Once a Settler, Always a Settler

You could say “settler,” or you could say “foreigner.” Or you could say “outsider,” or you could say “alien.” As an obviously Asian person in Detroit, I am in the most extreme racial minority of this city.

The nature of the Black community in general has been to welcome other marginalized folks into the fold. My experience has been that, once I demonstrated that I sought to be part of the solution and not part of the problem, I earned my solidarity stripes and was welcomed with open arms. Once my Black neighbors and colleagues could see that I was not there to extract, colonize, exploit, or dominate, but rather to be part of the fabric of community, they treated me as comrade and kin. As an Asian in Milwaukee and Detroit, I have been welcomed into many Black spaces, and many wonderful relationships.

The Black community gave me a grounding I never received in the white communities I was surrounded by, once my family left our homeland of Korea, and the Asian enclave of Hawai’i. Like many middle class immigrants, my parents were coached to select white suburbs to raise their kids. White communities welcomed me too. But on an unspoken basis of: you must help us enact our agenda.

What agenda? some might ask. The unspoken agenda of white supremacy, domination, and empire. I never heard these words, of course, and only well into my adulthood, after I’d married into the white community, and given birth to three children, was I able to put into words what I had discerned unconsciously. I was welcomed as an Asian in white society as long as I served as a wedge between white and Black, and helped to keep other Black and Brown folks at the bottom of the hierarchy, by assimilating into whiteness. The message from white society was, you’re different. You’re like us. Come on in, but close the door behind you.

The message from Black and Brown communities was, lean in with us, and help us get this door open! Or, let’s build another door to a better place together, or let’s work to get back what was taken away from us. Or simply, let’s tap into the inherent joy and celebration that is our birthright. Once I started to decolonize my mind and body, these projects as a way of life appealed to me far more than supporting the status quo of a racist society.

Yet, on some deep human level, I will still be othered, by white and Black communities alike. I will still be seen as a consummate outsider.

As I prepare to relocate to Hawai’i, where I was raised until my teens, I am once again feeling the discomfort of the settler, because I am not native Hawaiian. Meanwhile, East Asians comprise the ruling class, and many have enacted the agenda of white supremacy. White folks, haoles, comprise a minority in Hawai’i, but still represent much of the wealth, power, and leadership. Hawai’i is one of the most militarized and colonized places on earth. So what business do I have moving there?

Once a settler, always a settler. My homeland was decimated and torn asunder by American empire. My father came to Hawai’i in an effort to provide a better life for himself and his family. In the process, my brothers and I lost touch with our indigeneity and mother tongue, and assimilated into America.

Where is home now? In Korea, I am gyopo, a foreign Korean. My Korean is bumbling and childlike, and my ragtag clothes, tattoo, and long gray hair mark me as an obvious outsider. In Korea, I am perceived as American, and I come bearing my privilege, granted by the empire.

In Detroit, I remain a perpetual outsider. I am “the Chinese lady,” “that Asian woman,” and more. Last night I walked into a memorial celebration for a childhood friend of Baba Baxter Jones, the disabled elder I help care for. As usual, I was the only Asian person in the room, and the only non-Black person. In such a situation, I am typically overlooked, ignored, and treated as a servant, as most caregivers are: we become invisible. But in my case, I become more visible, and possibly suspect, because of my unusual appearance.

At this event, I was actually told by the hostess, the widow of Baba’s friend, to stop going up to the buffet. I had already gone up 4-5 times, because they only had three items that met Baba’s dietary needs, they were serving on small plates only, and I was trying to feed two people. I felt immediately confused and shamed, like a child, and was speechless. There were a hundred or more friends and family in attendance. Had someone complained about me? That Asian lady has gone up 4 times….

I had forgotten how much I stand out at such events. I was seen as an outsider. As a settler. In addition, caregiving, and the needs of people with disabilities, remains unseen and unacknowledged. The accommodation of allowing a caregiver to take multiple trips to the buffet  to feed a PWD was not understood. In a city like Detroit where so much has been stolen: land, labor, water, and more….I was perceived as another taker.

I am a settler in Detroit. I will be a settler in Hawai’i. I am a settler everywhere I go. Wherever I go, I will be occupying stolen land.

The best I can do is try to be one of the “good” settlers, like Grace Lee Boggs, who came to join the labor movement, and lived in Detroit for 60+ years, rooted on Field Street, organizing, writing, teaching, and learning, instead of myriad other settlers who came to build their fame and fortune, by buying up swaths of cheap land, making sweetheart deals with city government, and extracting knowledge, labor, and other resources from multi-generation Detroiters.

What will it mean to be a good settler in Hawai’i? Is it even possible? I take seriously the words of Haunani-Kay Trask, who points out that Hawaiians are not Americans. Americans appropriated and colonized the islands by military force. Americans are the enemy, and from the Hawaiian sovereignty perspective, are not welcome on the islands.

In every yoga class I teach, I have been offering a land acknowledgment, always closing with “We commit ourselves to coming into right relationship with the land, its people, and its spirits.” How do I make this meaningful, and not trite or rote? I embrace the overall commitment of the yogi to sovereignty, and see the practice as one that trains us to take charge of our own lives, exercise agency, and liberate ourselves, while supporting others in their own sovereignty and liberation.

