In this episode, Lama Rod and Chetna talk about: What liberation smells like, sounds like, feels like and looks like for Lama Rod from both an abstract and embodied experience Contentment and acceptance alongside the wrongness, suffering and crisis of the world The subtle practice of “holding the chaos and crisis, instead of the chaos and crisis holding you” Holding space for everything that’s arising is still feeling the chaos and tension, feeling our hearts breaking and enraging, and also still being connected to the space that’s holding us and everything Reacting to everything may create more harm, and gives little space to respond The choicefulness and consent of this practice Chetna references Dylan McGarry’s art that speaks to how to hold ourselves and each other accountable requires holding Accountability is meeting the reality, showing up and telling the truth We have to confront our personal broken-heartedness as an expression of the collective disappointment Not giving in to everything being “too much”, letting things arise in the nature of one’s own mind Liberation work is calling us to do what we thought was impossible Lama Rod’s practice of “no choice” as a way to not bypass the work or give himself excuses Chetna’s relation to this with choosing to be in recovery, and having chosen “no choice” when it comes to engaging with certain substances The necessity of “no choice” despite our human shit, to eliminate complexity and not enabling ourselves to get out of the work Boundaries as a way to maintain discipline and dedication in the face of difficulty “No choice” as conducive for empowerment, balance and liberation On the other side of some rigidity, hard choices is discomfort is space, like a crucible and the discomfort of alchemy Seed processes and the struggle of a seed cracking open to sprout, and how it relates to our nature’s propensity to emerge through discomfort Surrendering to the dark or the unclear, where our awareness isn’t and where there are narratives of danger Lama Rod’s relationship to the energetic of depression, and the medicine of surrendering to get close to the depression and see what it needed The darkness is asking to be tended to, and the need to offer care to the things we’re afraid of Pressing down, avoiding and pressurizing the darkness before it leaves us without choice due it’s need to be released Depression as a portal to liberation, love and compassion when we sit down and ask what it needs and why it’s here Tending to the darkness softens our hearts and reduces the isolation The advanced practice of loving the things we’re most afraid of The distinction between love and like; wanting someone to be free and resourced even if I don’t want them to be my friend If someone, or a collective of people were free and getting what they needed, what harm would that prevent? Trying to love in this way has to come after we spend time with the rage, fear, grief The coexistence of loving someone (and understanding that they deserve to be free) and being pissed off at them too How this could allow us to take less personally our anger without it overtaking us or making it wrong in us The Love is what holds the space, the watery Love sets the boundaries for the fire of anger without repressing it or letting it overtake or spread wildly You can sometimes help someone be free by staying out the way, and whatever we do in Love is helpful The apocalypse as something that’s been around for centuries, not just our lifetime or our disruption The apocalypse has been experienced by many different communities across time; this can allow us to zoom out beyond the confines of our lives This is a time of decolonization, when we are dealing with the wounds of colonialism Abolition as a way of healing to abolish the systems that perpetuate violence The pain and suffering of individualism that narrows our realities and produces isolation and separation, which is a root of colonialism Decolonization is really about community; Loving people without feeling like we need to like them and holding chaos are ways to decolonize and be in community This work is both personal and collective; us as individuals have to name the experience of our pain, and our ancestors pain, in order to abolish and heal the pain of the collective Remembering who we were before systems of oppression is hard work; the cellular structure of our hearts proves our capacity to return to who we were born as We have to grieve our way back, for our ancestors and ourselves, in order to move forward The importance of unwounding our hearts to be present in community more and in this liberation work Find more: Lama Rod online: lamarod.com Lama Rod on IG @lamarodofficial Chetna on IG @mosaiceye and the podcast @creationforliberation Other offerings: Upcoming Events: Reclaiming Creativity Workshop with Kripalu. Embodying BHAKTI: The Yoga of Love - a series for women and non-binary activists (mosaiceyeunfolding.com/communityevents) Work 1:1 with Chetna for high-achieving changemakers to get out of your heads and into embodied creative alchemy (chetnamehta.co/sessions)

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“What did the council decide on item 42?” — answered with the speaker and the moment.

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