National Mental Health Awareness Month

This is the last month of Troi’s internship with me, and she wanted the opportunity to say goodbye. It has been an honor and a privilege to share this blog space with her for the past few months. I hope she has learned at least half as much from me as I have learned from her. I look forward to witnessing her find her place in the world of social justice.  

Thank you, Troi, you are an inspiration.

See you on the journey,

Robin

As the end of the school year comes to a close, I find myself taking a breath for the first time in a while. Not having papers to write, documentaries to watch, or books to read is such a relief, and I am glad that I can enjoy the summer weather now without the commute to class. But the fact that after a whole school year, I am just now finding time to breathe, a sentiment I found my peers also shared, is very interesting considering the rhetoric in grad school around making sure that we get rest. Telling me I need to rest but assigning me multiple readings, papers, and 30+ pages of a textbook to read on top of the internship we are required to do doesn’t seem like you are fostering an environment of self-care. Now don't get me wrong, I understand that, of course, we have to do work, how else will we learn? And, I have found that my internship is very engaging and I have learned so much about my interests because of it (something I’ll reflect on later). But I have found myself over the last couple of years rolling my eyes when anyone mentions self-care, because frankly, what does that even look like? They will often say in meetings about dealing with stress that self-care is not just bubble baths and face masks; it can look like listening to music or hanging out with friends, but I find even these suggestions are not based in reality. I would love to hang out with my friends, but when all of us are working, in school, interning, dealing with family commitments, and honestly just… life, when are we supposed to hang out? I always make it a point to listen to music to calm my anxiety, but is music really a long-term form of self-care? What happens when the weight of your stress has accumulated over days, months, and years? There is no amount of bubble baths, friend hangouts, music, food, or even sleep that will counteract that. That is why, in honor of National Mental Health Awareness Month, I want to talk (rant) about the reality of self-care and the fact that if you want people to care for themselves, we are going to have to create a world in which people can consistently do that. I also want to talk about self-care within activist spaces specifically and touch on the “politics” of self-care, that is, who has the privilege of caring for themselves?

I’m sure that anyone who is reading this has been told to practice self-care at some point in their life. And if you are like me, I am sure you appreciate the sentiment, but know that your day-to-day routine probably wasn't going to change much. At orientation for my Social Work program, one of the first things that they talked about was self-care and told us to get a therapist, which I know probably doesn’t seem like a good sign for a program, but this is social work, so it makes sense. Whenever teachers or directors say that, though, I can’t help but internally scoff because I, like many others, know the reality of what it means to care for ourselves. The reality is, there is no time to take care of ourselves. Yes, it is a nice sentiment to tell your students, for example, to care for themselves, but saying that against the backdrop of assignments, tests, internships, jobs, job searches, readings, family obligations, and social obligations sets a whole different tone. You want me to take time to breathe, but I have multiple assignments due and 40+ pages of readings? And yes, I am aware, as I mentioned before, that we need assignments to some degree, but having all this stuff to do and also finding time to have a social life or work is stressful. There are simply not enough hours in the day to do all that needs to be done and also find time to rest. 

Now I won’t lie, I do try my hardest, as I am sure many people do, to find joy in all the little things, but the reality of self-care is that the ability to do that is a privilege. Self-care is a privilege that very few of us are awarded. If you look online, you will likely see many videos of people's self-care routines. They eat dinner in their nice apartment with their pet by their side, then they go take a bath in a beautiful bath tub with a bath bomb, they change into a cute pajama set, and then they do their 1,000-step skin care routine before climbing into bed with a snack and a book before finally going to sleep. Now, while the ASMR of these routines is nice, I won’t lie, who has time to do that? Yes, I am sure an influencer that is making thousands of dollars per video is going to have time to do that but the rest of us? It's dinner, shower, face routine, and then lay down doom scrolling before passing out with my phone in my hand dreading the sound of my alarm clock. I don’t think that single mothers or fathers, parents working full-time jobs, grandparents that still have to work when they should be retired, and low income families living paycheck to paycheck want to hear an influencer in a penthouse in LA tell them they need to care for themselves. And sure maybe I am picking on the influencers a bit but they are simply a perfect representation of how performative self-care has really become. As long as you look like you are relaxing then you are doing self-care. And this is why I hate it so much when jobs and schools, these literal businesses, tell you to take care of yourself. I can’t. But they know that. They know. Because the reality is only those in a certain class, whether that is economic or race or the intersections of that are able to relax. 