I must surrender to the land and its people and spirits, including my two grandchildren. I must be a steward and a servant. At the same time, in Hawai’i, I must also challenge and dismantle the privilege of being East Asian. What will these commitments look like? What will they consist of? Caught in capitalist society, I must also make my own living. How will I do this in ways that support sovereignty and not empire?

I remain troubled. I have no choice but to embrace the contradictions I cannot escape. The same way that, if I wish to stay alive, I must ingest the life force of a plant or animal, I must also grapple with the issues of land, place, and settler colonialism everywhere I go. I hope you will be troubled alongside me. How do you practice right relationship with the land you are on, its people, and its spirits?

A Sigh of Relief: Teaching a BIPOC Yoga Class

As a person of color in America, I am habituated to doing an unconscious audit of each room I enter. How many Black and brown faces do I see? How many people who look like me, an Asian? I habitually read the room to gauge my level of probable safety in that setting.

All too often I am The Only One: the only person of color, and/or the only Asian person. This happens in many settings, and alerts me to be on guard, and to expect microaggressions. How much I am on guard may depend on the degree of familiarity with the others present, whether there are strong, consistent allies present or not, the reason for our gathering, etc.

BIPOC often end up The Only One, or vastly outnumbered in Iyengar Yoga classrooms. The BIPOC who do show up are often the ones who have assimilated into white dominant culture, whether by choice, by necessity, or by default. I have routinely experienced racial aggression in these settings, both from members of the white dominant culture, and sometimes by BIPOC who may feel pressured to conform or remain silent.

The nature of racial aggressions, whether micro or macro, is such that the casual observer may notice nothing out of step. But those of us who have heard or observed these things many, many times are extra sensitized and on high alert. Here are some examples of racial or other aggressions from Iyengar Yoga classrooms:

• A white teacher touches or strokes the hair of a Black student without invitation or consent.
  

• A white teacher displays “fawning” or tokenizing tendencies toward students coming from underrepresented communities, giving undue attention and compliments. 
  

• During class, we hear two presumably Black people in a heated exchange outside. One white student offers to call the police.
  

• A white teacher repeatedly corrects a Black student’s buttock actions, implying that their body is not “good” or “right.”
  

• White students feel free to frequently interject, ask questions, and centralize themselves and their experiences.
  

• When George Floyd is murdered, your teacher says nothing about it at all. When a student asks for their counsel about it, they give a bland, canned response, indicating they had not prepared any kind of thoughtful response, despite their status as respected spiritual leaders in the community.
  

• Teachers hold colleagues, students, apprentices, and mentees to expectations based on access to expendable funds, childcare, transportation, and other factors that may not be realistic.
  

• When you point out such examples to organizational leadership they respond with incredulity and denial.
  

For all these reasons, a BIPOC class may be welcomed by many practitioners. It’s one place where folks of color can be that much more relaxed. Already, āsana requires us to do difficult things that may be quite uncomfortable, new, or make us feel vulnerable and awkward. Already we may feel we have had to be polite, well-spoken, and obedient in white dominant culture. When we remove as many of the potential barriers as we can, we can be more present, with more ease.

I have been teaching BIPOC-only classes with great joy since the mid-2000s. Here are some things I’ve learned.

• Excellent āsana instruction is not enough. Students who choose a BIPOC class often seek other kinds of support, guidance, and a sense of community from the teacher and other students.
  

• Take a few minutes to help students down-regulate their nervous systems when they arrive. BIPOC have greater exposure to potential harm on a day-to-day basis than their white counterparts. It may take some time in Supta Baddha Koṇāsana, Supta Swastikāsana, or Supta Vīrāsana to finally relax.
  

• Allow for some chitchat in the first 5-10 minutes. Take time for introductions and check-ins if the class is small enough. White supremacy emphasizes timeliness and productivity. An anti-racist yoga space understands that productivity cannot necessarily be quantified, and that there are many ways to be productive.
  

• Consider incorporating a land acknowledgement at the beginning of class, to help students contextualize themselves in the karmic interweaving of our larger time and place. If we are not native to our land, we arrived as captives, refugees, or settlers. Whatever brought us to this place, we hope to evolve into right relationship with the people and spirits of the land. Take your time to develop your own ways and words of acknowledging the land. I like to tie it into the invocation to Patañjali, and talk about the lineage of teachings.*
  

• Take time to explain why you are choosing certain poses, sequences, and set-ups, and what they have to do with being BIPOC. For instance, in Supta Baddha Koṇāsana, you could talk about how we often feel we need to protect or defend ourselves because of the racism we encounter or anticipate, and how expanding the heart/lung region and groins is an opportunity to let down our defenses and nurture ourselves. When practicing arm balances, you could discuss how empowered we feel when we can bear weight on our hands, as a reminder of our inner fortitude.
  

• Put less emphasis on textbook execution of the poses, and more on the physical, emotional, and mental impact. Help students by offering individualized instructions (otherwise known as “corrections”) to promote well-being rather than correctness. For example, teach them how to straighten the front leg in Trikoṇāsana so that they can access the full length of the spine and protect the knee from hyperextension.
  

• Feel free to reference current events, and how they relate to the practice of yoga. Connect the personal practice to collective liberation. For instance, we’ve discussed the current Covid-19 crisis in India, and talked about the reluctance of wealthy nations to share vaccines and technology, which is connected to the history of colonization. We’ve also discussed how our teachers are in India, and how much we all owe BKS Iyengar and his family, and when we do not give back to them in some form, that is appropriation.
  

