You aren’t the problem
But you are the solution.
I'm observing a concerning pattern in personal development marketing. It sounds like this:
The 3 mistakes you're making that keep you at your money set point! Register for the free webinar.
Click the link in bio for the mindset block that's holding you back
This key miscalculation is keeping you from [insert desired outcome here]
I've clicked and gone to a lot of these at this point, because I'm getting serious about building a business that can support my lifetime goal of returning acres and cash dollars to the Occaneechi Band of the Saponi nation. And I actually have gotten some value from pretty much all of them.
Here's the issue (and lol, look at me doing the same thing I'm critiquing, I know):
There is a limit to what individuals can do in the context of systemic catastrophe.
The message in this kind of marketing is that an individual's choices are entirely responsible for the outcomes they experience. It's common in the Law of Attraction space, where folks say things like "You create 100% of your own reality."
This is spiritual bypassing, and it happens a lot in problematic New Age spaces.
Let's be clear, acting from an internal locus of control can be incredibly empowering.
But without context it can slide into victim-blaming and denial of systemic oppression.
Cedric Robinson used the term racial capitalism to emphasize the inequity embedded in the economic system we inhabit. In a market that artificially limits supply of basic human needs (water! food! shelter!) to create demand for the profit of a few, suffering happens systemically.
Systemic problems require systemic solutions.
Spiritual/energetic/embodied healing practices that deny material reality are always going to fall short.
It is unethical to treat the suffering due to land theft and genocide as a demand, and then gatekeep supply to a solution that doesn’t address the root cause. This is manufactured dependency and profoundly unjust.
Given the exploitative power dynamics that define systemic oppression, this sets people up to blame themselves for all of their problems and give away their power to an external authority who claims their framework is universally applicable.
Socioeconomic factors are going to impact whether participants/clients get results from even the most fabulous framework. Marketers are out here directly contradicting each other, each backing up their claim with the thousands of people who got results from their specific system... But there isn't a one-size-fits-all fix. Even my preferred solution - a nonviolent love revolution - won't make everyone happy.
Spiritual/energetic/embodied healing practices that deny material reality are always going to fall short. The graphic above is how I see mainstream healing play out: those individuals with access to resources get a little better and it impacts their micro- and meso- environment, but the big picture doesn't transform. Structures like environmental racism, patriarchy, and white supremacy continue to systematically cause harm.
Unfortunately, there's a financial incentive for healers to ignore the big picture because clients' ongoing suffering can be treated as a pain point for ethical marketing. Just blame the person's hurt on something they're doing wrong, and sell them your solution.
I envision social change movements full of individuals who are
🧭Soul-led
🫀Heart-inspired
🧠Intellectually-grounded
👩🏽🦽Embodied
✨Ancestrally led
...Creating a wave of revolutionary, radical love.
If you're in, let's do this.