Liberation Thinking

Liberation Thinking

“The less you think about your oppression, the more your tolerance for it grows. After a while, people just think oppression is a normal state of things. But to become free, you have to be acutely aware of being a slave” --Assata Shakur

.Last night I read this quote, and while I liked it, and could relate to it, for me, it felt incomplete. I'll explain why. Years ago, I had a most amazing teacher by the name of Eldridge Greer. He had started to talk about “Liberation Thinking”. I was intrigued, and knew this statement in and of itself held and was truth. He had just begun to develop and implement his ideas in the counseling center he was director of, and where I worked for him. Unfortunately, at the same time, the most hideous racism I've ever seen began to rear its ugly head right before our very eyes. I watched in horror as he was slowly but surely taken down by the racism of the white staff that he supervised. Sadly and truly, these same staff supposedly believed in the principles of multiculturalism. Yet, this did teach me that even those who espouse and try to live the principles of liberation, and cross-cultural understanding, fall victim to the tangled vines of racism and have a hard time breaking free. In their inability to break free, they are also unable to see how their internalized racism is operating on, within and through them. It is a poison.

What I also learned from this situation is that as a person of color, I too must work on my internalized oppression, and keep working to set myself free from the trap that threatens to keep me enslaved.

The  above quote speaks to me of a phase in this growth and learning.

We must first figure out who we are. Then we began to see how we have been affected and enslaved during our lives by the systems that oppress. Next, once we see this, we have to change our thinking. If we continue to believe that we are slaves, we will continue to act and respond as slaves. It requires a vigilance, and I would counter that rather than fixating on ones oppression, we must instead come to see how it operates within us, and learn to first change our thinking, then our actions toward ourselves (self sabotage, etc.) and toward others. We cannot stay stuck. We must began to believe that we are liberating ourselves, and finally, we must plant within our whole being a sense that we are indeed liberated and free, and live as such. I wrote the following as my personal response to the above quote that speaks to what I just stated:
Then you have to firmly, totally, and completely go about the task of liberating yourself. You cannot remain a slave... ..or even continue to allow "slave mentality" to remain in your consciousness. it has to be rooted out like the awfullest of weeds...from the beauty of your colorful and luscious garden...

As a therapist, I have had the honor of seeing many people of color in my time, and have come to see that what is most difficult is starting the journey to a place where one learns to simply love and honor self enough that one no longer can act, live and behave in ways that damage ones being. That being becomes and must stay precious and sacred.

After graduate school, without my conscious knowledge, I set out on a path that would eventually lead to what I see as my liberation. I had to continuously look at myself as a being worthy of loving. I had to keep challenging the parts of myself that had been twisted by the racism of others and the systems I'd come into contact with over my life. I declared a moratorium on my reading material—I decided that for at least the next 3 years, I would read only books by people of color, I would not read books by white men, as I'd been, what I felt, indoctrinated by their words all of my life. I started with books by Black women, then I moved on to other women of color. My education was rich! Through the words of Alice Walker, Maya Angelou, Toni Morrison, Pearl Cleage, Octavia Butler, Audre Lorde, bell hooks, and the list goes on and on,  I began to find my own voice. I began to feel a pride in who I am, in the struggles that have taught me and brought me to where I am now. I then began to understand and hear the words of other women of color—Isabelle Allende, Gail Tsukiama, Leslie Marmon Silko, Paula Gunn Allen, Arundhati Roy, and many more who helped me to see how other women around the world have struggled in much the same way, though differently, depending on their countries of origin, and the systems they had to be entangled in. Through this turning away from the droning words of white men, I was able to reach places within myself that were always there, but needed to be awakened by my sisters all over the world. This is where and when I began to truly feel that I could see what freedom looks like.

From there, it has been the joy of life experiences that have schooled me, and helped me to keep walking this liberating path. In the last 6 months, I was lucky enough to be in living situations with two well-meaning but racist white women who took me further down the road than I ever would have made it alone. They showed me how I'd been enslaved, they showed me how I had acted in the past in response to the pressing, smothering, maiming, killing weight of racism. Their ignorance brought me clarity, their lack of seeing brought me sight, their random unthinking actions taught me how to be as Audre Lorde said, deliberate and unafraid. I have no more time for fear. I am a fearless warrior of my own liberation, and I now see that part of my new work as a healer in the world is to help impart this warrior fearlessness to my brothers and sisters. The work is to help us all to learn and know with certainty what it means to simply be able to live as liberated people who no longer need to see ourselves as slaves.

I am now living as a woman who is aware of oppression, but doesn't need to live in and with it. My mind and heart are set on my liberation, and the beauty of my colorful and luscious garden is growing by leaps and bounds. I am grateful to all of my teachers...

