Spirit in Action
Beyond Diversity 101
Niyonu Spann began leading Beyond Diversity 101 workshops after about 10 years as a diversity workshop facilitator. In this new approach, Niyonu uses mixed modes, song, movement, body work, etc, to move in new directions of growth following knowledge of racism from all sides. Among other things, Niyonu makes music with Tribe1.
Music Featured:
- Broadcast on:
- 15 Aug 2010
- Audio Format:
- other
(upbeat music) ♪ Let us sing this song for the healing of the world ♪ ♪ That we may hear as one ♪ ♪ With every voice of every song ♪ ♪ We will move this world along ♪ ♪ And our lives will feel the echo of our healing ♪ - Welcome to Spirit in Action. My name is Mark helps me. Each week, I'll be bringing you stories of people living lives of fruitful service, of peace, community, compassion, creative action, and progressive efforts. I'll be tracing the spiritual roots that support and nourish them in their service, hoping to inspire and encourage you to sink deep roots and produce sacred fruit in your own life. ♪ Let us sing this song for the dreaming of the world ♪ ♪ That we may dream as one ♪ ♪ With every voice of every song ♪ ♪ We will move this world along ♪ - Today for Spirit in Action, we're going to be talking to neo new span, the source of a series of experiential workshops called Beyond Diversity 101. That's one of the ways I got to know about neo new, but another vital energy flowing from her is music. I'd heard her perform previously, but I recently took part in a week long workshop she led at the Friends General Conference Gathering, a workshop called Singing Our Souls. At the end of the week, we produced some spirit deepening music with neo new, and before we talk to her about her experience of race and overcoming the chains of racism, I'd like to share with you one of the songs that we learned. We'll go now to neo new spans workshop on the grounds of Bowling Green, Ohio State University, and then we'll visit with neo new. ♪ I wish I knew how ♪ ♪ It would feel to be free ♪ ♪ I wish I knew great ♪ ♪ All these chains holding me ♪ ♪ I wish I would have been ♪ ♪ A woman with only three ♪ ♪ The woman I wish I would have been ♪ ♪ All these chains holding me ♪ ♪ I wish I knew how I would have been ♪ ♪ Waiting for loyalty ♪ ♪ I wish I would be great ♪ ♪ Oh Lord, our teaching ♪ ♪ I'd love to help you more ♪ ♪ I wish I knew how it would feel ♪ ♪ Waiting for loyalty ♪ ♪ I wish I would be great ♪ ♪ All these chains holding me ♪ ♪ I wish I knew how it would feel to be free ♪ ♪ It would feel to be free ♪ ♪ I wish I could pray ♪ ♪ All these chains of holding me ♪ ♪ Anyone I'll wait ♪ ♪ Wait in the water ♪ ♪ Wait in the water ♪ ♪ Wait in the water ♪ ♪ Wait in the water ♪ ♪ Wait in the water ♪ ♪ Wait in the water ♪ ♪ Wait in the water ♪ ♪ Wait in the water ♪ ♪ Wait in the water ♪ ♪ Wait in the water ♪ ♪ Children ♪ ♪ Wait in the water ♪ ♪ It has some trouble to water ♪ ♪ Wait in the water ♪ ♪ Wait in the water ♪ ♪ Children ♪ ♪ Wait in the water ♪ ♪ It has some trouble to water ♪ ♪ Wait in the water ♪ ♪ Wait in the water ♪ ♪ I wish I could pray ♪ ♪ All these chains of holding me ♪ ♪ I wish I could pray ♪ ♪ It would feel to be free ♪ ♪ I wish I could pray ♪ ♪ All these chains of holding me ♪ - Nionu, thanks so much for joining me for "Spirit in Action." - Thank you for having me. - And thank you for leading some beautiful music this morning. Nionu is leading a workshop, which I'm attending. We're singing our souls, and it's so good for you to bring your soul here with us today. I've known about you for a number of years, but I've not actually ever talked to you before today. The first place that I made contact with you or knew much about you was the Beyond Diversity 101 that you were offering. I'm sure you didn't start there. If you did Beyond Diversity 101, does that mean that you also did Diversity 101 or how did this go? - Yes, well, I did do Diversity 101. And what I think of Diversity 101 is those activities that begin to get folks in touch with their sense of outrage or their sense of guilt about what has been and what is being done. You know, it's those workshops that kind of say when was the first time that you experienced racism? Not that we might not ask that question in a B.D. 101, but what I found in the first work that I was doing in this field was there was almost an expectation during those workshops, whether it was anti-racism or bias awareness, that if you get folks in touch with their anger and get folks in touch with their guilt, that you've done the work. I was noticing that as a facilitator or consultant in this field that you could make quite a bit of money just doing that. And so I began to ask a question, is there anything beyond that? Or I would oftentimes hear folks say in a workshop, you know, there's always been sexism or there's always been racism and there always will be and that's the way it is. So when I asked the question, is that the cycle that we're stuck in? Is it an always thing? And I seriously asked the question I began to have teachers and experiences that showed up in my life to help me understand that there is something beyond. In a nutshell, I would say it has a lot to do with understanding our co-responsibility and acknowledging the true difference in access and the true difference in power to access and at the same time recognizing our part and having created what is and what shall be. - Well, in order to get to that point where you're going beyond, you had