• Feel free to share poetry, music, prayers, quotes, and other sources of inspiration, and invite students to do the same.
  

• Offer a flexible payment structure as an alternative to the capitalist habits which undergird systemic racism. Our economy has been built on exploitation of BIPOC. Allowing students to determine what they can pay through a sliding scale model teaches them how to practice financial sovereignty. Students take responsibility for both their own learning and their desire to support BIPOC teachers. Seek sponsors for the BIPOC class to lessen the financial burden—reparations!
  

• Offer more opportunities to build BIPOC Iyengar Yoga community, such as book discussion groups, celebrations, potlucks, panel discussions, etc. They can be low-key, and community-led, so responsibility is shared. For instance, a member of our community asked to start a donation-based BIPOC reading group for Resmaa Menakem’s My Grandmother’s Hands. Since we already practice Iyengar Yoga as a form of “cultural somatics,” we gladly welcomed this offer.
  

• Ask your white colleagues to do parallel anti-racist work among themselves. At Iyengar Yoga Detroit Collective, white teachers and students formed Ahimsa in Action, which meets twice a month to do anti-racist work together, and support each other in dismantling generations of white supremacy. Iyengar Yoga provides the perfect backdrop for this work, because we already have a common vocabulary, ethical philosophical foundation, and a somatic practice.
  

Every participant releases a big sigh when they enter a BIPOC-only space. We feel less guarded, and more welcome. Hopefully, we extend that sense of ease into other parts of our lives, so that we can help our society and culture evolve toward the beloved, equitable community we all seek.

*Here is a sample land acknowledgement and invocation to Patañjali, but each person will do it differently, and vary it each time:
As you feel the earth beneath you, acknowledge the beings of this land, human and non-human, past, present, and future. Here in ______, we honor the ________ people. Whatever brought us to this land, we commit to coming into right relationship with this land, its spirits, and its people. We also commit ourselves to coming into right relationship with the lineage of yoga, passed on through generations, as we acknowledge our teachers, and chant the invocation to sage Patañjali.

More reading:
Yellow, Black, Brown, and Beautiful  

It is Time

HOW TO TAKE DOWN A DISABLED BLACK ELDER: VIDEO DOCUMENTATION

 

https://www.facebook.com/OneMichigan/videos/719453185507150

 

The allegation of sexual assault being used to discredit Baba Baxter Jones is captured in this Facebook video. Read my detailed commentary posted with the video on the Facebook link. Here are the key points:

• The assault is announced at 2:10, loudly and publicly. The person yelling is wearing a white visor, seems agitated, and is looking over her left shoulder. The assault apparently happened seconds ago ("That man just grabbed my ass..."). 
  

• Watch the video from about 1:58, pausing every second to view each frame. Pause at 2:01, when this person is 6-10 feet to the right of Baba Baxter. 
• Note the movement and pace of the march, set by the chants and drums. 
• To drive the chair, Baba's (dominant) right hand must stay on the joystick. To move his hand off the stick would STOP THE CHAIR. It would also require that those behind him stop, while everyone else kept walking. Power wheelchairs to do not have "cruise control" or "auto-pilot." The wheelchair user's hand must be on the joystick at all times to drive it.
  
•  At 2:05, see this person walking forward diagonally to her right to report the assault.
  

•  The march was paused from 1:13-1:30 to let marchers consolidate. The person making the allegation is standing behind the DWB sign, with Baba about 15-20' back (1:13).
• As the march restarts at 1:30, Baba's right hand remains on his chair for the remainder of the video.

In conclusion, as a survivor of sexual assault, I support and believe other survivors. If the person in the video claims harm, it needs to be investigated, and the harming party held accountable. In this case, it's physically impossible for Baba Baxter to have committed assault as alleged, while driving his chair. Meanwhile, the actual perpetrator has not been held accountable.

HOW TO TAKE DOWN A DISABLED BLACK ELDER

Just how do you take down a disabled, Black, community elder activist? Read on.

June 29, 2020

It was the height of the Black Lives Matter protests. I was at home, for a respite from the urgency of the daily protests, when I received an alarming text from a friend: “Seems ______ is saying baba baxter touched one of "her youth" inappropriately at the march. Just look out. She actively, consistently targets activists. And I dunno what happened but I would expect a shit show.”

I had just come home from the rally with Baba Baxter Jones to protest the recent police aggression against marchers in Southwest Detroit. I’d been attending marches for several weeks by now, and had come to see the young protesters like my own children.  The night before, the police had responded with such violence that protesters could’ve easily been killed. As a survivor of multiple incidents of racist police brutality, Baba Baxter felt passionate about these marches and attended as frequently as possible. I participated with him once or twice a week, and other nights we asked allies, friends, and advocates to accompany him.

A little later I went to pick Baba up from the march. Several march organizers waited with him, to help load him and his power wheelchair into the truck and trailer. He seemed confused and shaken up, and I told him about the heads-up text I received from our friend. “What happened?” I asked.

Baba said, “I don’t know, it was really strange. This big guy came up to me during the march and he was trying to talk to me. I was distracted because we were chanting and yelling, and I was trying to steer the chair through the crowd. I couldn’t really hear him, but he said something like, ‘I know what you did back there.’ I didn’t know what he was talking about, and then he walked away.”

