The attempted murder of Jacob Blake by law enforcement is not new in a country whose legacy is rooted in state violence. Nor do you don’t get a white 17 year old killing protestors w/ an AR-15 without the President first vilifying protestors; or a gun lobby that has bought Congress and control of gun legislation, or a white nationalist culture stoked by Trump & his enablers. But that is not the only legacy alive in America.

This week marks the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment and the movement for women’s suffrage. Except, the 19th amendment only really helped white women. But this story - of liberty and justice for “some” - is the unfinished business of the American experiment. 100 years later, we’re seeing the hand of white supremacy that continues to live on in the 53% of white women who voted for Trump and the 74% of white women who don’t talk about politics.

You are entitled to your feelings about Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. After all, no politician is perfect and these two most definitely are not. But they are moveable. The Biden/Harris platform is as far left as any democratic ticket in history; not because they are the most progressive candidates, but because activists have been pushing them non-stop towards the progressive policies that can protect our people and planet.

We don’t just have a Donald Trump problem, we have a white person problem. As Jill Filipovic said, “monsters don’t make us, we make them”. We should all be looking in the mirror right now and asking not just “what is in the way of a New America?” but “how am I in the way of a new America?”.

Maya Angelou says that “when someone shows you who they are, believe them”. And this administration is showing us who it is. What do you call the deployment of paramilitary forces to American cities? What do you call the blatant disregard of a Supreme Court decision to uphold DACA? What do you call an administration that ignores a court ruling to release children from detention centers?

“Good trouble” is still trouble. It isn’t passive participation, it’s radical action. If we are to truly honor John Lewis’s legacy, we must reckon with What are we willing to put on the line for justice? What must we risk and give up for the sake of collective liberation and wellbeing?

The only “cancel culture” that exists is the “cancel culture” of abject poverty or mass incarceration or workplace discrimination - where entire groups of people are systemically stifled and silenced from participation.

It is what has sustained what bell hooks calls the “imperialist white supremacist capitalist patriarchy” for all of time. It is our complicity. It is our obedience. And it is our unwillingness to demand real, transformative change.

Black lives still matter, even though your feed is back to “normal”. Now that the immediate scramble to catch up to systemic racism has passed, it’s time for us, white people, to get to work.

If you think protesting doesn’t work, think again. Last night’s primary proved that the conviction and energy of the Black Lives Matter movement has indeed translated to the polls.

Something is happening. But the only way to sustain it is to embody a revolutionary love that is so big it can hold the messiness, discomfort and accountability that is needed for transformation in this moment.

The question is “where will we go from here?” Will you commit to the movement beyond the moment? How will you take responsibility for your part? What will you do when equality asks you to give something up?

This moment is a reckoning for the wellness community. A choice between a “wellness of me” that is rooted in separation, scarcity and supremacy, or a “wellness of we” that brings forth healing, creativity and possibility. That may sound overly simplistic, and easy it is not. But it IS a choice each and everyone one of us need to make about who WE are and what it means to be well.

Announcing The Wellness of WE speaker lineup!

If we want to survive this moment -and I mean not go back to normal but transform into something else entirely - we must face the hard to look at truth of our people and planet. 

There is no handbook for how to navigate this moment. There is simply how we show up for ourselves and one another. 

It’s important to remember that the world has been broken for a long time - built upon white supremacy, exploitation and greed. The answer to that is not to fix or cure the world of its brokenness - there is no “normal” to return to. There is only navigating the brokenness in a way that reveals the beauty of who we are beyond the lie of separation.

Nature teaches us that repair is possible. But only if we make space for the grief and action it requires.

Truth and love is the cure to this virus. And it can heal us if we let it.

 We need a feminist response to COVID-19 that centers human rights and recognizes and prioritizes the needs of the most vulnerable communities.