Essay Blog with selected excerpts of forthcoming book (and other essays):

Living Out Loud

Ecologies of Connection, Decolonizing & Telling It

Posted May 19, 2024

Author’s Response: For those of you asking for more essays from my forthcoming collection to be uploaded, thank you so much for your encouragement and feedback. I appreciate this so much. :) For the moment, I am keeping some of the essays for this collection tucked away until the book comes out in 2025. However, I will still be uploading working essays (new essay below) on a more regular basis here in 2024.

Posted May 19, 2024

Taking a Side and Taking a Stand on the Genocide in Gaza

by Fabiola Nabil Naguib

Author’s Note: I would like to acknowledge that the following short essay will be angering, even infuriating for some, while feeling like solace and/or solidarity to others. As an artist, writer and activist, I will not censor myself or others. I believe that open and transparent sharing, vulnerability and dialogue in the spirit of love, justice and freedom for everyone is urgently needed. I believe that those of us with differing positionalities and worldviews need to listen, witness and stretch in a sincere attempt to understand one another, even where agreement is impossible. For me, the space between our most fervent beliefs is where possibility lives—where interdependence, connectivity, dignity and freedom for all can flourish. As a human being, this breathing space—where I reflectively make space for myself and others—is essential to my inner process of recycling hope, again and again.

May the violence and suffering stop for the sake of all!

Most often, it is both unavoidable and necessary to take a side when standing together for change.

I am feeling absolutely gutted over the Genocide occurring in Gaza—like my insides have been wrenched out of place, out of body. Today my grief makes it hard to breathe. My stomach turning, my thoughts and feelings whirling, my heart and solar plexus feeling weighted, as if filled with cement. This load-bearing swings me like a pendulum—from heartbreak to anger to angst and back.

Aside from speaking with loved ones, community members and other activists, I am reading and watching mostly well-established independent news free of governmental and corporate influence, local posts from inside Gaza as well as Al Jazeera news online. The truth about what is happening to Palestinians is horrific—as are the lies, gaslighting and mis and disinformation that mass media outlets are peddling and perpetuating as “news.” And for people still not aware or less aware of what is happening to Palestinians, this “news” is more than decontextualized and misleading—it is unethical, dehumanizing and immoral.

I feel sickened and heart wrenched. The only way for me to not let my anguish, frustration and incensedness overcome me is to channel these feelings into constructive forms of expression—activism including writing, visual art, standing with others publicly as well as supporting others feeling the same. I am heartened that more people around the world are grasping the scope of this catastrophe, the ongoing Nakba that Palestinians, as Indigenous peoples, have been attempting to survive, again and again for decades.

The relentless, remorseless and abhorrent actions of the Israeli government—the brutal siege, bombardment, massacre, starvation, imprisonment, torture and the like, of Palestinians in Gaza—are beyond egregious. My moral condemnation also applies to the actions of western governments, providing ongoing cover and outright, multifarious support of these crimes and inhumanities. The nature and force of the Israeli state’s atrocities would be unimaginable only if one ignores or is unaware of the way in which the state was formed and its systemic policies and practices since its inception. The Israeli state’s historically well documented foundations in violent couplings—imperialism and geopolitics, Zionism and settler-colonialism, bigotry and apartheid, entitlement and the weaponization of victimhood—have deeply informed the formation and development of this state and bring us to this horrific and tragic contemporary moment.

Throughout my life, I have participated in activism, information sharing and dialogue regarding the colonization and occupation of Palestine, in public forums, professional contexts and in my personal life. While this dialogue has often been challenging and uncomfortable to say the least, it always felt and still feels urgent to me to participate in opportunities for understanding across communities, ideological difference, and divergent worldviews. I truly believe that without the willingness to have these uncomfortable and brave discussions transformative change—co-existence of all peoples and communities, political emancipation and restructuring toward substantive equality and freedom for everyone in Palestine/Israel—will be an impossibility.

In dialoging across difference, I have found it imperative to differentiate between people/groups/organizations who speak out against Zionism, Israel’s Apartheid and occupation of Palestine and people/groups/organizations who are antisemitic. Although it has always been the case, now, more than ever, there are those that confuse anti-Zionism with antisemitism as well as those that conflate the two intentionally. Of course, there are individuals and groups that mask their bigotry in calls for justice, this is also nothing new. But over the course of decades of participating in various forms of public activism such as organizing, protesting, speaking, writing and making art that speaks out against Israeli atrocities, I have yet to come across haters that express and promote antisemitism. This has not only been a huge relief to me but also reveals the problematics and dangers of rampant and strategic collapsing of anti-Zionism with antisemitism—NOT the same at all.

