February’s Living A Better Life Resources
Woooooosahhhhhh
January was tough. Trump re-entered office and began undermining the rights and lives of millions of Americans. Trump’s attacks on health are particularly targeted and include:
Brazen attacks on transgender people: One executive order threatens to end gender transitions for people under the age of 19 by mandating that federal insurance programs exclude coverage for gender-affirming care. The orders have led to some medical institutions pausing care for trans patients.
Enforcing the Hyde Amendment: Such a move bars federal funds from being used to cover abortion and related health costs with minimal exceptions.
Withdrawing from the World Health Organization: This decision cuts 15 percent of the organization’s budget, hindering its ability to monitor health crises like pandemics, set international health standards, and research global public health matters.
Pausing foreign aid for 90 days and issuing stop-work orders: The work of USAID and PEPFAR, which provides HIV/AIDS care to millions of people around the world, has been upended. There are concerns that this could cause a resurgence of the disease in Africa.
Inhibiting how federal public health agencies communicate with the public: The CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, a publication series that provides timely health information to the public, is not publishing, and multiple federal government datasets have been removed from the agency’s website. (Some CDC files have been restored due to the mass outcry against this, and there’s a file of the complete datasets before January 28 on the Internet Archive.)
It’s a lot, and it’s heavy. I struggled with this edition of Living A Better Life Resources because what do you offer the public when our world continues to fracture in front of our eyes? I returned to the Black women writers and thinkers I admire for insight. Their praxis was two-fold: community and what Black Studies professor Stephanie Y. Evans calls collective self-care.
Community is the backbone for justice, and so is collective self-care, which is a recurring theme in the writings and teachings of Black women. As Evans wrote for the Harvard Divinity Bulletin:
When I started looking at Anna Julia Cooper1 and some of the elders for clues about stress management, it recalibrated how I thought about wellness in this historical context. I am not saying, ‘Well, if you just shore up your personal practice with yoga—if you just meditate—it will all be OK.’ I’m trying to understand a Black feminist approach, which is a practice of collective self-care, which you see in the narratives and life writings. Rosa Parks was not only taking yoga, she was also teaching yoga. So, this idea of self-care in the Black feminist and African feminist context is not about self and survival only. It is what Rosalyn Terborg-Penn calls African feminist values of survival and self-care in networks.
The works of Toni Morrison emphasized the significance of self-worth and self-discovery within the community framework. Audre Lorde was, perhaps, one of the most prolific in writing about the role of community and self-care on the lives of marginalized folks. In The Master’s Tools Will Never Dismantle The Master’s House, Audre Lorde notes that: “Without community, there is no liberation…but community must not mean a shedding of our differences, nor the pathetic pretense that these differences do not exist.” In A Burst of Light, Lorde wrote: “Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.” Of course, it all got me thinking about how bell hooks insisted that we choose to lead with love, grace, and understanding.
Right now, building community and taking care of yourself will be crucial. February’s Living A Better Life Resources are centered around caring for ourselves, which will, hopefully, allow us to show up for our communities as our best selves. The goal is to survive together so we can continue forward together.
Help Breastfeeding Parents Get Pumps After the LA Fires
Perifit offers a free breast milk pump to any breastfeeding parent who lost their home in the recent LA fires. Those interested can fill out this application, and the company will send them a Perifit Pump with accessories. As of publication, the pumps are still in stock.
Move Your Body Joyfully and Meaningfully
I’m a big advocate for movement that you enjoy enough to do regularly because it boosts your mood and your brain’s resilience to stressors. I’m a weight lifter because I feel profound peace and fulfillment from picking up something heavy and putting it down. It reminds me that I’m in control of how the weight moves. It’s not in control of me. Exercise is going to help promote self-care right now. If lifting weights isn’t your thing, you can opt for walking, running, yoga, or pilates, which promotes mental clarity, relieves chronic stress, and helps you feel sounder within your body. Some of my favorite fitness gurus are Nico Marie, IsaWelly, Danyele Wilson, and Benedicte King.
Take Meaningful Breaks
I’m real bad about not stepping away from the computer or putting my phone down. I’m a doom-scroller. It’s a problem. Lately, I’ve been staying off my phone for the first hour of my day and the hour before bed. When I do have my phone, I use it more thoughtfully. Instead of scrolling through TikTok or Instagram, I’ll put on an audiobook or podcast. I love Spotify for this because they include a bunch of audiobooks within the premium subscription, and the app compiles them into playlists. I’ve been pursuing Do Health Your Way and In Your Healing Era because my anxiety has been SKY HIGH lately.
If I’m not on my phone, I grab a physical book or magazine or cut on a show that isn’t about politics or health while I enjoy a cup of tea. Lately, I’ve been sipping Lipton green tea—shoutout to them for sending me a few boxes last month.
Connect With Your Breath
Breathwork can help us establish a healthier baseline. Black Girls Breathing, a new book written by Jasmine Marie, a breathwork expert and founder of a wellness company of the same name, is an invitation to heal and embrace growth, one breath at a time. Drawing from her personal experiences in the corporate world and the all too familiar physical impacts of stress, Marie emphasizes the transformative power of breathwork to help us heal and redefine success. She explains that deep, intentional breathing can reset the nervous system. Beyond the physiological benefits of breathwork, Marie’s book encourages readers to reclaim their lives with intention and joy, offering tools to face external challenges.
We certainly need that right now. I’m listening to this one on Spotify as part of my “Don’t Scroll, Listen To A Book” praxis.
In the same post, Evans explains that Anna Julia Cooper meditated and journaled daily.