to go, I think, I think every, all of us have to go through, call it the guilt, call it the anger, call it whatever, it's those turbulent emotions because at least as far as I understand it, we all swim in this soup of cultural understanding and we don't even know enough to be outraged about outrageous things happening. That can be war, it can be racism, it can be sex roles, it could be economic disparity, all of those things. Frequently, we grow up with it and we just say, "Oh, that's the way it is." What got you to the point where you knew that the system was messed up, that you had been raised in a system that demanded a strong reaction? - It's kind of an interesting question being born in 1955 in Newark, New Jersey. My life was laid out in such a way that I understood that there was stuff to be outraged about. With the Newark uprisings or Newark riots that happened when I was a young girl and actually had to be shipped off to my grandparents in Philadelphia for my family to feel that I'd be safe and with the Black Panther parties on the corners and all that was going on, it wasn't so much in my experience that it was so much knowing that there was something to be outraged about. For me, the journey was, in fact, getting in touch with my part. Now, this is on an individual level. A good example would be as a Black woman teaching in a friend's school, being the only African-American in the upper school, for instance. I noticed that there was a pattern of my offering of suggestion or an opportunity for greater understanding during a staff meeting, during a faculty meeting and feeling unheard by the rest of the faculty. Now, this is a common experience for the only of anything, I think. What was more empowering for me was not so much noticing that folks didn't have an understanding or necessarily maybe a tolerance for listening. What was most empowering for me was to notice that I had a tendency to bring myself less to the table out of an expectation of not being heard or out of the true experience of not being heard. What was most empowering for me was when I was able to, one, begin to take note of my part in pulling back myself, my power, my understanding, my truth. And what did I wanna do about that part of it? Right now, I'm really talking on what I would call an individual and group level, because I had access to a way of being or I had access to bringing myself more fully in those circumstances. So that was an entryway for me. Looking at what are the things that I do that sustain the status quo? And I have to say, the more I got in touch with that, the more powerful I actually felt to shift that dynamic. Now, that's on an individual and group level. We could take ourselves as a people, in this case, as African-American people. I'm more excited at this stage in my life to say to a group of African-American folk, what do we do that helps to sustain the current reality? I'm much more interested in that and in many ways than trying to set up an environment where I get white folks to know more and more and more and more kind of like what they've done and get them more and more and more in touch with that. It's the same question though for a group of white folks, a group of heterosexual straight folks to say, what is it that we're doing that's sustaining the status quo? I just mentioned that as an entryway because that understanding and noticing how I was being different once I understood my part. And my part could be I'm leaving this job. I mean, that's also a part. So in other words, I'm not saying you're stuck in that circle but understand the choice points in there. Was there a moment when you saw it in clear relief? You saw, of course you're sitting in these meetings at the Quaker School you were teaching at and you noticed that eventually. Did someone come and hit you on the head? Did someone remind you? Because from my experience, you can live in that kind of environment and just go along and never wake up from the bad dream there. Was there something that all of a sudden you turned around and maybe you said, I have to leave this school or maybe you said, hey folks, you're treating me like a token here or you had to take your power back. How many times? It's interesting because as we were sitting in worship before you introduced this and asked the first question, I was thinking what a gift it is to be able to look back over the path because when you're in it, when you're in those moments and I'll share a couple of them with you, the challenge for me is, you know, give over, thine on willing, give over, thine on desiring to be or to do anything. You know, that is the momently challenge. So that's the experience when the stuff hits the fan. But looking back, I can see at different times in my life at different ages where I could, you know, kind of live up to the truth that I had at that time. So for instance, when I was a teacher at Oakwood Boarding School, I feel like I was, I mean, I was young. I was 22, 23 years old. Again, my then-husband Dwight and I were at first the only African-Americans and there was a Haitian couple that came. When I left Oakwood, it was under a tremendous challenge of one feeling unseen, unheard, discriminated against. And with the young voice that I had at the time, I tried to speak to that, but we ended up leaving. With that unfinished feeling, you know, after eight years and having a child born there and all the pain of that. And I fast forward to a later time in my life working at another