election thoughts
December 10, 2024
Hello Beautiful Human,
The air is heavy today. The energy among us feels dense as we are mentally trying to strong arm the results of the Decision 2024 from landing as our future reality because we do not want to believe it is true. Our beautiful community has spoiled us in love and light that we may have similarly forgotten voices outside that space. Speaking for myself, my beautiful Delaware bubble spoils me with so many freedoms and inclusion that I can occasionally forget that we of the people includes many voices and votes beyond my state. The total votes from the whole country are in; all votes from those who voted are in. The strong arm must come down; we the “whole” people of the US have voted. Inauguration Day will welcome a new President as we knew we would. However, the words and messages in my inbox pang loud and clear that this is not the President of your vote, nor the President of your choosing. As I address you today, know I am speaking to those within our community, as well those on a path of their own, as there will be global impacts of this election decision whether they voted or not.
Before we begin, even in the creation of this letter, I can hear the short and shallow breaths of survival barely landing in the top of your chest. They started there for me too. I invite you to try and breathe deep enough for the breath to go deep enough to touch your heart. Release your breath allowing some of the heaviness to exit with it. Breathe in again and allow it to go deeper to fill your belly. With this breath out, guide your breath down the front of your body, all the way to your toes, imagine it grounding beneath your feet so you are present in the here and now. As you breathe in direct the breath up your back from your feet, circling above your head, landing at your heart. Breathe again allowing your arms to follow the circle of your breath to create a circle of presence for you. As always, repeat as needed to take care of yourself. Your self-care is essential, we will need it for the journey ahead.
On Grief
Let’s sit together for a moment together in our grief and frustration, let’s not pretend it isn’t real. Let’s not get lost bypassing our own emotions nor fill our mind with positive platitudes and pretending to be ok. It is ok to say you are not ok right now. Your messages tell me that you are less than hopeful. The hopes we shared in the campaign season did not bring the candidate of our choosing into power. The grief you are feeling has been caused by a sense of loss that goes beyond the vote. Generally, we can endure and adapt to a loss when things don’t go our way, it gets harder when we perceive this loss as losing a piece of ourselves. We grieve today “because we feel a sacred essence [of hope] within ourselves” was “awakened and then compromised” with the election decision (Judith, 2004). The cacophony of grief may wiggle loose all the previous moments where you similarly felt your hope become compromised. It may seem you are experiencing all those moments where hope became a four-letter word. Fertilizer can be an amazing tool for growth, but before I go there, I urge you to acknowledge all that you are feeling right now knowing it is all welcome. Name it. List it. Scribble it. Shout it. James Baldwin reminds us that nothing can be changed until it is faced (Baldwin, 2004).
I hear your anger, I hear your worry, I hear your fear. I hear your grief wanting point fingers saying “they” took our hope, “they” took our power, “they” are pulling the rug from beneath our feet, “they” are about to take all our autonomy! Blame can create a necessary barricade to protect your heart right now. I encourage you to use this barricade only like a cast to a broken bone. A cast is not needed forever without restricting flow. A barricade in our heart cannot last forever or we will also barricade hope in its truest form from reentering with beautiful possibilities. We do not want to be barricaded into this space of hopelessness or fear because that is not who we are. Dr. Michael Beckwith says the “pain pushes until the vision pulls” (Own, 2016).
We grieve as we fear a powerful silencing and erasure with this election decision. It was not advertised that the upcoming administration would cultivate a place where every voice is heard, where compassion and kindness is everywhere, nor a place where our queer friends, BIPOC, AAPI, Indigenous, Latinx, or other marginalized groups, immigrants nor dreamers will have the luxury of travelling freely in the truth of who they are, how they love, or how their soul is experiencing this round at human life. Fear makes it seem too big to even start the process of fighting it. Lao Tzu encourages us the “journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step” (Nucleus_AI, 2023).
Dearest community of Nones, Seekers, Healers, Mystics, Skeptics, and all those in between - you are the heart of hope! Hope must pull us out of grief. Hope must pull us out of fear. We must not barricade ourselves from our community so we can gather to gain vision and hope again. We need you to collectively pull the energy back to the currents of hope and possibility so we can more easily trudge through the guano of this moment and lead the next phase of our community, and our country, with loving kindness. Our collective is passionately ready to lead a revolution that pulls the visions sacred hope to action within in each person. So. what steps will we take as a community to reconnect with our vision hope? Firstly, let us breathe.
