Peace TalksRadio
Transcriptof Dealing with Burn Out
HOST: On this edition of Peace TalksRadio, we explore what it means to be a peacemaker in an age of burnout.
“I very much want to validate that burnout is real. Asactivists, it will perpetually feel like there's more to do and that it's notbecause peace isn't just the goal. It's also the way we get there. I think oneof the core pieces of my activism is that.
The individual is so important and so taking care ofyourself is in itself a form of activism and a radical act.”
HOST: How movements can carry grief without burningout and what it takes to protect the people doing the work? Coming up on PeaceTalk Radio.
This is Peace Talks Radio, the radio series and podcast onpeacemaking and nonviolent conflict resolution. Whether it's the search forInner Peace, harmony in our closest relationships or understanding in ourworkplaces, schools, neighborhoods, and beyond, we explore it here on PeaceTalks Radio. From personal moments to global movements, we consider what ittakes to build a more peaceful world.
I'm Jessica Ticktin. Today, activism feels different. Theworld moves faster. Now, crises layer on crises, outrage is constant. And evenas the noise grows louder, many of us feel quieter inside. Exhausted anduncertain how to keep going to help guide us correspondent Julia Joubert speakswith two people working at the intersection of activism and peacebuilding.
Jacob Lefton, an artist and former peace building, technicaland design director. And Michaela Ledesma, a chaplain and mediator helpingcommunities find resilience through compassion throughout their conversation.Julia will also be referencing the Activist Handbook, A collaboratively builtWikipedia for activists created by organizers who train thousands each monthand share over 450 guides and 4,700 resources for movements around the world.
Here's correspondent Julia Joubert:
Julia: Istarted by highlighting that activism feels different today. And if I'm honest,that's largely because I'm unsure how we even define an activist anymore. Somuch of what's happening now takes place online or in private conversations,making it feel less like the public collective action We used to associate withactivism.
For myself and many of the friends I'm active with, what wedo doesn't always feel like activism in the traditional sense. So I begin todayby asking Michaela Ledesma, how would she define an activist?
Michaela: I've engaged over many years, both in whatwe would consider classical activist spaces. So for example, anti-nuclearactivism with Greenpeace in Switzerland, as well as in institutionalized peacebuilding context with different international organizations.
And what I've really arrived to is that anyone who isengaged cord social change. With altruism in their heart, I would consider anactivist. I believe that it's really more about the motivation and each of ushas our own specific positionality in the society in which we live with ourpeers, our families, and our communities, and also different contextualconstraints and opportunities, which means that activism across context, we cansee many common themes and threads and approaches.
Um, but the main thing is that we have this sense of my lifeis not just about me. My own wellbeing, or maybe my immediate family and thewellbeing of my immediate family. But my life is also about creating change andbenefiting a broader community, and I'm willing to step out of that smallerframe. And my field of action is with that heart, with that bigger vision andthat bigger frame.
Julia: For Jacob Lefton, his path into activismreflects Mikayla's thoughts. It began with an innate sense of fairness withinhim that refused to stay quiet.
Jacob Lefton: How I got involved in activism is oneof those questions where I kind of have to go back to my, like who I am as aperson. I am, I think, naturally a bit contrary, and I'm also naturally a bitjustice minded and justice oriented, and I've been causing a ruckus since Iwas.
At least in high school around things that I thought wereunfair or seemed unfair to me and my experience and to the people around me asstudents. And the very first piece of formal activism that I did was in, Ithink it was between junior and senior year of high school. There was a bigbudget cut coming and the town was trying to hold, like a referendum, a vote toraise property taxes a little more so that they could fund some of the schoolbudget and not cut services. And I joined that campaign basically as apolitical activist doing door to door knocking. And then I, after that votefailed because it, it did fail in our like slightly conservative town, a groupof students, and I hosted a fundraiser, rock concert on the school lawn, and webooked a couple of local bands including the then Rising Dresden Dolls, whichwas quite cool to do. It was a bit offbeat, and that was my first step intoactivism.
Julia: When Jacob moved beyond high school campaigns,he began to experience the first real pushback to action and how it affectedhis morale.
Jacob: I ended up going to Hampshire College inAmherst, Massachusetts, which is a very funny school where every studentcreates their own course of study and their own major, and it's a very.Hypothetically, students are very involved in the, the curriculum and theprocesses in the college, and I quickly found out I had, I think it was a oneof those awakenings that you have as an activist, that you step into a spacethat has an aspirational message around it, and you find it to be somethingdifferent because.
Over time, that message has changed and people haveinterpreted it differently and the structures of power have coalesced orbasically hardened up. And so I stepped into that and I did a lot of, ofstudent activism around curriculum design and student agency. And I was electedas a student trustee at Hampshire College.
