Jivana Heyman 08:00:59
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Anjali Rao 08:01:29
Welcome to the love of Yoga podcast. I'm your host, Anjali Rao. This podcast explores the teachings of Yoga for self and collective transformation. We dive into how spirituality and philosophy can ignite social change. I share conversations with folks who are on the front lines of justice and liberatory movements, thought leaders, change makers, and healers.
Hello, everyone and a very warm welcome to the level of Yoga podcast. I'm your host Anjali Rao, my pronouns are she her, and I'm really really excited to share this particular conversation with you all. With us today is Erica Woodland, the co editor of Healing Justice Lineages and just a thought leader in movement and liberatory work. Erica Woodland is a facilitator consultant, a psychotherapist and a Healing Justice practitioner with more than 20 years of experience working at the intersections of movements for racial, gender, economic, Trans and Queer justice. In the anthology Healing Justice Lineages that Erica co edited with Cara Page, we are led with stunning brilliance through the history legacies and laboratory practices of Healing Justice, which is a political strategy of collective care and safety that intervenes on generational trauma from systemic violence and oppression. I have to say that this book is accelerating to read. And I'm still in the process of digesting what I read because it is so rich and informative. In fact, Erica and gage Cara sorry, invite us to pause off and and go back to the book when we are ready. And we have medicalized it, I really, really appreciated this approach because that is so in in sort of alignment with the teachings of Yoga, which talker talk us through the importance of pausing and processing as often as possible, and really understanding where we are in our nervous system. So I really appreciated this approach of Africa. In fact, I want to talk about so many parallels that I found in the philosophy and the teachings of Yoga and Healing Justice as a framework. This book is laden with hope, because it offers us solutions. It offers us teachings from the past our history of movement history. And it's something that we are all at least I know, I'm desperately in need of right now. So a very strongly felt heartfelt thank you. And welcome to this podcast. Erica, it is such an honor to have you with us as a guest.
Erica Woodland 08:04:35
Thank you so much.
Anjali Rao 08:04:37
I want to begin at the beginning, Erica, what was your journey your path into your work?
Erica Woodland 08:04:45
I love this question. Because how I understand this question is is to really situate myself inside of a lineage and to understand myself as part of generations of resistance and healing work. And so I want to name my primary teachers first, before I get into some of their like chronology. I came into those work by way of my mother, Michelle Woodland, who's an ancestor. And who knows, tenacity around care and protection for her children as a single Black woman, keeping kids alive in the 80s and 90s. In Baltimore City. She modeled for me something that I didn't see a lot of other places, which is the amount of sacrifice that it takes to take care of your people at all costs. And I learned early on that capitalism was an entire scam and a lie because I was like, oh, capitalism says if you work hard American Dream is right there and watch this beautiful woman. And then I learned that this is also a story that's true of other Black women in my family. I watched her work herself to the bone to keep us alive. And you know, I was simultaneously around super privileged people who didn't do any work at all and Just got things handed to them. So there's kind of like ethos around care and protection. And I've been, like, very, very primary in our work. And our relationships. I learned that from her. And I was very pissed off as a little one, just injustice is just like, going to continue to be unacceptable to me. And so I would say things all the time, like lots of rabble rousers do this isn't fair. And I watched the impacts on her and her life. And I'm forever grateful for what she taught me. The other teacher, I want to call into the space mentor, revolutionary Marshall "Eddie" Conway, former Black Panther, former political prisoner, recent ancestor, and we're approaching the one year anniversary of his transition. And I met him in my early 20s, when I was getting politicized around abolition and starting to do harm reduction work. And he taught me a lot about history. He taught me also a lot about the revolutionary sacrifice that's connected to love and struggle. And he taught me a lot about some of the trappings and burdens of like holding the kind of leadership that especially Black folks from his generation had to hold. And I'm so grateful for him because he was very open and gracious and generous with me in terms of his teachings and his wisdom. And that was that was through his words, but it was primarily through his actions, and the love and intention that he brought and just like, commitment, like he was a unbreakable and is an unbreakable kind of spirit. So I call on him often, in these times.
