Rohadi  0:05  
Episode 55. Faith in a Fresh Vibe podcast. I'm your host, Rohadi. Coming at you from treaty seven territory, Calgary, Alberta, Canada welcome. This is a podcast on decolonizing and deconstruction Christianity but we also include different topics including this one. The Enneagram, which I'm sure many of you are familiar with, but what you probably aren't familiar with is the Enneagram through an anti racist lens. Don't get your feathers in a ruffled punch. This is a liberating episode with Jessica Dickson. Not going to take up any more time to rate review. Leave five stars wherever you pick up this podcast. Let's just jump right in and meet Jessica.

Jessica  1:04  
Yeah, I call myself a life empowerment coach who helps people find healing at the intersections of the Enneagram anti racism and embodiment?

Rohadi  1:16  
Yeah. Oh, so those those two Enneagram. Yeah, I've heard of it before. And I've heard of anti racism too, but together and the embodiment piece, so I didn't even remember that I was just so excited about anti racism and the Enneagram. But embodiment Oh, that's just another factor to add into touch and feel of the Enneagram I'm so excited to learn from you. In this episode. Before we begin, let's situate ourselves for the listeners. Would you let us know where are you right now? What lands are your feet touching the ground upon?

Jessica  2:02  
Yeah, I am on the unceded Land of the Qumran nation and what is colloquially known as San Diego, California.

Rohadi  2:12  
where all of my cauliflower comes from, or San Diego is probably too far south. Do I have that right? Is San Diego cells in San Jose? North? Yes. And it's at the bottom. Yeah. Okay, good. Who you have to forgive my Canadian ignorance.

Jessica  2:32  
I have so much forgiveness.

Rohadi  2:35  
Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. Forgiveness in spades. How did you wind up in San Diego?

Jessica  2:46  
I came to San Diego in 2017. Because I used to work in higher education. So now I of course I run my own business. I'm also a fitness instructor. But before I work in higher education in Residence Life, and I was at a school in Ohio, okay, and I had an opportunity to come work at an institution in San Diego at the University of California, San Diego and I had a few video interview shoes and got offered the job and packed up my car and gave away a tonne of furniture and moved across the country.

Rohadi  3:29  
I want to jump right into the Enneagram and I would love if you started from the beginning started from the top or the bottom and assume that I know nothing about the Enneagram I think I recall being exposed to the Enneagram of the first time in 2018 when someone who was down with it was trying to pick up my numbers

Jessica  3:58  
they tried to type you didn't they?

Rohadi  4:00  
Yeah, and to help me along the way of like this might be you know like this might be what you are or so that was my first exposure to the Enneagram but I also have both an acceptance of wow there are important tools out there to help me learn more about myself and also a reticence to adopt any type of programme or computer result that tells me what I am. Tell me what I am. I'll tell me who I am. That's, that's my own trauma I got to work with but what is this?

Jessica  4:44  
I think there's an implication that there's a problem and I don't think that that's a problem.

Rohadi  4:51  
Those are wise words, just become a therapy session. Four minutes in

