Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
Small Dunce help from small small human areas small.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
It's so funky. Welcome to Small Doses podcast. We are
muddling through, aren't we. Samanda steals here and you know
this episode. You know, people, I gotta tell you some episodes.
It's just like, how have we not did an episode yet?
I came across Ajan Marie Brown on these internets and
(00:37):
I was really impressed by her sense of humor, also
by the texts that she creates around really trying to
live in our best selves in this terrible world while
creating a better world. And one of the books that
she released that I feel like needed to get talked
(00:59):
about is her latest which.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
Is Loving Corrections.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
And so many of us are finding ourselves in community
with folks who are maybe having a tough time, maybe
having a tough time with acknowledging the shifts and realities
that are coming about right now in response to the
shifts and realities that have been ignored, and it becomes
(01:29):
very frustrating for a lot of us, myself included, to
lovingly correct people about their willful ignorance. That being said,
there also becomes I think a real question about can
we lovingly correct in the United States, and what does
that look like?
Speaker 1 (01:44):
What does loving corrections look like?
Speaker 2 (01:47):
And I think for some people, they may think that
that's just all about quote unquote like gentle parenting or
being soft witted, creating a soft landing. And I think
in some cases that may be true, but I think
in other cases there's also tough love. So we're going
(02:08):
to get into that today. And I want you to
ask yourself, how do you like to be corrected? And
if you find yourself saying I don't like to be corrected.
Speaker 1 (02:17):
You know that it's time to dig deeper.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
You know, I get a bad rap because people think
that I always want to be They're like, oh, she
always wanted to be right. She don't want to argue
with nobody, Like she just thinks her opinion is the
one that matters. Because when I would be on Instagram,
people would try to check me instead of correct me.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
And that is the way that I don't like to
be corrected.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
Do not try to check me, Like when people add
on extra things, like when they say like respectfully and
then they'll be like, you don't know, No, if you
end sharing information with me with hope that helps. No,
you're being snide and it's not necessary. Maybe I don't know.
And also people don't oftentimes lead with enough curiosity, they
(02:58):
lead with indictment.
Speaker 1 (03:00):
And I had so much of that on the instagrams.
Speaker 2 (03:03):
It was so unnecessary, It was so without love, It
was so without even just consideration for how it may
make me feel. That people misinterpreted that as oh, she
only wants to hear her own opinions. No, I just
want to hear dissenting opinions done in a respectful fashion
that is not about trying to diminish and demean, which
I think so many of us are so accustomed to.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
That we may not even recognize that we're doing it.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
So today we're going to get into this conversation that really,
I think helps us to contextualize what loving corrections really
are when we may have missed the mark on them,
and how we lovingly correct ourselves.
Speaker 1 (03:39):
Which we definitely don't do enough of.
Speaker 2 (03:41):
That I can say wholeheartedly applies to everybody.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
Let's get into it, y'all. Welcome to small doses. Miss
the Adrian Marie Brown. That was not the sound I wanted.
Speaker 3 (04:02):
Oh okay, good, I was like, wow.
Speaker 1 (04:06):
There we go. Actually a more appropriate sound for you is.
Speaker 3 (04:11):
I was like, where's the magical fairy sound? The second
sound reminded me. I saw Nina Simone perform in the
Beacon Theater in New York in two thousand and She
had a peacock feather. This is like her last time
I was the US. This is her last time. She
was like, I'm not doing this US shit anymore. But
she had a peacock feather and she stood on the
(04:32):
stage and she rolled around. She's like clap, louda, louda louda.
And it was just like, can I give her more?
Speaker 1 (04:40):
Like how more? You know?
Speaker 3 (04:43):
So when I hear a crowd, I'm just like Nina's
in the background, Yes, you know, give it to me,
give me my flowers, right, yeah. But I am actually
the fairy. I'm just like fairy Godmother I appeared, you know.
I keep laughing with people that when Wicked came out,
I was like, I'm a wanna be Alpha Ba. But
I've always been a little bit more Glinda. And I'm
really reckoning with the Glinda, you know, just being like
(05:05):
oh damn, you know, just like.
Speaker 1 (05:08):
Yeah, you don't have to be all Glinda. Don't be
all no.
Speaker 3 (05:11):
I mean you know, I am mixed race, so yeah,
I am like always like a little bit of everything,
but that part of Glinda that's sort of like it's
uh Linda, and I'm like, my name is lowercase with
Marie is to eat, you know, like that little stuff.
But I'm just like, I think Glinda might just be
a verco. But yeah, I feel welcome to though by
the sound effects.
Speaker 1 (05:29):
Good welcome. This is long overdue and I'm glad to
have you here.
Speaker 2 (05:37):
And I want to tell everyone who's watching the episode
that I have a thing where soothing voices it like
lullabies me to sleep, and it's not a reflection of
that person. So apparently I have a soothing voice because
I have put myself from my own podcast.
Speaker 1 (05:58):
Like listening back to my own podcast put me to sleep.
Speaker 3 (06:01):
If you didn't have that experience, like, how would you
normally describe your own voice? Like how do you sound
to yourself? Hype hype m hm. In my mind, I
am always behind buster rhymes. Just that's great. Yeah, I
came from a certain time and I'm supposed.
Speaker 2 (06:19):
To be going yeah, like that's how I feel like
I always sound. And then when I consciously choose not
to sound like that.
Speaker 1 (06:27):
I feel like I don't sound like myself.
Speaker 3 (06:29):
Yeah, that's right. I always feel like I sound like
a kid kind of. And so it's always so funny
to me that other people are like, you sound so soothing,
because what's happening in my brain is always like what's
going on? Like what's that butterfly? Just you're like, what's like?
I'm always asking, Like in my brain, it's still that
child like yes sense of stuff. And so that's how
I feel like when I'm talking, I'm like, I mean
(06:50):
like it could be so like we could be free,
like like you know, but it feels like a little kid.
And then people come back and like, oh my god,
like you know what I'm like, is that is that
what I sound like?
Speaker 1 (07:01):
So in my mind, I do sound like a kid.
Speaker 2 (07:04):
So it surprises me when people are like, you're yelling
all the time, and I'm like, am I.
Speaker 3 (07:08):
Because I'm really kids are kids are always like mom, wait,
I'm doing a cartwheel or whatever, and you're like free, Yeah, exactly,
you're yelling at her freedom.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
But I literally think that I'm so serious.
Speaker 3 (07:21):
I really support you, and.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
I've seen video of myself as a child, and I'm.
Speaker 3 (07:25):
Like, that's how I think I'm the same way. I'm
the same way, the.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
Same and they're like, no, you sound like you're yelling
at the people and disenfranchising them.
Speaker 3 (07:35):
Well, I also think with someone like you, you're like
messing with people's perception because you're like, Oh, I'm a
gorgeous person, I'm a smart person, I'm a this person
or that. Like, there's a lot of ways that people
would be like, oh, I'm expecting this from you, and
you're like, you're not going to get that. You're going
to get Malcolm X as a child doing cartwheels, right,
It's like that that's what you're going to get. It's
(07:55):
not what you expected. So even that moment for people
is like you're getting jarred by your perception versus reality
more than anything I'm actually doing.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
And then I mess with their perception because I'm typically
saying something that may jar their own concept of their
their own perception of their own identity.
Speaker 3 (08:11):
And they're like, bitch, yeah, I didn't want that. I
didn't believe lies alone alone. It's the yelling part. It's
one of the most fascinating aspects of human interaction to
me is the moment when someone feels that they're communicating
like calmly or clearly or just directly, and the other
(08:31):
person is like, you're yelling at me, And how do you.
Speaker 1 (08:34):
Want to live with me and do a study because
that's my life?
Speaker 3 (08:37):
Yeah, like I will. And I think a lot of
black women, I know this is the lives that we
end up living or the lives cast into. Oh I'm
sure you do. Oh, I'm sure you do. But I
think like this is why I feel like as something
I still need to study. Like I don't have a
take on it quite yet. I just like there's something
where I'm like, oh, if you hear something that challenges
(08:58):
your way of being, it's like the volume is automatically
turned up on that.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
I have a theory.
Speaker 3 (09:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
My theory is that someone is echoing what you're already
saying to yourself, and so that's why it sounds so loud.
Speaker 3 (09:12):
Oh yeah, So I think in community where it's like
we're in community with each other, I think that's probably
what happens, is like you're seeing me too clearly. And
then I think there's the other thing that's like I'm
just scared of your whole people, So you always sound
loud to me, you're supposed to be enslaved, and I
don't know why you're talking to me like an equal.
That sounds very loud or whatever it is.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
When I was on the Real and I had come
to my executive to say, I am not comfortable with
the amount of negativity that is allowed to exist in
the comment section.
Speaker 3 (09:43):
Yeah, because tect me, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
Protect me.
Speaker 2 (09:47):
She was like, you're being very condescending, like on the
show or like in that moment with her, in that
moment with her, and I said, it sounds like condescension
to you because I'm speaking to you as an equal
and you see beneath you. So that's why it feels
condescending because you feel like I'm pulling you down to
a level that you have put me on.
Speaker 1 (10:06):
But we are equals.
Speaker 3 (10:07):
And she was helping me to buildup the theory here
because there's something. I think what we're talking about is
like power dynamics change the volume with which we hear
each other.
Speaker 1 (10:16):
Right, That's what it actually is true, because that's what
parents too.
Speaker 3 (10:19):
You, right, Yeah, Because I'm like, I know when a
kid that I love, I'm like a slight tonal shift
and I'm like, okay, in your head. You're yelling now,
and I can tell that little three year old, do
you think you got it together? But I can actually
feel the shift, But yeah, I do think there's something
about that. Even for me. I'm like, I don't feel
like I have changed much over my life, you know,
like I feel very consistently me, But the way people
(10:40):
respond to me is so shaped by their own experience,
and they're how they relate to Oh, you have this
many books or this many followers or this many of
this or whatever, and so now how I hear you
is different. I'm like, Okay, well, I didn't do anything.
I'm still saying what I've been saying I mean, and.
Speaker 2 (10:58):
That leans into the the ability to have loving correction, right,
Because I feel like in my recent experience, particularly since
I've like actively left the Hollywood space and really like
earnestly leaned into educating and edutainment in a way that
isn't like conflicted by that, I feel like I've amassed
(11:20):
a following of folks who are not following like me, Amanda, Like,
I'm some like, yeah, you know what I mean, but
they are understanding of like my intentions and the person
I am so they're able to hear my corrections differently,
They're able to hear my adjustments in a way that
I feel like a larger audience. Who would assigned celebrity
(11:41):
to me and who would assigned this? Yeah, they couldn't
hear me because they feel like I'm talking down to them,
because they've put me on a pedestal that I didn't
even ask for.
