We need something more than self -care to overcome the presidency of Trump

It is difficult to maintain our well -being and mental health after we balance our every day lives, but along with Donald Trump in the White House, it appears that evidently there’s one other stressor that black women must manage.

After Trump won his offer for re-election in November, many black women in the whole country-who largely voted to prevent him from taking one other term-they were said to withdraw from protests and politics.

Self -care calls have been justified whether it’s more time for meditation and mindfulness, or just disabling the message. But before we retreat to individual silos, to escape the madness, which Trump quickly causes, it is necessary to remember how black women historically reacted to a hostile area, which is commonly done through “social care”.

Essence talked to a licensed master social employee and a professor Dr. Anna Ortega-Williams, LMSWAbout how black women can move after months and years, because Trump directly attacked civil rights and social security network programs.

Here are some ways to transcend the self -care frame of one which refers to “social welfare” to support one another.

Remember about your history

According to Ortega-Williams, these circumstances will not be recent to the black people. “If you really think about it when there was no hostile area?”

In the fight against these conditions, black people have never done this with the individual activities of “self -care”. In the black diaspora, Ortega-Williams notes: “We have always had the sense of” I’m because we’re “. We take this term from Ubuntu, so I am not without you. Part of our line and our roots is to understand that we are part of a collective. Individualism has never saved us. “

“We understand what it means to be an attack based on mass, identity at the group level [and] We wear it in the blood, “adds Ortega-Williams. “It looks like a sickle. It looks like disproportionate heart disease indicators. We understand what he does with our bodies when there is system violence. Individual concept of care is never enough. We can have personal goals as well as collective goals. Our well -being is multi -family. Personal exists within the collective, and the collective exists in a personal one. “

I do know you will not be alone

Trump’s actions inside the first two weeks of his administration – from the end of programs of diversity, justice and integration (Dei) in the federal government to freezing federal assistance (before not reproducing it), which reportedly made health care portals and other social services inaccessible – the most vital influence the sources of income and health of black employees.

The president’s attack on Dei also had a right away impact on the private sector, wherein the corporations, which once undertook to diversify, announced the immediate completion of these programs after it was sworn in. For black employees who’re released under his instructions, Ortega-Williams admits that “it may seem very painful and very isolating.”

Black professionals who could do all the “right” things to climb the corporate ladder, but now have found their work in the chopping block, they could feel confused and query their very own skills. But, Ortega-Williams notes: “When we realize that our individual damage and pain are blocking … We also see that our healing is blocking. Our activities can be blocking. “

So, after recognizing that individual self -care just isn’t enough to survive the next 4 years and later, how to discover a community?

Ortega-Willliams encourages people to take into consideration where they find kinship. “Follow your strengths and talents. Talents and strengths of everyone are needed. For example, Girl Trek is an organization in which black women said that they want to help increase the lives of black women by 10 years. It’s amazing. “

“Just start saying someone:” Hey, I need to become involved. ” [Ask yourself] “How can I exploit what I actually have for our collective good? When you ask this query, and the more you ask someone, this manner you can be connected to the network – he adds. “Ask a question and the setting will appear. It will become clear because then someone else listened to us in the world. Your intention is strengthened. Start where you are. There is always a way to connect. “

In addition to Trump, we inherited a rustic that harmed the black collection. While capitalism encourages us to be in silos, it also is determined by the myth that “someone who works hard, and then you do it, and does not take into account the gap of wealth and their roots lines derived from the free labor force used for generations. Trying [thrive] There is a recipe for burnout, “says Ortega-Willams.

Questioning these standards may start small. “How to check someone? Maybe every week we have to have a rotary pot with food in which someone’s cooking or someone is dividing. Reject these myths and instead adopt what we have seen growing up, “he says, referring to a family unit. “It was not called a further family. It’s just a family. We have these roots and it is a remembering process. “

In as of late there’s a understanding of the need to feel despair and helplessness. But, as Ortega-Willams states: “Our ancestors support us.”