When we got home, we started to piece together the situation:

• A youth* claimed Baba had touched her inappropriately. This was in the midst of a crowded street march, with hundreds of people around, with Baba flanked by organizers, while he was trying to navigate his power chair.
• For some reason, Baba was being targeted as the perpetrator. The man who came up to him was an organizer with the group, One Michigan, that hosted the youth.
• The allegation had already begun circulating through the community.

I contacted some of the march organizers by text to warn them of the allegation. Several responded right away:

• “that’s insane - here for baba 100%!”
• “People have troubling personalities that need energy work. Sorry this must be stressful AF. We don’t believe that of Baba ofc. Love to you and Baba.”
• “I was next to baba the whole time I didn’t see him touch nobody inappropriately”

As of that night we did not even know exactly what was alleged. What kind of touch? When and where did it occur? Who was touched on what body part? Why did they think it was Baba? Who witnessed it?

The likelihood of the allegation struck me as nearly impossible for many reasons:

• We’re in a pandemic, Baba is immuno-compromised, and strict about spatial distancing. No hugs, only elbow bumps, masked, no physical contact.
• He’s acculturated march organizers to have wheelchairs in the front line as an accommodation for disability. It’s extremely difficult and stressful to navigate a wheelchair through a crowd, and nothing’s worse than getting bumped from behind by a wheelchair. For safety and practicality, it’s best to put wheelchairs in the front of the march.
• Because he is always in the front line, he is flanked by organizers leading the march. On the night of the 29th, One Michigan stepped in front of DWB for one section of the march.
• The power wheelchair makes Baba highly visible and impossible to hide, sneak around, or do anything illicit.
• Baba has a spinal cord injury and nerve damage in his arms and hands. He can only reach out so far towards people around him. He maintains a space bubble around the chair. With his right, dominant hand he must steer the chair continuously. His right hand cannot ever leave the joystick while moving. His left hand can only reach so far, especially while he is in motion. The likelihood of touching someone, anyone, in any way, while driving the chair, in the midst of a crowded march, with his left hand, seems nearly impossible. Those who’ve never used a power chair should try this out themselves, while imagining they have a spinal cord injury and nerve damage that restricts both lower and upper body movement. Someone would’ve had to be practically leaning on his chair to even be accidentally brushed by his elbow, and this was unlikely at the height of a pandemic.
• If such a touch occurred, wouldn’t there have been witnesses? Hundreds of people were marching, and Baba was smack in the middle of the street, surrounded on all sides by marchers.

So many other questions arose: Why did the youth think Baba touched them? Why didn’t the adults in charge discuss the allegation with Baba, aside from the brief, threatening, non-specific reference from the man who came up to him? Who else at the march that night knew about the allegation? Did anyone investigate the situation that night, to get to the bottom of it, and clarify exactly what happened?

To me, it felt like there was clearly a misunderstanding of some sort, and that the youth may have been confused about exactly what happened. After all, it was a hot night, a tense situation, and a loud, shouting crowd of folks from disparate groups and identities moving through the streets. Trauma confuses our senses and perceptions, and impedes executive function. If I experience inappropriate touch in a crowd, it would be easy for me to blame the wrong person, or mistake an accident for an assault, or be triggered and relive a past trauma. As a child, I would hope that the adults in charge would recognize these possibilities and respond accordingly. If the adults had calmly and rationally investigated the situation right then and there, the damage could’ve been nipped in the bud.

Inevitably in community organizing—especially when coalitions are rapidly assembling to address urgent issues—rifts, disagreements, and factions start to bubble up. Rumblings at the marches had been ongoing for a couple of weeks or so. This is human nature, and no big deal, but these conflicts and growing pains present necessary challenges to work through in mature and strengthening ways. Was this allegation arising out of these rifts? Was Baba being scapegoated?

I felt strongly that, for some reason, Baba was being singled out and attacked, and that he needed immediate protection. The following night, June 30, I was unable to accompany Baba to the march but a friend, a well-connected Southwest Detroit resident and indigenous healer, volunteered to be with him. I asked her to smudge and cleanse the space and the people around them, because it seemed apparent to me that a lot of messy, destructive energy was circulating. I advised Baba to speak out and ask for protection, and specifically to ask members of the safety team to march alongside him because he was being singled out and accused of perpetrating harm. But when he finally got a chance to speak, a Detroit Will Breathe organizer cut him short and would not let him finish, saying “Nobody is beyond reproach,” implying that the rumored allegation may have been true.

The next day, July 1, Baba and I had a phone conversation with a DWB organizer, acknowledging the allegation of harm made against Baba. Baba and I immediately requested investigation, dialogue, and a restorative justice or mediation process to address the allegation. DWB agreed to the process, and asked that meanwhile, Baba stop attending DWB events. I suggested that if a cooling off period was desired, then One Michigan, responsible for making the allegation, should also stop attending DWB events. DWB disagreed, because the organization was part of their coalition, despite my argument that all coalition members needed to be held accountable.

Days went by, and we received no word from DWB about the dialogue. I also reached out personally to One Michigan, by phone and email, and received no response. At a July 4 community event, we spotted members of One Michigan whispering to our friend, one of the event organizers. Later, my suspicion that they were spreading the allegation proved true, although our friend did not take the bait, and instead urged One Michigan to take it up with Baba, and seek mediation.

