An invitation to hold complexity together

Can we invite expansiveness in our lives? Can we lean into the possibility that offers?

Dear friends,

We are living in truly troubling and terrible times. I don’t know how else to say it.

The election of Trump is a devastatingly disastrous blow to democracy, human rights, and fundamental freedoms. Countless women, gay and trans people, migrants, asylum seekers, refugees, Black people, Indigenous people, people of colour, and people in poverty will suffer and many, many more will die. For those of us who are north of the border in Canada, there is no doubt that a Trump presidency will mean a race to the bottom here too.

If you are feeling despair and helplessness, know that you are not alone. I’ve been going to some dark places in my mind these last few weeks and have been prone to random outbursts of inconsolable sobbing. I can’t help but feel the unbearable heaviness of this grief.

I know though that when we are operating from a place of trauma and pain and fear, we reach for the binary, for extremes and absolutes. We want simple and easy. How could we not?

But that, my dear friends, is the way of the oppressor. And we must refuse to succumb to such narrow thinking. After all, that’s what got us here in the first place.

What we need in this moment is to practice holding complexity, to practice holding multiple truths at once, and to practice sitting in the discomfort of such uncertainty.

Over the last year, I’ve found a beautiful and powerful tool to help me in this practice, called vent diagrams.

What is that, you ask? A vent diagram consists of two overlapping circles with two statements that are both true and seemingly contradictory. Unlike a Venn diagram where the overlap between two circles signifies a shared quality or characteristic, there is no such thing here. Instead, in a vent diagram, the overlapping middle is an essential tension that cannot be “solved”.

I first came across this liberating practice through Instagram at @vent_diagrams and I've been using it in many of my workshops to help communities move through the complex issues of our times. I’ve also been using it personally to process the intricacies of my own emotions and experiences. You’ll likely see me using these a lot more in the future to name the contradictions that I/we cannot (yet) solve.

As the creators E.M./Elana Eisen-Markowitz and Rachel Schragis explain, "Making vent diagrams as a practice helps us recognize and reckon with contradictions and keep imagining and acting from the intersections and overlaps. Venting is an emotional release, an outlet for our anger, frustration, despair - and as a vent enables stale, suffocating air to flow out, it allows new fresh air to cycle in and through."

Holding Grief & Gratitude

At the beginning of November, I facilitated a storytelling gathering with Living Hyphen at the Good Mourning Festival, a two-day festival at the Evergreen Brick Works dedicated to honouring the significance of mourning in public spaces. In a world where grief is often private and hidden, the Good Mourning Festival is a radical invitation to celebrate the profound communal aspects of mourning. It was exactly the kind of balm we needed during this time of such deep despair.

From the loss of our loved ones to the mourning of previous versions of ourselves, from the devastation of living through a climate crisis to the despair of witnessing multiple genocides unfold before our eyes, we know that the gradients of grief run far and wide. And for those of us who have been displaced in some way – whether voluntary or forced, on this land or from another land – our experiences may be tinged with loss in the shape of the deep distances away from our homeland, the disconnection from our ancestors, the forgetting of our mother tongues, the forgetting of our traditions and culture. At the same time, we are full of gratitude for our adopted homelands, for our triumphs, and for our everyday existence.

We welcomed all of these experiences of grief and gratitude and took a “yes, and…” approach to our emotions and experiences. We also invited our community to engage with vent diagrams and share some of the contradictions they have been working through in their own lives. What emerged was something profound, powerful, and deeply moving. I invite you to bear witness to these experiences.

Sitting in the Discomfort of Contradiction

I don’t know what the next four years will bring and truthfully, I am afraid.

And in my fear, I choose to lean ever closer to my community. In my fear, I choose to look beyond the binary. In my fear, I choose complexity and nuance.

Mathura Mahendren, a friend of mine who created the beautiful resource Dismantling the Master’s Tools, recently taught me that the word “complex” comes from the Latin word complexus. The root words of “com” means “together” and “plectere” means “to weave, to braid, to twine, to entwine”. She talks about how when we hear that something is complex, it is often to shut down a conversation. But Mathura reminds us that at its root, "that which is complex is an invitation to weave and braid together".

Can we invite expansiveness in our lives? Can we lean into the possibility that offers?

And so I ask you, what contradictions are you working through in your life right now? What multiple truths are you holding and grappling with? Share your “vents” with me! Don’t let perfection overrule you. There are no wrong answers to our experiences.

Let’s embrace the mess together.

In loving solidarity,

Justine

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What’s Happening In My World:

• I recently traveled to Bosnia & Herzegovina where I learned all about the genocide against Bosnian Muslims during the war in the 90s. I had the chance to speak to survivors about their experiences and bear witness to such important history. It is astonishing to see the parallels in the ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people. Read my thoughts here.

• Looking for community during this time of collective grief? Join Living Hyphen for our final gathering of the year on December 17 at The Theatre Centre. We have six talented storytellers who will share their stories of “Holding Grief and Gratitude”. This is a free event, RSVP now!

• Back in the summer of 2023, the Peel Art Gallery, Museum + Archives reached out to me and Living Hyphen asking if we would consider collaborating on an upcoming exhibition dedicated to telling the stories of newcomers and immigrants. I was over the moon! At Living Hyphen, we know the importance of archiving the history of our diverse communities; histories that have, all too often, gone undocumented, unheard, and untold. I'm beyond excited to share that the exhibition - Stories of Home: Finding Community and Belonging in Peel - is now open for public viewing. Learn more about the exhibition and visit soon!

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