broken record

In trying to find a name for my blog, I googled "obscure words" and came across "epicrisis" which roughly means praising or disparaging a perspective by quoting someone else.* Yup. That's pretty much what I do.

A very dear friend, who I owe a long email to, said she hears my voice when I write. Funny, I've often felt as though I have no voice. In fact, the reason I chose the grad schools that I chose was because the Sociology they condone allow for such things. Yet, I am not sure how to do that quite yet. Or I think I don't know how to have a voice. Part of it is that I come from an applied sociology background. But the other reason is that I don't quite trust what I see yet. I am not sure I have an analysis or at least one worth putting on paper.

Some of my dear friends and colleagues assure me that this is not the case and I appreciate their encouragement. But I can't seem to get over that little voice in my head that says "fraud fraud fraud fraud." So, I rely on other peoples' analyses to demonstrate my points. But I'm not sure, in the academic sense, when this becomes cherry picking. I know it does, in fact. In a paper that I wrote, I was accused of setting up a "straw dog" defined as "something (an idea, or plan, usually) set up to be knocked down. It's the dangerous philosophy of presenting one mediocre idea, so that the listener will make the choice of the better idea which follows" (my emphasis). That feedback was pretty much right on and pretty much my fear - always.

I think it's important to be rigorous and diligent with research and writing and I need to learn how to toughen up if I am going to do what I do. But I worry that I am getting myself into a whole mess of trouble in choosing the field that I did. I am not sure I really understand what's going on around me and my learning curve is pretty steep at times. Many of the activists that I am surrounded by (for the organizing that's going on in Toronto around the summit) are writing papers just like I am. Yet they seem to breeze through it. They somehow produce papers in the middle of the organizing as though that part of their life is incidental and as time consuming as that annoying pimple they are going to get around to squeezing. Here I am - I fret fret fret about my writing, sitting in front of my computer writing and deleting mediocre sentences for hours on end. I feel like I can't seem to pull it off somehow. It's enough to make a gal crazy. If only I could eliminate the voice telling me to shut up long enough to do the work. And then I could get around to doing the other work too.

*It's also a medical term meaning secondary crisis in the course of a disease.

The End of An Era, I think

For my non-yoga pals, this post is going to seem kind of dumb. But for those in the know, it's a big "step" (though some might characterize it as a "misstep"). I think I am done with Ashtanga - at least for the foreseeable future. I have struggled with this for almost two years now and it occurs to me that the practice just doesn't serve my body anymore.

Those who knew me as a yoga teacher can attest that I followed the "bible" of Ashtanga. For about seven years, it served me very well. But, my body is in a place where it doesn't work for me anymore. It might be a function of grad school - all the sitting and the stress that I carry in my shoulders. It might be a function of they way it cultivates particular parts of my practice - my abnormal musculature for a gal of my size (really, I'm a powerhouse). But since I've stopped practicing Ashtanga, my yoga teachers, my chiropractor, my shiatsu therapist have independently noted that my body is different in that it is more mobile and free. A softening has occurred.

While this may seem like a "so what" post, this decision has not come without its controversy and some hand wringing on my part. On broader scale, my studio is embroiled in a debate, one that is inscribed on my body - to be or not to be an ashtanga studio, or at least a "traditional" one. For those familiar with the culture, there is a brutality in the taking of sides and I feel like my body is microcosm or a site on which that debate is taking place. I am being pulled aside and asked why I am not practicing traditionally anymore. I am being lured to a gamut of studios promising traditional instruction. I am being asked to confirm my affection for the practice. Yesterday, I decided to practice primary to see how I felt. I stopped at Marichyasana C. I just don't like it anymore. It feels like its doing more harm than good.

That said, by golly I miss it. It is such a wonderful practice. It's a mindset, a meditation. It's a structured subculture. It's beautiful, frankly, a lovely brutality. In a conversation I had yesterday with a practitioner, he said he asked one of the teachers, a follower of the tradition, "when does it stop hurting?" His answer - "Never. It's supposed to hurt. That's how you know you are growing." Yikes.

