I Will Walk With My Hand in Yours

[Note: I use the terms “women” and “men” in this post to refer to humans who identify with those terms. Because this is not all-encompassing of the spectrum that is gender – and also, for example, I am aware that trans men can bear children – I ask for your grace, patience and input while I’m learning how best to be inclusive in essays of this type. I also send deep bows of gratitude to the people who I have listened to during this time and whose wisdom has helped shape this essay.]

     Since the day the Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade, I’ve been doing my best to be present to the feelings and thoughts of the women in my life, and as empathic, I hope, as a man who can never know what it’s like can be.

     I’ve also had my own feelings: sadness, grief, guilt, anger, rage, despair, worry, compassion. As the father of daughters, blessed with many beloved women in my life, and as a human on a never-ending quest to expand my empathy for all, my heart broke for the millions and millions of women living in a country whose government now moves to control their bodies. And for the immense suffering – including, to be sure, death – that will come of this.

     As a man who for so long had only limited access to his heart, I have learned not to move too quickly into action when strong feelings arise. Feel, name, breathe, express, share, ground, tend…and sing. For me, songs are medicine: they give voice to what burns brightly within, and bring healing as I let it blow through.

     While continuing to listen to the women in my life, continuing to challenge myself to expand my empathy for women and all humans affected by this decision, and continuing to attend to my own heart, I’ve been struggling with how to respond, how to support change. As I’ve been reflecting on what I might do, I’ve seen many inspiring humans rising up: marching, calling elected officials, working on Electoral College reform, and so much more. I’ve been helping to get voters registered for crucial elections for some time now, and I’ll continue to do that (here), but the question that’s been on my mind – particularly since so much of the responsibility for the Roe v. Wade repeal rests with men in power who look like me – is this: how do I show up, how do we men show up, as allies right now? I’d like to share some thoughts, an initial call to action directed to men, and an offer of allyship in support of all women.

     This week, I read adrienne maree brown’s astonishing book, Emergent Strategy – a monumental gift not only for movement-builders, but for anyone who wishes to shape change. Her work is a towering embodiment of spiritual direction and practical guidance for individual and collective action – a profound blueprint for change in ourselves, our activism, and our world.

     In a few words, emergence is “the way complex systems and patterns arise out of a multiplicity of relatively simple interactions.” brown gives us example after example of emergence from the natural world and the adaptation, thriving, and resilence it generates. And then brown gives a ringing and resonant call to action: “How can we, future ancestors, align ourselves with the most resilient practices of the natural world as a species?” Using many examples, not only from the natural world but also the world of movement-building, brown shows how effective emergent strategy – building complex patterns and systems of change through relatively simple interactions — is in shaping change.

     I’d like to share how my still-evolving understanding of three aspects of emergent strategy –  resilience, interdependence and decentralization, and relatively simple interactions – has helped to shape my initial thoughts on how I, and perhaps other men, can respond to the Roe v. Wade repeal.

     First, resilience, as brown points out, is how we recover and transform after something bad happens. She names transformative justice, “transforming the conditions that make injustice possible,” as a core practice of resilience. What are the conditions that made the injustice of the Roe v. Wade repeal possible? Here are some: Toxicity, internal shadow, and projections in many of the men in this society who bear most of the responsibility for the domination, subjugation, and dehumanization of women. And so, what should be done? Some form of punishment, were that to be even possible? As brown notes, punitive methods have a long history of destructiveness rather than generativity.  

      Where I have begun, with myself, is compassionate yet firm self-confrontation: asking – and endeavoring to answer, truthfully – questions such as, “How have I helped to make this injustice possible? How am I perpetuating it? And what will I do with those truths?” This process of self-inquiry, self-awareness, self-reckoning, and, hopefully, self-driven transformation on the part of men is crucial to shaping change in any of the oppressive systems of our time.

     Also, I believe that men’s response to the repeal must be women-centered. In men’s process of self-confrontation, being women-centered means being driven by true empathy – feeling into the experience of women in a way that is as deeply attuned as possible, and challenging ourselves to keep expanding our hearts to meet women’s hearts. If we, as men, do not have sufficient empathy for women around the impact of a decision like the repeal, it is far too easy to ignore our role in it and perpetuate its injustice. The more we have true empathy that is received with a feeling of attunement, the better we can show up as allies. Not just understanding, in our heads, but feeling, in our hearts and in our bodies.

     But how can we, as men, have enough – or any – empathy for an experience – pregnancy and childbirth – we can never have? And for an experience – having our bodies controlled by the state – that most of us have never had? We can reach through our common humanity, yes, but that’s not enough. Men reading this: Imagine you dearly, dearly dream of becoming a biological father for the first time and sharing the joys, heartbreak, and intimacy of the parenting experience with your beloved – it’s something you yearn for more than anything. Yet the Supreme Court suddenly mandates that you get a vasectomy, it’s irreversible unless the Court one day overturns its decision, and the prospects for that are very, very bleak. Really imagine how you’d feel, as if it actually happened. Notice all the feelings that come up. Stay with them. Longer. What you’re feeling right now, although infinitesimal compared to the devastation wrought by the repeal, are feelings you can turn into empathy for women.

     In a second connection with emergent strategy, I’m deeply aligned with its focus on interdependence – “mutual reliance and shared leadership, vision,” in brown’s words – and decentralization – that we “decentralize our idea of where solutions and decisions happen, where ideas come from”— in shaping change. And, conversely, I’m appalled by not only the ineffectiveness but the frequent destructiveness of so many hierarchical, command-and-control systems in our society. In brown’s words:

“Many of us have been socialized to understand that constant growth, violent competition, and critical mass are the ways to create change. But emergence shows us that adaptation and evolution depend more upon critical, deep, and authentic connections, a thread that can be tugged for support and resilience.”

