Latest / Soul Salon with Ayandastood / 15: showing up together & what I'm avoiding rn

Transcript

15: showing up together & what I'm avoiding rn · Soul Salon with Ayandastood

• 0:00
  if you have something you're terrified to do but you've been meaning to do it and it's
• 0:03
  plaguing your psyche I really wouldn't invite you to just come say what's up
• 0:08
  hello sunshine and welcome back to paradigm shift with i understood as always i'm so grateful to
• 0:14
  have you here i'm sending you the love the ease the joy the passion the pleasure the self-trust
• 0:22
  and also the service and the being for others the looking around seeing how you can help
• 0:29
  okay to the extent that you can and i'm also sending you deserve help if you're struggling with
• 0:35
  something you deserve help and i'm trying to create ways for us to support each other
• 0:41
  and today i want to tell you about a event that i'm having this sunday if you can't make this one
• 0:45
  there will be more but it is called showing up to get there be showing up to get there because
• 0:51
  why would we show up alone i'm someone who avoids so many difficult tasks and i think to myself
• 0:56
  wouldn't it be nice wouldn't it be nice if we could do this in community if we could come
• 1:01
  together and this could be a way that we could connect because i do i've always wanted to do a
• 1:06
  zoom call and i've always wanted to connect with people in more than just the written word because
• 1:10
  i am a person who loves to deeply connect and one time i did one on one calls and i want to do those
• 1:14
  again because i was incredible i have such wonderful profound thoughtful kind loving delicious people
• 1:22
  in community with me and i'm so obsessed with each of you i've been so blown away and like the
• 1:27
  comments i've been receiving on my sub sack have been so thoughtful and kind and generous to each
• 1:32
  other and responding to each other and helping each other so it just makes me really excited about
• 1:36
  what this can be and what this already is so i want to talk about this event why i'm having it
• 1:41
  and what the goal is the flexibility of it and then also just note that there will be more
• 1:47
  and you can join the next one and i would love to get your thoughts on this concept because
• 1:52
  i'm just really excited about it we are going to get on to a zoom call at working session so i'm
• 1:56
  going to be responding to texts i've been literally so behind on other people maybe editing
• 2:01
  something or writing something or working on something and so that's the goal for the session
• 2:06
  i did the Spotify poll for the first time and i asked people what is holding you back most
• 2:12
  creatively and this was the episode on insecure creatives gather and the options were money time
• 2:18
  lack of community fear and self-doubt and perfectionism and which one do you think one
• 2:24
  you guessed it it was fear slash self-doubt that one 77 people voted and 46% of people said fear
• 2:32
  or self-doubt that was number one the second one was perfectionism which was 20% the third one
• 2:38
  was lack of community which was 14% the fifth one was money which was 10% and the sixth one was
• 2:44
  time which was 9% it's not a perfect survey obviously but i just think that's so interesting like
• 2:48
  we're all going through this creative fears that's something that i would really like to help
• 2:52
  address together and this is this concept and it's based on this beautiful essay that i read by
• 3:00
  dr aisha kahn on her sub-site cosmic anarchy which is incredible resource i'll link to it in the
• 3:05
  show notes and she says that difficult emotions are meant to be held in community and what makes
• 3:12
  them so difficult isn't necessarily the emotion itself but it is the fact that we're holding them
• 3:17
  in isolation so when we think about grief what makes grief deeply painful of course in and of
• 3:23
  itself grief is hard but when you're grieving in a community and you have communal practices to
• 3:27
  grief when you know how to grief together it's more manageable to carry that grief similarly when
• 3:34
  you are angry but you have a people you have others to hold that anger with you to hold space for
• 3:40
  you it's the idea of when you are with someone and they're able to hold space for your emotions
• 3:45
  literally meaning that when your emotions are raised they don't jump to solutions they don't
• 3:50
  jump to the next thing they literally create an emotional container a space a room for you to
• 3:58
  exist in and to unpack or do whatever you need to in that and it could also be this idea that
• 4:04
  we don't always only need to speak about emotions but move through emotions so if you have people
• 4:10
  you dance with then that could be a big release of everything you experience that day and so you're
• 4:15
  holding the emotions as a collective and so part of my dream for society or for yes for society
• 4:22
  why would i not have a dream for society it can't only be about critique it also has to be about
• 4:26
  the constructive side Angela Davis has said this Dr. Ruha Benjamin who is on my podcast has said
• 4:31
  this Mia Mingus who is on my podcast has said this Agent Mary Brown who by now you know I'm obsessed
• 4:36
  with has said this that it's not enough to critique society we also have to know what our dreams
• 4:42
  are for society and in order to dream we need to be rested rest is resistance by Trisha Hersey
• 4:47
  all these ideas are serving us and serving our collective imagination which is so filled with
• 4:53
  hopelessness with we can't do anything with look around you know and yet I believe that
