A note from me:
Normally, only Monday posts are unlocked for all readers — a weekly offering of free reflection and resource.
But today’s conversation on Day 92 moved me so deeply, I knew it needed to be shared without barriers.
This is the kind of soul work, sacred truth-telling, and liberation practice we do together every day in this space.
If this resonates with you, I invite you to become a subscriber and support this work so we can continue building toward collective healing — one story, one practice, one community at a time.
🌬️ Before You Watch: What If Every Story Was Sacred?
What if we stopped treating our stories like sidebars, footnotes, or confessions…
and started honoring them as curriculum for liberation?
Because they are. Every single one.
Your grief and your joy. Your doubt and your courage. Your questions and your wisdom.
They are all part of the archive. Of the movement. Of the healing.
Day 92 is an invitation to witness your life as a lesson plan.
To see your lived experience—unpolished, unresolved, unfinished—as valid, valuable, and visionary.
What we are unveiling
This conversation is a sacred weaving of memory, reflection, and truth-telling. I offer a framework for why storytelling is a liberation practice, and how we can use it to connect across generations, honor our humanity, and preserve our collective wisdom.
We speak about:
Intergenerational storywork with kids and elders
The grief of losing family storytellers
Creating brave spaces for vulnerable truth
The harm of supremacist “safe spaces” that silence
And the difference between storytelling that heals versus storytelling that centers whiteness
This isn’t just a conversation. It’s a guide.
Three Liberation Lessons from Today’s Conversation
1. Stories Inspire and Sustain Movements
Movements are not just built on theory—they are built on testimony.
From civil rights leaders to your shady baby who drops truth bombs at breakfast, every story teaches. Your journey, even the parts you’re still healing from, matters.
Reflection Prompt: What stories from your life could nourish or ignite someone else’s liberation?
Vulnerability Builds Connection
When we show up in our full humanity—not as curated profiles or perfectionist projections—we create sacred spaces of belonging and transformation. Vulnerability isn’t weakness. It’s a portal.
But it requires brave space, not performance.
Reflection Prompt: Where are you sharing from your persona, and where are you sharing from your truth?
Collective Storytelling Preserves History
Supremacy culture erases, edits, and rebrands history to uphold power.
When we share our stories—across kitchen tables, in group chats, or on Substack—we are archiving truth. We are restoring oral tradition. We are building the library.
Reflection Prompt: What story are you preserving for future generations? And where are you holding it?
Your Story Is Sacred. Let’s Begin There.
Before we get into the structure, I want to root this moment in reverence:
You do not need to earn the right to share your story.
You do not need credentials.
You do not need perfect recall or poetic language.
You just need breath. And truth. And a willingness to witness yourself.
We’ve been taught by supremacy culture to minimize our memories, to shrink our significance, to question the worth of our lived experience—especially when it doesn’t look like what’s been historically centered or archived.
But here’s the truth:
Supremacy culture thrives in silence. Liberation grows in storytelling.
Every time we tell the truth of how we’ve loved, lost, resisted, failed, grieved, healed, and tried again—we create rupture in systems that want us voiceless.
Your story doesn’t have to be the center of the movement to shape one.
It just has to be yours.
Let’s talk about how.
The Three Layers of Liberation Storytelling
The Personal Layer: Owning Your Becoming
This is the story of you—the messy, tender, evolving human who is unlearning supremacy culture and choosing liberation.
These are the stories of joy, grief, rupture, reckoning. Not perfect narratives, but process narratives.
“I didn’t always know. I’ve caused harm. I’ve also made different choices since then.”
These stories remind us that we are not static. That change is possible. That healing is nonlinear.
The Collective Layer: Witnessing the We
These are the stories of your people, your lineage, your neighborhood, your block, your chosen family.
This is where we share how systems impacted us together—and how we fought back, supported each other, or survived side by side.
“Here’s what it was like growing up in my church, my school, my family, my region. Here’s what we were told—and here’s what we did.”