Pictures from Liberation Day at Wounded Knee

Liberation Day, February 27, 2013—Wounded Knee

Liberation Day, February 27, 2013—Wounded Knee Memorial

(I went to Pine Ridge to deliver the latest batch of supplies for the folks there, and this is a short accounting of an event I was lucky enough to be present for)

I am standing on the same site I was back in December., but the scene today, rather than a snowy, deserted landscape of graves and a quiet ghostly silence, is, by contrast, alive with the energy of celebration and hope. Wounded Knee has long been a monument to the struggle of the First People of America to reclaim their rightful place in the annals of history of the United States. As I wrote about in a previous blog, the first significant event that happened on this site, of course, was the massacre in December of 1890. Since that time, the mention of Wounded Knee has been a battle cry, and a rallying cry—written about from various angles, but remembered by most as a place where a deep and grave tragedy occurred that put yet another stain on America's colonizing and bloody history.

February 27, 1973, was the beginning of an occupation by the Lakota of the Pine Ridge Reservation and many of their allies, to protest a corrupt and unjust tribal governing body, as well as the conditions of abject poverty on this reservation that continues today. First People have come from many places far and wide to remember, to share, and to give hope.

If you have ever been to a “Four Directions March” you will understand and remember the beauty and the pageantry that happens. Essentially, folks gather together in the direction of their choosing, in this case, seemingly connected with whatever part of the reservation they live on. Folks are dressed in their finery—their feathers, native dress, and/or the clothing that for them has meaning—chamo and face masks, Viet Nam veteran hats and vests displaying medals of bravery. There are banners of various organizations—AIM (American Indian Movement), and the newest Movement group—Idle No More, as well as simple and powerful messages--”Honor the Treaties!”. As you can imagine, all of this together created quite a spectacle of color and energy. There were also a number of folks on horseback. I noticed that the security—while overseen by the tribal police, was carried out on the ground by a number of young people in black shirts—this was heartening and wonderful to see. This brought forth the sense that everyone had a part in making this celebration happen, and that the young are no less important as carriers of the future of their people.

The folks we were with were to be entering from the direction of the North. Along the route, there were stops along the way for the people to hear words of encouragement, to remind them of history, and the continuing need for hope and steadfastness in the ongoing struggle for dignity, peace, and the right to simply live as they wish, and to practice their ancient ways that I believe hold the keys to the healing of Turtle Island—our blessed Motherland.

My physical limitations wouldn't allow me to walk the 7 miles, so, for awhile, I followed along in my vehicle. I finally went on ahead to the Wounded Knee site, and you cannot imagine the joyful noise and the numbers of people who had started to gather. It was such an amazing spectacle to witness. One could not help but be drawn in by the excitement that was building as each new group from a direction arrived.

One by one, each of the directions arrived. I couldn't help but be very touched at the sight of their arrivals and the mood each group carried. One group came with horseback riders following behind. For some reason, I flashed to pictures I've seen of the First People on horses, and how they seem to actually become one with the horse, as if there is no line between the human and animal, and I rememberd how often the Native folks speak of “our relations” in the saying: Mitakuye Oyasin (All Are Related). Indeed, it became clear to me in that moment—and now, how deeply that goes, and why when I go to the Reservation, I always feel as if I've entered another world. I now see, that it is because I leave the world outside where everything is disjointed, and disconnected. I leave a world where there is so much pain, sadness, racism, hatred and fear. I respectfully enter a world there, where it feels as if the Mother is so very alive. The ground sings, the wind blows occasional whisps of dust—letting us know that the ancestors are there, and the peacefulness I feel, standing on and viewing the land is like nothing I've ever felt in the outside world.

Even in the poverty, even with so much that has been taken from the First People down through history, there was so much joviality present as the celebration became more and more connected, with the entrance of each new group. Then, finally, when the last group (the group my people were in) arrived, the excitement seemed to break out into a full frenzy of joyousness—the Mother drum became louder, and the singing could be heard all through the valley that is Wounded Knee. I admit that I was startled often due to the gun salutes that happened intermittently. I could somehow see how the Mother seemed to come alive here, and how beautiful Her people are in their ancient raising of sound to honor Her, and all the relations present.

There were speeches, again, inciting the people to continue to have hope,. At some point, they moved into the sacred space where the mass grave of the ancestors from the 1890 massacre is. There were prayers and more singing in words I could not understand, but somehow, as goosebumps rose on my body, I could not help but feel what was being said, and I know that the ancestors were being honored. I know that there was a sense of the renewed grief of all the years and all the struggle they have been through down through time. Yet, and this is what always amazes me, the First People have never lost their dignity, and their quiet warmth and deep deep understanding of the wisdom of Mother Earth, Father Sky, Grandfather Sun, and Grandmother Moon. In never having lost that connection, it is clear to me that one day, and I hope I live to see it, the balance will be restored, the Frist People will step back into the place they deserve to be in—as the keepers of the wisdom of all things in Nature, and all of our relations. I hope for this, along with them, I pray for this. Ah-ho.