In Bloom: watering our buds for a blossoming garden
Keeping ourselves and our communities nourished in resistance and resilience
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Hello everyone,
Welcome to our June newsletter! We had a busy May, starting our new Bloom courses (more on that below), so we havenât written to you since April - wow!Â
This is Nooreen writing to you from the breezy city of Edmonton, Canada, while wishing you a gentle start to your day or a pleasant end to your evening (whenever or wherever you are reading this from). Kindly note that youâre getting this email because you subscribed to our newsletter.
In this newsletter, as in all of our newsletters, weâll cover a grounding exercise, some fun suggestions for exploring our senses, a deep dive, news and updates from Bloom and Chayn.
G R O U N D I N G
Use your body
We are going to literally ground ourselves.Â
Find an empty surface on your floor. If you like, you can place a yoga mat on the floor, or you can do this on your bed too - whichever you are most comfortable with and have access to.Â
Lay on your chosen spot. Close your eyes if you wish to. We are going to do a quick body scan. Notice each part of your body, where the surface touches you, and focus on that sensation, the pressure, the texture, and then the temperature. Notice any vibrations in the house, building, or your surroundings. If you like, you could also listen to music with the speaker on the floor, and feel the vibrations of the sounds.Â
Now, once you are ready, you can open your eyes, slowly rise up and return to your present moment.Â
S E N S E S
đ Nature is healing - this may be an overused term in the wellness community nowadays, but it works wonders for me. If you are able to, a walk towards the river-valley or the beach-side to observe the colours -Â the lush green trees, the azure blue water, and the clear white and blue sky (on days when itâs not grey) - can be soothing to your sight and calming to your senses. If you are not able to do so, here is a 3-hour long video of a tropical beach; you can watch the colours and listen to the waves for however long you would like to.Â
đđź I have been listening to The Linda Lindas this week! They are an all-girl teen punk rock band that gained attention because of their energizing song Racist, Sexist Boy that went viral a few weeks ago. My favourites are the cover of Bikini Killâs Rebel Girl and their original, Claudia Kishi (The Baby Sitters Club rejoice!). If you are looking for music to pump up your morning, this is it!Â
đđ˝ Since lockdowns have been put in place, one thing that I truly miss is hugging my loved ones. So for those of you who are in places where restrictions have been lifted and you are able to see your family and friends, I would encourage you to spend an extra few minutes embracing them. While I understand the warmth of a cuddle with the smell of your favourite people is irreplaceable, you can try this self-soothing exercise called The Butterfly Hug - if you, like me, are not able to meet anyone.
đ I had some stale bread that I didnât want to go to waste, so this weekend I tweaked Nigella Lawsonâs Caramel Croissant Pudding recipe and made some caramel bread pudding and served it with blueberry jam. It would also taste great with maple syrup and crème fraĂŽche or clotted cream. Give it a go if you would like to whip up something fancy but quick!
đ¤ In line with our theme here, of resistance and resilience, I would like to share and for you to read out loud:
The Second Olive Tree by Mahmoud Darwish (originally in Arabic, translated by Marilyn Hacker)
The olive tree does not weep and does not laugh. The olive tree
Is the hillsideâs modest lady. Shadow
Covers her one leg, and she will not take her leaves off in front of the storm.
Standing, she is seated, and seated, standing.
She lives as a friendly sister of eternity, neighbor of time
That helps her stock her luminous oil and
Forget the invadersâ names, except the Romans, who
Coexisted with her, and borrowed some of her branches
To weave wreaths. They did not treat her as a prisoner of war
But as a venerable grandmother, before whose calm dignity
Swords shatter. In her reticent silver-green
Color hesitates to say what it thinks, and to look at what is behind
The portrait, for the olive tree, is neither green nor silver.
The olive tree is the color of peace, if peace needed
A color. No one says to the olive tree: How beautiful you are!
But: How noble and how splendid! And she,
She who teaches soldiers to lay down their rifles
And re-educates them in tenderness and humility: Go home
And light your lamps with my oil! But
These soldiers, these modern soldiers
Besiege her with bulldozers and uproot her from her lineage
Of earth. They vanquished our grandmother who foundered,
Her branches on the ground, her roots in the sky.
She did not weep or cry out. But one of her grandsons
Who witnessed the execution threw a stone
At a soldier, and he was martyred with her.
After the victorious soldiers
Had gone on their way, we buried him there, in that deep
Pit â the grandmotherâs cradle. And that is why we were
Sure that he would become, in a little while, an olive
Tree â a thorny olive tree â and green!
D E E P D I V E
The importance of decolonizing our practicesÂ
In order to bring systemic change, we need to implement the concept of decolonization throughout our work. But before that, we need to understand what decolonization means and what harm colonization has caused globally.