Quaker institution, also feeling and recognizing that there was misunderstanding and discrimination that I felt that I was experiencing. And the call that was so clear for me was to stay put that there was a speaking of that experience that I was called to beyond what happened when I was at Oakwood. And in fact, that there needed to be a cycle broken, which is the cycle of people of color. And I would say people in a not mainstream or a minority experience oftentimes what happens is you're in the pressure in the organizational, societal pressure. And you say, I'm out of here, you know? And what gets communicated is, oh, Niana was ready to move on or I think something happened there, but we don't really know what it was and but she's found something better that I think she likes and so forth. And I hear this all the time. And what I felt that spirits was leading me to in this last case was, no, you know, you don't just leave, you don't act as if the experience has not been what it's been. And that needs to be fully communicated. So that was the challenge or the call in that particular case. - I don't know much about your background in the workshop this morning. You mentioned going to Baptist church, singing in a Baptist church as opposed to those places where people are taught to be polite and quiet. And the question occurred to me, and I've got some background to this myself, is it worse to deal with blatant racism or with liberal comfortable sounding racism? I had a student when I was teaching at the University of Wisconsin in Milwaukee. He had grown up in South Alabama or something like that. You know, the racism's out there and it's on the table. He moved up to Milwaukee and he said, the racism was much worse in Milwaukee. Not that anybody was going around, throwing around the N word and doing all that kind of stuff, but it was, he said it just felt so cold and it's so hard to get a hold of. It's, he said, I want to go back where, if someone's mistreating me, they're doing it to my face. So in your experience, if you've had all those experiences, I don't know, blatant and versus kind of nice people, not even knowing how bad they're being. - You know, I've heard people say, I'd rather just deal with the blatant writing your face stuff. I have to wonder really about that. I mean, I know what's meant by it, God knows. And I think that the pain that is associated with when you come into relationship and you are believing that it's going to be different, you know, that the vision and the mission or the call and the relationship is such that you feel that you open yourself in a way so that that pain is very intense. And in some ways, I think strengthens the very thing that we're talking about, maybe hoping to get away with. In other words, I think it strengthens the shielding and the blocking. So I do understand that piece, but the few times that I've actually had someone yell out their car and say, you know, I won't say it, but really harsh words to me. I mean, the way that that has felt and it hasn't happened that many times or to hear my dad talk about getting picked up back in the '50s and beaten down in the jailhouse and just being led out the next morning and not being able to do anything about it, I don't lightly say, in other words, that dealing with liberal folks who are acting as if they no longer have any isms working within them, but feeling it on a daily basis, I'm not gonna say that that is necessarily easier. - What is your background, Neil? Where did you, you grew up in New Jersey evidently, there's a lot of space in New Jersey, including there's inner city to, I assume, 100% whites, upper class, neighborhoods, the kind of thing, what was your experience? I obviously at some point, you were at Oakwood Friends School, so you must have lived in a number of different communities. How did it go? What was your background, what was your experience? - Well, I grew up in Newark, New Jersey, inner city, Newark, New Jersey, very different Newark pre and post riots, which unless you've kind of been in that area, you wouldn't really understand, because Newark has such a specific reputation now, but it was very different before riots. I grew up in my early life in a Baptist church, Mount Calgary Baptist Church, and going to Sunday school on Sundays, and to Baptist Training Union, BTU, and it just felt like everyone was doing that in my neighborhood. It was primarily African American acting as if everyone was heterosexual kind of culture. And around eighth grade, right before high school, one of my cousins found a church in Newark that was pastored by a white couple who really reached out to the young folks in the community, and it was a very different church. I mean, the thing that we would always say is, we're allowed to walk up on the pulpit. I mean, that was like, you know, and there was, you know, guitars, there were white kids, there were black kids, there was going out, giving our testimonies on the corners of Newark, and it was an interdenominational church, and that really, you know, had a great significance and being exposed to that particular world, and the language of accepting Jesus as your personal savior, which was not, in the bad church, you were baptized, and then you went on. But in this church, it was all like, have you accepted Christ as your savior? So I was baptized again in that church after I accepted Christ as my savior. I love that church deeply, and always believed that I would go back there and