GUEST BLOG | Beth Anne Sánchez | From the Yoga Mat to the Streets
Moderator’s
Note: The
environmental and food justice movements have a tradition of critical
self-study among activists who collaborate on learning how to remain mindfully
engaged through an examination of the connection between self and the world. It is well established that people of color suffer disparate
harm from the discriminatory maldistribution of environmental risks and access
to ecological amenities like open space, clean air and water; safe food and
soil; think: Flint, Michigan and Standing Rock.
Our work to
heal our bodies is therefore always also the work of restoring balance to lived
environments unjustly rendered unsafe and hazardous. This lack of balance is
more than a matter of individual choices; only a privileged person can safely
make that assumption. The imbalance is instead the by-product of powerful
political and ultimately capitalist economic and legal forces endlessly
perpetrating acts of structural violence in the places where we live, work,
play, eat, make love, and pray.
The
commitment to reflexive self-study, what the Indian yogis call svadhyaya,
is one path to strengthening our work with communities of resistance especially
when it avoids the trap of ‘navel gazing.’ This is an important shared
sentiment and value across many fields of practice.
White middle
class yogis often lack an understanding of how the ideology of individual
enlightenment has intellectual kin in the ideology of neoliberalism or free
market fundamentalism. Like many white middle class yoga and ‘spiritual’
practitioners in the USA today, the neoliberals propose that freedom for the
individual means the unfettered pursuit of self-care, self-development, and
self-interest. In the economic sphere this reduces to the pursuit of
individualized interest which is assumed will magically provide for the general
social welfare, environmental protection, civil rights, and so on. There is a
difference between this ideology of disconnection and the joyful work of
fulfilling mutual obligations to community (the ‘We’) rather than the
self-centered pursuit of a presumably benign individualism (the ‘Me’).
There are
many other activists and advocates in social justice movements who are pursuing
yoga and meditation practice. We are ‘occupying’ a community of practice
that holds great promise as a source of renewal of ourselves and for the
building of new bridges in social justice activism. Our presence offers
possibilities for a much needed transformation of a community of practice that
has too often been reduced to a search for ‘personal enlightenment’.
There has never been a more urgent time for all of us to become mindful
practitioners of peaceful and collective nonviolent resistance against despots;
we must use this vital energy to create more just, resilient, and equitable
alternatives to a neoliberal capitalist system that is destroying the planet,
attacking our bodies, and assaulting all our relations.
We present an
eloquent statement on these matters from a skilled and dedicated Latina yoga
and meditation practitioner, Beth Anne Sánchez of Denver, Colorado. Ms. Sánchez
practices yoga and hosts a practice community in the Buddhist philosophy of
Thich Nhat Hanh and the Plum Village community. She
brings an important set of perspectives and a critique of central ideological
assumptions to initiate a much needed discussion about breaking through the wall of unexamined privilege that protects and implicitly justifies apolitical
dispositions, disconnection from the world, and blindness to the struggles we
are engaged in to repair and heal our communities and planet.
For more information on her practice
and work, and to subscribe to her newsletter, please visit the website at: Gurupriya Beth Sánchez.
Svadhyaya includes Race, Class, Gender, Privilege and All the
Rest
 |
| Go to: http://www.bethsanchez.net/ |
| Denver, CO
How wonderful that Patanjali put
Self-Study or Svadhyaya on the TO DO
list! As the third Niyama (observance) of the Yoga Sutras, Svadhyaya has
traditionally meant the study of scripture or the practice of personal mantra.
Through the lens of modern psychology, it is now commonly practiced as the
examination of thoughts, emotions, and behavioral patterns. These
understandings of Svadhyaya are valid and worthwhile.
My interest this month is
exploring an often overlooked aspect of Svadhyaya; knowing our own social
location and what that means in real material terms.
Like many persons of color, I
traverse worlds, languages, epistemologies, and ways of being in the world.
Like others in my boat, I have long reflected on the intersections of
race, class, gender, 1st world-ness, and other social markers that influence
tangible life outcomes for myself and others. My muscle for this facet of
Self Study is strong.
As the current administration
rolls out plans for the country and world, I find myself having tougher-than-usual
discussions with spiritual colleagues, friends and students; especially those
whose social locations have not involved repeated encounters with the systemic
marginalization that people like me, and those I feel solidarity with, regularly
face.
