moving forward with radical accountability

Hi. Just...HI.
I don't know how to start this. Weeks ago, I had things I was ready to share, and then SO MUCH happened. (I'll loop back around to that other draft eventually.)

This love letter, though, has some really vulnerable sharing about things I've never discussed or even mentioned publicly. This is the letter I never thought I'd write. But it feels like the right time and the right space for sharing personal struggles and having radical accountability.
It also has information on how I'm working to show up as a better advocate for social justice, the first step of many.

I want dive into the vulnerability, so I can shake off the terror at sharing this.

First, some facts: I started teaching yoga in 2005. Over the years, I taught at various studios. A lot of people don't know that I co-founded a yoga studio in 2009, which is not that long ago, but many epochs ago in western yoga time. More people know that I got into organizing events, that I co-founded and eventually directed a yoga and chant festival for charity, that I was a mantra musician for years.
By 2019, I'd left all the spiritual spaces I'd been facilitating. And I've never been happier.

Other facts: there are 2 essential reasons I left those spaces, and I've never said anything publicly about them.

The reasons why I stopped leading and facilitating in spiritual spaces are misogyny and underwhelming concern about social justice.

To be clear: I don't think there's a perfect standard to have around concern for social justice and know you're doing the "right" thing. What I mean is that there was not enough concern about social justice for me to be in alignment with my values.
(If it's not already obvious: I was involved with white-dominated spaces. In my experience and observation, conscious spaces that center BIPOC naturally address social justice.)

It's not easy to summarize things that were central to my life for 14 years, so there are a lot of broad statements. This love letter is not intended to be a callout, a cancel, or gossip. This is about me being accountable to my values. Over the years, as I gradually left these spaces, I've constantly been told that I've been "divisive." (More on that below, as it's also a form of tone-policing and intimidation to women.) I've been accused of gossip and trash-talking. I've done neither and I'm not going to start now.

I don't use "God," but the last few years did feel like this.

Some background about me: I grew up in a religious household that always intertwined spiritual beliefs and social justice. The religion never stuck, but the connection and intersection of social justice and spirituality did. I was 7 the first time I attended a protest, with my mother. I remember that protest with more clarity than I remember any childhood Thanksgiving or Christmas. I remember being the only child marching (it was a small protest), and I remember feeling safe and at ease. I still remember one of the chants. ("Pro-choice, that's our voice," if you're curious.)

Social justice is an intrinsic part of my beliefs and practices. My spirituality has always centered social justice, and it's not possible for me to do any social justice work without engaging my personal convictions and spiritual beliefs. Difficult conversations, advocacy, protesting—all of these things connect me more deeply to my personal beliefs and spirituality.

I have always been interested in transformation, consciousness, and liberation. Practicing yoga was deeply resonant to beliefs I'd held for many years, yet also pushed me towards deep transformation.

In 2005, I was 10+ years into an education career that I thought would last my entire life. Teaching yoga was not something I sought; other people convinced me. Immediately, though, teaching was also so resonant. It was a way to help people connect to themselves and the world more deeply. I think these are essential steps towards change, and I was honored to facilitate some of them.

I was so happy; I can't even express how happy I was teaching yoga. I started teaching at a time when I felt weird carrying a yoga mat in public. People had so many misconceptions and scrutinized me anytime yoga came up in conversation. Most often they assumed that I was a spacey hippie who did a lot of drugs. For the people who knew me outside of the studio, I was the only yoga practitioner they knew.

I saw, immediately, repeatedly, the difference that I made in holding spaces that were unusual at the time. I know I helped change perception, in my own small way, over the years, in my small sphere of influence.

Over the years, I got involved in other ways. I organized workshops. I ended up in teaching in several studios and other settings, including that studio I mentioned that started in 2009. I also co-founded a festival focused on 100% of proceeds going to charity.

