Posts by Rebecca Greenidge (she/her)
Can’t bear another zoom call?
I get it. You’re sick of zoom and wish I’d offer something in-person. For those of you who are new around these parts, it might surprise you to hear that I used to think our liberation journey could only bear fruit when we were together, in person. In 2019 my business coach told me I…
Read MoreFrom the Edge of the Earth
I was at the coast all of last week. It was amazing and I was reminded why I do what I do. This coming December is a big month for me. It will mark 5 years since I Jomo and I accidentally started JORE Consulting. Some of you may not have heard that story…but the…
Read MoreWilling
Relief. In its many forms. I watched, listened, and smelled the first rain – hoping it’s enough to extinguish some of the fires. Jomo had set up a daily backup of our website (oh, how he keeps loving me from afar) so when it went down last week my sister knowingly took the reins from…
Read MoreBeyond Anti_________
It was the rhythm that first caught my attention. drerp, drerp, drerp. [pause] drerp, drerp, drerp. [pause] drerp, drerp, drerp. I turned and became caught up in watching my cat drink from his water bowl. After every few licks, he would pause. Still completely in a ready-to-drink posture. Chin just above the water. I imagined…
Read MoreWhat If I’m Wrong?
It happened in two different sessions this week. Both questions could be summed up as… “But Rebecca, what if you’re wrong about that?” The truth? It’s pretty likely that I am. In this little corner of the world, I see no evidence that I have found a sure method of abolishing the system of racism.…
Read MoreTo All Who Labor
You are the life bearers. Dreamers. Architects. Gatherers. Teachers. Organizers. Leaders. The substance of your yearning. Swollen within you. You endure pain. Crying out even when no one hears. You carry the weight of vision. And the burden of explanation. You accept the loneliness. No one can labor for you. You gather your midwives. Strength,…
Read MoreOn Remembering
Today marks 9 months since my partner and Co-founder of JORE Consulting, Jomo D.M. Greenidge, transitioned to ancestor. For those of you who never had the opportunity to meet him – here’s one way we are remembering him. Jomo poured himself out. He gave. And gave until he could give no more. The night…
Read MoreRage
Black death I am, what’s the word? I don’t know… Enraged Terrified Inconsolable Yep, all of those I hear of him Daunte Black joy Father Son Dreamer Lover Precious Wonderful Good Good Good And I think of him Jomo Black joy Father Son Dreamer Lover Precious Wonderful Good Good Good And I see him lying…
Read MoreThe Stickiness of Superiority
Hey white folks, can we talk? If you are on this Rachel Hollis bandwagon (or the next famous white person who offers us public evidence that the system of white dominance is, in fact, still alive and well), I have a few thoughts… How might our internalized superiority be showing up in our impulse to…
Read MoreBroken
Came out of a store and found this cup. Broken. Alone. Sitting on the curb. When I peered inside, the broken pieces were collected at the bottom in a pool of sky sorrow. I was many moons younger when I learned about the Japanese tradition of wabi sabi – translated loosely as the beauty of…
Read MoreJomo D.M. Greenidge – Obituary
On November 8th 1970, Jomo David Mungai Greenidge was the second of four children born to Henry Greenidge and Esther Whittingham of New York. Jomo was constantly on the move from his very first steps. For his parents, Jomo’s kinetic energy was easier to manage inside the confines of his family’s Bronx high-rise apartment, but…
Read MoreWith Deepest Sadness
It is with the deepest sadness we are reaching out to share the devastating news that Jomo Greenidge passed unexpectedly last week. We are working to facilitate support for all current cohorts as we receive guidance from Rebecca. For now, please know that all cohort gatherings with Rebecca are being paused until further notice…
Read MoreDo You Hear It Too?