Anjali Rao 08:07:48
Wonderful. And, you know, I just really appreciate that you name your teachers in the beginning, that again, there's so many, like I said, so many parallels to the teachings that we that Yoga, brings in, we always name our teachers first. The first essay, in fact, which you penned for the anthology is about collective memory. And I think this whole summoning of our ancestors, summoning of our teachers as a part, I would think of that collective memory. We'll talk about the legacy of resistance, and how important it is for us to understand the history of these movements. And as an avid student of history, I love that you routed us into that as lessons for building movements and healing. Why do you think that this sort of remembering the sort of recollection is important for us?
Speaker 1 08:08:42
So I want to just call in Cara Page and her work around collective memory, because that her body of work has been really central to my understanding of the importance of memory work inside of Healing Justice. And so check out Cara's work with changing frequencies and the healing histories project is really about thinking about how we don't play into systems of domination by cutting off parts of ourselves, right. And so, for us with the book, and for those chapters, in the past section, we're really grappling with the nonlinear nature of time. We're also really grappling with the fact that this kind of disconnect between us and our ancestors, or the disconnect between care and political liberation, these things are relatively recent. When we think about it, you know, I can go back a couple of generations and be like, Oh, some of the things that felt like they were totally lost to me actually aren't. And so what does it mean to believe in the possibility that so much more is recoverable, right, and that actually, that recovery in that memory is not going to necessarily happen in the non spiritual realm, right? If we're talking about spirit, you can transcend space and time, right? Knowing about ancestors, you can transcend space and time. And I've seen that in my own life. I've seen that in my own practice. But most importantly, forgetting and disconnection that is a tool of white supremacy. And it's been quite successful. So when we intentionally go back and reclaim, ethically go back and reclaim, build right relationship with the folks who came before us, it just gives us more access to power to resources. And it Decenters us, though, as somebody who was born and raised in this treacherous as United States. We are deeply self centered, selfish, and do not understand how we've been infused with individualism, even when we're trying not to. I've been grateful to get a few opportunities to leave the country. It's really quite humbling, because you're like, Oh, right. You're inside of an empire. And so we also go back and remember to situate ourselves is one small part On this huge project of getting crew together, and to make sure that we're understanding ourselves in this moment in history and what we can contribute.
Anjali Rao 08:11:10
Absolutely, you know, I'm an I come from India. So we have a very sort of a different outlook to, which is getting rapidly homogenized right now because of empire and capitalism. But, but I grew up with this notion that we are part of a big, big collective and that collective is family that collective is community, that collective is neighborhoods, you know, those things are to really dissenter ourselves is. It comes naturally to me. But I don't I see that sometimes can also be sort of taken against you like, because it is such an individualistic culture here, too. It's seen as some somewhat of a negative thing that if you are not talking about what you do, when you're not talking about only yourself or positioning yourself as the leader of the organization, or the leader of something, you really aren't given that much importance, how would you hold that tension? Especially for you know, you as a Black person, me as a, you know, Indian immigrant? How would you hold that tension in a white supremacist culture where we have to sort of, quote unquote, take up space, and yet be a part of a collective effort?
