Community Care Package
Staying Rooted
By: Marianne Chung
Depending where you are in the country, this may be week 3 or 4 or 5 of our new normal. It’s easy to be anxious and feel uncertain at this moment, so it is important to make time and space to be rooted. I do this by remembering my core values: relationships, respect, beauty, learning, creativity and balance.
This week, I am practicing gratitude for the simple things that connect me to these values and to my sense of purpose. Like finding my new favorite recipe for vegetarian Tom Kha soup. Or connecting with my family and my APIAHF team over video. I feel gratitude each night joining almost 1,000 people in meditation and blessing the earth with more peace, hope, love, unity and healing. I practice gratitude when I walk outside and am able to see spring arriving in Washington, DC.
Gratitude is how I am connecting to my values and my purpose. I hope you are each finding your own ways of celebrating your values and feeling strengthened by them.
Food for the Heart
Last week, in Day By Day, we saw J adjust to working from home. This week, we see this pandemic through her parents’ eyes, as they navigate sheltering-in-place.
In-Language Resources
Our Community Library of over 300 COVID-19 resources in 34 AA and NHPI languages continues to grow. Please share these in-languages resources with your networks: http://bit.ly/AANHPI-COVID19-Resources.
Please continue to submit any in-language materials you find useful through this link, and we’ll add them to the collection: http://bit.ly/ShareCOVID-19Resources.
The Nitty-Gritty- The Tools You Never Knew You Needed
During moments of crisis, leaders like you are pulled to respond to the urgent needs of your respective communities, coworkers and families. With all that’s going on, how do we make space for ourselves to breathe, pause and continue moving forward? Here are a couple of tools we use to stay rooted during difficult moments:
- The Feelings Wheel can help put a specific name to our emotions. The act of naming can help us to process; to be more thoughtful and aware in our actions, behaviors and decisions; and to communicate our needs to others. While printers are hard to come by in our new work- from-home lives, consider keeping the Feelings Wheel open in your browser, as a way to ground yourself throughout the day.
- During moments of uncertainty, reflecting upon our core values can help us find our footing, tap into our inner energy and find confidence in our identity and personal direction. Acknowledge how your contributions to your communities are rooted in your values. Trust in yourself. Find even small ways to align your actions with your values, at work or at home. Share your core values with your team or your family, to reground and reconnect.
Show Your Love
APIAHF, as a proud member of the Protecting Immigrant Families coalition, is fighting to ensure that immigrant families are not left behind in COVID-19 testing, treatment and relief efforts.
Thank you, and please don’t hesitate to reach out to us if you have further thoughts.
Marianne Chung is the Senior Director of Network Innovations at the Asian & Pacific Islander American Health Forum. This is the third issue of the #HFCarePackage series. To get regular emails from this newsletter, please sign up here.
