people who say the problem was on the inside when we when which it's humans are humans and humans are always gonna be human, but there's also like the pressure from the outside and the who's on the inside, who's on the inside, yeah, and who gets their way to the inside and came from the outside, yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that story hasn't been told yet.
SPEAKER_06We'll wait 30 years for that one.
unknownAll right.
SPEAKER_06Um part of that embedded in that, and I want to sort of bring it back to that, is the idea you tell a story of a black mom who had lost, I think it was her son. And the thing that comes up for me, and I've talked to moms who've lost black moms who've lost their sons, because it is not an uncommon thing, sadly. Yeah, but you you hit on a thing that I've always sort of noticed that there's this way in which black moms, like within like I don't know, like 24 hours of losing their sons, suddenly become spokespersons for the movement.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_06And I'm always both impressed and horrified, yeah, that you have to take that on in a time when you would be, you should just be allowed to mourn and be angry. But there's a certain amount of like, I think responsibility these moms feel, but also sort of a a way in which the community sort of turns to these moms. Yeah. It's like tells us, tell us what to do.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_06And I really have always felt like that is just so much. Not every mom is built for that in the same way.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, that is um, it's an interesting thing because it is this is a story that is told over and over again. And it is always the question that I've had or the experience I've had of like who holds that person, that mother, that girlfriend, that family member at night, who holds them that night? And do they, especially as a mother, hold the family, hold the family together and have to keep holding the family together when they've gone through something like that. And I think that is a lot of the orientation, specifically for black mothers who have known that it have experienced that you have to still hold everybody together after you have experienced such a massive loss. And I do, I think there's something there for our communities to really understand. Um in those moments, but all moments, you know, who is holding the people that have held it together, who hold us together, who have held us together, who is holding, and do we even know how to do that? I think it's um, I think in those moments it's the most extreme, most devastating example. But it it is a something that I see time and time again.
SPEAKER_06Yeah. We've about five more minutes of conversation, then we're going to questions. So if you want to get your questions in, I think there's the QR code, or if you're online, you can put your questions in and we'll go to some uh audience questions. Um let's talk a little bit about in five minutes. I wrote I wrote a book about myself. It is nowhere near this book. I want to be clear about that, but I did have to write about my dad and my and my mom, and and there, I remember the fear of like my dad's like, I'm reading your book, and I was like, Oh no, you were just supposed to buy it and put it on a show.
SPEAKER_00Right.
SPEAKER_06You're just supposed to be proud that I got a book published. Right.
SPEAKER_00He actually wanted to read it.
SPEAKER_06He read it, he read it. Wow, he read it, yeah. Uh, that's for another event, or we can talk about that later. But talk about your i you become very aware when you're writing a book that's about your life, that at some point, like, oh, this is my version of events. Absolutely. Yeah, this is not the truth, absolutely, and also at some time, I don't know if this happened to you. People fact check you later when it's out in the world. You're like, that's better. Like my mom's like, that did not okay. Look, lady, uh, but talk about that, like the idea of like you write this thing. I always say in writing, you're supposed to write like the guilty parties will never read it.
SPEAKER_03Uh-huh.
SPEAKER_06But then at some point you got to put it out there.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_06Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Yeah. I I feel like I wrote, I think I wrote that way. I tried to write honestly how I experienced it. Cause I was like, it's not the truth, but it is my truth. It is what I am what I experienced or what happened and what happened inside of me, especially. Um, but in this book, you know, someone was saying to me, I feel like you were really um, they thought I was not as hard on some people in the book as I could have been. And I was like, well, I think the thing is I'm only telling stories that I've done a lot of work around. I'm not telling a story that is unprocessed. No, I'm telling stories I've done a lot of work on. Um, but also, you know, I think what was important to me was like, I wanted to feel my dignity in the stories, and I and I wanted other people to be in their dignity without protecting them too, without trying to coddle them or like take care of them in a particular way. Um, but I think there's a dignity in in everybody's story in a way. And so when I talk about my dad in the book, it I'm not telling, I'm telling the story to talk about abuse and what it does and how it keeps going and how it tears us apart. But um, you know, I think the work that I have done in particular is that I don't um it's not that I absolve him, I guess, in some way, but I understand how we got here. And that understanding is actually freeing for me in a particular way. Um, in a way too, because it has me, I'm clear about what to expect from our relationship now that I understand more.