Speaker 1 08:12:28
I love this question. It reminds me of like a kind of a regular practice, I have come to around humility, because for a long time, I thought humility was about kind of hiding the strengths that I have, or hiding the blessings that I have. And I've come into really a clear knowing that humility is about my ability to shine in the ways that I need to shine and encourage other people to also do that shining, to remember that my ancestors fought and died for things I have access to right now. And that is like, I that's a blessing. So why squander that blessing by making myself small, but it's not about me as an individual. So that's also why I name the people who have taught me and in the people I'm in relationship with. I'm here today, talking about HJ lineages, but Cara's here with me all the contributors to the book. And it is it is a tension, it's not to be resolved. It's just to be worked with. And it's a deep, deep feature. For me. I think that it's super complicated, because there are times where we, for our survival, we might have to move in ways that kind of mirror white supremacist, capitalist culture. But that is a survival strategy. That's not me. Right? And I think that we need to think about who we're accountable to, like, that's the question I come back to over and over again, is that I'm accountable to people. And the people I'm accountable to I did not wake up and say I wanted to write a book or be part of an anthology. I don't even think of myself as a writer. And so how I got to this project was the ancestors tapping me very forcefully on the shoulder being like, you need to do this. And community thing, we need something like give us something to help orient and ground us during these times. And so I said yes to that. But it's with a lot of discomfort. I don't mind being visible. I don't mind being of service in my own community of Queer and Trans people, Black indigenous People of Color have sick and disabled people, I don't mind that. I am not very interested in kind of being visible in the mainstream, because of how people act. And how they treat Black Queer and trans people. It's like, no, no.
Anjali Rao 08:14:17
Yeah, yeah. No, I completely appreciate that. And thank you for naming that, that we are always working with that tension. And sometimes we have to move in ways which feel like it's in, in tangent chill sort of relationship with white supremacy, but it's really not. It's really not that we're doing that only to survive and be seen. And then we, that accountability piece of it is really important. So thank you for naming that. I also want to like just, you know, there are people who are probably listening who don't know much about what Healing Justice means, and who are curious and who are also curious about the abolishment as to approach something that I have recently begun to really delve into and explore based on based on my own, you know, disillusionment with, with the world in general. So, can you please share some sort of some sort of the foundational premises and the ways in which we can engage with this framework, given who we are in the world? today
Speaker 1 08:16:03
so first I want to just name that Healing Justice as a concept was gifted to us and CO architect by Cara Page and kindred southern Healing Justice collective in the mid 2000s. It comes directly out of movement, it comes directly in response to seeing how state violence and community interpersonal violence and just the trauma that organizers encounter when confronting the state how that affects us spiritually, emotionally, environmentally, psychically, physically, and so forth. And for me, you know, when I came to Healing Justice, I was like, Oh, wow, this framework is expansive enough to hold all these different parts of me that I don't know how I didn't know how to integrate in my work. But Healing Justice really thinks and kind of refers to the ways that our peoples have always had strategies around care and resilience and resistance, and survival. And that predates the early 2000s, that's ancestral, that's our birthright. And so, for the real, some of the reason that we wrote the book is that there's been some conflation around Healing Justice and self care, or even Healing Justice and healing more broadly. And so Healing Justice as a political framework, is a political framework that seeks to build collective power so that we are healing, not so we can be healed, I want to be healed, believe me, or I want to move towards the healing, it's a destination will never reach. And, more importantly, we want to change the conditions that are leading to our suffering. So I'm a mental health practitioner, I'm a therapist, you know, one version of therapy is training people to cope with the unacceptable. Another version of my work, is supporting people to come back into their power and into the work they're here to do so we can get free together. So do I want to learn to cope with white supremacy? Or do I want to learn to abolish white supremacy. And so those are some of the distinctions that are really important. I think that piece on abolition is so central, because for us, this comes from a lineage of abolition, that goes back to the abolition of slavery. So the current conversation around abolition, which is very much tied to that work, is about the abolishment of prison and policing, and all of its myriad of forms. We're talking about the prison industrial complex. We're