It is urgent to educate ourselves on the discernible and categorical differences between antisemitism and anti-Zionism and to speak up accordingly, despite dominant social pressures to shut-up and stand ineffective and complicit in the brutal oppression of Palestinians. Equating anti-Zionism and anti-Zionists with antisemitism and antisemites is, at best, a gross misrepresentation and characterization and, at worst, utilized as a strategic and powerful tactic in silencing and repressing voices for just peace and freedom. Unfortunately, numerous instances of the former and latter are on the rise across social locations and contexts.

On days like today, when I can hardly breath through my sorrow and outrage over Israel’s continued Apartheid and the heinous Genocide in Gaza, I turn to the oxygenating and grounding wisdom of Archbishop Desmond Tutu during South Africa’s Apartheid:

“In a situation of injustice and oppression, there can be no neutrality! You have to take sides, you have to say, ‘Am I on the side of justice or am I on the side of injustice?!’” *

For me, to stand with Palestinians and people across the world, demanding a permanent ceasefire and an end to the ethnic-cleansing and genocide of Palestinians—as well as a decolonial political solution including the right of return for Palestinians—is to take a stand for justice, dignity, and freedom.

For those of you who have not yet taken a stand and/or found ways to be active in contributing toward ending the Genocide in Gaza, the atrocities being committed in the Occupied West Bank, Occupied East Jerusalem, and the settler-colonial realities across historic Palestine—I implore you to do so in whatever ways you can. It can be overwhelming and sometimes hard to grasp and navigate the ways in which we can make a difference in such dire circumstances. But there are so many ways to be active: informing ourselves/self-educating, sharing with family, friends and colleagues, writing elected officials, joining global collective actions such as the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement (BDS), joining associations and organizations for just peace and change, signing petitions, open letters, rallying, protesting, picketing, fundraising for needed medical and nutritional aid, and the list goes on.

We do not need to consider ourselves activists to be a part of change on this planet—all people can attune to our conscience and shared humanity, take action and be a part of change. As Archbishop Desmond Tutu reminds us, neutrality in the face of oppression and injustice is complicity. This is an uncomfortable truth for many. In my experience, attuning to our conscience and the right to dignity and freedom for all people/s does not involve neutrality. Most often, it is both unavoidable and necessary to take a side when standing together for change. The present course of genocide, ecocide and omnicide on this planet requires taking a side and taking a stand—for the sake of all human and more-than-human kin and the living Earth.

*This quote was taken from video footage of a speech delivered by Desmond Tutu during Apartheid in South Africa. See footage in documentary, “Mission Joy: Finding Happiness in Troubled Times,” 2021, 1:18:22.

posted January 22, 2022

Why It is Vital that We Become Comfortable with Discomfort (Part I)

Notes on Subverting Racism and White Privilege, Decolonizing, Self-inquiry, Ideological Differences and
Capacities Toward Social and Institutional Change

By Fabiola Nabil Naguib

Author’s note: I acknowledge that visitors to this website carry different entry points and varying degrees of familiarity/self-education/knowledge on racism and other colonial -isms as well as how they function. Thus, some may find this essay challenging, even difficult to stay with. Truth-telling can be discomforting while simultaneously contributive to opportunities for reflection and shifts toward change. Aside from the context and unpacking provided herein, there are copious resources online that can further aid with processing and contextualizing the content of this essay and the purviews shared (also see asterisked definitions provided below). I offer this essay based on an ethic of love, justice, connectivity and solidarity, and in the spirit of dialogue across difference in ideology and practice.

What is obvious to many in society is so often not obvious to many more.

As an Indigenous person committed and active with regard to anti-racism and decolonizing for decades, it is often arduous for me to discuss individualized and systemic racism with white people,* sometimes even those I know well, personally or professionally. As soon as the R word (Racism) or the W word (White/White Privilege*) is brought up, many white people, more often than not, begin to reveal subtle or not so subtle signs and symptoms of discomfort. These signals manifest in various forms and degrees of incredulity, defensiveness, minimization, presumption and/or silence. They also present by way of discernible fears, simply passing the buck and/or deflecting with claims of being offended or ambushed, for instance.

I have witnessed these and other indicators of discomfort-come-evasion from so many white people that have crossed my path. I observe how their discomfort frequently provokes an array of visible and audible reactivities that are evident to me but seemingly not to the white person or people I am conversing with (or at least not admittedly). And this occurs in multifarious conversations and forums, even those that profess to offer openness and opportunities to discuss and reflectively unpack or subvert racism. Unfortunately, I am not alone in these encounters. They are common experiences for many Indigenous peoples and people of colour that engage with white people in the service of awareness or change—professionally, in friendship and broader community.

The impacts of socialized reactivity, lack of awareness and understanding as well as depthful acknowledgment of racism, white privilege, white privilege protectionism* and white entitlement have plethoric consequences across contexts. And this problematic is further compounded by its prevalence where cognizance and proactivity are claimed or presumed—among educators, administrators, artists and academics, in the health care system, professional associations, NGOs, government institutions, media and journalism, etc., etc.