For the record, my choice to teach yoga and organize conscious events came from deep personal convictions. I never made a living wage off any of that work. In fact, most of it was unpaid. What mattered more was that I felt more connected to my own convictions, and these spaces were resonant.

But only resonant up to a certain point. Yoga spaces as held by white people frequently don't address social justice. There are patterns. White people often insist that "yoga is above politics." Or that those conversations are—wait for it—"divisive." Social justice does not fit the "high vibes only" aspiration for those spaces. 

My response is that social justice is about human rights, not politics. Moreover, the insistence to ignore social justice is willful ignorance of the obvious inequities in the west, and in addition to ignorance of the context of yoga in India. And I have no aspirations for toxic positivity. If you've had a session with me and that's come up, then we've talked about how "high vibes only" is a guaranteed way to be not present, not embodied, not authentic.

For many of these years, I struggled with my connections between spiritual spaces and social justice. On the one hand, making some difference was enough to keep me there. I saw the medicine that yoga practices provided for people. I saw their lives changing. I saw them growing. Over the decade of organizing a charity festival, I helped direct funds towards people in the US and overseas who had few resources, including healthcare, education, and healing. This was not funding white people's mission trips to countries of brown people. I felt very aligned with causes I believed in.

Yet I was also stifled. I didn't feel comfortable expressing myself, particularly about social justice. Partly because yoga has become so commodified that I can barely find my values in it. I've been disgusted to see the ongoing fixation on image and money, over genuine human community and true compassion for those who are marginalized and oppressed.

And partly because my views were deeply uncomfortable for those with a lot of privilege. So, I used my personal online spaces (my classes, my blog, my social media profiles) to share what mattered to me. My personal spaces had constant calls to #blacklivesmatter and other social justice issues. I continue to have intense conversations, both online and offline.

Certainly, though, despite my best intentions, I'm sure I caused harm. For example, I'm sure I gave the impression of agreement with microaggressions when I didn't speak up.

Eventually, the dissonance was too much. The "official," sanctioned statements did not go far enough for my beliefs. I saw so much good being done, yet I was also frustrated at not speaking freely and fully. I also wanted to feel more confident that marginalized people would feel comfortable addressing my mistakes. Some of them did, over the years. But I have no reason not to believe others were too polite or uncomfortable to confront me.

I also encountered constant misogyny. Many of you reading this already know what that's like. If you don't, start learning.

An incomplete list of how it can manifest: SO MUCH emotional labor demanded a woman (like me), disproportionate expectation for a woman (like me) to make sure everyone is at ease all the time. People short on time to help, but long on time to criticize and insult the work they didn't do but a woman (like me) did. People who dismissed requests from a woman (like me) for support, but insisted on involvement when a woman (like me) specified she didn't need help.

In my experience, many people use gaslighting as a bypassing tactic. Decades of misogyny had conditioned me to believing that it was simply the entry fee to living as a woman. But I still have agency; I can create whatever boundaries I want for myself.

It's telling about the power of misogyny that I experienced it even in spaces that I created. But the fact that I experienced it so consistently, repeatedly, across studios, in every space where I worked, underscores its pervasiveness. Like racism, it is the air we breathe.
Also: misogyny is not perpetuated only by men. Women absolutely disparage and limit other women. Some of y'all already know this. If this is news to you, start asking around and learning.

For many years, I clung to the differences I made in people's lives, to community connections I helped create, for the issues I advocated. And I don't just mean issues around anti-racism. I pushed for veg food at a time when the city had hardly any veg restaurants, for the sake of creating drawing attention to what was, at the time, considered very alternative. I had conversations after classes that challenged people's biases, that addressed my own missteps for students who were not white. I was one of the only event organizers in my city who cared about composting. Popup farmers markets don't even do it. But I took on composting because it aligns with my values about the environment. People were lukewarm at best about environmental issues, so you can imagine how much more difficult it was to advocate for "divisive" social justice issues. Still, I took measures towards inclusivity that I knew no one else had bothered to do. I pushed for for acknowledgement and awareness, to limited success.