also talking about the medical industrial complex as an extension of state control and coercion. And the all these words I just said, they're huge. They're concepts that you could spend your whole life studying like this, I guess what I want to offer is like, this is not a simple framework, right? It's a framework that is continuing to humble me with how much I don't know. Like, it's it's real serious business. And so the abolition piece is key, because we are not going to put forth any intervention that reinforces surveillance that reinforces any kind of policing, whether that's soft police like social workers or the actual police. And we cannot talk about Healing Justice outside of the other movements and political frameworks that is in deep relationship to in those frameworks with disability justice, environmental justice, reproductive justice, transformative justice, and harm reduction. And we since writing the book have been gifted the framework of laboratory harm reduction from sheer Hassan ID com Coronavirus, to really like basically take back harm reduction from the state. So it's a lot and the book is a good place to start. And it's like kind of offering you places where you pick your own adventure and become an entire nerd on a topic like the medical industrial complex, if that's your absolutely,
Anjali Rao 08:19:53
you know, I have been looking you know, what the thing that I've been like really interested in is intentional communities where we are where we can really have courageous conversations. Because I do think that we may not know the solutions, in fact, we won't. But we are. We are asking the questions. We are asking good questions, intentional questions, and courageous questions. And so I think that itself is like one of the most important things that we can do in community and which brings me to like sort of the decentralization which abolish and talks about a lot where, you know, it's not the nonprofit industrial complex is one thing also. So I appreciate us saying that it is like this expensive thing. And it's not one thing and it is definitely not self care, because self care is such a commodity. Right now. It has been sucked into the dominant culture. So we're not trying to be better at being in the system. We're trying to just disrupt the system and create something different, right. So yeah, I really, really Appreciate that approach. In Yoga we talked about you talked about suffering Erica. So our go back to that, that word that you use because In Yoga we talk about the inevitability of what we call as Dukkha suffering, like, you know, all of human experience, there is, no matter who you are there is some level of suffering, and how do we transcend that? How do we hold? And how do we eventually, you know, transform that metabolize that that is what the practice and the teachings of Yoga is about? So what to ask you, what does healing mean to you? And not only in terms of maybe, obviously, using the framework that you are such a big part of what and how has that evolved for you? Has that changed for you? What does that really mean for you?
Erica Woodland 08:21:49
This is a really important question, because healing is another word that gets kind of thrown about. Yeah, I like to start with healing. It's not for the faint of heart. If you know, my, my current incarnation chose to come here to heal. I have questions, comments and concerns about that it's very hard. You're becoming undone over and over and over again. So there's this piece about being able to be with human suffering or own human suffering. But also the suffering of all the beings that weren't in relationship to healing for me is also about the intersection between how do we integrate the wounds from that suffering and metabolize it so that we are moving towards our purpose and our destiny. So I am a practitioner, the Lukumi tradition. And we talk a lot about ancestors. And we talk a lot about destiny, what is the work that you're here to do, I'm also an astrologer. So it's nice to have like a natal chart to be like, here's a map that could point you towards your strengths, your gifts, and you know, what your soul is trying to be up to in this lifetime. But that integration piece is really, really important. Because when we are not when we aren't able to integrate our own suffering wounds and trauma, then we move through the world dumping that on other people. And sometimes it's largely unconscious. And sometimes people are doing that consciously, you know, from their own pain. But there is what I love about Healing Justice is that, you know, part of what we're trying to do with the book is read politicize the framework, but also recenter spirit, and to not back away from the spiritual nature of this work, while holding that so many people in our community have been deeply harmed, and abused by religious systems and structures in spiritual communities. Like those things are very real. For us, it's about what is your connection to something bigger than you, but to actually grapple with that tension around spirit? in an intentional way, like we have to, huh?
Anjali Rao 08:24:08
Absolutely.
Jivana Heyman 08:24:10
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Anjali Rao 08:25:09
So when you say split it, you know, I get all very nerdy about it, because Yoga is a lot about a lot about spirit. We call it different things. What in your I just want to know, out of curiosity, what is your experience of it?