Jessica  4:59  
so I've been Over the anagram, when I was still in higher education, I had just become a supervisor for a full time professional staff and I was like, oh, I need to find something that's going to help them with their professional development. Because I was in my late 20s, they were in there, some of them were in there like 6070. So, you know, they were much older than me. And I felt like I wanted to be respectful of them. And so we had done things like strengths, or the Myers Briggs or true colours or a lot of those things before. Yeah. And I was like, I need something new, I need something fresh. I did a Google search. I don't know what brought me to the Enneagram. But there was just a PDF document that had a description of the types. And I was like, wow, this is powerful. Because I liked that it didn't just, it didn't just talked about the strengths. So the good things, it talks about all of it, it talked about where your ish smells, and how you need to deal with it. And I, for me, that's like, I'm like, that's a place where we can really grow from, it felt like this, this authentic place of truth that we can really look at our lives from. So I became very obsessed, started studying it just fell in love with the system. But it did take me a few years to actually find my type. So I found information about the Enneagram. And then I found a test. And I've taken several tests, many tests over 20 tests, at least since then, every test has typed to me as a type two. And so I was like, Okay, I guess I'm gonna type two. Now I would now I tell people I that I don't recommend that you take a test, I recommend that you do a lot more introspective work. But at the time, I didn't really have anyone to guide me into that. So I didn't know. So it took me two years, a lot of of work around what I thought were type two issues like codependence and an anxious attachment style. So as I was doing some of that work, and as I heard more women of colour, and women speak about being an Enneagram, eight, I started to realise that that actually was my type. Because when I first read any kind of Enneagram descriptions, the descriptions all felt like a white male, eight who had a whole lot of privilege who was violent. Yeah. Who was a bully. And I'm like, I that's not who I even could be if even if I wanted for the eight. Yeah, for the eight. No, it was always like, at a distance for me. Until I heard more women speak about it, I heard more about like the subtypes. And I was like, oh, no, no, no, I actually am an eight. But my ideal. My ideal self was very much the Enneagram, too, because for my ideal self, that was the good Christian woman. And so the Christian woman is like the one who selflessly gives of herself, who needs to be needed, who does everything by denying or repressing her own desires, wants her own needs her own feelings? And I was like, oh, that's what I'm supposed to be. That's the good Christian lady.

Rohadi  8:19  
So I have so much, that's 2s. Yeah,

Jessica  8:22  
yeah, yeah. And I had so much conditioning around. Yeah, all of my all the things, all of the who I want it to be being bad. That I was like, Oh, I'll claim to this thing that's good for the Christian church. So

Rohadi  8:36  
What do you mean bad? Hang on? Well, the things that were bad, you flush that out?

Jessica  8:43  
You know, because so the type eight the reason that it's taught, what I think it's, it sounds like a often as taught like a white male with a lot of power is because the type eight focus is, who has power, what are they doing with it? Are they wielding it? Well, there's a focus on autonomy and make me making sure that I keep my autonomy, but also making sure that I avoid being hurt. There's a focus on me being in control of my destiny and creating and having an impact in the world. And that was not really encouraged in Christian community, especially white Evangelical community. And so it was like You can serve and that's what to do to serve. Choose a dish to serve. They don't lead. Yeah. And so continue,

Rohadi  9:40  
But you can't eat right, which is like evangelicalism. You just wrapped up evangelicalism in the Enneagram.

Jessica  9:48  
Yes, a lot of women who come to the Enneagram through white evangelicalism think that they are twos at first.

Rohadi  9:57  
And there's so there's the revelation of will pop out with the social media square and be like, you're really not a tubes. Not a to

Jessica  10:06  
write it's part of and. And the reason that I don't recommend test is because often when we're testing, there's an ideal that we're holding of ourselves. And we're answering from that ideal. And it takes a good amount of self awareness, self reflection, and the ability to be vulnerable with ourselves and be real with ourselves that it takes to answer that binary test with the level of honesty. Now, tests also have bias. And so that means that the person writing it, their their description of what a type two or type eight looks like, are the people in their lives. So if they've never seen a black eight, female type eight, they don't, they don't know how to describe that they're not going to describe that accurately. At All right? They're gonna go with the people that they know. So there's inherent implicit bias within that, no doubt, as well. But also it takes something and it takes a commitment to reality. And I think that white evangelicalism requires you to suspend your relationship with reality in a lot of ways that are unhealthy or unhelpful when it comes to self awareness in any way.

Rohadi  11:24  
Who, I mean, I wouldn't even pick on evangelical I mean, sure, let's pick on evangelical me, but I think any folks, so I mean, I would assume maybe you can correct me here that the the Enneagram is relatively new and evangelical spaces, and in many, they would never adopt it. As a tool, right. White progressives have certainly jumped on board. They're out there on the Enneagram. Ship.

Jessica  11:55  
They are, they are they are on it. I remember when I, I was, you know, just being obsessed with the Enneagram. For so long. Like, I've listened to a lot of podcasts. And I remember when it was first really starting to get popular at churches, and there were all of these sermons with people preaching about the Enneagram, and how it can help you but what they weren't actually talking about the Enneagram. And I'm like, that's not what the Enneagram is, you're changing the Enneagram to make it something that you want it to be, because you feel like you're going to lose people if you don't.