I want to acknowledge, on occasion, I do come across white people who are true-to-life allies working with Indigenous peoples and people of colour toward anti-racism and decolonizing. But I want to admit publicly: I wish there were more of you. I guess if the challenging work of unpacking and visibilizing white privilege and working for equity and decolonial change was easy and convenient, all white people would be doing it.

The reality is—the personal, communal, professional and systemic work needed to decolonize is an endeavour of radical openness, willingness and commitment. Working to subvert racism and inequity is part of this decolonial effort. Regardless of who we are, no matter our heritage or cultural contexts, our social location, it takes time, effort, care and consideration as well as self-inquiry to deeply self-educate and commence with corresponding healing—and journeying as such for change in the contexts we inhabit. These inner and outward endeavours require personal and social accountability to others, within and beyond our personal lives, socio-political, cultural and professional contexts. This stretching necessitates working on becoming comfortable with discomfort—because it will get uncomfortable if we are sincere in becoming and staying conscious—and working together toward comprehensive and lasting change. This is especially the case when our personal, social and professional relationships occur across difference, in knowledge, experience, reality, background, culture and socio-economic status, for instance.

When among white colleagues, friends or acquaintances, I frequently feel the unequitable burden of decolonial labour. These efforts are so rarely evenly shared with white folks in any context—Indigenous folks and folks of colour left holding the bag. This unevenness sometimes makes it hard to keep going, not only with the work required for change across contexts but sustaining energy, avoiding burnout and keeping the faith that profound and bold change is even possible. Sincere and sustained decolonial labour takes a tremendous amount of effort, time and energy—intellectually, socially and emotionally.

Demonstrated commitments toward anti-racism, equity and decolonizing are most frequently implicitly or explicitly expected, requested or simply left to Indigenous peoples and people of colour—in our workplaces, in public institutions, in friendship and broader community. I have observed this in my own life as well as the realities of countless Indigenous peoples and people of colour working for change. Simultaneously and tellingly, these labours are most often not greeted with curiosity or earnest support. They are also not appropriately acknowledged or equitably compensated (where appropriate)—neither in recognition nor renumeration. This means that so many people of colour and Indigenous peoples do a whole lot of work that is conveniently diminished and underacknowledged. It needs to be said—this conventionalized overlooking and erasure illuminates the convenience, access and benefits that inequity, white privilege and white privilege protectionism affords white people (personally, communally and institutionally). These and other invisibilizing practices draw attention away from the decolonial labour of Indigenous peoples and people of colour while obscuring the complacency and complicities of white folks (and others) who go along with or administratively enforce and perpetuate those inequities, consciously or unconsciously, happily or unhappily.

These may come across as harsh words to some folks, and to others, catharsis, solidarity. In any case, I am sincerely expressing without righteous indignation. Instead, my clear-eyed sentiments are reflective of the dire need for intellectual and emotional honesty and radical transparency. These prerequisites to comprehensive social and institutional change are rarely made room for within capitalist-opportunist driven dominant cultures and contexts that promote and support competition, upward mobility, inequity and exploitation—over interdependence, deep collaboration and justice. Institutionalized inequity manufactures, conventionalizes and normalizes environments and dynamics of oppression and uneven privilege. As a consequence of disrupting the status quo by speaking truth to power and working for change, many Indigenous peoples and people of colour contend with concerns and realistic fears of backlash, loss of access and privilege, threats to livelihood and future securities as well as other ramifications. Decolonial labour can be an exhausting balancing act when navigating and maneuvering within structurally and otherwise inequitable institutions and contexts. This can be and feel demoralizing and dehumanizing—and plainly put—is egregiously unfair.

I have been involved in efforts toward anti-racism, equity and decolonizing for decades. And it has been discouraging to observe the slow crawl toward change across contexts—in political, academic/university and other public institutions, in community development, art or literary contexts and broader community. The active avoidance and lack of depthful engagement and follow-through in subverting racism and its counterparts are disheartening. So many initiatives, one-off events, research, committees and programming advance lip service, rudimentary considerations, half-hearted measures and sporadic shifts. These activities and microadvances seem to make white colleagues and other peers feel better, more active—or at least less guilty or exposed for their participation in complacency and/or complicity.

I am disenchanted that so much of the social, political and institutional claims of working toward change across arenas are demonstratively hollow or at best misleading, even if initially well-intentioned. These claims so often erroneously imply or intentionally grandstand the impression of significant momentum and progress. But when observed more closely—in policy, institutionally, and legally—society-wide, we have barely begun to do the necessary and on-going work to disentrench racism, colonialism and subsequent inequities, never mind beginning to Indigenize.

Over the years, I have been engaged in community development, consulting, advocacy and activism as well as the arts and academia. This work, service and discourse across diverse contexts has made it abundantly clear that speaking truth to power and working for change can be unnerving, gut-wrenching and hazardous to your health and wellbeing. But it can also be inspiring when we get to see the fruits of our shared labour—the labours of so many individuals and communities working creatively, courageously and collaboratively for change.

