Power

From Martin Luther King Jr's address to SCLC in 1967, titled "Where do we go from here?" 

"What is needed is a realization that power without love is reckless and abusive, and love without power is sentimental and anemic. Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love."

This is the King I revere & turn to-- radical King, challenging King, the King whose voice is absolutely relevant & probing.  

Yogawood is considering vibhuti during the month of January.  All of these concepts are larger than the definitions offered, but vibhuti directs us towards power.  Facilitating our own personal power as it motivates us towards meaningful contribution in our communities.  That's the piece I keep returning to-- finding the bind, letting ourselves be tethered.  Power without love can be corrupting.  Love without power is "anemic" (I LOVE that!).  Binding the two creates meaningful, meaty engagement.

I keep running across artists with conscience.  Yesterday I was among my Woodstock community of artists & radicals.  Their art pumps my blood because it inspires me.  I mentioned this in yoga this morning-- we can lift our hearts, open our spines, & find freedom in our hips through strictly anatomical cues.  Or we can respond to some sense of inspiration from art or spirituality that lets our bodies move more boldly.  I believe in art as it reaches us towards our highest selves-- that's why I've always loved folk art.  Art that tells our stories, offers us instruction, reminds us who we are.

I've come across art "for art's sake," provocative for the sake of provoking.  This pisses me off.  Untethered, ultimately, this type of expression devolves to self-expression & selfishness.  Bind it.  Bind the expression to something of substance.  Don't speak until there's something to say.  Express self?  Only as it illuminates the Eternal Self.  

Woodstock, NY Annual Dr. Martin Luther King Day Celebration, 2013

Thinking of this dualism I'm again thinking of King often being juxtaposed with Malcolm X.  I think that's often ill advised-- or that these two don't contrast to the degree suggested.  I always felt drawn to X because of his uncompromising fire.  During certain phases King felt too apologetic & compromising.  This morning I keep thinking of words I heard Chris Dixon speak a few years ago: "Live in this world & the world we imagine.  Fight mass incarceration & practice restorative justice.  Fighting prison expansion acknowledges the injustice of this world.  Enacting restorative justice & truly rehabilitative community practices makes prisons obsolete & speaks to the world we hope to create."  Maybe X & King needed one another.  They pushed each other, they provided accountability, & broadened the conversation.  

We are bound to one another.  In the binding, we find growth.  Power illuminated by love.  Love rooted by purposeful power.  

As a white woman, I am so grateful to the people I love who teach me about respect and accountability.  I am so grateful for an opportunity to move, with acknowledgment & memory, away from interpersonal & institutional racism & bigotry.  Bound by accountability & strengthened by the opportunity to grow into something new, something bright, & something big.