Rohadi  12:34  
I tried to be,

Jessica  12:37  
um, oh, God, a lot of things. But they were just like Miss teaching what it actually is to fill an agenda, what the whole point of it was, and all, all of all of that. And it was just very like you I was so grossed out by it. I'm like, maybe like 80 grand, maybe you don't, but don't teach it as something that it's not I find so often, that when I'm speaking to people who have been in white evangelical spaces, and that's how they found the Enneagram, there is so much misinformation, and things that just aren't true or accurate about the types. And I have to be like, well, actually, that's not what the type is. And I just feel like an eighth hole. And I feel so mean cuz I'm like, I'm ruining your like, the delusion that you're in. And I'm like, but that's not what the type is. So whatever, whoever you heard that from, I'm so sorry. But that ain't it.

Rohadi  13:36  
This delusion. Yeah. So if that's you, you've encountered these aspects of what it ain't right. But what is it supposed to be doing? Yeah,

Jessica  13:47  
That's a great question. So the Enneagram it is a personality typing system. And it is, so our personality is part of our ego structure. And it gives us a sense of self and ideal about, you know, the world about who we should be in the world. We need a personality to exist, we need our ego structure, it just is what it is right? Without it, we wouldn't really function, our Enneagram type. Now, there's nine types that are distinct, but our Enneagram type is a mix of our core fears and desires. So the things that were motivated by, so fears that make us potentially not take action to avoid them coming true fears that make us move towards something else, right desires, where we, we want the things that we want, and so we will take action that is in line with those things. And those are the things that drive us now when we move away from the thing that we desire, or close to what we're fearing or when there's some kind In an existential crisis in our lives, then we also are driven to act out the reactivity of our type. And that comes through the passion, which is like an emotional energetic quality. It's the quality of the heart. When you think of passion, it's like the thing that must be faced comes from Passion of the Christ. You know what you the thing that's unavoidable within you like it is, it's, it's leading us there. There's also mental habit called the fixation that gives us mental patterns of our type. And then there's also the defence mechanism, which is kind of like, I call it like the security or bouncer of the type when when we move towards something that our type does not like that might cause us some kind of harm or be opposed to or anti, the ideal that we have. Our defence mechanism makes sure that that doesn't happen through its own specific type way. And so Enneagram ultimately, is this beautiful tool not for understanding what we do, but for understanding our why to understanding like, Okay, I might have taken this action, but I did it because as a type eight, I was making sure that you weren't even close to being able to harm me. the why behind it, it's the thing, that's the most important I see people over focusing so much on behaviour. And two types can have the same behaviour, but for very different reasons. behaviour doesn't always drive us to try. But we can look and say like, Okay, what was what was my why? Why did I do that? Like, that's what how we can use, we can look and see what we did, and then inquire and reflect around? What was our why, why did I show up like that? Why did I? Yeah, why was I mad? What were the things that were at play. So the self awareness and self reflection that the Enneagram gives us opportunity for comes from understanding our motivations. And that's also what leads us to our healing is when I can say, as a type eight that I was, I was afraid that you were going to hurt me. Because I've been hurt in ways that I don't want to experience before. And so I was guarded. And so I did these things, because I was guarded, then I can say, Okay, what protection? Do I really need? Do I need that same level of defence? Or can I let it go. Because our Enneagram type as being part of our ego structure gives us it gives us sensitivities in the world. So, you know, if I as a type 8am, avoiding vulnerability, then anything outside of me that's going to seem like a vulnerability to me, is going to be almost like amplified. And I'm going to do my everything that I can to try to avoid it. And so as I do more of my healing work, I can say, Oh, that's not like a real threat that I have to worry about. And I can say, oh, that's why I have been showing up the way that I have. And actually, that's not as adaptive. As I thought it was, it was adaptive way back when, when I was I call myself, like my pre Enneagram days, I call I say that I was a baby eight, like I was a little baby eight, just not knowing not being aware of anything. And you know, I needed those protections, then. And now I can say like, do I need the same level of protection that I used to, because we want to be protected from the things that are actually dangerous, but we don't want to walk around with our protection all the time. And that's something that I see in Christian spaces. Progressive spaces, too, is like, Well, I'm just an Enneagram, too, so I'm just gonna, so I'm just gonna, like force myself and help someone, force myself onto them. And it's like, the well that's trash. So how about you not? Because about consent? How about all these other things and you feeling like you have to be the one who helps someone has nothing to do with that other person. So you are pretending like it does, but it's all you. It's all you and it's all your desire to do what you can to make yourself seem as helpful as possible so you can get love. And part of the work of the Type Two is to actually embrace that I'm already loved, to give myself love and then to give for my over low so that I'm not grasping or manipulating people to get the love that I wish that I could that I'm not sure that I can ask for. And it keeps my relationships much more clean. Hmm, I just said a lot.