What keeps me motivated and inspired is my belief in and experience of the correlatives of love and justice. For me, love (integrating loving-kindness, depthful consideration, compassion and connectivity) and justice need to be nourished and embodied as indivisible. In my view, this indivisibility is required in order for transformative and lasting change to take hold across any and all arenas in society. Working toward social justice, regardless of context, is never exclusively a matter of justice. It requires depthful consideration and humility as well as striving toward shared dignity, freedom, mutual flourishing and more. Carrying this philosophy and practice informs my response-abilities toward compassion and empathy across difference and whole-hearted willingness to work with and among diverse others for change.

At this point in my life, with regard to racism and consequent inequities, there are no better people, bad people or those to blame, just largely, simply good people, allowing various forms of unevenness—injustice—inequity—to continue on their watch. We are all palpably, morally and practically responsible for the ways in which we participate (knowingly or unknowingly) and what we contribute to perpetuating, personally, communally and systemically.

My choice in telling it, to be so direct in this essay, is reflective and certainly intentional. I want to offer food for thought that attunes readers to reflections and feelings that stir, instigate and open dialogue across difference or at the very least reveal discomforts and barriers to change—inwardly and outwardly. In my view, it is crucial, no matter who we are, that we extend ourselves to breathe through dis-ease and dis-comfort in the service of truth-telling, integrity, social and institutional change. And, very simply put, if we want to contribute to more equitable, just and healthy social interactions, relationships, communities and professional contexts, being transparent and becoming comfortable with our discomforts are key. This is regardless of whether we are discussing or working toward subverting racism, white privilege, ableism, classism, casteism, homophobia, biphobia, transphobia, misogyny, speciesism, etc. As many people working toward transformation already know—needed change, whether personal, communal or systemic, does not usually come to fruition without active processes of visibility, whole-hearted truth-telling and, yes, loads of various forms of discomfort surfacing.

Regardless of the recent increase and on and off public discourse on institutionalized racism, truth and reconciliation, residential schools as well as calls for justice and accountability by various social movements, there continues to be immense resistance to change. A hard truth is—without the participation of white folks en masse—taking up and taking on the responsibility and accountability to comprehensively self-educate, fully acknowledge and address the unjustness and violence of racialized inequities, little meaningful change will manifest systemically, in policy or practice. Along with so many Indigenous peoples and people of colour, many more white people need to invest, personally and collectively, in cognitive, social and systemic subverting, reframing and transformation.

Becoming cognizant of what needs to change and caring about equity as well as social and institutional change is not enough. We all need to do the personal work, the self-educating as well as the deep and reflective ethical and emotional labour that nourishes and supports transformative change. Without this gathering and processing, without this integration toward embodiment, equality will continue to evolve so languorously that most of us alive today will never get the chance to witness nor experience it all-embracingly.

Part II is forthcoming in Fabiola’s collection of essays, Living Out Loud: Ecologies of Connection, Decolonizing & Telling It.

*Brief definitions/context:

*white people—I am using the term white people in relation to those racialized as such via historical and contemporary processes of racism, colonialism and imperialism. It should be noted that constructs and dynamics of whiteness are informed and impacted intersectionally and intergenerationally in relation to social location, including but not limited to geo-historical, legal, religious, regional, cultural, economic and socio-political factors. White privilege and entitlements of whiteness are thus to be considered contextually, whether on Turtle Island or Abya Yala, Africa, Europe, etc.

*white privilege—This is a widely accepted term, concept and reality. I articulate white privilege as a state and way of being, whether conscious or unconscious, that engenders and often exudes a sense of and systemic access to privileges, benefits, entitlements and advantages—based on whiteness—afforded to white people over others in a given society. White privilege and how it manifests can be understood within diverse geo-historical, colonial, cultural, regional and contemporary terms and processes that support systemic entrenchment of racialized inequity, selectivity and exclusion. Although some use the terms white privilege and white-skin privilege interchangeably, for the reasons stated herein as well as others, I do not.

*white privilege protectionism—I coined this term to refer to the conscious and unconscious ways white people protect their sanctioned privilege, access, benefits, advantages and rights. These entitlements are designated and secured systemically—thus, socially, professionally, institutionally and legally within euro-colonial, regional and geo-political contexts and dynamics. This protectionism is often embodied by way of various forms of complacency and/or complicity in social stratification and inequality. White privilege must also be considered within the context of intersectionality but this does not preclude white privilege nor white privilege protectionism.

posted July 1, 2021

Oh Canada: What Do We Care to
or What Can We Bear to Celebrate?

by Fabiola Nabil Naguib

I woke up this morning to CBC radio discussions on Canada Day. I felt an aching in my solar plexus, a grief that is palpable as well as a gratitude that words cannot reveal. I feel this many days of the year, but Canada Day always evokes and surfaces a specific and complex angst and reflection for me. This is a rare day, one of few Canada Days that I hear a diversity of Canadians speaking publicly (on the radio) about the problematics of Canada Day—celebrating the forming of a nation literally built on the backs, bodies and lands of Indigenous peoples and the exploitative, indentured and slave labour of many other communities.