do the same sort of outreach to young people. And then I went off to college, to Oberlin, and I was exposed again to another dictate, which said that you had to speak in tongues before you were a real Christian. So with some of the young adults that I was hanging with at that time, that was the thing. So I started going to a church there and started trying to speak in tongues, because I hadn't quite made it yet, and I was baptized once again in that setting, in that church, and there's a funny story that goes with that, because, you know, I was upstairs in the pastor was trying to get me to speak in tongues before I went down to get baptized. And he was like, well, say Jesus, say Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. Oh, over and over and over again. And so I was just trying, and what's wrong with me? How come I won't come? And so he sent me down, and the women got ready to put the robe on me to go into the water. And I just fell out. I had never experienced anything like this before. I fell out, and I don't know what I was saying. And the women were saying, not yet, not yet, not yet. (laughing) - Because they wanted me to get in the water first, and so it was, I often think about that experience in terms of how the order that folks think things should happen in, and that was also a, it was a significant door for me into a certain type of understanding of mysticism and a part of African culture. So that's a little bit of the door. And when Dwight and I were engaged to be married, I always assumed that I would be married in the church back in Newark with the white pastor and his wife, who had been missionaries in Kenya, and we were not allowed to be married there because Dwight had been married before. And it was beyond devastating to me. I mean, I must have cried for days. And so that was one of the, you know, looking back now. It was also one of those curves in the road, 'cause I don't know what might have happened if we were allowed to be married there. And I was marrying this Quaker who I'd never heard of Quakers before. It's a bit of that tale. (laughing) - The training that you did that I heard about, including from at least John who's sitting in this room, I heard a lot of good feedback about your Beyond Diversity 101. People talked about finding stuff out in what they were doing with you there. Now, you went around and did this. Now, first of all, was this workshop, I mean, it's bigger than a workshop, but was this coming out of your own personal stuff? Was this a group that was supporting you, leading you in this direction? How did this get refined? And what did the trainings consist of? I know there was some music in there. I can't imagine you without music. So why that mix? Where did it come from? Where was it headed? - Well, it does feel to me that when I mentioned before, calling out like, "Is there something beyond this?" That I can see a series of teachers, experiences that came through the years. A primary teacher of mine, Dr. Daria, is through doing some work with her. One of the key pieces, connections I made, is I had several relatives that I was sexually abused by as a child in my pre-13 years. Through some of my work with Dr. Daria, one of the things that I saw was the connection between some of the messages that I've received in the church about long-suffering, about being born into sin. Let's start with that. And others, there was some connection between those teachings and how I viewed myself and what I deserved in life and the experience of being sexually abused as a young person. And when I began to see some of those connections, I experienced an opening, a freeing. It wasn't just seeing the connections, but sort of undoing those connections and really beginning to have a different relationship with spirit or with God than I had had previously. That opening, those openings, those understandings and the shifting, I would call them shifting on the root level of how you believe or how you see the world at which you assume was central to the BD101 birthing that happened many, many years later. So in some ways I could say, no, there wasn't a committee, I wasn't talking to anyone except I was listening for what should be included that first five days. So it was very clear to me that it needed to be at least four days. It was clear to me that it wasn't intensive and it needed to be explained to people that way. It was clear to me that we needed body workers. We needed people to be working as people are releasing ways of understanding and core assumptions and root level stuff that stuff is also held in the body so that that would assist the movement. It was so channelled in some ways, you know? I mean, I look back at it and I think, 'cause the woman that I called to ask to do the first, to be the body worker for that first four days, I had seen her one time and she said, well, what do you want me to do? And I said, I don't know. I mean, I just feel like the one time I was with you, you seem to really understand what deep work in the body was about what the shifting that happens in the body and how that relates to emotions and spirit. So we kind of went into that venture together and I can't say that the BD 101s now, in terms of the outline of the four to five days, is dramatically different. I mean, I knew that there had to be movement and dancing only because it could have been something else if I had a different comfort zone or skill myself. It could have been something, but it needed to