Certainty, Curiosity And Stepping Into This Moment

There’s a lot in the philosophy of yoga about not being disturbed by dualities. It’s an important result of a good practice, and it is one we’re going to need more of in the coming weeks/months/years.

It feels to me like a time when we need to hold certainty and curiosity both at once. Certainty – because Donald Trump is not only violating the basic standards of democracy but trying to tell us he’s not. Because authoritarianism can creep up on you when you adjust to incremental moves that limit our democracy. Because we might start believing in “alternate facts” if we don’t hold tightly to the certainty that what we know, what we saw, what we heard is reality.

And then there’s the need for curiosity, which assumes maybe we aren’t certain, maybe we don’t know everything. I’ve been thinking about curiosity a lot ever since the election. I had huge flashes of anger and resentment at the people who voted for Trump right after, but pretty quickly that dissipated and instead I just felt sad. I mean – I am still angry at the rich and entitled who cynically supported Trump because his band of craziness will make them richer and more entitled. But I also know there are a lot of people who were confused. Who didn’t fully understand that he meant what he said. People who found him entertaining and aren’t clear about the role the President plays. People who felt that no one understood or articulated their experience – but it seemed like he did. I feel sad for those people because I know that Trump’s impact is going to fall on all of us. Unless you are very very wealthy, you are going to feel it. And many of those people are going to lose their health insurance, or they’re going to lose aspects of it the employer-provided insurance that Obamacare created, like free preventive care or the ability for their kids to stay on their insurance longer. Those same people are going to see disinvestment in their communities when Trump’s tax plans funnel resources away from public services and into the pockets of wealthy people and big corporations. Those impacts are going to hit all of us, whether we understood it back in November (of course I think I did) or not.

And then there’s the women’s march. I was ambivalent about this event from the beginning. I worried that compartmentalizing our outrage into something that conforms to gender was too limiting. I worried that I wouldn’t feel part of the sisterhood. I’ve been an avowed feminist since I learned, at age 18, what that means. But I’ve also always felt sort of on the outside of the mainstream feminist movement. Maybe that’s because I grew up poor and my experience of class defines a lot of how I see the world. Maybe it’s because I’m queer and so my experience of gender is different than straight women’s. Nonetheless, seeing the organizing taking shape and all the activity around the march, I started to get excited about it. I decided to attend the local march in Madison, WI, instead of staying in DC and working as a marshal for the national march. Like many people, I was buoyed by the energy, the size of the crowds, the creativity, the sense of power. The feeling that we could say collectively that what is happening here is not okay.

Some feeling of certainty.

Maybe some of you have seen some of the women of color commentaries on the various marches (if not look here, here, here). Women of color felt suspicious and wary of it because too often feminism seems to be an arena to advance the interests of upper class white women (though the national women’s march was organized by an amazing and diverse group). Women of color had bad experiences – there’s an especially disturbing account about indigenous women being dismissed, tokenized, made to feel unwelcome. And underlying all of that is the basic reality that white women helped elect Donald Trump. We can’t deny it. Maybe I didn’t vote for him, but a lot of my sisters did.

I have read this commentary with a mix of emotions. I have to admit that initially it made me defensive. I wanted to say LOUDLY to everyone I saw – Hey I didn’t vote for this guy. In fact, despite my own complicated feelings about Hilary Clinton I put my whole life aside to try to get her elected precisely because I saw the danger he posed. And I’ve worked hard to support women of color leadership – so don’t point that outrage at me.

Defensiveness is a kind of certainty. It is a statement that you have nothing to learn. It is an insistence that whatever needs addressing, it is not your problem. It is a refusal to listen and accept the truth behind the critique. So I’m putting that aside, and being open to what I need to learn. To be curious, not certain.

I am sharing all of this because I know that other white women have had the same reaction and I really want to ask that we all try to adopt, instead, an attitude of curiosity.

Obviously we have something to learn.

Obviously we need a broad-based movement that includes everyone – we aren’t going to beat Donald Trump any other way – and that means listening to and understanding where women of color are coming from. It means elevating their leadership, literally following their lead.

And it means we have to get in the game when it comes to supporting and addressing the issues that women of color have put on the table – like Black Lives Matter, among other things.

I have a lot to say about how the yoga community could be showing up more and better for a multi-racial, multiple gendered movement for liberation. I’m going to write about that another day.

But for today I’m making a pledge. Starting in February I will donate the proceeds from my yoga teaching to organizations that support women of color and communities of color. Initially, I’m thinking about the Movement for Black Lives and Mijente. If someone reads this blog and wants to suggest other organizations, I want to hear it.

I don’t make a lot of money teaching yoga, but I am lucky enough to have a full-time paying job. So I can afford to give. If you are able to give, I can vouch for both of these organizations and the value of the work they do.

What can you afford to do? Money is only one way to help. Go to a meeting or a protest. Volunteer. Contact your Members of Congress on the whole range of issues, including immigration, the Dakota Access Pipeline, and the criminalization of people of color communities. If you are reading this and you have questions about how to connect with organizations that support Black Lives Matter or the struggle for immigrant or climate justice, leave a note in the comments and I’ll hook you up.

It’s time, sisters. We have to claim and create the feminist movement we want to have and for me that means being curious, listening with big ears and an open heart, and stepping into this moment ready to do what is needed to make change.

With love, gratitude and solidarity.