SPEAKER_01Yes.
SPEAKER_00Um, and so my understanding allows there to be even a dignity in the way that I write about him. Like he is a human being, he is full and whole and human. Um, and he's done a lot of things that hurt real bad. Um, so there's that. But you know, we were talking about it back there. Sometimes people just don't want you to talk say nothing at all. Yeah, you know what I mean? Putting your dirty laundry, putting our laundry out there, yeah, and it brings streets and shame. Yeah, we're back at shame.
SPEAKER_06Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And I think one of the things with my own family that I've had to say to them is like, you know, when I write, I'm gonna write from this place of holding people on their dignity. And at the same time, I don't feel like there's anything shameful in what we've experienced or what I've experienced. I don't feel shame around it. Um, and in fact, I think that it can be helpful for people to not have to kind of tiptoe around their own stories and shame, not be willing to look at things because it's too shameful. It's a story. Yeah. And I'm not even saying my story is the most interesting story. It is a story, but I part of the invitation is to be like, there's information, there's wisdom inside of our stories, and um, shame doesn't have to keep us from looking at and contending with and feeling into um the stories that make up our lives.
SPEAKER_06Uh you got the iPad for the questions. Is that we're ready for that? Uh is there my uh related to this, is it scary to write a book that is ostensibly telling people how to heal?
SPEAKER_00Well, yeah. What do you mean? Yeah. Um I think I think I try to do a pretty good job of like this. Is not the answer.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And in fact, if I'm honest with my publisher, I was like, this was the original title, the one that I came up with, and then I came up with another one. And they were like, no, let's go back to the first one. And I was like, I think that sounds too certain. Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, yeah. It's I mean, it's uh, you know, it's a it's a it's a very bold title. It's definitely a title that people who are looking to heal will be like, oh, there's the book.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. But then hopefully they they pick it up and then they go, oh wow, okay, I don't have any answers, but I'm also invested in the process more.
SPEAKER_06Yeah. Um, so here's a couple questions. Uh first question's from Kristen. What first steps would you suggest for someone with a deeply felt sense of lack of safety in their body?
SPEAKER_00That's a great question, Kristen, because it's kind of a question that in a way answers itself. Because uh, for me, when I think about someone asked me recently, how would you work with a client that did not have a felt sense of safety in their body? There and almost um the question was almost a little frustrated. Like, I'm trying to convince them that it's safe to do this work. And I was like, the only work is figuring out what will make them feel safe. There's no other work. And um, that means, especially the somatic practitioner, I was like, we get to be very creative about what that means. I've done all kinds of weird stuff with clients. I was like, Do you want to be here? Do you want to hold this? Do you want to do this? It's really a creative pursuit. So I would say that to anybody that that question of um, how do I find safety is the question to pursue and to do that creatively. And I mean that um, you know, how you position yourself, what you hold, where you are, um, on what land, these are the questions that I think the the pursuit of that will open up so much more. There are things that are probably waiting to be to come to the surface to be felt, experienced, but they're waiting for uh a place where you can feel safe in order to do it. And that may be with someone, it may be with no one, it may be, you know, with a dog, it may be wherever it is, but get get really curious about what produces that sense of safety. Notice if you do something, if a little something dislodges, maybe not everything, it's not all or nothing. If I do this, it was something like oh, okay, okay, good. That's information. Um, but that is the question.
SPEAKER_06So deeply look into the idea of what your definition of safety is. No, okay, I'm glad I said that. I'm glad I asked that. Man, I said I was available to be corrected. You didn't have to like just do it.
SPEAKER_00Why not? No, no, no, I'm totally fine. Uh no, deeply, sorry, I did it again. Deeply feel into what produces a felt sense of safety for you. Not as an idea, not as in a because then when you have an idea of what would produce safety, you end up getting lost in shoulds. The should feel safe, which is fundamentally not a creative space, but getting into the felt sense of what actually produces even an inkling, an opening towards safety. That is it. And that's what I mean, be creative about everything. Y'all know what I mean when I say be creative? I mean in position, location, whatever. Get very, very, very creative about that and get very, very, very, very curious about what safety feels like in your body. That is the fundamental question, not the idea, but the feeling.