The following week, On July 6, I urged Baba Baxter to start attending marches again, because they are public events, and one cannot be barred indefinitely from public events. On July 7, I reached out to DWB to reassert the need for dialogue. They responded that they no longer planned to pursue dialogue because the youth didn’t want to participate, and also because they took Baba’s presence at the July 6 march as a gesture of disrespect. They closed our text thread with “We are looking for ways to move forward and will keep you posted.”

Baba and I took it upon ourselves to reach out to a member of the Detroit Safety Team, an experienced restorative justice facilitator, who agreed to facilitate a process between Baba and DWB. They reached out repeatedly to DWB that summer, who failed to follow through with the requests for information to get the RJ process started.

It was getting clearer and clearer that DWB and One Michigan had little to no interest in resolving the situation.

We thought the whole ordeal may have died a natural death, until a representative of DWB revived the allegation, through an email listserve to the Coalition for Police Transparency and Accountability. I responded to the message with clarifying information, reiterating the ignored requests for dialogue and investigation. CPTA agreed to support the process and help move it forward. We are currently in that process.

Most recently, the allegation resurfaced on Facebook, in the context of the upcoming Michigan Democratic Party Disability Caucus elections, to argue against Baba Baxter’s campaign for Chair. This person even posted a video in which a voice can be heard saying, “that man just grabbed my ass, in the wheelchair, he just grabbed my ass!” (2:10)

Rewinding the video frame by frame reveals the implausibility of the allegation. Namely, the accusing party was diagonally to the right of Baba (2:01). He could not be moving in his chair, and grabbing someone on his right at the same time. Apparently the accusing party and those perpetrating the allegation do not understand how a power wheelchair works. It doesn’t have “cruise control” or “auto-pilot.” The wheelchair user’s hand controls the chair, which will only move when pressure is applied to the joystick. If the user moves their hand off the joystick, the chair comes to a complete halt. To “grab [someone’s] ass,” he would have had to stop completely to reach his right hand out. The youth would also have had to stop to be within reach. Everyone behind them would then be forced to stop, and they would have witnessed said assault.

Baba keeps his water bottle and food bag hanging on the right side of his chair. Did she brush against something and think it was a hand? Did someone else in the march assault her? Who knows what she actually felt? But what is clear is: Baba’s right hand was driving his chair the entire time, and that hand never left the chair, and the chair did not stop moving.

I wish this kind of scrutiny and logic could have been applied much earlier. So much secondary harm could have been prevented.

The elephant in the room is ableism. I wonder how much Baba Baxter’s disability consciously or unconsciously scared the youth and adults who alleged inappropriate touch? PWD (people with disabilities) are often objectified, and seen as deviants from the norm. PWD can elicit fear because they are othered, kept out of the public eye, and dehumanized. Seeing them reminds us of our own mortality and vulnerability. A wheelchair often elicits fear, especially a power chair which we perceive as a small motor vehicle. Just like racism, ableism shows up without our conscious realization. Like white supremacy, it is both the air we breathe and the water we swim in. Baba Baxter especially stands out as a Black man in a wheelchair, not to mention an assertive, visible, unapologetic Black man. He often elicits trepidation. Is it possible that this young person unconsciously projected such fears onto Baba, even if he never touched her, then told an adult, who may have taken her literally, without scrutiny? A conversation and investigation could’ve addressed all of this months ago.

Meanwhile, none of us in good conscience can allow further assertions of this allegation. We must put it to rest immediately. At the very least we each need to view this video closely, understand the mechanics of a power wheelchair, and understand Baba Baxter’s physical disabilities. We need to actually investigate the harm the youth may have experienced that night. Unfortunately, DWB and One Michigan may have put more energy into assassinating Baba Baxter’s character than to conducting a proper sexual assault investigation. We need a clear, well-facilitated restorative justice process to address all harm. Unless and until we take these steps, true healing remains elusive.


*A subsequent Facebook post stated that “the youth” was not a minor as we were originally informed, but a 19 year-old young woman.



ADDENDUM: Baba Baxter’s Personal Statement, July 8, 2020

When Black lives are under attack ... What do we do..? What do we really do? Is that just a hollow meaningless chant that makes us feel good when we say it? How can we say Black lives matter, if we're not prepared to actually protect Black life? How do we really protect Black life? What do we really do? How are Black lives being attacked? Is it just the police or are they just a symptom of a much larger problem?

George Floyd was a Black life. George Floyd was a Black man. The whole world watched in shock as George cried out for his mother, as his last breath was squeezed out of his helpless body. Why was George attacked? Why wasn't George protected? George was not the first Black life, or the first Black man to be attacked. He was not the first Black life or Black man to not be protected, or not matter.

Black lives, and Black Bodies have always been under attack. Black men have never known what it feels like to wake up and not be under attack. Black men are always perceived to be the 800 lb gorilla in the room. Black men are taught at a very early age that you have to tiptoe through life like you're walking on eggshells. A Black man can never appear too aggressive, or assertive, or confident, or masculine, or any characteristic that might intimidate or threaten others, except if the other is another Black man.

A Black man is conditioned to live in fear. Fear of himself, fear of other Black men, and especially fear of others who do not resemble Blackness. The mere presence of a Black man causes others to feel insecure. So how can a Black man matter, or be protected in a society that is conditioned to fear him, a society that targets him, and places a bullseye on his Black body from the moment he is born? When a Black man tries to protect himself he becomes the enemy, When you try and protect a Black man you become the enemy.