• 4:59
  the spirit needs you know to hang on to both the hope and the despair and what Cornel West has said
• 5:05
  is that hope is existential meaning someone who has no hope they'll find it very difficult to go on
• 5:11
  it's an existential need to be hopeful for your life for your community for whatever that is if you
• 5:18
  have absolutely no hope not even just the saying but the actual absence of hope that is an existential
• 5:24
  kind of death and we are made to live that death especially anyone who is of any marginalized
• 5:30
  identity so as part of that dream for society that constructive you we need to try if we can
• 5:37
  to build the kind of world we want to see in the smallest of actions whatever we would love
• 5:43
  why not try to bring that into being if you would love a world with more community and you have
• 5:49
  the space time energy even if you're scared to do it it's you who needs to try and help create
• 5:55
  community unless you cannot obviously but I'm saying let's not let fear be the thing and so for me
• 6:03
  I am scared to have this event on Sunday because of course I am afraid the words of Audrey Lord echo
• 6:08
  in my mind it's daunting to speak your truth and speaking of course in language and in action
• 6:14
  but I feel it's so important to create these spaces for people to you know queer and re-imagine
• 6:21
  what community could look like especially when we're feeling alone I have so many things that I'm
• 6:27
  avoiding I'm like I'm behind on texts I am you know you're never behind but I think communication
• 6:33
  wise I'm behind on text because I owe people text and there's a person who hasn't responded to me
• 6:38
  in a long time and I was just journaling about this and it's creating a kind of anxiety I can like
• 6:44
  switch it off but I'm like why did I do something wrong and then I'm like no I didn't do something
• 6:47
  wrong but I wrote to myself like what is the universe trying to teach me through this feeling I'm
• 6:53
  having from this person and it's like they're it's trying to show you what it feels like to be ignored
• 6:59
  that the sense of like I understand we're all busy and also it doesn't feel good to feel like
• 7:04
  someone doesn't care about you and so I am creating that emotion by not responding to people
• 7:10
  and these aren't my like you know best friends but it doesn't even matter they're friends they're
• 7:14
  people they're human beings they're people I love they're my family some of them like cousins
• 7:19
  I owe responses to I owe my dad a call like all these different things and it's like I don't want
• 7:24
  to create the feeling of neglect and I think the universe is inviting me to look at the feeling
• 7:29
  that I am feeling from this one person who hasn't responded to me in a very long time and saying okay
• 7:34
  look girl look look what you're also creating in the universe do you want to be a creator of this
• 7:39
  because you know we're all creators but we don't only create you know the things we create on
• 7:46
  our platforms we also create pain we create resentment we create we are creators like we create
• 7:52
  many different things through our actions and we can't only own the good things we create or the
• 7:57
  I don't even like the duality of good and bad we can't only own the parts of the things that we
• 8:02
  create that feed our egos we also have to own the shadow side and so I know that I'm creating
• 8:09
  pain by not responding to certain people by taking so long to respond and it's because I get
• 8:15
  the text I'm like this is so lovely I respond physically and then it's not the moment to respond
• 8:21
  and then I'm like always one soon and then days pass and then long passes and then I'm a shame
• 8:26
  that I haven't responded now I'm avoiding the shame and I'm avoiding the text and so now I'm
• 8:31
  avoiding and so I was like wow you know I am going to feel this way for the rest of my life like I'm
• 8:37
  going to live a whole life of texting people so I better create some sort of way to confront this
• 8:43
  because I want to show up for people reliably now I don't believe in urgency culture I believe
• 8:48
  that is really like a product of white supremacy and capitalism which Trisha Hussi speaks about
• 8:53
  in her book Rastas Resistance white supremacy work culture is centered in this sense of urgency
• 8:57
  everything is urgent everything is always urgent there's no time to stop that our worth is
• 9:03
  connected to how much we create and do and we know that that's a lie because our worth is created
• 9:10
  simply by birth by us being alive by us being here on earth this divinity that has been stolen
• 9:19
  from us based on trying to treat our bodies like a machine this machine level pace also say him
• 9:25
  on TikTok an incredible creator who my love and I'm sure many of you follow them they're incredible
• 9:30
  and they talk about the different tenants and principles of white supremacy culture often and give
• 9:36
  so much information and understanding on why things like politeness and things like
• 9:42
  what was I just mentioning urgency like all of these different ideals are rooted in a white
• 9:48
  supremacy culture so definitely follow them as a beautiful resource and person and spirit while
• 9:52
  like just an incredible being on this earth so while I don't believe in urgency I do believe in
• 9:58
  being someone people can depend on which I'm currently not being and I do believe that I need
• 10:04
  to create a way to confront this avoidance and I thought to myself well if I feel this way so many
• 10:10