And that was kind of my first introduction into all of thesetopics of like, how do you, how do you have the negotiations and how do youexercise your power, but also what happens when you run into stiff resistance.Even stiff well-meaning resistance that you're aligned with on a lot of levels,but saps your energy and your power because you know the professors who areresisting you or the staff at the college who finds what you're asking for tobe inconvenient are going to be there longer than you, and they've been therelonger than you, and so they just, they don't have to move. Right? And so you,you've run into these walls where you're, you're like, okay, but this could bebetter. And so I think the whole early arc of activism in my life was movinginto this question of what do you do when it, when it actually, the trajectoryof the work that you're doing seems hopeless or pointless, or really hard.
And then I fell into volunteering for my friend's peaceeducation nonprofit in the local area, and I got really inspired by their workand I threw myself into basically volunteering for them. And then that turnedinto a position and a role where for a number of years I was supporting thedevelopment of technical processes and implementing technology tools tobasically improve peace building outcomes.
Then I stepped out of that for life reasons. I couldn'tbalance being a parent on top of being an artist and a peace builder. And thenI kind of got drawn back into peace building, or I would call it peace buildingwork and activism around the, the genocide in Gaza and trying to find a way toaccess that, um, because it touches me on personal levels.
It touches me on moral levels. And so I think it's necessaryto be involved and if you want to talk about a conflict that saps your will andenergy and hope, that is a very, very strong one. And so I think figuring outhow to manage that particular process is an ongoing challenge for a lot ofpeople.
Julia:It is clear that we begin because we care, andcaring deeply is exhausting.
The activist handbook calls this the paradox of compassionfatigue, meaning the more you invest, the more likely you are to emptyyourself. Jacob describes that turning point for him.
Jacob: I notice it in myself where I, I have asensation of like physically hitting a wall, like, oh, I don't want to pickthis up, or I can't show up, or I have to do something different.
I think there's. Common signs of burnout, of like exhaustionand lack of interest and your mood being affected, and relationships beingaffected, and like health as well. I think I'm pretty fortunate that some ofthose health questions haven't hit me. Like, yeah, it comes into my body, butit doesn't, it doesn't wreck my body necessarily.
And so I can listen to it when I, when I do notice that I'mphysically struggling. I That is a marker of like, oh, okay. Hey, my, I'm justlike, I'm unable to take care of myself.
Julia:The activist handbook highlights a number ofsigns of burnout in activists, including persistent irritability, emotionaldisturbance or mood swings, noticeable drop in motivational energy, wherethings that once felt meaningful, start to feel pointless, chronic fatigue ordifficulty even handling basic daily tasks.
Sleep disturbances, increased disillusionment or cynicismtowards the cause. Feeling numb, overwhelmed, or emotionally shut down. Morefrequent conflict with friends or family starting harmful coping habits, aswell as long-term signs, including apathy, depression, chronic exhaustion,where burnout begins to feel normal.
For many activists, this idea of burnout, feeling normal isoften coupled with a sense of not doing enough. Or in my case, not sufferingenough. Who am I to struggle with feeling this way when others are suffering somuch more than me?
Michaela shared her thoughts on this.
Michaela: I very much want to validate that burnoutis real, and I think all the more so in a present day when.
What's happening in the world is so challenging, changing soquickly, and where the visibility of unconscionable is so much in our, um,field of consciousness and whether or not we are managing our social mediafeeds and our doom scrolling or engaging in conversations that are. More toxicor more supportive.
That's just the reality. And I believe also compounded bythe speed and the impact of technology on our biology as human beings and onthe nervous system and as activists, because our hearts are big, it willinevitably, always perpetually feel like there's more to do and that it's notenough. So all of these.
Plus whatever personal experiences or factors we might bringare very real contributors to burnout. Mm-hmm. And I would say it's asignificant obstacle, I think, to us being able to sustain ourselves and, andone another in the work that's needed at this time.
Julia: The activist Handbooks wellbeing guide remindsus burnout isn't proof of commitment.And I consider how often activists mistakecollapse for weakness or confuse performance with commitment. In speaking toJacob, I had that realization about myself.
Jacob: If you can't take care of yourself and can'ttake care of other people, then you stop being effective within the movementand you stop being useful to other people, and you can also become.
A burden on them.
Julia: I, I really appreciate you saying if you pushyourself beyond your limits, you stop being helpful or have the potential tostop being helpful. This is a hard thing to hear, but I think it's a realitythat a lot of people in these spaces, myself included, need to hear, especiallywhen, and I'm just gonna speak for myself now, but.
I find myself often kind of reckoning with this, this takingpause or scaling back, and it becomes about me in that, in that choice. When Isay, you know, I, I know I need a break and I, I know logically to be there forothers, I need to be there for myself, but I am choosing to not do that, whichin itself kind of becomes.