As Canadians, our calendars are marked by this official public holiday. For me, this is a day (among many others) where I reflect on my deep gratitude for living on Turtle Island, ancestral, traditional, unceded and unsurrendered Indigenous lands. Simultaneously, I feel profound grief in understanding the injustices, horrors and indignities that have and continue to take place due to how this confederation, the dominion of Canada, was formed—and how it still operates.

I have thought often about what it means to be a legalized citizen of Canada, to live here and to celebrate the founding of a nation developed by way of genocide, occupation and colonization, human, land and more-than-human subjugation and seizure and all the counterparts of this annihilative process—as well as its continuity.

Looking back, I have so many memories of watching others singing the national anthem with such pride and celebrating Canada Day without recognition of how this nation was formed. I recall many occasions where I was publicly ridiculed and ostracized for not joining in collective singing of Canada’s national anthem or for not being willing to celebrate Canada Day in culturally dominant and socially sanctioned ways.

At an early age, I began reflecting on the multifacted inequities I experienced and witnessed in this country and questioned why this was occurring in all arenas of life. I already knew as a child that the country I was growing up in was haunted by deeply disturbing legacies and current-day practices largely condoned by the dominant culture and classes. Prior to being able to express this in the ways I do now, I knew this, because I experienced and observed downpressing firsthand.

Of course, I get it. I understand personally, socially and geopolitically that living in Canada is a relative privilege. But we must also consider context and intersectionality—the reality that all people living within the reified borders of Canada do not share the same access to quality of life—including and especially First Nations, Inuit and Métis peoples. When you look at what is happening around the world, it is no mystery as to why so many people want to live in Canada and appreciate living here when we do. The world is ravaged by civil wars, famine, mass bombing campaigns, brutal dictatorships, occupations, limited or no access to health care, apartheid, and so many other unjust and inhumane realities. But it is more than an infringement to celebrate a nation-state’s “birth” without context, honesty, nuance and without regard for Indigenous peoples’ histories, realities, freedoms and sovereignty.

I have always wrestled not only with the strategically reified narratives and understandings of Canada as a nation but also the complexities of migration. Because of my parent’s cognizance and their desire for me to hold awareness, I always knew that I lived on colonized Indigenous land and that I was Indigenous to another continent. I also came to understand that having to migrate to Canada was complicated for my parents. It meant different things to each of them and they both had significantly different realities upon migration—one being a displaced Indigenous person from North Africa, the other being a displaced, white European. At an early age, I began to grapple with the complexities of my Indigenous identity, diasporic location and living in a settler-colonial nation. I also came to understand how my parents fleeing to Canada represented their hope for possibilities and freedoms that they (and their children) could not access and experience in either of their home countries.

My parents were treated as undesirables, recorded as displaced persons and came to Canada as refugees. Although my parents migrated together, they came from different continents, cultures, social and geopolitical contexts. They met, fell in love, had their first child and were forced by the collusion of devastating and intersectional discrimination and socially induced lack of access and poverty to migrate. Their story, like so many people that have migrated to Canada seeking a better life, is complicated by injustice and lack of freedoms in their countries of origin that caused them to seek a life elsewhere.

Today, more than ever, I understand the complex and nuanced forms of gratitude that many individuals and diverse communities have for living in Canada. I am also cognizant of the uneven entitlements that many Canadians experience, espouse and perpetuate with their legalized citizenship and their varied relationships to complicity and complacency in the face of injustice and inequality.

Regardless of who we are, all people living in Canada have specific relationships to this nation-state and what it inequitably affords to those that live here. What is urgent to consider as Canadians (and legalized citizens of other nation-states) is a simple truth: We do not all enjoy the same rights, privileges and lived experiences within this country. This reality ensures that we all experience different emotions, thoughts and relationships to Canada Day and what Canada represents.

The nation-state of Canada echoes more than dishearteningly its Eurocentric and racist colonial history. Needless to say, the contemporary moment reverberates with this history as well as its continued entrenchment, perpetuation and impact. The continuity of lack of accountability of the Canadian government to Indigenous peoples across Canada is staggering as well as distressing. As legalized citizens of Canada (whether by birth or naturalization), it is time that more of us stand up for and affirm the urgency of truth, decolonization and reconciliation. Canadians need to consider and grapple with how much who we are in relation to the nation-state and the dominant culture alters (for instance) our access to and experience of dignity and freedom as well as what we care to or can bear to celebrate.

posted March 24, 2021

Loving-kindness:
A Utopic Ideal or Revolutionary Road Map?