That said, there are some people for whom the practice is tailor-made for their bodies. People who possess that amazing combination of strength and flexibility who progress in the practice, who move through the series with aplomb, who need no other kind of yoga to cultivate the necessary ingredients for a perfect dropback or a lovely kapotasana (see below).

For me, though, it seems like I am pushing my body in a direction it doesn't have the "softness" to go into these advanced poses. And I don't want to forward fold for the rest of my days, nor do I want to hurt anymore. I want to go into a studio and cultivate a practice that feels right for me, on that day, in that space. But, again, I mourn the loss of this thing that has kept me sane for so many years. Yet yoga, especially ashtanga, is supposed to cultivate adherence to the sutras. I am now really practicing my ahimsa, aparigraha, and santosha. Something about that actually feels pretty freeing.

self-

Anyone who has known me for a while knows that I struggle a lot with who I am. I suffer with envy. I envy people who have the skills I don't or the resolve that I don't or the sensibilities or natural talents or inclinations that I don't. And the list of things that I wish I "were" or could be is long. This is in part why I am drawn to certain aspects of yoga philosophy.

I think I am a good writer but I don't know if I am a profound thinker. I am okay with that some days (though less so whilst in school). I know I am smart, but I also know it takes me a while to figure shit out. That said, the one thing I do know and can say with some authority - I am a good teacher. I know that and I love love love teaching. One aspect of my talents is to boil down a complex idea and make it accessible and to some extent exciting (even if not rigorous).

Upon approaching the end of course work, I am starting to read stuff that I want to read. Lately, I am really interested in anarchism and the minutia of collective process. I believe in the liberatory potential of collective process. As a teacher, I wonder, I really do wonder, how likely it is to pull people into believing that collective process is a good way forward. I have seen how hard it is and how much time it takes up. I have seen people rip each other to shreds. I have avoided collective situations in which I see that happening and then guiltily enjoy the fruits of their labor.

This is obviously piggybacking on my last post. I went to the Toronto Anarchist Assembly and Bookfair this past weekend and I love these gatherings. I loved seeing people walking around with homemade vegan food and their dogs - making stuff and hugging and listening to rad music and reading great books and making great zines. It's amazing to watch community unfold in that way. But it is a subculture and it has its own codes (but what collective process doesn't, right?). It makes me wonder how to tap into the profound humanity I see in a lot of my students and harness their compassion into movements. On what scale do activists see the work unfolding and how much of a learning curve is tolerable in activist community?

As such, I think about intermediary institutions like the Highlander School or Mountain Justice Summer or "alternative" education systems like the Sudbury schools and I begin to recommit myself to "education as the practice of freedom". I am beginning re-believe (I lost something somewhere, probably in the process of grading papers) in education as a way to introduce people to radically different forms of social organization than they are used to. While I certainly think I want to finish my PhD, I want to teach above all else and I still consider other forms of education as a possible life path.

I frankly have to learn to appreciate my skills as they are right now and stop beating myself up because I am not the most poignant thinker in the classroom or the most dedicated activist with the best analysis and skills at the meeting or the most flexible yogi or even the best teacher. I have to forgive myself for my "selfish" pursuits (yoga, house buying, movie watching with Chris) and remember, as a colleague and friend once told me, the work will always be there. And I have to do the work as I can do it and let it go when I can't. If I want to do this for the rest of my life, I have to make my life sustainable because I have burned the candle at both ends and I have burnt out and gone crazy (literally) and dropped out and I don't want to do that again.

you are a very clear writer

I wrote this paper proposal about mountaintop removal for Political Ecology. We had to post it on the "moodle" -which is akin to an academic facebook kind of thing. Then we have been assigned folks for whom we have to review their proposals (and folks in turn review ours) and post them to the public forum. The two people who reviewed my proposal both stated, "clearly written and I can see how you’re writing this with broader audiences in mind" and "what you were writing about, it was clear and accessible. Which i think is quite important if you are going to be writing as an activist in the future"... Is it weird to find that insulting? Granted, the second quote came from a gal for whom that was only redeeming quality she could find in my proposal, so maybe I am perceiving this as a backhanded compliment.