It, it's counterintuitive. I'm not actually doing this forother people anymore. I'm doing it for me. I'm doing it to make me feel good.I'm doing it to make me feel like whatever it is that I'm doing. Is is part ofthe bigger picture, rather than just playing a smaller role, you know, andforgetting that I even in that small role, I'm part of the big picture.
Sorry, this is a lot of processing out loud that you'rehaving to hear here, but mostly to just say like, thank you for sharing that. Ithink that that's a very important thing for people to hear, especially thosewho are so determined to stay frontline and to stay visible that that is. Quitecounterintuitive to the purpose of you being an activist Sometimes.
Jacob:Yeah
Julia: But burnout isn't the end of activism. It's amessage from the body that the movement must evolve for both Jacob and Michaela.The answer began by redefining what activism means to them. Jacob draws adistinction between peace building and activism. He sees them not as opposites,but as different languages of the same longing.
One for justice, the other for coexistence and use them in away that feels sustainable.
Jacob: I think I've met activists who are not peacebuilders. I think I've met peace builders who are not activists internally. Icome into struggles with it because I have intensity. I have these, thesemoments where I'm like, I want to throw out any disagreement and I don't wantto have connections with people who I feel uncomfortable with and I don't havethe energy. There are certain topics where I feel like being a peace builder onthem is almost impossible for me to do unaided without a framework of like amediated conversation because I just feel too hot on that issue. I think thecore piece of it is to be clear about what is the type of world that you'reworking toward and how do you want people to work together?
How do you want to be in community with people and to find away to practice that as a, as a daily practice in your life? And once youstepped into that daily practice of, for me, for example, I'm exercising likecooperative and collectivist structures in my life and I am. Lending supportwhen I can to people, I, I have my, my own approach to how I want to see theworld and I practice it or I try to practice it around me.
And sometimes that means that there are bigger and morevisible activities that I do. And sometimes that means that the work that I dois small and in community and with friends. And for me it becomes a stream oflife where. Even if I'm not out on the street, I know that the other pieces ofwork I'm doing are in alignment with my core values.
Jacob and Michaela share alignment as a key ingredient toavoiding burnout. They also mention the value of community, the division oflabor-based on strengths and internal support networks. Here I return to Michaela.
Michaela: My belief is that each of us. Isessentially configured with a set of strengths and where we are in ourrelationship with our environment, our family, our community, to be able tocontribute in a way that is unique to us.
So, for example, I have colleagues who are incredibleanalysts, social media analysts, and who are able to take a platform that we'vedeveloped and they're able to map conversations, divisive conversations, and toobserve those trends and then to put out a report that supports others to beable to take strategic action.
Would we say that, that the action then by the folks who arewe, we would call frontline or engaging at the community level or engaging withpolicymakers. We might see that in an outside way as those are the people whoare taking that action. The action, right? Those are the, the activists. Butwould their action be as impactful without the folks who are preparing thereport or the folks who built the platform?
Absolutely not. Right. And likewise, as I've also engagedhere, for example, in public processes, I would say that what's beautiful tosee is where we can recognize the interconnected whole of the strengths thateach of us bring. So I've had a, a close friend and neighbor who is, um, we'veended up calling her Detective Patty because she is an unbelievable, tirelessresearcher of our public policies and codes.
I could never spend the amount of time that she spends onthat, and that becomes then our platform for action. Whereas my role in thisprocess has been much more organizing the community, helping to prepare ourpublic comments so that we can show up for public forum, et cetera. We need tostart to think of ourselves as a whole, as an ecosystem in which each person,the thing that they bring, the set of qualities and skills is essential to usbeing able to create the social change that we need, and rather than demand.
That everyone engage in the same way. How can we removeobstacles to people bringing forward their strengths such that we're much morepowerful together? My experience is that when I'm engaged in a way that doesn'tdeeply align to what I care about, to my values or to my skills and thecapacities that I have to bring, all of that acts.
As an energy drain, essentially, and it becomes much moredifficult to sustain myself in my activism work. Whereas on the other side,when I'm experiencing that strong alignment, and this is also where communitycomes in. Because we need to be surrounded by like-hearted people who share ourvalues, who are going to be there to support us when we have struggles, and tocelebrate when we have wins, even if they're the smallest wins.
When I'm well resourced and I'm aligned, then my resilienceagainst burnout is significantly higher.
Julia: I followed up by asking Michaela. If she meansto say that in spite of what many think, it isn't actually possible to separateourselves from our activism, and she used the analogy of parenthood to furtherexplain her thoughts.
Michaela: For most parents, it would never bepossible to separate themselves from the care that they have for theirchildren. However, skillfully or healthily that's expressed, right? It's likeit's something becoming apparent is something that activates something deepthat is embedded inside of us as human beings, that we can't separate it.
