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  • 🌈#21: A Queer Dharma: Yoga and Meditations for Liberation by Jacoby Ballard - Book Summary & Key Takeaways

🌈#21: A Queer Dharma: Yoga and Meditations for Liberation by Jacoby Ballard - Book Summary & Key Takeaways

Why is acknowledging Trauma a challenge for marginalized people? How can we transform our anger and begin to love ourselves? What is "Calling In" as opposed to calling people out?

Hello courageous people! 👋 Welcome to Edition 21.

This week, we are featuring 📚 A Queer Dharma: Yoga and Meditations for Liberation 🖋 by Jacoby Ballard.

I chose this book because it is Pride Month (every time I hear someone say Pride Month I hear Jonathan Van Ness squealing “Yasss Kween” in my head and it’s glorious) - and it has been insightful, informative and energising to me in so many unexpected ways.

If you are queer person or part of the LGBTQIA+ rainbow - hi and welcome (also, same 🙋‍♀️), I hope you will get a lot out of this summary! And if you are a straight or cis ally - hi and welcome, I think this will provide a huge amount of value to you as well, in addition to giving some more insight into the experience of queer people.❤️🧡💛💚💙💜

So let’s jump in. All text in italics are quotes taken directly from the book.

🦄 What is A Queer Dharma all about?

A Queer Dharma is split into two sections:

  • Part 1: Queer Dharma - Acceptance and Letting Go, Anger, Compassion, Forgiveness, an Invitation to Joy and Loving Ourselves Whole.

  • Part 2: Queering Yoga - about the Cultural Appropriation of Yoga, Capitalism, Teaching Queer & Trans Yoga, Injustice and Healing.

A bug bear of mine every single week continues - that I can’t cover everything! 😩 So most of this summary will focus on the content in Part 1, as much of Part 2 is much more specific to yoga teaching and training - if that is something in your wheelhouse I would highly, highly recommend you to read the final 100 pages of this book if not the whole thing!

🧘‍♂️ Who is the author, Jacoby Ballard and what wisdom does he bring to this topic?

Jacoby Ballard is a social justice educator and yoga teacher. He expresses himself as a trans man and is genderqueer. He says,

“I’m sometimes perceived as a man, sometimes as a butch woman, and sometimes as someone androgynous. I carried and birthed my child but did not nurse him.

Not often seeing myself reflected in mainstream yoga and Buddhism led to my work in the world: creating space for underrepresented people.” - page 3

Jacoby’s perspective shared with us through this book is invaluable - as someone who is so often seen as being on the outer fringes of society he is uniquely positioned to talk about the trauma and pain perpetrated against underrepresented people, and also to the immense healing that is possible. 

Though there are many parts which centre on the practice of yoga, the lessons are far reaching and applicable across many aspects of our lives away from the yoga mat:

“In 2018 I was a pregnant fella, sometimes perceived as a man with a beer gut, attending regular yoga classes and adjusting my practice to care for my body and babe-to-be, not discussing my pregnancy with teachers who I knew couldn’t hold my complexity.

I was fired by a yogic institution in New York for being trans; I continued to practice while refusing to enter a yoga studio for the next five years. I needed to heal. I needed to strengthen.

I would not wish the racism, transphobia, misogyny, ableism, and fatphobia of mainstream yoga on anyone, including myself; my practice and the teachings held and guided me through those harmful moments.” - page 3

Especially the sentence about having to shy away from certain situations or conversations with the knowledge that the other party might not be able to hold our complexity, really resonates for me and I’m sure it will for many of you as well.

The way that for whatever reason, we need to tiptoe, to hide, to be careful. It’s exhausting. 🥱

✋ Why is acknowledging Trauma a challenge for marginalized people?

Trauma is a word that has been used more and more frequently in recent years (including by yours truly), but there is an important distinction we need to make:

“Trauma does not stand in for something that is difficult; something can be difficult and yet not cause trauma. Trauma is something that overwhelms your ability to cope, leaving you feeling helpless, hopeless, and out of control.” - page 177

But there is a problem for marginalized communities even in getting to see and acknowledge their trauma:

“People with privilege receive consistent mirroring—seeing themselves reflected in history books, media, advertising. As Travis Alabanza asks as a queer Black person, “How could I know I could heal, if I had never been shown that people with my identities even experienced trauma?” - page 166

When there is no space or platform for the stories or for the pain, it limits all of our abilities to 1. recognise and 2. heal from trauma.

“We begin to heal ourselves by investigating our wounds. If we go toward the wound, we go toward the wisdom.” - page 41

Examples and stories help us to be able to do that.