On Hope & Power
Desmond Tutu motivates us to remember that hope is being able to see that there is light despite all the darkness (Hunter-Gault, 2021). When you’re ready, it may not be today or tomorrow, take a few moments to seek moments where positivity, beauty, and good is still alive – start with the small stuff like finding a dandelion growing on the sidewalk. Hope is always present to those who seek to find it. If we stop looking for hope, we will stop finding hope. Hope holds the beacon and lights the way for us to show up even when our mind (and our footing) seems uncertain. Hope is holding our vision in the middle of the humus. Once you see hope again, allow the joy in those moments to nurtures your optimism. As you find laughter again, I hope you know that you have the power to plant more seeds of hope with each act of kindness and choice to love. Let hope grow and nourish it well. Hope is the revolutionary vision that allows us to imagine a different future. Our hope was not taken!
Again, let us breathe.
Yes, the leadership of the country is changing. I want to assure you - your power is not gone because of the election. Some may define power in terms of having won this election, in the ability to pass laws, or even the ability to make people feel small. That is not true power. Power is within us! Power is what lifts us out of darkness and guides us into transformation. Power takes us from struggle and propels us to the future, inspires, strengthens, and empowers us without diminishing others. Hunt the small stuff, reclaim your vision of hope, and ask yourself “what convicts you to stand up? to speak up? to leave safety behind to defend it. We must allow hope to fuel our power, so we are able to fight for and demand freedoms.
Breathe.
Hope is the power of the conviction of our vision moved to the point action. Let us break the barricade! Power allows us to take responsibility for the world we live in now and for those we leave it for. We know the fight of legal freedom for all is far from over. We must nurture our power to sustain the action needed to rewrite a new tomorrow. Hold each other tight. This will take a long time! Our ancestors fought for this too, let us continue. We must not lose sight that the revolution happens in every moment that we love hard, rest deeply, and resist fiercely. Power holds the element of fire within us and is sustainable for the long haul.
Real Talk & Action
Real talk, no matter which candidate won there is still work to do! One elected official will never be the savior of a nation no matter how hard they tried. The founders of the country left a revolutionary vision of liberty and justice for all. We the people have been working on inclusion, freedom, and liberation for centuries and the work is still not done – we are not all free. It has taken decades to see shifts in equality – and still the work is not done. Civil Rights and other movements have been started and stopped with the political tug-of-war within each election decision. Laws are passed - and taken away, belief systems are imposed, checks and balances are not enforced - and lives have been lost. Some people who hold the highest offices in the country still do not know how to have peace that doesn’t harm another. Ruth Bader Ginsburg had to remind people ten years ago that “your right to swing your arms ends when the other man’s nose begins” (Schmidt, 2014). Some days it seems like we the people are not we-ing very well. Even if the other candidate won, there is still work to do.
Breathe.
I encourage those of us, in the bubble of loving kindness, who have opted out of government participation to take their vision into action too. I encourage those of us in the bubble of a state who supports inclusivity who sit back thinking “at least it’s not me” or “at least my state protects me” to use that vision of unity into action too! Join us beyond the bubble barricade with your powers of manifestation and unity to hold point for action to powerfully create unity for all of us. If unity is possible within us individually, it is possible outside of us – within our country, to we the people, and beyond. When you pop the bubble of comfort the vision for the way you want to live, and love, you allow loving kindness to move from a dream into a reality. Love and kindness challenge injustice. Love and kindness speak hope to power. Love and kindness extend to those who wish us harm. We cannot fight harm by doing harm – or by ignoring it. Hope guides us towards love – and love is not passive.
So What Do We Do?
Follow the guided breath and allow each new circle of breath hold you, ground you, sustain you, and remind you of your hope. Breathe and take up space. Breathe life back to the hope within you - the place within you that no politician, law, or other storm can touch. This sacred space grounds you, centers you, and keeps you whole. Charge your crystals, rub them together, set the intention of your actions. Set the intention and show up in love and to seek justice, and to demand remedial action when those two things fail. Hope is the work that you do every single day to passionately pursue the freedoms for yourself and is meant to be shared with others. Freedoms are nurtured each time we stand up, we speak up and defend it from ever be taken away.