I believe that those of us who are called to activism, it'sthe same thing. It's something that is embedded inus. And so our task is not toseparate ourselves or we've had these conversations at buildup, have some worklife balance, right? But to rather say, how can I structure my life such thatit's a full expression of who I am and what I long for, including in change inthe world.
And when we take that view, then it's more a question of howdo we navigate these different moments in our life or stretches where we havean opportunity and we're ready to step forward. We have the capacity todedicate ourselves. Maybe it's gonna be 12 hours a day. Stretch of time, andthen at the end of that, to have the wisdom to look and to say, I'm ready for adeep breath.
I'm gonna recharge myself in the ways that I know too,because I know that that next stretch is gonna look the same, that I'm gonna beextended again. And to think about our lives in that way, that it's much moreof a flow and an interaction between our inner world and our external world,where it's not about systematization and it's not about separation, but it'sabout integration and flow.
Julia: Recovery for an activist isn't alwaysdramatic. Sometimes it's invisible. A choice to rest, to step back, to letothers carry the banner for a while. It doesn't have to mean leaving theecosystem entirely. More often than not, you'll most likely still be doing, asJacob says, the small work.
Jacob: I think that's like the beautiful thing about,about cultivating community like this is that you can be in your rest and stillbe in community and still be in touch with what's going on so you don't getisolated.
And I think that this is, for me, so important is. To notfeel alone. And so then that leads you into the train of thinking of like,okay, but what does that mean? That means we're building connections withpeople who are supporting each other, and that means that we're modeling amethod of support that we want to see, and we're turning like the day-to-dayminutiae of our interactions with people into the change that we wanna see inthe world.
I've tried to take my personal activism. Bring it down intotiny grains of sand that make up like the beach of life that I'm walking on. Soeach little action might not be large, but in combination, in collection, theycreate the land that we're walking on. And I think that's like the, theproblems that we face are so big and so resourced and so overwhelming sometimesthat we can, I can, I find myself getting lost when I consider them. When Ithink about enormous movements in governments and billionaires and war machinesand industrial complexes and climate change, I get really overwhelmed and Iknow that there are enormous structural issues that need to be addressed.
I know that the people around me are working to addressthose, and if I can help to make it so that the way we work together is assupportive of each other as possible by having a daily life that is supportiveof those people on a human to human level. It enriches my life, it fills me up,and it helps, which means that the day-to-day interactions with people are apart of, not the whole thing, but they are a part of the activist journey.
And so then we can go and say, okay, well I'm doing smallwork, at least. I think one of the core pieces of my activism, and I think in alot of leftist spaces, is that the individual is so important and taking careof the individual is. And so taking care of yourself is in itself a form ofactivism and a radical act.
And when I come into that thought, it reminds me that thereare many ways of being active and they can be small steps of being and livingand engaging with the world in the ways that you think are. Important to beengaged with. And so if your activism can't be big and on the streets, you canwind it back or pair it down and have your activism and have your, yourapproach be focused on how do I interact with people on a personal level?
And if that means I don't go to rallies, I don't organize, Idon't, I, I don't hold the, the logistical. Weight of that in my mind anymore,but when I go into conversation with people, I still hold these positions and Istill make the case for it on an individual basis, and I show up, or I show upfor other people and I support them as best as I can.
If that means just like I go to an event or I make tea formy friend. If it's as much of like they're going through a hard time, but I canhave 'em over and make pancakes for them and help them live a little bit, thenI'm doing some work in building community and connection and supporting eachother, and so these.
In any movement, the second line and the support structuresare as important so that the frontline can keep moving and faces less risk ofburnout and other challenges. And so if you can step back and pick up some ofthose other things and in your day-to-day life, you hang on to. And work on thesmall interpersonal pieces of that process.
That's also, that is also activism, so I think it's less oflike stopping and more of like adjusting the dials and knobs on, like wherethat, how that lens is focused.
Julia: What Jacob reminds us is that activism doesn'thave to be loud to be real. It can be quiet, relational, and deeply human.Stepping back doesn't mean stepping out.
It can mean adjusting, supporting, or simply showing up forone another in ways that aren't always visible, but are no less vital. Thesequieter acts of care, they're part of the work too. They're part of what keepsus as activists and the movements we are in alive.
HOST: That was Julia Joubert speaking with Jacob Lefton,an artist and former peace building, technical and design director, andMichaela Ledesma, a chaplain and mediator helping communities find resiliencethrough compassion. Coming up after this short break on Peace Talks Radio, welook at how the way we define impact in activist spaces shapes us.
That's coming up in a moment. Stay tuned. Thanks forlistening.