This society was founded on the oppression of the Black man. This society with all of its -isms thrives on the oppression of the Black man. These -isms are structured and institutionalized. A Black man is always under attack, and forced to defend his very existence within these -isms. Society has carved out a place for the Black man and if he dares to step out of place he's punished.

Now what if that Black life, that Black body is a Black Man, and Disabled? Now it becomes even more complicated because another -ism is attacking. It's called Ableism.*

Mask Up! Building Personal and Collective Resilience Through Prāṇāyāma and Masks

Patañjali yoga sutra II.50: As the movement patterns of each breath - inhalation, exhalation, lull - are observed as to duration, number, and area of focus, breath becomes spacious and subtle.

(~tr. Chip Hartranft)

 

 

The COVID19 pandemic has been a fascinating opportunity to study the breath, immunity, and the nervous system, for Iyengar Yoga practitioners like me.

 

Today in class, we explored the idea of breathing through and with resistance. From a yogic, and general health, point of view, the nose is the perfect instrument for breathing. The narrow passageways, the mucus membranes, and the hair of the nostrils serve as filtration, cleaning the air as we inhale. The nose creates a small amount of respiratory resistance, toning the diaphragm and stimulating the phrenic and vagus nerves as we inhale and exhale. Nitric oxide accumulates in the sinuses, which plays an anti-viral role.

 

Mouth breathing, on the other hand, allows us to gulp large amounts of air, with little to no resistance, for instance after a sprint, when we may need instant oxygenation. However, during more typical day-to-day activities, mouth breathing can be very damaging, ranging from mild discomfort like cotton mouth and chapped lips, to hyperventilation, anxiety, asthma symptoms, sleep apnea, and more.

 

In today’s class, we added another layer of resistance through twists, creating an uddiyana kriya-like situation, deliberately restricting the movement of the diaphragm. We noticed how the abdominal twists prevented the diaphragm from fully descending to let air into the lungs. Instead of fighting the restriction, we practiced breathing into the resistance, and the whole circumference of the waist in this position of confinement. We also observed how the breath could be re-directed into the spaciousness of the chest, while using auxiliary respiratory muscles such as the intercostal muscles, and how even the arms could assist, by externally rotating to spread the collarbones, descend the trapezius, and engage the shoulder blades into the back ribs to assist the actions of the intercostals.

 

We explored this further in supine Ujjāyī, Viloma, and in seated Ujjāyī with prāṇāyāma mudra. We finished with a prone Śavāsana, with a narrow folded blanket under the navel, observing the breath in the back body with a mild restriction in the front body.

 

As always, Iyengar Yoga invites us to observe what these practices bring up in us physically, physiologically, mentally, and emotionally. The breath is one of the most obvious and powerful tools we have for self-observation, developing sensitivity and understanding, and eventually, transformation and healing. We undergo immediate changes in breath, heart rate, and body temperature when we experience stress of any sort, and we can bring immediate change to our state by consciously altering the breath.

 

Today’s breathwork in particular created the opportunity to build carbon dioxide tolerance. When we’re stressed, we easily fall into a cycle of overbreathing, disrupting the balance of O2 (ideally 94-96%) and CO2 (4-6%). If we have low CO2 tolerance, we feel we must breathe more, thus exacerbating the stress, and perpetuating the cycle. However, we disrupt the cycle when we build up our CO2 tolerance, which allows us to stay calm even in the face of stress, and keep our breathing at a normal level. In other words, CO2 tolerance teaches emotional resilience.

 

This is where masks come in. Most of us have an understandable natural resistance to masking up. It’s uncomfortable. It’s binding. It’s clammy. It pulls on our ears and our hair. We feel we can’t breathe. Some feel the economic impact of quarantine outweighs health hazards, and even the ensuing loss of life, so masking represents a huge sociopolitical and cultural divide.

 

Strong emotions may arise in some who refuse to mask: feelings of constriction, suppression, suffocation that bring up the urge to fight back. No one wants to be told what to do, especially folks who are not used to having restrictions. In our society, that tends to be the people on the highest end of the social hierarchy who have the most freedom: white folks.

 

As a person of color, an immigrant, and a woman, I’ve understood from day 1, without even being told, that I had to mediate my behavior, and that I could not bring my full self to every situation, and I always had to have my guard up. I’ve also been a frequent traveler to India and South Korea, where masking is part of the culture, mostly due to issues of air pollution, but also as an act of social responsibility to prevent the spread of illnesses.

 

What I now understand through the yogic physiology lens, is that masking can raise our carbon dioxide level in our bloodstream, and unless one trains oneself to tolerate such levels, we may experience discomfort, air hunger, and a feeling of gasping. Do you remember that old school cure for anxiety and stage fright? You were supposed to breathe into a brown paper bag until your breath settled down. When we panic, we tend to hyperventilate: too much oxygen. Restricted breathing, into the paper bag, still permeable (like a cloth mask), helps balance the O2 with CO2, tones the diaphragm, and awakens the parasympathetic nervous system, which signals us to calm down and slow down.

