A Post-Election Care Package
Resources for rest, recharging and resilience ❤️🩹
This has been a hard week. You get it, you know. Since Tuesday, we’ve been living in a painful Deja Vu, with waves of depressing realizations crashing over us throughout the days.
The stages of grief are not linear, and I’ve been mainly ping-ponging between denial, bargaining, and depression. I haven’t quite reached acceptance yet.
The last five days have been the emotional equivalent of opening the fridge over and over again, hoping to find new food inside (a different election outcome) that just isn’t there.
I wanted to write a piece about staying creative during challenging times. Something along the “turn your broken heart into art” lines. But I just don’t have that in me yet. I can’t find the inspiration. How can I encourage others to tap into their creativity when I haven’t showered in four days? So, instead of rallying myself to find any great wisdom or guidance, I’m pulling advice, resources, and inspiration from others.
At large, this newsletter will not be a political space. I understand we cannot separate activism from creation and that it’s a privilege for me to be able to compartmentalize. Still, I’ve decided to focus my activist efforts offline and keep this forum a space for inspiration. I created it as an outlet, an escape, a playground. My work for my community will remain mostly in person, and I can discuss wallpaper, disco, and Chappell Roan’s makeup here.
That being said, the weight of this week is too much to handle and certainly too impactful to ignore. So, I’ve listed below equal parts distractions and actions. I’ve put together a little care package for you to take what you need.
This week has stirred up a lot of 2016 trauma in my body. I’ve been feeling warm anxiety coursing through my body and tightness in my chest. How much I have felt viscerally and physically has been startling. I know that it’s annoying to be told mid-anxiety attacks just to breathe or meditate, but they are go-to recommendations for a reason. Here’s a handful of recs to recenter.
This Gentle Guide to Self-Regulation by Janea Brown is amazing. She lists “a few low-medium effort things actually helped when I lost all hope.”
Jay Shetty led some meditations on his Instagram this week, and I found both of them (here and here) really helpful. 🕉️
Some resources for anyone else experiencing stress physically:
Here’s a quick nervous system regulation exercise from holistic therapist Morgan Starr-Riestis. 🧘♀️
I am finally listening to the audiobook of The Body Keeps The Score 🧚♀️
The Nervous System Reset by Jessica Maguire has also been recommended to me 💆
Open is a solid tool/app for breathwork, which can help regulate us 😮💨
This might seem a little GOOPy, but I love the vagus nerve products from Osea. I use the oil as aromatherapy when I meditate. 🧴
Healthline has a good list of 11 Podcasts for Anxiety 🎧
Tips from Refinery29 on how to rest & recover while fighting for change 🙇
Kind Things to do for Yourself by intersectional environmentalist Leah Thomas 🫶
Are you a writer feeling overwhelmed? My talented friend, author Jessie Rosen, is offering Zoom calls to help writers troubleshoot in anxious times. 👩💻
For those of you in the disassociative phase - I gotchu. Distractions are important, calories don’t exist rn, and cute animal videos are proven to increase serotonin. Whatever your distraction coping mechanism is, I’ve got some more for ya.
I stress-baked Ina Garten’s famous Barefoot Contessa Coconut Cupcakes and “Outrageous” Brownies, which were welcome distractions and yielded delicious results. 🧁
Matt and Mike, Irish Step Dancing brothers, always make me smile 👯
After John Mulaney’s SNL last weekend, we rewatched some of his older host episodes and could not stop laughing at this classic movie spoof with Kate McKinnon. 😂
omfg THIS OTTER 🦦
I’ve been taking a LOT of baths this week, and you can’t beat the classic Dr. Teals Epsom salts and foaming bath suds. 🛁
I wanna make this comforting coconut curry ramen soup. 🍜
Maxine the Queen! 🐈⬛
Some of my favorite comfort movies and where they’re streaming: Eurovision (Netflix,) Pride and Prejudice (Hulu,) About Time (Prime,) The Big Lebowski (Pluto,) Kiki’s Delivery Service (Max,) Amelie (Max,) Only You (Prime,) Galaxy Quest (Pluto,) Moulin Rouge (Peacock,) Avatar 2: The Way of Water (Disney+,) I Love You Phillip Morris (Pluto,) The Grand Budapest Hotel (Prime,) The Greatest Showman (Disney+) plus the classic shows: SATC (Max,) Gilmore Girls (Netflix,) and Mad Men (which you have to buy from Amazon but I’ve rewatched so many times its worth it.)