(Music Break)
Host: You are listening to Peace Talks Radio, theradio series and podcast about peacemaking and nonviolent conflict resolution.I'm Jessica Ticktin here with correspondent Julia Joubert. Today we'reexploring peacemaking and sustainable activism. Earlier we heard how theemotional cost of activism, especially burnout, is often rooted in the systemsexpectations and myths we carry about what quote real activism unquote issupposed to look like.
We also learned that being an activist isn't just aboutbeing on the front lines. It's about alignment. It's about how you practiceyour values every day in ways that sustain you. In part two, we continue theconversation looking at how grief shows up in movement spaces, how we canredefine success in healthier ways, and how organizations can build realsupport into their structures, not just into their slogans.
We begin with an honest reflection from correspondent Julia Joubert.
Julia: Previously, we talked about how rest and careare essential to staying in the work, but there's another layer we need to lookat. Because even when we know better, many of us still end up running ourselvesinto the ground, and often it's because we measure our worth by how much we do,how visible we are, and how urgent everything feels.
It's one of the hardest lessons in activist work, andMichaela sees this as a byproduct of the very systems we're trying todismantle.
Michaela: So it's a really important point forself-awareness and self-reflection, that especially if we've been in go modeand nonstop mode, or we are working in a value system that says unless we'resuffering, I.
Unless we're doing it without stop, you know, the, the, theconcept of productivity and of tireless action in the way that I've experiencedit, where it comes connotated with a kind of guilt and a disconnection from thebody. I believe that that's part of our capitalist and industrial complex thatwe're actually trying to liberate ourselves from.
Julia: She continues to share how impact can andshould be redefined. It's not always about the big wins, and if we set our eyeson only those, we are bound to lose steam at a much quicker rate.
Michaela: I'm also a Tibetan Buddhist practitioner,and so I have to say upfront that my perspective is. Both evolving and verymuch informed by that frame.
Earlier, maybe 10 years ago or 15 years ago, doing peacebuilding work, I felt like there was a much more black and white way ofmeasuring impact. So for example, did communities that have been in violentconflict, did they sign a peace agreement or did that peace agreement hold. Iactually worked in the border area between Sudans and Sudan with my greatfriend and colleague, Elena, for a number of years, and we had very positiveimpact, you could say, from the work and then the Sudanese army invaded nine monthslater after.
As that project was evolving effectively, you could saywiping out. The positive outcomes that had been created in part with ourinvolvement or support, but primarily of course, by the leaders and thecommunity members there. To our surprise, in that specific context, uh, anumber of the communities who had been through a reconciliation processthemselves decided not to return to violent conflict.
So in a very unexpected way, despite. What we hoped would bean impact of increased peace and security in that border area between Sudan andthen South Sudan. That impact being wiped out, but these other impacts emergingthat we didn't expect. And if we had not continued to be in touch and Atlantacontinuing to have a role in that work in an ongoing way, we might never havebeen around to even see that.
Right. So. I'm very much of the mind and of the experiencethat impacts both can never be fully seen in their long view. And therefore, wehave to hold the biggest aspiration for positive change of active peace in oursocieties, not a passive peace. And at the same time, our expectations and ourdefinition of impact has to be almost micro.
I had the opportunity to sit with Hanah Han Elder Elia Rivasat the end of last week, and she said to me in relation to coming and speakingat our upcoming Build Peace conference, she said, if I change one person'smind, that will be enough. Which is very touching and humbling because she hasbeen working for decades on environmental justice issues, on surveillanceinfrastructure in the border area that divides the traditional lands of the HanHan people.
So she is someone who would very much be in a position todefine that impact in a bigger way. These are the changes we want to see evengenerationally. But instead she said, I wanna change one person's mind. And Ithink that's really where I'm personally as well, is that if we are operatingin a way that is really grounded and with a lot of integrity in our values.Even if we can't see any change today, or in 10 years or in 20 years, I believethat those actions woven together by all of the people who are working in thatway are going to produce a very different outcome Had we not shown it.
Julia: Everymovement faces loss, sometimes it's the loss of a campaign. Sometimes a person,sometimes faith in the movement itself. This brings us to grief. The questionisn't whether grief arrives. We've learned in part one that it does. Thequestion is how we hold it together. For Michaela, acknowledging grief is partof the healing architecture of activism.
Michaela: It is so important to have spaces forprocessing all types of experiences and the nonviolent communication frame. Oneof the things that I love about it is that it provides an, you know, anincredible framework for engaging around. Unmet needs that are then creatingconflict so that we can hopefully, in collaboration with others, findstrategies to get those needs met that are also not causing harm.
But what NVC also provides is a very clear lens on grievingor mourning. So to say, when something has not turned out the way that we like,or when something has, maybe we've gotten a positive outcome, but there havebeen side effects from that, from that experience. That can include things likeburnout, um, but it can also be trauma, primary or secondary trauma, whateverthat might be.
