Juniper: Change is Liberation

I am honored to share this conversation with my dear friend Juniper (they/them), an Afro-Indigenous Earth Worker, Medicine Keeper, and Plantarchist Witch. Juniper stewards Maroon Grove Freedom Farm which is a liberated Black space they reclaimed through reparations. They are in a process of healing their ancestors and the land along with other Black and Indigenous people. I am deeply grateful and humbled to call Juniper a beloved. 

Irina: What has been giving you life lately?

Juniper: This land. The life that is being cultivated here and the essence and embodiment of Black liberation. Walking in this path that feels really natural and right and being able to integrate in this role of “This is its own little revolution.” All the trees, all the different trees, and the different ecosystems and the swamps… it’s like all kinds of little spirits. Little animals, my dog, my chickens, they’re just so silly. They always keep us busy. One chicken that was sick now has to be reintroduced to the flock… I put her in the area with the other chickens and the sibling that she came with started attacking her. I had to eventually separate them and tomorrow I’m going to build a chicken run so they can be separated and reintroduced to each other, which is… so interesting. Staying on these toes when shit goes wrong and staying open to all the changes. And the changes of the seasons, all the transitions… 

Irina: That’s powerful. What do you think is helping you stay open to the transitions? 

Juniper: This year was… a lot. The last two years have been very transitional. I came back to Virginia in January and I was only gone for a year and a half so it wasn’t that long, but a lot has happened in between then. I lived in Oakland for a little bit and then New Orleans for a little bit, and in both of those places, I just learned a lot. One of the things that I learned is that I needed to change. I’ve really been moving into that… trying to change so that I could be in the “right” relationship with the people that I’m building with, that I’m trying to be sustainable with.

I’ve been doing a lot of shadow work and a lot of that has been really hard. I got out of a relationship earlier this year and it was really emotionally abusive and that showed me a lot as a mirror for myself… My vulnerability being used against me in a lot of ways and being punished for being vulnerable… it’s very strange moving through the world and having these weird fucked up experiences and I’m just like, “What the fuck? Do I have an open door on my forehead or something?” It’s hard to stay open because of those experiences, but I think it’s also just helped me grow. I grew up in a house where no one really talked about their feelings, especially with my dad. He still doesn’t talk about his emotions… he’s very quiet and contemplative and I’m very similar to that. I’ve learned that I don’t have to hold everything in and being able to just let it out when I feel safe to do so really takes weight off my shoulders and my back. It helps my relationships become stronger, which has been really sweet. 

A part of that is also just recognizing the abundance that’s around me and recognizing what spirits and ancestors have brought into my life because being open and believing in something and sticking to that allows me to be open to seeing the possibilities of what liberation could look and feel like. 

Irina: What have you seen or felt as far as what liberation could look like? 

Juniper: I think it all just comes back to Maroon Grove, the farm. Seeing that yes, large scale reparations will affect not only an individual but generations and generations. That has been very radical, and probably the closest to Black liberation being actualized in a sustainable way that’s not going to be taken away by some authority figure is the closest I’ve seen. It’s so hard to think about letting go of control… you know, the vision will change because as Octavia Butler says, “The only lasting truth is Change. God Is Change." I’m holding onto that because change is also liberation… really channeling that has been nice. It’s nice to be able to change or change your mind and not be punished or shamed. 

Irina: I love that… change is liberation. 

Juniper: Yeah, change is growth even though it’s painful. 

Irina: And growth can be painful and messy, more often than not.

Juniper: Exactly. That’s the wild part about it, whenever I’m talking to elders, I’m just like, “y’all, being in your 20s is wild.” There’s so much going on and so many things to question all the time and just… so much shit going on. It’s a lot of pain but a lot of veil-thinning going on.

Irina: Yeah, what do you think is becoming more visible in the thinning of the veil?

Juniper: I think it can be scary… we definitely need to see the truth because lies don’t do shit for nobody. On a large scale, it’s the veil-thinning of the violence this so-called “country” has been doing for generations and generations. More people are starting to become aware of that… it’s scary, stressful, overwhelming on a large scale. In our interpersonal relationships, it can look like how we’re seeing more of each other especially as we move in different dynamics. Recently, I had a friend move into a camper here… you know when you live with someone, the dynamic kind of shifts. In that dynamic, we started to see each other in a different way that’s not working out. A lot of difficult conversations are brought up within those moments of the veil-thinning, questioning everything, reveals that this isn’t working or we need to try something different. 

All in all, I’ve been trying to channel curiosity and come from places of curiosity and ask questions with myself and with people I’m having these difficult conversations with. In that shadow work, in that veil-thinning, I’ve realized that in the past years, I found myself getting so offended, so defensive because my whole life, I was gaslit by my sibling and there’s a lot of childhood trauma of just having to defend myself. I’m trying to not let that control my conversations, and instead just come from a place of curiosity because that really makes a difference in a conversation.

Irina: I was just noticing that about myself, too. I’m like, “Damn, I’m getting so defensive…” Why? Where is this coming from? Why do I feel the need to be so defensive? And I think curiosity is a great reframe, like, let me be curious. I’m feeling this way… why? What is being triggered right now? What is this illusion because this is not actually a dangerous situation? I don’t have to protect myself… I can be vulnerable and honest about how I’m feeling but I’m having to defend the ego. 

Juniper: It’s so hard to not get all up in the ego, defending the ego. I’m like, yes, I’m going to be vulnerable and honest and then I notice there are still some things I’m holding back. 

Irina: I think capitalism and white supremacy are built on lies and are built on people hiding themselves to form protection or manipulation -- it’s shifting those centuries of intergenerational trauma and habits. Resmaa Menakem, this Black somatic healer, talks about generational trauma that doesn’t get processed and starts to look like a character trait of a people or a family. It’s the things that we don’t process in our bodies that then become our ways of being. It can start to feel like a culture, a people, and is it really? Or is it just ingrained responses?

Juniper: Exactly, because we’re so multi-dimensional and not monolithic. I try really hard not to be like my older sister, who can be really mean, and I notice moments of me being like her and I’m like, “no no no!” It doesn’t have to be this way. Just because we grew up in a house with tough love, I’m trying to channel more nurturing energy. 

Irina: That’s like me and my dad. I remember running to my room and crying and telling myself, “I’ll never be like this!” And now I see it in myself and I’m like, “Fuck.” I have him inside my head all the time, but I don’t have to be that person. All this shame comes up, like oh no, I’m being this way. How do I not repeat that? It’s multiple layers of self-judgement, guilt, shame, fear. Okay, curiosity… this is a feeling, and feelings come up… that doesn’t make it the whole truth or even part of the truth. 

Juniper: Exactly, like who is this? What is this? Leaning into questions…I’ve been enjoying that.

Irina: What are some questions you’ve been asking yourself lately?

Juniper: A lot of “Why am I responding this way?” And “Why am I getting defensive? Why do I feel afraid that something fucked up is going to happen?” It’s coming from a mindset of scarcity. Maryam Hasnaa has this school called New Earth Mystery School and she helps people get closer to their highest self. I’ve been trying to channel that, especially when having difficult conversations. I’ve been really mindful of being passive-aggressive. I ask Ocean, my sibling here, “Have you experienced me being passive aggressive?” And they were like, “No, I haven’t personally. Why?” and I responded, “I don’t feel like I have been, I just want to make sure I’m not falling into my old patterns.” I don’t want to regress, I want to ascend into someone who can have difficult conversations and feel what I’m feeling in that moment, feel what’s coming up and not just react, but respond in a way that’s coming from authenticity. I’m just questioning everything we were taught when we were kids; everything we were taught, told what to do, trying to decolonize, re-indigenize, move from a place of love not resentment.

Irina: Yeah, shifting from that scarcity and urgency… I just look back at my life and I’m like, “How many major life decisions have I made from a place of scarcity and urgency?” 

Juniper: Right. Do you feel that those situations where you’ve moved from a place of scarcity and urgency have backfired?

Irina: Backfired, for sure. So many very ambitious projects without really the relationships, trust or self-work that needed to happen, which caused harm to myself and others. Backfire!

Juniper: Same, I can relate! 

Irina: I was taught “dream big” and plan these certain things and success looks this certain way and you have to work harder, you have to do more… and I’m really seeing the underpinning of that and am now making better choices in the moment. Sometimes I know better and I still do the thing. I’m like, yeah, I’m operating from a place of scarcity, fuck it, just keep doing it. 

Juniper: Yeah, exactly. I’m really trying to calm down with that as well. Calm down, you don’t have to immediately make this decision out of scarcity and fear. It’s not really coming from a place of crystal clear thinking. 

Irina: The question that I’ve been asking everyone is “What time is it on the clock of the world?” 

Juniper: Time is not linear, but now we’re seeing how our experiences, despite our different time zones, despite where we are in the world, are all tied. I think we have a lot to learn from each other and I think the time is trying to tell us to slow down and that we need to be in a different time zone, and not doing what we’ve been doing. I think I’m going to be reflecting on that question for a while… it feels like it’s moving fast. It feels like it’s really ticking. It feels like we really gotta get our shit together and it’s ticking ticking ticking. What time do you think it is on the clock of the world?

Irina: I think it’s time to reimagine what’s possible. I think it’s time to listen deeply to ancestors, to ourselves and each other. We have not been listening, we’ve just been doing shit. We need to be listening to our bodies, definitely slowing down and letting systems crash and burn and fall away and not come back. It’s time to release a lot that has been harmful and destructive. That’s what time it is of the day in this moment. 

Juniper: Yes, I like that. Time to listen, to learn from our animal relatives, because they’re like, “Look, we’re trying to tell y’all!” 

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This conversation was lovingly transcribed and edited by my dear friend, writer, and cultural organizer Rivka Yeker. You can check out their work at @hooliganmagazine.