Erica Woodland 08:25:27
Wow, that's a great question. I think that I've been fortunate to have studied several different traditions that kind of brought me back into something that I felt really strongly as a young person. So I actually went to an Episcopal private all girls school. It's a whole nother book. It was It was wild. But I remember having these and I'm not Christian now. Me and Jesus are cool. I'm not Christian. At these profound spiritual experiences in prayers Like every morning going to school, like, I, I could feel it, I could feel it. And then, you know, I had a lot of challenges around, you know, Christianity as a system, I was like this, some of the stuff was really not aligned. And then I also during that time, remember I like, was obsessed with the moment, I will just go outside and stare at the moment I was there at the start, I still do that. So they're the things that evoke all majesty wonder that was my, those were my early experiences of spirit. And then I got introduced to different cosmologies, and different ways that people understand the spirit, and multiverse. And I was like, Whoa, this is so cool. And some of this is deeply, deeply personal. So there's a relationship that I seek to cultivate with my own spirit. There's a relationship that I seek to cultivate with ancestors, both from my lineage and ancestors that are just like a part of my, my crew and my life. And then I, I try to experience spirit and everything around me, you know, so I'm also in a trouble I lived in the Bay Area for 13 years. This, I'm like, How can you not fall to your knees with like, majesty, it's just it. This world is really glorious, and really, really painful. And so what I'm what I'm most clear is, that's how I expanded spirit.
Anjali Rao 08:27:25
Beautiful and love that thank you, thank you for I know, it was Norton in the list of questions. And I was just sort of curious to hear what you had to say. So I appreciate that. It's beautiful. I want to also like refer to your interview with Eddie Conway, I think you mentioned, you know, that he's one of your teachers and mentors were in, I think it was your second or the third essay in the book is former Black Panther. And he talks about how we should not repeat the mistakes of our movement as ancestors, and that we should learn from the past. And one of the things that history offers us as a gift is how to not make the mistakes of of our ancestors. What have been some of your own excavations from your movement work?
Erica Woodland 08:28:16
I have to say, it takes a lot to rock me that question. Okay. And I think this is really important, because I am 43, I'm about to be 44. And I came into this work in my late teens, early 20s. So I'm middle aged. But I've been in the work for multiple decades. And it's really, it's been rather amazing to have been alive long enough to see certain cycles not complete, but to be like, Oh, here's where we are in this cycle. So one of the things that I learned from Eddie and continue to learn from any is a, you know, these structures and systems of domination are actually not creative. They have about four or five signature moves that they use to control and dominate. And they repeat them over and over again, over time, and just supply the same things to different communities. So if you look at the violence and degradation and attempted genocide of indigenous peoples on this land, you're going to see lots of similarities to chattel slavery and the enslavement of Africans brought to the Americas, you're going to see a lot of similarities between the act of genocide right now in Palestine. So these things are deeply connected, things are deeply connected, and you can't really be friend a monster like that. So it's, it's why, you know, when I became politicized, I came into the work of the Panthers. I went to my first critical resistance conference when I was in college, like people who are like, actually, there's no reform of these systems. We can't afford that. If we're doing anything that you know, looks reformist, it's still like having to stay alive long enough so that we can actually create something different while tearing this down. And this piece around, like being willing to learn from the past is so so important. When I started to learn about the Panthers and I got to be in relationship with with Black Panther elders. The first question I had, especially as a healer, it was like, damn, there's a lot of trauma like how, what did y'all do? How, you know? And so in that interview with Edie, it's so interesting, because, you know, he would say they weren't doing some things in that area. And I was like, you know, I humbly disagree. Actually, there was a lot outside of even the programs that the Panthers did that I think were really important to the spiritual and political development of Black people, and the ways that inspired people across the globe. But I think there's this piece on Brown, we have the ability to be a couple steps ahead. So something like backlash, right? Like, you know, if, for instance, Trans people become more visible and get more rights and have more leadership downloaded, there's going to be backlash. Why are we surprised when that happens? Right? I'm all but I'm also surprised, right? Because there's still a part of us that like is holding on to, or maybe there's some goodness inside of these systems of domination, there's not the goodness is in us, we have to figure out how to get that out there, we have to find other people who are, who want to be in a context and the conditions that are life affirming, but to actually, to continue to have deep distrust of systems of violence, you know, and to not fall for false solutions. And so that's part of what the book is trying to do is to say, sometimes even the solutions we generate are still rooted in lack of understanding of history, and also of social movements, and how moments of resistance work. And that I learned through tutelage of the Panthers and kind of other revolutionary movements, primarily in the US, but a lot of people aren't necessarily getting that education.