Tend the fire within you with each breath. Feed it with the values that make you move. We all have some sort of generational pain, oppression, marginalization, and rejection. Seek support to heal these wounds and nurture your fire. Rest when needed and join us in the fight where you can. If a smile of kindness is the extent of the fight within you – smile, smile, smile to each passerby. If you can do more, do more. If you are a healer the fight may be twice as hard to hold space while caring for others. Rest when needed and join us in the fight where you can.
Each moment we join to speak, to stand, or to fight, the vibrations resound a beautiful melody and mantra for us as we march along. Whether it is the song of angry men from Les Misérables joining us in the fight for the right to be free, in our collective vibration we cherish the sounds of diversity, the ringing of justice, and can feel magical and mystical possibilities! (Les Misérables, 2012). Emma Goldman may even join us if we dance along the way to the revolution: Alice Walker may also join because hard times require furious dancing! (Schulman, 1991 and Walker, 2013). Drink water, rest when needed, and join us in the fight where you can! Grab some coffee and keep going! Coffee and dancing are amazing self-care tools. This is a part of the self-care that Audre Lorde speaks of that is not self-indulgence, “it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare” (Lourde, 2019). This kind of radical self-care keeps us grounded and whole in a fight that will try to break us. Don’t drink coffee? If you meditate – meditate! If you pray – pray! If you dance in the moonlight – dance like no one is watching! Self-care is a part of the compassion that required for us to care for ourselves and for us to take care of others along the way.
Let’s get to work! A revolution isn’t one big moment, it is a series of transformational events that lead to significant and radical change. Bring your hope. Bring your power. Bring your action. If you can volunteer, organize, march, educate, and show up, please do – each moment matters. We have lots of work to do. It will not end with a new election cycle or different candidate; it has to me maintained. Tend the garden. Keep planting seeds until unity is attained. Plant the seeds for future generations to join us. It is guaranteed that we will identify many more problematic roots in the garden along the way. I pray we can meet the roots not just with removal but with a beautiful structure made by our vision of hope.
As for me - I cannot stop at a dream. I welcome the pull to action fueled by power to seek opportunities and join the revolution of life-giving and deeply transformational goodness, unity, and peace crafted by our collective visions of hope. When you’re ready - take a breath, charge your crystals, tend the fire within you, sing your mantras, grab your coffee, and let’s get to work!
In Hope & Loving Kindness
🖤Di
References
Baldwin, J. (2004). Vintage Baldwin. Vintage Books.
Hunter-Gault, C. (2021, December 27). Remembering Desmond Tutu’s Hope. The New Yorker. https://www.newyorker.com/news/postscript/remembering-desmond-tutus-hope
Judith, A. (2004). Eastern body, Western mind: psychology and the chakra system as a path to the self. Celestial Arts.
Les Miserables. (2012). Epilogue: Do You Hear The People Sing? [Song] On Les Miserables: Highlights from theMotion Picture Soundtrack. Universal Republic.
Lorde, A. (2019). Sister Outsider. Penguin Classics.
Nucleus_AI. (2023, April 21). [Morning Quote] A Journey of a Thousand Miles Begins with a Single Step. YOURSTORY. https://yourstory.com/2023/04/embrace-journey-one-step-at-time-personal-growth
OWN. (2016, October 9). Dr. Michael Bernard Beckwith: Pain Pushes Until the Vision Pulls. [Video].YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eDrPrNjcnqE
Schmidt, C. (2014, October 14). A Look Back – Justice Ginsburg’s Oral Dissent in Hobby Lobby. ISCOTUS now. https://blogs.kentlaw.iit.edu/iscotus/a-look-back-justice-ginsburgs-oral-dissent-in-hobby-lobby/
Schulman, A. (1991, December). Dances with Feminists. Women’s Review of Books 9 (3).
Walker, A. (2013). Hard Times Require Furious Dancing: New Poems. New World Library.