The Lineage Layer: Preserving What Was, Envisioning What’s Next
These stories link the past to the present to the future. They hold the memory of what came before and ask: What are you stewarding forward?
“This is what I learned from my grandmother. This is what I will pass to my grandchildren. This is what we refuse to forget.”
How to Hold Stories Without Recreating Trauma Bonds
Not all storytelling is healing. Some of it recreates harm—especially in white-dominant or performative ally spaces.
To avoid trauma bonding:
Don’t center pain for consumption. Your story doesn’t need to bleed to be valid.
Ask: Is there restoration here? Sharing should move us toward wholeness, not emotional exhibition.
Include the and. I was hurt—and I found help. I was silent—and I found my voice. The and is where the healing begins.
Always include a next step. What did you do with the lesson? What did it shift in you? That’s the praxis of storytelling.
Inviting Brave Space (Not Just Safe Space)
“Safe space” can become a weapon of tone policing and whiteness-centered comfort.
Brave space is about risk, reciprocity, and responsibility.
You’re not safe because we all agree—you’re safe because we are committed to truth, repair, and honoring each other’s humanity.
To create brave space:
Model vulnerability before requesting it. You go first. Show what authentic sharing looks like.
Name the boundaries. Let people know how you’ll hold them accountable and how you’ll be held.
Say the hard things with care. Brave space means we don’t dance around oppression—we name it, with love and clarity.
In brave spaces, harm is addressed. Not ignored. Not weaponized. But transformed.
Tools to Create Your Liberation Archive
Every movement needs record-keeping. Yours does too.
Here are tools and prompts to start building a personal or community-based Liberation Archive:
For Self:
Create a Liberation Journal: Dedicate a notebook or doc to moments where you chose differently, set a boundary, unlearned harm, or reclaimed joy.
Use audio memos or voice notes for story capturing—especially if writing is a barrier.
For Home:
Begin a Story Ritual at meals: Ask “What’s one thing you learned about yourself today?” or “What’s a story from our family we haven’t told in a while?”
Print family photos and write captions that hold memory and legacy.
For Work/Community:
Start a Shared Reflection Doc for your organizing group or community circle.
Record debriefs after big actions, workshops, or seasons. Archive what worked, what didn’t, and what wisdom emerged.
Your stories are curriculum. Your moments are medicine. Your archive is an act of resistance.
Practice Your Praxis: Try This Today
Tell one story from your liberation journey to someone you trust.
It doesn’t have to be dramatic. Just true. Make it about a lesson.Choose one format for your archive.
A journal, a folder on your phone, a shared Google Doc. Start recording.Ask one person in your life to tell you a story.
Not for debate. Not for analysis. Just to listen and honor the telling.Reflect:
“What story do I need to release?”
“What story do I need to remember?”
“What story am I rewriting in this season of my life?”
Closing Words
Your story matters.
Not just because of what you’ve survived.
But because of what you chose to remember.
What you decided to carry forward.
What you’re still learning, still becoming, still daring to believe is possible.
Every liberation journey is a living document.
May you write yours with truth. May you tell it with courage. May you live it with joy.
If this resonated with you — if you felt seen, softened, stirred, or sparked — I want to invite you deeper.
Liberation is not just what we talk about here. It’s what we practice. And in our paid community, we go even further with:
Weekly tools + frameworks like this one
Access to live sessions + replays
Reflection prompts, downloads, and sacred resources
And most importantly, the collective energy of people walking this path alongside you
It’s $8/month, $80 a year, $120 a year to create equity and of course,scholarships are always available. Please email me at: Scholarships@DesireeBStephens.com Because nobody gets left behind in this work.
Join us, your story is part of the revolution. Let’s write it together.
In solidarity and liberation,
Desireé B. Stephens
Educator | Counselor | Community Builder
Founder, Make Shi(f)t Happen
Writer of Liberation Education
Where Reflection Meets Transformation
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