That is difficult. We need to make space for that. And sooften, for example, in our processes where we're debriefing. Kind of at theclose, or it can be midstream in a process. We're often making space forcelebrations. That's the easy and fun part. We're making space for learnings.Um, is there something from this that we wanna be sure we carry forward, um, toimprove or ability to do this work or to care for each other better goingforward to address teaming dynamics and so on.
But also the importance of making space for grieving. Whatare the things that. We need to hold together and to create a space inconversation as a group or where that doesn't feel appropriate to have someoneavailable to have that conversation and to just make space for that to be fullyarticulated our, our ability to take action.
I believe is also hinges on our access to our full range ofhuman experience, which means if we are shutting off parts of ourself or ourexperience, including our emotions, especially grief and anger, and we don'thave healthy ways in which to process those, all the other aspects of thesystem are gonna get blocked.
And so to not see that as something optional, to not see theperson who is in a state of grief. And we know that grief can take manydifferent forms, can affect us for maybe long after.
Julia: Michaela reframes mourning as maintenance. Ifwe can make space for collective sorrow, we can make space for collective care.
Grief isn't a failure of activism. It's often a sign of howdeeply we care, and I believe that deep down we know this, but I also know weneed reminding and we need tools for how to do it. The activist handbookexplains that one of the first things we can do is simply acknowledge whatwe're feeling.
Instead of pushing grief aside or trying to power throughit, we're encouraged to name it, feel it, and allow it to move through us. Theyalso say that it is helpful to get clear on what exactly we're feeling. Is itburnout? Is it anxiety? Is it grief? These emotional states can overlap, butnaming them gives us a better chance of responding with the right kind of care.
The handbook calls this emotional literacy, and it's a skillthat can grow over time. Another key reminder as both Jacob and Michaela havesaid in part one is that you don't have to carry this alone. Even just talkingabout what you're feeling with someone you trust can prevent isolation. Griefis heavy and one of the most powerful things we can do is let others help holdit with us.
The handbook also suggests creating small rituals, simpleways to honor what you're feeling. That could be journaling, lighting, acandle, taking a walk, drawing, or anything that helps you make emotionalspace. It doesn't have to be formal, just meaningful to you. Finally, the mostimportant thing, maybe setting boundaries.
The handbook makes it very clear. You are allowed to rest.You are allowed to say no. You don't have to destroy your health or peace toprove that you care. Because say it with me. Caring for yourself isn't separatefrom activism. It's part of a sustainable path. We've spoken a lot about whatactivists can do for themselves, and I want to turn now to the potentialsupport people and systems.
In part one, Jacob mentioned this second line and thesupport structures, and he continues here.
Jacob: There's this whole field in peace building of,um, non-violent civil resistance. There's a book from Erica Chenoweth withabout non-violent civil resistance, which is basically like examining howregimes have changed without violence, without violent revolutions, but throughthrough protest activity and other work.
And the thing that people come away with from that book isif 3.5% of people of a population of the country mobilize. The regime will fallbecause in her work she found that no regime stood after more than that amountof people had mobilized. But what she goes on to say as she looks at like thehistoric cases through the 20th century and then into the Arab Spring, is shebasically says the successful movements were the ones that built a long supportnetwork like over many years.
Took the time to build their support systems and to workwith different tactics. And the tactics that she describes are more peacebuilding tactics rather than activist tactics. The frontline people in thestreets were important, but the true changes came when the people supportingpillars of power could step out of those pillars into a space where they feltthat they could safely step into.
And so. Having hard line activism that attacks those pillarswas, is a detriment. And creating a space where those people feel they, theycan or need to step into is helpful. And also for those frontline workers,having a support network of a population of people who are not going toprotests but are, you know, making people lunch, taking care of the kids.
Opening their businesses when people have to like flee thethe riot police and letting them come in and take shelter there. There's somany pieces of this work that can be done and are necessary without beingvisible in any way.
Julia: This is Peace Talks Radio, and I'm Julia Joubert.We are talking about activist burnout and building sustainable activism.
Joining us are Michaela Ledesma and Jacob Lefton, who sharetheir experiences and offer insights on how to not only recognize and manageburnout, but how to build a sustainable framework within self and withinorganizations so that burnout can be prevented. And if it does happen, peoplecan be supported to come back.
We've been speaking a lot about the self and, and how we cansupport ourselves. And you mentioned before as well about being the supportline being quote unquote activists as well. I'd love to know what advice you'dhave for people who see themselves as or or wanting to support. Activists, andI'm gonna share just a kind of a personal story with you to give you somecontext as to why I'm asking,I have a friend who. I think we struggle sometimesbecause we can't really talk about these, the things that I'm active on and,and the spaces that I'm active in and the things that I care about. He's verypragmatic. He's very. You know, kind of down the line. So we, we struggle to,to kind of talk about it.