This is a perfect segway, if I do say so myself, into activism and what self-care looks like in that space. Self-care in the context of activism is truly a touchy subject because as I touched on before, who really gets the privilege of caring for themselves? And in activist spaces there is a specific conversation, which I have written about in my blog post for Women's History Month, around the amount of emotional and physical weight that Black women in particular carry in activist spaces. After the election there was a lot of conversation amongst Black women regarding what we were going to do next, if anything at all. After all, we heavily lifted this election with voting registration drives, educational content, community organizing, and showing up to vote in general all for nothing. One of the most common sentiments amongst us was to simply mind our business, to do nothing, and allow everyone else to take the lead for once without us doing all this labor for nothing in return. But I felt a bit unsettled by this. Not because I didn’t agree, because I did in some ways, but at the same time I thought to myself, do we have the ability to just “not do anything”? Do Black women or Black people have the privilege to just decide we are not going to get involved? As we have been seeing over the last couple of months, we really do not have that privilege to just do nothing. That is reserved for people that are not going to be disproportionately affected by these laws, restrictions, cuts, and legislations. I wish we could just sit by but how will we do that when our people are the first on the chopping block every time. Self-care may have been the motivation for this sentiment, and trust me the weight of everything is so heavy I can't blame my fellow sistas for dropping the load, but unfortunately I fear that if we drop the load no one would pick it up in our stead. Instead, they will take the lightest and easiest parts to carry, leaving behind the nuance needed to make a change, all while claiming that they are doing the best that they can. 

Earlier I asked what even is “self-care” at this point, and this is because with the internet the term has become watered down and weaponized against others. I talked about this in my writing about community last month, but people have begun to protect their peace to the point of isolation. They weaponize therapeutic language to excuse being anti-communal which is annoying enough to witness as someone with a psychology background but it is especially annoying when you watch it play out in activist spaces where people self-care themselves into a state of apathy. I know that it is hard to see all of these tragedies and injustices play out in real time, I know how much we have been desensitized to it all but the reality is it is not appropriate for an activist space to simply decide to check out completely. Yes people should have hope and joy, after all these are core tenets of activist spaces and if you are not fighting for the right of people to be happy and healthy what are you fighting for. And yes you should find time to rest and log out BUT there is a limit. Now saying that there is a limit, I understand may seem hypocritical given that I just spent the beginning of this talking about how there is no time for self-care and that we should be creating more time to care for ourselves but I also want to acknowledge the reality that we are just not there yet. You can “protect your peace” but not to the point of not fighting for it especially if you do not exist in an oppressed body. People have taken “protecting their peace” to the point of not only being anti-communal like I expressed before but also to the point of not doing anything at all. If you do nothing there will be no peace to protect at all. And that is why even though I emphasize the importance of self-care for all people because you can’t pour from an empty cup, I also want to add the nuance that self-care is not to be used as a “get out of doing emotional labor” card. 

Self-care is in and of itself a touchy subject because although we are performatively told to do it, in our current reality of living in a country where you have to work multiple jobs, have side hustles, or even if you have a full time job, work a ridiculous amount of hours a week to survive it is just not as feasible as people may make it seem. If we do not advocate for an economic system let alone a world where people are able to rest, we will implode. This culture of “I’ll rest when I’m dead” is unnatural. We are not meant to live this way, if you can even call this living. We are not meant to work and work and work and work and work and work and work until we drop. We are not meant to need side hustles and multiple streams of income. We are not meant to spend the majority of our day and lives at a job. This is not living, we are existing and that is unnatural. I don’t know what the people reading this may believe but for me I don’t believe that we were put on this earth to just robotically toil away until it is our time to leave. So I hope that people feel validated reading this, that I understand and acknowledge along with you that the way we have structured our existence is unnatural and problematic. But I also hope that people don’t take that and do what I mentioned not to do before and use self-care as an excuse to do nothing. If anything I hope that the pursuit of happiness and peace, the right to care for yourself without worrying about consequences pushes you to fight just that much more against the culture we live in. Please continue to advocate for third spaces and fight back against the urge to just fall in line. I know that it feels like a hopeless pursuit sometimes, and I won’t pretend like I don’t feel that way sometimes. But I know that there is something greater out there. I attached some articles and information about how to advocate for self-care and a more human centered culture but to conclude self-care in its current form is performative but we can turn it into something more feasible and accessible for people no matter their economic status, race, religion, gender identity, or sexuality. Find your ways to rebel and let hope, joy, and love guide your life's practice. 

Reflection on my internship with Robin

I can’t believe that this is my last blog that I am writing for Robin. When I wrote the first blog for Black History Month, I could have never imagined the doors that I would open for myself mentally. See when I was younger I was a huge writer. My sister was (and still is) an artist and I was the writer and somewhere down the line in my life, I’m not sure where I stopped writing. Perhaps it was some mental health issues or the navigating college as a first generation student, but I stopped. So when I wrote the BHM blog, I was honestly surprised that the words flowed so easily on the page that it was like I never stopped writing. I honestly am an introvert and much more quiet of a person, so I find that I am much more articulate in writing than I am orally. Writing the blog reminded me of that thing that I really enjoyed doing and was praised for a lot growing up. I forgot how much I missed it because it just hadn’t been on my mind until recently. I have to thank Robin so much for giving me this space to write and vent about the things I often just keep in my mind. I also had this fear of being perceived, given that I get a little anxious about people not liking me or my work and so the thought of “what are people going to think?” stressed me out. While I am sure there are people who disagreed with me, hearing people message Robin and talk about my work being powerful or helpful or that they needed to hear what I wrote made me more confident, though that doubt still creeps in. For anyone who read these, thank you and I am glad I could make an impact. I intend to post these writings and new ones as well as poetry and maybe short stories on substack so if you are interested in continuing to see where my writing journey goes you can follow me there @troijenea. To Robin, thank you so much for giving me this space and being a bridge to me as well as your network. I have learned so much and I have honestly unlocked a part of my interests that I forgot about. I am glad that I could share part of myself with you and your network and I hope (I know) that any intern you may take in the future will feel the same. I will still write and I am sure that we will continue to stay in community with one another. Thank you to all who read this and a HUGE thank you to Robin for the work that you do and the space that you created for me. 

