Launch Your Boat Care Is Our Instinctual Response Dear [name], in her 2009 book, A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities that Arise in Disaster, writer and activist Rebecca Solnit examines five major disasters and the ways that mutual aid, altruism and cooperation were the instinctual responses of impacted community members as well as people bearing witness to these events from a far. through in depth research, including time spent in historical archives and in conversations...
10 months ago • 8 min read
Ancestral Transmissions Dear Reader, almost a year ago, an indian woman I’d never met facebook messaged me that her mother was looking for relatives with whom she had lost touch. this person then posed the question, “is your mom, kanaka and your dad purushotham?” my body tingled. in an instant a stranger became a relative and a hidden door to an unknown past cracked open. after i confirmed my parentage, my new found relative revealed that her mother, irene, and my mother, kanaka, were second...
about 1 year ago • 7 min read
An Act of Self Preservation Dear Reader, As the daughter of first generation Indian immigrants, it is very hard to not follow through on something. Backing out was not an option when I was growing up. Once you committed to a project, an instrument, a person or a group, you stayed steadfast no matter how uncomfortable, hard or unenjoyable the experience became. In fact, joy was an afterthought, a potential side effect but never a core intention. A lot was riding on the commitments my father...
about 1 year ago • 7 min read
Nature's Blueprint for Becoming Dear Reader, I don’t know about you but i’ve been experiencing a constant whirring over the past few months. I feel it just behind my eyes, like a merry go round that will not stop. I also feel it in my chest like i’m in a swinging seat on a ferris wheel that is moving a little too fast for its axis. Each day’s news images of more people, including hundreds of thousands of children experiencing starvation, preventable disease, drone attacks, military ambush and...
over 1 year ago • 6 min read
Failure: A Liberatory Path Dear one, Happy Full Snow Moon! This full moon invites us to shed what no longer serves us and plant seeds for the future. Snow Moon also calls us to connect with our inner strength and resilience during the darkest and coldest nights and to re-member we have the power to endure and thrive. One thing I’m shedding is fear of failure. Like all of us, I’ve been conditioned to fear failure by systems which practice supremacist power. Take racial capitalism in the u.s....
over 1 year ago • 5 min read
The Power of Breath Dear Reader, I recently had the privilege of co-facilitating the Facilitative Leadership for Social Change workshop, a training series developed by the Interaction Institute for Social Change, for 30 digital navigators and 5 staff of the Alliance for Digital Equity. The Alliance staff did a phenomenal job of holding 1:1’s with prospective participants, resulting in a gathering that was diverse across various spectrums of experience including race, class, gender,...
over 1 year ago • 8 min read
When and when not to ask As a child, I was a rule follower. Rules helped me feel order and predictability in a childhood that often felt uncertain and overwhelming. In the span of 6 years, our family experienced my mother’s death, my maternal grandmother’s return to India, my paternal grandmother’s moving in, my father’s short courtship with and marriage to my second mother, and my family taking in a 15 year old foster child after her own mother’s tragic death. In this period, my family...
almost 2 years ago • 8 min read
What legacies will we carry and what will we lay down? I first met Ana Polanco in Coaching for Healing, Justice, and Liberation (CHJL), a 9-month coaching certification program led by and designed for movement leaders of color. Ana was a coach mentor and guided a group coaching session on surfacing the core needs and values of coaching clients. I remember entering Ana’s zoom room and seeing her larger than life presence on the screen. She wore a burnt orange tank top, a necklace of white...
about 2 years ago • 4 min read
Reshaping Our Bodies, Voices, & Lineages Dear Reader, There is a black and white photo of my mother on a clothing rack shelf in my closet. It’s propped up behind some jewelry boxes. This location offers a moment of communion with my mother as I clothe and adorn myself. She stands close to a building that may be her home. She stands her full length, her silk sari perfectly pleated and draped over her left shoulder and arm. Her thick black hair is pulled back at just the right amount to allow a...
about 2 years ago • 6 min read