reading “braiding sweetgrass” while working on “writing for organizers” has made me think a lot about what it means to be “actionable” in writing.
Kimmerer’s writing is WAY more concrete than other books I have read with similar paradigm shifting aspirations.
Her stories are moving, the science is beautiful, but also — I felt in some ways like this is one of the most actionable books I’ve ever read about climate change.
This book is what mushrooms feel like, I think. Not that I have not ever done psychedelics, in spite of my whole deal.
What I mean by this — Robin Wall Kimmerer’s writing is fundamentally hopeful because it introduces a fundamentally new (to me) paradigm for approaching the world around us.
I find it sort of fascinating that this book, feels so actionable.
Why?
I’ve struggled with the answer.
Her stories, are not particularly Call Now or Take Action Today.
Another book I found intangible but actionable — my grandmothers hands — But that book, all about embodiment and white supremacy, has very little resemblance to this one. at least none that explains why braiding sweetgrass feels actionable.
My grandmothers hands, for all of its focus on emotion, is about the freaking body. It’s extremely tangible, actionable. Menakem is trained as a therapist and you know how you can tell? He wrote a freaking workbook! Put the book down for a second! Do this exercise! Take a deep breath! It’s a workbook, man. That’s why I loved it. But. WHY it is actionable doesn’t feel like a mystery.
Braiding Sweetgrass is not a workbook. It is a collection of stories.
These stories are rooted in her world, and her own relationship to nature.
It is a reflection on how she has and has not lived up to the work of her own values, connection to nature.
But more importantly, it is a reflection on how her values, her way of living in the world and evaluating her own choices, was created, both intentionally and unintentionally, through her life, the generations before her, and nature itself.
And as a result, it’s an invitation to do that work yourself, and acknowledge the ways you’ve already done that work in so many ways.
It’s an invitation to reflection.
I think that’s why this book feels actionable.
Because It’s so emotional, and her writing invites everyone to deep in the reflection and their every day life, not to DO more, but to think about why more.
it is an invitation to reflection through Ketterer’s own vulnerability in writing. What a trip.
By the way, if you’ve never listened to it, I highly recommend her @ologies episode with another wonderful person w strong voice, @Alieward
I haven’t finished the book yet, and I know I will be writing a lot about it as long as I am reading it.
But one thing I am resolving to do as a writer bc of it — think more about what it means to write in a way that invites others to write more.
read more from me here: https://notesonfeednet.substack.com/
