When I was 15 years old and a freshman in high school, I ran for Student Government Secretary. A little context: the current president recruited and encouraged me to run despite the fact that I was a White Jewish girl from a fancy neighborhood asking to represent the student populace, which was 97% Black and 65% eligible for free-and-reduced lunches.
One by one, I watched the opposition candidates take the stage, promising things outside their jurisdiction. When it was my turn, I took the mic, speech in hand, and hopped down off the stage. I proceeded to give my speech standing in front of my peers instead of on the stage above them, looking down.
I won by a landslide.
I honestly don’t know where I got the idea. Something inside compelled me.
Ever since then, and honestly before, I have felt the ground swell beneath me, butterflies dance around me, trees bend towards me when I challenge hierarchy, question assumptions, and undermine the-way-things-are-meant-to-be in honor of what I'll call, a bigger truth.
I’m not an anarchist. Order is helpful, actually essential.
When we acknowledge and honor the natural order, we feel belonging.
Examples of natural order include:
Who is older, who is younger. Who came first, who came next. Who gave, who took. Who perpetrated, who victimed.
Honoring the natural order grounds and connects us.
But humans also have the ability to impose an unnatural order. To corrupt and manipulate. To prey on vulnerability and weakness. To use their gifts for personal gain in a way that is not magnanimous.
My being is a fine barometer for this kind of manipulation.
It feels part of my soul’s contact–yes, my South Node is in Leo for my astrology lovers–to learn about manipulation and its harms.
The purpose of this learning is to envision ways of connecting and healing that are in opposition to the guru model.
I’m calling this an anti-guru space.
What is this anti-guru space, you ask?
ANTI-GURU SPACE:
In this space…no one is better than anyone else, knows more than anyone else or has the answers more than anyone else.
In this space…we encourage one another to source from within. We model for one another how to live life, led from one’s inner truth. We teach practices to remember how to listen.
In this space…we believe healing happens individually and collectively when we each align with our inner truth. The only important truth is the one inside of us.