Rohadi  20:19  
But it's filling in the blanks for folks like me who are have a nascent understanding of the Enneagram, which as you're describing, it comes across as another tool or resource that can develop into a skill for the potential of healthy growth, the potential of whether you take that road to healthy growth. And, and that growth unto health is a pathway that also leads through the places you need healing. Which is an I don't know, enough to say whether or not that is a particular objective, or goal of Enneagram typing or work, is it?

Jessica  21:19  
Yeah, that's really what it's about. I think people, people get into it sometimes to just know themselves. But I all the time, I'm like, yelling at everyone, no one, no one in particular, but every one in particular, you know, like, do the work, it's not enough to just know you're tight, knowing your type is the first step, self awareness is great. And the point is to understand what your work is, so that you can do it. And then that creates more healing, more growth, and then you get more like a wider experience of who you are in the world. Like you're not, you don't get to just be like the closed off, type A, and just use my own tight, like, you don't get to be the person who keeps everyone at arm's length. You know, when you do the healing work around, okay, I'm just feeling really protected. Because I felt like, my vulnerable ability was gonna get me killed, then I can, I can do my healing work around that, so that I have more of my heart that's available for me and for the important relationships in my life. And it just gives me more access to me. Hmm,

Rohadi  22:41  
that's a word. Would you think that? Would you say that the contemporary understanding or the general understanding of Enneagram is just around that identity piece? Just get me my numbers. I want to learn more about myself, and then it sort of stops there. Is that kind of

Jessica  23:01  
That's what it feels like a lot of the time. Yeah. And, you know, one, one Enneagram teacher was like, you know, inner work is outer work. And I haven't necessarily seen that. I think that there has to be a level of intentionality. Because I think people want to know about themselves. And that's a great thing. I think when we choose to not know things about ourselves, like, being willfully ignorant is not it's not like an honourable posture. I guess it's just, um, but I see people take it all the time, especially like in Christianity easier. Yeah. Like you, like, all these people are gonna know if they know too much about each other. It's like the Tower of Babel. They're gonna try to be like, God, it's like they're gonna take over the world or Bilderberg like It's like done. It's, it's just irritating to me. And so I'm very much a we, we know ourselves because a knowing ourselves and understanding like, What color's our souls, what makes what brings us life and makes us passionate? I understand like, Those are beautiful things to understand about ourselves and do it because it impacts how we move in the world. Because we're not just individuals, we're individuals living this collective experience. Yeah, so we are people who might when I'm reactive, and I yell at someone, because I feel like I need to defend myself even when maybe my nervous system is just really sensitive and they weren't a real threat to me, I have to be able to take responsibility for that. And so under so this is where the behaviour part comes in, because our behaviour points to what we need to take accountability around But the understanding the motivations underneath the behaviour point as to what we need the healing around. Hmm. And those are two parts of the process. But they're distinct parts of the process. So one is like, Okay, I need to reconcile and be accountable for the ways that I showed up and the ways that were maybe hurtful for other people, or ways that even diminished myself because of out of fear. And not that there's anything wrong with that, when we're when we're afraid when we feel like we need to be protected. I think it's better to protect ourselves. But what the Enneagram gives us is the chance to see as I don't actually need to be as protected all the time as I am. So why am I choosing this level? This thickness of defence? And that's where we get to say, oh, okay, no, I get to, I get to show more of my heart. You know, for the type eight, our hearts are so squishy, and tender, and like fleshy, and, you know, soft. So of course, that defence is going to be big, and you can't even get a step, don't take a step further, or I will kill you because I'm gonna protect my heart. Like, of course, that would be a very strong defence, that makes perfect sense when I think about it. And as I start to do the work, I can see like, I don't need that level of defence for where I am right now. I've needed it before. But I'm actually okay. So in what ways? Can I do the embodiment work? To actually hold myself in those times when I may feel a little bit fragile or tender? How can I give myself that love? So that I don't feel like I have to be jumping down people's throats on my mom's some of my mom's favourite. Feedback is like, Why are you jumping down my throat? I'm like, Ah, I am. But I feel like I need to protect myself. That's why.