Speaker 3 (11:50):
Yeah, I mean the whole conversation around celebrity for me
is such a fascinating place. It feels like, you know
what I think about like all of human history. I'm
like this little blip around celebrity. It's fascinating to me
because it used to be like kings and queens or
it used to be something it's like in society that
were like, Okay, these are the people we're going to
elevate above all else, and then we want to both
like worship them but also punish them. That's the fun part,
(12:13):
and like how do we navigate this? And everyone is
supposed to want that life whatever it is, being in
the most power, the most visibility, but then you get
there and you're like this is awful, and I don't
want this. I want a real life. I want to
be able to be authentic or whatever it is. Some
people do like it, you know. I occasionally meet people
I'm like, oh, you were meant to be famous. You
(12:34):
saw this out, you sought this out, you wanted it,
you love it. This is great. But the people that
make the most sense to me are people who are
similar to me, where it's like I'm doing what I'm
on earth to do and in this moment it happened
to lead to celebrity. Which I'm a facilitator. Like the
book Loving Corrections, All my books emerge from my work
as someone who's like, I'm trying to facilitate human relationships
(12:56):
for most of human history. That's not something that makes
you famous, right, Like my peers who facilitate are not
like just skyrocketing or whatever. That's not happening.
Speaker 2 (13:05):
So what do you think was unique to you? Because
you just said your peers, But I mean, what is it?
Speaker 1 (13:11):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (13:12):
So one thing I think is that I think the
love piece of the way that I approached my work
as a facilitator. I think people kept calling me back
because I was like, I'm not just going to try
to get us from like we need a plan. Now
we have a plan. I'm trying to get us from
like we're not a unified body, and now we love
each other and we're going to like roll with each
other for a long term.
Speaker 1 (13:32):
Right.
Speaker 3 (13:32):
So I think in my work that created a different feeling,
and I wrote a emergent strategy to try to like
put my finger on like, here's what it is we're
talking about. I make non judgmental space for people to change.
I make non judgmental space for people to relate to
each other. I'm interested in being able to make mistakes
and learn, and that's different, you know, that's a different approach.
(13:53):
But then I think it's also like I'm a theater kid,
you know, so there's a part of me that's also like,
you know, I did go to North Atlantic hig Schoo
the performing Hours, and I was like the next Jasmine
guy for like five minutes, and it was like I'm
gonna sing and dance and like perform. And so I
think that led to the way that I when I
speak in front of people or whatever, there is something
that can come up that's like a little bit more
like Jazzy I don't know. And then I love to talk.
(14:16):
So I think the podcasting and stuff I don't know though,
I really don't fully comprehend it. And luckily when it
skyrocketed for me was right during the pandemic. So my
experience of it is like people are like, oh, we
all know your name now, but I'm like, the whole
world was shut down, so no one really Like I
haven't done a lot of TV. People don't really know
what I look like, necessarily if they happen to land
(14:38):
in the Instagram pocket where they're like, oh, I do
know her, But now I don't even post myself on
Instagram as much like I'm like, here's some memes, and
here's some.
Speaker 1 (14:46):
I was gonna say, but you are the meme master.
Speaker 3 (14:48):
I love doing well. You know, the memes have made
me happy. Right now I'm feeling it's like maybe a
little too dystopy even for me to get it up,
but I'm struggling to like feel integrity with offering people
me in this time. But for a while that was
the thing where I was like, Okay, it's not about
the memes for me. It's like I want to cultivate
a feeling. I want to cultivate a different feeling. I
want to cultivate an emotional shift and a sense of togetherness,
(15:11):
and the bigger the divide is, the harder it is
to like curate a moment that's like, do we all
feel this hilarity grief poetic thing? Can we just feel
it for a moment? Okay, now go back to the scroll,
you know, but we'll see if I'll come back to it.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
How did the book Loving Corrections come together?
Speaker 3 (15:38):
Yeah, it's weee. It's related to this facilitation thing, right,
which is I kept getting feedback from people around the
way that I facilitate, in the way that I intervene,
which is that there's something about the loving correction where
I'm like, I don't spend my time trying to correct
people I don't feel love for There's something specific right
that I'm like, it's not my business all now, I know, right, yeah, pumpumpume,
(16:02):
But it's not just where I'm going to put my
energy because I don't think change happens that way. And
in my own life that's never worked. Like if someone
comes at me and I'm like, you don't care about
my existence, there's nothing you're going to offer to me
that's really going to transform me. Right, it might make
me get a better security system and better boundaries, but
it's not really going to fundamentally change me. All the
people who have actually been able to change me were
(16:23):
the ones who were like Adrian, what you just said
was really offensive. What you just did really hurt someone's feelings. Yeah,
have you read the Black feminists? Like you need to
sit down with the Combine River collective work, You need
to sit down with the Soil Clifton's poetry. You need
to like people who lovingly were like here, I see
that you're on this path, and I see your curiosity,
and I love you enough to nudge. So first the name,
(16:45):
that's how the name. I was like, loving corrections is
what I do. And then had written this column for
Yes magazine that was all about accountability, and I was like,
accountability from the most intimate, like inside ourselves? Are we
being accountable to ourselves? To the grand the scale of
like can we be accountable to the earth and to
our timeline? And it was so good to write that,
(17:05):
and I was like, I want that in a book,
and that feels like loving corrections. And then I had
all these other essays.
Speaker 1 (17:11):
When you wrote that for them, was your deal that
you owned it?
Speaker 3 (17:14):
Yeah, so I always do that when I'm writing for anyone,
like if I'm doing a column or any work that
I do for anyone else, I always make sure I
secure that I actually own the intellectual property of it
to do with what I want, and I always then
give credits. So like in Loving Corrections it says these
were first published here, they've been edited or whatever. But
I'm like so grateful that Yes Magazine gave me the
(17:35):
space to explore all that at my own pace, and
then I was able to pull it together. And then
the other essays they each emerged from like a real
corrective moment where I was like there was like a
word for white folks, for instance, where I was like,
there's a certain way that white folks are showing up
in movement and in spaces. I want to really course
correct some of that. But I also want to call
out those of us who are in deep relationship with
(17:57):
white people and not owning that and not talking about
what that takes. Because I kept seeing that in movement
space where people are like black lives, Matt, you know,
and I'm like, yes, and you have a white partner,
and what does that mean? And like don't hide that person,
Like let's talk about like all those things can coexist,
and actually part of the American experiment, part of the
biodivergence of life, part of a multiracial democracy, is being
(18:19):
able to be honest about those things that, like, our
lives matter and there's intimacy with those who have historically
oppressed us. That's part of the stew of this place,
the paradox. Yeah, So for me, I was like, I
want to talk about and just trouble the water out
a little bit, this idea that we are trying to
hold these hyper separate spaces almost as performance. But then
(18:39):
most of the people I know don't live in that
level of hyper separation or segregation. And that doesn't mean like, oh,
there's some good white people, but there are white folks
who are doing their labor. They're doing their work, and
they're doing work enough to be in an intimate relationship
with you, Right, So I was like, I want to
write about that or one to men. You know, it's
just like I see all these women who have gotten
(19:01):
into these heterosexual relationships and they tried to be gay.
They couldn't get there, and so then it's like, here
you are in relationships with.
Speaker 1 (19:09):
Trying to be gay. They just couldn't get there.
Speaker 3 (19:12):
Anyone who's a friend of mine who's straight. I'm like,
it's not for lack of effort. It's not for lack
of trying to find a way another way, but not
because I think everyone is queer or anything like that,
but mostly because I'm like, men are in a serious
crisis right now, which we're seeing play out on such
a global scale, and so then try to love them
in this crisis is difficult, and so I was like,
(19:32):
let me write the most loving thing I can to
men who care enough to try, because I'm like, these
are men who I'm like, you call yourself a feminist,
you're dating a feminist woman, You're dating what you are
powerful who are earning more than you generally, and you're trying,
but you're still putting this particular foot in this particular mouth.
And like, let's see if I can help as a
queer auntie energy, you know. So each of the pieces
(19:53):
emerged like that with I think the final pieces I
wrote for that book were around Zionism and Palestine and
just want to to put a few words on that,
which I you know, sent to our friends Pala and Noura,
Like I'm not going all in. But yeah, there's just
already been great books written about that. But I was like,
I want to make clear my position.
Speaker 2 (20:12):
I mean, do you feel like you grew up in
a home of loving corrections?
Speaker 1 (20:17):
Like how did you even develop this?
Speaker 2 (20:19):
Because I feel like I've had to really learn how
to correct lovingly.
Speaker 3 (20:24):
Yeah, do you feel like you do now? You feel
like you have it?
Speaker 1 (20:27):
I have it? Now? Do I use it all the time?
Speaker 3 (20:29):
That's different? That's different.
Speaker 2 (20:30):
I think sometimes I think I'm being loving in the
way that someone else can receive it. I struggle with
giving loving correction that people receive honestly, because I feel
like a lot of people have a perception about me.
Speaker 1 (20:46):
So it's like they think I'm being like fake.
Speaker 3 (20:48):
So it's almost like there's a membrane or something that you're.
Speaker 1 (20:50):
Like, yes, how do I know?
Speaker 2 (20:52):
I'm really trying to just be here with you and
like suckle you at my breast in this moment, and
they but like the people who know you know me, Yeah,
we've gotten there where the mask is off.
Speaker 3 (21:03):
That's the essence of you know, Like when people ask me, like,
what is the essential aspects of a loving correction, I'm like,
relationship is the essential piece. If there's not actually a
relationship there, it's actually really difficult to do. It doesn't
mean it's impossible to do, but it's like so much
of what I do is like, who's actually in relationship
with that person? Who could have a loving relationship? And
I say this, so back to like where did I come?
(21:25):
You know, my family life. My parents were an interracial
relationship in the Deep South in the seventies.
Speaker 1 (21:30):
Who was the white one?
Speaker 3 (21:31):
My mom is white, mom white, dad black, And they
went in the military and then like left the South
because they were like, it's too dangerous and too regressive here,
so we're going to go into the military to have
this whole other experience, right, But the part that they
were looking for was like international. They were like, if
we can just get to other parts of the world,
will see this differently. And truly, my experience growing up
(21:53):
was being around a lot of other mixed families who
are in the military. So I did have some of that,
but the love between my parents was very instructive to me,
where it was like you keep coming back. And I
have to give my parents credit because my mom was
disowned by her family when she married my dad eloped
with my dad, but she was like, Okay, they've let go.
