How I Identify
My lived experience is through the body of a white (mainly of Irish, German, and Polish descent) cis-gender woman born into a middle class family in the suburbs of Pennsylvania. My lived experience is through a body that’s sensitive to energy, emotions, touch, and the cycles of nature. My lived experience is social, outgoing, in the world; as well as introspective, contemplative, reflective.
My lived experience at a foundational level is a home of love, as well as a home of addiction and pain. I honor my family, my lineage, my ancestors; and the resources and burdens embedded within us. They are my biggest teachers.
My lived experience through choice is of spiritual seeking, multicultural connection, and service; full of learning, color, and Guidance. My lived experience is queer and transcendental of form as a spiritual being having a human experience.
My professional experience and source of passion is in international sustainable development and sociology. Think UN, nonprofit world. I like to be practical! Use applied social science and a whole-systems approach to figure out how to address things poverty, gender inequality, and climate change.
My lived experience has parameters to it that does not make it universal. I would say it has limitations, but I don’t believe it needs to be viewed that way. Instead, trusting in the puzzle pieces we’re all provided; the puzzle pieces that transpire. My lived experience does not hold wisdom or medicine for everyone. It’s not meant to. In the name of inclusivity and just plain ol’ common sense, my lived experience is but one tiny perspective in a vast sea of rich, wise vantage points.
What does your story hold?
I own and recognize that I embody privileges and social truths that exist in our fractured, unequal world. I own and recognize my privilege as a white body of European descent in this world that historically prioritizes the lives of those with lighter skin tones. I own and recognize the socioemotional luxury that comes with being born into a body that I identify with. I own and recognize the psychological ease that comes with having socioeconomic safety nets. I own and recognize the political freedoms I’m privileged with as an American.
I welcome and invite voices forward to balance mine, to fill in gaps, to create more wholeness, and to build a multidimensional resonance. My request is that any voices do so in a way that is respectful, self-aware and with a vision towards interdependence.
I commit and recommit my life to breaking abusive patterns, ending oppressive cycles, and liberating the God-given potential of our interconnected world. I welcome this as messy, humble work.
My offerings are my consciousness are my healing are my personal journey.
May it be of service.
Why include this?
Because who we are matters.
As we as a world continue to make more space for all of the rich, beautiful diversity that exists on our planet, it’s necessary for me to share and own the histories, realities, privileges and inequities that I’ve experienced, and how they fit into the larger puzzle of our collective body.
Being clear and open about who I am, the body I inhabit, and the vehicle through which I offer things feels important in the pursuit of co-creating an inclusive, conscious world. I hope it builds greater trust with you as a community member or client.
I also look at this as a practice. A practice of acknowledging differentiation as a gesture towards reconciliation and collective healing. Just like with all spiritual practices, once the technique is practiced enough times it begins to become integrated into the practitioner’s psyche, spirit, consciousness in a way that allows the practice to fall away. No longer needing to be done so explicitly; instead it is inherently embedded. This is my hope, prayer, and vision for this acknowledgment of identity. That we collectively move towards a place where we’ve ‘practiced’ it enough times that we can let it fall away and move towards a new phase of relating to each other that further liberates us from the constraints that identity boxes impose.
Are you looking for a starting point to reflect on your own identity?
That’s awesome! I like this one - it’s an edugraphic by Sam Killermann called You Soup that offers a model for understanding diversity and the intersections of identity. It’s from 2012 so I’m sure some may feel more nuanced amendments could be made; but either way, it’s a great foundational starting point.