A social work practice of politicised embodied radical consciousness?

I am an AASW registered social worker, NSW Victim Services counsellor and community organiser, and I am struggling. I am struggling because I am seeing, feeling and sensing our collective pain. And as we collectively experience ongoing trauma from the ‘poly-crisis’ of climate collapse, transphobic hatred, mens violence against women, sexual violence, child sexual abuse, cost of living crisis, international wars, and global Genocide. I feel ethically and spiritually compelled by a commitment to the professional social work value of social justice to engage in practice that involves “politicised embodied radical consciousness”. This reflection is a kind of truth telling and an attempt to hold onto my soul and resist despair, dissociation, separation and hopelessness.

This practice means I pay attention to the often invisible power dynamics in society. How intersections of identity such as age, skin colour, weight, gender, disability, social class create ongoing harm. I am also curious about the links between distress and disease as they interface with trans generational trauma, economic hardship, poverty, systemic racism, colonisation, migration, discrimination, marginalisation, dehumanisation, war, genocide and oppression.

When I identify as “white bodied” I am placing myself on the cultural map (Saira Rao, Regina Jackson), instead of assuming ‘whiteness’ is the norm and everything else is different. I understand that in many of our bodies are the lineages of both oppressor and victim. And what we all share is how ‘white supremacist capitalist patriarchy’ (Bell Hooks) is burning us and the planet from the inside out. My personal prayer is to unwind “supremacist consciousness” (Ashira Darwish) from my nervous system, organs, mind, blood and bones, and soul.

I understand many harms are often invisible to white bodies.. how mass dissociation, social media, entertainment, and over consumption enables the comfort of the white majority to “look away”. I know that we are living in a country where the echoes of Genocide and ongoing colonisation deeply affect First Nations People. I have witnessed first hand how racism, supremacist consciousness and oppression masquerade as “protection”, imprisoning our systems of care like chains that bind up self determination and autonomy. I know this country I am sitting on, Gumbaynggirr Country… has stories, and dreaming and so much knowledge that is important for our survival. All of us.

As a community development practitioner, social worker and therapist with two decades experience in frontline services. I (no longer) believe that our Western Eurocentric clinical Psychiatric models are enough for treating the ongoing collective trauma I am witnessing in individuals and communities. Many of us are experiencing continued high levels of distress and impacts on daily functioning. There is a need to fund robust community driven LOCALISED responses to social issues like housing, healthcare, education, collective healing programs, truth telling and frameworks that encompass the entire human, body, mind and spirit.

I remain in a state of “active hope” (Joanna Macy), knowing the body is intent on healing (Ariel Giaretto) and so is the planet. I practice Dadirri (Miriam-Rose Ungunmerr)… an Indigenous healing practice that invites us to enter into a quiet, still awareness. As I practice I try to move in the world consciously, knowing my energy has an impact wherever I go. I fail at this often, as the rage inside of me, burns and burns. I remain committed to the ongoing work of not violencing the self or the other as we enter into a place of increasing global insecurity and local division. This is not easy, as addiction, workaholism, consumerism allow our nervous systems to have breaks from the bombardment of stress. Within a colonial settler entity focused on extraction of everything from our local forests to our literal attention, this feels ‘by design”.

Dadirri recognises there is a deep spring that lives inside just waiting for us to call on it as it calls on us, it waits for us always.. As a somatic therapist I know our nervous systems have a predictable mammamlian threat response and there is much somatically oriented therapists trained in models grounded in polyvagal theory and neurophysiology can share to empower people to have agency over their responses versus feeling subjected to a bombardment of flashbacks, anxiety, insomnia, shame and depression. As a therapist who integrates therapeutic touch I understand for babies and children, nuero affective touch was our first “language” and is fundamental to healthy human growth and development on every continent and capitalism is a threat to health infant and child development. Our need for caring social touch is vital for human wellness. And safe therapeutic touch continues to be pioneering work in a system that is rigidly dominated by the Eurocentric biomedical framework.

As a trauma survivor, talk therapy did not enable me to heal my trauma at the level of the body. Somatics in this way provides an alternate liberatory pathway in which the body can be invited into the dialogue, while maintaining consent, body autonomy, and empowerment. When we feel the metaphorical “boot” of supremacy and “despair” on our backs, we can invite our spines to simply straighten just 00.05%. The practice of simply standing tall and knowing our human rights and dignity are inherent freedoms that can exploited but never be taken away may be helpful. I understand without colonisation, capitalism, fragmentation and individuation we may not have ever needed the field of “somatics”. As a white bodied person who grew up in “white Australia” I understand I was also harmed by colonisation, stripped of connection to my Italian and Irish ancestry through the processes of assimilation and naturalisation.

“You gotta have that fire in your belly, it’s important, if I didn’t have that fire in my Belly, I would not have got things done”. - Joyce Clague, Proud Yaegl Elder and International Human Rights Activist.

Yaam Marraalu Ngiyaanya Gani - The Planet Earth Connects us all - Gumbaynggirr.

I must acknowledge the work Aline LaPierre, Evelyn Scott, Regina Jackson, Saira Rao, Resmaa Menakem, Peter Levine, Emilie Conrad, Prentis Hemphill, Vicky Reynolds, Bell Hooks, Uncle Micklo Jarrett, Miraim-Rose Ungunmerr, Amber Elizabeth Gray, Joyce Clague, and many others.. as well as being in the presence of my own self. My love to comrades Rataj Abdullah and Ella Dulunymi who started Gather for Gaza @palestineactiongumbaynggirr, in many ways I was losing hope in activism until I met you both….. love to the entire G4G crew. And finally my recent yarn with Uncle Al that inspired this stream of thought to emerge into coherence. I remain curious about a collectivist vision in our community here on Gumbayngirr Country… we have hard work ahead.