 

We have to train ourselves to breathe softly, steadily, and evenly through our noses as we mask. Most of us habitually overbreathe. We increase lung capacity not by gulping huge amounts of oxygen, but by mediating the breath, as yogis teach, through nasal breathing with soft inhales, exhales, and periods of retention (breath holding). Prāṇāyāma involves conscious mitigation of the breath so that we build up our CO2 tolerance, and balance our sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems to create a calm and alert state.

 

All of us need to stay calm while protecting ourselves and others through masking and distancing. Can we shift our perception of the mask from an object of restriction into an object of liberation? If we experience strain in it, can we understand that strain as a signal to shift the way we breathe? To apply prāṇāyāmic principles and practice softer, more subtle bāhyābhyantara stambha (exhales, inhales, and stoppages)? We can make mask-wearing a practice for  healing and transformation for ourselves and others.

 

An Iyengar Yoga Sequence for Sacro-Iliac and Hip Stability

Many questions have recently come up from folks experiencing pain in the region of the sacrum, low back, and/or outer hip. Current events, including skyrocketing COVID19 rates, may be contributing to the instability many feel. We all may need to step up our grounding, centering, stabilizing practices in the face of so much suffering and uncertainty.

I've had intermittent SI issues for some years, especially early in my practice. The issue seemed to resolve itself as my practice became more balanced and mature. However, since menopause, and some accompanying loss of strength and muscle, some of the sacral and hip issues have returned. At least once a week, I concentrate on strengthening and stabilizing this region, and the sequence I've developed through lots of exploration, research, and trial and error, has been helping a ton. I hope it helps you too.  

The wonderful, classic Tadasana with a sacral strap and block. Here, the strap is at the level of the pubis and horizontal center of sacrum. It can also be taken a little lower, toward the greater trochanter/outer hip. It's also wonderful to wear more than one strap: 2 or 3 at varying levels can be incredibly helpful. The strap/s should provide immediate relief from discomfort, and can be worn all day, while you drive, or whenever. Place the buckle at center front, so it doesn't dig into your skin, and you can easily adjust it. It should be VERY snug. The block is not a requirement, but is helpful in doing the next asana. You could add another strap below the block if you wish.

Tadasana variation: Here I am shifting my weight to one leg. Try not to bend to the side or forward, but to make the weight shift subtle and slow and only until the other leg becomes light and the foot just barely leaves the floor. The standing leg will be working hard, and the gluteals, especially the medias and minimus, firmly engaged. The lifted leg and its glutes will also be engaged. Do both sides to correct asymmetries.

Utkatasana is also helpful. Make it a shallow bend, emphasizing the knees and ankles more than the hip flexion, staying upright with the trunk. Lengthen the buttocks downward and press them forward, strongly engaging the gluteus medias and minimus especially.

Here I am doing the same weight shift I did in Tadasana. Ekapada Utkatasana is quite challenging and will ask a lot of the legs and hip muscles to maintain symmetry. In other words, don't let the standing leg outer hip bulge out. In all poses, the work is to keep the femur heads deeply engaged.

From a narrow Utthita Hasta Padasana (not pictured), I apply the same concept of leaning from side to side. The strap is not absolutely necessary but will intensify the work of the pose and the training of the muscles. You can also use a resistance band if you have one. In either case, the lifted leg needs to stay facing forward while abducting and pushing OUT into the strap. The standing leg, as always, should be stabilizing the femur deep in the hip socket. The intensity can be adjusted by the distance between the feet: the further apart they are, the more difficult the pose. Make sure the gluteas medias and minimus are fully engaged on both sides.

Vasisthasana variations: Here I have to work hard in the lower hip to grip the femur in. I can intensify the challenge by abducting the top leg, as in Utthita Hasta Padasana (no rotation), and challenge further by using a strap or band and pushing out into it. Resist the temptation to do the work from your abdominal strength, and instead redirect the effort into the legs and hips.

 

 

Coming down onto the forearm brings the body more parallel to the floor and increases the challenge. Even more intense (not pictured) is having the feet on a chair and the hand on the floor.

 

Chatush Padasana variations: this is one of the very best for SI and hip issues. You could also hold the block between the thighs here. Ekapada requires strong effort in the standing leg to make sure the hips stay level and square. You can work up to it, by doing the weight shift as in the earlier Ekapada poses, or with the lifted leg foot on a wall or chair. 

Enjoy and good luck!

 

 

 

 

 

More on Trauma, Retribution, and Iyengar Yoga

from Leading with Love: Inspiration from Spiritual Activists

 

Like love and wisdom, trauma is cumulative. Every new trauma re-opens the doors of past traumas. The traumas can be personal, collective, and intergenerational. No one is exempt from experiences of trauma, but definitely some people have experienced more traumas, and more repeated and severe traumas, than others.

 

Global white supremacy, empire, patriarchy, and capitalism create a breeding ground for both individual and collective traumas. Theft of people, land, and resources over centuries…wars fought to control these people, land, and resources…ensuing genocide…divide and conquer strategies pitting neighbor against neighbor…hypermasculinity as a survival response to incessant violation…abuse within families, especially of women and children, repeated over generations….I hope you get the picture.

 

We are all trauma stewards. We are all required to tend to, and hopefully heal and recover from, our own traumas, if we are to survive in this world. As adults, we each need to develop ways to feed and house ourselves, which requires some level of functionality, despite the blows we have endured. We’re extremely fortunate if we develop livelihoods that nourish us spiritually, and enable us to be present as trauma stewards for each other. Due to structural inequities, as well as cultures of violence, neglect, and blame developed as a response to trauma, many people are just surviving.

