But when we put the blame on ourselves as individuals for society’s slow pace of progress, we feel overwhelmed, and then our brains start working overtime to prevent that. That’s what leads to reactions like freezing (Frozen), or walking away (Exhausted), or even intellectualizing until the bad feelings fade.
Your part in this transformation was never about matching the magnitude of the problem: It’s about finding a way to stay in it that’s personally sustainable. Your effort matters, even though it’s never going to be enough on its own — and you can carry that tension without letting it flatten you. Learning to live with the not-knowing, the incompleteness, the years without a clean resolution, is an essential part of the work, too.
Your part in this transformation was never about matching the magnitude of the problem: It’s about finding a way to stay in it that’s personally sustainable.
This feels really meaningful to me. My disability means that I can’t often participate in the ways that I want to and I hit my capacity much faster than I feel like I should. But it really is a marathon, not a sprint.
Maybe I could say that I’m frustrated by my physical limitations even as I acknowledge that it doesn’t all fall on me.
Especially in the US, whenever you go to a protest or in person event I think you should always assume that for every “version” of somebody that is there, there are 10 other people very much like them that just didn’t have the energy, physical capacity, mental headspace and/or they were working/too existentially exhausted from work.
From that perspective the raw amount of people that shows up is only a small window into a greater potential, which is always I think what the spirit of in person protest and events should be about anyways…
Otherwise why do them?
Agreed - I don’t have any disabilities and it’s still easy to feel like I can’t participate the way I want to. I do like this quote for a little self support.