(22:16):
But her grandfather wrote her a letter and was like,
I don't agree with what you've done, but I'm going
to keep sending you resources so that you don't go
underwater because the rest of your family's cut you off.
And then my dad was the one who was like,
it's important that we if the possibility is there to
be in right relationship with your family, it's important that
we do that. And he had lost a lot of
(22:36):
members of his family at a really young age, so
he's like this matters, like you don't just have these
people forever. And so something about the combination of the
two of them being willing to like keep coming back
to the well and being like, are you all ready
for relationship? Okay, not yet, Okay, are you ready for relationship? Okay,
now there's a little opening. And so slowly, now like
forty eight years into this experiment, my family has game nights.
(23:01):
We're all play cards with each other, like the two set,
and again we're not there yet, but that might happen
by like we're eighty, you know, Like we're just slowly,
you know. And these are folks, like some folks still
Trump voters. Some folks still you know, there's still a
lot of divergence of politics, opinions, worldviews, all the stuff.
But there keeps being this like, but are you willing
(23:22):
to come back and try being in some level of
right relationship with each other? And so I think I've
grown up in that world where it's like it might
not be ready yet, you know, but time will do
some of the work for us. And I think that's
another piece of loving correction. It's like the Internet has
us tricked into thinking that stuff happens like that. No
real change happens like that. There's always some build up
(23:43):
that's happening under the surface. So even if it looks quick,
it always was building up. Revolutions always look it was
like it was building up. You made us a pass
for so long. Now we revolt, And the same thing
in a family, in a loving relationship, it's like, we
don't just break up out of the blue. I was
mad for a long time.
Speaker 1 (24:00):
I was trying to knock that vending machine over for
a while.
Speaker 3 (24:03):
Honey, I wanted it to be different. So I think
there's that piece, you know. I'm like, Okay, do we
have a relationship, are we willing to let time do
its work so that we'll change enough to come into
right relationship. And I do think all of that I
gained in my family and then have continuously practiced. My
(24:23):
favorite essay in that book is the one with my sisters,
the conversation with my sisters, because I'm like, you can
see how it's flowed into our generation where we're like
we do sister check ins with each other, so we
preempt the conflict, or we like have a container where
we're like, how are you, what's actually happening with you?
Let's correct it before it can spin into a lifelong
(24:45):
resentment where we don't talk. Let's sister each other. I
tried that with my ex how they go the time
is not ready yet?
Speaker 2 (24:53):
Well, I think that for him, the idea of loving
correction was so foreign to him, so it was literally
like hard to accept the love of the correction. Because
my thing was like, once I began really working and
started to genuinely heal, I began to understand correction differently,
(25:14):
and you know, like for me, it had always been contextualized.
Speaker 1 (25:17):
As you've done something wrong, whereas.
Speaker 2 (25:19):
Once you start healing, it's oftentimes like, oh maybe you
didn't know that this like you're leading with grace.
Speaker 3 (25:27):
I think of it as the difference between like I
always have peoplem like, I'm not trying to correct you.
I'm not God. I do you have the power to
do that?
Speaker 1 (25:33):
Right?
Speaker 3 (25:33):
What I'm trying to do is say you say you're
on this path, and I'm going to help you course
correct because there's a way that you're actually not on
that path with how you just talk to me, right,
or like what you just did was if you say,
for instance, with the men's piece, I'm like, if you
say that you believe that we are equal people the
base based basis level of feminism. Right, if you just
(25:54):
say that you believe that we're on some level of equality,
but then you talk to me like you expect me
to do more the management of our home, I need
to course correct that because what I see is you're
out of alignment with what you say. Now, what may
happen is we may find what you're saying. The misalignment
is within you right where it's like you're saying what
(26:14):
you think I want to hear because you want to
stay with me, but that's not what you actually believe.
And so sometimes it's like, Okay, I'm going to give
you some time to go off and live your life,
and maybe you'll figure out that you do want that.
Maybe you won't. But maybe the most loving thing I
can do is the boundary I'm going to set, like
I'm not going to be in relationship with someone who
sees me as less than them. I have to course
correct my life. Yeahead in that path, right because I
(26:37):
you know, the like little baby anarchist Buddhist part of
me is like I don't believe in getting attached to
changing other people. I don't believe in trying to control
other people. I don't think that we're supposed to get
a relationship to fix someone.
Speaker 1 (26:51):
So you're not a codependent.
Speaker 3 (26:52):
I am a recovering codependent. I'm recovering codependent, and I
don't know how far I am on that journey. I'm like,
who knows, But I do have a really strong sense
right now that I'm like. The way I love now
is very much like, oh, how do I stay as
curious as I can about this other person being another person?
(27:13):
Down to like very small things, you know, like the
person I love now, like she'll leave something out on
the counter and I'm like old me would have been like,
I've got to fix that. I've got to fix that
so she doesn't do that anymore, and that she understands
we don't leave something like how that wat food whatever? Yeah,
And instead I'm like, oh, let me get curious about that.
Like she lose that out because she is a working
(27:35):
person and she's running fast and she liked like there's
all these factors that lead to that, and like it's
a really loving, sweet thing I can do. It's like
I get to sleep two hours longer than her every morning,
and then when I wake up, I'm like, nothing's actually
gone bad. I'm just gonna put it away whatever it is, right.
Speaker 1 (27:51):
Oh.
Speaker 3 (27:51):
But it's like, how do I just be like loving
right where I'm just like, oh, I see how much
you're holding in this moment, and that there's no intention
of harm that you're to me. This is just how
you are now. If I was like I really can't
deal with that, that, I'd be like, we can't keep growing
in this kind of relationship because it's too much for me,
and I can't. I don't feel loving about it. And
I have had those things where like I had a
(28:12):
partner who really struggled with honesty, and I was like,
I'm really being loving. I'm like, I see the roots
of that. I understand where you learned that practice where
we all are dishonest in different ways and I am
dishonest in this way and blah blah. But then I
was like, I can't actually live with the way you're
in that practice. It doesn't work because I struggle with trust.
(28:33):
So I'm like, are things that were fundamentally struggling with
are like triggering each other to new heights? And I
was like, that's not where I want to grow. I
don't want to grow my like re stress. So those
are moves right, So like, the most loving correction I
could do with that situation is set the boundary, whereas
with this one, I could be like, oh, I appreciate this,
and I have an episode of How to Survive the
(28:54):
End of the World, the podcast I do with my
sister that's with Alexis Pauling Gums and Shanga Dari Wallace,
who are part where I'm like, they're witchy. I feel
like they're casting a love spell with each other. But
they talk about that that they're like, if you really
want to love someone, you have to learn to love
the things that could annoy you and like see them
as like loving acts. Like the honey. There's like sticky
(29:14):
honey on the side of the jar, and Sean Godari
talks about that. She's like, and I can spect my love.
My love just leaves that. That's how I know I'm
with someone else. I was by myself, my honey would
be all in the jar. Because I'm loving somebody, some
of that honey is outside the jar.
Speaker 1 (29:30):
Oh wow, that's beautiful, right.
Speaker 3 (29:32):
So there's these ways of holding it. And now I
feel that flowing through my life. And who I choose
to let clothes to me, who I spend time with,
who I invest in enough to give correction or give
this kind of attention to is. I'm like, oh, I'm
no longer in friendships or relationships where I'm like, we
keep cycling the same thing over and over again, and
(29:52):
like neither of us can course correct each other to
get out of this loop. We're just in it. So
I'm like, I don't do that, I don't keep circling.
I'm just gonna I'm gonna go over this.
Speaker 2 (30:01):
I know I had to do that recently, and it's
something it weighs on me. But it's just a very
present because it was such an act of love for myself. Yes,
and I'd never done that before in that way. Yeah,
I'd never done that before in that way. Like, and
it was very much so when you were talking about
how presenting these loving corrections. But the relationship is the thing.
(30:25):
What I've noticed also, though, is that it can also
sever relationships because it reveals oftentimes, well not oftentimes, but
it can reveal the lack of the actual relationship.
Speaker 3 (30:36):
Yeah, and I think this is right, you know. I'm like,
I don't want to blame everything on like social media,
because I think that social media is rooted in something
in us that is looking for like the best performance
of our lives and not the lives.
Speaker 1 (30:49):
Right. Yes, it's the highlight reel, right.
Speaker 3 (30:52):
And so I'm like, oh, people used to do that
with like their Christmas letter or something. It's like, it's
so great my life, you know. It's like, Oh, you're
not in a real enough relationship for me to challenge
the narrative you're giving me every year at Christmas. I
don't know, the same thing. It's like in Instagram or whatever.
I'm like, y'all don't actually know enough about me to
be yelling at me the way you're yelling at me
right now. And I don't know enough about you to
(31:13):
care that you're perplexed. But I don't know you enough
to really feel that right like, we're not in relationship,
and I've had to really clock that for myself. But
I'm like, so many of us are so lonely while
surrounded by so many people, and the loneliness is in
the gap between the real and the performance of relationship,
(31:34):
and so so much of what I'm trying to do
is get people to be like, come in closer, get
in a relationship, yes, even if it's less people right
which for me, I had to do that. I have
to be like, I don't have two hundred best friends.
I have twenty people who I'm pretty solidly close to.
And I think about this where I'm like, when big
things happen in my life, who do I want to
tell it to you? Where I'm like, they're going to
(31:54):
get it and they're going to receive it, and they're
going to hold me. Or when I'm feeling scared or
when so things like right now, and I wonder about
this for you, but like right now. I'm like, we're
living with an administration that's disappearing people for standing up
for the things that we've been standing up for, right
and I'm like, I need to have people around me
that I'm like, I don't want to be paranoid, but
I'm like, I do want to have people I can
(32:15):
be like. It's freaky. It's really uncomfortable to live through
this bulbit in this way, and I don't just want
to automatically pretend like it's all good. I'm like, it's
not all good. This is a really scary time. But
for me, I'm not going to take that to a
bunch of strangers on the internet. I want to take
that to people who love me enough to be like, Okay,
here's how we will protect you. I'm here to just
(32:36):
bear witness. I'm here to help you, like not gaslight
yourself and pretend it's not what it is. The people
who love me are like, yeah, and also, here's the
counter narrative, or here's what also makes it worth it
for you.
Speaker 2 (32:53):
This has been the last three days for me really literally,
like this conversation happened directly with somebody today where it
was like I had expressed concern about my own safety
within this realm, and their response was just kind of
very less fair, and I had to lovingly correct and say, like,
(33:15):
it's this is a real concern and I'm not sharing
it with you casually because it's not a casual time.
