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Stella's avatar

Feb was a bit hard for me to be honest. I had loads of back pain randomly out of nowhere (lasted a week ISH and thankfully went away) so I definitely feel you on the amazing feeling of being able to go and do even something as simple as get on the tube! So I was very frustrated. But the end of the month was really meaningful, I threw myself wholeheartedly into supporting my activisty friends running in the SU elections on our campus and campaigning for them, and we managed to win every single position! which puts organising on our campus in an amazing place. This year the SU has been really lukewarm on Palestine but the four winners are so committed on this (+ other issues like disability rights!) that a better future feels really possible. And doing stuff in person is just so much more fulfilling than scrolling, although I've been doing a lot of that too. Idk, February has been weird, but it turned out all right in the end. Hope your March goes better than it started!

edit: and through my friends I also discovered the incredible song Ana Dami Falastini which I highly recommend listening to. It's soulful and determined and hopeful and sad all at the same time but it gets me ready to do good things for Palestine whenever I listen to it (which this week looks like getting my mum chocolate covered Palestinian dates for Mother's Day which supports farmers in the West Bank and 50% of the profits go to supporting aid for Gazan kids)

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Gemma's avatar

Glad you’re feeling better. Food poisoning is the worst.

I definitely feel the guilt and sense of dystopia and injustice hard and think of Gaza several times a day. But I’ve realised a lot of my guilt and shame spirals were being specifically triggered by non-Palestinians on Instagram making me feel like I should be doing more and that if I’m not heartbroken and miserable 24/7 I don’t care.

As such, I’ve started implementing specific boundaries around social media. 30 mins to keep up to date, and be aware of actions, and then I log off.

I then do more offline- and am subscribed to email for Palestine Solidarity etc to keep aware of new actions. I’ve found that’s helped me keep so much more regulated and charged to keep going.

Plus, someone wise once told me, joy is resistance for anyone switched on to social justice of any description, and in finding joy for ourselves, we can use that to strengthen our resolve to fight for joy for everyone.

Thank you for bringing some of that joy to us ❤️

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