  people feel this way because I am part of the collective I am of the collective and I've had this
• 10:14
  idea for like a year where I'm like what if we got in a zoom call and did things we were afraid to do
• 10:18
  because me and my best friend do this with some of our creative projects where if we're scared to
• 10:23
  write an essay or for a scare to finish something or send something we'll get on a call or get on a
• 10:27
  zoom call and we'll do it together and someone on my sub-site commented an incredible comment that
• 10:33
  I can't wait to share their name is Shan and they said I love this in the neurodivergent community
• 10:39
  we call this body doubling we struggle with focus and task initiation but it's been found that
• 10:45
  just having another body in the room or someone working alongside you helps to get you started or
• 10:51
  keeps you going thank you Shan that is so beautiful body doubling that is so stunning and I always
• 10:56
  think it's always the communities that are pushed to literally marginalized or that are other
• 11:02
  in our society that have the imagination to create the world that we want so this is coming from
• 11:08
  the neurodivergent community which is this is these are the ways of seeing disabled activists and
• 11:13
  thinkers and feelers and and healers have so many ideas that we need as a society to bring into
• 11:20
  being in such as the idea of body-mind the idea that the West through Descartes has been
• 11:25
  obsessed with the separation of the body and the mind but they are necessarily interactive like
• 11:31
  they are a whole they're influencing each other all the time they can't even be separated how
• 11:36
  you feel is so related to your body mind and so all of these ways of seeing I love for example
• 11:41
  looking to communities that have been so the polyamorous community for example have incredible ideas
• 11:46
  on what love could look like outside the colonial imagination outside of position and outside of
• 11:52
  the idea of compulsory monogamy this is the idea of querying society like this radical queer
• 11:58
  imagination and ways of being and seeing and thinking and feeling that can really create a
• 12:04
  generative new world where love is at the center safety is at the center communities at the center
• 12:13
  something that Sahara Rose always says is your message and she has a great spiritual
• 12:18
  podcast called the highest self I really love that it's basically how can you
• 12:22
  alchemize what you've experienced as something you're meant to be ashamed from and avoiding
• 12:26
  and put it into your art put it into what you have to say put it into your message
• 12:30
  and I feel like as a person who avoids why not help others create a community container for
• 12:36
  facing avoidance and I think that's something I would love to do more as a long term thing I mean
• 12:41
  I hope I feel like my vibe is I'm good at starting things and bad at sustaining them so we'll see
• 12:47
  I'm I'm let me not say bad but like I struggle the most with sustaining the idea or bringing it
• 12:53
  to actual life I can have the idea but like executing on it and like sticking with it is what I
• 12:57
  struggle with most so if you have something you're terrified to do but you've been meaning to do
• 13:02
  it and it's plaguing your psyche I really would invite you to just come say was up I really
• 13:07
  wouldn't invite you to just come say was up like come say hello and it's from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.
• 13:14
  eastern time and even if you come like for 10 minutes just come say hello I'm going to be there
• 13:20
  for the full time we're going to I'm going to discuss kind of what people want the frequency to be
• 13:24
  maybe it's kind of like office hours where like you just always can come through I don't think I
• 13:29
  can do it every single Sunday at that time but I'm going to find a way to make it like a consistent
• 13:33
  space in some way whether that's every two weeks or every week because I really want to help
• 13:38
  people I also like would love to support people on their journeys okay I love you lots I hope that
• 13:44
  you are out there I was going to say thriving I hope you're thriving I know that's a lot to ask
• 13:48
  these days all days but I really do hope that that is my hope my hope is that you are finding the
• 13:54
  joy the light the pleasure and also being of service to someone in your life that's my hope
• 13:59
  that you are not only focusing on the self but also the other my last episode I shared that
• 14:06
  quote from Jay Shady about nature and service I think that's what we're here to do is to
• 14:10
  is to help each other on this life journey and do that within the capacity that we have right
• 14:16
  and to bring more love and more healing and more joy whatever your calling is to bring more of it
• 14:21
  into the world thank you so much for listening I wanted to just make a short episode on this
• 14:25
  and the next episode is going to be on envy so stay tuned and listen to that one I love you so
• 14:31
  much I'm sending you so much love as always please subscribe to the subsack if you can join the
• 14:36
  newsletter and that's where I share information on events like this and my thoughts I'm writing an
• 14:41
  essay on beauty as alienation of the self it's really something I'm struggling with so I would love
• 14:46
  once it's done for you to receive it and number two my ask is if you can please leave a five-star
• 14:52
  review rating on apple and Spotify it really helps people find us and also helps my creative
• 14:57
  dreams for this project to come true okay love you bye