below are my notes from the jan 23 working families party mass call:
beloveds i am recovering from norovirus (like an ayahuasca or ayurvedic purge without the magic) and its a slow recovery, but i have some thoughts. i put these thoughts into four buckets to help with making meaning, getting concrete and moving forward.
bucket 1: accept reality and decide what you will do
- accept reality, which is not the chaotic story they are telling…we lost a round, and it’s already costing so many of us, and is going to cost us, so much. but we did not lose to a coherent, aligned, functional force…there is an erratic, emotional, disinhibited leader who knows how to harness negative attention, surrounded by people convinced they can use him to grow their money, power, or regressive ideologies. they were elected by people who want a lot of different things, many of whom have been hoodwinked, many whose desires are closer to what we are interested in growing than what he will be up to. the reality is we need to be ready to welcome them however late they awaken.
- the reality is bleak and chaotic, but not permanent. remember the future is unwritten. we are not IN their story even if we are IMPACTED by it. we have to keep writing and living OUR stories, the ones where justice and love and equality and material well-being and care and connection and freedom and safety and dignity and belonging and earth are at the center. in OUR stories, this is either a failure (because we don’t learn anything but vengeance and smallness and violence)…or a tragic set-back that we turn into a multitude of opportunities for liberation and a living economy.
- the reality is that the elite are wildin’ out. and making themselves so visible and plain. we reject that whole way of being. every day, relinquish and resist exceptionalism and elitism. american exceptionalism is fatal for the whole world. what our nation has instigated, funded and/or allowed to happen anywhere in the world is going to happen to more of us here, we need to be humble about that. and remember, elitism in practice doesn’t require money, just thinking you are better than somebody else. D-Elite! let go of being better than anyone, of deserving more safety or resource…that’s one root of this harmful time.
- the reality is scary, so really take your life seriously. this is, among other things, a numbers game. we need every one of us. we need you. stay as safe and healthy as you can. use the OODA loop method when you’re in acute crises – observe, orient, decide, act (repeat) [hear the method in detail by Queer Nature on this episode of the How to Survive the End of the World podcast]
bucket 2: find others to do it with! be intentional about who you are in community with
- we have tried answering this with big mass efforts and i know i am speaking to organizers with big visions…i always have to make a case for the small and steady, the tangible and connected. when you feel overwhelmed by the scale of the changes and problems and urgency, focus back down on what you can do, and get specific with your support. who can you actually show up for? who can you ask for help and let show up for you? everything large is made up of the small.
- how intimately can you live the block and build strategy in your daily life? divest from MAGA businesses and institutions! building our love-based, worker-based efforts.
- don’t pull each other under…notice that when we are all going under we can start pulling each other into danger. people stepping up to lead right now aren’t outside the danger or exhaustion or sadness or fires or sicknesses. I just survived norovirus and nothing in the world stopped — but that was ok because I am in community who cared for me and covered me instead of asking for more. community allows us to stagger and pace ourselves through this.
- experiment together! try things and assess if they work, if they make your community tangibly safer. don’t get attached to the experiments, stay attached to the well being of the community.
bucket 3: rearrange your boundaries when it comes to communications and information.
- notice what overwhelms you and place boundaries. reclaim your precious precious attention.
- notice who misinforms you or misleads you and place boundaries. divest, unfollow, correct! don’t waste attention!
- notice who is in control of each app you use and why you are in those spaces…and place boundaries. (remove yourself from muskymetaverse, come say hi on bluesky and i am figuring out where i can do my meme magic…)
- become a source of information on the things you care about…not just everything like a firehose, but uplift what you know and can vouch for. we can help each other connect to opportunities to help!
- find those people and places still committed to journalism and fact checking and don’t just join/use/follow/boost them, but invest in them.
bucket 4: Ritual!
- politics is ritual on ritual on ritual. we need to re-root in the sacredness of even this time
- notice the sacredness of the moment, of your emotions, of the change, of all that you love
- act precious
- find a grounding ritual practice. one of mine is tarot and i pulled this tarot card for the collective today from the Medicine Cards deck: “raccoon, the generous protector. this robin hood of the animal kingdom…has the uncanny ability to assist others without allowing them to become victims or dependents…tends to the needs of the tribe before taking any for themselves. uncommon lack of greed. who needs you?”