Note: I am a white person speaking to white people. This piece was written originally after the murder of Ahmaud Arbery. Until the senseless murders of Black people stop, this will still be relevant. Share as you wish. I’m spinning in circles today. Another Black person was lynched. My mourning clothes feel too comfortable. Everything…
Read MorePandemic
The past few days have been a whirlwind. The Coronavirus is sweeping through our communities like a silent thief. Endangering our most vulnerable. After finishing with one of our cohorts two nights ago, I made my routine call home to say I was on my way and Jomo shared that the NBA had shut down.…
Read MoreTrue North
White people are socialized for weakness. It took me a long time to see this and I spent years misidentifying it. This socialization starts in childhood. It sounds like “we don’t talk about that”, “you ask too many questions”, “stop crying”, “there is no race except the human race”. The underlying messages are that there…
Read MoreEmerge: Foundations
The Challenge My amazing business coach invited us to a 5-day Share The Love Challenge. This was perfect timing as I’ve been working on a series of posts that will highlight a list of resources that have helped my understanding about race EMERGE. Come check out the first post in the Emerge Series for more…
Read MoreEmerge: Where To Find Help
The Challenge My amazing business coach invited us to a 5-day Share The Love Challenge. This was perfect timing as I’ve been working on a series of posts that will highlight a list of resources that have helped my understanding about race EMERGE. Come check out the first post in the Emerge Series for more…
Read MoreEmerge: Aural Learning
The Challenge My amazing business coach invited us to a 5-day Share The Love Challenge. This was perfect timing as I’ve been working on a series of posts that will highlight a list of resources that have helped my understanding about race EMERGE. When I was 30, I studied to become a labor doula. I…
Read MoreDysconsciousness
Pacific Educational Group defines dysconsciousness as when I don’t know, but I think I do. When I was a young child, I was misidentified as a Native person by my classmates and they excluded me from group activities because they thought I was Native. At the time, my favorite way of wearing my hair was…
Read MoreGet Off The Struggle Bus!
You’ve never known us to hold back. So I’m going to be bold. I’m doing this because I know this struggle intimately. It comes in the form of barriers that sound like… I don’t have energy or time I can’t afford it I won’t be able to make a difference I worried y’all. Like, really…
Read MoreSprouted
Sometimes we’ve got to go back to Kindergarten! At the end of our recent event series with the Alliance of White Abolitionists, we planted seeds in paper cups. All week, I’ve been watching and anticipating these little sprouts – and it’s done something to my brain…I’m eager to grow, watching for the things I’m missing,…
Read MoreWhat the $$$$?
Let’s talk about money This week, I (Rebecca) posted about an upcoming cohort on social media and this was one of the responses: “I’m personally not going to attend this seminar. I learned in school and on the news how terrible the white race has been. I choose not to be like that. I’m pretty…
Read MoreIn One Minute
She invited me over. The counter read “how long can you last?” and I sat. Put the headphones on. Placed my hands on the sit-in counter. Closed my eyes. I was transported to the lunch counters. It started with the sounds of a busy lunchtime cafe. People talking, eating, laughing BANG the counter and my…
Read MoreCome Find Me Here…
I am excited to partner with White Awake from the DC area for a 2-part Webinar series on Building Local Community taking place August 18th and September 1st, 2-4pm PST. As many of you already know, the mission of JORE Consulting is to liberate all people from white dominance and we believe that building local…
Read MoreHow Shall We Respond?
Ava Duvernay’s When They See Us is incredibly important for white America to view and process. The mini-series has the potential to draw us to consider who we are in this time. It’s too easy to look back thirty years and think “I would never do that” which had me wondering whether my life exhibits…
Read MorePPB Incident Updates
This page will host the public updates from an interaction I had with Portland Police Bureau which took place on June 13, 2019 around 6:15pm near Killingsworth and NE 42nd Ave. I wrote about the incident here and will keep most recent updates at the top of this thread. 10/28/19, received an email from…
Read MoreJuneteenth
Imagine with me 2.5 years ago Pause here a moment Before reading on What is that thing That has you shackled For the last 2.5 years? Is it illness? Is it debt? Is it worry for your child? Is it depression? Is it addiction? Is it powerlessness? Is it houselessness? Is it fear? Is it…
Read MoreBlack Women Are Not A Problem
Black women are not a problem. Black women are not a problem. Black women are not a problem. To white people who hold power: study this graphic and commit to never, ever pushing black women out of your organization or watching it happen in your organization. Do not make decisions in isolation but rather stop…
Read MoreAbolition
I connect deeply with the prophetic nature of abolition work. It sounds like dreams, yet points toward a vision beyond today. It sounds critically unwavering, yet holds us capable and able of more than we thought possible. It sounds like immaturity, but requires both the imagination of youth and the steadfast experience of elders. This…
Read MoreThe Only Thing That Matters
Yesterday I attended the Black Voices United Candidate Forum. Maranatha Church hosted this black-led space for candidates for Portland Public Schools Board to answer questions of concern from the black community. This event was organized by Nichole Watson and moderated by Sam Thompson. Michelle DePass and Shanice Clarke — you are both my sheros. I wish both…
Read MoreThe Myth of “Choice”