 

Even some with accumulated material wealth are just surviving, from a soul perspective. They are spiritually bereft. #45 reminds us daily of the brutality and systemic violence our nation is built upon, and the ill-gotten generational wealth, shaped by generations of abuse, that put a sociopath in power. We witness daily the unspeakable ravages such a person, operating within systems and institutions built on oppression, can commit. We witness the hordes (stil a significant minority of this nation—30%) who respond to the dog whistle of his trauma, which resonates with theirs, who support him unquestioningly. They resonate with his fear of white annihilation, scarcity mindset, desperation to blame the other, and inexorable smugness of white superiority, because what else do they have to cling to? They even insist their God is white.

 

This is what our nation is made of. This is the culture Iyengar Yoga has emerged from. This is what all our institutions have emerged from, including IYNAUS.

 

Our nation is also shaped by struggle, boldness, vision, and resilience. Too many heroes to name from over the centuries, but off the top of my head, Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass, Grace Lee Boggs, Charity Hicks….

 

Will we take it upon ourselves to shift and transform our culture and its institutions? There’s a part of me that says, fuck it. I am so thoroughly disgusted with mainstream society and I long to disengage from all of it.

 

But then I get hungry, and thirsty, and cold. I need a vehicle to acquire necessities. I need electricity to heat my home and wifi to communicate and get information. I need a goddamn debit card. I have not managed to get off the grid.

 

So like most of us, I am carving a middle path. I practice harm reduction. I am stewarding my trauma through somatic, creative, spiritual practices. I build community with others on parallel paths. We compare notes, teach each other, share food and resources, and support each other.

 

We are all survivors of abusive lineages and colonization. Most of us have been both survivors of harm and perpetrators of harm. How could it not be so? What parent has never lost their temper and lashed out at their innocent child? Or have times of shutdown or dissociation, when we are emotionally unavailable? In our intimate relationships, haven’t we all done and said hurtful things? When we open up so wide for each other, we make ourselves vulnerable to each other’s traumas. I’ve not met anyone who is exempt.

 

Iyengar Yoga in the USA is no exception. No institution is exempt. We need to regard each other and all our institutions through a trauma-informed lens. Why the fuck would I ever expect an institution to protect and serve me? Every institution and system was designed to serve the dominant power structure, and to protect their property.

 

IYNAUS emerged from a need to control who could represent, control, and access the teachings of BKS Iyengar. The community had grown exponentially worldwide, and Guruji was no longer able to personally mentor each teacher, nor monitor what each nation was doing. So associations were set up, with guidelines established locally, and overseen from a distance by Guruji.

 

Is it any wonder that despite the extreme minority of men in yoga classes, at least the past 5 presidents of IYNAUS included only 1 woman? Is it surprising to anyone that the culture of IYNAUS and Iyengar Yoga is overwhelmingly white? Even in a nation that is increasingly BIPOC, and will soon be majority BIPOC, the culture of Iyengar Yoga lags far behind.

 

IYNAUS as an institution reflects the community that comprises it. In our nation it has traditionally been a practice of the educated upper middle class. The middle class serves, in this nation, as functionaries of the upper class, and have been given access to many resources in exchange with compliance, and willingness to uphold the power structure. As such, are we surprised that our community struggled to figure out how to hold Manouso Manos accountable for decades of sexual abuse? And that allegations of other men abusing their power in the Iyengar Yoga world remain unsanctioned and unabated?

 

We excuse none of it. But I am thoroughly convinced that healing will come from outside the institutions. I hold their feet to the fire, at the same time that I actively build the alternative.

 

Iyengar Yoga Detroit Collective has a reach that extends beyond our city and region, due to globalized technology in the face of Covid-19. We have Iyengar Yoga practitioners from around the world able to participate in our webinars, workshops, and weekly classes. We are able to share our imperfect, evolving, trauma-informed, anti-oppression practices. We have study groups and committees explicitly addressing the prevention and correction of harm. We have a fund to support our many projects. We are in conversation with other communities with the same goals. We identify with the global Healing Justice movement, as defined by Cara Page and Kindred Southern Healing Justice Collective, emphasizing the relationship between social justice and healing trauma, individually and collectively.

 

How do we hold each other accountable without relying on institutions bound to repeatedly betray us? This is the starting point for radical, revolutionary love. We must create these containers for each other. It’s our only hope for healing. Transformative justice and restorative justice circles can meet with or without survivors, with or without perpetrators, because participants understand that harm occurs in social and historical contexts. There are many ways TJ/RJ sessions can be structured, and no one structure fits every situation. Each community must take responsibility. TJ/RJ is not a quick fix. It will require multiple sessions, with expert facilitation, possibly over weeks and months, and even years. As we know, healing happens in layers and spirals, and hopefully, never truly ends. TJ/RJ is the alternative to cancel culture, which never really works because it doesn’t address root causes. If healing happens in layers, acts of harm result from layers of trauma.

 

In the words of abolitionist Angela Davis, “We have to imagine the kind of society we want to inhabit. We can’t simply assume that somehow, magically, we’re going to create a new society in which there will be new human beings. No, we have to begin that process of creating the society we want to inhabit right now.”