How do we embody gentleness while we speak the truth?
When Conversations Can Trigger
The highlight of my week was sitting down with the Civic Power Fund and #BAMEOnline to discuss the powerful question: can the revolution be funded? We were joined by experienced organisers including Zain Hafeez and Charlotte Fischer.
We moved through tricky topics including the complexity of our society’s current funding system being built on routes centered in 19th-century philanthropists who very much worked in a way of helping the deserving poor rather than shifting power. Whilst there is of course a time and a place for this, it has meant that our wider dominant funding system today is built so that service charities need people to be needy in order to continue their work. This is the arena that grassroots organisers enter when applying for funding. It means the work is not really owned by the people it is claimed to be owned by. Communities are accountable to their funder. It limits their ability to be radical and ultimately disempowers them.
Take a look at this article by Eliza Baring who talks about revolutionising the funding system by reconfiguring the relationship between Civil Society and the State: Reconfiguring the relationship between Civil Society and the State to achieve transformative change
I had two key takeaways from this conversation:
1. To read ‘What White People Can Do Next’ by author and broadcaster Emma Dabiri. I’m not usually a reader but I’m keen to get stuck into this.
2. I feel a calling to host our own Connecting For Good online conversation exploring similar topics in ways they have manifested for us. Watch this space!
When Time is Running Out
Speaking of funding, we joined together with our partners Rethink and Coventry and Warwickshire Partnership Trust for a review of the year ahead and acknowledgment of the final year of remaining funding. A reminder of funding being finite is fair to say it can feel disheartening and pressurising to achieve what our communities need in a limited capacity. We held a really open, honest and positive space to explore winnable and worthwhile achievements in this next year. What would be our newspaper headline this time next year? (FYI this is a brilliant question to pitch to your team as a dreaming-up exercise to get your creative juices flowing). This helped us to move into a mindset of legacy thinking and sustainable growth. We want our work to shift power to communities who know the solutions so that they have the tools to keep this change ever-moving and growing.
When Your Soul Is On Empty
A ‘bad’ week is a strong word. I prefer ebb. Life is full of ebbs and flows, and this week the universe sent me an ebb in my personal life. I had a lot to balance and I knew I needed to give myself the space to move through this with love and kindness. At work I noticed myself distracted and people asking if I was okay. I am lucky to be gifted with a bubbly and optimistic nature but on this day that just wasn’t shining through. I knew that the right thing to do was to listen to my body. I work within a team who prioritise collective care- the idea that each individual’s care is the responsibility of the collective. My team held me by moving my afternoon meeting to later in the week and encouraging me to go home and do something nice for myself. I really did need this. I went for a long walk with my dogs as the the sun was setting. It was just the 3 of us on the field with a bright orange setting sun. Afterward I made dinner for me and mum from scratch. Cooking from scratch is an act of self-love for me. It totally reset me and gave my heart the space to breathe and rest. I came back to work the next day with energy and readiness to seize the moment. I do wonder what would have happened if I didn’t listen to my body and I pushed through, or if I didn’t have a team who cared for me in this way. An individual’s care is the responsibility of the whole team. Lifting up our allies at Act Build Change for sharing this wisdom. I noticed how this came into fruition for me this week.