be something that was moving the energy and it needed to be, to some degree, something that folks didn't think was necessarily a natural thing to do in a workshop setting. So those were some of the pieces and each BD 101 starts with, I invite people to bring something for the honoring table that just honors their path to that point. Sometimes people bring family pictures, sometimes they bring a doll, a rock, driftwood. There's been all kinds of things that folks bring and the contract in my mind between myself as facilitator and holder of the space and those folks that come is when they really give voice to what the calling is or what their intention is and that is what I feel that we're holding the space for. And it's focused on to a large extent root level shifting. And what I mean by that is, as I said before, when those shifts were going on in my own life about, I think of a deservedness is a big one because not that I've gotten there where that still doesn't come up for me to some extent, but there is a huge difference between how I walk in the world around two things, one around who I be and what I can embrace and deserve and the other being in terms of how I look at my participation in creating what has happened. So those are two big shifts for me personally and they're shifts that I think need to happen for us on a societal in parts of society as well and how we be in the world. And that's why, I mean, I'm so excited to continue this work. We'll be back to Nionna's span in a moment, but first let's listen to Desre singing of the kind of thing Nionna was just talking about. Song is, "I ain't movin'." ♪ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪ ♪ Love is my passion, love is my friend, love is my friend ♪ ♪ Loved you never so, love never ends ♪ ♪ Then why am I faced with so much anger, so much pain ♪ ♪ Why should I hide, why should I be ashamed ♪ ♪ Tom's much too short to believe in somebody else's life ♪ ♪ I work with dignity, I step with pride ♪ ♪ 'Cause I ain't movin' from my face, from my race ♪ ♪ From my history, I ain't movin' from my love ♪ ♪ My face, from my love, means too much to me ♪ ♪ Loving self can be so hard, honesty can be demanding ♪ ♪ Learn to love yourself, it's a great, great feeling ♪ ♪ When you're down, baby, I will set you free ♪ ♪ I will be your remedy ♪ ♪ I will be your tree ♪ ♪ A wise man is clever, seldom ever speaks so word ♪ ♪ A foolish man keeps talking ♪ ♪ And the other is he heard, no, no, no, no ♪ ♪ Tom's much too short to believe in somebody else's life ♪ ♪ I work with dignity, I step with pride ♪ ♪ 'Cause I ain't movin' from my face ♪ ♪ From my race, from my history, I ain't movin' from my love ♪ ♪ My face wound up, means too much to me ♪ ♪ Loving self can be so hard, honesty can be demanding ♪ ♪ Learn to love yourself, it's a great, great feeling ♪ ♪ Tom's too lonely, too lonely with our brothers ♪ ♪ The future voices need to be heard ♪ ♪ One closer hour is older than the big ♪ ♪ Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, it's almost every break ♪ ♪ You've never think to be done ♪ ♪ Tom's much too short to believe in somebody else's life ♪ ♪ I work with dignity, I step with pride ♪ ♪ 'Cause I ain't movin' from my face, from my race ♪ ♪ From my history, I ain't movin' from my love ♪ ♪ My face wound up, means too much to me ♪ ♪ Loving self can be so hard, honesty can be demanding ♪ ♪ Learn to love yourself, it's a great, great feeling ♪ ♪ Design of movin' from my face, from my race ♪ ♪ From my history, I ain't movin' from my love ♪ ♪ My face wound up, means too much to me ♪ ♪ Loving self can be so hard, honesty can be demanding ♪ ♪ If we learn to love ourselves, they'll have great, great feelings ♪ ♪ 'Cause I ain't movin', I've been here long before ♪ ♪ I ain't movin', 'cause I want more, more ♪ ♪ I ain't movin', got my feet on the ground ♪ ♪ Hey, hey, I was not concerned ♪ ♪ Love should miss the rounds of liberty to see ♪ ♪ Damn it, damn it, damn it, damn it, damn it ♪ ♪ Oh, yeah ♪ Desre, and her song, "I Ain't Movin'", and that's a good place to be, self-knowing and accepting with deservedness, as Niono just said earlier. If you just tuned in, this is Spirit in Action, which is a Northern Spirit radio production. My name is Mark Helpsmeet, your host here. Our website is northernspiritradio.org, go to the site. You'll find the stations where we're broadcast, you'll find how to subscribe via iTunes, and you can leave comments. All of our programs are archived on our site, so you can listen to anyone from the past five years. We have with us today here, Niono Spann, who is a great many things, but mainly a blessing. I'm in her workshop here at the Gathering. This is the National Gathering of the Friends General Conference. We are in Bowling Green at the University here in Ohio. Niono, what came out of, or what did you intend to come out of, and what came out of, the Beyond Diversity 101 training? Did anyone turn around and save the world, or did they save themselves? I mean, I'm really wondering, did someone find out about their abuse and find out that they can change their ways? I mean, all of those things are possible, and of course, I also believe it's confidential, so I'm not asking for any violation that way. I'd like to know where it's aimed at, because we're here today talking about Spirit in Action, and I think looking for ways that the Spirit's transforming the world. As you were asking that question, it was almost like a comic strip, like seeing different