P.S. If you ever want me to write for your blog again, I would be more than happy to!

Resources

Arc of White Womanhood: Lifework Session #12 - Register here

White Women, Get Ready: Disrupting Patterns of White Womanhood in Our Social Justice Movements. Join author Amanda K. Gross for an introductory session about her book, White Women, Get Ready: How Healing Post-Traumatic Mistress Syndrome Leads to an Anit-Racist Change. Inspired by Dr. Joy DeGruy's work on Post Traumatic Slave Syndrome, White Women, Get Ready tells the story of how white ladies have been groomed to uphold overlapping systems of oppression, the harmful multigenerational impact, and how we can use our unique white lady positioning to help upend these violent structures

  • Lifework Sessions are a companion to The Arc of White Womanhood, a course for those socialized white & female, concerning intersections of race and gender. You do not have to have completed The Arc or previous LW sessions.

White Affinity Group Facilitator's Course - Robin DiAngelo, PhD

May 19 – July 14, 2025

Accepting registrations for the next virtual series beginning on May 19th!

"In your antiracism efforts, have you considered starting, sponsoring, or moving forward with a White Affinity Group? It's a foundational but challenging process. That is why my colleague Amy Burtain and I have designed an online training course to support both new and seasoned facilitators. It's based on our new book: The Facilitator's Guide to White Affinity Groups.”

The People’s Institute of Survival and Beyond:  Undoing Racism/Community Organizing Workshop

Upcoming Workshops: 

THE CENTER FOR THE STUDY OF WHITE AMERICAN CULTURE (CSWAC) OFFERINGS

WELCOME TO THE MERRY, MERRY MONTH OF MAY!

Did you know that the origin of the distress call "Mayday" is a cry for help in French? "M'aidez" means "Help me!" So May Day represents a call for solidarity. Let's work it!

BREAKING NEWS:

Conference on Building Anti-Racist Multiracial Community is BACK!

This year our annual conference will be virtual. Save the date: October 17-19, 2025, noon to 6pm ET; 9am-3pm PT

See below for a recording of last year's keynote speech by CSWAC founders Dr. Charley Flint and Jeff Hitchcock, Finding New Pathways to Racial Justice.

LINK to recording.

FREE presentation at the ARCN

Lost Souls Public Memorial Project part 1 - Journey to Our True Purpose

THURS, MAY 22 | 7-8:30PM ET, 4-5:30PM PT

Learn how a small group of New Jersey citizens refused to allow New Jersey’s role in the domestic slave trade to remain hidden, exposing the part played by a powerful family that included a sitting Middlesex County Court of Pleas Judge and his plantation owner son-in-law. Beyond the family, other powerful men and women, including the governor of New Jersey, actively participated in the illegal enslavement activities. 

You will hear how the group evolved from a singular primary focus on memorialization to an expanded mission centered on the humanity of those who have come to be known as the Lost Souls, including navigating political and multicultural community engagement.

Presentation followed by Q&A.

ARCN members please use this link to learn more and sign up.

Those who are not yet members can see details and register here.

FREE presentation at the ARCN

Lost Souls Public Memorial Project part 2 - Disrupting the Silence: Power, Pedagogy, and the Lost Souls of 1818

THURS, MAY 29 | 7 - 8:30 PM ET, 4-5:30PM PT

This presentation explores how our education system continues to misrepresent and dehumanize enslaved people through curriculum and teaching practices that often center systems of power rather than the humanity of those who endured them. Drawing on critical historical scholarship and lived memory, it examines the ways in which traditional teaching reinforces narratives of passivity, invisibility, and erasure. In contrast, the Lost Souls Project offers a powerful example of how communities can reclaim the stories of the Black people stolen from New Jersey in 1818 and sold into the Deep South. Through storytelling, archival recovery, and remembrance, the project works to restore dignity and personhood to those who were denied it in both life and historical record.

This presentation calls on educators, students, families, and community members alike to take up the work of remembering and humanizing. Whether in classrooms, museums, neighborhoods, or homes, all who encounter this story are invited to challenge dehumanizing narratives, uplift the lives and legacies of the Lost Souls, and ensure that historical justice begins with how—and whom—we choose to teach. By embracing a more honest and empathetic approach to history, we can begin to undo the harm that traditional teaching has done and reimagine the future of education and memory.

Presentation followed by Q&A.

This is part 2 of a 2-part program. It is not required to attend both parts.

ARCN members please use this link to learn more and sign up.

Those who are not yet members can see details and register here. 

Robin Schlenger