But it feels like you're receiving it that way and
maybe I'm misinterpreting it, but that's how it was. And
he called me today and was like, okay, so yeah,
we're not going to text no more because he was like,
(33:37):
I realized that I am not effective on text and
he was like, I'm still learning. We work together, but
he was like, I feel like I'm still learning your
language and learning your needs. And he says something that
was very interesting. He was like, you know, some people's
temperature needs to be told, and some people's tensperature needs
to be read. And he was like, you're somebody whose
temperature needs to be read, Like you want people to
(33:59):
be like I, because he's like, you're in I see
it so much that it's like do I also got
a verbalize and so we had a really great conversation though,
where I gained a second person that I feel like
I can a third that I feel like I can
be like, hey, this.
Speaker 1 (34:17):
Is fucking with me today.
Speaker 3 (34:19):
It's really, it is.
Speaker 2 (34:20):
Really And so it's interesting that you were like, I
think about that with you, because I think there's also
an element of like me being visible and a public
figure that a lot of people can't relate to. Yes,
So you know what, you're hard when you try to
have the conversation with just people that don't necessarily get that.
Speaker 3 (34:34):
They're just like, oh girl, no, I mean. And I
had to learn that. You know, there was a period
in my life where I was facilitating and coaching, and
I was coaching a lot of people who were very visible,
and I was making the mistake of being like, just
don't worry about those people on the internet. Girl, It's like,
don't worry about it, right, because I was just like,
focus on you, you know, manifest your safety whatever.
Speaker 1 (34:53):
And I was wrong write amster hands like come on.
Speaker 3 (34:56):
But I had to go back and be like, oh,
I didn't understand will look like what it can feel like,
the pylon can feel like what the attention feels like.
But I also think, as you were speaking, we're in
this parallel universe extravaganza right now, right where I literally
feel like in my circles, some people are paying hyper
attention to like everything that's going on right now. Some
(35:18):
people are like head deep in the sand, I will
not look at that. It's not affecting me yet, and
I will not Yeah, and then those folks are like
trying to yell it across the chasm to each other.
And then there's a bunch of people like on the
spectrum somewhere in the middle, like should I be moving
or stockpiling or chilling or like really not knowing, And
(35:39):
I'm like it's parallel universe. I'm like a lot of
the people who have their head in the sand, they're
like parents who are like I literally can't take this
in and also do what I need to do for
my kid. I'm like, vallid, I literally understand you. And
then the people who are hyper vigil I'm like, someone
needs to be you know. One thing that's been giving
me piece is I'm like I didn't go to law school,
(36:00):
and I just let that settle through all the way
down the ground as I'm just like there's some stuff
that is just like part of this is a legal battle,
and I'm not going to become a legal expert. I'm
not going to listen to like every podcast to like
learn the legalities of it because I didn't go to
law school because that's not my job. So when I
see them like a judge just did this, I'm.
Speaker 1 (36:18):
Like, a judge, you went to law school and then
you prepared.
Speaker 3 (36:23):
And you like know how to read that stuff and
then make this to you thank you for being.
Speaker 2 (36:30):
Too because you but I know that stuff. And I'm
like I have to tell people the I'm like you'.
Speaker 3 (36:36):
And I'm like enough to get like a hook, you know.
I'm like, I don't want to be a pundit, but
like I'm smart enough that I could, you know, like
I can get enough. And I think a lot of
us are like that I got enough. But I'm like
reminding myself that I'm not a doctor, so my response
right now doesn't need to be like emergency room. I'm like,
I don't know how to do that. I watched the Pit.
I was like, oh, not for me, but entertaining. I'm
(36:57):
glad you're doing that fake doctor's real doctors all. But
then what is my work to do? Yeah, and that
part of the peril, I'm like, Okay, what I have done,
like standing up for Palestine. I would do it in
every timeline that I can imagine. There's no world in
which I wouldn't do it, and I will continue to
do that because I'm like, oh, I know it's right.
And it's been helpful to remember James Baldwin. I remember
(37:18):
reading you know, he talks about that like, if people
aren't angry with you, if you're not unpopular based on
what you're saying, then you're not I'm mangling no, but
it's very that if.
Speaker 1 (37:26):
Everybody likes you, you're not doing money.
Speaker 3 (37:28):
Yes, that's what it is, right, And so I remember
reading that and being like, yeah, I'm way too likable.
I need to you know, like I felt that. I
was like, I'm actually much angrier about so many things,
or like I feel how I feel, And Palestine was
such a good clarifying space for me because it was
a space where I could be like, this is just
something that comes from the same part of me that
loves everything else in the world, and so it's very
(37:51):
easy for me to hold this stance. And now I'm like, oh,
in the backlash that's coming, I'm like, I can see
how illogical it is, I can see how rooted in
colonial power.
Speaker 1 (38:00):
It is.
Speaker 3 (38:00):
I can see all the things about it, and so
I'm like, oh, the fear that I feel is not
at all about the stance that I have taken or
any of the stances I've ever taken. The fear is
about living in an irrational time and being in this
parallel universe where some people in my life are aware,
like we need to look after each other. We're in
an irrational time. It's a dangerous time. And so that's
(38:22):
the thing, like if I think of a course correction
we need to have right now, is that everybody needs
to have some people who they're talking with and in
relationship with around Like, this is an irrational time. So
if this shit is this fan, I'm going to be
here for you, whichever it is. And so I'm like,
even if you're a parent who's like I can't pay
attention to all this, But if I need to hide
in your basement, is that cool? We don't have to
(38:43):
talk about the rest of it, but like, is that okay,
right or whatever it is? But you still have my
back because like you can be looking away, but I'm
at risk.
Speaker 2 (38:51):
I mean, and those are necessary questions to ask, right,
There are people right now, who are like at risk?
I threw that out there recently to somebody and I
did not get the response I thought I would get.
Speaker 3 (39:00):
But it's helpful, right, yeah, you know, right, So I'm like,
I have this feeling too, because I'm like, you know,
there's that poem that's always like if they come from.
Speaker 1 (39:07):
They came for the communists, they came for the social
exactly right.
Speaker 3 (39:10):
And I'm just like, we're in that kind of time
where if it's not directly affecting you, you might think
you can get away with not feeling scared or feeling ready.
And I'm like, I don't actually care as much about
the emotions this time is producing in people. I'm like,
if it's fear, despair or whatever, I'm like, yes, all
of that is relevant. What I'm really interested in is like,
(39:30):
what small actions and changes and course corrections are you
making in this time in your own life, because I'm like,
regardless of how you feel, you should have a local
network of people that you know how to get to
their house without a GPS and they know how to
get to years. Regardless of how you feel right now,
you should be stockpiling some resources in your home so
that if you need to like be in your house
for a month because there's a virus or there's a
(39:53):
gun shooting, shoot off, chum coumpume time or whatever, that
you can just be like, we're in and we know
where our people are. Right, I'm thinking on this very
like actionable, tangible level, like it's a dangerous time, be ready,
be preparing yourself, have a go bag, those kind of things.
I'm like that way, no matter what you feel, when
this shit hits your fan, you'll have something that you
(40:14):
can do and you'll already be of use. And then like,
if you're like not the kind of person who's going
to show up and intervene when Ice is taking people,
then you damn sure better be sending donations to the
people who do if that matters to you and every
issue we care about, there's already someone fighting that. Some
of them are lawyers, some of them are organizers, and
you might be called to that path. But you know,
(40:36):
for people who are in their forties or fifties, sixty whatever,
I'm like, you might not be that if you haven't
been that already in your life. So what is it
you already are in your life that can be applied
to this moment. Can you be a revolutionary mom? Can
you be a revolutionary teacher? Can be a revolutionary banker,
can be a revolutionary dog walker? Like, whatever work you're doing,
how does it become a part of our liberation and
(40:57):
how does it become a part of us surviving this
irash Pale time.
Speaker 2 (41:01):
Yeah, I mean I think where we are is the
tip of the iceberg. So this is the time to
also just start wrapping your mind around some loving corrections
for yourself. And so we're going to talk about those
in our Patreon only segment that we're about to get
into at did there, so come and join us, Come
(41:28):
and join us.
Speaker 1 (41:36):
The last.
Speaker 2 (41:41):
To close it out, though, this brings us all the
way back around because the soft landing is what a
loving correction is.
Speaker 3 (41:48):
That's what it is. All it is is being like
humans are just gonna human like. There's not some evolved
version of us at a collective level that's going to
do this some different way. There's not some version of
that's going to yell ourselves into liberation and freedom. That's
not going to happen. What is going to happen is
we're going to love each other and We're going to
find more people to love and like. Even the people
(42:10):
who are doing the worst shit in the world right now,
some part of them is loving someone. And the people
that I'm scaredest of are the lonely ones, Like I
think of an Elon Musk or a Trump as the
most sluckily people who really struggle for belonging, And I
think it shows us more than anything else. The most
dangerous thing you can be in this world is all
alone with resources. So part of what we need to
(42:32):
do is be like, I'm never going to be that way.
If I have resources, they're shared, they're communal. I'm focused
on being not all by myself ever, Like I'm really
focused on even if it's the relationship I have with
the birds and the otters and the folks in my yard.
I'm like, yeah, I've got like this family of otters
that has been like flowing through my backyard. It's been
very interesting. They're so cute. They're actually as cute as
(42:55):
you think they are, but maybe even cuterer than that.
Speaker 1 (42:57):
I don't even think I have a frame of reference
for that kind of cute.
Speaker 3 (42:59):
Yeah, it's an overload. Like I was like, oh, do
I want a dog, or do I want a family
of honors that hold each other's hands and they have rocks.
So I've been like deep diving on like what otters
are like and what they do. That's the thing about living,
you know. I moved into like more country, like not
country country, but like much more country than I've ever
lived in, and so I'm like, Okay, I'm in relationship
with a world outside of human right, Like I'm like,
(43:23):
I know humans are also nature, but like I'm really
being like okay, but there's a natural cycle and it
is so peaceful that they're like, girl, I'm a tree.
Do you know how much I care about what Elon
must say? Yesterday, Zeir wrote at all, like I will
outlive him or I won't, and then I'll come back
as a seat and someone else will outlive him. Like
nature just is such a great reminder that's like this
(43:45):
is so temporary. It's seasonal, as cyclical, as temporary, So
don't get so caught up in the experience and take
it so personally. We're just the humans at this time,
and it's a pale time. And that's my other thing.
It's like it's not a dark time, sot I'm saying
it's the Dark Age. Is this is a pale time,
This one all alongs to whiteness and white supremacy and colonialism.
It's a pale time. This is the peak of it, hopefully,
(44:05):
and then we get to move into the Rainbow era.
