On Hope and turning 37
Dear Good Ancestor,
Today I am celebrating my 37th birthday, and with it renewing my commitment to myself to show up for the journey of good ancestorship.
My 36th year was an incredible ride, and I am grateful to my family, friends, team members, book readers, podcast listeners and guests, supporters, and collaborators who helped make that possible. Thank you.
On the work front:
I published my first book - Me and White Supremacy - which has become an international bestseller, is being translated into many more languages, now has an accompanying Guided Journal, and has been voted as one of the best books of the year on numerous lists including Libro.fm, Waterstones, and Barnes & Noble, and is currently a Goodreads Choice Award final round nominee.
(Notably - the digital PDF Me and White Supremacy Workbook was published exactly two years ago today!).
My work has been featured on various news and media outlets, podcasts, in magazines (including British Vogue’s September ‘Activism Now’ Issue), and even in a documentary! And as I continue to work on the Young Readers’ Edition of Me and White Supremacy, I am humbled and excited to continue the journey of holding space for this work.
On the personal front:
Like every single person in the world this year, I have been processing all the thoughts and feelings of living through a global pandemic.
I am grateful that none of my immediate family have been touched by COVID-19. And that my extended family who were infected this year have now recovered. I am grateful for health and safety, and saddened that this basic human right has been denied to so many. I am simultaneously grateful for the shifts in perspectives this year has provided, while being devastated at the loss of life from a virus that we still don’t have a cure for (and the inequities of class, race, and gender that have made this pandemic even more painful than it is in and of itself).
We have undoubtedly had an unprecedented year. And while 2021 isn’t going to magically change things, we are at that time of the year where things begin to slow down, and we reflect on the year that has been. I have certainly been doing a lot of reflecting.
My last newsletter to you was back in May of this year. For various reasons, I did not have the capacity or space to write a newsletter each week. While this year brought a lot of success for my book, it also brought up a lot of conflicting and painful feelings around why the book has become such a success this year. The murder of George Floyd and the global uprising of the Black Lives Matter movement brought up so much for so many of us. And I needed to step back and take the time to feel the feelings of grief and anger that being in the spotlight because of the murder and traumatisation of Black people brought up.
I will be honest and say that I landed in a place of complete and utter hopelessness a few months ago.
Hopeless at what the world has been, what it is today, and what it will continue to be if nothing changes. I thought about all the work that so many ancestors have done to fight white supremacy, and how so much remains the same. And I questioned whether or not the work that I am doing is actually changing things.
After some time spent in that energy of hopeless however, I came to an important realisation. And that realisation was this: Despite what the world has been, and what it is today, I simply cannot afford to be hopeless.
I cannot give myself the ‘out’ of hopelessness while I still have air to breathe, and life to live. My children and my possible future descendants cannot afford for me to hopeless. And I only have one life to live, and I do not want to live it hopelessly.
With this simple yet profound realisation, I came to a decision that is now guiding my every step:
Hope must be in my every footstep.
Hope must be something that I not just wait for, but actively create - through my thoughts, beliefs and actions.
Hope, corny as it may sound, must become my practice.
Every good ancestor that we know of lived through their own times such as these (actually, much worse), and yet they kept moving forward. Perhaps it was Hope that drove them? Not the hope of 'maybe change will happen someday’, but the hope of ‘I will do everything I can do, so that change will happen one day’.
It is from this intention of Hope that I now lead.
And my Hope is about the having the courage to face the truths that need to be faced, having the resiliency to do the work that needs to be done, and having the heart to honour our full humanity as human beings who are doing our very best to get through life as individuals and as a collective.
While I may be most well-known for Me and White Supremacy, the lesser-known body of the work that gives me immense levels of hope is actually Good Ancestor Podcast.
The podcast is the space where I get to have deep and meaningful conversations with ordinary human beings who are doing extraordinary work to bring hope and change to the world. And while we’ve been on break for a few weeks now, I am excited to share that we are back with new episodes this Thursday, and two new exciting changes:
1. I’ve been blessed with an incredible new team member, Sarita González, who is my Executive Assistant and Podcast Manager.
She’ll be in your inbox this Thursday to introduce herself and share this week’s episode, and every Thursday thereafter with brand new episodes of the podcast. Sarita has been an absolute blessing to myself personally, and to our podcast team. And as a long-time Good Ancestor Podcast fan, I know she is excited to share our upcoming episodes with you. (I also wanted to take a moment to thank the other two important members of our podcast team - Vanessa Canoy and Dave Visaya - without whom we would not be able to produce this incredible show!).
2. We’ve decided to no longer do ‘seasons’ for the podcast. Instead, the podcast will now been an ongoing program that provides weekly doses of Hope through inspiring and enlightening conversations with change-makers and culture-shapers.
In addition, you’ll hear from me every Monday with weekly Letters From Layla such as this. In it I will share thoughts and reflections on race, identity, leadership, personal transformation, social change, and of course, Hope, and being a good ancestor.
And lastly, you’ll receive separate important announcements about new publications, events and features whenever relevant.
I want to thank you for being on this journey of shared humanity with me. For showing up for the work (personal and collective). And for giving me reasons to be Hopeful :)
I hope you’ll enjoy what we have in store for you with our new Good Ancestor Podcast episodes, and I can’t wait for you all to meet Sarita.
Thank you for being a good ancestor,