But he has expressed wanting to support me. He has expressedhis, seeing what I am doing and wanting to know how he can support. And I willbe honest with you when I say being asked, what can they do to support. Wasfrustrating for me. It was annoying because not only what did I feel like Iwas, I was pushing myself to my limit.
I was then having to think about how to be supported andplease call me on my, call me on my nonsense if you need to on this, but alsoto come to you then as someone who's definitely been in this space a lot longerthan I have, how would you advise people who are looking to be in thatsupporting role? To do it in a way that actively supports.
Jacob: I mean, if someone wants to be in a supportrole, I think that the most important thing that they need to do is to listento the people who they're supporting and understand that the things thatthey're asking for are real. Needs and desires, and even if it doesn't makesense to you or you see them as a symptom of something else and you want toreframe the conversation, the only way that you can build any trust to startany kind of conversation, to reframe it or to discuss other topics is byaffirming them in the first degree.
Julia: Mm-hmm. You say the first step for support isto listen. Conversely, a lot of activists I speak to don't, don't often havethe energy or the tools to ask. So you're saying listen to what they need, buta lot of the time they're burning the candle at both ends and don't know whatthey need and don't know what to ask for.
So how do we strike a balance there?
Jacob: I think this became really, really visible inthe Black Lives Matter movement back in 2020 when there was a real push ofpeople saying, don't ask people of color to educate you as a white person.Here's a list of resources. Go read them. I think to really try to listen tothat and to understand, well, why are you so confrontational about evenexplaining to me what's going on?
To to say, wait, but I want to hear it from you, is notlistening because they've just said what you can do to help is start byreading. Like the thing that you can do to help right now is to not ask forthings from me, and I'm gonna be really honest. This is hard. We likeindividual attention. We like to feel important.
I think the most important thing in this is it's not,especially when we go into an activism around a topic that is not centered onus, one of the hardest things to do is to understand fully and completely. Itis not about us. We will be uncomfortable and I think there's an importantpoint of self-awareness, of understanding.
At what point is it too uncomfortable for me to do rightnow, and how do I come into like, it takes an incredible amount ofself-awareness to examine that. That personal discomfort and building thatself-awareness is something that you can do is asking yourself, why do I feeluncomfortable? Why someone in the movement that I want to get involved withtold me something that was hard for me to hear, and made me feel emotional in away that I didn't expect?
Why? What's going on with me and why was it so hard for meto listen to them and if I want them to listen to me? Especially people inmarginalized positions or who are supporting causes for marginalized positions.Uh, I think this is a peace building tool or understanding is one of thefoundational things that you need is trust.
And trust is very slowly given. You don't automatically getto have access to people so. One of the tasks is how do you build that trustand you build that trust by being reliable to people and by listening to themand affirming them, and then once they trust you, you can come intoconversation with them.
Julia: Michaela adds to this by sharing some adviceon what we do if there are people around us or in our movements who we feel arenot showing up in the way we expect them to.
Michaela: In relation to passive folks, because it'scome up several times, right? Like what do we do in our movements where we havepeople who are maybe showing up in name but not in action, or where we havepeople who are just not getting activated at all?
And that's very much a part of the reality that we live in.And I do, I believe that the more we express show up, bring. Forward the valuesthat we have inside in a positive way that is going to then trigger andcatalyze others to get activated. So it's not a question of judging folks whoaren't there for whatever reason, but rather to say, if I show up fully, thatthat in and of itself is my work to bring others on board.
Right. By inspiring, by embodying, by engaging in a way thatothers feel like I wanna be a part of that, you know, and, and then if we'rebringing them in in a way that really invites them to contribute theirstrengths and doesn't demand that they do things that are outside of theircapacity, then imagine, right?
Then suddenly our network can become much bigger and muchmore beautiful. Because we're not, we're letting go of expectations and insteadinviting based on what people have to bring. Returning to the theme of supportsystems, I wanted to know from McKayla what processes she and buildup had thatprovided support to the activists in their network.
I think it's important as a part of a process or an activitydebrief. In our organizational framework, we include, we have a resiliencestrategy, and in that we also include that any team member can request that,that the collective come together to discuss something that's been difficult orsomething that needs attention, and so.
For example, we had an incident at a Build Peace conferenceof sexual harassment of a conference participant that two of our colleaguestook on and supported and. What we recognized was necessary after that was acollective debrief that included holding all of the different aspectspersonally and organizationally.
And in that broader frame of a space we created for ourglobal community to talk all of that out. And it gets emotional. It'sinevitable, right? So we have to, it's like a muscle that we have to buildwhere we're not intimidated by our humanity and the fuller expression of thathumanity. And it's here, it's really important to have ideally, at leastseveral team members who are committed, who are appalled, and who have thecapacity to anchor those conversations.
