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PSA: There Is No Substitute for Doing the Work
Even ‘The Revolution’ won’t set you free if you don’t learn how to heal.
Let me say it louder for the folks in the back: there is nothing we can win, achieve, oust, destroy or accomplish that will replace the need to work on ourselves. No matter what external structures or systems may be causing us pain, no matter how bad the world is, there is nothing we can do to it that will magically erase the need to work on healing ourselves.
I often joke that I won’t date radical men anymore because they think all of their problems are caused by capitalism. Like most jokes, it’s rooted in truth: there’s a trend I’ve noticed, especially among community organizers and activists, of noticing how badly systems of capitalism, colonialism, racism, patriarchy and so on have corrupted our lives and infected our thinking.
Once this has been recognized, a (perfectly reasonable, but misguided) belief often arises that capitalism and the other -isms are the only causes of our suffering. This perspective imagines that doing away with capitalism, colonialism and so on will eradicate our pain, without us having to pay any attention to the role we play in creating and perpetuating our own suffering.
