#blacklivesmatter

Let me hold the door for you.

I may have never walked in your shoes

But I can see

Your soles are worn.

Your strength is torn.

Under the weight of a story

I have never lived before.

So let me hold the door for you.

After all you’ve walked through.

It’s the least I can do.

Morgan Harper Nichols

I think the most powerful tool in this world to fight injustice is by education.

So last year I taught a Black Lives Matter yoga class with my dear friend Keri Perkins, we were also part of a 24 hour yoga marathon for Black Lives Matter together last June, after that we joined forced with Natalie who organised that marathon and created our own collective called THE SAMYA COLLECTIVE. Yoga Teachers for Racial and Social Justice! We kept the conversation going all year, we taught a class the end of May called NEVER FORGET, remembering George Floyd and all others #saytheirnames through the practice of yoga. Please have a listen HERE to SAMYA COLLECTIVE on my podcast.

This didn’t end last year, this movement, because BLACK LIVES STILL MATTER and we cannot stop fighting. To me the most powerful tool in this world to fight injustice is by education. Educating ourselves first and then sharing that with others. The times we are living in right now, aren’t times to stay silent. Or not taking a stand. WE MUST! My whole life I felt ashamed of my skin colour and what it represents. This white supremacy. This white privilege.

I can’t really explain in words how much my heart is broken. How racism effects me. I am just so disgusted by it, heartbroken, confused, outraged, in agony. I have fought for justice for different causes and in different set ups for the last twenty years or so and for some reason fighting racism, standing up and showing up for black lives and the lives of people of colour is the one closest to my heart, the most important of all……

Picture The Black Lives Matter Movement Baltimore

the character of our nation isn’t reflected in how we treat the rich and the privileged but how we treat the poor, the disfavored and condemned.
bryan stevenson (from the movie no mercy)

I now know that hopelessness is the enemy of justice. Hope allows us to push forward even when the truth is distorted by the people in power. It allows us to stand up when they tell us to sit down and to speak when they say be quiet. Through this work I’ve learned that each of us is more then the worst thing we’ve ever done that the opposite of poverty isn’t wealth the opposite of poverty is justice.

That the character of our nation isn’t reflected in how we treat the rich and the privileged but how we treat the poor, the disfavored and condemned. Our system has taken more away from this innocent man than it has the power to give back. But I believe if each of us can follow his lead we can change this world for the better. If we can look at ourselves closely. And honestly I believe that we all need justice. We all need mercy. And perhaps we all need some measure of unmerited grace.

From the movie just mercy. The true story of Walter Mc Millian and his lawyer Bryan Stevenson from the Equal Justice Initiative.

Please join me in this fight, be an ally and educate yourself, educate others and show our ever ongoing support to those who have been ignored, neglected and silenced for way too long!

RESOURCES:

You all MUST READ Skill in Action by Michelle Cassandra Johnson

Other great books: