“We will not go back to normal. Normal never was. Our pre-corona existence was never normal other than we normalized greed, inequity, exhaustion, depletion, extraction, disconnection, confusion, rage, hoarding, hate and lack. We should not long to return, my friends. We are being given the opportunity to stitch a new garment. One that fits all of humanity and nature.”—Sonya Renee Taylor
In this issue: staffing update, conservation easement update, GiveBIG May 5 & 6, and Journalists of Color on COVID-19.Click to read the issue.
COVID-19 has shaken us. It has revealed the stark inequities in the United States. It has confronted us anew with the realities of systemic racism, the nonsensical devaluing of essential farm workers and caregivers, the inhumanity of affordable housing shortages, and the cruelty of the prison industrial complex. It has reminded us that we need fresh food to live, and that vegetables grow better when fertile soil is nurtured. It has also shown us what we hold dearest: our health and the health of our loved ones. Fresh air. Clean water. Community. Being together.
Since 1972, the Whidbey Institute has explored what’s possible when we steward place, nurture community, and co-create experiences that support our best selves—individually, collectively, and in service to our shared future. Working on the leading edge of social transformation, we’ve learned so much—about power and privilege, about personal responsibility, about the ecology of collective change. Our learning journey continues.
These are times for taking stock. For engaging our grief. For dreaming big. For recognizing what we don’t want to go back to, and for nurturing what we see as possible. For bringing compassion, integrity, courage, and wholehearted commitment to the work that’s needed now.
The creative collaborations, heartfelt connections, and deep revelations that people experience at the Whidbey Institute are part of what comes next. Thank you for being in this work with us.