Never Give Up

Hey y’all! What a time it’s been. I decided to let the larger community and friends of Therapy with Treah know what’s going on, so I started a blog! Welcome. I’m nervous about my writing and an anxious perfectionist, so please accept this very imperfect blog as an offering to vulnerability. I want to start with an introduction to one of my favorite things: ART! I love all kinds of art; visual art, street art, gallery art, kid art, homemade art, 2D and 3D art, and especially weird art. The picture on this blog of the “Never Give Up” mural was taken by me, many many years ago when I lived in Kirkwood after moving back to Atlanta from getting my Master’s degree in NJ. Sadly this beautiful mural, created in 2012 by @emedemati, has been painted over, but it lives on in my heart, a kind of mental testament to who I want to be and who I believe I am. The letters of the words “Never Give Up” as you see them are made up of tiny red and blue Xs and Os, painted next to each other, over and over on the white background. I have never felt connected to a piece of art the way I did this mural. I love Ellsworth Kelly’s Red White from 1962 but that’s a gallery piece held in the permanent collection of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. The mural encompasses the transitory nature of street art which is a better analogy for love than any gallery piece held in storage, in low humidity, in the right lighting, saved, protected and as perfect as possible for the duration of all time. Art on the street is hammered by nature, the sun, the wind, and life is happening all around it, all the time. That’s an analogy for life and love if I’ve ever seen one. This particular piece combines my love of LOVE with my fundamental belief in never giving up, not backing down and holding on to and claiming every shred of joy, every morsel of comfort, every moment of connection one can get from life because life is hard. It’s a beautiful representation of not giving in to the darkness that’s always lurking around the corner and at the edges of our own hearts and in the outside world. I often see tenacity and stick-to-it-ness characterized in the media and entertainment by an “I’ll sleep when I’m dead” kind of hustle mentality that often comes across as so hard and so lacking in tenderness. I respect the hustle, I really do, but there’s so little humanity and connection involved and we are boiled down to our capacity to produce, compete and WIN as equated with our very worthiness. I reject that! In the places and spaces when love and connection are prioritized it’s all soft pink haze (a wonderful oft hated lovely color, the color of my website), it’s all clouds and defenselessness and vulnerability which is so often seen as weak and lacking. But the real strength, the real work is in holding the softness and the fear and the courage and staying soft. The only way I’ve survived my life, my work, this world is by combining my deep love and deep vulnerability with this aspect of “never giving up.” I was thrilled to see it in artistic vision on a huge tunnel wall in my old neighborhood. But like so much, I had to let the mural go and remember the many times I drove and walked by it on the way to work or play, participating in my life. Like so many other relationships, events, times, objects it only exists in my memory and I hold it softly in a place close to my heart, one of the hardest working muscles in the human body. Like the oracle Cardi B says, “Look myself in the mirror, I say we gon' win/Knock me down nine times but I get up ten.” A daily reminder that I am grounded by and based in love and compassion always and I hope you are too.

Is art a source of joy and replenishment for you? Do you like street art? Gallery art? Performance art? Both? Wherever you go to look at art, go check some out soon! There are numerous studies that show the positive physical and emotional benefits of looking at art. It releases dopamine (feel good, calm down) into our blood, can increase critical thinking skills and lower feelings of depression and anxiety.

ETA: I’ve been thinking about the ending of this blog and come to the conclusion that it was unclear and steeped in white supremacy. White women especially have a long history of silencing marginalized communities, especially Black and Indigenous people, by using words like “love/peace/kindness/compassion” to shut down necessary critique and call outs from people of color about racist behaviors, language and microaggressions. I am grounded by and based in love and compassion for myself and I believe in Beloved Community. What groundedness looks like behaviorally on different days and in different situations is different for different people, sometimes it's gentle and sometimes it comes with the power of rushing water! And that’s what I want for you, especially if you are a person who holds even just one of these identities: queer, trans, Black, Indigenous, people of color (QTBIPOC), disabled, femme, low-income, survivors, and all other oppressed people. (language from the Anti-racist Education Working Group) I am queer, disabled, femme and a survivor but I also hold race privilege and some class privilege (my disability prevents me from working full-time but I do have a graduate degree) So when I say I want groundedness and love/compassion as your starting point, that means considering love and compassion for yourself in prioritizing your OWN wellbeing over that of what others/the system/people in positions of power want for you. That may mean for example, getting a good night’s sleep and eating a good breakfast so you can go and disrupt some sh*t and block a highway or go to a coordinated direct action protest. Other times being grounded by and based in love and compassion looks like staying in bed and sleeping because your body and your spirit needs the emotional and physical rest the comfort of a safe nest provides. I am NOT inviting anyone to prioritize love and compassion over the safety of oppressed people or to use love and compassion as language to silence others.

*(also something else I’ve been thinking about, does ethical consumption even really exist for anyone other than the financially privileged? does it exist at all? that’s a conversation for another time, maybe another blog topic) If you have any thoughts or feedback about this topic, or anything else, don’t hesitate to reach out to me at TreahLPC@pm.me!