Speaker 1 (44:08):
But um bomb
Small Dunce help from small small human areas small.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
It's so funky. Welcome to Small Doses podcast. We are
muddling through, aren't we. Samanda steals here and you know
this episode. You know, people, I gotta tell you some episodes.
It's just like, how have we not did an episode yet?
I came across Ajan Marie Brown on these internets and
(00:37):
I was really impressed by her sense of humor, also
by the texts that she creates around really trying to
live in our best selves in this terrible world while
creating a better world. And one of the books that
she released that I feel like needed to get talked
(00:59):
about is her latest which.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
Is Loving Corrections.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
And so many of us are finding ourselves in community
with folks who are maybe having a tough time, maybe
having a tough time with acknowledging the shifts and realities
that are coming about right now in response to the
shifts and realities that have been ignored, and it becomes
(01:29):
very frustrating for a lot of us, myself included, to
lovingly correct people about their willful ignorance. That being said,
there also becomes I think a real question about can
we lovingly correct in the United States, and what does
that look like?
Speaker 1 (01:44):
What does loving corrections look like?
Speaker 2 (01:47):
And I think for some people, they may think that
that's just all about quote unquote like gentle parenting or
being soft witted, creating a soft landing. And I think
in some cases that may be true, but I think
in other cases there's also tough love. So we're going
(02:08):
to get into that today. And I want you to
ask yourself, how do you like to be corrected? And
if you find yourself saying I don't like to be corrected.
Speaker 1 (02:17):
You know that it's time to dig deeper.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
You know, I get a bad rap because people think
that I always want to be They're like, oh, she
always wanted to be right. She don't want to argue
with nobody, Like she just thinks her opinion is the
one that matters. Because when I would be on Instagram,
people would try to check me instead of correct me.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
And that is the way that I don't like to
be corrected.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
Do not try to check me, Like when people add
on extra things, like when they say like respectfully and
then they'll be like, you don't know, No, if you
end sharing information with me with hope that helps. No,
you're being snide and it's not necessary. Maybe I don't know.
And also people don't oftentimes lead with enough curiosity, they
(02:58):
lead with indictment.
Speaker 1 (03:00):
And I had so much of that on the instagrams.
Speaker 2 (03:03):
It was so unnecessary, It was so without love, It
was so without even just consideration for how it may
make me feel. That people misinterpreted that as oh, she
only wants to hear her own opinions. No, I just
want to hear dissenting opinions done in a respectful fashion
that is not about trying to diminish and demean, which
I think so many of us are so accustomed to.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
That we may not even recognize that we're doing it.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
So today we're going to get into this conversation that really,
I think helps us to contextualize what loving corrections really
are when we may have missed the mark on them,
and how we lovingly correct ourselves.
Speaker 1 (03:39):
Which we definitely don't do enough of.
Speaker 2 (03:41):
That I can say wholeheartedly applies to everybody.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
Let's get into it, y'all. Welcome to small doses. Miss
the Adrian Marie Brown. That was not the sound I wanted.
Speaker 3 (04:02):
Oh okay, good, I was like, wow.
Speaker 1 (04:06):
There we go. Actually a more appropriate sound for you is.
Speaker 3 (04:11):
I was like, where's the magical fairy sound? The second
sound reminded me. I saw Nina Simone perform in the
Beacon Theater in New York in two thousand and She
had a peacock feather. This is like her last time
I was the US. This is her last time. She
was like, I'm not doing this US shit anymore. But
she had a peacock feather and she stood on the
(04:32):
stage and she rolled around. She's like clap, louda, louda louda.
And it was just like, can I give her more?
Speaker 1 (04:40):
Like how more? You know?
Speaker 3 (04:43):
So when I hear a crowd, I'm just like Nina's
in the background, Yes, you know, give it to me,
give me my flowers, right, yeah. But I am actually
the fairy. I'm just like fairy Godmother I appeared, you know.
I keep laughing with people that when Wicked came out,
I was like, I'm a wanna be Alpha Ba. But
I've always been a little bit more Glinda. And I'm
really reckoning with the Glinda, you know, just being like
(05:05):
oh damn, you know, just like.
Speaker 1 (05:08):
Yeah, you don't have to be all Glinda. Don't be
all no.
Speaker 3 (05:11):
I mean you know, I am mixed race, so yeah,
I am like always like a little bit of everything,
but that part of Glinda that's sort of like it's
uh Linda, and I'm like, my name is lowercase with
Marie is to eat, you know, like that little stuff.
But I'm just like, I think Glinda might just be
a verco. But yeah, I feel welcome to though by
the sound effects.
Speaker 1 (05:29):
Good welcome. This is long overdue and I'm glad to
have you here.
Speaker 2 (05:37):
And I want to tell everyone who's watching the episode
that I have a thing where soothing voices it like
lullabies me to sleep, and it's not a reflection of
that person. So apparently I have a soothing voice because
I have put myself from my own podcast.
Speaker 1 (05:58):
Like listening back to my own podcast put me to sleep.
Speaker 3 (06:01):
If you didn't have that experience, like, how would you
normally describe your own voice? Like how do you sound
to yourself? Hype hype m hm. In my mind, I
am always behind buster rhymes. Just that's great. Yeah, I
came from a certain time and I'm supposed.
Speaker 2 (06:19):
To be going yeah, like that's how I feel like
I always sound. And then when I consciously choose not
to sound like that.
Speaker 1 (06:27):
I feel like I don't sound like myself.
Speaker 3 (06:29):
Yeah, that's right. I always feel like I sound like
a kid kind of. And so it's always so funny
to me that other people are like, you sound so soothing,
because what's happening in my brain is always like what's
going on? Like what's that butterfly? Just you're like, what's like?
I'm always asking, Like in my brain, it's still that
child like yes sense of stuff. And so that's how
I feel like when I'm talking, I'm like, I mean
(06:50):
like it could be so like we could be free,
like like you know, but it feels like a little kid.
And then people come back and like, oh my god,
like you know what I'm like, is that is that
what I sound like?
Speaker 1 (07:01):
So in my mind, I do sound like a kid.
Speaker 2 (07:04):
So it surprises me when people are like, you're yelling
all the time, and I'm like, am I.
Speaker 3 (07:08):
Because I'm really kids are kids are always like mom, wait,
I'm doing a cartwheel or whatever, and you're like free, Yeah, exactly,
you're yelling at her freedom.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
But I literally think that I'm so serious.
Speaker 3 (07:21):
I really support you, and.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
I've seen video of myself as a child, and I'm.
Speaker 3 (07:25):
Like, that's how I think I'm the same way. I'm
the same way, the.
Speaker 2 (07:29):
Same and they're like, no, you sound like you're yelling
at the people and disenfranchising them.
Speaker 3 (07:35):
Well, I also think with someone like you, you're like
messing with people's perception because you're like, Oh, I'm a
gorgeous person, I'm a smart person, I'm a this person
or that. Like, there's a lot of ways that people
would be like, oh, I'm expecting this from you, and
you're like, you're not going to get that. You're going
to get Malcolm X as a child doing cartwheels, right,
It's like that that's what you're going to get. It's
(07:55):
not what you expected. So even that moment for people
is like you're getting jarred by your perception versus reality
more than anything I'm actually doing.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
And then I mess with their perception because I'm typically
saying something that may jar their own concept of their
their own perception of their own identity.
Speaker 3 (08:11):
And they're like, bitch, yeah, I didn't want that. I
didn't believe lies alone alone. It's the yelling part. It's
one of the most fascinating aspects of human interaction to
me is the moment when someone feels that they're communicating
like calmly or clearly or just directly, and the other
(08:31):
person is like, you're yelling at me, And how do you.
Speaker 1 (08:34):
Want to live with me and do a study because
that's my life?
Speaker 3 (08:37):
Yeah, like I will. And I think a lot of
black women, I know this is the lives that we
end up living or the lives cast into. Oh I'm
sure you do. Oh, I'm sure you do. But I
think like this is why I feel like as something
I still need to study. Like I don't have a
take on it quite yet. I just like there's something
where I'm like, oh, if you hear something that challenges
(08:58):
your way of being, it's like the volume is automatically
turned up on that.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
I have a theory.
Speaker 3 (09:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
My theory is that someone is echoing what you're already
saying to yourself, and so that's why it sounds so loud.
Speaker 3 (09:12):
Oh yeah, So I think in community where it's like
we're in community with each other, I think that's probably
what happens, is like you're seeing me too clearly. And
then I think there's the other thing that's like I'm
just scared of your whole people, So you always sound
loud to me, you're supposed to be enslaved, and I
don't know why you're talking to me like an equal.
That sounds very loud or whatever it is.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
When I was on the Real and I had come
to my executive to say, I am not comfortable with
the amount of negativity that is allowed to exist in
the comment section.
Speaker 3 (09:43):
Yeah, because tect me, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
Protect me.
Speaker 2 (09:47):
She was like, you're being very condescending, like on the
show or like in that moment with her, in that
moment with her, and I said, it sounds like condescension
to you because I'm speaking to you as an equal
and you see beneath you. So that's why it feels
condescending because you feel like I'm pulling you down to
a level that you have put me on.
Speaker 1 (10:06):
But we are equals.
Speaker 3 (10:07):
And she was helping me to buildup the theory here
because there's something. I think what we're talking about is
like power dynamics change the volume with which we hear
each other.
Speaker 1 (10:16):
Right, That's what it actually is true, because that's what
parents too.
Speaker 3 (10:19):
You, right, Yeah, Because I'm like, I know when a
kid that I love, I'm like a slight tonal shift
and I'm like, okay, in your head. You're yelling now,
and I can tell that little three year old, do
you think you got it together? But I can actually
feel the shift, But yeah, I do think there's something
about that. Even for me. I'm like, I don't feel
like I have changed much over my life, you know,
like I feel very consistently me, But the way people
(10:40):
respond to me is so shaped by their own experience,
and they're how they relate to Oh, you have this
many books or this many followers or this many of
this or whatever, and so now how I hear you
is different. I'm like, Okay, well, I didn't do anything.
I'm still saying what I've been saying I mean, and.
Speaker 2 (10:58):
That leans into the the ability to have loving correction, right,
Because I feel like in my recent experience, particularly since
I've like actively left the Hollywood space and really like
earnestly leaned into educating and edutainment in a way that
isn't like conflicted by that, I feel like I've amassed
(11:20):
a following of folks who are not following like me, Amanda, Like,
I'm some like, yeah, you know what I mean, but
they are understanding of like my intentions and the person
I am so they're able to hear my corrections differently,
They're able to hear my adjustments in a way that
I feel like a larger audience. Who would assigned celebrity
(11:41):
to me and who would assigned this? Yeah, they couldn't
hear me because they feel like I'm talking down to them,
because they've put me on a pedestal that I didn't
even ask for.