And that was enough for a long time.

Until it wasn't. I believe that conscious spaces, spiritual practices compel us to strive for diversity, equity, and inclusion. And if I'm not doing that, I'm not only out of integrity, I'm contributing to the problem.

I was honoring some of my values, but not all. Not enough. I did a lot of good, but I certainly harmed myself in many ways.

More importantly, I was continuing harm, perpetuating dynamics and situations that did not address injustice.

I believe in not settling, so I left. I left many times, over the years—I left multiple studios, multiple committees, multiple groups of people who created yoga-centric events and spaces.

Whenever that happened I was immediately accused of gossip, of somehow sabotaging the place I'd just left. But I didn't, though I can't offer anything but my word.
Did my ego, always petty, want people to suffer in my absence? Absolutely yes, unequivocally.
Did I actually make any efforts for people to suffer in my absence? No. That would have taken me even MORE out of alignment with my values than I had already been. 

Over the years, I've concluded that those sorts of accusations are a way to silence people (or at least women). Being called "divisive" has made me fearful. It's made me consider my choices that much more carefully, which is not a bad thing. At this point, years later in some cases, I don't fear that accusation.

For so many years, I was unwilling to give up, always hoping I could better reconcile. But I never could. It took years of misogyny, years of compromising myself, working to the point of severely compromising my health, until I surrendered. It took 2 intense health scares in 2019 to convince myself that I'd made the right decision.

I still wish I'd done more. I can't change the past, but I can do better moving forward.

I can't change the past, nor am I interested in hating on people for the past. I hope that this time of deep reflection influences all of us, especially white people, to be more accountable. I still value transformation, consciousness, and liberation. My preference has always been to support everyone's spaces. Rather than call out, I'd prefer to call in. I'm in too. Join me.

My part is about me, to be accountable to the years I played respectability politics and prioritized being palatable.

As I've gotten older, I've realized that if racism is the air we breathe, then it's possible to make antiracism the air we breathe. I've always wanted my commitment to social justice to be something that's inherent in how I show up in the world. It's not necessarily something I aim to draw attention to, as I don't want to slip into saviorism or virtue signaling.

My silence for all those years had layers: trying to check my ego, listening to my intuition, often being too afraid to speak lest I offend, ensuring I'm not "divisive." I'm learning, in real time, how to speak up and love louder. Please hold me accountable. Please let me know how I'm doing.

From a recent bike ride in my neighborhood.

I never knew how much relief I'd feel to be in spaces where I can express myself fully, where I feel fully in integrity with my values. I'm grateful for a life without separation, where I'm not constantly choosing, in every conversation or social media post, when or how I can express myself freely. Like I said, I've never been happier. 

In the spirit of no separation, I want to share how I've been implementing social justice into life post 2005-2019. There are things innate to what I do, as well as the first 2 things I'm changing to be more supportive.

Things inherent to what I do now:
~ If you've gotten a Numinous Spiral reading, odds are good that we've talked about social justice, privilege, misogyny, or racism—perhaps more than one, perhaps about advantages you have or additional challenges you face. All of that is inherent to the deck, as not enough divination connects to social justice, in my opinion.

~ If you want to see this more firsthand, schedule a reading where you use the guide (via a shared document). These readings are a way for your impressions to guide the development of this deck.

~ Likewise, if you've had an Intuitive Dive, these topics often come up. They are the air we breathe, and it's possible to face them with grace and compassion, rather than shame or hate.

~ One of the guidelines/agreements for Numinous Moxie (my mentorship program) is to learn about social justice. I've just updated that to reflect a deeper commitment (see below).

~ My limited event production in 2020 (Ecstatic Dance Atlanta and Earthbeat) has been for spaces that explicitly value diversity, inclusion, and social justice.