Rohadi  27:18  
And so defence, yeah. So

Jessica  27:20  
now it's like, oh, I can, I'm much more discerning about when and to whom I show my heart to, but it's not always tucked away. It's tucked away when it needs to be. But it's not always and realise getting out of, you know, higher ed and working for myself. It comes with being an entrepreneur comes with its own challenges. But being in that predominantly white world where men, white men who were empowered didn't really know how to interact with me. Because it seemed like they felt like I was trying to take their power in some kind of way. Because as an eight, I just hold my own sense of power. Never was, but I needed to be defended, because I was being attacked regularly. Or having an opinion for being passionate about something. For not being passionate enough about something. There was always something there. Yeah,

Rohadi  28:14  
yeah.

Jessica  28:14  
There's always a new rule. Yeah, yeah. So I needed it. And I don't need it anymore the same way.

Rohadi  28:21  
Is it accurate to say that in the work that introspective work as you drop defence you are in, it's indicative you're in spaces, or you are in a place where you can live out your true self?

Jessica  28:39  
Yeah. There's like a deep self, like a, like a who, who I was made to be in like the Think of baby, I love babies. And they come and they're so precious and innocent and can't do anything for themselves. There's just, they cry, and they try to communicate with us. And we're so like, I don't know what you need, and they their gender and needs so much support. And they can't protect themselves. And they can't defend themselves. And they learn, they learn that their parents either will or won't be there to protect and defend them. And so they develop their own ways of managing expectations around that. But I think when we do our work, we're like reclaiming some of our own innocence, knowing that we and developing the trust within ourselves for ourselves, like learning like, Oh, I was maybe unprotected in my life, but now at 37 I actually, I actually can, I can protect my own self. So I can let those innocent sweet parts of myself that have that I've had, that I've hid that I've protected that I built walls around, I can actually let her out a little bit. She can be soft and sweet and cute in the world, because I am here. I 37 year old is also here to be with her. And I think that that's what our type work actually allows us to be more of that innocent, you know, sweets,

Rohadi  30:41  
That's liberation! Yeah,

Jessica  30:43  
yeah. Yeah.

Rohadi  31:02  
Well, it's so good. The story of freedom and liberation. I want more of that, you know, we need more of that. You have touched on it a couple of times here. Early on, you spoke to introspection, like, this tool is only so good, as far as you will look inside. And then there's a critique of inner work and outer work. When does the inner work? And where does the introspection become intentional work of embodiment. Because just thinking about change might be a step. But when you use the word embodiment, thoughts now turn tangible and touch and feel. And that goes beyond just thinking about change. So where and how does embodiment factor into developing skills and tools? Through the Enneagram?