by Fabiola Nabil Naguib

When I share my thoughts on loving-kindness, I receive an array of responses: expressions and comments akin to confusion, tentative or unconvinced, the ever-popular jaded eye roll or those, I admit, I most enjoy—understanding and affinity. There seem to be wide-ranging assumptions across dominant cultures, differently grounded as they may be, that correlate discussions on loving-kindness with naiveté, insincerity or as overly sentimental—just plain sappy. For me, this brings up a multitude of questions: How many of us take the time to reflect upon deeper considerations and purposes of kindness? How many of us invite ourselves to drop more deeply into loving-kindness and consideration—whether toward self or outwardly in community? How many of us generously give ourselves the space for loving contemplation, offering ourselves the time to think through and feel through how we love and how this impacts how we live each day? And how many of us consider the impacts of loving-kindness when practiced as an integrated part of daily living in our personal, social and professional contexts, with everyone, everywhere?

Loving-kindness goes far beyond politeness, and even further than common decency. It involves not only the willingness to respond to others in relation to common good, it also involves mindfulness, empathy, openness and personal response-ability. For me, loving-kindness is a constellation of feelings, thoughts and actions imbued with deep consideration and conscious intention in the ways we acknowledge and welcome connection and communication with others—whether human or more-than-human. In my experience, loving-kindness is a way of feeling, thinking and acting that, with mindful practice, can awaken with ease and sincerity, requiring no force or fakeness. This awakening and the continued deepening of this capacity can not only dramatically alter how we relate to others, it can also aid self-awareness, self-love and healing. Moreover, so often how we relate to, perceive and treat others is reflective of ecologies within—including how aware of and responsive we are to our healing and accountability.

Loving-kindness and its counterpart, depthful consideration, defy (or at least healthily counter) narrow and reductive perceptions of difference or judgement and the behaviours that often accompany them. Loving-kindness and consideration rely on our response-abilities to connectivity and relationality—acknowledging and embodying interconnection and interdependence. In this socio-cultural and ecological moment, it is urgent that we become aware (and live as if we are aware) of how our beliefs, attitudes and practices impact one another and the web of life, in obvious and unseen ways.

The practice of loving-kindness does not mean we must accept or tolerate behaviours of others that are thoughtless, unkind or harmful. Instead, it can inspire the most loving in ourselves while inviting the most loving presence in others. We are not required to be perfect, to live up to an ideal. There is always room to falter, learn and reground ourselves—I am personally grateful for this. Extending an ecology of spaciousness, activated loving-kindness also involves releasing control and expectation as to how others will perceive us and how they may respond—not in our hands. This approach can aid us in responding from more expansive aspects of ourselves. The invitation is to consciously practice mindfulness, curiosity, generosity, compassion and care in how we relate, how we live and love, not to be a superhuman. This process can reveal avenues for connection and growth as well as emotional, mental, personal and communal flourishing.

Yes, stretching and reaching inwardly and outwardly requires willingness and courage—we may not always like what we see/feel/experience in ourselves and others. The sad reality is that the majority of people on the planet live within complicit and complacent socio-cultural and political-economic contexts that perpetuate multiplicities of harm (yes, including “the West”). These deeply rooted conventions of harm normalize specific behaviours and justifications for them, never mind flat-out denials of harm-doing (and denials of harm-seeing). Living in environments where inequalities and other injustices secure access, freedoms and privileges for some that others cannot share in often desensitizes people en masse—to the realities of others as well as normalizing feelings of entitlement (whatever kind). One of the side effects of living within systemic systems of harm is how easily individuals can lose sight of the ways we cause or contribute to micro and macro harms. Behaviours in ourselves and others we may give little attention to or find permissible can deeply impact others around us and the ecosystems that we are an integral part of—whether or not we are cognizant.

For those of us that are not losing ourselves in the forgetting of cognitive dissonance (or striving for such), there is so much vitality in co-creating renewed ways of living and being that are reflective of deep collective care and connection. We can affect and collaborate in the service of uplifting ourselves and others. And, as such, the practice of loving-kindness should not be mistaken for politeness, naiveté or an avoidance of realness. On the contrary, it is a practice that challenges us to consider our choices and approaches, what we bring into being and doing. It is a practice that challenges us to be radically open and to love freely in a socialized world that is overtly dismissive of the power of love—loving deeply, especially without selectivity, hesitation or restraint.

In this short essay, I have attempted to share what the practice of loving-kindness and depthful consideration mean to me as well as a few of my entry points. I am no expert on how to be a better human. I try every day to be better, more awake, more aware, and more loving and encouraging of loving. All of us need reminders at times to deepen our reverence for the multifaceted, profound dimensions of experience that love can bring to our lives and everyone we interact with.

