The Work of Holding Space
Hi Everyone,
I wanted to remind to folks who are thinking about registering for Social Justice Stewardship that tomorrow (May 1) is the last day to register at the early bird price of $400.
Social Justice Stewardship is a two-day (June 20-21) in-person training on the relational skills needed to steward social change work over time. I’m privileged to present this training in partnership with Network for Edwork, Martha Hurwitz, and other facilitators who are in the process of confirming their participation (more news on them soon!). You can learn more and register by clicking here.
I want to take some time in this newsletter to go deeper into the idea of social justice stewardship, what I think it is, and what I think it requires.
One way I describe social justice stewardship is to say that it is the work of holding the space for social change with steadiness and intention. It is not neutral. I think it has a two-part agenda:
1) It seeks to actualize a better vision for our world.
2) It is committed to learning from the work in an ongoing way.
In other words, being a steward means that we seek to influence the work while we also seek to learn from it. And we do both of these things as we hold it.
Moreover, working deeply with social justice issues often means that we’re inviting trauma into the room. In some ways, I think you could say that the essence of social justice work in the 21st century is metabolizing the collective, globalized, generational knot of trauma that all of us are holding as a result of centuries of imperial violence.
Effective stewardship means curating spaces where the amount of awareness in the room is at least momentarily larger than the amount of trauma, so that people can be supported to see and understand one another more clearly. At least that's how I define spaciousness in this context. And I think it's a key component of stewardship.
If you’ve ever been in a situation where a community began to splinter, and it felt as if nobody was truly seeing anyone else anymore, you might have some idea about what I’m trying to say about the importance of awareness here.
The practice of stewardship is a lifelong endeavor. Training for it involves curating a degree of emotional largeness within ourselves, deepening our relationships with other stewards, and developing the skills and awareness for navigating difficult moments.
We’ll explore these ideas and many more at Bethaday Community Learning Center in Seattle on June 20-21. Click here to register.
What do you think? Are you doing stewardship work? What are your thoughts on the idea of social justice stewardship?
Send me your ideas at james.boutin@mailfence.com. I would absolutely love to hear from you.
Lots of Love,