There is something new emerging after a long period of healing. I’ve changed and find that my friendships and support systems have also changed, for the better. There is kindness at the heart of my relationships with people that share my values.
When people share your values, identity becomes something that matters much less. After many years spent seeking people that share my identities, especially as an Indian lesbian, I found myself feeling more isolated than ever.
In the years of solitude and healing, I developed a new relationship with myself and self-compassion that helped me to much better identify who my people are. It feels good to be with them, which may sound simple, but before I really knew how my body felt, I tended to move towards people that were not always healthy for me.
Choosing people, work and things that feel good and healthy has also led to re-writing my story. After almost 15 years telling a trauma story in the media and that then becoming my job, I found myself in a loop of re-traumatising myself, which resulted in physical sickness.
Trauma Capitalism as I’ve been calling it has somehow become our work as speakers, campaigners, writers, artists and activists. But we are all tired of this by now and we need to find other ways to tell out stories.
It is with this spirit that I wrote my new show SOUND. Whilst this newsletter has been a place to share and tell stories that have helped me to heal, I also have wanted to arrive at a place where I experience joy from my own story. I am replenished by my story and so too are my readers and my audience.
Saturday 29th November in Shoreditch is a gathering of wonderful, kind-hearted people that share my values and also want to connect with storytelling that is joyful, celebratory, comedic and true. I hope you can join me there for what I hope will become a growing in-person space for us to connect and find our people.
I would love to see you there!
Reeta x