SPEAKER_06Can I tell you what makes me feel really safe when I would love to hear that? Uh laying down on the floor. Yeah. Is my like, I just gotta lay down. Like not on the like on a bed, like like not in a place where you're supposed to lay down, like on the floor. Like in like just wherever I am, I just gotta lay down. I've done it in green rooms, I've done it in my house, I've done it to the annoyance of my wife when we're having discussions. Uh I hear what you're saying. Hold on a second, you know. So that's great, but it really makes me feel like okay, I can I can get through this moment. That's great. I love that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I feel really safe under a blanket. Yeah, yeah. A blanket, a blanket on the floor. Yeah, yeah, sweating under there, just like, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_06No, there can be a comfortable bed and I will choose the floor. Like, I'm just like, I need to be on the floor.
SPEAKER_00That's good to know about yourself.
SPEAKER_06Yeah. Uh, question member from an question from a member of the audience. What advice would you give an aspiring practitioner that feels called to spiritual and embodiment work, but feels societal pressure to follow a more traditional, that's in quotes, healing vocation, i.e., becoming a psychotherapist or a psychologist?
SPEAKER_00It's a great question. Um, as someone who did that path. Is this your question? No, I was okay. Okay, cool. So we have two people asking that same question then. Well, I started studying somatics first, and then I was like, I gotta get, I gotta be legitimate. And then became a psychotherapist. Um, so I would be legitimate. Because I was like, I can't just be like a black queer person out here, like, I'm a I'm a somatic practitioner. He'll be like, according to who?
SPEAKER_06So that's how I feel about the title motivational speaker. Yeah. Right. Who have I motivated?
SPEAKER_00Why did you get qualified to motivate? Right. Um, so I totally understand that question of like, you know, choosing, but I feel like we're in a different era than we were when I was kind of posing that question. I think it's it's uh much more of a to me, it seems like an option to be um somatic or spiritual embodiment practitioner. Um, I think whatever you do, and however, I mean, look, this path that I'm on is totally bizarre. I'm like organizer, embodiment practitioner therapy. It's like a weird blend of things that I have just created by doing every day. Um, but I think it's just about that. I think whatever you do, if you do it with dedication and devotion, if you do it full-bodied, if you do it, I mean, I'm really around my practice. I study. I study, I study and I practice and I try and I practice and I study. Um, sometimes we want to be practitioners or even therapists because we want to fix people or tell people what to do, or you know, and our curiosity gets really stunted. Um, but I think as long as you are treating it as a craft that changes you, that grows you, that will be recognized by your community and by other people, and you will be affirmed on that path.
SPEAKER_06Oh, we got some snaps. Hey uh question from from Chantel. You were speaking about connecting to the land as a way to foster embodiment. What if the land and the environment slash climate makes it difficult to experience embodiment? I'm thinking of the deep south, Mississippi, where my people are from.
SPEAKER_00I'm not from Mississippi, I'm from Texas, and I live in North Carolina. Um, and so I relate to elements of this question. I I was saying to my partner the other day, I was like, the real the one of well, one of the real public health crises in in where we live is is white supremacy. It's like really toxic shit. Um and at the same time, um the land didn't do it. You know, and the land holds memories and stories and bones, um, but it wasn't actually the land. There's, you know, the way I perceive it, there's kind of um a fog. There's some kind of haunting that hovers over the land that has to be in a way reckoned with and felt, but it isn't actually the land. When I started, when I moved to North Carolina and we were doing a lot of gardening there, um, I told the story on the podcast that I somatically had to figure out how to garden because I noticed I was overextending, I was like doing too much and I was working till my back was hurting. And I was like, that is not what I want to do on this land. Because actually, the land that I was living on was part of the one of the largest plantation systems in North Carolina, Stagville Plantation. And I was like, on this land, black people and black bodies were trained to overextend that their limits were no longer um relevant. So we had to kind of disconnect and unplug from our own body's limits in order to satisfy somebody else's hunger greed. And I did not have that direct experience, but I also have inherited living past my working past my own limits, working past my body's limits. That's all I've seen modeled is working to the bone. And so I was like, that's how I was approaching it. And I was like, oh, actually, can I relate to the land in Way that um allows me to be in my center, allows me to have limits, and that actually changed the relationship to the plants and how I was able to pluck something, or you know, what I was able to do, the relationship came