Speaker 3 (11:50):
Yeah, I mean the whole conversation around celebrity for me
is such a fascinating place. It feels like, you know
what I think about like all of human history. I'm
like this little blip around celebrity. It's fascinating to me
because it used to be like kings and queens or
it used to be something it's like in society that
were like, Okay, these are the people we're going to
elevate above all else, and then we want to both
like worship them but also punish them. That's the fun part,
(12:13):
and like how do we navigate this? And everyone is
supposed to want that life whatever it is, being in
the most power, the most visibility, but then you get
there and you're like this is awful, and I don't
want this. I want a real life. I want to
be able to be authentic or whatever it is. Some
people do like it, you know. I occasionally meet people
I'm like, oh, you were meant to be famous. You
(12:34):
saw this out, you sought this out, you wanted it,
you love it. This is great. But the people that
make the most sense to me are people who are
similar to me, where it's like I'm doing what I'm
on earth to do and in this moment it happened
to lead to celebrity. Which I'm a facilitator. Like the
book Loving Corrections, All my books emerge from my work
as someone who's like, I'm trying to facilitate human relationships
(12:56):
for most of human history. That's not something that makes
you famous, right, Like my peers who facilitate are not
like just skyrocketing or whatever. That's not happening.
Speaker 2 (13:05):
So what do you think was unique to you? Because
you just said your peers, But I mean, what is it?
Speaker 1 (13:11):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (13:12):
So one thing I think is that I think the
love piece of the way that I approached my work
as a facilitator. I think people kept calling me back
because I was like, I'm not just going to try
to get us from like we need a plan. Now
we have a plan. I'm trying to get us from
like we're not a unified body, and now we love
each other and we're going to like roll with each
other for a long term.
Speaker 1 (13:32):
Right.
Speaker 3 (13:32):
So I think in my work that created a different feeling,
and I wrote a emergent strategy to try to like
put my finger on like, here's what it is we're
talking about. I make non judgmental space for people to change.
I make non judgmental space for people to relate to
each other. I'm interested in being able to make mistakes
and learn, and that's different, you know, that's a different approach.
(13:53):
But then I think it's also like I'm a theater kid,
you know, so there's a part of me that's also like,
you know, I did go to North Atlantic hig Schoo
the performing Hours, and I was like the next Jasmine
guy for like five minutes, and it was like I'm
gonna sing and dance and like perform. And so I
think that led to the way that I when I
speak in front of people or whatever, there is something
that can come up that's like a little bit more
like Jazzy I don't know. And then I love to talk.
(14:16):
So I think the podcasting and stuff I don't know though,
I really don't fully comprehend it. And luckily when it
skyrocketed for me was right during the pandemic. So my
experience of it is like people are like, oh, we
all know your name now, but I'm like, the whole
world was shut down, so no one really Like I
haven't done a lot of TV. People don't really know
what I look like, necessarily if they happen to land
(14:38):
in the Instagram pocket where they're like, oh, I do
know her, But now I don't even post myself on
Instagram as much like I'm like, here's some memes, and
here's some.
Speaker 1 (14:46):
I was gonna say, but you are the meme master.
Speaker 3 (14:48):
I love doing well. You know, the memes have made
me happy. Right now I'm feeling it's like maybe a
little too dystopy even for me to get it up,
but I'm struggling to like feel integrity with offering people
me in this time. But for a while that was
the thing where I was like, Okay, it's not about
the memes for me. It's like I want to cultivate
a feeling. I want to cultivate a different feeling. I
want to cultivate an emotional shift and a sense of togetherness,
(15:11):
and the bigger the divide is, the harder it is
to like curate a moment that's like, do we all
feel this hilarity grief poetic thing? Can we just feel
it for a moment? Okay, now go back to the scroll,
you know, but we'll see if I'll come back to it.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
How did the book Loving Corrections come together?
Speaker 3 (15:38):
Yeah, it's weee. It's related to this facilitation thing, right,
which is I kept getting feedback from people around the
way that I facilitate, in the way that I intervene,
which is that there's something about the loving correction where
I'm like, I don't spend my time trying to correct
people I don't feel love for There's something specific right
that I'm like, it's not my business all now, I know, right, yeah, pumpumpume,
(16:02):
But it's not just where I'm going to put my
energy because I don't think change happens that way. And
in my own life that's never worked. Like if someone
comes at me and I'm like, you don't care about
my existence, there's nothing you're going to offer to me
that's really going to transform me. Right, it might make
me get a better security system and better boundaries, but
it's not really going to fundamentally change me. All the
people who have actually been able to change me were
(16:23):
the ones who were like Adrian, what you just said
was really offensive. What you just did really hurt someone's feelings. Yeah,
have you read the Black feminists? Like you need to
sit down with the Combine River collective work, You need
to sit down with the Soil Clifton's poetry. You need
to like people who lovingly were like here, I see
that you're on this path, and I see your curiosity,
and I love you enough to nudge. So first the name,
(16:45):
that's how the name. I was like, loving corrections is
what I do. And then had written this column for
Yes magazine that was all about accountability, and I was like,
accountability from the most intimate, like inside ourselves? Are we
being accountable to ourselves? To the grand the scale of
like can we be accountable to the earth and to
our timeline? And it was so good to write that,
(17:05):
and I was like, I want that in a book,
and that feels like loving corrections. And then I had
all these other essays.
Speaker 1 (17:11):
When you wrote that for them, was your deal that
you owned it?
Speaker 3 (17:14):
Yeah, so I always do that when I'm writing for anyone,
like if I'm doing a column or any work that
I do for anyone else, I always make sure I
secure that I actually own the intellectual property of it
to do with what I want, and I always then
give credits. So like in Loving Corrections it says these
were first published here, they've been edited or whatever. But
I'm like so grateful that Yes Magazine gave me the
(17:35):
space to explore all that at my own pace, and
then I was able to pull it together. And then
the other essays they each emerged from like a real
corrective moment where I was like there was like a
word for white folks, for instance, where I was like,
there's a certain way that white folks are showing up
in movement and in spaces. I want to really course
correct some of that. But I also want to call
out those of us who are in deep relationship with
(17:57):
white people and not owning that and not talking about
what that takes. Because I kept seeing that in movement
space where people are like black lives, Matt, you know,
and I'm like, yes, and you have a white partner,
and what does that mean? And like don't hide that person,
Like let's talk about like all those things can coexist,
and actually part of the American experiment, part of the
biodivergence of life, part of a multiracial democracy, is being
(18:19):
able to be honest about those things that, like, our
lives matter and there's intimacy with those who have historically
oppressed us. That's part of the stew of this place,
the paradox. Yeah, So for me, I was like, I
want to talk about and just trouble the water out
a little bit, this idea that we are trying to
hold these hyper separate spaces almost as performance. But then
(18:39):
most of the people I know don't live in that
level of hyper separation or segregation. And that doesn't mean like, oh,
there's some good white people, but there are white folks
who are doing their labor. They're doing their work, and
they're doing work enough to be in an intimate relationship
with you, Right, So I was like, I want to
write about that or one to men. You know, it's
just like I see all these women who have gotten
(19:01):
into these heterosexual relationships and they tried to be gay.
They couldn't get there, and so then it's like, here
you are in relationships with.
Speaker 1 (19:09):
Trying to be gay. They just couldn't get there.
Speaker 3 (19:12):
Anyone who's a friend of mine who's straight. I'm like,
it's not for lack of effort. It's not for lack
of trying to find a way another way, but not
because I think everyone is queer or anything like that,
but mostly because I'm like, men are in a serious
crisis right now, which we're seeing play out on such
a global scale, and so then try to love them
in this crisis is difficult, and so I was like,
(19:32):
let me write the most loving thing I can to
men who care enough to try, because I'm like, these
are men who I'm like, you call yourself a feminist,
you're dating a feminist woman, You're dating what you are
powerful who are earning more than you generally, and you're trying,
but you're still putting this particular foot in this particular mouth.
And like, let's see if I can help as a
queer auntie energy, you know. So each of the pieces
(19:53):
emerged like that with I think the final pieces I
wrote for that book were around Zionism and Palestine and
just want to to put a few words on that,
which I you know, sent to our friends Pala and Noura,
Like I'm not going all in. But yeah, there's just
already been great books written about that. But I was like,
I want to make clear my position.
Speaker 2 (20:12):
I mean, do you feel like you grew up in
a home of loving corrections?
Speaker 1 (20:17):
Like how did you even develop this?
Speaker 2 (20:19):
Because I feel like I've had to really learn how
to correct lovingly.
Speaker 3 (20:24):
Yeah, do you feel like you do now? You feel
like you have it?
Speaker 1 (20:27):
I have it? Now? Do I use it all the time?
Speaker 3 (20:29):
That's different? That's different.
Speaker 2 (20:30):
I think sometimes I think I'm being loving in the
way that someone else can receive it. I struggle with
giving loving correction that people receive honestly, because I feel
like a lot of people have a perception about me.
Speaker 1 (20:46):
So it's like they think I'm being like fake.
Speaker 3 (20:48):
So it's almost like there's a membrane or something that you're.
Speaker 1 (20:50):
Like, yes, how do I know?
Speaker 2 (20:52):
I'm really trying to just be here with you and
like suckle you at my breast in this moment, and
they but like the people who know you know me, Yeah,
we've gotten there where the mask is off.
Speaker 3 (21:03):
That's the essence of you know, Like when people ask me, like,
what is the essential aspects of a loving correction, I'm like,
relationship is the essential piece. If there's not actually a
relationship there, it's actually really difficult to do. It doesn't
mean it's impossible to do, but it's like so much
of what I do is like, who's actually in relationship
with that person? Who could have a loving relationship? And
I say this, so back to like where did I come?
(21:25):
You know, my family life. My parents were an interracial
relationship in the Deep South in the seventies.
Speaker 1 (21:30):
Who was the white one?
Speaker 3 (21:31):
My mom is white, mom white, dad black, And they
went in the military and then like left the South
because they were like, it's too dangerous and too regressive here,
so we're going to go into the military to have
this whole other experience, right, But the part that they
were looking for was like international. They were like, if
we can just get to other parts of the world,
will see this differently. And truly, my experience growing up
(21:53):
was being around a lot of other mixed families who
are in the military. So I did have some of that,
but the love between my parents was very instructive to me,
where it was like you keep coming back. And I
have to give my parents credit because my mom was
disowned by her family when she married my dad eloped
with my dad, but she was like, Okay, they've let go.