As poet, writer, and activist Tina Curiel-Allen writes: âTo talk about decolonization, people need an understanding of what we are decolonizing from. Colonization is when a dominant group or system takes over and exploits and extracts from the land and its native peoples. Colonization has taken place all over the globe, through the stealing of lands; the raping of women; the taking of slaves; the breaking of bodies through fighting, labor, imprisonment, and genocide; the stealing of children; the enforcement of religion; the destructionâor attempts to destroyâspiritual ways of life. All of these things have left a psychological, spiritual, and physical imprint on indigenous peoples, and a governmental ruling system that we did not create, that was not made for us. These are the things we need to heal from, where we need to start reclaiming. This is where organizing and decolonizing comes in.â You can read her article here.Â
Decolonization also applies to our work here at Chayn. Because when talking about healing from trauma, the current mainstream framework tends to be colonial, as it is upheld by systems of oppression like capitalism and patriarchy. Hence, concepts such as intergenerational trauma and community healing are removed when providing support to survivors of abuse. It forces us to believe that healing is linear or that grieving has a time-limit and âonce you are doneâ you can âreturn back to workâ or âgo back to how you wereâ. Which is untrue: healing and grieving look different for everyone, and oftentimes we live with our grief and heal at the same time as living and existing. And using a personâs productivity to a capitalist workforce as the metric of how âsuccessfulâ their healing has been denies marginalised communities the agency to define their own healing pathways and practices that will serve the community.
At Chayn, we hope to tear down this narrative and build a nurturing community and environment where our approaches are inclusive of everyoneâs experiences and not solely âa single storyâ. Our founder Hera wrote a blog on our design principles for ensuring our support and resources are trauma-informed. Â
Apart from the healing and recovery space, colonization and the colonial framework have an influence on almost everything. Therefore, we need to unlearn what we have been taught and work on decolonizing our thoughts and practices. We can start by educating ourselves and listening to voices that divert from the mainstream Western narrative. Here are a few resources to help you get started:Â
Decolonizing Feminism - Instagram account of Khara Jabola-Carolus: dismantles mainstream white feminism and Western media through her postsÂ
Feminism in India -Â online platform where you learn about feminist news and movements in India
Indigenous Canada - free 12-week course on the history of the Indigenous Peoples in Canada
Decolonize Palestine - resources and information on the history of the Palestinian people and the importance of their resistance
Updates from Bloom
Courses
Our 2021 programme of courses is up and running - weâve just started Healing from Sexual Trauma, and finished Creating Boundaries at the end of May. Speaking of which, weâve already got loads of wonderful feedback from Creating Boundaries:
âI stopped having therapy because I cannot sustain the expensive sessions. That is why I am so thankful there is BLOOM and kind hearted, dedicated people like you.â
âThis course could be helpful for anyone, yet has great benefit for those who have experienced abusive behaviors with a very gentle, mindful approach to prevent it from being too overwhelming. It has brought so much clarity to my past experiences, putting words, labels, researched proof to what I didnât know how to explain or process.â
Thank you to our lovely participants - we have been so grateful to share this space with you, and reflect with you on your insights, experiences, challenges, and triumphs. We are in this together.Â
Weâve got more courses coming up later this year - Managing Anxiety starts on August 2nd, then Recovering from Toxic and Abusive Relationships in September, and finally Reclaiming Resilience in Your Trauma Story in November. Sign up for these on our website.Â
But donât worry if you missed Creating Boundaries or the start of Healing from Sexual Trauma! You can still sign up for both and catch up with the material by signing up through our website.Â
Flowerbed
We have been loving our Flowerbed sessions recently! For those of you who donât know, Flowerbed is our bi-weekly check-in where members of the Chayn team check in with each other and chat about a particular topic to do with relationships, wellness, recovery, mental health, boundaries, and more. In our recent sessions, Chloe and Vesa discussed how the patriarchy affects our perceptions and narratives of celebrity women in pop culture, Disha and Jahnvi explored patriarchal expectations of romantic relationships in South Asian cultures, and Lakshmi and Elysha talked about how to create healthy boundaries in relationships. Flowerbed sessions take place every other Thursday at alternating times, 1PM BST and 7PM BST, over on Facebook Live.Â
Our next session will be on Thursday 17 June at 7PM BST, when Naomi and ZoĂŤ will be returning to one of our favourite topics: pop culture and patriarchy. Join us via Facebook Live - itâs free to join, 45 minutes long, and you can kick back and relax or join in through the comments.Â
Updates from Chayn
Have you met our new Operations Manager Kim and Movement Builder Naomi? Together, Kim and Naomi organised and ran our successful Strategy session, which Hera wrote all about in blogs here and here.
Want to keep up-to-date with webinars and other events from Chayn? Subscribe to our YouTube channel, and follow us on social media: Twitter, Facebook, Instagram.Â
Thatâs all from me, Nooreen, this time! I hope you find some refreshing insights with this content, and have a peaceful June.
In love and light,Â
Best wishes from Alyson, Beatriz, Hera, Lakshmi, Kim, Nooreen, Snigdha, and ZoĂŤ