“It’s really cool because like I say wherever you journey it’s up to you and you’re free. So we have anyone from believers and some still go to church to atheists who no longer go to church and agnostics. The common value is that we respect one another in our journeys and we don’t try to correct or rebuke or question. So it’s a very unique kind of vital community that’s being offered there.”
Read More“It started with my oldest son who was born with a visual impairment. So both my boys have a genetic visual impairment that causes blindness, so they’re legally blind, but functioning. They can’t drive cars and they’ve lived with this their entire lives since they were babies. My oldest daughter has a genetic condition that affects her mobility so sometimes she uses a wheelchair, sometimes she uses a cane and it is very much an invisible illness on other days because she’s walking. But she does have to have a handicapped spot. And having these children, and let me specify, I’m not saying being transgender is a disability, but having these kids and seeing how they navigate the world and learn to advocate for themselves, and didn’t listen to people saying, ‘No, you can’t do that.’ They tried it on their own and discovered whether they could or could not do, allowed me when Sunny at a very young age, like from the time he could walk and talk and express himself and say what he wanted to wear and what he didn’t. And he started expressing that he wanted to be a boy. I let him lead. I didn’t project any of my fears, cause I had them. My confusion, cause I certainly was confused, right? I didn’t project any of that. It was a lot of asking questions. ‘What do you mean you want to be a boy? Or what does being a boy mean to you?’ Right and like, ‘All boys don’t have short hair. So do you think having short hair means that you’re a boy?’ There’s a lot of things I had to grapple with within myself, but I recognized the whole time that it was about me.”
Read More“Understand that the most impact that you’ll be is right where you stand. So, where are you right now? And what can you do in your immediate environment to move the needle? And that there’s, everybody doesn’t have to be an organizer on the front line, everybody doesn’t have to be holding a picket sign and have their arms linked. And while that is a valuable form of resistance and that’s gotten us a lot of places. That there are a whole lot of other things that we can do, in the place that we are, that helps us all get there.”
Read More“And storytelling is actually a very important part of trauma work in and of itself. The stories we tell ourselves, about ourselves, about our trauma, about the world we live in influence the way we feel about ourselves and also the way we behave. The way we act and show up.”
Read More“So I feel, and I’ve been doing a lot of research as far as reaching out to my black friends and family and finding out. do they have a bad taste because it’s direct sales, or is it Sseko or is it the mission? What exactly is preventing them from wanting to join or be a part or be a customer of Sseko?” {Carisa Montgomery}
“Yeah Carisa when you were just talking about the solution of the problem being inviting more people to our community and being more inclusive, I’m thinking about two of the aspects of Sseko which are one of my favorite parts of being a Sseko Fellow which are our Design and our Impact Councils. So on the Design Council we get to offer our suggestions for future catalogs. A lot of the things we are making now are a direct byproduct of the suggestions that are being made in that space. And we also have an Impact and Connection Council where we talk about the best way to foster connection between the women who are involved in Sseko here in the United States and our women in East Africa.” {Taylor Trenchard}
Read More“Well I think that fashion is a way that people express themselves. So I think that when there’s this divide between not being able to find clothing you identify with, you start feeling discluded (not included), and like, not part of a society or group.”
Read MoreSalem on being conscious + aligned.
“And I’m more myself. I’m more aligned. I’m more aware of myself than I’ve ever been.”
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