Here, before God, in the presence of these witnesses, from this time, I consecrate my life to the destruction of slavery! – John Brown, 1837 Yesterday I read Kyle Korver’s self reflective piece about his emerging race consciousness. His story models the process of how white people go from centering white cultural norms to an…
Read MoreAudiobooks 2019
Dear America: Notes Of An Undocumented Citizen by Jose Antonio Vargas When They Call You A Terrorist: A Black Lives Matter Memoir by Patrisse Khan-Cullors I’m Still Here: Black Dignity In A World Made For Whiteness by Austin Channing Brown Survival Math: Notes On An All American Family by Mitchell S. Jackson They Called Me…
Read MoreTrayvon
I can remember being in the process of our homestudy for adoption during the first half of 2012. We had told our worker that we wanted to adopt 2 boys between the ages of 5-9 years old. I had been looking at the photos of boys – ones that may join our family – seeing…
Read MoreBlank Canvas: 2019
I was a young adult when I first heard the proverb “begin with the end in sight”. With this wisdom at my fingertips, I could will myself past the discomfort of reaching for my goals. Each winter, my family would head into snow-covered woods in search of a Christmas tree. My mom would forge the…
Read MoreI Am Them And They Are Me
Again, I loudly say “I am them and they are me”. Today, the impulse of all white anti-racists will be to distance ourselves from this data. We must not do that. Surfacing our individual vote as proof positive of our “solidarity” or “good white person” status is individualism – a tenet of white dominance. We…
Read MoreTo Parents Raising White Children
To parents of white children, Do your children sit under the authority of black women? I’m not asking about your child having black friends because you moved into (let’s be real, gentrified) a neighborhood where your child could be exposed to black people. Don’t misunderstand the question because of your black family or friends who…
Read MoreWhite Women: We Need To Talk
White women, we need to talk…We need to talk about our addiction to speak, comment, examine, criticize, and enter spaces that are created by and for Indigenous, Black, and Brown people. We are deeply sick. Really. Admit :::: I interject myself into places that are not for me because I seek recognition for my work…
Read MoreBeginnings
We hugged and sat down. Sipping coffee she tells me that she can’t understand how our nation elected this guy. I felt her panic and disorientation. She was waking up to a nation she didn’t recognize. I remembered feeling so many of the same feelings years before. The only difference between us was time. White…
Read MoreInterconnected
White domination is personal and it is a system. Individual and interconnected. The Dismantling Racism tool Three Expressions Of Racism teaches that there are personal, institutional, and cultural forms of racism. Educating white people on the systemic nature of white domination, by examining institutional racism is necessary. The vast majority of white people have little…
Read MoreFeeling Flood
It’s been a flood lately. The barriers breached. Took some time to examine the feelings that have been coming up for me as a white person engaged in abolitionist work to end white domination. What I found was a flood. Still after all these years, I was having a hard time identifying the feelings and…
Read MoreNot A Straight Line
The other day he was sharing with me how he’d rather take the longer way because the road is straight and flat which allows him to get visual feedback about how much further he has to walk. I’ve often referred to the self-work for white people to abolish white dominance in ourselves as a continuum.…
Read MoreBreak. Curl. Slough.
I loved spending time as a child on my grandparent’s farm. One of my favorite trees had a thin, papery bark that would break, curl and slough off as the trunk expanded. I remember feeling a sense of sadness for this tree that never seemed to be able to just get a break from this…
Read MoreUnicorn Pathways
He called it the racial equity industrial complex. I was struck with the layers of truth in his statement. To create anything within the context of white dominant culture means that which is created will inherit the DNA of white dominance. I’m at fault too. She came to the learning space enveloped in her degrees…
Read MoreEvidence
“Winter trees on a north coast headland That drops into Murlough bay Asking mystical questions With the serenity of their gentle sway And I’m fascinated by the mystery Did God peer down then bending Pencil sketch them in the cloak of darkness Or the distraction of the sun descending They are so skilfully shaped like…
Read MoreWhen Did It Begin?
We’ve been talking a lot about boo boos lately. It’s summertime and she is still learning how to play with wild abandon. As a four-year-old black girl, there is a fear in her that is not something I remember ever having. I was her age when my family moved to a small town in eastern…
Read MoreWho Is In The Seat?
I watched her walk by and was taken right back to that place when I was Parent Teacher Organization Chair and fighting a private school to make way for families of color. The student demographic was about 75% children of color, about 60%+ of which were black. Looking back, I know that my ego was…
Read MoreTo Love Oneself
There is no love in upholding and perpetuating white dominant culture. One of the normed lies in the white community that to love oneself is to grab everything we can get our hands on – every opportunity, affirmation, promotion, etc. that we perceive the universe wants for us. James Baldwin wrote in The Fire Next…
Read MoreI Commit
I continually struggle with taking responsibility for my participation in racism. It has been painful to admit the harm that I bring to my children, my husband and dear friends. Yet, in this I’m violating an agreement I hold to share my perspective responsibly. My perspective lands squarely as a white person which means I…
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