You’re not crazy. You’re not alone. You’re not helpless. Here are some articles, references, infographics, and books you can check out to try to make sense of things and figure out how to move forward.
From Scientific American: Election Grief is Real. Here’s How To Cope. 🪦
Mikala Jameson of Body Type on connecting with our community 🫂
An internet friend put together this list of books called “So You’re Thinking About Becoming Radicalized?” 📚
An important reminder that Rest is Resistance - a book by Tricia Hersey, founder of The Nap Ministry 🛌
Another contribution from Janea Brown, What to Read After the Election 📚
Thoughts from my amazing life coach on creating when you’re struggling to make sense of the world 🧑🎨
I’m still in despair mode. I’m not yet ready to motivate. I’m grateful to the people immediately snapping into action, pushing to ensure the president-elect’s first 100 days aren’t disastrous, but I don’t have it in me yet. I’m starting in the new year. I need to gear up first, to figure out what my approach to involvement will look like, and to commit when I’m ready. HOWEVER. I know a lot of people are prepared to channel their rage into action NOW, and I am HERE for it, here for you. If you’re one of those people answering the rallying cry, here are some jumping-off points.
Get involved in your community. Mutual Aid LA has a ton of resources (I love working with produce in the park) and if you’re based elsewhere, find an org through their online hub. (Bonus: Mutual Aid 101) 💪
This incredible video by poet, content creator & non-profit founder Lynae Vanee: Fear and destitution are what they want. But both of these things are useless. Rage, joy, and rest can all be resistance tools if used with intention. 🫖
This piece by Bess Kalb of The Grudge Report about channeling rage into tiny, helpful actions and looking to your community is perfectly on point. 📌
Rachel Cargle will always be the activist leader we don’t deserve, and her post-election carousel was another example of why. I particularly liked the social change ecosystem map and the beautiful James Baldwin clip. ✊
Cargle’s Loveland Foundation makes it it possible for Black women and girls nationally to receive therapy support.
A friend who is heavily involved in mutual aid recommended these books to get started 📚:
Mutual Aid: Building Solidarity During This Crisis (And the Next) by Dean Spade
Let This Radicalize You by Kelly E Hayes and Mariame Kaba and the accompanying workbook
Donate!! If you have the means, even $10 helps keep organizations fighting.
The ACLU is a great place to start. Their homepage currently has a full post-election spotlight on the steps and measures they’ll be taking to fight back. (I love the full-page ad they took out in the NY Times for a letter to Trump.)
NILC Immigration Justice Fund works to secure racial, economic, and social justice for low-income immigrants in this country.
Welcoming Schools is a bullying prevention program to create safety for LGBTQ+ students around the country. 🏳️🌈
Trans Equality is a trans-led nonprofit that helps the community navigate the realities of law and policy and makes sure “trans voices are not only heard, but embraced in rooms where they've long been ignored.” 🏳️⚧️
Planned Parenthood and the Center for Reproductive Rights are GEARING UP to fight against anti-abortion extremists. 🩷
The NAACP is “leading the fight to end racial inequality,” doing incredible work. 🖤
The Environmental Defense Fund is working for a “greener, healthier America,” which is more important than ever with a climate change denier in office. 🌎
Wherever you are in your post-election journey, I’m sending you love. I know we want to burn everything down, but I encourage us to build instead. To turn our destructive motivations into constructive actions. Please share this post with anyone struggling in your world, and if you have more resources, ideas, words of wisdom, links, or anything else, please share it with us here in the comments.
As for me, I’m determined to shower today.