The pace of this cultural moment, all of its distractions, distortions and competing values often leave little room for breath and daily mindfulness, never mind self and world inquiry. Giving ourselves the time and spaciousness to probe inwardly, reflecting upon our values, what actually motivates us and how we perceive the world and others around us, can offer understandings and recognitions that are truly transformative. It is not always easy to practice the radical openness required to consciously think and act beyond our own perspectives, needs and worldviews. While this stretching may certainly not always feel comfortable or even practical, it can energize possibilities for personal growth, expanding awareness, connection, compassion and so much more. Diving into deep inner and other-regarding reflection can provide opportunities for revelation and reconfiguration, a spacious integration that can be profound and life-altering.

For me, the practice of loving-kindness and depthful consideration is not a utopic ideal of how to be in the world. It is a welcoming invitation to individual and shared response-abilities in co-creating a more beautiful, just and connected life, community and world. Loving-kindness and depthful consideration as inward and outward processes, as a daily practice, can be radically transformative—I dare say revolutionary.

posted November 14, 2020

Ruminations on Silence and Silencing:
Does the Truth Hurt or Can it Transform?

by Fabiola Nabil Naguib

As a child, out of necessity, I quickly became familiar with the intricacies of silence. By the time I was seven years of age, I was already apt at distinguishing between types of and approaches to silence, and their multiple uses. At that porous age, I understood that silence had many practical applications. For instance, silence could be compassionate or profound, used in the service of solace, sanity, rejuvenation or reflection. Silence could be just as useful in staying out of harm’s way, keeping the peace, making a point, and effective for the purpose of retaliation. Silence has been an intimate and powerful teacher in my life, elemental to understanding complex or overlapping truths, motivations and intentions, my own as well as those of others.

Alongside the spacious possibilities of silence, inviting contemplation, a sense of connection, peace and/or healing, for instance, I acknowledge the uneven, problematic and harmful uses of silence and silencing others. Silence often needs to be relinquished or exposed for the sake of harm reduction, personal or collective healing and growth, or individual and collective fairness and justice. There are also potential perils to breaking silences and challenging the social conventions and policing that support silence. So many of us know that there are consequences for disrupting the status quo in the service of truth-telling and change. This often impedes people from taking personal and public action. I often find myself engaging in internally intensive risk assessment before I speak out. This has become an automated process, a way to brace myself for a diverse array of potential blowback, despite holding on to hope for deep mutual listening, genuine exchange and meaningful change.

I understand personally how much telling it as you see it or experience it can impact emotional and physical safety as well as affect various forms of access, mobility and livelihood (among other things), in the short and long-term. In addition, there are often reactive versus reflective responses from others, such as denial, deflection and projection, popular go-tos for so many people when faced with the truths, experiences and realities of others. This seems to be especially so when sharing truths that shed light on or reveal harmful behaviors, inconsistencies, complicities and complacencies. Breaking silences is no easeful endeavour, and often fraught with anxieties and fears that are reasonable, given personal, professional and socio-political contexts.

I am ever paying attention to convenient, strategic and systemic uses of silence and silencing, and how they are employed and for what purpose. The task of silencing is big business and seems to be entrenched and perpetuated in all arenas of relationship in society. Messages and markers of this are replicated and encouraged everywhere, embedded with expectation: “silence is golden,” “don’t rock the boat,” or “the truth hurts.” Even in this cultural moment, it seems to be widely sanctioned, this idea and action of withholding personal, social and political truths, often posited as easier on ourselves and others, our families, communities, career opportunities, upward mobilities, and social acceptability and position. These socialized codes of silence and silencing that many people are programmed with from birth perpetuate silence as not only preferable but, in context, quite simply as unilaterally prudent. At times, I feel painfully disoriented by the fervent devotion that so many people still have to silence and silencing, and thus the status quo and all of the harm and inequity this entails. But have cultures around the world not been philosophizing on and professing for hundreds and, in some cases, for thousands of years wisdoms akin to “the truth shall liberate you”—and others collectively when we consider common good?

Millions of people around the world break codified silences and resist repressive silencing toward change. These efforts illuminate vital realities and injustices as well as nourish powerful alternatives for cooperation, harm reduction, just peace, sustainability and shared freedoms. Simultaneously, and on a widescale, people continue to experience and witness reactive and repercussive responses to truth-telling and action. Moments and events often cause me to think of the courage of telling it, the profundity of speaking and sharing our truths (or understandings of truths) with individuals and/or publics. What disturbs me is how doing so is still widely rendered or obfuscated as misguided, socially deviant, oversharing or threatening. In a similar vein, I witness too many of us that do speak up and out perpetuating entitlements in silencing others—shutting down or diminishing exchange or presumptively attributing “attack worthy” meaning to what could become constructive dialogue. Without the ebb and flow of open discussion and possibility (versus ridiculing debate), how can we gain insight, understanding, and create social environments that promote exchange, brave spaces and innovative collaborations for change? We need to proceed with care and consideration when engaging with the truths and perspectives of others. Otherwise, our participation as individuals contributes to collectivities that perpetuate silence and silencing, replicating impasse. Does it really matter who is doing the silencing and for what cause?

