The Art of Liberation

“What we’re reading or listening to or, rather, what we’re getting into lately is in some sense the most profound question we can ask each other.” (David Dark)

I think what I’m getting into lately is the concept of being liberated. But as I think and read and write and pray, it seems this work (if we could call it that) is more an artform than a chain breaking. The art of liberation. Or maybe it is art that liberates. I am being liberated from the throes of spiritual abuse, but also my own prisons of fear and shame and anger, by way of literature and music. 

The art of liberation blossoms when purity culture is backhoe-d out of the soil. Or when the word “bully” is spoken six years apart. The art of liberation reverberates through the flow of Sudanese American hip hop artist, Oddisee, as he tells us to “rest assure… it’s the cure.”  

He goes on to say, “I ain’t made of iron, I’m just braver than the others.” Which, in processing the impactful art of liberation, serves us well for freedom’s closest cousin is bravery. Not iron. Not indestructible. Not hard as a rock. Brave. 

All this makes me pose the question: Have you done anything brave? I’m assuming we might be even more brave than we realize… so, what is something brave you’ve done? 

I’ll wait, because, to quote David Dark again, “there’s no hope without story and without carefully practiced story-receiving abilities.”

In preparation for your response, and my receptivity, here’s what we need to do: “We need to quiet our minds long enough to hear what someone else is saying. Listen for the possibility of connection.” But wait one second and allow me to interrupt. I say (I realize I’m not listening at the moment), listen for the possibility of communion. Listen for something intertwined with the Divine and you and me, us. May our practice of “story-receiving” be enhanced by an ear (really, our entire presence) positioned in the direction of the uncharted possibility of holistic communion. Ok. Tell me, if you will, about being brave… 

*If there is no one to tell right now, write it down or share it in the quietness of the presence of God. 

My story goes like this: 

I wrote a letter, pretty much the same letter I had written six years prior, to a man with the same name. This time, after I wrote it, I sent it. This time, after I wrote it, I went to therapy. 

This time I climbed down from the high chair of my childhood, glanced through the living room window, and joined my mom in the car. We drove away, together. Surprisingly, some distorted orientation of this experience has lived in my psyche for over thirty years, and every time it replayed, I was stuck in the high chair as my mother drove away without me. Left behind. Alone. Turns out, I might just be likable, desirable, good company. 

This time I sent a letter, and snapped a dead branch off of my fruit-bearing tree. A clean break. Well, messy as shit, but snapped clean off. You see, I am a tree… rooted and growing slow. Pruned. Fertilized. I already ran from the danger of falling dead-branch debris, fled the danger, and set to walking. As my pace slowed, I found my stride along the sendero. I was progressing onward, a transformative path-walker. My feet were now dust free. Shaken and liberated. 

These feet were the messengers of good news, beautiful, for in the wake of my bravery I have been liberated. Behold, such art.