All humans are wired for connection. But who do I far more often find leading from the relational, with empathy, rootedness, and equity? Women, who have the knowledge of our interdependence uniquely in their bodies through the singular gift of being able to nurture life itself. Women, who so often know vulnerability not as weakness but as strength, a strength that creates and sustains deep connection. Women, who are intimately attuned to cycles and rhythm and who, in my experience, are far more likely to relate to our Earth not as supply house and sewer but as teacher and mother. Many of us men have a lot to learn about how to lead from the relational instead of the individualistic, from the collaborative instead of the competitive, from the heart instead of the head.

     As I see it, interdependent, authentic, collaborative relationship is central to any effective strategy to reverse the Roe v. Wade decision and meet all existential threats that we face. And so I am convinced that one of the keys – perhaps the key – to transforming any of our enormous societal problems, including restoring women’s control of their own bodies, is the exact opposite of the repeal’s dehumanization. It is, instead, elevating the feminine spirit, elevating the feminine energy, elevating women.

     We already have many extraordinary women in positions of leadership in this society, and we men should support their leadership, but we need many, many more. The massive expansion, stronger interconnections, and adaptive evolution of the collectives needed to solve our most pressing problems will require unprecedented community-building. Part of what’s needed to accomplish that is more leadership from women, which will require men to cede hierarchical power and to show up as allies, working alongside in a remaking of many of the organizational strategies we have long used to shape change.

     And, we men must also elevate the feminine in our own development: not only must we continue our ongoing process of self-confrontation, but we must listen – really listen – to women, and we must commit to a never-ending process of developing and elevating the feminine aspect – what Jung called the “anima” – of ourselves.

     Finally, brown’s “relatively simple interactions.” In her words, which she supports with many compelling examples: “what we practice at the small scale sets the pattern for the whole system.” That brings a brief story to mind. 

     I recently ended an 8-year experience with movement-building at ExtraFood after a year-long transition to my successor. As I’ve said many times, our movement has been as successful as it has been because of our consistent, collective agreement to carry community-building as one of the most dearly-held values of our movement, and, ultimately, because of the power of community.

     Here’s an example of that power. As background, our county is 85% White. Black members of our community make up about 3% of the total population, and many live in Marin City, a city founded on segregation and redlining during World War II. My experience has been that few White people in our county ever see themselves as having a reason to visit Marin City.

     One year, at ExtraFood’s annual Volunteer Appreciation event, when I walked in I saw, on one side of the crowded room, several Black women from one of our food distribution partners in Marin City. On the other side, I saw a White ExtraFood volunteer who, for years, had been delivering food for us to that organization. Just as I walked in, they saw each other from across the room, ran toward each other and hugged. For me, this was a powerful reminder that understanding, healing, and collective action so often begin two people, one relationship, at a time.

     I’m all for change at the very top of the many oppressive and destructive hierarchies in our society, and I have enormous respect and gratitude for all who are fighting those battles. But in my experience, so often transformation happens right here on the ground, in our workplace, in our relationships, in neighborhoods down the road that we’ve never visited – through an accumulation of seemingly small moments together, like running toward each other and hugging – that create systems of change.

     Those small moments deepen relationship. As much as I’m supportive of self-focused individual transformation, my experience is that there is no more powerful force for individual transformation than relationship, which I broaden to include not only relationship with human beings, but also relationship with the life that pulses in the natural world. And what is relationship but mutual connection, understanding, empathy, resonance, feeling seen and heard and known and held, and giving the same? Most of us don’t want to hurt who, and what, we love. We want those we love to thrive. It is the small moments, in relationship, that will make all the difference in our collective work to shape change.

     I am committing to examining and re-examining my personal life and my professional life, on an ongoing basis, for opportunities to elevate and empower women. For example, I can already see ways in my community singing leadership, and in my executive coaching and management consulting, that I can use my privilege, positional power, and platforms to step back and offer leadership opportunities. Relatively small opportunities built of relatively small interactions, yes; but they can build to systems of change with many, many more of us men aligned in this spirit.

     In addition, I am committing to continuing my self-confrontation process, to continue to listen – truly listen – to women, to deepen my empathy, and to continue developing the feminine aspect of myself.

     That is where I start.

     To those who identify as men who are reading this: let’s talk. Because at least in the circles I travel in, I don’t hear men talking about this much. I know I would benefit from your perspective, your insight, and your support – and I would be honored to offer mine. Email me, post comments, if there’s enough interest I’ll host Zooms, let’s figure out how to be in conversation about this. That’s the call to action. Because I certainly don’t know if the steps I’m suggesting are a fit for you, and honestly, I’m not even sure yet that they point a skillful way for me. But it’s a start, and I want to hear yours. Together, we can find our way.

     And to those who identify as women reading this, I send this song, Grateful My Hands, by the women of MaMuse, out to you, to convey my deep intention: if you’ll have me, I will walk with my hand in yours.

I will walk with my feet on the earth so sweet

I will walk with my hand in yours

For the time is right for us to unite

I will walk with my hand in yours

Grateful my hands in yours

Grateful my hands in yours

Grateful my hands in yours

Grateful my hands in yours

I will walk with my heart open wide from the start

I will walk with my hand in yours

For the time is right for us all to rise

I will walk with my hand in yours

Grateful my hands in yours

Grateful my hands in yours

Grateful my hand in yours

Grateful my hand in yours