Jessica  32:12  
Yeah, I think it's a massively important part of our work that we take on with intention. So when I think of embodiment, I think of a few things. One of the things that I think of is our identity, we have a body, our body holds identity, I am black, I have this beautiful brown skin, I have an afro. So when I move through the world, I'm fat, I move through the world, people are gonna look at me, and they're gonna think certain things about me, because of their own conditioning, because of whatever judgments they have, or whatever thoughts that they have. That's always going to impact whether I'm safe, whether other people feel safe because of their conditioning, or whatever. So that's one aspect of embodiment that I think is really important is understanding like, how am I bad is does this show up? The wide bodied person needs to be thinking about that, when I walk into a store? And I think that I'm asking a simple question. Am I really, is it really that simple? Or is do I need to actually think about the way that I'm showing up. So that's one aspect of embodiment. Another is, of course, our nervous system. Our nervous system is patterned by many things. It's patterned by our own trauma. It's patterned by vicarious trauma. It's patterned by intergenerational trauma, you know, our nervous systems, like get trauma from our ancestors. So that we can be protected from the same from the things that they were hurt by. And it's, it's patterned by the sensitivities of our Enneagram type, which is why it's important to know, what are the core fears and desires of our Enneagram type. Because if I don't know that I, you know, have this fear of being controlled. Then when I'm controlling and that devolves into me being controlling, I'm not going to be able to take the same level of responsibility for it, or or soothe my nervous system. And there's that other part of embodiment which is one is just understanding how our nervous systems are pattern. But then the next is like actually doing the work. So when I'm triggered, what do I do? Do I have the tools to actually come and soothe myself when I noticed that I'm in an Enneagram eight trigger now are nervous systems and the ways that they're patterned by privilege. And marginalisation is so important. And this is where the anti racism thing comes in. Yeah, okay, because our socialisation starts before we're born, right? We're born into these systems. Some of us are born into a system in which we are going to internalise privilege. And some of us are born into a system in which we are going to be marginalised and oppressed, on a systemic level, throughout our throughout our lives. And that means our nervous systems have a certain level of safety, people who are white and have privilege and are socialised into whiteness. Now, one of the characteristics of whiteness is a conflict aversion. So, a white person with privilege, who's privileged might be under question. Now they've already internalised advantage because of their privilege. So then the next thing is, you're challenging me and I want to avoid the conflict. So how does that show up in a fight response, for example. Because now, if I've internalised privilege, and it lands at this pre verbal level, when we're socialised, the things that were socialised. They land below the level of language. So often we don't, the power of the Enneagram, the power of doing anti racism work is being able to name things. Because our language, the language that we have shapes our reality. That's why people who speak multiple languages have live in multiple worlds, and are able to see the world in very different ways because of the language. So our language, language that we have for things is so so important. And so if we understand, you know, if I'm a person who has a lot of privilege, and I understand that, the way that I internalise it that if someone threatens, if I feel threatened, like someone is threatening that, because now I've internalised that as part of my sense of self, and pre verbally, it's then part of my sense of who I need to be to survive, then that's actually my work to do. Not someone else's. So in those spaces, like the wide bodied person, the male bodied person, there is a responsibility to say, Oh, that's my privilege being triggered. I actually am safe. I actually can have this conversation actually don't need to fight. But I do need to hold myself. Because I have so much, so many years, so much time that I have been conditioned to think that if someone is having this conversation, that it means I'm going to lose my life.

Rohadi  38:05  
I mean, you're basically describing when, when it comes to anti racism work, what all white people need to do. It's like you're just retelling a story that we all know, for. Black and brown folks already know. Now you are actually pulling this tool into a place that might, it might be another tool to match where folks, white folks specifically are having that dissonance happened within their body. Gosh, I can't imagine. I mean, I'm making a statement here. A sweeping generalisation. But there's not a lot of white folks that have developed that introspective skill, to be alert of what is happening in their body surrounding the press against white privilege or whiteness.

Jessica  39:04  
This is why this work is so needed on a large scale. Because it's so important that white people are able to get the language to do the work. This is the work cuz a lot I mean, you know, the the pseudo white awakening or whatever we're calling it of 2020

Rohadi  39:24  
The white awakening Dang, the pseudo white awakening. Were that is that a thing? Where did where did you get? That must be a thing from

Speaker 2  39:36  
just like, you know, people were like, oh, yeah, interventionism. Like they were like, Oh, I have oh, I got some other priorities I gotta deal with so

Rohadi  39:49  
Where did you all go? Disappeared real quick. Yeah, dang.

