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The following is an exercise offered in all Transformative Solidarity workshops and programs.
It is offered as a video/audio version and a text version for your convenience.
The Embodying the Five Guiding Principles exercise is a writing exercise so take a moment now to setup your device, or computer, or get something to write with and on. While it’s a writing exercise I encourage you to engage in the ways that work best for you. Maybe it’s writing, maybe it’s drawing and sketching, maybe it’s voice notes, or maybe it’s just being in your mind. This exercise works best when you engage in the ways that make the most sense for your being or self, yeah?
I also want to invite you to do your best to settle and find a comfortable position for your body, and for your being, make sure you have some water or a beverage you enjoy.
In the Transformative Solidarity Model, the three phases: Awareness, Action, and Integration are our map. They help us determine where we are, where to go, and what to do once we get there. The Five Guiding Principles are what support and hold us in being where we are, getting to where we want to go, and determine how and if to do what we want to do once we get there.
Without the Five Guiding Principles I believe we will continue to stumble in repeated patterns and maintain these systems of privilege and oppression.
For this exercise we will use an example from your life to learn about and embody The Five Guiding Principles. And I’ll also share an example along the way.
To do that, I would like to invite you to write about a time when you had or needed to have a hard conversation with someone. This conversation can be about anything. I invite you to just write about what happened?
Allow Yourself About Three Minutes.
Honesty is the space between right and wrong. It’s not just about what’s true or what happened. It is about the insides of what happened. It’s about our histories, our triggers, our expectations. It is our joys, fears, struggles, and confusions. To be honest is to sit in the awkward and uncomfortable moments of ourselves, of others, and of this work.
A hypothetical example: Say, for example, I told my friend I would show up for them and join a project. We talked about what it meant and might look like. But I didn’t show up. I kept cancelling or rescheduling our meetings. I didn’t really show up for the conversations around brainstorming. And my friend had to, kind of, pull me along. And eventually my friend got upset and called me out on it. What’s true is what I told them, I had just become a freelancer and was learning what that meant for me and what’s true is I did have other work come in. And so, what is true is that it was hard for me to juggle all of these things.
But, what is honest is that I didn’t want to prioritize this work with my friend because I was feeling disappointed about another job they had that didn’t come through. What’s honest is I got scared about my future and income and prioritized other things. What is also honest is I didn’t know how to share this with my friend, and I wasn’t fully aware of it when it happened. What’s honest is that I pulled away without any explanation or conversation and that hurt my friends’ feelings and created confusion between us. What might also be honest is that I had a triggered response when my friend expressed anger and upset toward me. And it’s possible that it’s also honest I became defensive.
Now, I invite you to return to your story and write it again through the lens of Honesty.
Allow yourself about three minutes
Normally, at this point in my workshops I would stop to ask you how you are doing, how you’re feeling. But since we don’t get to be in real-time conversation I’m going to invite you to check in with yourself.
How are you feeling? Is anything happening in your body? Make note of what you’re feeling, where you’re feeling it. Take a couple of deep breaths as needed, wiggle and shake as needed and as able, and continue when ready.
To sit in the hard and uncomfortable parts of ourselves and those around us requires finding Grace.
Grace is also about meeting others where they are, holding space for their histories, and for the possibility of who they can become.
Grace is the space we come to when sitting with the honesty between right and wrong becomes uncomfortable or unpleasant. Grace embraces the complexities of the human experience. It is about supporting our process of understanding as we challenge ourselves and the systems around us.
Back to our hypothetical example about me and my friend. Finding grace for myself might look like holding space for my growing awareness, loving myself for the ways in which I try to protect myself, patience as I learn, belief in myself that I can grow and become in the ways that I desire.
Now, I invite you to return to your story and find where you might offer grace for yourself and for the other person.
Allow yourself about three minutes.
Again, I’d like to invite you to check in with yourself, before continuing.
How are you feeling? Is anything happening in your body? Make note of what you’re feeling, where you’re feeling it. Take a couple of deep breaths as needed, wiggle and shake as needed and as able, and continue when ready.
Honesty and Grace allow us to set down the judgement of ourselves and others. And without judgement we are able to lean into vulnerability.
When we’re honest and we find and lean into grace, this opens space for vulnerability. Vulnerability invites others in. Vulnerability invites ourselves in. To be vulnerable is to risk. It is to risk feeling joy, intimacy, harm, love, and shame. To be vulnerable is to open space for possibility and growth.