(22:16):
But her grandfather wrote her a letter and was like,
I don't agree with what you've done, but I'm going
to keep sending you resources so that you don't go
underwater because the rest of your family's cut you off.
And then my dad was the one who was like,
it's important that we if the possibility is there to
be in right relationship with your family, it's important that
we do that. And he had lost a lot of
(22:36):
members of his family at a really young age, so
he's like this matters, like you don't just have these
people forever. And so something about the combination of the
two of them being willing to like keep coming back
to the well and being like, are you all ready
for relationship? Okay, not yet, Okay, are you ready for relationship? Okay,
now there's a little opening. And so slowly, now like
forty eight years into this experiment, my family has game nights.
(23:01):
We're all play cards with each other, like the two set,
and again we're not there yet, but that might happen
by like we're eighty, you know, Like we're just slowly,
you know. And these are folks, like some folks still
Trump voters. Some folks still you know, there's still a
lot of divergence of politics, opinions, worldviews, all the stuff.
But there keeps being this like, but are you willing
(23:22):
to come back and try being in some level of
right relationship with each other? And so I think I've
grown up in that world where it's like it might
not be ready yet, you know, but time will do
some of the work for us. And I think that's
another piece of loving correction. It's like the Internet has
us tricked into thinking that stuff happens like that. No
real change happens like that. There's always some build up
(23:43):
that's happening under the surface. So even if it looks quick,
it always was building up. Revolutions always look it was
like it was building up. You made us a pass
for so long. Now we revolt, And the same thing
in a family, in a loving relationship, it's like, we
don't just break up out of the blue. I was
mad for a long time.
Speaker 1 (24:00):
I was trying to knock that vending machine over for
a while.
Speaker 3 (24:03):
Honey, I wanted it to be different. So I think
there's that piece, you know. I'm like, Okay, do we
have a relationship, are we willing to let time do
its work so that we'll change enough to come into
right relationship. And I do think all of that I
gained in my family and then have continuously practiced. My
(24:23):
favorite essay in that book is the one with my sisters,
the conversation with my sisters, because I'm like, you can
see how it's flowed into our generation where we're like
we do sister check ins with each other, so we
preempt the conflict, or we like have a container where
we're like, how are you, what's actually happening with you?
Let's correct it before it can spin into a lifelong
(24:45):
resentment where we don't talk. Let's sister each other. I
tried that with my ex how they go the time
is not ready yet?
Speaker 2 (24:53):
Well, I think that for him, the idea of loving
correction was so foreign to him, so it was literally
like hard to accept the love of the correction. Because
my thing was like, once I began really working and
started to genuinely heal, I began to understand correction differently,
(25:14):
and you know, like for me, it had always been contextualized.
Speaker 1 (25:17):
As you've done something wrong, whereas.
Speaker 2 (25:19):
Once you start healing, it's oftentimes like, oh maybe you
didn't know that this like you're leading with grace.
Speaker 3 (25:27):
I think of it as the difference between like I
always have peoplem like, I'm not trying to correct you.
I'm not God. I do you have the power to
do that?
Speaker 1 (25:33):
Right?
Speaker 3 (25:33):
What I'm trying to do is say you say you're
on this path, and I'm going to help you course
correct because there's a way that you're actually not on
that path with how you just talk to me, right,
or like what you just did was if you say,
for instance, with the men's piece, I'm like, if you
say that you believe that we are equal people the
base based basis level of feminism. Right, if you just
(25:54):
say that you believe that we're on some level of equality,
but then you talk to me like you expect me
to do more the management of our home, I need
to course correct that because what I see is you're
out of alignment with what you say. Now, what may
happen is we may find what you're saying. The misalignment
is within you right where it's like you're saying what
(26:14):
you think I want to hear because you want to
stay with me, but that's not what you actually believe.
And so sometimes it's like, Okay, I'm going to give
you some time to go off and live your life,
and maybe you'll figure out that you do want that.
Maybe you won't. But maybe the most loving thing I
can do is the boundary I'm going to set, like
I'm not going to be in relationship with someone who
sees me as less than them. I have to course
correct my life. Yeahead in that path, right because I
(26:37):
you know, the like little baby anarchist Buddhist part of
me is like I don't believe in getting attached to
changing other people. I don't believe in trying to control
other people. I don't think that we're supposed to get
a relationship to fix someone.
Speaker 1 (26:51):
So you're not a codependent.
Speaker 3 (26:52):
I am a recovering codependent. I'm recovering codependent, and I
don't know how far I am on that journey. I'm like,
who knows, But I do have a really strong sense
right now that I'm like. The way I love now
is very much like, oh, how do I stay as
curious as I can about this other person being another person?
(27:13):
Down to like very small things, you know, like the
person I love now, like she'll leave something out on
the counter and I'm like old me would have been like,
I've got to fix that. I've got to fix that
so she doesn't do that anymore, and that she understands
we don't leave something like how that wat food whatever? Yeah,
And instead I'm like, oh, let me get curious about that.
Like she lose that out because she is a working
(27:35):
person and she's running fast and she liked like there's
all these factors that lead to that, and like it's
a really loving, sweet thing I can do. It's like
I get to sleep two hours longer than her every morning,
and then when I wake up, I'm like, nothing's actually
gone bad. I'm just gonna put it away whatever it is, right.
Speaker 1 (27:51):
Oh.
Speaker 3 (27:51):
But it's like, how do I just be like loving
right where I'm just like, oh, I see how much
you're holding in this moment, and that there's no intention
of harm that you're to me. This is just how
you are now. If I was like I really can't
deal with that, that, I'd be like, we can't keep growing
in this kind of relationship because it's too much for me,
and I can't. I don't feel loving about it. And
I have had those things where like I had a
(28:12):
partner who really struggled with honesty, and I was like,
I'm really being loving. I'm like, I see the roots
of that. I understand where you learned that practice where
we all are dishonest in different ways and I am
dishonest in this way and blah blah. But then I
was like, I can't actually live with the way you're
in that practice. It doesn't work because I struggle with trust.
(28:33):
So I'm like, are things that were fundamentally struggling with
are like triggering each other to new heights? And I
was like, that's not where I want to grow. I
don't want to grow my like re stress. So those
are moves right, So like, the most loving correction I
could do with that situation is set the boundary, whereas
with this one, I could be like, oh, I appreciate this,
and I have an episode of How to Survive the
(28:54):
End of the World, the podcast I do with my
sister that's with Alexis Pauling Gums and Shanga Dari Wallace,
who are part where I'm like, they're witchy. I feel
like they're casting a love spell with each other. But
they talk about that that they're like, if you really
want to love someone, you have to learn to love
the things that could annoy you and like see them
as like loving acts. Like the honey. There's like sticky
(29:14):
honey on the side of the jar, and Sean Godari
talks about that. She's like, and I can spect my love.
My love just leaves that. That's how I know I'm
with someone else. I was by myself, my honey would
be all in the jar. Because I'm loving somebody, some
of that honey is outside the jar.
Speaker 1 (29:30):
Oh wow, that's beautiful, right.
Speaker 3 (29:32):
So there's these ways of holding it. And now I
feel that flowing through my life. And who I choose
to let clothes to me, who I spend time with,
who I invest in enough to give correction or give
this kind of attention to is. I'm like, oh, I'm
no longer in friendships or relationships where I'm like, we
keep cycling the same thing over and over again, and
(29:52):
like neither of us can course correct each other to
get out of this loop. We're just in it. So
I'm like, I don't do that, I don't keep circling.
I'm just gonna I'm gonna go over this.
Speaker 2 (30:01):
I know I had to do that recently, and it's
something it weighs on me. But it's just a very
present because it was such an act of love for myself. Yes,
and I'd never done that before in that way. Yeah,
I'd never done that before in that way. Like, and
it was very much so when you were talking about
how presenting these loving corrections. But the relationship is the thing.
(30:25):
What I've noticed also, though, is that it can also
sever relationships because it reveals oftentimes, well not oftentimes, but
it can reveal the lack of the actual relationship.
Speaker 3 (30:36):
Yeah, and I think this is right, you know. I'm like,
I don't want to blame everything on like social media,
because I think that social media is rooted in something
in us that is looking for like the best performance
of our lives and not the lives.
Speaker 1 (30:49):
Right. Yes, it's the highlight reel, right.
Speaker 3 (30:52):
And so I'm like, oh, people used to do that
with like their Christmas letter or something. It's like, it's
so great my life, you know. It's like, Oh, you're
not in a real enough relationship for me to challenge
the narrative you're giving me every year at Christmas. I
don't know, the same thing. It's like in Instagram or whatever.
I'm like, y'all don't actually know enough about me to
be yelling at me the way you're yelling at me
right now. And I don't know enough about you to
(31:13):
care that you're perplexed. But I don't know you enough
to really feel that right like, we're not in relationship,
and I've had to really clock that for myself. But
I'm like, so many of us are so lonely while
surrounded by so many people, and the loneliness is in
the gap between the real and the performance of relationship,
(31:34):
and so so much of what I'm trying to do
is get people to be like, come in closer, get
in a relationship, yes, even if it's less people right
which for me, I had to do that. I have
to be like, I don't have two hundred best friends.
I have twenty people who I'm pretty solidly close to.
And I think about this where I'm like, when big
things happen in my life, who do I want to
tell it to you? Where I'm like, they're going to
(31:54):
get it and they're going to receive it, and they're
going to hold me. Or when I'm feeling scared or
when so things like right now, and I wonder about
this for you, but like right now. I'm like, we're
living with an administration that's disappearing people for standing up
for the things that we've been standing up for, right
and I'm like, I need to have people around me
that I'm like, I don't want to be paranoid, but
I'm like, I do want to have people I can
(32:15):
be like. It's freaky. It's really uncomfortable to live through
this bulbit in this way, and I don't just want
to automatically pretend like it's all good. I'm like, it's
not all good. This is a really scary time. But
for me, I'm not going to take that to a
bunch of strangers on the internet. I want to take
that to people who love me enough to be like, Okay,
here's how we will protect you. I'm here to just
(32:36):
bear witness. I'm here to help you, like not gaslight
yourself and pretend it's not what it is. The people
who love me are like, yeah, and also, here's the
counter narrative, or here's what also makes it worth it
for you.
Speaker 2 (32:53):
This has been the last three days for me really literally,
like this conversation happened directly with somebody today where it
was like I had expressed concern about my own safety
within this realm, and their response was just kind of
very less fair, and I had to lovingly correct and say, like,
(33:15):
it's this is a real concern and I'm not sharing
it with you casually because it's not a casual time.
