A Meditation for the Movement
Jasmine Burnett (she/her) has been orbiting the reproductive justice multiverse for nearly two decades. She entered the movement as a grassroots organizer, who has now evolved in her life as an herbalist, writer, strategy consultant, and coach. She designs and leads processes that builds the clarity, direction and will of powerful, yet weary leaders. Her writing has been featured on Rewire, TheRoot.com, Mindbodygreen, as well as two anthologies: The Echoing Ida Collection (2020) and Sweeter Voices Still: An LGBTQ Anthology from Middle America (2021).
As tough as this moment is, the Supreme Court, in all of their power to protect (or really deny) our rights to make decisions about our bodies and families, is providing us with an opportunity to dream bigger, wider and fuller for our people. This reality is offensive and harmful. To put it delicately, this is the one, comrades. The revolution has come, and it is time to pick ourselves up, lay ourselves down, be still and take a deep fucking breath. Remember that we have each other, and even though we don’t like each other all of the time (or, in many cases at all) we’re all we’ve got.
It makes sense that we are making shifts in our movement through our knowledge, skills and experiences. But, we haven’t checked in about the ways that our consciousness and lives are also knee deep in a personal revolution. All of the aspects of our work that are transitioning in real time are normal for the shifts required in a revolution.
The past few months, our movement has shifted. A lot. We've delt with racism and anti-Blackness, sexual harassment, worker exploitation, union busting, ever-shifting funding and structures, a global pandemic, televised police brutality, and more. Those conversations opened wounds that haven't completely healed—perhaps your clinic or organization is still dealing with the fallout. It’s normal to have high turnover when the heat is on to dismantle your work. It’s normal to have deep conflict with each other when we have not addressed the deep conflicts that we have within ourselves. It’s normal to feel panicked that our work to-date is being gutted, while the world is enmeshed in real fears about pandemics, climate change and wars. I too am jolted by the realities of all of this, and more. I am still here, and you are still here.
With all of that going on, I invite you to join me in a meditation—a moment to pause and think about how we show up in this movement for ourselves and for everyone around us. Close all the other tabs on your computer, put your notifications on do not disturb, and join me for a moment:
We all get to choose how we speak to ourselves, and be responsible for the ways our “self talk” encourages us to be in the world of our work. If we take the time to Be, Breathe and Believe, we are going to get through this together and united.
Now, take a deep breath and exhale with a sigh, scream, cry, or moan. All are acceptable.
Reflect on how it feels to settle into the big and heavy truths of what is real, and release it.
This conversation is a time and space to carve out care for yourself and to allow your heart to be visible in this work simply because you exist in the world.
Your work in this movement may be your life’s purpose, but if you have not accessed your personal passions by tapping into your imagination, our impact will be weak. We deserve the time and opportunities to strengthen ourselves on purpose. We deserve the space to be vulnerable so that we can experience comfort with the reality of our stories.
Though I know a lot about people and our movement, I am not going to act like I can meet every single person where they are in their experiences, backgrounds and identities. But, thanks to my trauma superpowers, I do know how to de-escalate internal crises, and responses to external threats with intention and care.
In this moment, I want to celebrate plant medicine from sipping and bathing with my herbal tea blends, to smoking and ingesting cannabis for their gifts of peace, pace and clarity to support my personal balance in crises. If you have these too, join me.
Locate the tools that support you with personal balance in crises and use them with intention. Pace yourself so that you know the difference between indulging to internally de-escalate rather than indulging to escape. We struggle between the balance of internal de-escalation and escape because we are searching for the balance of where we are and what we need right now with the possibilities for the future.
Our framework, reproductive justice, teaches us to fight for what is urgent, appreciate what we have, and build the systems and structures that allow us to live dignified lives. It situates our work in a life cycle that we have embodied in our roles and talents in the work, and less in the self awareness and creativity in our own lives. The invitation here is to be present for your healing.
Our mandate with reproductive justice is to craft human rights into the consciousness of the world. This will be impossible if we do not take time to have a conversation with ourselves about our desires for our personal humanity. When we lack presence with ourselves, we invite a set of experiences of always trying to prove ourselves to others.
Be aware of the voice that is yours and the voice outside of you that is convincing you that you are not worthy. If the story you replay about yourself in your mind doesn’t speak sweetly to you, write another story that speaks to you with care, and holds you in your integrity.
Are you still breathing with purpose? Take another breath.
Try a breath that I call the conch shell breath. Conch shells held up to your ear gathers the energy of sound and translates it to your ear like the sound of the ocean. Take a moment, close your eyes, and take a deep breath in. With a closed mouth, exhale through your nose and feel the echo of sound in your throat and chest with your exhale. Repeat with as much frequency as you need to stabilize your nervous system.
Breathe.
Our movement has evolved so much. What was founded with the money and research of eugenicists, is now more formally led by more Black, Indigenous, Latinx, Asian, multi-racial, queer, and transgender people than ever before who are poking holes in the gross misrepresentation of "pro-life." Given the spectrum of talents reflected in our movement, we know that we have come so far and have even further to go. I believe in us because I know that we are multidimensional beings, living as multi-level geniuses who are navigating the multi-level bullshit of the world.
Sometimes the daily struggle of bullshit makes the daily struggle for human rights feel impossible. The seeds of our freedom dreams have nowhere to sprout in the untamed and overgrown garden that holds the harvest of our wounds.
We are currently in the Spring season and many of us are physically clearing space in our gardens to plant new seeds this year. Use this exercise as an opportunity to be clear about what we know to be true about our lives and work, not what we are told is true from someone else who benefits from the negative experiences in our lives.
We know our individual and collective relationships to reproductive health, rights and justice. We know that power, control and clarity about our lives and work is what sparks our passion for justice and keeps us here when our energies are low.
It’s time, comrades. The time is now to level up on your personal sustainability, and level down on crossing each other's boundaries. Our charge for this moment, through June and well beyond, is to be balanced as we confront the urgency of the moment with our visions for the future.
Reflect on what, or who you give the best parts of yourself to, and why you don’t give them to yourself. Our energy and focus is currency. Save some of you for yourself.
Be Visible. Be Vulnerable. Be Present. Be Aware. Be Balanced.
Repro workers, I love us, I trust us and I believe in us. The work of healing your relationship with yourself, and how you show up for this work is within your hands, if you want it.
Love, Jasmine.