In our example, vulnerability can be sharing with my friend what’s honest, acknowledging the ways in which I hurt them, and offering an apology.
Vulnerability can also be about holding space and receiving the feelings and experience of my friend. Vulnerability is letting go of who is right or wrong, and embracing curiosity, compassion, and grace for yourself and the other.
Vulnerability can also be about holding the possibility that you might be wrong. And leaning into all that might bring up, with grace and in honesty.
I invite you to return to your story and try to name the feelings that are showing up or showed up if you already had the conversation.
What feelings are showing up now?
Sometimes it can be hard to name feelings – so you can also describe the feeling or where it might be in your body.
Allow yourself about three minutes.
Ya’ll are doing great. I’m sure of it. Find your breath if needed, give a little wiggle and shake, pause the video and move in the ways your body might need and is able. And I will share the final two guiding principles.
We will not do writing for these last two, but you will be invited to actively practice them.
When we do this work alone (and many of us desire to do this work alone, myself included) we often struggle with moving forward.
Witness facilitates the space to move from private to public. To witness is to engage. We are not just watching or being watched – we are with and within the experience. We are part of the transformation.
It is to expose and open ourselves to vulnerability with others. and with ourselves. Witnessing is something we do for ourselves and something we can do for others.
From our example: Witnessing myself could be observing my behavior, emotions, and reactions while holding all the understanding and grace I might show a dear friend or family member. Witnessing my friend could be in the observation of their language, behaviors, and other information I might know and holding them in grace and understanding. Holding space to witness their experience, emotions, and reactions to what happened. Witnessing is about embracing the Individual.
As you have gone through this exercise and remembered a past conversation, you have, effectively, been leaning into witness yourself and the other person.
To witness is to hold space for both the feeling of the moment and the curiosity of the moment.
So how might you witness yourself and the other in your hard conversation? In workshops I would invite you into small groups to share with each other. So, I invite you now, to do two things.
First, I invite you take a moment and witness your being as an individual.
Second, I invite you to think about who you might feel safe to share this experience with? Who would you be willing to allow to witness you?
Allow yourself to be connected in vulnerability with all that that can mean, all that it can feel like, while also inviting in grace and honesty.
Our final Guiding Principle is Commitment.
To commit is to make a choice. To make a choice is to have agency. Commitment is agency.
Commitment is agency, it is volition, it is choice. Commitment is to live in honesty, find grace, and embrace vulnerability. Commitment allows space for growth and possibility. It requires honesty in those moments when our Awareness shifts, grace for ourselves and our process, and the vulnerability to be witnessed and to witness.
From our example: Commitment shows up when my friend and I decided to have a conversation about what happened between us. Commitment was the choice to share my experience and to embrace theirs. Commitment to my Awareness of the Individual and Interpersonal. To help guide me in the areas I might struggle. Commitment to Awareness of the Institutional and that so much of what I’ve been taught benefits only some, so how I can move differently?
To commit is to make a choice. To make a choice is to have agency. Commitment is agency.
What are the choices you are making? Are they rooted in Honesty, grace and vulnerability? If not, will you invite yourself to lean toward them? Will you risk being witnessed so that you may grow and be reflected back to yourself? Many of us commit to things like allyship or solidarity because we think we are supposed to. Commitment is choice, if we don’t move into commitment with agency we will struggle to be in honesty, to find grace, and to be vulnerable, and I believe we will remain fearful of being witnessed. What are the choices you are making? What is the choice you want to make but aren’t sure how? What is your commitment to active-allyship and Transformative Solidarity?
You may not have a quick or easy answer to these questions. And many might have even more questions.
I invite you to follow those questions and see where they lead.
All offerings are available virtually and in-person. Workshops and programs follow the Transformative Solidarity (TS) Model.
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Please note: All workshops include discussions of and challenges to racism. We believe no matter the topic of injustice, without including and addressing racism we will inevitably perpetuate racism and white supremacy.
We currently offer Turning Privilege Into Change workshops on anti-racism and trans and nonbinary active-allyship.
Our CE Courses are available for licensed mental health service providers in California working with trans and nonbinary clients. We currently offer courses in Spring and Autumn.
Our long term programs are designed for companies and non-profit organizations working toward systemic change. These programs are three, six, or twelve months depending on your needs.
We offer one-on-one and group coaching depending on your needs. We are available for private, corporate, and nonprofit consultations. Contact us to schedule your free first 30 minute call.