I can’t remember if it was right after the election or right after the inauguration, but I was, as many of us were, feeling terrible. And I had a meeting with the owner of the studio where I teach in Columbus. Heartfelt is queer owned and committed to elevating the experiences of marginalized humans.
Vinny, the owner, is a freaking unicorn, and I mean that on an emotional, spiritual, and mental level. He’s worked hard to build a beautiful life filled with joy. And he personifies it: the first meeting I ever had with him, he came into the coffee shop in a long, bright pink, faux fur. He fuels himself with bags of skittles. And I think, really, he probably passes rainbows. ((laughing))
He is not a caricature, don’t get me wrong. As I said, he’s worked hard and the glitter coating you see on the outside is over a depth that comes from profound challenges met with curiosity and grace.
Back to our meeting after the orange menace took over.
I asked Vinny how he was doing, expecting him to say something like “devastated” or “scared”… you know, something more along the lines that I, existing in so many safe roles, was feeling. (Besides being a woman, of course, which has never been safe in this country.)
Instead he said something more along the lines of “great! Excited about (fill in the blank)!”
I was stunned.
And this was the start of a huge realization that has taken me until the last week or so to really articulate.
I have never been someone who had to be told she was privileged. I understand the layers and layers of my personal privilege.
But this particular piece of privilege was so deep… it’s really a core privilege and I think we can be most ignorant of those.
Over these first few months of 2025, I hear myself constantly saying to loved ones and trusted confidants that I do not have the tools to live in this world that they are building. I am devastated. I am in a deep, drowning sea of despair. I feel a level of powerlessness that I have never felt before.
My depression is the worst it’s been in over 20 years.
On top of that is a red hot rage and hate that I’ve never felt before.
I am afraid for all of us.
And that all makes sense.
But it’s the lack of tools that has completely stunned me. I do not have the right tools to meet this moment. I mean psychologically, of course.
Nothing is working.
Vinny has the tools. Other marginalized humans have the tools. They are, somehow, being angry and still also finding their joy and living their lives.
You know why?
Because this unsafe world is the world they have always lived in. They have had to develop these tools from day one. (Again, as a woman, there is definitely a lack of safety but as a whyte woman… it’s, well, a bit safer.)
My. God. When I realized this!
THIS is the depth of our privilege. We have not needed these particular tools*.
(*These tools are distinctly different from the tools a lot of us have created in response to personal traumas that are not relative to being marginalized by the wider culture.)
And now we do need them and you can’t just snap your fingers to conjure them and you can’t just sit in meditation for a few days and they suddenly appear.
These are tools that are forged in pain and challenge that has been in people’s lives for decades. These are tools that marginalized communities share with one another and teach each other.
And there’s the other key… communities.
I have communities of which I am a part, but I do not know how to deepen these communities in the way that, for example, the trans community has always had to do. Or the black community. Or any religion that is not freaking Christian in this country.
I think my communities are exceptional. I love the humans who are in the many circles of which I am a part. But for the most part, the communities themselves are also part of the privilege issue in that the people in them tend to all look like me and have the same sorts of backgrounds. So there’s no new information being brought in (and we all work hard to learn but it’s second hand, for the most part, isn’t it?).
I don’t have some sort of revelatory conclusion to bring here.
I am just noticing the depth of the problem.
And it’s really scary to notice this when we need to be able to hit the ground running. People are suffering and they need us.
But it we are struggling ourselves just to maintain an okay mindset, to be able to do the bare minimum, to simply live from day to day, we are really of very little help.
Because one of the key ingredients in this coming revolution/resistance is the ability to move forward from joy and love and compassion. Or we’ll build something that looks like all the old things and those old things helped to get us to this terrible place.
We need new ideas and better ideas and more beauty and laughter and playfulness so that we can conjure and create something brand new that makes space for each of us in our unique beauty.
So that’s where I am… contemplating my privilege, my lack of tools, the layer of shame that comes with that, and what I need to do to build the right muscles for the work ahead.
