Naming What We Imagine: A Pathway to Self-Liberation

At growURpotential.org, we mentor Healing Healers to transform by looking inwards. Healing is not just personal; it’s also political, communal, and imaginative. To change or actively participate in our journey, we must become familiar with our inner landscape.

“What we can imagine, we can name. What we can name, we can nurture. What we can nurture, we can liberate." Meisha Thrasher, co-founder of growURpotential.org

According to Meisha Thrasher, co-Founder of growURpotential.org, "this mantra emerged from my own healing and facilitation work, where I watched individuals reclaim power by giving shape to what once felt like chaos. Imagination allows us to perceive possibility. Looking inwards allows us to see patterns, systems, and stories. When we choose to transform judgment, fear, and doubt we can experience liberation within, and in relationships. And through relationship, we find the courage and clarity to heal inherited trauma."

The idea and practice of naming the parts of ourselves is not new. We help Healing Healers invest deeply in the many philosophies that guide looking inwards because they all effectively deconstruct internalized oppression. We can only use protective strategies when we know how, and once we know how we can experience a life of abundance and liberty, while navigating a world that's not there yet.

• bell hooks amplifies these truths, particularly her writings on love, naming pain, and healing as acts of liberation.

  
  

• Audre Lorde: amplifies these truths, especially in A Burst of Light (especially the essay “The Transformation of Silence into Language and Action”)

  
  

• Resmaa Menakem amplifies these truths, especially in My Grandmother’s Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Mending Our Hearts and Bodies.

  
  

• Adrienne Maree Brown amplifies these truths, especially in Emergent Strategy and We Will Not Cancel Us, where she often discusses the power of imagination, naming, and relational transformation as pathways to liberation.

  
  

• Tara Brach celebrates the courage of facing ourselves in Radical Compassion: Learning to Love Yourself and Your World with the Practice of RAIN.

  
  

• Lama Rod Owens, a queer Black Buddhist teacher shares these truths in Love and Rage: The Path of Liberation through Anger

  
  

• Prentis Hemphill preaches these truths everywhere as the Founder of the Embodiment Institute, and centers the same truths in The Black Embodiment Initiative.

  
  

• Cara Page & Kindred Healing Justice Collective anchor these truths in Healing Justice Lineages: Dreaming at the Intersections of Ancestry, Activism, and Collective Healing (with Erica Woodland)

  
  

• Alexis Pauline Gumbs inspires us to practice listening, submerging, and re-emerging in Undrowned: Black Feminist Lessons from Marine Mammals.

  
  

• Erica Woodland, Founder of the National Queer and Trans Therapists of Color Network (NQTTCN) champions braver investments (with Cara Page) in Healing Justice Lineages (co-editor) because healing for QTPOC is foundational to justice.

  
  

• Sonya Renee Taylor inspires a radical reimagining of self-worth, through embodiment practices in The Body is Not an Apology: The Power of Radical Self-Love.

Join us to explore how we transform by looking inwards, get to know the gifts of somatic language, and the path to personal fullness. Let yourself be the guide for you! Join our Healing Healer Network today, get started HERE.