Be authentic about where you are and know you are not alone. Take the next intentional clear, and bold step. Make it attainable, make it clear, and communicate it loudly. Then, you can customize your response and commitments from there. This requires a lot of intentional work. Remember, this Black Lives Matter response letter is not the work; the letter is just a statement.

Earlier this week I had the opportunity to be interviewed by Josh Landes at WAMC on my perspective as a leader on the justice and equity work that’s happening right now on multiple levels. For example, this week we had a racist incident happen again just south of where I live in Berkshire County, Mass. A 10th grader put up a meme that was titled “10 little n-words” on Instagram two days ago. I was asked for a response. I was also invited to share my thoughts on the recent student-led protest in my hometown of Great Barrington. 1,000 people showed up, which is significant given that Great Barrington’s population is just around 6,000-7,000. I was also asked to respond to the uprisings across the country and next steps with law enforcement and the call to defund the police. I spoke with WAMC as a Black woman from where I am in the work personally and about what BRIDGE’s experience has been.

Earlier this week, I spoke with both WGBY and Berkshire Bank for an in-depth discussion about the killing of George Floyd, the protests that have erupted across the country, what can be done to create change, and how to take care of our communities right now. Here is a summary of what we discussed in both conversations. Please share this resource.

Since its founding in 1980 the Schumacher Center for a New Economics has been an advocate for community land trusts as a way to create more equitable access to land. The board of directors queried staff as to how the community land trust model could be applied to the issue of reparations. This guest post from Staff at The Schumacher Center for a New Economics is a summary of that thinking.

In fall 2019, before arts productions moved online, WAM Theatre co-produced Dominique Morisseau's award-winning play Pipeline with The Nora at Central Square Theater. First presented at Shakespeare & Company in Lenox, Mass., the production has been nominated for two Elliot Norton Awards. This show was also an intentional effort to prioritize cultural competence and equity for cast members and audiences from the start. With Pipeline, BRIDGE and WAM worked to make sure that the cast would be embraced with care and respect. Read about this unique collaboration.

Hello dear friends. Thank you for asking me where to give. Strategically, here are my best suggestions.

We’re inviting people to be inspired and to be held accountable to the work that needs to get done. I've also been talking with people about showing up to these Labs not only with clarity about work that needs to get done, but outcomes they hope to see. So the invitation is just to bring your full self to the table and have a conversation. Come co-create plans and collaborations that will support change. The invitation is, “Let's work together to not go back to things the way they were because nothing is holding us all the way we need to be held.” I just had a conversation with one of our speakers reiterating that everybody is a leader! I want leaders of foundations working alongside community organizers and recent college graduates. I want everybody sitting alongside each other.

This week! I am thrilled to announce the launch of BRIDGE’s New Pathways series of talks and action-focused labs intended to seed an equitable and resilient future based on justice, healing, and transformation! We are sharing these short and accessible talks (produced by BRIDGE with Outpost Studios) with local and national leaders to support new forms of leadership and organizing during and post COVID-19. Topics include new ways to think about diversity, equity and inclusion, healthcare, financial health and literacy, resilience, mindfulness, belonging and more. My hope that this series will serve as both an oxygen mask during these challenging times as well as an opportunity to create new pathways in our hearts, brains, and (thereby) our work.

As we rise to the occasion with this current set of challenges and build responsive, effective structures to support all of our communities, the time is now to create and fully embody a culturally responsive and responsible way of operating. We must embrace the challenge to serve ALL people well. Let’s lean in hard to create a better future, a new and better “order.” Everything that we do now will set us up for the new ways we will live in community and operate together.

In the coming weeks, I ask you to intentionally extend your circles, listen deeply to those who have been living this horror before and after COVID-19, and roll up your sleeves because the call for structural transformation is here. The call to differentiate between harm and threat of harm is imperative. Human beings, our communities, and our shared health (not only wealth!) are taking center stage. The societal transformation we are starting to witness around the globe and engage with at home has already established for us that we have the capacity to change and change radically when we commit to making way for the common good.

Some see it as a time of apocalypse. It is. If you understand that the true meaning of the word is "the dropping of the veils," the great revelation. A time when the shadows rise up from the dark depths, ready to be witnessed.

The arts create space for community. They take us away from the idea of the individual toward a shared sense of community, responsibility, and understanding, which helps shape our society. One thing I’ve been thinking about is that the role of the arts depends on the intention of how the art is created and who’s engaging with it. Because we’ve also seen that the arts can be used negatively. So the role of the arts in equity and justice work, if we boil it down, I think is to build community, shape society, and build understanding through an experiential space.

Seeing these women was the best medicine and affirmation. Hearing their perspectives and advice gave me such hope and motivation. They discussed their challenges, wins, and goals for working within the systems and structures that govern our country. They used the same language of equity, inclusion, and liberation that I use in my own work… Listening to these Congresswomen speak about how they take their analysis and activism right with them into their respective committees proves to me that we are ready for the new American Dream of liberation and equity. 

I encourage brave conversations in which we can all lean into our discomfort and conflict in dialogue and radical candor with each other. I believe this is what allows cultures and dynamics with an improved positive social impact to evolve. This approach invites more authenticity and empathy from others. From an embodied leadership perspective, centering on authenticity and empathy almost always leads to better work no matter where we find ourselves leading as women.

I realize now after over a decade of steady work that what I want to do is create a Reparations movement for people and their families at all ages and stages of awareness and growth. And I need your help. I want every human to embrace their accountability to one another in the form of their embodied love in action. I believe that reparations (i.e. active gestures of love, repair, and care) will lead to healing the harm caused by racism, sexism, and the impact of capitalism.

View tweets from my #PracticingEquity Twitter chat on poverty and privilege here and please plan to join me for our next Twitter chat January 8th at 4pm ET.

As a consultant on equity and inclusion for nonprofits and corporations and in trainings on cultural competency through BRIDGE, I often refer to Dr. Ruby Payne’s work as a tool to unpack gender identity and race bias associated with the eighth form of poverty and/or resources, what Dr. Payne calls “hidden rules” within not just groups, but systems of oppression.