“It is important not just that queer and trans people access yoga, meditation, and other healing practices but also that we be held by community leaders who have healed themselves, too. Having a teacher and sangha reflect back to us various aspects of ourselves is as important as the science of the practice itself.” - page 166

Representation 👏 matters 👏.

😯 The upside to experiencing deep pain and trauma

I’ll level with you, if someone said to me three years ago that there was an upside to experiencing trauma, that very statement would have sent me into a fit of uncontrollable rage.

But what I now believe people mean by this notion, isn’t that we should “be grateful for the trauma having happened” (🙄🤢 sometimes people mean well, but they are unskilled with their words) but it is instead the ability to hold and see a deeper range of emotions:

“When I do the work to see my own wounds, fully, along with the shame and guilt that accompany them, it gives me the courage to see others’ pain fully.” - page 36

Jacoby goes on to quote Elizabeth Kübler-Ross,

“The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity, and an understanding of life that fills them with compassion, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen.“ - page 186

Again, I want to reiterate that this doesn’t mean the trauma was “worth it” or any other bizarre notion like that, but recognising that through these experiences we reach depths and an awareness that we may not otherwise have been able to reach.

😡 How can we recognise and use our Anger?

Whenever we have experienced trauma, there is inevitably a vast swathe of anger that comes along with it. If we can learn to slowly process that anger and let it go, we will be all the better for it.

“Thich Nhat Hanh teaches about anger being a ball of fire we intend to hurl at someone else, but in the process our own hands get burned.” - page 21

We can even use anger as a clue:

“Anger is important and wise. We need to feel its seething fires and righteous indignation. We need to be present to our anger, like a screaming young child trying to tell us something.

What does your anger have to tell you? What is it bringing to your attention about what is important to you? What is wrong? Anger deserves attention and requires a patient and enduring witness. And we don’t want to get stuck there.” - page 22

The only way we can deal with our anger is by facing it head on and finding out what is lying underneath it.

There are various Discharge Practices outlined in the book so that we can release our anger in a purposeful way, for example by hitting a boxing bag or yelling at the top of a mountain:

“Discharge allows you to retain the wisdom of the anger that tells you that something is wrong and communicate in a grounded way.” - page 23

If we are able to do that, we can move onto the next phase and realise that through all of this,

“The universe is inviting me to grow, to take the harm I’ve received and, rather than add another drop, transform it into an offering.” - page 34 

🥰 Learning to love ourselves

“Loving ourselves is deep work, and as I teach lovingkindness workshops I find that whether I am teaching in an elite, expensive yoga studio or a maximum security prison, the most difficult work for my students is in offering love and kindness to themselves as individuals, for we have been taught self-hatred in the interest of capitalism.” - page 101

So in our already challenging bid to love ourselves in the face of the various traumas we have experienced, we are served up another blocker in the form of being brainwashed:

“You know when you look in the mirror and you think “oh, I’m so fat, I’m so old, I’m so ugly,” don’t you know, that’s not your authentic self?

That is billions upon billions of dollars of advertising, magazines, movies, billboards, all geared to make you feel shitty about yourself so that you will take your hard-earned money and spend it at the mall on some turn-around creme that doesn’t turn around shit. - Margaret Cho” - page 101-102

All this is to say that if you have had a difficult time in learning to love yourself, 1. You are not alone; and 2. Keep doing the work, whatever that looks like to you.

💆‍♀️ Reframing Self Care as a Non-Negotiable

I don’t know about you, but I’ve been sloooooowly getting better at Self Care over the past couple of years. And it certainly does seem to be becoming more mainstream to see various aspects of Self Care as essential to our wellbeing, but in case you need a refresher (and honestly, same) this section really delivers:

“Daily practices of yoga, meditation, eating well, sleeping at least eight hours each night, and spending time with beloveds are not just things that are “good to do” or that make me “healthy,” but are actually core strategies that ensure my survival. Seane calls these “Non Negotiables.”

They are the practices I need to do each day so that I can do what I am here to do most skilfully and powerfully.” - page 24

So if you’ve been looking for it, permission granted for you to take some much needed time for you. And if taking the time out for you isn’t a compelling enough reason, here is one more that should help:

“As we engage in self-care practices, we are also taking care of the collective body—our partnerships, our families, our communities, our organizations, our projects, and the world.” - page 24

Did you hear that? The literal world. 🌎

🥺 On Leading alongside our flaws and imperfections

A theme throughout this book is that all of us have value to contribute and there are people out there who feel more seen and accepted through our experiences. But how do we lead in the face of fear and uncertainty?