But there is a broader tension here. This really irritates me. Why is academia so insular? Unless you're Foucault and have your own "authentic" voice, why would one want to obscure their ideas in a bunch of mumbo jumbo? And why does it feel like an insult to be clear? It's as if being clear and being a complex thinker are mutually exclusive. And why does this feel insulting to the activist community? Activists are some of the smartest people I know. Really. And I'm in rooms full of smarty-pants all day long, many of whom wouldn't know how to tie their own shoes but could tell you all bout the intellectual trajectory of Kant, Hegel... yawn. And for my academic friends, this is not ubiquitously you. But, my goodness, sometimes I want to strangle the people who perpetuate the "ivory tower" insularity that I think plagues the left academic world. No wonder we're largely (but not totally) irrelevant.

Rant rant rant.

necessary learning

It's no secret (or maybe it is), that an important aspect of activism is learning how to retool relationships so that they (we?) don't reproduce the oppressive structures of the dominant culture. I had a long conversation last night with a gal in my department who is very involved with one of the leading activist groups in this here city and that conversation really got me thinking...

In my experience, it is common, if not encouraged, for people to "call out" folks for doing "fucked up" shit in their organizing. For example, men who take up too much space or white folks who reproduce white privilege in organizing are (and should be) taken to task for their inability to recognize that their behavior is oppressive. I will make myself very very clear here. This is a very important and very necessary aspect of organizing.

That said, when does it go too far? The phrase "The road to hell is paved with good intentions" sticks out in my mind. I think that it's a load of shit. Unless one is an infiltrator, people who are doing the hard hard work of organizing and activism are well-intended. The nuances of their behaviors and intentions are important to scrutinize, yes. At what point, however, does scrutiny fracture the movements themselves? Do activists spend too much time tearing one another apart that they forget who the real "enemy" is? Can we forgive one another for our steep learning curves given that most of us have internalized the subtle fucked up aspects of white supremacist capitalist heteronormative ableist speciesist patriarchy? Is trying enough?

There is another kind of balance here and this one is going to be a little bit more difficult to tease out and will no doubt invite more scrutiny. The gal that I was chatting with last night said something to the effect, "There are people in real crisis, people whose lives are being ruined by the policies and practices that we are fighting. I can't expect already overworked core members of the group that I am a part of to deal with my shit of feeling like I am not being treated nicely or expect people to put their already overtaxed energies toward helping me learn how to organize better. I need to learn how to be called out in order to work on myself and I don't expect that it should be done gingerly."* And she's right. When one sees the atrocities unfolding all around them, how can it be justified that the privileged movement actor who is coming from a comfortable place needs coddling in order not to feel bad about herself in the process of trying to become involved in the world in a meaningful way? But then, how does that mindset push people out of movements and lend to burnout?

I'm of two minds about this and this is why I am writing this blog. I think it's true that those with little to lose, those with a lot of privilege aren't the ones who are being served by these movements. But, many people engaged in these activities often give huge parts of themselves over to them, develop intense relationships with their "comrades", and because they are often so busy, begin to rely on these networks not only for their political but emotional needs.** And because we are human, we need nurturing and support from those around us. I don't think it is wrong to expect that. At what point, then, does the scrutiny become a detriment to the emotional well-being of activists and lend to people dropping out of the movement, getting burnt out, or even getting pushed out? And if we are trying to undo the oppressive practices of the larger world, wouldn't that begin with compassion?***

All this is to say, what are activists' responsibility to one another's emotional well-being? I don't know, I really don't.

*I know for a fact that "gingerly" is not a word that came out of her mouth.

**Upping the Anti published an editorial along these lines in their most recent issue. I don't fully agree with it's conclusion but friendship in activist circles is certainly something to think through.

***And this is where I get muddled because there are certainly limits to my compassion. I could easily name names.