Scene I.
My client’s hand was inching along her chest, tapping on her heart like she was testing for ripeness. Minutes ago she had been a storm of competing truths (so much feels like a storm these days). But now the winds were calm, her focus spacious and forgiving as her hand improvised on my screen. This was an ensoulment session, and my client was kicking ass. Slowly.
Last newsletter I announced that my books were open for 1:1 spiritual accompaniment work. Now I get to sit with very cool people and help them be the love warriors they know they are, with more of their own soul’s wisdom on board to steer the way through mystifying transitions in a world on fire. Very cool! Very cool that this is a practical skillset that is learnable, common, and abundant, not ephemerally bestowed on a privileged few! Very shitty that the systems of control and oppression have forced so much soul wisdom underground because it’s a direct threat to empire!
So, my client. She had been practicing a “hand dance” with the prompt “how do I feel soul.” Hand dances come from the lineage of InterPlay and are one of many ways to tap into body wisdom. Unexpected and marrow-deep insights tend to come from hand dances. “When I started, I was in my head, and my hand was rushing around. When I slowed my hand - there was soul! Once I had synced to the pace of my soul, my movement could speed up again and stay synced.” How absurdly simple. As I listened to my client’s reflections, a phrase popped out of my mouth that would become my own personal intention for this autumn season.
Slow Down to Catch Up.
Scene II.
The Art for Social Change Jam was coming to a close. This gathering of artists across a kaleidoscope of mediums and identities had been in the works for 3 years, thwarted by many pandemic/crisis-related events. If a hand dance helps tap into personal insight, a Jam helps tap into collective insight. We find again and again that the pain and shame of one participant reveals a truth rippling throughout the entire group. Often this truth casts light on the internalized frontlines of the battle against all oppression. And so we dance between the personal and the systemic, casting ourselves as research subjects for how we get free.
The themes that emerged, dear reader, were thus:
I’m sensitive as hell. Is that ok in a world on fire?
I need to move slowly in order to make my work. Is that ok in a world on fire?
I haven’t made art in years because the systemic, economic, and urgent conditions have pushed it to the background. Am I still an artist?
Slow Down to Catch Up.
Pace mismatches become particularly apparent when working with groups. Ever go on a group vacation? You know what I mean. So perhaps it’s no surprise that pacing became a central tension at the Jam. Not just between participants, but between participants and the World. The incessant urgency of our times is rendering creativity malnourished, the very skill we need most to solve our urgent problems. The Jam offered a temporary but real slow-down, enough time to catch a breath, sync back up (back down?) to the speed of the soul, and let that renewed soul guidance lead. In Meg Wheatley’s words, an island of sanity.
Scene III.
Kazu Haga has been a nonviolence practitioner for over 20 years, and I can’t stop quoting him. In a recent training on revolutionary nonviolence, Kazu unapologetically challenged the status quo of social change. In my own summary, he said:
The way we do protests aren’t transformative and aren’t working.
The only questions worth asking have no answers. We need to be asking bigger questions.
Our strategies need to match the scale of the situation, which is full-out crisis.
Kazu sometimes repeats an axiom from an unlikely source - the military. Far be it from me to be picky about whose good ideas I steal. Here’s the axiom:
“Slow is Smooth. And Smooth is Fast.”
In other words, we simply can’t afford to move fast. “Fast” sacrifices base-building for quick wins. “Fast” trades relationships for the aesthetics of an action. (shout-out the hundreds of thousands of hours of grassroots organizing that propelled NYC’s mayor-elect into office. MAMDANI WON Y’ALL!!!!).
“Slow down to catch up” is about committing to the present moment as the only real site of impact. Letting that lil stressed out panic brain take the proverbial back seat and stop trying to do a big kid’s job. And it feels counterintuitive as hell.
Back to Scene I.
It’s mid-autumn. In the Jewish calendar we’ve just entered the month of Cheshvan, an entire month associated with slowing down. I always learned this was to make room for digesting the intensity of the High Holy Day season that precedes it, but lately I’ve been thinking of Cheshvan as making space to receive the miracles associated with the month to follow - Kislev, aka Chanukah month.
Me and my beloved client are wrapping up. In the weeks to come she’ll continue playing with pace, experimenting on her walks to the subway and conversations with friends. So will I. I’ll walk the dogs without my phone in my hand. I’ll drop all my plans to have an unexpected repair conversation with a family member. When the conversation goes long, I’ll give it time. And when I spiral about not doing enough to fight fascism, I’ll remember to pace myself and just show up for the next local I.C.E. defense meeting.
The most honest thing for me to say about what to do in these times is: “I don’t know.”
Followed closely by: “organize, organize, organize.”
And third, not to be forgotten, is: “slow down, so that you may catch up.”