Anjali Rao 08:32:19
Yeah, I hear that I hear that a lot of people are not getting that education. And that's why one of the things that you know, we can do is to really continuously talk about in languages which feel sort of accessible and meeting where the other person is at and not not really throw like jargon. I think that's very intimidating for many people. So I'm really trying to get people to, first of all see that they already know, and they're already doing enough and pushing the edges and the envelopes of people where they're at. Which brings to be this next question, which is, how do we stop ourselves from getting into the dominant cultural space, like, repeating the mistakes of the dominant culture in movement work? Because I see that a lot, you know, that you talked about, you talked about accountability, and you talked about making sure that we are checking ourselves in our individualistic value? What are some of the ways in which you have seen that happen? And how do we? How do we push, push that out of our systems in some way?
Erica Woodland 08:33:35
So this question is really important. And it requires a high level individual personal work that I don't think we're honest about. You know, it's, it's this thing that we're grappling with, it's kind of like, I work with organizations who are trying to integrate, like racial justice into their organization. I don't have a worker who's about racial justice at work, and then in their personal life, don't give a fuck about racial justice. Yeah. So it's like, there, it's like, and then how much can your employer require of you in terms of personal work, so to just like, actually be inside of some of these tensions, because so much of movement work is been absorbed by the nonprofit industrial complex, we have to talk about some of those things. And then there's all kinds of organ organizing that's outside of the nonprofit industrial complex, where these dynamics are still proliferating. So the first is to accept that we've all internalized these things, and that it's we're there is no real prevention. There's like, what are your strategies to stay aware? And what are your strategies for interruption and intervention? And what are your strategies for repair? There's so much that transformative justice has offered us about this question. And, you know, there's a lot of harm and abuse that happens in movements, right, and we have to deal with it. Like there are people who are literally will never come back into movement spaces because of the harm they've experienced. You know, as a young person, I experienced all kinds of things. Queer phobia, transphobia ableism white supremacy? I was like, Are you serious? I thought I was coming here. Y'all have it together?
Anjali Rao 08:35:17
No, yeah.
Erica Woodland 08:35:18
People are just out here peopling so, but I do think we're in a moment where and shout out to people who are younger than my old ass. The young people are not are literally not tolerating things that I tolerated when I was young. And that actually gives me so much hope. It's like, No, we don't want raggedy elders. No, we're not going to we're not going to kind of acquiesce to someone who is being abusive just because they are older or they have more experience. They're just not having it. So I think there's a lot of work that is already happening to shift those dynamics in our movement spaces. But it's ongoing work. So you should be asking the question, How is capitalism showing up? In our organizing was white supremacy? And for me, the bigger question is ableism, because nobody's talking about ableism. Healers aren't talking about ableism. Organizers aren't talking about ableism therapists aren't really talking about ableism. You know who's talking about ableism? Disabled people. Yeah. Yeah. And that's that, that to me would be one of the bigger gaps right now. And one of the bigger heartbreaks is people's inability to see the intersection between other structures are violence and ableism. Oh,
Anjali Rao 08:36:37
yeah, absolutely. In fact, that's one of the biggest parts of the work that accessible Yoga does, which is talking about ableism and Yoga spaces. So yeah, completely, completely concur. I want to talk about dissent. Also your Erica, because you did talk about you know, how the younger people are like pushing back and say, We're not going to like a quest to people just because they're older. And that is such an important thing to kind of cultivate that sort of independent thinking. And as a group as an even, even between, like interpersonal relationships. How is that? You know, it's how is that way in which we're, we're what I want to say is, how do we resist? How do we be effective? And how do we how can we be intentional in our resistance, given the scale of what we are seeing now? Because it's, especially for me, I can say that I come from India, where it's rapidly descending into totalitarianism. And even here, to a certain extent, you are free to read, you know, you're free to protest, but it's still what's happening right now, in terms of, you know, Palestine movement is, is heartbreaking, young young students are being penalized people are losing their jobs. So how do we as a collective community, or an ally ship with resistors? You know, what, what do you think? What can we do?
