AEC’s Wishes for the New Year
You may have noticed that we took a break from blogging over the last two weeks – our effort toward some more presence and family time over the holidays. We hope you got some of the same. We (Amy and Lauren) actually got some face time together over New Year’s and discussed our reflections, wishes, and resolutions as we transitioned from one year to the next. Here, we share them with you. Feel free to share yours in the comments!
Call some people out and others in
Call outs are necessary and are often an effective way of both alerting an individual to their oppressive behavior and alerting bystanders to the oppressive behavior. Calling out is a good thing and offers individuals and organizations a chance to acknowledge wrongdoing, to apologize for pain inflicted, and to remediate with different actions or language. However, the culture of calling out can offer its own challenges: it can turn away those new to equity work or unfamiliar with appropriate language. Calling in, according to this article by Ngọc Loan Trần, offers an alternate pathway. It also aims to halt oppressive behavior, but does so with more compassion. That is, calling in offers course correction specifically to those that are trustworthy and putting forth effort to participate in and care for communities that value equity and justice. We plan to talk much more about this in an upcoming blog! In the new year, I (Lauren) hope to add this tool to my kit in order to continue justice work while also making sure more people feel equipped and connected.
Get active
If you want to set some kind of fitness resolution, make sure it includes lots of kindness to yourself (see below). The activity I mean here has to do with – you guessed it – your elected representatives. The midterms are only recently in the rearview mirror and we already have news alerts flooding our phones about the individuals assembling exploratory committees for a presidential run. All that is to say, there’s a lot of work to do and it’s our responsibility to pay very close attention as we barrel towards the general election in an all too short twenty-three months. Get informed on the one or two key issues about which you care most and then commit to contacting your reps at least monthly – that’s my goal! I use a couple of apps to help me identify contact info for my reps and to keep me informed (both of these also provide scripts for what to say or write when I reach out): Resistbot and 5 calls.
Be kind to yourself
In the spirit of self-care and kindness, it is important to remember that the most important person to be kind to is yourself. If you are like me, you sometimes say things to yourself that you would never dream of saying to other people. So this year, I (Amy) am going to set the intention to be kinder to myself. This is especially valuable as we engage in challenging work, whether it be equity work, work in teaching, or work in our personal relationships. We will stumble. We will err. It is easy to focus on these missteps and beat ourselves up over them. And yet that behavior makes getting up even more difficult. On New Year’s Day, I read a beautiful intention on the Instagram of @katherine.keegan and it really stuck with me. Her resolution states, about herself, “I will be proud of her. I will cheer her on. I will be tough on her when she needs it. I will love her flaws and hope she overcomes them. I will support her through the struggle. I will love her through all struggles.” This year, I resolve to love myself as I love others through the struggle. The work is hard. The struggle can be overwhelming. But I will grant myself the grace and kindness through it that will give me the strength to continue the work. I hope this for you as well.
-Amy & Lauren