Spiritual Activism: A New Frame For Social Change

Several years ago, I had a girlfriend with a history as a direct action activist. The cause deepest to her heart was animal rights, and she had spent many hours screaming into a bullhorn, “Your mother kills puppies,” at the homes of employees of huge companies that tortured animals for mascara testing.

Her stories moved me, the passion and dedication to creating change – not just in terms of breaking into factory farms to release chickens, but in a greater mission to fight sexism, racism, capitalism, and homophobia – to end animal and human suffering. My girlfriend woke me up to social justice at a time when I was losing my cisgender privilege. This brought into sharp relief the safety net of privileges I still had — race, class, education, national origin, maleness/masculinity — that many other trans folks did not.

With this awareness came a large amount of self-judgment. Why wasn’t I out there in the streets screaming and fighting for the welfare of my people? In retrospect, I can list a few reasons: escapism from myself (my constant self-judgments and my general unease) required a lot of energy; direct action was not a model that personally resonated with me; and I had yet to reframe some of the work I was already doing (through writing) as a positive contribution.

What I did have was the start of a yoga practice, and a Sanskrit phrase I learned in one of my very first classes: Lokah Somastah Sukhino Bhavantu, which loosely translates as “May all beings be happy and free.” These few words made a strong impact on me; they held space, a care and inclusion, for everyone (including the mother who kills puppies). I wasn’t sure what to do with this phrase, would only later discover the power of a mantra, but this offered my first hint that there was an entry into activism that did not require a bullhorn.

The definition and associations of “activism” was the very first thing we discussed in a 3-day workshop centered around Karma Yoga that I attended one year ago. A controversial Malcolm Gladwell article had come out at that time, praising (and rightly so) direct action protests around the civil rights movement while dismissing our current social media as a tool for powerful change. I thought of my old girlfriend who would throw around the term “slacktivist” when she wasn’t out in the streets. I realized how much resistance I had to expanding my definition of activism beyond direct action.

In this workshop, I discovered a new term. It turns out “karma” is not a curse word that means you fucked me over, now you’ll be fucked over. Karma yoga translates sometimes as “selfless service” or “yoga of action.” I think both of these definitions fall short. “Selfless” connotes a giving that exceeds receiving, an expenditure of energy without an equal replenishment of that energy. “Action” here in America is simply another excuse to kick our own asses.

I prefer to think of karma yoga as the natural result of feeling connection, an action or service born from tapping into this experience. Developing a practice (mindfulness, meditation, asana, or other)  that creates a pathway to this state is what makes service sustainable. For me, this workshop signified a paradigm shift, offering a new language to shape social change from a place that feels organic rather than hard and forced.

And still, I found myself trying to beat, convince, and argue those around me into a more trans-inclusive world. I still beat myself up for not fighting tooth and nail for trans people. Until very recently, there was something disconnected, some type of resistance still inside of me.

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A couple weeks ago, I attended the Transcending Boundaries Conference, celebrating gender, sex, sexuality and relationship diversity. A hero of mine, Kate Bornstein, delivered the keynote speech. Sitting on a stool, wearing her diesel femme duds, puffing away on an electronic cigarette, she surprised me by going off on a spiritual tangent. I had not imagined kink and polyamory going hand in hand with Pema Chodron.

The theme of the conference and the speech was Beyond the Binary, and in addressing this topic, Bornstein brought up the Tibetan term shenpa. In her brief summary of Chodron’s teaching (which I later read a bit about here), she defined this multifaceted word as “hook.” I interpreted this to be a combination of a trigger for a preconceived notion (i.e., a prejudgment or a story) followed by an attachment to that notion. Bornstein pointed out the long-haired guy with a kilt in the front row as her example – we see him and immediately think something, “hippie.” The second we attach a story to this trigger, we are hooked.

What Bornstein called for was an awareness in this moment, a mindfulness around it, a willingness to step through the judgment or story and say hello. Binaries are more than separations like man/woman, heterosexual/homosexual, monogamous/polyamorous. They almost always contain a value judgment of good/bad. Binaries are the dualities that many spiritual practices seek to dissolve.

As Bornstein said, “Hello is seeing past the binary, saying welcome into my space.” She called this a “Radical Welcoming.” And it is radical, because it means extending this greeting beyond our community, those of us transcending boundaries, to all — transforming the “fuck you” to those who hurt or trigger us into a compassionate hello. She explained this as “The Activism of Love,” and I realized then that this was the first time I’d ever heard a trans person, a major leader intimately aware of the injustices to queer folk, drive from the heart. In that moment, she mended a divide that I hadn’t known existed inside of me, merging my queer and spiritual paths.

This would be the theme for my next week, the many conversations and moments shared with queers, yogis, activists, leaders, and teachers, as I toured around the East Coast to speak at colleges. At every single event, somebody told me about their meditation, mindfulness, or yoga practice, asking what they could do to further the integration of a queer and spiritual life. I can feel a change percolating in our community, a call for an activism fueled by love rather than anger.

If this interests you, join the conversation around queer and trans yoga here. Try not to attach too much to the “yoga” part. As the admin says, “If you breathe, move, and walk a spiritual path,” you are practicing yoga. Personally, I see this as a space to build a wellness and spiritual community that is queer and trans inclusive, not exclusive; a space to focus on the specific needs for healing the queer/trans body; a space where we don’t have to protect ourselves from dominant culture and can safely let go of our grip on our identities.

Lokah Somastah Sukhino Bhavantu

If you made it this far, you may still want to chill for a bit to take it all in. Since this is my last post in my yoga series, I want to leave you with three things you can do. If we each practice these (without self-judgment) regularly, our community will transform, our power will grow.

Breathe — Inhale and Exhale. Put a reminder on your phone, a Post-it on your wall; a note in your bathroom. Don’t ever underestimate the power in the simplicity. There is magic in the breath.
Be Kind — To yourself. To those who are ignorant. To all.
Set an intention — Plant your feet, close your eyes, and place a hand on your heart. Ask yourself: If my body, my being, could be an expression of something right now, what would it be?

Nick Krieger has been blogging about yoga for OP. To read his earlier posts, click here, and here, and here. Krieger is also the author of the new memoir Nina Here Nor There: My Journey Beyond Gender.