Speaker 2  39:55  
Yeah. But with that, you know, like people weren't getting a lot of intellectual education. And one of the things that I hold, and I believe is that until our nervous systems know something is true, it does not matter what we know, intellectually. We can know a whole

Rohadi  40:11  
until Hold up, hold up until our nervous system knows it is true. What was the final part?

Speaker 2  40:19  
Until our nervous systems know we won't actually change. And that's the that's the point. Because who, because we can know so much intellectually, things can make perfect sense to us, they can be logical to us. But our nervous system is still here, like, oh, that's, that's actually not part of my survival. That's not part of what my nervous system knows to survive. So then we get to teach our nervous systems. Hey, buddy. I like to think of the nervous system like its own thing that we get to interact with. Because I think it's it's important to see it as something that we get to impact in our nervous system is just always functioning. It's always just scanning to make sure we're safe, to scanning to make sure that there's no impending harm. And so that's it's always on the on the prowl, it's always working. It's always doing its thing. And if we know something intellectually, but we have not embodied it, we have not healed our nervous system. We have not said, Oh, but I have that when, when when I have a reaction. Oh, I have this other thing that's happening. Yeah, yeah. And we can tell by our trauma responses, and we can tell by the reactivity of our Enneagram type when we feel challenged.

Rohadi  41:44  
Yeah, yeah, you can, you can feel it. But you have to have the alertness develop that skill. And I'll speak to only myself as someone who, I don't know if this is cultural, being male, but of not cultivating those skills of being able to listen and respond to what is happening in your body. I still have problems with that. And that the body's moving too fast for my mind to catch up to explain what is happening. You know, and this is only something that I can address if I continue the introspective embodied work to figure out what's going on. And if I don't, then, like even Rohadi from a year ago, like DC, that kind of what a tool, what was he doing, and he had not figured out the way to respond to his nervous system, but not merely as as this response of survival. But on the other end of that, as you speak, on on survival, and, and the connection to our nervous system, and its responses, it the healing part, when we mix the healing part in it. That's where the liberation comes from, not to use my own story. Now go back to as you were sharing on white folks, white folks need to be free from the shackles of the system that are pulling them down as well.

Jessica  43:18  
Yes. Because whiteness is inherently dis embodying whiteness as we know it. Because if we, you know, our nervous systems, and our sense of self is connected individualism is just something. It's a characteristic of whiteness that has kept white people thinking that they're all alone, that they're just themselves that they're not really part of a group like what does I mean, I guess why, but what does that really mean? You know, I hear that I hear

Rohadi  43:48  
Yeah, it's an eraser. It's an

Jessica  43:50  
eraser of their own souls, but they don't realise it.

Rohadi  43:54  
Because it came with a little glimpse of power and privilege at least. But at that taste comes at the expense of black and brown and marginalised bodies.

Jessica  44:06  
Right, good. Right, right. Exactly. Exactly. And so named, the reclamation of the body, you know, I, part of part of what I really think embodiment is as well as like, Do you acknowledge your body, I so many white people see their body as like, something that they kind of use to just get things done, but not necessarily as part of who they are. And I'm very much one for body. I'm very much for body love, body positivity, but I will if you just start with body acknowledgement, I have a body this is how my body impacts the world. This is how I move through the world because of my body. These are opportunities that I have. These are opportunities I don't have, like getting clear about all those things, is an important part of our embodiment. And if we truly say that we that black lives matter how Can you say that if you hate your body, if you're at war with your body? Like, how is that? And how does that have integrity? I don't understand how that has integrity, and no one has been able to answer. And I would love an answer if anyone has one. Like, how can you truly say that if you hate yourself, otherwise, it's just a projection? Can we say that we really love from a projection, I'm not sure.