Erica Woodland 08:38:11
So some of what Cara and I have talked a lot about before this particular Flashpoint where we're thinking about the need for organizers, practitioners, cultural workers, and anybody who's invested in getting free and using healing justice that have a strategy for that, to really be in deep assessment of risk. So. So there are moments in my life where I'm resisting from just pure human response to degradation right now. And then there are moments like we've seen right across the world where people have met, they've organized they figured out how are we going to shut down this highway? How are we going to shut down this airport? What are we going to do about the folks getting arrested? What is the care plans, people were going on strike? Where's the fun to pay people who were striking right now. So they're, I guess what I want to offer is that this moment of resistance is so important. And I My hope is that it activates and re activates us to find our communities, our political homes. Right? Again, who are you accountable to Canada, individual people out here resisting by themselves, we actually are so much stronger together. And when we're coordinated. And not everybody has to do the same thing. In fact, we're not going to get free that way. So this is actually a beautiful moment where I it's restored some of my faith in organizing because I was like, Oh, wow, like, for whatever reason, this moment, got us in alignment in a way that I haven't seen in a very, very long time. And so you need to assess risk. One of the things that I appreciate about all the organizing around Palestine right now is people are like, stop being in your feelings, feeling guilty, because you can't do this one thing. There's a ton of things that you can do. So that messaging, like shout out to the comms people for that, like that messaging has been so helpful. Do what you can from where you are, and take risks based on where you are. Also be thoughtful about depending on how you're positioned. Risk function is differently if you're Black. Well, you know what I mean? Risks functions differently if you're disabled and non disabled. So it's like very, very important to again, situate yourself and I would say, more strategic resistance is where I want us to go. Yeah, and that doesn't mean that you know, when we just have these, like acts of defiance that come from our spirit, right, and probably come from our ancestors, those are good too. And how do we sustain this for the long haul? And how do we also connect what's happening in Palestine with what's happening everywhere? Because literally, this moment is like if you do and understand interdependence. I mean, COVID should have taught us about interdependence. But it didn't, unfortunately. Yeah, but maybe this moment well,
Anjali Rao 08:41:07
yeah, yeah, no, I saw you. In, given what we are seeing, you know, the scale of what we're seeing with genocide, war, climate justice, all of the things and how do you take care of yourself? What are your practices of, you know, I'm getting a sense that you it's a very spiritual practice. And all of the things that you named already is anything else you want to share with our listeners about? What are some of the things that you go to constantly consistently?
