Birds, Crows, and Cracks

Evidence of Finding Our Way Back

Dear friend,

This might sound strange, but stay with me. It starts with the birds.

There are always birds outside my bedroom window. This morning, the birds were the first thing I attuned to. I listened and thought to myself: Do they sound chipper? Are they longing? Is there urgency, fear, or play?

Moments later, I wiggled my toes. Slowly at first, then picking up speed until I heard those satisfying little cracks.

This deceptively unextraordinary sequence, the birds, the toes, the cracks, is how (today at least) I know I’m fully alive. When I can’t tell you how the birds sounded, when I move through the morning without reaching for any of it, that’s when I know something in me has slipped. Because surely the birds didn’t go anywhere. I did.

I’ve been somewhere other than here.

***

Next week, I get to do something that fills me up in a unique way.

I’m teaching a module I designed for a professional certificate program for people working in higher education called Trauma-Informed Teaching and Advising. I taught it for the first time in January, and it was one of the most rewarding experiences I’ve had in a long time.

I appreciated being in a room with folx who, at different points in their careers and holding different roles, sat with parts of their own story they had never quite examined. Together, we explored the ways in which their lived experiences has informed how they lead, teach, advise, and show up for their people and communities.

I’m thankful that this kind of reflective practice in a professional context still moves me. God willing, it always will.

One of the gifts of this work, of occupying space in academia and in learning spaces more broadly, is that I get to teach and facilitate in ways that matter to me. I don’t take that lightly.

I am discerning ways to extend this work to support many of you in my community, a container outside traditional academia. Talk back to me if there’s resonance for you.

***

I am nervous every single time I share publicly. My nerves are an expression of reverence.

What I feel before I walk into any proverbial room is deep respect for the people in it, and for the fact that they said yes. They showed up. I want to honor their participation, and so I tell myself I will deliver. I do my best to rise to that standard.

At the same time, the practice of facilitation requires being attuned enough to shift when the room needs something different. That’s not me claiming to know what everyone needs. It’s me taking seriously what gets offered when someone gives you their time, their attention, and often, in the work I do, their vulnerability.

And somehow, walking back into a room of people who said yes helps. It always brings me back here.

***

I started Saturday Morning Letters five years ago because I needed connection and expression. That still remains true. Thank you for staying.

So friend, hit reply, or drop me a comment below today. Tell me how your birds have been sounding. I want to know what your version of the toes and the cracks looks like. I’d love to learn what room you’re about to walk into, or what you’ve been sitting with in the quiet of your thoughts and spirit.

I read every reply. I mean it.

Glory to Glory,
Khalia