scenes and different individuals. There's been 14, I think 14 or 15 BD101s, intensives. Each has a very particular flavor. There's a train of trainers coming up at the end of this month, and it's a requirement to have done a five-day intensive to be in the train of trainers, but it's not a requirement at this point to have done more than one, and I wonder about that. I've wondered about it for a while, but more and more, I wonder if that needs to be a requirement, partly because if you did the one BD101 that was all women and one Asian man, there's a way in which you understand that experience, and then you take that into the training for trainers. If you did the BD101 that was at Northern Yearly Meeting, which was a very large group, and I would say was probably one of the most heart-centered BD101s, is very, I remember, I can taste how much heart-centered there was. There was another one that was at Kirkridge that had like five African-American women and five white men and white women, and there was a particular energy, not to say that heart was in there, but it was much more like sharp and a little edgy, and then there was one in this past spring that, I mean, there's an activity that is so simple. It's just defining some terms. It's probably one of the ones that you never think is anything's going to come up, and folks were so ready to start dealing with and calling out their own stuff and other people's stuff that I was like, wow, you know. So as you ask about what's come out, this is what's going through my mind, is the various group settings and what people have come to do, actually come to do. So a few common reports. One is that I've had several white folks who have said that moving beyond a place of guilt has allowed them to be much more of an activist in the world, or to parent a child of color in a way that they never imagined, because you know, there's so many myths within this work and within the understanding around difference that are truly blocking our communication or wholeness. Almost every group I've said that I challenge people to think about the term ally, just to really think about what are they talking about when they say being an ally, because embedded in that terminology oftentimes what I experience is that you experience racism, and I want to be an ally to you in your fight against racism. At least neo-new. I don't really have much use for that kind of ally, because I want you to know how you are experiencing racism, how it is keeping you from being whole, and I want us to be equally passionate about doing work to get rid of it. In some ways you can say, "Oh, that's very theoretical." But no, that lives out in the real everyday world. It's very apparent to me when you are really completely with me, and when you see how you are a target in some ways, or not so much a target, but how you have also suffered under this racist society that we're living in. So to see people shift in their understanding around that is very huge. To have an African American sister say to me, "For the first time I really get how I'm working out of a victim mindset and how that's blocking me from so much of what I want to be doing in the world, and how I want to be." To have a school or institution begin to make some of the changes that I've seen. Partly because of folks coming back from BD101, I love it the most when a group organization sends two or three people so that they have a language and they have an understanding that can begin to be infused throughout the institutions. And when people have gone back and actually then send me their diversity plans and their work, and I see that they're not the typical sort of multicultural plans or diversity plans that I've seen in many institutions, which are really about checking something off the list to say that we did it, but really doing that work at the root level, that's huge. And for me personally, you know, I just recently moved to the city of Chester after I left Pendle Hill because I don't know, I feel like this time in my life spirit is like, you're going to be working in some of the hardest places for a little while in doing this work, and folks need to get in touch with a sense of responsibility and ability to respond that in many ways, they've just kind of really lost. And when I say the city of Chester, that's one of the most economically depressed cities in the state of Pennsylvania. And so this is, you know, I really feel like I'm in the trenches with this work right now. So going from Pendle Hill to Chester, I cannot tell you the extreme difference. Are you doing this beyond diversity work only amongst Quakers? Have you done it in the outside world? Does it have to be done differently there? Can you do it the same? I think amongst Quakers, there's this understanding about spirit and listening to each other, sinking down to the seat, the stuff you were talking about earlier. In fact, I had a sense just five minutes ago, I was saying, is this woman channeling John Woman? The way that he dealt with getting rid of slavery within friends where he didn't go and push the guilt button, including going to the plantation owners, some of them were just befuddled because he didn't try and do that stuff. So first of all, are you channeling John Woman? And where else are you doing this work? Absolutely not just with Quakers, though I have to say because of, you know, like most of us, partly because of my associations and definitely the four years at Pendle Hill and offering