There are many embedded
assumptions in the yoga/meditation circles that bear upon these difficult
conversations. A partial list includes: The assumption that individual
transformation will magically fix the world; the high value placed on niceness
over social justice; the taboo against all forms of anger and fear; the
idealization of focusing exclusively on oneself over the value of
relationality, inter-being, and solidarity; the belief that violent and
oppressive systems are a thing of the past or created through opposition
to them; the assumption that everyone is having their own freely chosen
equivalent experiences; the glorification of individual effort to overcome all
barriers; the overgeneralization of resistance to what is as a hindrance to enlightenment;
the idea that truth claims for some are truth claims for all; an infatuation
with inner thoughts as the primary driver of the conditions of the world;
and the lack of familiarity with the history, power, necessity and gift of
collective social movements by oppressed peoples.
Over the years, I have danced
with many of these assumptions; sharing and teaching parts of them myself.
I have felt that some huge pieces of the conversation were missing.
I have been shy about saying so and have experienced real personal harm
by questioning dominant narratives. All this in spite of the rallying cry,
offered especially to women, to express one's voice, even when it is difficult
to do so.
Exclusive of a deep understanding
of the real workings of race, class, culture, gender, politics, economics,
history and the structural violence these markers nest inside of, the
aforementioned spiritual assumptions are disassociated and dangerous. The messy
realties of our own relationship to structural power and privilege must come
now to the foreground as the very fate of our country, our shared systems, our
sisters, our brothers, our children, oceans, forests, fishes, breath and our
very own flesh hang over the precipice.
When universal truth claims
remain unexamined, what happens is a kind of disassociation from shared
responsibility for our world and for each other. Perhaps this is what has
caused some good-hearted practitioners to suggest that people who are resisting
the current regime’s policies are erring as spiritual practitioners. Such
people are said to be motivated by hatred, upset, fear, anger and negativity.
We wrongly allow the White House occupant to determine our emotional states.
Our upset is said to worsen matters through the process of “othering” Trump. We
are told that our tone is unkind, unskillful, and unacceptable, regardless of
how vital the message or how sincere the desire to help compassionate people
see their own blind spots. There seems to be little comprehension of the
severe manner in which vulnerable groups are violently and repeatedly “othered”
(deported, beaten, shot, incarcerated, redlined, poisoned, displaced, invaded,
genocided...) or how public policies result in actual material traumas that
operate far beyond the level of thought.
As a person of color unpacking
the dominant assumptions in my community, I have asked a few questions such as:
“what evidence exists for this assertion?”, “who is really being “othered?”, “can
you see the protection of a privileged status inside of that statement?”. I
have tried to make visible the world view in which certain claims sit. In
return I have received deflection, criticism, tone-shaming, silencing and
personal insult from sincere spiritual practitioners.
Upon reflection, I see that I have
touched upon the sociopolitical equivalent of a weak muscle or an
underdeveloped nerve pathway. I have seen that people whose group
identity is not directly under attack do not necessarily share a visceral sense
of vulnerability, relationality, or solidarity that might move them to
immediate protective action on behalf of others. I have wondered if what
I am witnessing is the conferring of inherent goodness onto those who behave as
tyrants as a more comfortable response than standing up to resist them.
These experiences fill me with
powerful and mixed emotions; incredulity, anger, frustration, the desire
to help, the desire to give up, the desire to retreat into my own racial
community, confusion, clarity, and resolve are among them.
I acknowledge that a number of
yogis and meditators, of varying backgrounds, are already socially and
politically engaged in resistance efforts daily and to those folks, I say THANK
YOU and KEEP IT UP! Even when it is uncomfortable
or inconvenient to march, to call, to write, to insist on better policies,
to own your personal or group privilege and use it for the good of others,
please keep it up!
In closing, I know that
compassion is a strong value in practice communities. Therefore, I call
on my fellow practitioners to put that compassion into tangible and material
action, especially for the vulnerable among us. I ask that we take our
warrior poses beyond the mat and into the public sphere, to step beyond
the ME and into the WE.
If we are uncomfortable doing so,
devotion and regular practice over time, like all other aspects of the path,
will develop our confidence, skills, and synergy. Inside of our action for the
collective, each of us as individuals will become serendipitously prone to enhanced
personal healing by focusing on others.
Finally, I implore all
practitioners to take up the task of including race, class, gender, religion,
sexual orientation/identity, ability, national origin, 1st world status and
other social markers as inherent to the practice of Svadhyaya.
We know what we stand for.
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Let’s make it real in this
precious world.
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