Week 2: Strength

“When I dare to be powerful, to use my strength in the service of my vision, then it becomes less and less important whether I am afraid.” —Audre Lorde

Many of us feel tired of this word; exhausted of the expectation to be strong despite the daily assaults on ourselves and the people we love. Many may feel tired of the toxic cycle of being treated as if you are invincible while being spoken about as if you are broken.

If that is how you feel coming into this week being told to remain strong in the face of still so much unknown, know we see you and we stand with you. We come into this with the promise of collective strength rooted in an understanding that we no longer have to survive and struggle in isolation. While we battle endless attacks from the police, prisons, courts, policies, and rhetoric that all attempt to fracture us as a people, we know that a people united will never be divided! 

Our power lies in our collective strength.  We can each bring our individual gifts and abilities—art, humor, cooking, music, wisdom, words, strategy, vision, etc.—and offer them in the creation of communal care and wellbeing. This tapestry of strength holds us all in love and struggle, as a movement and as a community.

Strength—as we define it—is not solely the ability to endure; it is also the ability to sustain. It is the ability to imagine and to create. The ability to find and feel hope and joy. Strength is the ability to love yourself and each other, and to practice vulnerability with one another. 

We invite you into the practice of stitching together hope and despair, tenderness and brokenness, and love in the face of fear, so that together we may feel the mighty wellspring of strength. This strength is available to carry us toward the world we are already living into.