Here are 2 things I'm implementing now to be a better advocate:

1. I want to encourage a culture of giving. If you make a donation to a charity, bail fund, advocacy group, education that focuses on Black lives and anti-racism work,  you're welcome to send me the receipt and apply that same amount towards one of my offerings. For example, if you donate to Fair Fight, The Loveland Foundation, Charis Books, BLM, and many others, I'll discount my offering in the same amount of your donation.
If you have a recurring donation, you can apply this discount towards something every month with me.

This also applies to any Black candidates running for public office, such as Jaime Harrison, who's running against Lindsay Graham.

I'll also honor donations towards advocacy for the abolishment private prisons, which disproportionately have Black men as inmates. If you don't know about the implications of prison labor, please start learning. Food supply and call centers are just 2 of many examples of the hidden, barely compensated labor of inmates.

Additionally, this discount applies to donations supporting Native Americans/indigenous populations. You might already know that per capita, the Navajo nation is one of the worst impacted population by covid. They get little support and little attention. I wish this headline wasn't real. I'll honor donations to any tribe or advocacy group.

Finally, detention centers and family separations are still happening, and those centers are of course very vulnerable to covid. There's a very particular sort of outrage when I listen to the rhetoric of people, very clearly descended from immigrants, hate on immigrants. Fuck that noise. So I'll honor donations sent to organizations like RAICES.

The point is: you choose the amount and you choose the charity. I'm here to honor it.

2. For anyone who is not Black or African-American, joining Numinous Moxie now requires joining The Great Unlearn, a self-study course focused on social justice, founded by activist and writer Rachel Cargle. This is a powerful way to dive into essential work, under the guidance of an expert. I'm also doing this work, and I know it connects and deepens any self-work you undertake.
Your membership level for The Great Unlearn will be applied as a discount towards Numinous Moxie. For example, if you join The Great Unlearn at $50/month, you can apply a $50 discount every month to Numinous Moxie.

These 2 things are a start of what I know is a long-term process. I'm always interested your suggestions, as usual. I'm here to dig deep, and I'm glad you're here.

Additionally, I've added a mission statement to my site. This is a first draft; I know it doesn't encompass everything. But I've been working on it for a few weeks and I want to share now, rather than letting perfection be the enemy of accountability:

Social justice is inherent to everything I do. I am committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion. They are inherent in my offerings and in my professional structure. I am always learning and evolving. I strive to hold spaces that allow and encourage deep reflection, accountability, and potent transformation around antiracism, misogyny, xenophobia, and other social justice issues. Your sincere exploration is welcome. Vehement attachment to oppressive structures is not.
Let’s co-create a better world.

In my first draft of this email, the ending was an encouragement to learn about Juneteenth. Now that there's a rally in Tulsa on that day, I have a different statement. Believe what you will about the timing and location, but I know they're not a coincidence. If it is truly is coincidence, that only highlights the gross insensitivity, ignorance, and negligence at play.

I live in Georgia, where voter suppression is obvious and even more is ALREADY IN the legislative pipeline, to go into effect before elections later this year. This administration and its supporters are playing a much longer game, aiming to manipulate the upcoming election. Some of the only skills of the current administration are branding, manipulating public sentiment, and (related) stirring up hate.

Stirring up hate has a lot of functions. It can incite harmful action or useless violence. It can keep you from seeing the big picture. Notably—I think most importantly for this person—it garners tremendous attention. That's all he's ever wanted. Again and again and again.

And garnering that excessive, sustained attention siphons your precious, powerful energy. Again and again and again.

So, in light of that, the new ending to this love letter:
Y'all already know rally is beyond offensive and inappropriate.
However -
Do not let small people consumed by hate derail or misdirect your sacred anger. Know what's really going on.

Don't be distracted; don't get played. Do not be disempowered.

Respond, not react—intelligently and effectively. Response doesn't equal passive; response just means intentional.

Listen to Black people.
Love louder.

In solidarity,
S.

—
she / they
Siderealchemy