BD101 there at Pendle Hill. There's a large number of Quakers, like when I look at the whole BD101 database, I think it's 50%, 60% Quaker. There's a school district in Florida that sent four folks up to the last intensive, very exciting to have, you know, this school district find the website, get a call and say, this looks different than the other workshops we're considering. Why is that? And, you know, to have them come up. So yes, each workshop is a mixture of folks. What I find is I don't really believe that Quakers, it's not so much that we have an understanding of those things in a way that other folks would not have an understanding. I think that it's like I was saying in the workshop today that my sister and I, we come from a musical family. So, you know, we sang harmony in the back of the car all the time. That was our way of kind of cutting out chops. We were doing that stuff early and we were singing against like she was saying one song and I'd sing another one and see if we could hold our parts, you know, I'd go louder and she'd go louder. And because we came up with a musical family, we practiced all that stuff. So it'd be very hard for you to get me off my part in terms of music. And it's what I think as friends is that our practices lead to a deepening, a more easily accessible that silence and sinking down and so forth is more accessible. But I think it is a natural language. I think it's a natural way of being. So, it's funny I'm talking about Dwight so much. But when we were in our wedding and when Dwight and I got married, we got married in a black Baptist church in Newark and we had a Quaker wedding. For the most part, except we allowed the pastor to, you know, he still said I have to say these words. So he said his words, but everything else, it was a Quaker wedding. And afterward, I mean, he loved it and some of the folks in the church loved it so much. He kept trying to have the silent times during the services. But then somebody would get up and start testifying. And before you know it, they were shouting and everything. And so the door was open, but they did what they were really used to and familiar with in those spaces. I think of the work of Parker Palmer in the teaching communities. I mean, not that that's the only place that he works, but if you look in the teaching community and look at what Parker Palmer has brought to the field of education and how people understand it, it's a bunch of Quaker stuff. A lot of it is what we think of as the clearness process. He wouldn't necessarily use spirit or God language in that context, but people are drawn to it. They're thirsty for it. So I'm doing a summer camp in Chester this summer, three weeks. And part of my goal is to have these 13 to 16-year-olds tap into just a little, little, little, little bed. What happens in a moment of silence? Because I think a lot of what happens and why, you know, my dad has three TVs going in his house at one time, is the defense is against hearing what's there. And we hear that meditation and so forth. So I say all that to say, I don't think of it as folks not getting some of this stuff naturally or easily that is a part of the BD101 experience or the Beyond Diversity 101 experience. I feel like it's partly creating a space for remembering. And that was one of the songs that we did this morning. Please see me and remember I've come to learn to love. And I love the word "re-member." So that's what I feel as Quakers in many ways, part of the gift that we have to bring to this society at this time is helping folks to remember that we can ourselves have an understanding and that we have been given a gift to discern the way forward. But we have to remember. We have to remember what we say we are about, which is that there is that of God and everyone. And people can actually be given a message from God. Well, Nion, I'm afraid we're at the end of our time. But I think it would be completely inappropriate if we went off without some music. Is there something that you'd care to share to finish off this session? Well, thank you, first of all. It's a great opportunity. I never think of myself as being able to speak for an hour's time about anything. So I'll just do a little bit of "re-member." Please see me and remember I've come to learn to love. Please see me and remember I've come to learn to love. It's hard sometimes to show the love inside. It's hard sometimes to show the love inside. Please be with me and remember I've come to learn to love. Please be with me and remember I've come to learn to love. It's hard sometimes to be the love inside. It's hard sometimes to be the love inside. Thank you so much, Nion. Many blessings as you go forward on your work of healing and holding and singing forth the spirit. Thank you so much, Mark. Our guest for spirit and action today has been Nionu Span. You can find out about Beyond Diversity 101 workshops at the website beyonddiversity101.org. Maybe you can take part in one of the five-day intensives or maybe you know someone else who's interested. If you Google Nionu's name, you'll also find connections to some of her musical work like that with Tribe One. I think you'll enjoy and be deepened by that music. Thanks for joining us for spirit and action and we're going to take you out this time with one more song kind of on today's theme. This is Bill Harley and some other folks singing "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?" "Ain't you got a right to the tree of life?"