into clearer view. I was like, oh, I can be really present for this because I don't have to disconnect from myself. So I think remembering that it is actually not the land actually allows the land to be an ally and for us to be an ally to the land. And I think that's part of the reparative piece. But there is a lot of, you know, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not a witchy person, okay? And some of you may be, I'm not, but there are some spells cast on that land. There are some spells cast, but also there are portals, and there are places where our people were fed, where they stole away, where they fell in love. Um, they also loved pastures and made friends with trees and knew plants very well, you know. Um I talk about Harry Tubman in the book. She was she was a master herbalist. So we have to also call on those histories to help us reembody our connection to those places there where people try to make it hard actually for us to connect. I think we still have to reach for it.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, I really appreciate it. We we sort of have a similar talk around Harry Tubman in my house around sort of the claiming Harry Tubman is more of a badass instead of a tragic figure. That's all she is. I did not try, but you know, sort of a like she was escaped, you know. I in my mind, I picture sort of a comic book here. You know what I mean? Like in a way that she's not like sort of portrayed in she's it, yeah, yeah, yeah. She's it, yeah. I don't mean she's pretraised as track, but you know, like the uh no connection to slavery sort of makes it 20 times. She went back and you know the conditions. The way we talk about like nightmarish Davy Crockett. I don't know what he did, but he's portrayed as the king of the wild frontier. He is, he has a song, I don't think he freed nobody from nothing, as far as I understand.
SPEAKER_00You're gonna make me dig back into the crates about Davy Crockett.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Wow, yeah.
SPEAKER_06So that's what I'm saying. Like, there's not that sort of like yeah, she is that though, and then you also talk about Fannie Lou Hamer. And the same, I think about like the time I've spent in the South, and you hear about the stories from like Fannie Lou Hamer who refuse to feel separate from this state. Yes, who refuse to feel separate from this land, yes, you know, who refuse like, no, this is mine. That's right. I demand to be, I demand my humanity, and I will fight for my own humanity.
SPEAKER_00I love that quote about like if I fall, I'm gonna you know fall forward, that's right, and fall towards liberation towards liberation, that's right.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, yeah. Question from Denmark D Is there an act of protective resistance you suggest we can practice as multiple oppressed slash marginalized people to attend to our own care in the midst of this barrage of everyday oppressive experiences?
SPEAKER_00Protective care in the midst of it all. Uh, I think we've talked about some of it. Um which I think some of it is community and community amongst people and non-people. Um, but community and finding resource and being present for being present in community because some we don't have community, but like really be there with each other, really process what is there. Um, I think that's an element of protection. I mean, that's where the safety is. I think that we're we're in this moment where people have misconstrued what safety is. Safety is violence or walls or separation in their conception, but safety is community deeply relationship connection. Um individual practices. I mean, for me, everything is um well, it really depends. It really depends. I I practice I'm gonna kind of go the spectrum. I I practice to feel my both smallness and my power. I have to feel my vulnerability. I find I think may I say this earlier? Like when I really felt vulnerable is when I felt most powerful. I was like, hmm, okay, this is what my true power is, and this is how my this is what our power is together. Um, but I first had to be really vulnerable and listen. So in a way that helps me. Um, I think I do things to feel safe and to settle, but I also do things that make me feel like a badass and like I can fight. Um, there we are again. Yeah, no, never talked about that momentally. Um, but that also in a way feels protective to me. And I'd say that alongside community and processing and grieving and um training our looking and witnessing, like witnessing what is really happening and the depth of it, and also remembering what is also really happening is um beauty too. And I I have you know, my child, so I'm like, I have to bear witness to this person who is growing and developing, and I have to wit. So I think really practicing your witnessing and your looking so that you can see more of what is happening.
unknownAll right.
SPEAKER_06Uh I think this might be the last question. Uh, and then I have one more question. It's a question from Tiffany. A lot of the response to BLM in workplaces and schools got buried in DEI. Yeah. Often DEI trainings extract and instrumentalize BIPOC stories of racial trauma to educate white people while not providing much healing for BIPOC in return.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_06Do you have any advice on how to get out of this cycle?