Um, because that's not a therapy, right? That's not like aprofessionally led, that's just us showing up for each other as human beings.But when we do that systematically, and I think it's absolutely critical whatwe do, slowly, that muscle will build over time. We'll, we'll see the value ofit, um, because that being in our collective space means that we are reallyrelating to our lived experience.
We're creating space to process that and to support eachother, and also to learn from that going forward as opposed to shoving it inthe background and allowing it to go underground or become one individual'smental health challenge. Right. Which is so common I think these days.
Julia: Would you mind sharing specifically with ham,you don't have to give us the buildup secrets, but um, of course I understandthat it's kind of built into the culture of the organization, but do you have yeahcertain meetings or, uh, meetups or networking or open door policy, do you haveanything like that that we could maybe learn from? Uh, in terms of um actuallyyeah making this a reality?
Michaela: Absolutely. Buildup actually has collectiveagreements, so our organizational framework is fully public and open source.
So I could share the link or folks can look that up. Andactually it's very important for us that we. Have the possibility to connectwith and to share experiences with other groups and organizations that wouldlike to work in this way. Um, so folks can also feel free. Really feel free toreach out. We love these conversations.
There are a few things I would say that underpin our model.So one is that because we're a virtual first organization. We have smallclusters of colleagues that are based in the same geographies who are able tomeet and work face-to-face. But as a fuller team, that's not possible. Butwe've learned that at least twice a year, we need to have in-person anchorpoints, and that those anchor points are not just about work, but they're alsojust getting to spend time together, go for dinner, go for coffee, go to thebeach together, because that allows us to really.
Be with each other in a way that is recognizing our humanityin a similar way. At those meetings, uh, at those retreats, and also at, wemeet twice a month as a full collective to update on certain topics and to makedecisions. We always start with a personal check-in and there's a questionthat's related to, you know.
Topics vary, but kind of what's happening in your world. Andwe break out into small groups and folks have a conversation about that, thatjust provides a different anchor point than jumping directly into an agenda.You know, kind of how are you doing? And then in my capacity as peace buildingchaplain, I also now have monthly or more frequent catch ups with each of theteam members. And the chaplain role is one of walking alongside, it's not atherapeutic role, but it is one that says, I'm here for a conversation. Youmight be facing certain challenges at home, at work, ethical challenges, whichare inevitable in the type of work that we do, and it's important that wecreate spaces to discuss those.
Um, I would say, uh, we have other policies that. Folks canfind in our collective agreements. We have an incident reporting policy. Wehave an emergency fund. We, we have a needs-based salary model, um, which is awhole topic unto itself, but our whole model is essentially structured toreally reflect in a very deep way this root of care that we try to bringforward in, in the way that we work together.
Julia: Burnout doesn't just happen to individuals. Itoften happens in environments where overwork is normalized and support isinconsistent. According to the activist handbook. One of the most importantthings an organization can do is like buildup, take collective wellbeingseriously, not just as a value, but as a built in part of how things are run.
That starts with culture. Organizations can prevent burnoutby creating a culture where people feel safe to speak up when they'reoverwhelmed. This includes setting realistic workloads, encouraging time offand making emotional check-ins, a regular part of meetings, not just somethingreserved for crisis.
Clarity also matters when roles, responsibilities, andexpectations are clearly defined. People are less likely to overextendthemselves or burn out trying to do everything. Flexibility is important too,allowing people to step up or step back based on capacity without shame. Whenburnout does happen, the response matters.
The handbook encourages organizations to meet burnout withsupport and not judgment. That means listening, adjusting workloads, andoffering people a path to recover. Without pushing them out. It also meanshaving systems in place, policies for rest, peer support networks, and sharedaccountability. So care doesn't rely on just one or two people holding it all.
Burnout isn't inevitable. With the right structures inplace, it can be prevented, and when it happens, people can be supported tocome back.
Host: That was Julia Joubert in conversation withpeace activists Michaela Ledesma and Jacob Lefton. You'll find Julia's completeconversations with Michaela and Jacob along with the link to the full activisthandbook @peacetalksradio.com.
That's also where you can explore all our episodes datingback to 2002. See photos of our guests, read and share transcripts and sign upfor our podcast. You can also make a donation to support this work into thefuture all at peacetalksradio.com. Support comes from listeners like you. Alongwith the Albuquerque Community Foundation Ties Fund and KUNM at the Universityof New Mexico. Nola Daves Moses is our executive director, Ali Adelman composedand performs our theme music for correspondent Julia Joubert and co-foundersPaul Ingles and Suzanne Kryder. I'm Jessica Ticktin. Thank you for listening toand for supporting Peace Talks Radio.