I have spent the majority of my life almost obsessed with the multifacetedness of silencing and the strategies employed to instigate and further it—dis-and-misinformation, lack of personal, political, intellectual and social honesty, integrity and responsibility. In light of this constellation of cognitive dissonance and collusion as well as my despair and exhaustion in countering it, I sometimes take telling it breaks. Like so many people, I have to choose what I speak to and counter, and how often, in order to conserve my energy and hopefulness. There are always implications of and consequences to truth-telling, profound, inspiring, unpopular or downright hostile. Regardless, telling it usually receives very visceral response, perhaps because so many people allow for things to pass that they witness, and so few people are offered the space to fully be or speak from the depth of who they are and their realities.

I am well versed on the reality that silence can be the only safe measure in some situations and many contexts. While I understand this, I cannot help asking as to when silence, and policing others in the service of silencing, became a worldwide mainstay of personal and social interaction, another way of keeping people in line, avoiding intimacies, understanding, compassion, empathy, relationality and connection. Too many of us are participating in the social sanctioning of ways of being that harm selfhood, communities and the environment. I am continuously wondering if we have become addicted to knowing as little about our authentic selves, and each other, as possible. Has lack of accountability become our default setting, relinquishing personal and social responsibilities and care?

Most people are aware that the truth is not always comfortable or comforting, and not always easy to process or to learn from. Many of us spend our lives running from truths because to face them might mean we need to change our beliefs about ourselves, and thus confront the impact we have on the lives of others and the world around us, close and far. Yes, the truth can hurt, hearing it, acknowledging it and digesting it, even when it is in the service of love, integrity, honesty or the beauty of the promise of change. The truth can also heal, restore, create community, save a life or many, offer respite, relief and solace. I believe that activated in the service of mutual regard, dignity, consideration, justice, compassion and loving-kindness, truth can transform a moment or create a movement.

For me, uninhabiting the violence of silencing, challenging silences that need to be and not participating in the silencing of others, is as revolutionary as speaking truths openly and publicly. And it will be until more of us stand in solidarity with strangers, friends, family, co-workers, colleagues, community and others that dare to speak against cultural currents of silencing and harm. As more people partake in the endeavour to speak and live individual and collective truths, as more of us are motivated by love, collective good, equality and a share in justice, peace and dignity, the more our world can transform.

posted on October 1st, 2020

Our Hearts as a Map for Change:
Notes on Heart Cognition as a Radically Divergent
Way of Knowing and Being

by Rajdeep S. Gill and Fabiola Nabil Naguib

To access this article, click here

posted September 24, 2020

Writing for My Life: Notes on Decolonizing Poetry

by Fabiola Nabil Naguib

For many in dominant literary communities the Eurocentric stance and theory on poetry (increasingly adopted worldwide) is that a poet should show, not tell. Poetry thus can inadvertently or intentionally become an exercise in word-smithery, conventionalized creative mechanics meant to dazzle (those in the “club”), often obscuring meaning and purpose for diverse collectivities. Certainly, I would like to acknowledge the multifaceted skill involved in crafting such poetry as well as the potential of enjoyment for the reader. Nevertheless, there are poets who write in alternate traditions and styles of poetry all over the world, inhabiting diverse and divergent practices and motivations for writing. Not all poetry is intended for nor requires a reader to copiously interpret, dissect or analyse. For me, “poetry is not a luxury,”* it is not a vehicle for literary, social and economic mobilities largely sanctioned for those with investment in the imperial “do’s and don’ts of writing.”

Over the course of my life, poetry has been and still is a manner of travelling within to self and world inquire, and then travelling outwardly, to write with honesty, care and radical consideration for self, individuals and collectivities, human and more-than-human. Poetry has been my personal medicine and sustenance, a way for me to write for my life. It holds the power of truth-telling, regardless of how varied truths can be. Poetry can hold the power of location, the relief of revealing and/or expelling personal and communal demons or devastation. It can reflect beauties, joys, recognitions, and so much more. Telling it, and telling it plainly and clearly, holds the power of living out loud and the potential for change-making, if only for the reader that knows they are not alone in their hopes and despairs, their resistance and resilience.

I write poetry because I cannot bear not to. I write because I have something to say; I write for myself and for others; I write for the Earth. I write with hope for change of so many kinds. I write to keep centred in my heart. I write to keep myself honest. Every time I write I am acutely aware that I am writing for the right to be and thrive for myself and so many others. This stems from my personal attunement to and resonance with a deep sense of connectivity, responsibility and accountability. My poetry is not meant to conform to and perpetuate confines of literary supremacy and cultural assimilation. It is made for, and meant for, a space to breath, to be autonomous, authentic, free, and to flourish. “Poetry is not a luxury,” it is the means by which I write for my life.

*This phrase is borrowed with gratitude from “Poetry is Not a Luxury” in Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches by Audre Lorde.

Check back for new essays in the coming months.