But it feels like you're receiving it that way and
maybe I'm misinterpreting it, but that's how it was. And
he called me today and was like, okay, so yeah,
we're not going to text no more because he was like,
(33:37):
I realized that I am not effective on text and
he was like, I'm still learning. We work together, but
he was like, I feel like I'm still learning your
language and learning your needs. And he says something that
was very interesting. He was like, you know, some people's
temperature needs to be told, and some people's tensperature needs
to be read. And he was like, you're somebody whose
temperature needs to be read, Like you want people to
(33:59):
be like I, because he's like, you're in I see
it so much that it's like do I also got
a verbalize and so we had a really great conversation though,
where I gained a second person that I feel like
I can a third that I feel like I can
be like, hey, this.
Speaker 1 (34:17):
Is fucking with me today.
Speaker 3 (34:19):
It's really, it is.
Speaker 2 (34:20):
Really And so it's interesting that you were like, I
think about that with you, because I think there's also
an element of like me being visible and a public
figure that a lot of people can't relate to. Yes,
So you know what, you're hard when you try to
have the conversation with just people that don't necessarily get that.
Speaker 3 (34:34):
They're just like, oh girl, no, I mean. And I
had to learn that. You know, there was a period
in my life where I was facilitating and coaching, and
I was coaching a lot of people who were very visible,
and I was making the mistake of being like, just
don't worry about those people on the internet. Girl, It's like,
don't worry about it, right, because I was just like,
focus on you, you know, manifest your safety whatever.
Speaker 1 (34:53):
And I was wrong write amster hands like come on.
Speaker 3 (34:56):
But I had to go back and be like, oh,
I didn't understand will look like what it can feel like,
the pylon can feel like what the attention feels like.
But I also think, as you were speaking, we're in
this parallel universe extravaganza right now, right where I literally
feel like in my circles, some people are paying hyper
attention to like everything that's going on right now. Some
(35:18):
people are like head deep in the sand, I will
not look at that. It's not affecting me yet, and
I will not Yeah, and then those folks are like
trying to yell it across the chasm to each other.
And then there's a bunch of people like on the
spectrum somewhere in the middle, like should I be moving
or stockpiling or chilling or like really not knowing, And
(35:39):
I'm like it's parallel universe. I'm like a lot of
the people who have their head in the sand, they're
like parents who are like I literally can't take this
in and also do what I need to do for
my kid. I'm like, vallid, I literally understand you. And
then the people who are hyper vigil I'm like, someone
needs to be you know. One thing that's been giving
me piece is I'm like I didn't go to law school,
(36:00):
and I just let that settle through all the way
down the ground as I'm just like there's some stuff
that is just like part of this is a legal battle,
and I'm not going to become a legal expert. I'm
not going to listen to like every podcast to like
learn the legalities of it because I didn't go to
law school because that's not my job. So when I
see them like a judge just did this, I'm.
Speaker 1 (36:18):
Like, a judge, you went to law school and then
you prepared.
Speaker 3 (36:23):
And you like know how to read that stuff and
then make this to you thank you for being.
Speaker 2 (36:30):
Too because you but I know that stuff. And I'm
like I have to tell people the I'm like you'.
Speaker 3 (36:36):
And I'm like enough to get like a hook, you know.
I'm like, I don't want to be a pundit, but
like I'm smart enough that I could, you know, like
I can get enough. And I think a lot of
us are like that I got enough. But I'm like
reminding myself that I'm not a doctor, so my response
right now doesn't need to be like emergency room. I'm like,
I don't know how to do that. I watched the Pit.
I was like, oh, not for me, but entertaining. I'm
(36:57):
glad you're doing that fake doctor's real doctors all. But
then what is my work to do? Yeah, and that
part of the peril, I'm like, Okay, what I have done,
like standing up for Palestine. I would do it in
every timeline that I can imagine. There's no world in
which I wouldn't do it, and I will continue to
do that because I'm like, oh, I know it's right.
And it's been helpful to remember James Baldwin. I remember
(37:18):
reading you know, he talks about that like, if people
aren't angry with you, if you're not unpopular based on
what you're saying, then you're not I'm mangling no, but
it's very that if.
Speaker 1 (37:26):
Everybody likes you, you're not doing money.
Speaker 3 (37:28):
Yes, that's what it is, right, And so I remember
reading that and being like, yeah, I'm way too likable.
I need to you know, like I felt that. I
was like, I'm actually much angrier about so many things,
or like I feel how I feel, And Palestine was
such a good clarifying space for me because it was
a space where I could be like, this is just
something that comes from the same part of me that
loves everything else in the world, and so it's very
(37:51):
easy for me to hold this stance. And now I'm like, oh,
in the backlash that's coming, I'm like, I can see
how illogical it is, I can see how rooted in
colonial power.
Speaker 1 (38:00):
It is.
Speaker 3 (38:00):
I can see all the things about it, and so
I'm like, oh, the fear that I feel is not
at all about the stance that I have taken or
any of the stances I've ever taken. The fear is
about living in an irrational time and being in this
parallel universe where some people in my life are aware,
like we need to look after each other. We're in
an irrational time. It's a dangerous time. And so that's
(38:22):
the thing, like if I think of a course correction
we need to have right now, is that everybody needs
to have some people who they're talking with and in
relationship with around Like, this is an irrational time. So
if this shit is this fan, I'm going to be
here for you, whichever it is. And so I'm like,
even if you're a parent who's like I can't pay
attention to all this, But if I need to hide
in your basement, is that cool? We don't have to
(38:43):
talk about the rest of it, but like, is that okay,
right or whatever it is? But you still have my
back because like you can be looking away, but I'm
at risk.
Speaker 2 (38:51):
I mean, and those are necessary questions to ask, right,
There are people right now, who are like at risk?
I threw that out there recently to somebody and I
did not get the response I thought I would get.
Speaker 3 (39:00):
But it's helpful, right, yeah, you know, right, So I'm like,
I have this feeling too, because I'm like, you know,
there's that poem that's always like if they come from.
Speaker 1 (39:07):
They came for the communists, they came for the social
exactly right.
Speaker 3 (39:10):
And I'm just like, we're in that kind of time
where if it's not directly affecting you, you might think
you can get away with not feeling scared or feeling ready.
And I'm like, I don't actually care as much about
the emotions this time is producing in people. I'm like,
if it's fear, despair or whatever, I'm like, yes, all
of that is relevant. What I'm really interested in is like,
(39:30):
what small actions and changes and course corrections are you
making in this time in your own life, because I'm like,
regardless of how you feel, you should have a local
network of people that you know how to get to
their house without a GPS and they know how to
get to years. Regardless of how you feel right now,
you should be stockpiling some resources in your home so
that if you need to like be in your house
for a month because there's a virus or there's a
(39:53):
gun shooting, shoot off, chum coumpume time or whatever, that
you can just be like, we're in and we know
where our people are. Right, I'm thinking on this very
like actionable, tangible level, like it's a dangerous time, be ready,
be preparing yourself, have a go bag, those kind of things.
I'm like that way, no matter what you feel, when
this shit hits your fan, you'll have something that you
(40:14):
can do and you'll already be of use. And then like,
if you're like not the kind of person who's going
to show up and intervene when Ice is taking people,
then you damn sure better be sending donations to the
people who do if that matters to you and every
issue we care about, there's already someone fighting that. Some
of them are lawyers, some of them are organizers, and
you might be called to that path. But you know,
(40:36):
for people who are in their forties or fifties, sixty whatever,
I'm like, you might not be that if you haven't
been that already in your life. So what is it
you already are in your life that can be applied
to this moment. Can you be a revolutionary mom? Can
you be a revolutionary teacher? Can be a revolutionary banker,
can be a revolutionary dog walker? Like, whatever work you're doing,
how does it become a part of our liberation and
(40:57):
how does it become a part of us surviving this
irash Pale time.
Speaker 2 (41:01):
Yeah, I mean I think where we are is the
tip of the iceberg. So this is the time to
also just start wrapping your mind around some loving corrections
for yourself. And so we're going to talk about those
in our Patreon only segment that we're about to get
into at did there, so come and join us, Come
(41:28):
and join us.
Speaker 1 (41:36):
The last.
Speaker 2 (41:41):
To close it out, though, this brings us all the
way back around because the soft landing is what a
loving correction is.
Speaker 3 (41:48):
That's what it is. All it is is being like
humans are just gonna human like. There's not some evolved
version of us at a collective level that's going to
do this some different way. There's not some version of
that's going to yell ourselves into liberation and freedom. That's
not going to happen. What is going to happen is
we're going to love each other and We're going to
find more people to love and like. Even the people
(42:10):
who are doing the worst shit in the world right now,
some part of them is loving someone. And the people
that I'm scaredest of are the lonely ones, Like I
think of an Elon Musk or a Trump as the
most sluckily people who really struggle for belonging, And I
think it shows us more than anything else. The most
dangerous thing you can be in this world is all
alone with resources. So part of what we need to
(42:32):
do is be like, I'm never going to be that way.
If I have resources, they're shared, they're communal. I'm focused
on being not all by myself ever, Like I'm really
focused on even if it's the relationship I have with
the birds and the otters and the folks in my yard.
I'm like, yeah, I've got like this family of otters
that has been like flowing through my backyard. It's been
very interesting. They're so cute. They're actually as cute as
(42:55):
you think they are, but maybe even cuterer than that.
Speaker 1 (42:57):
I don't even think I have a frame of reference
for that kind of cute.
Speaker 3 (42:59):
Yeah, it's an overload. Like I was like, oh, do
I want a dog, or do I want a family
of honors that hold each other's hands and they have rocks.
So I've been like deep diving on like what otters
are like and what they do. That's the thing about living,
you know. I moved into like more country, like not
country country, but like much more country than I've ever
lived in, and so I'm like, Okay, I'm in relationship
with a world outside of human right, Like I'm like,
(43:23):
I know humans are also nature, but like I'm really
being like okay, but there's a natural cycle and it
is so peaceful that they're like, girl, I'm a tree.
Do you know how much I care about what Elon
must say? Yesterday, Zeir wrote at all, like I will
outlive him or I won't, and then I'll come back
as a seat and someone else will outlive him. Like
nature just is such a great reminder that's like this
(43:45):
is so temporary. It's seasonal, as cyclical, as temporary, So
don't get so caught up in the experience and take
it so personally. We're just the humans at this time,
and it's a pale time. And that's my other thing.
It's like it's not a dark time, sot I'm saying
it's the Dark Age. Is this is a pale time,
This one all alongs to whiteness and white supremacy and colonialism.
It's a pale time. This is the peak of it, hopefully,
(44:05):
and then we get to move into the Rainbow era.
Speaker 1 (44:08):
But um bomb
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