How to Cope with Being Human
|
Greetings from Detroit! Hi Reader , The last time you heard from me, I was still in Ghana wondering what life might have store for me once I went home. Now here I am, 10 or so months later, happy to be in your inbox again. :) As you'll hear in my latest podcast episode, during the time that I wasn't in touch I was preoccupied with navigating my "less-than-smooth" transition to life post-sabbatical. At times I would think about the podcast or other creative work that I wanted to put out into the world; I just wasn't in a space to create it. Have you ever felt blocked - creatively or otherwise? My guess is that you have. It's just part of the human experience. To be a human being means that we have to cope with sometimes feeling blocked. So, how do we do that? Well, I coped with wanting to work on the podcast but not knowing what I wanted to say by showing up and trying to draw water from a dry well; by getting frustrated and giving up; by starting Julia Cameron's The Artist's Way. I even created an affirmation for myself: As you can see, I eventually made it to the other side to find that, as Tara Mohr foresaw in this beautiful poem, "the well was filling, the waters moving". That, too, is just part of the human experience. Happy and merry all the things, Janai NEW EPISODEBefore we’re “do-gooders” who want to change the world, we’re human beings. To be a human being means that we have to cope with our own anxieties, insecurities, and disappointments, no matter what’s going on in the world outside of our heads. To be a human being means that we live in a world that we didn't choose and that we have to cope with what author/coach Bina Patel calls “The F*ckery”: all the isms and systems and ways that humans harm other humans. How do we cope with being human —without completely succumbing to cynicism, resignation and despair? In Episode 24 “How to Cope with Being Human –Part One”, I share two of my five strategies. As you listen, I invite you to reflect on how YOU cope. I’d love to hear your strategies! * Listen on
Don't forget to rate, review, and share :-)
|
Janai Gilmore
Stay up to date on my latest podcast episodes, workshops, and random musings.
Words. A New Episode. Other Goings On. Hi Reader , Before 2025, I had a pretty fixed image of what my role in changing the world was and was not. That’s because I had a pretty fixed image of the type of person I was and was not. I was not a “go-to-a-protest” type person. I was not a “go-to-Lansing-to-advocate-to-legislators” type person. I certainly was not a "door knocking,- phone banking,- or-approaching-strangers-at-community-events-for-a- political-campaign" type person. In short, the...
a young, smiling program manager @ the office in January 2020 Hi Reader , The tension is real for many of us professional do-gooders. We want to change the world. AND we want to pay off our student loans as quickly as possible. We want to be part of the revolution. AND we want to be able to retire one day. We want to dismantle (or at least reimagine) capitalism. AND we want to be able to pay our bills. It’s common for us to hold competing (if not downright contradictory) desires like these as...
Hi Reader , The last time we met here I asked you, "Who's inspiring you to be brave and hopeful these days?" Amber Hamilton, President and CEO of the Memphis Music Initiative (MMI), is on that list for me. Her work is expansive. She leads: MMI's staff and stakeholders in the work of providing young people in Memphis access to music instruction and space for creative expression. an innovative campaign to disrupt philanthropy by modeling what it looks like to invest in Black-and brown-led...