Erica Woodland 08:41:41
So this question is, so it's a question I get a lot. And it's also like, it's a good question for the moment, because I have never been able to kind of witness a live stream or genocide before in my life. So Exactly. Like these conditions. I, I am in my spiritual practice regularly. And I was like, Oh, I don't have a spiritual framework to understand this. This is
Anjali Rao 08:42:07
100, per se, I'm talking about right now, I don't
Erica Woodland 08:42:10
understand. And so that has brought me to speaking directly to particular ancestors. So Harriet Tubman is an ancestor works really closely with me and with this project. I've been talking a lot to Eddie Conway, I've been kind of reaching for other people who have lived through things that were of this magnitude, and still stay the course. And a lot of the work that I'm doing both in my organization, but also in other work is supporting people to find their spiritual fortitude, grounding, anchoring during this time, and like, where's your resilience really going to come from to meet this moment? Because my self care is great. When like, Yeah, I do the self care list. I've I've been great at that. But that's actually not enough. Yeah, that's not enough. And it's really about you know, I think some of what has been so in, like, amazing about watching the resistance on the ground in Gaza. is people being really clear, like, the freedom we're fighting for, we might not see this in our lifetime. Yeah, you know, and death is not an ending. And like that, kind of like spiritual. Like, essentially, I've been trying to put myself through a mini like, spiritual worship bootcamp, because I'm like, what does it mean to be built for these times, I would like to be built for these times, that requires that I do certain things. And it requires that I avoid other things, right. And so especially as a deeply sensitive person, as a healer, as somebody who's deeply intuitive, I'm like, there's just certain energies, I can't be around right now, if I'm going to do what I need to do. So there's like a high level of discipline that I've called into this year, because I'm like, I think I'm someone who's supposed to be alive right now to fight, and to create and suburbs. But if I didn't have that clarity, I don't know what I would do. And I got that clarity from my practice. And I got that clarity from my ancestors, tapping me repeatedly on the shoulder being like, get it together, you know, but that was a relationship that I've cultivated over time. So it's not going to be the same for everyone. But there is this piece around, like what helps together? You know? And? And also, if you don't have that, then what's the right role for you at this time? What I'm trying to have us avoid? This is a very traumatic moment. So we're all activated, we're all trigger. Everybody's nervous systems are just, I mean, fried, right? Are we doing the things that we need to do to co regulate and to self regulate so that we can be as strategic as possible and so that we can also not take each other out in the process of getting free? So if you are not able to show up in certain ways, are we like creating space for rest and respite? How are we staggering? There are folks who were leaving work right now who are not okay. You know, they they're not okay. And we can't just keep going and can't just keep going. And then there's times where I'm not okay. And I'm like, Oh, I can't, I can't do it. And then I rest, I reground and I come back. So if you don't see how long this fight is, then we're not gonna have the resources to sustain this resistance. So for me, it's timing. It's for me, it's about like having people around me who will tell me you're not okay. Yeah. And you probably shouldn't be doing what you're doing right now in terms of your job. Like, you know, yeah, that's that's real and that's not a personal failing. That's that's not a part smell failing. That is the most human thing that could ever happen is you are overwhelmed by the horrors of this time and you need to grieve, or you need to rage or you need to rest or all the above. Yeah.
Anjali Rao 08:46:13
Beautiful. Love that. Love that. Thank you. Thank you for sharing. And we are coming to the end of our podcast conversation. I know I can continuously talk to you because you bring so much depth and wisdom. Is there anything else that you want to share with our listeners?
Erica Woodland 08:46:36
Well, first, thank you for this conversation. Thank you for reaching out, thank you for the community that you're holding and building. And the conversations that I know you're stewarding in this moment are so important. And I think the other piece is quite simply to find your work and to do it, and it you know, it really doesn't have to be what everybody else is doing. You know, like I say, I'm thinking a lot about folks for whom this work of resistance and its work of liberation is like, very much like with their children in their families in their very local community. You know, we're not all going to be on the bridge shutting it down. But and that's okay. Right. But to actually think about, like, based on where you have power or based on where you have privilege, based on where you have knowledge based on where you have a community of accountability, where can you intervene?
Anjali Rao 08:47:32
Wonderful. I think this is the most one of the most important messages that that you can share and that we can we all need to listen to time and time and again. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much, Erica, I look forward to continue to learning from you reading what you have to offer. And I'm so grateful for your generosity and sharing both in the book and right now in the conversation. So thank you so much. I'm really really grateful. Thank
Erica Woodland 08:47:58
you. It's been an honor.
Anjali Rao 08:48:06
Thank you for listening to the love of Yoga podcast, and offering from accessible Yoga Association. Please support our work by becoming an ambassador or by visiting our online studio at accessible yoga.org
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