Rohadi  45:25  
That's formative. This is so good, oh, this is so good. This is a cultural formation that's happening here in all of its intersections of how, and I'll pick on us for a second here, us being Christians, and that we have figured out maybe the ideas of love, usually just in our head, because it lacks the embodiment of what that love looks like in practice. But when it comes to our body, we have forgotten to love ourselves. We can't love others, we can't even love ourselves, we don't know how to love ourselves, we've been formed in in Christian teachings and spiritual formation of how to ignore thyself or Deny thy self rather than to love ourselves. And for you to connect all those pieces into you don't even think about how you're going to love your neighbour, or love marginalised folks, or do well in those things unto justice and liberation, until you have the pieces together, of, of even seeing yourself. And of course, not to divorce the individual. But to wrap it all the way around to the front, as you shared how the individual is an individual, but one in a collective in community. And that is the place where we need to find and build our collective liberation. You have a book here, there's all these pieces to this incredible book that then people can buy, and just read and not embodied. But at least they bought the luck. You know, say, this is like, you got all the answers, you got three steps here. Just give me the book, and we'll talk about it in our book study. And away we go. It'll be hot. All the embodiment books right now are hot too, as well. So I mean, there's something here, and this is actually what gives me quite a bit of hope, both in and, boy, the work that you are doing, but also there seems to be a cultural shift happening amongst a lot of different folks across the spectrum, who are curious and are doing the necessary work of embodiment. We need to bring down socially society to bring down the barriers so that that exercise is not merely one that privileged folks, you know, folks who can afford a therapist, folks who, who need the help can get the help. We need to figure out how to drop those barriers. But I kind of have a sense of of hope that's Advent right now, this probably won't come out during Advent but a sense of hope that there is a shift culturally happening where we're starting to make sense that we're not disembodied people, rather like Christ as the incarnate Christ. We are blood and flesh people who desire to be free and whole. In community. Yes. Like give me give me that Christiane? Yes. And I think we'll, we might be alright. You have hope? Or like, how are you feeling with? What is your body saying, when it comes to the work is specifically your work around, however, the embodiment piece on to healing, and also the anti racism piece on to freedom?

Jessica  49:18  
I have hope. I have so much hope. I see my clients. I've worked with a few clients for maybe almost two years, or I started my business in 2020. So some have been with me kind of near the beginning. And we we still work together even on an individual level or at the group level. And I see the how different their lives are. Yeah. And it's potent and it's so powerful. And it's like, we couldn't the question the conversation that we're having today, like we couldn't have had had six months ago or, you know, a year ago, a year and a half ago, but we are they, they are doing the deep work. And it is a gift. It is a gift to the world, it's a gift to the people in their lives. It's beautiful. And so I don't always love being an entrepreneur, like the entrepreneur parts of it, where I'm like, I gotta, you know, I got to do a pose or I got to do all these other things while in LA, but the worst salary Oh, I have not experienced much like it sounds life the beauty of someone who was able to say, oh, yeah, that is privileged. That is my privilege. Okay, what am I gonna do with it and to take action it's a wow, it's it's beautiful.

Rohadi  51:04  
Anything that we didn't cover, you want to give a shout out to our

Jessica  51:12  
let me check in with myself.

I think the most important thing that I want to leave with is that everyone would know that this work comes from a place of you already being whole of you already having value that cannot be diminished. And coming from that place where shame doesn't become who we are, it just becomes an experience or emotion that we move through that we deal with, that we move on from that allows us to understand that we felt it because we cared about people, we want it to be seen in a good way. And that's just part of being human. This reclamation of our humanity. It comes from us already being whole. It doesn't come from us needing to fix a part of ourselves, but to reclaim a part of ourselves that has been taken for the acquisition of power sometimes for status at times. But that we get to be whole coming from that we already are and reclaiming ourselves. And it doesn't come from I have to fix myself or none of that, to me, actually leads to lasting change.

Rohadi  52:53  
You offered us so many life giving words. So thank you for being here. Where can folks find you? Yeah.

Speaker 2  53:03  
Probably the best place to find me is my Instagram Jessica D. Dickson coaching, or Jessica D. Dickson. You get a little bit more of my personal spice on the non coaching one which is awesome. And so I have a group programme called lifelong vulnerability. That's a six month group programme. I enrol that every quarter. In 2023, I have a series of workshops called Living liberation. And so that's an opportunity if you really want to do the work. It's part learning art practice, in within community