SPEAKER_00Well, it's probably not anything that you are, it's not just you, Tiffany. Um, it's like people don't want to change. People don't want to change for real. Um, I think that's partly what I'm trying to say in the book. It's like that is that is what must transformation is it. That's the thing. We're alive and changing and transforming. People don't really want to change because white people know. I mean, what can we educate on at this point? There's nothing to be educated on. There's nothing more to say, there's no more information to provide. We are just playing a game and dancing. And I'm like, okay, maybe this fact will do it, maybe this figure will do it, and finally we'll figure it out.
SPEAKER_06Infographic.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. There are no infographics. There are no facts and figures. There is no more information. There's nothing else to be said in the way of information. We're at the edge of that. There's only the willingness or the denial of transformation and changing. And that includes changing ourselves, how we are in the world, where we belong, how we conceptualize belonging, changing power, resources. There's only that that remains at this point. And that's why I'm sort of talking about embodiment because I'm like, there's no more information. There's none. There's only the doing, there's only the risking. There's only the transformation. There's only the recovery of relationship. That is the only thing that is left to do. Or, you know, perish or something.
SPEAKER_06We laugh like we talked about inappropriate laughter earlier and you just did it. Or it's over. Anyway, I'll be at the back signing books for the till the end of humanity, which could come at any moment. Yes.
SPEAKER_00Right. Yeah. That's kind of it. That's kind of we got a snort over there. That's kind of what time it is. It's like, are we going to do it or not? I'm right there with you. So yeah, I think DEI, it yeah, I haven't experienced it because I have not worked in many of those environments. I'm like, DEI in a corporate setting is such an interesting thing to me. I'm like, how far could this go?
SPEAKER_06Not very, not very far. I mean, the thing I will say is someone who's been in those environments or been brought into those environments. I remember the time I remember sort of it being so clear is when remember when Starbucks said we're going to close at noon so we can fix racism.
SPEAKER_03Right.
SPEAKER_06And I know people, I know some of the people who worked in that. So I'm not in I'm not insulting their work. But it was just very clear to me that like a Starbucks in let's say North Dakota, yeah, their staff has a different relationship to racism than the Starbucks in Minneapolis that is run by like you know uh Ethiopian refugees.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_06You know what I mean? And that if you're just giving them the same, the same course, yeah, you're not actually doing the work.
SPEAKER_00We're so into performance.
SPEAKER_06Yeah.
SPEAKER_00In this moment, everybody is we're not at all at the one.
SPEAKER_06I mean, like when I last heard about what is somatics, it's like some people are like, oh, this dude doesn't know it. You know, we're not all at the 101 level.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_06To recognize that in this work.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and to me, embodiment is the opposite of performance. You know what I mean? It's it's not performance, and we are so compelled and you know, recruited into performing ourselves, into performing everything. We're like, I did it, racial justice, I did it, right? You know, I turned that IG square black and scene, right? And it's such a fleeting, empty way of trying to engage with change without actually trying to change it all.
SPEAKER_06Well, this next question is like they this is working, the the universe is conspiring. What does embodiment feel like? This is from a member of the audience. What is the biggest thing that changes or that you notice when you arrive there? Do you have any recommended embodied practice for dealing with toxic shame?
SPEAKER_00Um to me, embodiment feels mostly like not leaving myself or not leaving myself for too long. Um that mostly I live in me. I dwell in me. Um, and the place where I come from is kind of down and back in me. And I live from that place as much as I can. And when I leave it, then I try to figure out, oh, why did I leave it? And then get back there as soon as I can. Um, embodiment is is living, you know. I I I would say in the beginning of this work that what I was really invested in is my people being able to live and experience their lives. Um and all people to be able to live and experience their lives. Uh I'm in my life. You know, so a lot of people live and you know, they live and they're they breathe and they don't get to live. You know, I had a podcast guest, Vivian Tansor, is a seed keeper, Palestinian seed keeper, and she was telling me how she feels actually so alive in this moment. She feels like her people are also living in a way, they are present to their lives and what life is and being in our lives. And I think that to me is um what embodiment is. I'm here. I'm here, I'm trying, I'm present as much as I can. Sometimes it feels awesome, sometimes it feels like a mix of things, sometimes it feels deeply awkward and uncomfortable and painful. Um, it feels like everything that I feel.