“Seane knows firsthand that when you lead, your flaws, ignorance, and mistakes are more visible. She taught me that when I am unafraid of everything being seen, I am actually safer than if I were to tuck things away and pray that my full humanity will not be witnessed.” - page 71

This is certainly a very different view of leadership than what many people hold, and I absolutely love it. If more people embraced this style of leadership, I think the world would be a much better place.

Someone who truly embodies this is Nikki Myer, the founder of Yoga of 12-Step Recovery. Jacoby comments,

“I was struck by how she introduced herself. Nikki often introduces herself in this way—telling the whole story, not just the glittery, shiny parts. She maintains the same tone throughout, conveying respect and acceptance for each part of her path, as tangled as it has been. She says,

It has been a big journey to reintegrate all parts of myself—to accept without judgment all the various experiences that make up my whole—and come to radical self-acceptance. I’m a drug addict. I’m an alcoholic. I’m a codependent. I’m the survivor of both childhood and adult sexual trauma. I’m a love addict. I’m a recovering compulsive spender. I’m a yoga therapist. I’m a Somatic Experiencing practitioner. I’m the founder of Y12SR. I am the mother of two living children and one deceased child. I’m the grandmother of five. All of this is true, and I say that with gratitude and grace. I’ve discovered that if I exalt one part of myself and diminish another, I create a separation that becomes a war inside me, and that’s the antithesis of yoga.” - page 70

What if we were able to show up with all of the parts of ourselves, with everything that that means, in all aspects of our lives?

🤯 🤯 🤯

This open, honest, transparency creates the foundation for another incredibly important layer: our ability to take feedback. Something that is referred to in the book as “Calling In”.

🧐 What is “Calling In” as opposed to Calling Out?

This is best described by the below anecdote. The background to this story is that Seane Corn was someone who Jacoby was originally very sceptical and suspicious of, but slowly got to know her over a number of years:

“As Seane was working on her submission for Yoga and Body Image, she asked if I could tear it to shreds, to be her harshest critic. This was an honor for me, to contribute to a draft of Seane’s submission and utilize my activist critique, examining whose experience is centered and who is excluded or disregarded.

This moment was built upon other trust-building moments, as I had come to trust Seane and understand that she was on my side, that she understood my experience in the world and supported my work.

In this moment, she taught me a wonderful lesson about befriending your “enemies”—that part of me that could hurt her and be overly critical could be useful to her if she drew me in, built relationship, and didn’t shame that part of me.” - page 111

If we keep those who are different to us at an arm’s length and judge them for their decisions, we are not truly contributing to building a loving community and transforming the harmful parts of our society.

“In response to callout culture, many important thinkers have proposed “calling in,” done from a place of love, refusing to give up on one another amid mistakes, and collectively living into deep transformation and, ultimately, liberation.

Loretta Ross describes it thus: “Calling-in is simply a call-out done with love.”

“Call-ins are agreements between people who work together to consciously help each other expand their perspectives,” says Loretta Ross. “They encourage us to recognize our requirements for growth, to admit our mistakes and to commit to doing better. Calling in cannot minimize harm and trauma already inflicted, but it can get to the root of why the injury occurred, and it can stop it from happening again.” - page 203

In a world where we are (I think often naively) working towards a perfect utopia in which noone ever gets hurt, this seems like an answer which is actually doable and can help us progress towards a world where there is at least, much less harm inflicted on those around us through prioritising these types of conversations.

How can we keep progressing towards effecting this change? 

I would be remiss if I did not close out this summary with a further prompt towards the practice of yoga and all that it encapsulates:

“My practice allows me to ground, to find strength, to weep, to rage, to grieve, and then to engage.” - page 182

So there we have it, some deep food for thought for us all on Anger, Self Care, Leadership and Love. Happy Pride Month to each and every single one of you!

Stay happy and stay safe.

Until next week,Eleanor ❤️🙏

🧠 Resources & Links

🖥 Jacoby Ballard’s Website including class timetables for VIRTUAL: (hallelujah)

📸 Follow Jacoby Ballard on Instagram - 3k followers

🖥 Mirror Memoirs - an oral history project centering the narratives, healing and leadership of LGBTQ survivors of color in the movement to end child sexual abuse

📕 Next week’s book

Coming out next Friday 24th June 2022 is #22:📚 The Art Of Gathering: How We Meet and Why It Matters🖋 by Priya Parker

So much of healing work is to do with reconnection. This book helps us to understand how we can connect with the people around us more deeply, and I’m very excited to read it.