SPEAKER_06You know what I mean? Yeah, and do you have any recommended embodied practices for dealing with toxic shame?
SPEAKER_00Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, I'm smiling because I'm kind of thinking about the the story that people have been asking me to tell about how I started to do work around love and loving myself, and I would sing Whitney Houston songs to myself, dedicated to myself, and I'd really be like, you know, saving all my love for you, singing to myself.
SPEAKER_06Um you're singing the whole song right now, not really.
SPEAKER_00Nobody wants that, probably. You're like, nice, apprentice. Um, but I think I think things like that that speak back to you and speaking in a way not just to kind of say things, but figuring out how to say things in a way they start to sink into your skin, and less of you is refuting them. Um, so I think that is one element of it. I think looking at it always helps to kind of look at what is a story that's lodged here, how is it lodged here? What does it do? Because stories will produce a posture, a breath pattern, a way of being, and getting curious about the kind of constellation of how does this shame show up in me? Where does it get activated? Um, mapping it is really helpful for me because once I kind of map what happens, sometimes I can map my way back out.
SPEAKER_06Uh what has been most beneficial to your healing as a queer black person?
SPEAKER_02Question from Mad Remembering Remembering um how divine I am.
SPEAKER_00You know. And remembering it because I already knew that, you know, way back in the day. I know it about all of you. I know it about me. Um, and just, you know, knowing that the world tells stories about I think I talk about this in the book too, about who is in a way close to God, you know, like that's the myth of supremacy. These set of human beings are somehow closer. Um but I think I knew a long time ago that no human could tell a story about me in that way, and that no human could tell uh that kind of story about any of us. And I don't know, I think I just know that. And even the way, you know, being a black and queer person is deeply important to me. It's just also a way into my own feeling and everything and connection to you. It's it's it's not even a special thing in re in my reality. Um it's not even a special thing, but it's just it's like, oh, this is the this is the way that I had to find um my way back to wholeness through a bunch of lies and stuff.
SPEAKER_06Well, this is the last question. It's not it, and this is the perfect last question to end on. Just for remember the audience. So good job, whoever wrote this question, um, or whoever assembled these questions in this order as a community effort. What do you think is the most important call to action for us as individuals to best support healing in our communities? The Bay Area crowd likes homework, as you know, especially this type of crowd. They want some action items. Yeah, yeah. See, you got a thumbs up. Yeah, they like they like homework. You want something to do? They don't want like just they don't want vibes. I mean, they like vibes. The Bay Area loves vibes. The Bay Air is built on vibes, many vibes, yeah, but then it became vibes with an action list.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Um, I think one place to look at is you know, thinking of ourselves. We talk, I talk about in the book, and we talk about the embodiment institute, transformational characters, and we're using this term to talk about people who are taking on healing in whatever kind of systems they are embedded, family systems, community systems, organizational institutions. And so getting clear about how you're already inside of so many systems, and that means that you are benefiting and responsible to those. Um, so if you're a therapist, I say this in the book, if you're a therapist, you're a part of wherever you're doing therapy, if you're doing it in a clinic, that's one side of power for you, and one side of change for you. If you're part of organizations around being a therapist, that is one side of power, one side of change for you. If you are a black person or a white person, it's like these are all places where you can do something and change something. And those places all are your responsibility. Um, so I would say look closely at what you're already a part of and what you're already doing or you're already contributing to, what's already feeding you and sourcing you, and remember that you are responsible. The other thing is you don't, if you're trying to do something community level, you ain't doing it by yourself. So um, getting clear about who you're doing it with, that's called organizing. Um, so organizing yourself, finding like-minded, you know, where two or more are gathered, there's an organization. Prince is simple, everybody. Thanks, uh Becoming the People is produced by Devin Delania, sound engineered, and edited by Michael Main. Our theme song was created by Miata. And if you're enjoying these conversations, please subscribe, rate, and especially, especially leave us a review on Apple Podcasts or wherever it is that you listen to podcasts. And if you haven't already, please join us over at the Patreon, Prentice Hemple. We are having a great time over there, building community, learning together. Come join us. And as always, thank you for listening to Becoming the People.